Early Historians, Myth and the Aristocracy of Ancient Greece

Abstract

The problem of correlation between history and myth was always a matter of actuality. History coexists with myth, opposes it, and in the same time collaborates with it. The main subject of early Greek historians’ studies was genealogical mythography. And genealogies in Ancient Greece were always of interest firstly for aristocrats. It is mainly for them that all abundant mythographic literature existed. Aristocrats played the role of patrons for the authors who investtigated their family trees. By the way, the same aristocrats patronized the work of vase-painters, too: for myth is translated not only by verbal means, but also by nonverbal (e.g. visual) ones.

Keywords

• early greek historical writing
• myth
• aristocracy
• genealogy
• the philaids
• the codrids
• the pisistratids
• hecataeus
• hellanicus
• pherecydes of athens