Zitate von Thúkýdidés
Thúkýdidés
Geburtstag: 460
Thukydides war ein aus gut situierten Verhältnissen stammender Athener Stratege und herausragender antiker griechischer Historiker. Für Thukydides’ Auffassung der geschichtlichen Wirkkräfte bedeutsam sind insbesondere seine Annahmen über die Natur des Menschen und die Motive menschlichen Handelns, die auch die politischen Verhältnisse grundlegend beeinflussen.
Sein bis heute Maßstäbe setzendes Werk Der Peloponnesische Krieg hinterließ er zwar unvollendet, doch begründete er in methodischer Hinsicht erst damit eine dem Geist neutraler Wahrheitssuche durchgängig verpflichtete Geschichtsschreibung, die einem objektiv-wissenschaftlichen Anspruch genügen will. Uneins ist die heutige Thukydides-Forschung darüber, in welchem Umfang er diesem Anspruch bei der Abfassung seines Werkes gerecht geworden ist. Teilweise in Zweifel gezogen wird speziell seine Darstellung der Rolle des Perikles bei der Entstehung des Peloponnesischen Krieges.
Thukydides selbst sah den Sinn seiner Aufzeichnungen darin, der Nachwelt „ein Besitztum für immer“ zu hinterlassen. Als markantestes Beispiel für das Gelingen dieses Vorhabens erweist sich die Unterscheidung von diversen kurzfristigen Anlässen des Peloponnesischen Krieges und seinen in der damaligen griechischen Großmächte-Rivalität zwischen der Seemacht Athen und der Landmacht Sparta begründeten langfristigen Ursachen.
Zitate Thúkýdidés
„Ein Glück, das man nie gekannt, zu entbehren, tut nicht weh, weh aber, ein Glück zu verlieren, an das man gewöhnt war.“
— Thúkýdidés
Peloponnesischer Krieg, 2, 44,2 / Perikles
„Das Geheimnis des Glücks ist die Freiheit, das Geheimnis der Freiheit aber ist der Mut.“
— Thúkýdidés
Peloponnesischer Krieg, 2, 43, 4 / Perikles
„Nur die Liebe zur Ehre altert nicht, und das, woran sich das tatenlose Alter am meisten freut, ist nicht, wie man behauptet, das Geld, sondern die Ehre.“
— Thúkýdidés
Peloponnesischer Krieg, 2, 44,4 / Perikles
„Die Grabstätte berühmter Männer ist die ganze Erde.“
— Thúkýdidés
Peloponnesischer Krieg, 2, 43,3 / Perikles
„Die Verfassung, die wir haben […] heißt Demokratie, weil der Staat nicht auf wenige Bürger, sondern auf die Mehrheit ausgerichtet ist.“
— Thúkýdidés
Peloponnesischer Krieg, 2, 37,1 / Perikles
„Again, in our enterprises we present the singular spectacle of daring and deliberation, each carried to its highest point, and both united in the same persons; although usually decision is the fruit of ignorance, hesitation of reflection.“
— Thucydides
Context: Again, in our enterprises we present the singular spectacle of daring and deliberation, each carried to its highest point, and both united in the same persons; although usually decision is the fruit of ignorance, hesitation of reflection. But the palm of courage will surely be adjudged most justly to those, who best know the difference between hardship and pleasure and yet are never tempted to shrink from danger. In generosity we are equally singular, acquiring our friends by conferring, not by receiving, favours.
Book II, 2.40-[3]
„I could have wished that the reputations of many brave men were not to be imperilled in the mouth of a single individual, to stand or fall according as he spoke well or ill. For it is hard to speak properly upon a subject where it is even difficult to convince your hearers that you are speaking the truth.“
— Thucydides
Context: I could have wished that the reputations of many brave men were not to be imperilled in the mouth of a single individual, to stand or fall according as he spoke well or ill. For it is hard to speak properly upon a subject where it is even difficult to convince your hearers that you are speaking the truth. On the one hand, the friend who is familiar with every fact of the story may think that some point has not been set forth with that fullness which he wishes and knows it to deserve; on the other, he who is a stranger to the matter may be led by envy to suspect exaggeration if he hears anything above his own nature. For men can endure to hear others praised only so long as they can severally persuade themselves of their own ability to equal the actions recounted: when this point is passed, envy comes in and with it incredulity.
Book II, 2.35-[1]-[3]
„In generosity we are equally singular, acquiring our friends by conferring, not by receiving, favours.“
— Thucydides
Context: Again, in our enterprises we present the singular spectacle of daring and deliberation, each carried to its highest point, and both united in the same persons; although usually decision is the fruit of ignorance, hesitation of reflection. But the palm of courage will surely be adjudged most justly to those, who best know the difference between hardship and pleasure and yet are never tempted to shrink from danger. In generosity we are equally singular, acquiring our friends by conferring, not by receiving, favours.
Book II, 2.40-[3]
„By day certainly the combatants have a clearer notion, though even then by no means of all that takes place, no one knowing much of anything that does not does not go on in his own immediate neighborhood; but in a night engagement ( and this was the only one that occurred between great armies during the war) how could anyone know anything for certain?“
— Thucydides
Book VII, 7.44-[1]
„They stood where they stood by the power of the sword.“
— Thucydides
Book IV, 4.98-[7]
