The play lacks moral ambiguity within many of the central characters. The answer was to be found in the power of Athens, although less in its extent than its character. PDF Political Myth and Action in Pericles' Funeral Oration Pericles - Wikipedia . It was written by the Greek philosopher Thucydides (460-395 B.C.E. In a book packed with battle, conquest, and massacre, Thucydides account of the plague is especially horrifying. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. Instead, survivors looked for already burning funeral pyres, adding friends and relatives to the blaze. In 430-429 B.C.E., Athens was devastated by a mysterious epidemic, which reared its head again a few years. As Thucydides recounts Pericles claiming in a famous speech, "Our natural bravery springs from our way of life, not from the compulsion of laws.We are lovers of the beautiful, yet simple in our tastes, and we cultivate the arts without loss of manliness." [10] David Cartwright describes it as "a eulogy of Athens itself". Near the start of the Peloponnesian War, a plague swept the city. [a], The Funeral Oration was recorded by Thucydides in book two of his famous History of the Peloponnesian War. Introduction to the Funeral Oration. Why Was Athens Defeated? Pericles married in his late 20s but divorced some 10 years later. "Pericles' Funeral Oration - Thucydides' Version." They lived without the comfort of the two major devices that other cultures have used to evade that terrible truth. The New Yorker may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. A democracy is a form of government that gives all the ability to participate, and according to Pericles everyone has a responsibility to take part. To me, at least, they still seem to indicate some of the important ways in which democracy is likely to go astray. .he may not wander about comfortably acting like someone with a clean reputation or else he is beaten by his betters. They respected the warrior class and placed them among the top member of the society. For the whole world is the burial place for famous men; not only does the epitaph inscribed on monuments in their native country commemorate them, but in lands not their own the unwritten memory, more of their spirit even than of what they have done, lives on within each person. Pericles believed these should be the goals for every Athenian to live and die for. How did Cleisthenes reform Athenian democracy? Funeral Oration. There are several different English translations of the speech available. The surge in mail-in voting this year has protected people from the coronavirus, but it has also highlighted problems in the nations patchwork, underfunded election system. And it is right to judge those most courageous who understand both the pleasures and the terrors involved most clearly and yet do not turn away from dangers as a result (2.40.3). "[22], Pericles addresses the widows of the dead only here, telling them that "the greatest glory for a woman is not to be spoken of at all, either for good or ill."[23] This passage is often cited as characteristic of Athenian attitudes to women's role in public life,[24] but is also connected to the standard behaviour of women as mourners at private funerals.[25]. Finally, Pericles revels in the variety available to the citizens of Athensan object of scorn to Plato, but another quality, we must remember, normally associated with aristocracy. No one, moreover, if he has it in him to do some good for the city, is barred because of poverty or humble origins (Thucydides 2.37.1).