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Peloponnesian War Research Paper

Decent Essays

I disagree with the statement. While works of fiction may be skewed they usually have some historical backing of the time period they are set in, and some even are based loosely on real historical events. In historical tales we can assume that the underlying themes show many of these ancient cultures beliefs and practices.
There are many arguments against using fictional sources to describe historic events. Many of the Greeks examined history in the form of poems, plays, and songs. Rare were the historians that recorded history in nonmythical ways. Greek historian Thucydides examined only the facts and rejected the idea of divine intervention. In his History of the Peloponnesian War he ignores the usual Greek method of using myths and instead …show more content…

By examining Greek plays such as Medea by Euripides or Lysistrata by Aristophanes we can see that women are second-class citizens and that Greek culture is dominated by the patriarchy. Medea shows how women were “required [for us] to buy a husband and take for our bodies” and that “there is no easy escape for a woman, nor can she say no to her marriage” (Euripides 65). This shows that even in a society where males are encouraged to be inherently dominant to women, there are still people who realize women are not just bed warmers for the men, but actual people with rights. It also gives an insight into a Greek women’s view on these ancient arbitrary methods, which is not always seen in history since most of it is told from the male perspective. Medea shows historians that the fight for equality for women has been going on for …show more content…

Today there are a vast number of religions and churches. In the past different societies have evolved and religion has evolved along side these societies. By examining a cultures religion, historians can better grasp why certain events and actions took place. In Hippocrates The Sacred Disease he rejects the assumption that epilepsy is a sacred disease. He states that it is not “anymore divine or sacred that other diseases” and that epilepsy actually has a “natural cause”. Hippocrates theories that the sacred origins of this disease were most likely created by “magicians, purifiers, charlatans, and quacks” that felt their “claim to great piety and superior knowledge” was threatened by the lack of a substantial treatment. From this unwanted sense of inferiority they “concealed and sheltered themselves behind superstition and called the illness sacred”(Hippocrates, p49). While Hippocrates is correct about epilepsy being a normal disease, there is much historians can learn about Greek culture and medicine at that time from these exaggerated

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