Historiography or the methods by which the historian pursues the writing of history, is a subject which has been the catalyst of much debate, but, almost never much agreement. Peter Green, recently retired as the Dougherty Centennial Professor of Classics at the University of Texas at Austin, has contributed much over the course of a pro-fessional career spanning some thirty-six years to the study of ancient history and the classics. He has worn the various hats of a novelist, publisher and journalist but it is in his work as an ancient historian that this paper will concern itself. Historians approach their subject from a variety of different angles and it will be the purpose of this paper to determine how Peter Green, the historian of ancient history, approaches his particular subject. That Green is a revisionist historian will be discussed by first putting forward of definition of revisionism and its place within the profession as a historiographical method. Next, this discussion will center around Green's revisionism as the challenge to orthodox and non-orthodox views of historical questions. Finally, the dangers, as suggested by Green, which are inherent in revisionism will be explored namely, a priorism and the morally relative view of history. Green has remained remarkably consistent in his views on history and the writing of it. Although this paper will not discuss the changes in Green's views over the course of his thirty-seven year career it might be helpful for the sake of points of reference to mention three "periods"; the sixties when he was a self-described "freelance maverick flaying the professors"(Shadow 8) (1960 saw the publication of his first collection of essays, Essays in Antiquity), the seventies when, as a full-time professor at Texas he published his second collection of essays, Shadow of the Parthenon, and, finally, the eighties and nineties when he produced his magnum opus Alexander to Actium and a third set of essays Classical Bearings.

In the preface to his magnum opus, Alexander to Actium, Green states unequivocally "it is, of course, a truism that every historian remains at heart a revisionist, and I am no exception to the rule."(Alex xvii). Revisionism is the word that best describes the historiographical method of Peter Green and it is the intention here to provide an accurate definition of this rather slippery term. Green's revisionism is an approach to history which utilizes the traditional tools of empirical evidence and inductive logic together with a more modern acceptance that, as the philosopher Karl Popper writes, "each generation has its own troubles and problems, and therefore its own interests and its own point of view. It follows that each generation has a right to look upon and re-interpret history in its own way."(Novick 395) Green's method of writing history, in its emphasis on the importance of re-interpretation, does not adhere to what Peter Novick refers to as "that noble dream" of the historical profession, objective historical truth. In an early essay, Green states that he is suspicious of the "quite alarming delusions of objectivity" (Essays 62) to which some historians cling. He mentions in another historical essay, that "human nature being what it is, objectivity has been far too often identified with the desired end"(Shadow 108) in historical discourse. He is, on the other hand, committed to rational, inductive logic which Novick refers to as the traditional basis of the objectivists who took their lead from the "rigidly empirical approach" of "a simplified and considerably vulgarized version"(Novick 34) of Francis Bacon's scientific method. In this regard, Green writes, "most serious historians have always veered by instinct in the direction of empirical thought, wisely preferring inductive to deductive methods"(Shadow 96) and, again later, "inductive logic, methods of definition and verification, proper consideration of evidence...these, and these alone, are the barriers which stand between us and the mindless abyss."(Shadow 98) Green's revisionism, then, forms a somewhat eclectic mix. While grounded in traditional empirical logic, his revisionism is marked by an open skepticism toward the hope of attaining pure objectivity. This is an important element to consider as this discussion moves to specific definitions and examples of Green's revisionist methods and, later, when the place of the moral judgment in history is explored.

Throughout his career, Green has been consistent in recognizing that as each decade, half- century and century entails historical change so too the historian must be prepared to re-examine the past in light of his own experience. Following Popper's view historical revisionism is, as the term suggests, concerned with the importance of necessary periodic re- interpretation, and that re-interpretation is irretrievably connected to every influence which the historian's environment has had upon him. Green suggests as much in an early essay entitled, Clio Perennis.

Every historian is at the mercy of his own culture, tradition, and environment; his attitude to the past will be directly conditioned by his status or beliefs in the world he inhabits.(Essays 52)

With the passage of twelve years, Green's opinion on this revisionist constant is unchanged as can be glimpsed from the following two remarks.

Perhaps even more important than the accumulation of new evidence is the changing overall attitude to the study of ancient history as such. This change, it hardly needs saying, is intimately connected with the world-shaking events of the last half-century. Our judgments, choice of subjects or evidence, and assessments of such writers as Thucydides or Polybius, are all conditioned by our own rapidly changing ethics and morals, (Shadow 48)

and "it is visually impossible for any Western scholar not to let his attitudes regarding democracy, freedom of speech, and the whole totalitarian spectrum affect his judgments when writing history."(Shadow 13) Here, then is what could be called the revisionist creed; a acknowledgment that the historian is, in the end, a product of his times and that his writing of history cannot fail to reflect this. There is a clear indication of how Green considers that the past has influenced his own view of history when he states in the preface of Classical Bearings, (1989) "I am, and take pride in being, that least trendy of creatures today, a passionate liberal humanist," (Bearings 8) This statement may go some way toward explaining why Green has been labelled an anti-establishment scholar during his career. The liberal humanist in him is, no doubt, suspicious of authoritarian attitudes and establishment claims to truth wherever they may crop up. However, there is a danger here in reading too much into Green's politics. As will become apparent, a committed historical revisionist naturally questions any view which makes a claim to being an establishment or orthodox view. Re-interpretation of this sort, as we have seen, is the hallmark of Green's revisionism and the breaking down of hallowed. consensus views is its natural by-product.

Green's stance as a "passionate liberal humanist" and sharp-eyed revisionist, a fimm believer in the revisionist creed of necessary re-interpretation of history, has consistently involved him in an open challenge to existing academic opinion. He has, in this role, gained a reputation for being unhesitant to knock down hallowed historical myths. To this end, it is entirely consistent in Green's early work to find him seriously questioning the "myth of benevolent Periclean patemalism" which, as he sees it, is less concemed with Pericles"'inspired building programme and famous ideals" and more with "his ruinous imperialism, his all-too-familiar assumption of justifiable aggression."(Essays 17-8) One inevitable corollary of this overthrow of established scholarly opinion is that it has gamered Green much criticism from the historical community. Throughout his career, critics have referred to Green's "vigorous polemical aggressiveness... [and]...his attacks on modem academics and modem historical and critical dogmas."(G&R xx, 204) He is described as a writer on "the fringes of the Establishment... [who]...has launched guerrilla attacks on the professional armies of classical scholarship,"(TLS 1973 #3743, 1471) and whose books have "contained a swinging attack on the classical teaching profession, or a large part of it, for conservatism and stuffiness."(TLS 1973 #3697, 28) For Green, a proper appreciation of the intellectual inheritance of Westem classical scholars must take into account that "the temper of nineteenth-century classical scholarship was largely on the side of authoritarianism."(Essays 163) Despite the fact that the nineteenth century's "classical myths...[of]...Periclean patemalism, of authoritarian Platonic ideals" and "the assumptions-moral, religious, political-which sustained (them) have been to a great extent invalidated for the modem mind"(Essays 16-17) the lesson of their obstinate staying power should not be lost on the modern historian. This may be the passionate liberal humanist speaking or the committed revisionist. Either way, Green is suspicious of orthodoxy taken for granted. The example of the nineteenth century German historian Johann Gustav Droysen illuminates Green's point here. Droysen's work on Alexander the Great, Green believes, is colored in no small way by the fact that Droysen was "an ardent advocate of the reuinfication of Germany under strong Prussian leadership" and

thus we have a biographer of Alexander imbued with a helief in monarchy and a passionate devotion to Prussian nationalism...For the aspirations of independent small Greek states (as for their German counterparts) he had little but impatient contempt. In his view it is Philip of Macedon who emerges as the true leader of Greece, the man destined to unify the country and set it upon its historical mission; while Alexander carried the process one step farther by spreading the hlessings of Greek culture throughout the known (and large tracts of the unknown) world. (Alexander 482)

Eugene Borza states that "Droysen's conceptions were propounded so forcefully that they have conditioned virtually all subsequent scholarship on the subject."(Alexander 483) Green challenges W.W. Tarn's "Brotherhood of Man" approach to Alexander as another faulty and (previously) orthodox view which had far out-stayed its welcome by the time Ernst Badian demolished it. It was, Green says, indicative of a scholar "swept away on a wave of international idealism... [and]...a product of "Tarn's personal political convictions." (Alexander 484) The relentless progression of time has the inevitable effect of consigning historical judgments, like those of Droysen and Tarn, to the graveyard of obsolescence as each succeeding generation of historians places their own particular stamp upon the profession. Green is sensitive to this phenomenon when he writes, "when I was young I was always being advised to modify my brash anti- establishment views. Now the wheel has come full circle, and I run the risk of being dismissed as hopelessly old-fashioned." (Bearings 8) The impetus to continue struggling with history and constantly train one eye on critical re-interpretation and argument is that "the controversy itself, if only by compelling both sides to take fresh stock of their position from time to time' provides its own just)fication." (Shadow 1 10)

Revisionism does not always entail a jab at the scholarly establishment and Green is equally up to the task of shedding new light on more current and less controversial issues. The nature of the revisionist's purpose is to contribute to the on- going debate and, in this role, Green is less anomalous and more commonplace among historians. Some revisionist views in his later work, Alexander to Actium, involve Green's attitude toward the Greek city-states during the Hellenistic period.

Autonomy was indeed synonymous with polls rule, and a vital condition for its survival; but the anomalous, not to say paradoxical, position of these cities in the context of a bureaucratic and authoritarian central government meant, in the vast majority of cases, that their much-touted freedom was illusory, a matter of empty honorific titles, parochial

offices, municipal privileges, votes that lacked power, form without

substance. (Actium 25-6)

Most scholarly critics have had occasion to mention (whether by means of denigrating or praising) Green's revisionist bent. In a Times Literary Supplement review, Simon Hornblower attests to Green's fresh re-interpretation on this particular issue,

one of his theses, sourly but I now think correctly argued for, is the revisionist view that the life of the polls did in a real sense come to an end with Philip and Alexander, who brought about the 'emasculation of political life'; the fashionable recent consensus has been to deny or qualify this."(TLS 1991, 4583, 23)

On the question of the spread of Hellenism, Green questions the not necessarily orthodox view expressed by John Ferguson in The Heritage of Hellenism that "the Hellenistic age preserved, diffused and transmitted" (Ferguson 153) the many achievements of the Greeks. Green finds instead that "this impact was, first and foremost, economic.and demographic rather than cultural."(Actium 316) The need for revisionism occasionally even touches upon some of Green's own arguments. A good example is found in his collection of later essays entitled Classical Bearings. Green, reviewing his own essay originally written in 1957, finds fault with his earlier judgment of the historian Polybius's objectivity and in commenting upon a similar view from F.W. Walbank remarks "I think Professor Walbank would probably agree with me now that in 1957 we both let Polybius off a good deal more lightly than he deserved." (Bearings 170) On his collection of earlier essays, Essays in Antiquity, Mason Hammond writes that while "scholars and others may disagree with Green's judgments..he wafts a fresh breeze of re-evaluation to stir the drooping banners of traditional philology and to rouse the somnolent warders of academic ivory towers."(AHR lxvi, 61) Again, the need for fresh re-interpretation of historical questions is intimately related to the revisionist's goal and Green has shown himself to be more than willing to embrace this need.

Green's view of the revisionist's duty to history includes the periodic challenging of established opinion in the name of intellectual honesty, however, Green is mindful that a danger exists in a too exuberant revisionist attitude, namely the unforgiveable sin of a priorism. This may be best described as an argument from theory rather than from empirical evidence, a theoretical underpinning which serves as the starting point of a historical work and colors the conclusions attained. It is readily apparent that an approach of this kind runs contrary to revisionism, even when it comes in the guise of revisionism, because it is diametrically opposed to the continual openness to re-interpretation which is inherent in revisionism. As we have seen, the revisionist historian already brings enough preconceived notions to his work in the form of his own experience. That the difference between a priorism and the influences of the historian's environment is not merely the careful splitting of hairs will be treated at the end of this section. In 1960, Green was complaining of "the inevitable temptation to use one or more of the new disciplines as a universal explanation for any and every phenomenon."(Essays 54) He continues

Marxist historiography, whatever its stimulus-value in the economic field, is no more an absolute substitute for rational critical thought than any other theory. Cultural anthropology is a useful ancillary tool for the historian: it is not a panacea for all historiographical ills, much less an overall substitute for history...False analogies with biology and physics will lull him (the historian) into carelessness by convincing him that scientific objectivity is,after all, obtainable. (Essays 54)

Green holds up Polybius and that historian's universalism as a brand of a priorism which effected his writing. In Alexander to Actium Green suggests that Polybius' "escape clause is that Tyche (Fortune, Chance, Luck etc) can be invoked as an explanation only when no rational cause for an event appears possible."(Actium 271) This creed which Green claims effected "such dissimilar a priori thinkers as St. Augustine, Hegel, Spengler, and Professor Toynbee" is a concept "at the back of every historical monist who has ever attempted to impose some kind of rhythm or overall predictable pattern on the chaotic mass of human history."(Essays 60) In 1971, there is no change in Green's view on this subject. He singles out Toynbee again and his a prioristic universalism when he writes of Toynbee's,

obsession with symbols, his hunger to discover an overall pattern in history, his terror of ultimate chaos-all these are frequently presented as a good and valid reason for erecting such all-embracing frameworks. (Shadow 99)

Paraphrasing Professor Momigliano, Green states that "Marxism, psycho-analysis, and the 'neo-Augustinisnism' of Professor Toynbee all tended to produce unilateral approaches to the 'eminently many-sided history of Greece'."(Shadow 49) Green sums up his position as of 1971 by saying that man

has never lacked the urge to excogitate ingenious a priori explanations for the world he has inherited. These explanations take many and wonderful forms, ranging from elaborate cosmologies to notions of challenge-and-response, from cyclic myths to economic statistics. But one feature most of them seem to share is a kind of creeping monadism. A philosopher of history, in fact, somewhat resembles a patent-medicine huckster bawling his wares in the market-place. He not only is convinced that he has found the elixir of life. the key that will fit all historical locks; he also spends a good deal of his energy assuring all comers that his rivals across the way are either knaves or fools. Cross the road, of course, and you will hear the same story repeated with a change of names.(Shadow 94)

Green takes pleasure- in naming names when it comes to labelling pre-conceived theories of history and in the collection of essays published in the late 1980s, he continues on the same theme. He writes, "agitprop is the ultimate betrayal of all scholarship."(Bearings 8) and devotes several pages of a review of Geoffrey de Ste Croix's The Class Struggle in the Ancient Greek World. Green is quick to notice "the continuous emphasis on theory (Ste Croix is contemptuous of scholars who do not work from a priori models)," and suggests that Ste Croix's failure to include certain source material in his bibliography is due to the "obstinate refusal of the material to demonstrate Ste Croix's general thesis of class exploitation."(Bearings 121) Ste Croix's adherence and insistence on fitting Greek history into his own definition of class struggle results, for Green, in applying an theoryladen term, class struggle, to "'situations in which there may be no explicit common awareness of class on either side, no specifically political struggle at all, and perhaps even little consciousness of struggle of any kind'."(Bearings 123 quoting Bernard Knox) While praising much of Ste Croix's work for its attention to detail and his mastery of the evidence, Green, finally, finds the book flawed.

The road of the true party-liner through ancient Greek civilisation is beset with innumerable pitfalls. To his credit, Ste. croix tries to come to teens with most of them, though in the process he increases his own vulnerability. Honesty will keep breaking through the dogma, and the ideological restrictions he forces himself to accept give him the air of a fighter with one hand strapped behind his back, while the other jabs away heroically at all comers.(Bearings 125)

Clearly, during his entire professional career, Green's rejection of a priori theoretical systems has not changed nor has he found any reason which might mitigate this rejection. New disciplines and theories are helpful and should not be rejected out of hand but their use as a unilateral catch-all is a form of "creeping monadism" to be avoided. There. is a hint here of inconsistency in that the historian's preconceived notions, those having to do with his own experience, his moral, cultural and political make up, sound like a less formalized version of the same a prioristic underpinning which Green deplores. In a sense this is true. First, however, the historian's unavoidable preconceived notions are influences picked up over the course of a lifetime and do not necessarily constitute a theoretical whole. Secondly, a priorism in this context suggests a single theory or system as the starting point for a discussion and not the possibly myriad influences of personal experience. Thirdly, they are often subconscious influences which enter into the historian's work without the his knowledge.Yet in the end the problem persists and there is no clear and satisfactory answer for the dilemna. Perhaps the impetus should be squarely on intellectual honesty and open scholarly debate in order to weed out these problems. In other words, "the controversy itself, if only by compelling both sides to take fresh stock of their position from time to time, provides its own just)fication." (Shadow 110) As it is, the structural theory or conceptual framework which has been so attractive to the revisionist as a handy weapon with which to flay orthodoxy, is hopelessly wrapped up in ideological first principles and misguided loyalties, and is, in the end, antithetical to the honest intellectual pursuit of a revisionist view of history. This view holds that honest, inductive reasoning and the necessary challenging of accepted historical opinion are the best that the historian can hope to bring to his work.

The value of the moral judgment in history is a central motif in much of Green's historiographical writing and it clearly points to a second danger which confronts the revisionist historian; the danger that overzealous revisionism can degenerate into a morally neutral view of history or moral relativism. Peter Novick cites the American philosopher Richard Bernstein on the inherent distinction between the objectivist and the relativist,

At the heart of the objectivist's vision...is the belief that there are or must be some fixed, permanent constraints to which we can appeal and which are secure and stable. At its most profound level the relativist's message is that there are no such basic constraints except those that we invent or temporally (and temporarily) accept. (Novick 538)

The relativist and the revisionist appear to be almost synonymous here, in that in the absence of a fixed absolute called "objectivity", the historian is left to re-interpret the past for today without any certainty that he will be any closer to the "Truth" than the historian who suceeds him. With the advent of these relativist doubts. Green suggests that the historian was faced with the distinct possibility that in spite of his mastery of the subject

there was still no guarantee that he would not merely have substituted one set of prejudices for another. No wonder, then, that he so often, despairingly, abandoned any attempt to form valuejudgments. (Essays 53)

The danger in this approach to history is suggested by the historian Thomas Haskell,

quoted, in Novick's book, as writing

revulsion at the horrors of Nazi Germany was "one of the principle anchors of the twentieth-century mind ," and however tempting it was to accomodate to relativism, "we know that we cannot permit that anchor to break loose."(Novick 627)

The only proof against this lapse into a morally neutral view of history is the historian's vigilant maintenance and continued inclusion of a moral judgment in his history. In Essavs in Antiquitv, Green writes,

all history, we may say then, is finally moral history, an extended illustration of the external human struggle with right and wrong. Yet how are these to be assessed? The historian, being human, can only judge morality by the standards he knows (or instinctively assumes), and apply those standards, as judiciously as he can, to the ideas governing those actions which he is studying.(Essays 53)

The standards which the historian either knows or must instinctively assume represent the same standards which Haskell refers to as the "anchors of the twentieth-century mind." Here Green is in agreement that there must be some kind of philosophical or ethical grounding for the study of history, in spite of the claims of relativism or, in Green's specific case, revisionism. In Classical Bearings, Green insists that "there is a clear distinction ...between being blind to progress and holding our against ephemeral trends."(Bearings 8) He alludes to which ephemeral trends he means when a few sentences later he writes, "those who argue from the relativism of knowledge ta the worthlessness of such historical endeavours are, almost invariably, ideologists with an axe to grind...[and]...Ranke's ideal, history written wie es eigentlich gewesen, was, at the deepest level, right after all."(Bearings 8) In Alexander to Actium, Green considers the ideal of Ranke, the recognized founder of the objectivist school, not attainable but "that does not release the historian from the harsh obligation of striving for it to the best of his or her ability." (Actium xvi) The historian's appeal to "objectivity", criticized for taking on the hollow sound of a pathetic longing for some scientific grounding for history, is contrasted with an over- done relativist skepticism that too gleefully destroys the historians hope for some positive value from his work. As Green says in another context, "intellectual skepticism has many virtues; but comforting and sustaining ordinary people is not prominent among them."(Shadow 33) In the end, the historian must recognize that he is and, therefore his version of history is also, a product of his own times. The desire for an unambiguous and wholly objective truth upon which to ground history is futile but the pursuit of truth must continue in spite of its relative nature. Green suggests that the historian, in keeping with a recognition of those influences that have shaped his historical views, must not shy away from reflecting those influences in his moral sense of the world. It is this moral sense which brings some grounding and, therefore, some meaning to his work. It is also the one guardian against a view that morality itself is relative or neutral.

The adoption of a morally neutral view to questions of morality in history is, for Green, tantamount to ignoring one-half of the historical process. As we have seen, skeptical attitudes toward objectivity in history and a general acceptance of the relative nature of truth have led some historians to consider all questions of morality in history as relative. Green, who is equally skeptical of attaining objectivity, still sees the moral question to be tied irrevocably to the historical method and, in view of the horrific events of the this century, of vital importance for the twentieth century historian. He writes,

even the discovery of truth involves implicit moral judgments. In working out what Caesar did, and why, we are bound to produce a verdict on his motives. Why did he invade Gaul? Why did he cross the Rubicon? It is not enough to analyse the immediate historical causality of these events, and avoid the moral issue by saying that Caesar had no option but to behave as he did.(Essays 104)

It is interesting that a morally neutral view of history, one which is seemingly so often identified with radical attacks against a conservative belief in objectivity, should crop up in a book written by such an admittedly conservative scholar as A.G. Woodhead. Yet Green's best treatment of this issue arises in the course of his review of Woodhead's Thucvdides on the Nature of Power. Green quotes Woodhead as writing "'the bases of public conduct are without moral connotation"' and paraphrases him as writing "the application of power should be treated as something natural, inevitable, and morally neutral."(Shadow 87) Green holds that moral neutrality in action and the application of power

can only be sustained, as Mr. Woodhead makes abundantly clear during his exposition, by playing verbal and conceptual hopscotch with every basic principle of justice and common human decency in the world. (Shadow 87)

In describing Woodhead's treatment of Athenian imperialism, Green continues, "we find the conflict on Corcyra being described as a 'natural process"' and later "a reasoned apologia for the oligarchic revolution of 411 is closely followed by an equally plausible panegyric on hereditary aristocratic rule."(Shadow 87-8) Finally, in his treatment of Antiphon and his part in the oligarchic revolt of 411, Woodhead concludes

If our own political predilections cannot allow us to approve of what he stood for, we must acknowledge his right to stand for it, and we cannot but applaud the virtues or principle, thought and action which he brought to the championship of his right. (Shadow 90)

In a highly sarcastic assessment of Woodhead's position here, Green scoffs, "three cheers for Hitler, Stalin, De Gobineau, the Inquisition..." (Shadow 90) In the end, Green puts this criticism of the morally neutral treatment of power into a concise sentence,

No one in his right mind objects to power as such (one might as well object to a car having an engine); but its perversion to destructive and immoral ends is quite another matter. (Shadow 88)

The moral judgment on the use of power which Woodhead either avoids or finds entirely relative is, in Green's opinion, a factor that severely threatens Woodhead's conclusions. Green is moved to remark that Thucydides most likely never "took a neutral attitude to power." (Shadow 90) It is particularly important for the historian living in the twentieth century to avoid falling into this morally relative trap. Green states that the reality of the 19th century

was such that Shaw could make cute little rationalist jokes about militarism and torture and dictatorships and religious persecution, because (the great under-pinning argument went) we have emerged from that fog of superstition and primitivism. (Shadow 60)

Today we do not have the luxury for such a feeling of security. The inclusion of moral

judgments in the historical debate is perhaps the one security against moral relativism.

Ferguson, John. The Heritage of Hellenism. New York: Science History Publications, 1973.

Green, Peter. Alexander of Macedon. Berkeley: University of California Press, 199 ]

Green, Peter. Alexander to Actium. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990.

Green, Peter. Classical Bearings. New York: Tharnes & Hudson, 1989.

Green, Peter. Essavs in Antiquity. Cleveland and New York: The World Publishing Company, 1960.

Green, Peter. The Shadow of the Parthenon. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1 972.

Novick, Peter. That Noble Dream. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988.