Most classical authors and modern historians depict the ancient Greek
world as essentially stable and even static, once the so-called
colonization movement came to an end. But Robert Garland argues that
the Greeks were highly mobile, that their movement was essential to
the survival, success, and sheer sustainability of their society, and
that this wandering became a defining characteristic of their culture.
Addressing a neglected but essential subject, Wandering Greeks focuses
on the diaspora of tens of thousands of people between about 700 and
325 BCE, demonstrating the degree to which Greeks were liable to be
forced to leave their homes due to political upheaval, oppression,
poverty, warfare, or simply a desire to better themselves. Attempting
to enter into the mind-set of these wanderers, the book provides an
insightful and sympathetic account of what it meant for ancient Greeks
to part from everyone and everything they held dear, to start a new
life elsewhere—or even to become homeless, living on the open road
or on the high seas with no end to their journey in sight. Each
chapter identifies a specific kind of "wanderer," including the
overseas settler, the deportee, the evacuee, the asylum-seeker, the
fugitive, the economic migrant, and the itinerant, and the book also
addresses repatriation and the idea of the "portable polis." The
result is a vivid and unique portrait of ancient Greece as a culture
of displaced persons.
Les mer
Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9781400850259
Publisert
2014
Utgiver
Vendor
Princeton University Press
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter