The Archidamian War was in Thucydides’ view caused mainly by Sparta wanting to ‘take down’ the power of Athens, while its course was shaped largely by Sparta’s reliance on conventional tactics and limited resources, compounded by its ‘slowness’ to act. This notion of a mismatch between highly ambitious strategic objectives and deeply inadequate tactical means remains pervasive in scholarship on the war. However, Thucydides’ record of Spartan actions is open to a different interpretation: Sparta’s main strategic goal was merely to preserve its hegemony over its allies, and accordingly it needed to support the military ambitions of the latter, especially Corinth and Thebes on whose military resources Sparta was dependent. Sparta initially did the minimum necessary to keep Corinth and Thebes onside but, in the face of Athens’ refusal to compromise, gradually developed more ambitious strategic goals of its own. When Sparta applied conventional tactics and limited resources it was in pursuit of specific, restricted strategic aims, but when Sparta pursued more ambitious strategies it developed new, complex and often daring tactics to match. Their ultimate lack of success was largely the result of Sparta having to make concessions to the mutually incompatible strategic interests of Corinth and Thebes.

Chapter 2 examines the Vedic sacrificial post called the yūpa and its role in ritual performances. A Mycenaean Greek cognate term and comparable ritual implement lies behind the Linear B form spelled u-po – that is, hûpos (ὗπος). Among other topics treated in this chapter are the Mycenaean deity called the po-ti-ni-ja, a-si-wi-ja, the Asian Potnia, and the u-po-jo po-ti-ni-ja, the Potnia of the u-po (that is, húpoio Pótnia [ὕποιο Πότνια]), a term matched exactly by Sanskrit patnī-yūpá-.

Chapter 6 examines Iranian cult and myth as evidenced in the Nart sagas of Transcaucasia, but also among Scythians as well as in Zoroastrian tradition, including the psychotropic cult substances Haoma (Iranian) and Soma (Indic). The Greek polis of Dioscurias in the Caucasus is explored as a place where Hellenic and Indo-Iranian divine-twin myth and cult affiliation meet, as indeed they do in the Pontic polis of Sinope. Aeolian connections are conspicuous at both locales.

Chapter 1 examines Pylos tablet Tn 316 in depth, giving particular attention to the Linear B forms spelled po-re-na, po-re-si, and po-re-no-, and related Sanskrit forms, and to the especial closeness of post-Mycenaean Aeolic to ancestral Helleno-Indo-Iranian in regard to this matter.

Chapter 3 examines the Mycenaean wanaks and lāwāgetās, figures responsible for leading Mycenaean society in specific ways and who correspond notionally to figures implicit in Indic and Iranian social structures – figures who descend from still more ancient Indo-European antecedents charged with the task of leading society through the spaces of the Eurasian Steppes and in migrations southward out of the Steppes.

Examination of the foundation traditions of Magnesia on the Maeander, an Aeolian polis of western Anatolia, and the various Aeolian mythic traditions attached to this city located within Caria.

The investigation of Aeolian foundation myths continues in this chapter, with examination of traditions of the founding of Boeotian Thebes. Ancestral Indo-European tradition is again evident, as is an Anatolian stratum, one which foregrounds technological expertise of Asian origin.

Examination of Luvian patronymic adjectives and their diffusion into the Mycenaean dialect of Anatolia – that is, Ur-Aeolic – and their distinctive use in post-Mycenaean Aeolic. Also, discussion of hekwetai ‘warrior allies’ that appear in the Linear B documents, whose names are commonly identified by the use of the Aeolic patronymic formation of Luvian origin, and discussion of other sacralized warrior relationships with Anatolian ties.

A synthetic, concluding discussion addressing the relationship between Ur-Aeolic and Special Mycenean and providing a historical framework for, especially, the introduction of Aeolic language and culture (pre-Thessalian/Boeotian) into European Greece following the Bronze-Age collapses and for the spread of pre-Aeolians (Iron-Age Ahhiyawans) eastward into Cilicia.

An investigation of the Hittite cult implement called the kurša and its relationship to the breast iconography of Ephesian Artemis, to various Greek implements within the context of both Bronze-Age Anatolia and Indo-European cult, and to Aeolian myth as expressed in, especially, Argonautic tradition.

Exploration of the mythic concept of Aia, region of the rising sun, and its Hurrian and Luvo-Hittite background, its introduction to European Mycenaean Greeks by the Ur-Aeolians (Ahhiyawans) of Anatolia, and Aeolian Argonautic elaborations.

Exploration of Aeolian foundation traditions and the localizing of such traditions in both the eastern Aegean and Magna Graecia, and of the reflexivity and reciprocality of Aeolian ethnic identity that these mythic traditions entail.

Investigation of the Bee-nymphs of Mt. Parnassus and the ancestral Indo-European strain and Anatolian strains of divination introduced into European Hellas by migrant pre-Aeolian communities.

The twin principles Help Friends and Harm Enemies are fundamental to the structure of Oedipus at Colonus. At the outset Oedipus reveals Apollo’s prophecy which he wishes to fulfil, and whose fulfilment will constitute the action of the play. He is to find rest at Athens, ‘bringing profit by dwelling here to those who welcomed me, but doom to those who sent me away, driving me out’). The dual theme is restated more explicitly when he tells the chorus that if they help him they will gain ‘a great saviour for this city, and troubles for my enemies’. For the first 700 lines of the play, until Creon arrives, Oedipus’ two-edged hopes and emerging power to implement them are constantly stressed. He shows his benign aspect to the Athenians, to whom he promises soteria and benefits if they help him. The arrival of Ismene shows his love for his daughters, and through her message his power over Thebes is revealed. It gradually emerges how he intends to use that power, and the scene culminates in a curse on his sons and a prayer that he may indeed have the control over their fate which the oracle has promised him. Later, in his long speech to Theseus, it is made clear that the same event will simultaneously bring help to his friends and harm to his foes, and Theseus’ response shows a full understanding of this.

If there is a Greek tragedy that is not often associated with choral song this must surely be Sophocles’ Oedipus Tyrannus. The play has become synonymous with the story about the young Oedipus’ fate made famous by Sigmund Freud, and as such it has been canonized as the founding myth of psychoanalysis. As Freud first put it, in the fourth of his Five Lectures on Psychoanalysis: ‘The child takes both of its parents, and more particularly one of them, as the object of its erotic wishes … the child reacts to this by wishing, if he is a son, to take his father’s place, and, if she is a daughter, her mother’s … The myth of King Oedipus, who killed his father and took his mother to wife, reveals, with little modification, the infantile wish, which is later opposed and repudiated by the barrier against incest.’

Nobody hates like a Greek neighbour does, to paraphrase Simon Hornblower. But did this reflect a genuine inimical attitude, or are there more layers to commemorative practices? An analysis of the neighbourly commemorative practices reveals a different reality. Looking at dedications, festivals and literary sources provides a more nuanced insight. Rather than a preference for Panhellenic arenas to propagate a warring rivalry to the largest audience, local venues and spaces were preferred. The thinking behind this localised commemoration are the intentions to strengthen local cohesion vis-à-vis a known ‘other’, in this case the neighbouring polity. Dedications at sanctuaries like Olympia or Delphi were inspired by a desire to proclaim credentials for leadership over all of Greece, rather than stress the localised interactions. Often these were made with or in relation to the Spartans, meaning these sanctuaries provided a different audience for other goals. This becomes clearest by looking at a local sanctuary, the Amphiareion at Oropos. Here both polities aimed to promote their ownership by mostly targeting local audiences. This example demonstrates the potential of contested sanctuaries for understanding local rivalries and commemorative practices and how they acted as mirrors for neighbourly relations.

The author first addresses the contents and the nature of the proems of the Histories, secondly the arrangement of Ephorus’ work and, thirdly, the main contents of each of the thirty books that formed it.

This chapter looks at the broader contemporary significance of declamation, focusing on (Macedonian) imperialism, and taking as its major case study Aristides' To the Thebans: concerning the alliance I–II (Orr. 9–10), in which Aristides recreates Demosthenes' speech urging alliance between Thebes and Athens before Chaeronea. The image of an attack by a despotic and barbaric king echoed some presentations of the Parthian menace, potentially ennobling a contemporary conflict. But the image of the greedy despot also echoed discourses about 'bad' emperors, thereby offering a negative exemplum to heed. Finally, Macedon in these texts further recalls the Roman empire more generally: accordingly, these texts make available an unusually negative attitude to the empire, but also, I argue, a celebration and a justification of Rome's power over Greece. I compare the discourses present in a fragment of Pollux's declamation On the Islanders, where the Persian court recalls Lucian's denunciation of the vulgarity of rich Romans in his De mercede conductis. In closing, I note the particularly high number of potentially meta-exemplary remarks in Aristides' declamations, encouraging audiences to ponder these texts' meaning deeply.

'Urbicide' is a Latin formation - as deployed in this chapter, it refers to the total or near-total destruction of cities (poleis) of the ancient Greek/Hellenic world between the 6th and the 4th centuries BCE. Urbicide was an extreme measure of interstate politics, but not as rare as one might have predicted - or hoped. It represented the other, dark side of the ancient Greeks' fierce attachment to their own native polis. In some cases a polis might be removed from the map once and for all (e.g. Arisba on the island of Lesbos). In others, it might be only temporarily annihilated (Thebes). In all cases, the possibility of largescale enslavement of formerly free Greek citizens was ever-present, and often was realised.