Tragic History and Polybius

So too, we may move our hearers to tears by the picture of a captured town. For the mere
statement that the town was stormed, while no doubt it embraces all that such a calamity
involves, has all the curtness of a dispatch and fails to penetrate to the emotions of the
hearer. But if we expand all that the one word 'stormed' includes, we shall see the flames
pouring from house and temple and hear the crash of falling roofs and one confused
clamour made of many cries. We shall behold some in doubt whither to fly, others
clinging to their nearest and dearest in one last embrace, while the wailing of women and
children and the laments of old men that the cruelty of fate should have spared them to
see that day will strike upon our ears and we shall secure the vividness we seek, if only
our descriptions give the impression of truth; indeed, we may even add fictitious
incidents of the type which commonly occur.

Quint. Institutio Oratorio 8.3.67—68

For history has a certain affinity to poetry and may be regarded as a kind of prose poem.

Quint Institutio Oratorio 10.1.31

The highly debated idea of “Tragic History” was developed by modern historians and
classists to explain a genre-fusing phenomenon that occurred in the works of Hellenistic
historiographers. To these modern scholars, this sort of Hellenistic history featured elements of
tragedy intimately intertwined within their historical narrative. Georgina Longley has posited
that the decline of theatrical tragedies coupled with the rise of Macedon (the conquests of
Alexander the Great and the successor kingdoms) provide a plausible historical context for why
such literary inventions were used. As such, many of the best examples of Tragic History in the
Hellenstic period are regarding urbs capta (the capture of a city). Others, including B.L. Ullman,
have suggested that Tragic History was formulated as a negative reaction to Aristotle’s
dichotomization of history and poetics. In chapter nine of his Poetics (a chapter largely dealing
with tragedy), Aristotle teases out the difference between history and poetry, saying, “They differ
in this, that the one speaks of things which have happened, and the other of such as might have
happened. Hence, poetry is more philosophic, and more deserving of attention, than history. For
poetry speaks more of universals, but history of particulars” (Poetics 9.2). For Aristotle, tragedy
is the mimesis of life which arouses emotions in the audience, while history is the bare facts of
life. He echoes a similar sentiment in his work on Rhetoric, “[Historical events] are the business
of politics, not of rhetoric” (1.4).

It has been argued that the negative response to Aristotle’s dichotomization can be seen
in two different groups- the peripatetics (followers of Aristotle – most notably Callisthenes) or to
the school of Isocrates, who’s founder said, “For the deeds of the past are, indeed, an inheritance
common to us all; but the ability to make proper use of them at the appropriate time, to conceive
the right sentiments about them in each instance, and to set them forth in finished phrase, is the
peculiar gift of the wise” (Iso Speeches ). According to some modern scholars (most notably
Ullman), Tragic History was a quasi-defined genre produced by one of these schools.
 In a pivotal essay in 1960, F. W. Walbank demonstrated that there is insufficient
evidence that Tragic History came through one of the aforementioned schools and that it doesn’t
seem to be a genre. Rather, Walbanks sees it more as a literary mode that an author can enter
and exit as they please. For instance, Cicero asks the younger historian Lucceius, who is
seemingly writing a history which includes a portion on Cicero, to “neglect the laws of history”
opting instead for an approach with more rhetorical flourishing. He continues: “Truly the mere
chronological record of the annals has very little charm for us-little more than the entries in the
fasti: but the doubtful and varied fortunes of a man, frequently of eminent character, involve
feelings of wonder, suspense, joy, sorrow, hope, fear: if these fortunes are crowned with a
glorious death, the imagination is satisfied with the most fascinating delight which reading can
give.”

 In general, then, this historian [sc. Phylarchus] throughout his whole work has made many
random and careless statements…(6) Wishing to emphasize the cruelty of Antigonus and the
Macedonians and with them that of Aratus and the Achaeans, he says that the Mantineans, when
defeated, [A] were subjected to great misfortunes, and that the most ancient and the greatest of
cities in Arcadia wrestled with such great misfortunes as to bring all the Greeks to dismay and
tears. (7) [B] Eager to arouse the pity of his readers and to make them sympathetic (lit., fellow-
feelers) to what is being said, he brings on women clinging to one another, tearing their hair and
baring their breasts, and in addition he describes [C] the tears and lamentations of men and
women accompanied by their children and aged parents being led away into captivity. (8) He
does this throughout his history, [D] striving on each occasion to place the horrors before our
eyes. (9) Let us ignore for the moment his ignoble and womanish disposition, and consider what
is proper and useful to history. (10) Now then it is not the historian’s task to startle his readers by
describing things sensationally, nor should he try, as the tragic writers do, to represent speeches
which might have been delivered, or to enumerate all the possible consequences of the events
under consideration, but rather to record with fidelity things that were actually spoken and done,
however commonplace these might be. (11) For the aim of tragedy is not the same as that of
history, but the opposite. The tragic poet seeks to thrill and charm his audience for the moment
by the most persuasive words, while the historian’s task is to instruct and persuade for all time
those who love learning, by means of the truth of the words and actions he presents, (12) since in
the first case (p.76)the supreme aim is probability, even if what is said is untrue, the purpose
being to deceive the spectators, but in the second it is truth, the purpose being to benefit those
who love learning. (13) And apart from these considerations, Phylarchus [A] relates the majority
of the reversals in his historywithout subjoining why things were done and to what purpose,
without which it is impossible either to feel pity reasonably or anger appropriately at any of the
events

Ekphrasis- to bring vivid imagery before the eyes

Grand style- bringing tons of emotions