Chapter VII. On the Same Subject, From Josephus

[JOSEPHUS] [1] ‘MY first thought then is of utter astonishment at those who think it right to attend to none but Greeks concerning the most ancient facts, and to seek to learn the truth from them, but to disbelieve us and the rest of mankind.

‘For I see that the very opposite is the case, if at least we are not to follow vain opinions, but draw the just conclusion from the facts themselves. For you will find all things among the Greeks to be recent, having come into existence, as one might say, yesterday or the day before; I mean the foundation of their cities, and their invention of the arts, and the registration of their laws: and the writing of their histories is almost the latest object of their attention.

‘Doubtless, however, they themselves admit that the most ancient and most constant traditional record is that of the events which have occurred among the Egyptians, and Chaldeans, and Phoenicians (for at present I omit to include ourselves with these).

‘For they all inhabit regions which are least subject to destruction from the surrounding atmosphere, and have taken much care to leave none of the facts of their history unrecorded, but to have all continually enshrined by their wisest men in public registers.

‘But the region about Greece has been invaded by thousands of destructive plagues, which blotted out the memory of past events: and as they were always setting up new modes of life, they each of them supposed that their own was the beginning of all.

‘Tardily and painfully they learned the nature of letters. Those at least who assign the greatest antiquity to their use of them boast of having learned it from the Phoenicians and Cadmus.

‘Nevertheless no one could show any record that is preserved even from that time either in temples or on public monuments: seeing that there has been great doubt and inquiry, whether even those who so many years later went on the expedition to Troy, made use of writing; and the true opinion is rather that they were ignorant of the use now made of written letters.

‘In short, there is no undisputed writing found among the Greeks older than Homer’s poetry: and he was evidently later than the Trojan war. They say too that even he did not leave his poetry in writing, but that it was transmitted by memory and afterwards put together from the songs, and that this is the cause of its many discrepancies.

‘Those, however, among them who undertook to write histories ----I mean Cadmus of Miletus and Acusilaus of Argos, and any others who are said to have come after him----lived but a short time before the expedition of the Persians against Greece.

‘Moreover all with one voice acknowledge, that the first among the Greeks who philosophized about things celestial and divine, as Pherecydes the Syrian, and Pythagoras, and Thales, got their learning from Egyptians and Chaldeans, and wrote but little: and these writings are thought by the Greeks to be the oldest of all, and they do not quite believe that they were written by those authors.

‘Is it not then necessarily unreasonable for the Greeks to have been puffed up, as though they alone understood the events of early times, and handed down the truth concerning them correctly? Or who could not easily learn from the same historians, that they had no certain knowledge of anything which they wrote, but gave each their own conjectures about the facts?

‘Accordingly in their books they frequently refute one another, and do not hesitate to make the most contrary statements concerning the same events. But it would be superfluous labour for me to teach those who know better than myself on how many points Hellanicus has dissented from Acusilaus in regard to the genealogies, and how often Acusilaus sets Hesiod right; or in what fashion Ephorus exposes Hellanicus as making very many false statements, and Ephorus is exposed by Timaeus, and Timaeus by those who came after him, and Herodotus by them all.

‘Nor did Timaeus deign to agree with Antiochus and Philistus or Callias about Sicilian history, nor again have the authors of Athenian histories followed each other’s statements about the affairs of Attica, nor the historians of Argos about the affairs of Argolis.

‘And why need I speak about the smaller affairs of the several states, seeing that the most celebrated authors have disagreed about the Persian invasion and the events which happened therein? And on many points even Thucydides is accused by some of falsehood, although he is thought to write the history of his own time with the greatest accuracy.

‘Now of dissension such as this many other causes might perhaps be brought to light by those who wish to seek for them; but I myself attach the greatest importance to two causes which shall now be set forth.

‘And I will mention first that which seems to me to be the more decisive. For the fact that from the beginning there was no zealous care among the Greeks to have public records kept of contemporary events----this most of all was the cause of error, and gave impunity for falsehood to those who afterwards wished to write about ancient history.

‘For not only among the other Greeks was the care of the records neglected, but even among the Athenians themselves, who are said to be aborigines and studious of culture, nothing of this kind is found to have been done: but the oldest of their public records they say are the laws about murder written for them by Draco, a man born a little before the tyranny of Peisistratos.

‘What need is there to speak of the Arcadians, who boast of antiquity? For they even at a later period were scarcely instructed in the use of letters.

‘Inasmuch therefore as no record had been published, which would have taught those who wished to learn, and convicted those who were guilty of falsehood, there ensued the great disagreement of the historians among themselves.

‘But besides this there is that other second cause to be assigned. For those who set themselves to write made no serious study of the truth----although they have always this profession ready at hand----but tried to display their power of language; and adapted themselves to any style in which they thought to surpass the rest in reputation on this point; and some of them turned to writing mythical tales, and some, to gain favour, took to eulogizing cities or kings; while others had recourse to censuring men’s actions or those who had described them, thinking that they should gain reputation herein.

‘In short they are constantly doing what is of all things the most contrary to history. For it is a test of true history, whether all spake and wrote the same accounts of the same events; but these men imagined that if they wrote different accounts from others, they should thus appear to:be themselves;most truthful of all.’

So much, says Josephus. And these statements may be confirmed by the testimony of Diodorus, which I shall quote from the first Book of the Bibliothecacompiled by him, and which is word for word as follows: