[In the following excerpt, Usher presents an overview of two minor Greek historians-Diodorus of Sicily and Dionysius of Halicarnassus-who were émigrés living and working in Rome during the latter part of the first century B.C.]

Beginning with Diodorus of Sicily, we encounter history in its broadest conception. He inherited the idea of universal history from Ephorus, divested it of its Greek orientation, and included the whole of the inhabited world in a compendious Library of History. No less a Greek than Ephorus, he was convinced by two things of the obsoleteness of his 'Hellenocentric' view of the civilized world: he lived, like Polybius, under Roman rule; and, more significantly, he was influenced by a Stoic doctrine which radically affected his attitude to history, that of the brotherhood of man. The placing of his date of birth in the region of the year 90 B.C., probably at Agyrium in Sicily, makes it possible that he acquainted himself with the current teaching of the Stoic philosopher and historian Posidonius on that subject. Like several other Hellenistic historians, he made Rome his centre of study, but he travelled abroad at least as far as Egypt. He probably survived into the Augustan era. There is no evidence that he did anything of note except to write; and the length of his Library (forty books, of which fifteen survive in unabridged form) disposes us to doubt whether much time was left for any other creative writing.

The title itself arouses a curiosity which is to some extent satisfied in the eloquent introduction. Here Diodorus engagingly disclaims deep intelligence or insight, and admits the second-hand nature of his material. From other personal utterances it becomes plain that his main interest lies not in creative historiography but in the presentation, in a convenient and readable form, of a comprehensive history of the human race. To further increase understanding of his intentions we may most usefully turn to his application of Stoic doctrine. Two main concepts are involved. The first affirmed that mankind, though separate in space, are brothers in blood, and that this conceptually united world is harmonized and ruled by divine providence. The universal historian becomes the servant of this providence, and will attempt to relate the apparently confused and disconnected events of world history to a central divine plan. Diodorus falls far short of realizing this ideal, and does not seem to have fully grasped the difficulties inherent in it. On the concept of human brotherhood, however, he is frequently articulate, often expressing pity at the sufferings of men at one another's hands. More specifically, the evil of slavery, of which he may have become conscious through his childhood experiences in Sicily, the scene of two servile revolts in living memory (135-132 and 104-102 B.C., moved Diodorus to write two notable passages describing conditions in gold mines in Spain and Egypt.

Another aspect of Stoic doctrine which affected the form of Diodorus's history is the concept of the utility of history as a medium of education and general benefit. Linked with the universal concept, this finds its logical form in Diodorus's concentration upon imparting information in a simple, straight-forward (and, it should be said, often dull) style, but with particular emphasis upon the deeds and memorable utterances of important men, which illustrate good or evil in human endeavour. Most of Diodorus's own personal comments are upon such actions. This interest in individuals and in moral instruction affects his choice of material, a fact which is best illustrated by comparison with the parallel narrative of another author—Xenophon—whose interests lie in a somewhat similar direction. True to his universal conception, Diodorus gives the broader coverage of events outside the immediate theatre of the Ionian War. On the other hand, Xenophon's accounts of battles, though by no means entirely satisfactory, are clearer than those of Diodorus, who too readily resorts to rhetoric. Xenophon also usually scores when it comes to the disclosure of motives and strategy, and is correspondingly less lavish with censure and praise. When we come to the period of Theban dominance, however, Diodorus's pro-Athenian bias, which he derives from his source Ephorus, proves less mischievous than Xenophon's adulation for Agesilaus, and it is mainly from his account that we are able to estimate the genius of Epaminondas. Before the period of the Peloponnesian War Diodorus is scarcely less useful, devoting a whole book to the Pentekontaetia, which is scant coverage by other standards, but since Thucydides summarizes these years in thirty chapters it is the fullest continuous account we have. And again, after the more detailed Xenophontine account breaks off in 362 B.C., Diodorus, using Ephorus as his main source, once more furnishes the only consecutive account of these years, while for the period 323 to 302 B.C. he is the main literary authority. Sicilian episodes, which understandably occur frequently, and for which he is indebted chiefly to Timaeus, provide modern historians with much of their knowledge of the early history of that island.

The foregoing facts concerning the scope and value of Diodorus's narrative being undeniable, criticism of his work has been directed mainly against two faults: his superficiality, which from his own terms of reference and the brevity of the human span is inevitable; and his lack of originality. The latter needs definition. Distinction must be made between content and form. He has been called, among other things, a 'scissors and paste historian', and the fact that he depended upon others for his material has led to the wide assumption that he had no style of his own, but copied his sources verbatim. Such assertions are, in the absence of more than a few fragments of some of the original sources, very difficult to prove. On the other hand, recent work on the style of Diodorus, including statistical examination of his sentence structure and vocabulary, has tended to show uniformity, and to lead to the conclusion that he tried, not without success, to forge a style of his own and to create a work of independent merit.

Another émigré Greek historian who took up residence in Rome during the latter part of the first century B.C. was Dionysius of Halicarnassus. He tells us that he arrived in Rome in the middle of the 187th Olympiad (30 B.C.). From other indirect sources it can be deduced that he was in his late twenties at this time, and that he probably had considerable resources or influence to have been able to make the journey from Halicarnassus to Rome at that troubled time. Once ensconced in the great city, Dionysius was allowed to enter into its cultural life and became the leading member of an active circle of literati. Both Greeks and Romans comprised this coterie, but they shared a common interest in the purification and promotion of Greek as a literary language, and turned for their models to the orators of fourth-century Athens. Of these the most admired was Demosthenes, who was considered to embody all the major oratorical virtues. But due attention was also paid to the peculiar qualities of his lesser brethren—the smooth periodic virtuosity of Isocrates; the plain, pellucid simplicity of Lysias, which concealed his artistry; and the vehement and exhaustive argumentation of Isaeus, from which Demosthenes learned so much. Dionysius wrote essays on these and other authors, including Thucydides, part of whose introduction (in Book I) he has the temerity to rewrite, omitting chapters 2 to 20 as irrelevant. However, this essay also contains more mature criticism, and is of some interest on the grounds that it explores the possibilities of adapting the best Attic oratorical usages and techniques to the medium of historiography.

Dionysius's choice of history as the medium for his single excursion into creative, as distinct from critical, literature was to a large extent conditioned by time and circumstances. Roman oratory had attained to a brilliant virtuosity in the hands of Cicero (whom Dionysius never mentions in his writings), Caesar and their contemporaries under the free republic, whereas Greek oratory had languished since the fall of democracy in the motherland. Under Augustus, any form of free speech was subject to certain restrictions, and there was no longer any scope for impassioned political harangues. But oratory now became a form of mass entertainment, an alternative, for the more gentle or the more squeamish, to the blood-sports of the Colosseum. The language used in this stage-oratory was Latin, the language of the Roman populace. But in history Greek maintained its continuity, largely because it retained a reading public of intellectuals like the circle of Dionysius. Therefore, in electing to devote his creative talents to the writing of history, Dionysius was choosing the most acceptable medium through which to promote his crusade for the revival of Attic Greek. By further choosing the early history of Rome down to the First Punic War as his subject, he discharged an obligation to his hosts. In his preface he expresses his gratitude to them for their cordial hospitality and offers his work as a token of this gratitude. But he intended it to be much more than this. In his rhetorical writings he had expressed the view that the first duty of the historian was to select a worthy subject. What worthier than the rise to supremacy of the mightiest power of his day? But in the same passage he unwittingly reveals the danger inherent in such a choice. How is a 'great subject' to be defined? Dionysius criticizes Thucydides for choosing a subject inferior to that chosen by Herodotus, since the latter embraces a cosmic war, while the former is concerned with a parochial affair among Greeks. Such a shallow criterion of great historiography raises serious doubts concerning Dionysius's own competence as a historian, whatever his pretensions. And in spite of a considerable measure of solid achievement, these doubts are never wholly dispelled.

His Early History of Rome (Antiquitates Romanae) consisted of twenty books, of which the first ten are preserved complete, together with most of the eleventh. In order to study native sources Dionysius acquainted himself with the Latin language (the influence of which is curiously perceptible in the word-order of his Greek). He also shows a commendable appetite for precise information, and is responsible for the preservation of the Servian Census. He had also read Thucydides and Polybius (whom he disliked on stylistic grounds) on the subject of historical causes, understood the distinctions they made and tried to apply them. He paid careful attention to chronology, and is not entirely to blame for the errors which arise from the confusion between the Greek and Roman calendars. In the matter of bias, his obvious admiration for Rome did not prevent him from censuring her politicians when this seemed appropriate. He scrupulously compares his sources in the best Hellenistic manner, and in much the same critical spirit as that which he applies to his learned literary discussions of the authenticity of the speeches of Dinarchus and others. And finally, his preconceived 'programme'—to represent Rome's achievement as a continuation of a glorious Greek past by showing that the founders of Rome were Greek in origin—was not in itself an impediment to the truthful presentation of subsequent Roman history.

But these virtues are to some extent cancelled out by the author's preoccupation with form at the expense of content. As a leading rhetorician, he conceived his magnum opus in a rhetorical spirit, which in the context of his own day meant that it was designed, like the public declamations, to make the maximum emotional impact on a listening public. An obvious means of achieving this effect in a work of history is to include a high proportion of live speech; and this Dionysius does. After the first two books, orations become frequent, forming about a third of the whole text. In the shadowy context of early Roman history, where little was known for certain of personalities and motives, or in some cases even the existence of some of the leaders named by tradition, the assignment of arguments and characterization could not be made with any serious claim to authenticity. On this view the speeches in the early books of Livy are open to the same criticism as those of Dionysius. But at least Livy's speeches were written in Latin, whereas those of Dionysius take unreality a stage further by having all the signs of their author's reverence for the canon of Attic orators, for Herodotus, Thucydides and Xenophon, from whose pages he has culled many sentiments and verbal expressions. Sometimes whole speeches appear to be modelled on classical originals, like that of Coriolanus advising the Volscians, the model for which is Thucydides's speech of Alcibiades to the Spartans. Often it seems probable that the existence of a classical model to fit the situation, rather than the knowledge that a speech was actually made, has led to the insertion of a speech.

Another aspect of rhetorical technique, amplification, is very much in evidence, and often destroys the historical perspective. Dionysius's narrative of the story of Coriolanus once more provides an excellent example, especially when compared with that of Livy. Dionysius needs forty-eight chapters to deal with it and assigns fifteen speeches to the protagonists: Livy dismisses the episode in half a chapter. It is a story full of tragedy, pathos and torn loyalties, and as such contains rich material for rhetorical display. Livy and Dionysius had access to the same sources, and yet treated the same episode very differently. It might be objected that Livy's reticence may be due in part to embarrassment at the treason of a prominent country-man; but he is elsewhere as ready as Dionysius to censure bad generalship or statesmanship with impartiality. The difference between the two historians is further illustrated by later divergences. The Samnite Wars, a protracted and dreary series of campaigns which lacked the definition of time and space (an essential quality for successful rhetorical treatment) that characterized the Coriolanian episode, were nevertheless probably more fully documented, and were certainly more important for the survival of Rome and the growth of her power. They cover six books in Livy, whereas Dionysius accords them less than four. Altogether it is not unfair to say that it is only when historical importance and rhetorical or dramatic qualities coincide in an event that one can be sure it receives from him the attention it deserves.

Perhaps Dionysius's most original contribution to ancient historical thought is his attempt, in the first two books, to combine within a single narrative the work of many different authorities for the legend of the Greek origins of Rome. Even this, however, is not without its weaknesses, for the more successful his synthesis is, the more completely is early Rome deprived of its native primitive elements—elements whose existence has been firmly established by modern archaeological discoveries. Thus deprived of the credit for experiment and innovation, the early Romans lose much of their vigour and individuality. Nevertheless Dionysius is one of those minor historians we should least want to be without, since his scholarly diligence has enabled us to fill many of the gaps in Livy's account.