自由帝国逻各斯的诞生——希波战争与希罗多德的雅典帝国叙事

The Construction of the Logos of Empire——The Greco-Persian Wars and Herodotus' Narratives of Athenian Arche

希波战争造就了雅典帝国。面对来自东方的波斯帝国的压力,雅典应变出一套关于自由反对专制的话语,将对方描述为野蛮的专制帝国,自己则成了自由的化身。波斯帝国原属地哈利卡纳索斯人希罗多德心仪雅典、向往自由,他继承自由反对专制这一雅典话语,模仿《荷马史诗》的语言、风格,乃至史诗特有的环形结构模式,完成了一部《历史,或雅典帝国的崛起》。希罗多德的雅典帝国元叙事,成为西方帝国逻各斯建构之始。

The Greco-Persian Wars made the Athenian Empire. Confronted with the Persian Empire from the East,Athens, the so-called" School of Hellas",produced a discourse of Liberty vs. Despotism,which described the Persian Empire as barbarous and despotic while Athens itself as the embodiment of liberty. Herodotus, born in Halicarnassus in the Persian Empire and admired Athens for its ideal and practice of liberty,imitated Homer's language,style and even the Ring Composition pertaining to Epics,and carried on the Athenian discourse of Liberty vs. Despotism in his Histories or the Rise of the Athenian Empire. The ideal of the Empire of Liberty,the highest possible achievement of political life as far as the western world is concerned,finds its root in the Athenian Empire. Herodotus' narrative of Athenian Empire paves the way for the western world to build the Logos of the Empire of Liberty.