Prevalent among classicists today is the notion that Greeks, Romans, and
Jews enhanced their own self-perception by contrasting themselves with
the so-called Other--Egyptians, Phoenicians, Ethiopians, Gauls, and
other foreigners--frequently through hostile stereotypes, distortions,
and caricature. In this provocative book, Erich Gruen demonstrates how
the ancients found connections rather than contrasts, how they expressed
admiration for the achievements and principles of other societies, and
how they discerned--and even invented--kinship relations and shared
roots with diverse peoples.
Gruen shows how the ancients incorporated the traditions of foreign
nations, and imagined blood ties and associations with distant cultures
through myth, legend, and fictive histories. He looks at a host of
creative tales, including those describing the founding of Thebes by the
Phoenician Cadmus, Rome's embrace of Trojan and Arcadian origins, and
Abraham as ancestor to the Spartans. Gruen gives in-depth readings of
major texts by Aeschylus, Herodotus, Xenophon, Plutarch, Julius Caesar,
Tacitus, and others, in addition to portions of the Hebrew Bible,
revealing how they offer richly nuanced portraits of the alien that go
well beyond stereotypes and caricature.
Providing extraordinary insight into the ancient world, this
controversial book explores how ancient attitudes toward the Other often
expressed mutuality and connection, and not simply contrast and
alienation.
