A Traveller's History of Greece

by Timothy Boatswain, Colin Nicolson

In a clear and comprehensive manner, the reader is here provided with an authoritative general history of Greece from its earliest beginning down to the present day.

Genres: Greece, Nonfiction, History, Travel

320 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1990

Reviews

[Lyn Elliott · Rating 4 out of 5]

We’ve just been to Greece for two weeks, on the sort of tour that cherry picks something like the top ten essential Greek sites you must see before you die - it’s very difficult to manage your own itineraries so far away from Australia, with only a tiny smattering of Greek at your disposal.
When I saw this book at the local library I thought it would have historical information organized by location that would help me with the places we visited, but it’s much more interesting than that - a potted history of Greece from 3000 BC, give or take a few, up till 2002.
The tour concentrated on the sites of classical antiquity (Acropolis, Delphi, Olympia, etc) with Meteora, Knossos and Rhodes thrown in.
We encountered Cycladic art for the first time - not in the Cyclades themselves, but in souvenir shops and museums in Athens, especially thenMuseum of Cycladic Art, very close to the wonderful Benaki Museum.
Where did that come from?
In that Museum, which features superb examples of sculpture, jewllery and other arts from many periods of Greek history and was not on the tour, but one we visited on our own, there were floors of costumes featured as Greek traditional, many of them wedding dresses, heavily hung with jewelry, that represented the bride’s family wealth. Where did the design, style and social meaning of these costumes come from? Byzantine Greece? Don’t know. All I can easily find for that period is the rich robes of the ruling and wealthy classes. Slavic elements? Turkish?

Questions kept occurring wherever we went. Why did this or that civilization decline? What replaced it? What continuities were there? Are there still continuities from the great pasts we recognize from standard ancient histories?

I didn’t find anything much to help me with costume or culinary traditions, for instance, but did find the brief references to underlying philosophies of artistic expression interesting pointers to further research if I were so minded.

The clearest things I learned from this admirable little,book, however, are the endlessly recurring fragmentation of Greek politics from the earliest city state rivalries to the self-destruction of the post WWII civil war and the fractious divisions of contemporary Greece. I also found it fascinating to read of the Great Idea that dominated Greek foreign policy from the C19 and which has repeatedly had disastrous military and economic consequences for Greece: the dream of a shrunken Greece state resuming territory it once held in the classical era or as part of the Byzantine Empire. The ethnic catastrophes of the 1920s stemmed directly from this, as do the current tensions with Turkey.
I highly recommend it as a political and lightly cultural introductory history of Greece over a 5000+ year span of history.

Fortunately I have a friend who is passionately interested in Greek textile and costume history and who’ll be able to point me in the right direction to answer my question, and I already know the links between Turkish and Greek food traditions. The Byzantine cultural connections remain a gap. Maybe I finally need to tackle Norwich, who has been sitting on my shelves for about 20 years.

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall I thought this was a pretty good, concise history of what is now modern-day Greece. Sure, it could have used more detail in some places and less in others, but when you are trying to jam the entire history of a country into 300 pages or less, I understand that you have to make some sacrifices and hard decisions about what to include and not include.

To speak to some of those decisions, I thought it could have used more content on the cultural aspects of Greece, including how their relationships with the Turks, Romans, Venetians, and Balkan nations throughout their history shaped their worldview beyond just their political situation. I also thought it could have used more discussion of the Greek economy, beyond just saying at various points that it was too dependent on one or two export crops, which seemed a bit simplistic of an assessment.

Like I said though, if you're looking for a good overview that can give you a fairly reasonable sense of where Greece has been and how it got to where it is now, at least from a geopolitical perspective, this is a decent book for that purpose.

[Polina Howe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed the book. Was a great refreshment course before travelling to Greece. I also learn a lot of new stuff.
A couple of notes:
- stylistically preferred the part written by Colin Nicolson, from the 15 century to present day. That not to say that Timothy's Boatswain wasn't good, but just a bit too dry for my liking, especially when we are talking about the golden age of Greece.
- I wish there was a bit more information on the custom and day to day life of people. I felt like there was a lot more about foreign policies and the interaction of Greece with other countries, when I was more interested in the actual Greece itself and how people lived, their customs and culture.
But overall the book was enjoyable and great for a quick crash course.

[John Benson · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book covers more than 5000 years of Greek history in less than 300 pages. Timothy Boatswain has written the first half of the book which takes us up to 1453, while Colin Nicholson takes us to the rest of the history. It mainly details the political world and the various upheavals of its history. The book gives a good outline of Greek history and unites the ancient and modern parts of its history. Not overly exciting, but a good overview.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating but torturous. Maps difficult to read. Transitions within a time period not well connected in reader's flow.

[Theodora Zourkas · Rating 3 out of 5]

A great book that traces the history of Greece from prehistoric to 2005. A great overview and it helped me understand Greek behavior and culture. Will definitely read more in the series

[Neder Bulan · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not my genre

[Monica St. Dennis · Rating 3 out of 5]

There were parts of this where I chad to concentrate REALLY hard in order to make myself pay attention to this, but overall it wasn't horrible.

[Raghava Rayudu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gives you a basic insight of Greece history for a good 3000 years. Nicely written, don’t expect too much of academia since it’s a travellers history. A well read

[KT · Rating 3 out of 5]

There were a couple of sections of this book that about bored me to tears. Wars and politics. And the history stops in 2002. But I for sure learned some things.

[Patricia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Densely packed with info, but surprisingly readable. Just the thing for an overview.

Includes two accounts of deaths that, I'm ashamed to say (though the author is clearly complicit), made me laugh out loud:

". . . Grand Vizier to Suleiman the Magnificent. Eventually he fell victim to the intrigues of Suleiman's wife and died in the traditional manner, strangled with a bowstring by deaf mutes." (142)

"On 30 September 1920, walking in the grounds of the summer palace at Tatoi, [King Alexander] rescued a pet monkey from the jaws of his dog, Fritz, only to receive a bite from the monkey's ungrateful mate which proved fatal. He died of blood poisoning on 25 October." (209)

[Fadi Badine · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book is a very good start to get to know Greece's history.
However, I found that there's a big difference between the first and second parts (each section written by a different author).
Section 1 is way better than the second and the author's style just attracts you to continue reading and never stop.
The author's style in section 2 is not that attractive and the continual jumping from year to year is a little annoying.
Furthermore, section 2 contains some errors:
- On page 221, it is written: "an ultimatum was delivered to Metaxas on 28 October 1941." .... Actually it is 28 October 1940 since Metaxas died on 29 January 1941 (something that is mentioned on page 222
- On page 246, ERE is mentioned to be a Right party (which is true). On page 247, it's mentioned that it is a Left one

Some issues were not elaborated correctly:
- Karamanlis ran their 1974 elections with his new Nea Democratia party. What happened to ERE? When did he change? When did the new party begin?
- He described Pasok as radical Left. Currently it's Centre Left. Did it really start as radical? When did it change?
- One major event was almost unmentioned except for a small hint in a note couple of pages before the end of the book: the 17 November 1973 event when the army crashed the students. This important event that marked a change in the treatment of students and has an effect on each and every demonstration that takes place even to our days where whenever violence erupts, troublemakers hide in universities which the army is not allowed to enter ever since 1973

[Austin Riba · Rating 4 out of 5]

Delivers exactly what it promises - a concise history of Greece from ancient times to the present. The writing was clear and in a format that makes it easy to go back and lookup major events, persons or eras for reference. Greece has had a much more turbulent past than I had thought, especially in the last century. Very valuable information and just what I wanted for before my trip. Could use more photos/drawings but I suppose they wanted to keep the book as physically compact as well.

[Evan Clark · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good concise history of Greece. How concise? How about three pages on Alexander, the Great. This is a good book to read for anyone taking a trip to Greece, (like we are soon), who wants a little background on the country.

[Lindsay · Rating 3 out of 5]

Concise history of Greece. While I tend to prefer the ancient, more mythological stuff, this was well done and opened my eyes to a more turbulent past than I realised.

[megan]

Read for class