Pausanias_Travel_Writing_in_Ancient Greece [Maria_Pretzler]

Pausanias: Travel Writing in Ancient Greece
the Lamian War, and there is an account of the invasion of the Gauls in
the early third century, an event revisited at greater length as part of the
description of Delphi in Book X. 13 It is not clear whether post-classical
history, particularly that of Alexander’s early successors, was in fact as
neglected as Pausanias maintains, because he is not the only Greek writer
of the Roman period to tackle Hellenistic history, even if the subject rarely
features in the rhetorical texts of the Second Sophistic. Pausanias’ explicit
statement so early on in the Periegesis and the sheer amount of Hellenistic
history included in his work suggest that he thought that a focus on this
period, or perhaps more generally any historical information that was not
part of the mainstream classical canon, was likely to impress or interest
his potential readership. 14
Most of the Hellenistic history presented in Book I is included in the
description of the Athenian agora. This passage, with its many long
digressions, makes it quite difficult to follow the complicated route around
the site and its many distinguished monuments. The description of the
agora is shaped by two distinct aims: Pausanias uses a topographical
framework, and he wants to include extensive historical accounts which,
in this case, are designed to combine to give a fairly comprehensive
overview of a particular period. These ambitious goals cannot be reconciled
without compromising the overall effect. In fact, these digressions are not
particularly well integrated with the description of the site because
Pausanias focuses on classical monuments and ignores important postclassical
additions to the Athenian market-place, most notably the
monumental Stoa of Attalos. 15 This selection did not offer convenient or
conspicuous anchors for all the Hellenistic narratives that needed to be
included, and in order to link particular historical events or figures to the
topography Pausanias seeks out smaller monuments, including appropriate
honorary statues which may not have been very conspicuous among
the hundreds of sculptures that had probably accumulated in the centre of
Athens by this time. 16
The Athenian agora underwent many significant
changes in the post-classical period, but it is unlikely that a visitor in the
second century AD would have perceived the site as the focal point of
Hellenistic history which it becomes in Pausanias’ text.
The discussion of local history was bound to become easier once Athens
was left behind, because in other places the amount of material worth
recording was more easily manageable. The histories Pausanias presents
in most cities consist of a few key episodes such as a founding hero, stories
connected to the activities of Herakles and his descendants and events
connected with the Trojan War, while later periods are often summarised
by references to a handful of instances where local history coincided with
major events that affected all of Greece. He develops historical introductions
which offer an overview of these main defining points in a city’s past.
A ‘typical’ mode of historical introduction emerges slowly, starting in the
first book when Pausanias ventures outside the city of Athens and encoun-
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