A Laconian Deipnon in a Persian Skenē: Food-Based Identity Rhetoric in the Histories

Abstract

This article examines two instances in the Histories (1.133.2, 9.82.1–3) where Herodotus compares Greek and Persian meals to one another. Although these comparisons appear to reinforce identity rhetoric which sets a Greek “Us” against a Persian “Them,” I argue that when situated within the larger narrative of the Histories and Herodotus’ discussions of ethnic foodways, the comparisons reinforce the basic similarity of Persians and Greeks as peoples whose diet depends on sitos, or cooked grain. This similarity in diet suggests a similarity in identity as Herodotus destabilizes contemporary identity rhetoric opposing Greeks (as a whole or as individual groups) and Persians.