302 Philip Kaplan
Mediterranean, he placed peoples north, south, east or west of other peoples, and he even
used days’ walking or sailing to indicate distances. Judging from the very incomplete evi-
dence of the fragments (biased, perhaps, by the large proportion preserved in Stephen of
Byzanium’sEthnika), Hecataeus was interested inethn ̄eprimarily to locate them spatially,
in relation to other peoples, to cities, or to geophysical features. Occasionally, he men-
tioned land genealogies to explain names, particularly of Greek places and cities (Pearson
1939: 51), or provided customs of foreign peoples, including foods and dress (FF 154,
322, 323a, b, 335; 185, 284, 287) and details of flora and fauna (F 291, 324a); how-
ever, he was primarily quoted in later sources for his geospatial referents. He also used
the tool of mapping, pioneered by his predecessor Anaximander as a means of projecting
an overall scheme of the world (FrGrHist1 F 12a, Agath. 1.1). No direct evidence of
Hecataeus’ map survives, but it must not be too far from the map of Aristagoras described
by Herodotus (5.49–50). The map served three functions: to indicate generally the rela-
tionship of places to one another, to indicate the physical position of peoples inhabiting
the world, and to convey an overall sense of the scale of distance of the world—this last
feature caused Aristagoras’ project to misfire, when the Spartan king became aware of
the distance of Susa from Sparta. Whether Hecataeus’ purpose extended beyond simply
locating peoples, to accounting for their identities and differences, is not clear from the
surviving fragments. He did speculate to some extent on the movements of peoples: he
asserted that the Peloponnese was originally inhabited by barbarians (F 119, Str. 7.7.1),
and related the story of how the Athenians drove the Pelasgians out of Attica (F 127,
Hdt. 6.137). However, beyond this, there is little evidence that Hecataeus systematically
catalogued, much less explained, ethnic or cultural difference.
Hecataeus’ successor Herodotus continued to explore the affinities between geography
and ethnography, although ultimately he subsumed them within the project of a historical
narrative. TheHistoriesis not a comprehensive survey of the peoples and places of the
world, but it does contain, in its first five books, extendedlogoidevoted to several of the
peoples encountered by the Greeks or conquered by the Persians. Theselogoicombine
geographical and ethnographic description, often as dominant elements, but sometimes
as an adjunct to a historical narrative (most notably with Egypt and Lydia). Herodotus
worked with an overall schematic conception of the world that served to help explain the
place and nature of the various peoples in it. Greece stood at the center of the inhabited
world: the farther one went from the center, the more extreme became the climate and
environment, and the more striking were the differences of the peoples from the Greeks,
most notably among the Skythians and other northern peoples, and the Egyptians and
Ethiopians to the south (see Hartog 1988; Romm 1992: 54–67). Munson, however, has
argued that Herodotus, in mapping similarities and difference, is not nearly as schematic
or ethnocentric as is commonly supposed (2001: 73–133).
Herodotus recognizes that the relationship between peoples and the lands they occupy
is far from straightforward. In his discussion of Egypt, after dismissing the Ionian view
that Egypt consists only of the Delta, and that the Nile is the border between Libya and
Asia, Herodotus advances the view that Egypt is the land inhabited by Egyptians, just
as Cilicia is the land inhabited by Cilicians, and Assyria that of the Assyrians (2.17.1),
suggesting that geographical divisions are predicated on ethnic distinctions. In fact, as
he goes on to say, the relationship is reversed (2.18): the inhabitants of the cities of
Marea and Apis, living on the Egyptian border with Libya, ask the oracle of Ammon to