This volume covers a wide range of topics in Athenian intellectual
history, drawing on the methods of various other disciplines to provoke
a reconsideration of outstanding problems and controversies in classical
studies. The papers have been organised by the editor around three
natural groupings. The first five chapters will be of interest to those
who have no specialist knowledge of Greek. There is a fresh look at
Socrates' doctrine of the soul, a twentieth-century reappraisal of
Protagoras' relativism and an examination of the primary function of
myths. A second group analyses more specific problems, considering the
two burials of the Antigone, the stylistic characterisation in the
speeches in Thucydides and the Socratic paradox as it seems to be stated
in the Hippolytus. The final papers critically examine controversial
passages from Iphigenta in Aulide and the Trachiniae. The papers, by
distinguished scholars, will be important reading for all who are
interested in the thought and literature of fifth-century Athens.