Contained in:
Book Chapter

Uniting past and present: Sicily as a locus of identity between Greece and Rome

  • Maria do Céu Fialho

Basing on the accounts of Thucydides and Plutarch, the paper analyses the way Sicily and the proposed Athenian expedition to Sicily, as a strategic bridge to advance over Carthage, define Nicias and Alcibiades, and what they represent: old Athens, comprised of experienced rulers and devoted, thoughtful citizens, who retreat, aware of the madness and threat of disaster that will lead to the ruinous outcome of the civil war. Forced to join the expedition, Nicias, as the embodiment of this polis, will stay until the end, in a campaign with which he does not agree, trying to save his fellow citizens. Alcibiades together with what he represents are fighting fiercely for the realisation of a megalomaniacal dream that will bring fortune and power for their own advantage. While Nicias accepts the command out of duty and imitation, Alcibiades yearns for it. In this background, Sicily and Carthage, waving from afar with their wealth and promise of power, constitute the stimulus for action that ultimately destroys an Athens close to defeat. On the other hand, in the young Roman republic, Sicily and Carthage offer natural encouragement of the conquest and submission of their power, as an imperative of the logic of expansion, affirmation and survival of Rome as a nascent power. It is the generation of the old Roman nobility that claims Carthago delenda est.

  • Keywords:
  • Sicily,
  • Carthage,
  • Athens,
  • Rome,
  • Nicias,
  • Alcibiades,
+ Show More

Maria do Céu Fialho

University of Coimbra, Portugal - ORCID: 0000-0003-2115-9638

  1. Bernabé Alberto. 2013. “Orphics and Pythagoreans: the Greek perspective.” In On Pythagoreanism, edited by Gabriele Cornelli, Richard Mckirahan, and Constantinos Macris. Berlin: De Gruyter, 117-52. DOI: 10.1515/9783110318500.117
  2. Casadesús Bordoy F. 2013. “On the origin of the Orphic-Pythagorean motive of the immortality of the soul.” In On Pythagoreanism, edited by Gabriele Cornelli, Richard Mckirahan, and Constantinos Macris. Berlin: De Gruyter, 153-76. DOI: 10.1515/9783110318500.153
  3. Catroga Fernando. 2004. “O magistério da História e exemplaridade do ‘grande homem’: a biografia em Oliveira Martins.” O retrato literário e a biografia como estratégias de teorização política, edited by In José R. Ferreira, Maria do Céu Fialho, and Aurel
  4. Fialho, Maria do Céu. 2008. “From flower to chameleon. Values and counter-values in Alcibibiades’Life.” In Philosophy in Society. Virtues and Values in Plutarch, edited by José R. Ferreira, Luc Van der Stockt, and Maria do Céu Fialho. Leuven and Coimbra:
  5. Guthrie, W. K. C. 1998. The Sophists, 3rd repr. ed. Cambridge: University Press.
  6. Hammond, N. G. L. 1986. A History of Greece to 322 BCE, 3rd repr. ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
  7. Hitchner, R. Bruce. 2009. “The Mediterranean and the history of Antiquity.” In A Companion to Ancient History, edited by Andrew Erskine. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 429-435. DOI: 10.1002/9781444308372.ch37
  8. Hirata, Elaine F. V. 2012. “Monumentalidade e representações do poder tirânico.” In Representações da cidade antiga. Categorias históricas e discursos filosóficos, edited by Gabriele Cornelli. Coimbra-São Paulo: Imprensa da Universidade-Annablume, 23-38. DOI: 10.14195/978-989-8281-20-3_2
  9. Leão, Delfim. 2012. “The Eleusinian Mysteries and political timing in the Life of Alcibiades.” In Plutarch in the religious and philosophical discourse of late antiquity, edited by Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta and Israel Muñoz Gallarte. Leiden, Brill, 181-92. DOI: 10.1163/9789004236851_014
  10. López Eire A. 2002. Poéticas y retóricas griegas. Madrid: Editorial Síntesis.
  11. Mosconi, G. 2021. Democrazia e buon governo. Cinque tesi democratiche nella Grecia del V secolo a.C. Milano: Ed. Universitarie di Lettere Economia Diritto.
  12. Rhodes P. J. 2006. “Thucydides and the Athenian history.” In Brill’s Companion to Thucydides, edited by Antonios Rengakos and Antonis Tsakmakis, Leiden : Brill 523-46.
  13. Rhodes P. J. 2007. A History of the Classical Greek World. Oxford: Blackwell.
  14. Rhodes, P. J. 2011. Alcibiades: Athenian Playboy, General and Traitor. Barnsely, South Yorkshire: Pen and Sword Military Books.
  15. Rogan, Esther. 2018. La stasis dans la Politique d’Aristote. Paris : Classiques Garnier.
  16. Romilly, Jacqueline de. 1995. Alcibiade. Paris : Éditions de Fallois.
  17. Rossetti, Livio, and Carlo Santaniello. 2004. Studi sul pensiero e sulla lingua di Empedocle. Bari: Levante.
  18. Ruzé, Françoise. 2006. “Spartans and the use of treachery among their enemies.” In Sparta & War, edited by Stephen Hodkinson and Anton Powell. Swansea: The Classical Press of Wales, 267-85.
  19. Strassler, Robert B. 1996. and Victor D. Hanson, The Landmark Thucydides. A Comprehensive Guide to the Peloponnesian War. New York: Free Press.
  20. Stuttard, David. 2018. Nemesis. Alcibiades and the Fall of Athens. Cambridge/Massachussets/London: Harvard University Press.
  21. Vickers, Michael. 1999a. “Alcibiades and Melos: Thucydides 5.84-116”, Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte 48.3: 265-81.
  22. Vickers, Michael. 2019b. Sophocles and Alcibiades. Athenian Politics in Ancient Greek Literature. London/New York: Routledge.
  23. Zahrnt Michael. 2006. “Sicily and Southern Italy in Thucydides.” In Brill’s Companion to Thucydides, edited by Antonios Rengakos and Antonis Tsakmakis. Leiden: Brill, 629-55. DOI: 10.1163/9789047404842_026
PDF
  • Publication Year: 2022
  • Pages: 93-108
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
  • © 2022 Author(s)

XML
  • Publication Year: 2022
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
  • © 2022 Author(s)

Chapter Information

Chapter Title

Uniting past and present: Sicily as a locus of identity between Greece and Rome

Authors

Maria do Céu Fialho

Language

English

DOI

10.36253/978-88-5518-612-4.07

Peer Reviewed

Publication Year

2022

Copyright Information

© 2022 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Bibliographic Information

Book Title

Crises (Staseis) and Changes (Metabolai)

Book Subtitle

Athenian Democracy in the Making

Editors

Breno Battistin Sebastiani, Delfim Ferreira Leão

Peer Reviewed

Number of Pages

140

Publication Year

2022

Copyright Information

© 2022 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Publisher Name

Firenze University Press

DOI

10.36253/978-88-5518-612-4

ISBN Print

978-88-5518-611-7

eISBN (pdf)

978-88-5518-612-4

eISBN (epub)

978-88-5518-613-1

eISBN (xml)

978-88-5518-614-8

Series Title

Studi e saggi

Series ISSN

2704-6478

Series E-ISSN

2704-5919

187

Fulltext
downloads

110

Views

Export Citation

1,346

Open Access Books

in the Catalogue

2,262

Book Chapters

3,790,127

Fulltext
downloads

4,420

Authors

from 923 Research Institutions

of 65 Nations

65

scientific boards

from 348 Research Institutions

of 43 Nations

1,248

Referees

from 381 Research Institutions

of 38 Nations