| Summary: | The purpose of this thesis is to re-evaluate with special reference to the Attic History of the third-century historian Philochoros the nature of local historical writing at Athens, its sources,m ethodologya nd defining features. Attic historiography( or "Atthidography" as it is more commonly known) began in the late fifth century B. C. with a non-Athenian called Hellanikos and cuhninatedw ith Philochoros in the third. Current consensush olds that these writers worked within a rigidly defined genre whose most salient hallmark was the schernatisationo f Athenian history around a list of annuala rchonsa nd that the aim of each successive writer was to present history with a unique political slant. This thesis challenges conventional wisdom on three scores. First, it argues that, while there can be little doubt that Philochoros organised his Attic History in the shape of a chronicle, the historical treatiseso f his literary predecessorsa doptedd ifferent traits and in few instances exhibit an annalistic structure; this observation discourages the notion that Philochoros modelled his own treatise on earlier works of the same title or drew his historical material from those works. Second, it contests the idea that local historical writing was a function of a protracted ideological polen-ýc at Athens: starting with the History of Herodotos and finishing with Philochoros, it argues that literary figures in most observable cases sought not to voice one side of public debate over given historical themes but instead sought to subvert public perception in its entirety. Third, it contends that Philochoros was able to construct an historical narrative largely, if not principally, from documentary evidence and that his debt to an earlier tradition of oral narrative was minimal. This thesis intends to subvert a tradition of scholarly thinking originating with F. Jacoby and to encourage reconsideration of entrenched doctrines and dogmas.
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