Thucydides: The Peloponnesian War

"The absence of romance in my history will, I fear, detract somewhat from its interest; but if it be judged useful by those inquirers who desire an exact knowledge of the past as an aid to the interpretation of the future, which in the course of human things must resemble if it does not reflect it, I shall be content. In fine, I have written my work, not as an essay which is to win the applause of the moment, but as a possession for all time." — Thucydides I,22^[1].

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A Reading Group

A reading group for discussion of Thucydides History of The Peloponnesian War (431 - 404 BC). If you are interested in this text, please add your name to the list of participants and put this page on your watchlist.

News

2008-03-24: We have finished the first two books - in 12 chat sessions (logs available) - international collaboration with Italian, German Wikiversity/Wikibooks.

Structure

Tenth-century minuscule Manuscript of Thucydides's History

The Peloponnesian War is arranged in the following books:

author	book	time (BC)	status
Thucydides	Book 1
	Book 2	431 - 429/428
	Book 3	428 - 426/425	discussion
	Book 4
	Book 5
	Book 6
	Book 7
	Book 8
Xenophon (book: Hellenica)	Book 1
	Book 2

The Text

The Peloponnesian War by Thucydides

different translations

Richard Crawley: The History of the Peloponnesian War

Thomas Hobbes

Benjamin Jowett

Schedule and tasks

Next meeting

date: postponed untill after the northern spring or southern autumn/fall.
time:

topic: Book 3, aphorism 50-75

(Even if you can not read all aphorisms before, we can give you a short intro -> My history teacher always told: history is better in one aspect than e.g. mathematics because you can join at any time.)

place: IRC chat, we will join at #thucydides (don't forget to also look in #wikiversity-en)

add yourself here, if you want to join:

Themes for next meeting

topic: ...

organization:

experimenting with an audio session ?
using/creating a mailing list (e.g. open or closed) ? you can get info about meeting times, ... by mail

What was done so far ?

past meetings

Proposals

(Propositions of Daan)

(Some typical questions a historian should ask): What is the purpose of the text of Thucydides? (Does he have a political aim? Is he honest with his facts?) What story is being told? Do we miss some information? What can we know about the Greek society thanks to the text?
In what way can we improve the Wikipedia articles related to the Peloponnesian Wars and Thucydides? There is a big chance that the wikipedia articles have not been created by people who had the original sources or high quality secondary literature at hand, so improvement could be easy. For more information, see Wikipedia:WikiProject critical source examination.
The reading groups are a new phenomenon. How can we make them more fun in order to atract a base of people who want to stay? One way is to have an active social bonding of something, but it should be linked to the activity, the reading and discussing of books.

References

↑ History of the Peloponnesian War/Book 1. (2007, November 10). In Wikisource, The Free Library. Retrieved 11:45, November 18, 2007, from http://en.wikisource.org/w/index.php?title=History_of_the_Peloponnesian_War/Book_1&oldid=476315