The Lame Hegemony: Cimon of Athens and the Failure of Panhellenism, ca. 478-450 BC

This work presents an in-depth study and reconsideration of early 5th-century BC Greek history. Focusing on Athens in the aftermath of the second Persian invasion, it reconstructs the chronology, events, and context of the first half of this century, through the figure of the prominent Athenian politician and general Cimon, son of Miltiades. The study deals with themes of politics, economy, religion, military and social issues, and reception. The near-complete absence of contemporary sources means that the analysis is based mainly on later traditions. This study argues that present scholarship needs to be revised in favour of source criticism that reinterprets the surviving evidence, by setting it against its own contemporary context and by highlighting divergences among the sources. The ancient tradition has reshaped and reinvented the memory of the period under study along with that of Cimon. By peeling away a complex of layered traditions, biased by cultural stereotypes and later perspectives, this monograph questions traditional approaches to the 5th century BC, opening new ways to address and interpret Classical Greek history.