Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Landmark Herodotus and Thucydides

I want to pass on a format recommendation for reading Herodotus and Thucydides.  There are Landmark versions of both that are simply wonderful.  I got the Landmark Thucydides from the library and it has made understanding the writing much simpler.
Each page has a header that keeps track of which year and season of the war is taking place.  There are footnotes that connect the readings to other places within the Peloponnessian War.  Each paragraph has a summary statement in case the meanings are confusing.  There are also essays and indexes in the back to give more background, but I haven't dug into any of those yet.
And best of all, there are maps every few pages to help the reader place all of the mentioned cities and regions!  This is crucial to understanding something as geographically driven as a war.  I with I'd read Herodotus with the Landmark to keep clear where the battles were taking place.
If you're keeping up with the reading list or just stumbled upon this post from Google, I can't recommend these books too highly.


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