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The Semantic Usage of tyrannos and Related Words

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 May 2015

J.L. O’Neil
J.L. O’Neil*
Affiliation:
University of Sydney
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Extract

It has long been recognised that the word tyrannos and related forms are often used in Greek where the English derivative ‘tyrant’ is an inappropriate translation. This has led some modern writers to consider the word to be a synonym for basileus, and simply to mean ‘king’. Wilamowitz concluded that the pejorative use of the word, which has been carried over into the English ‘tyrant’, was a late development, stemming from Plato. Andrewes holds a similar view, that before the fourth century the word was neutral and that a ‘monarch’ could be addressed as ‘tyrant’ in compliment.

Type
Research Article
Information
Antichthon , Volume 20 , 1986 , pp. 26 - 40
Copyright
Copyright © Australasian Society for Classical Studies 1986

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References

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14 Alkaios D 17.13 Page; Solon fr. 33.6W.

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24 3.81.

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27 See also Isokrates 4.125 f.

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39 Eth. Nic. 1160 b 2; Politics 1295 a 16; cf. Politics 1311 a 2; 1313 a 15; Rhetoric 1366 a 2.

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48 Republic 9.573 b 6; 574 e 2; 575 a 1; 587 b 1; cf. Phaedrus 238 b 2; Laws 9.863 e 8.

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53 Xen.HG 4.1.1; 5.4.9.

54 Xen.HG 3.5.13; 6.3.8.

55 Xen. HG 4.4.6; cf. H. Berve, op. cit. (above, n. 6), 1.370.

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68 5.109.1; 5.113.1, 2.

69 9.28, 64; cf. 3.11, 25, 34 and 55; 9.27, 31, 34, 39 and 66.

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71 See note 3 above.

72 O. 1.23; P. 1.60; P. 3.70.

73 O. 1.107; O. 2.5, 46, 95; O. 3.3, 9, 39, 43; P. 1.61, 79; P. 2.5; P. 3.80.

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84 Though monarchos was normally a harsh word, as I hope to show at some later date.