Decoding a Narrative Allusion

The Death Narratives of Ammianus’ Julian and Xenophon’s Cyrus

Bibliographic Data

ID10285689
AuthorsTunç Türel (0000-0003-0025-2876, Charles University, corresponding author)
Year2020
Volume74
Issue6
Pages1015-1033
Publication date2020-10-28
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueMnemosyne (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0026-7074 • E-ISSN: 1568-525X
PublisherBrill (PUBLISHER • NL)
DOI10.1163/1568525x-bja10049
OpenAlexW3096643831
LanguageEN
References cited12

In this paper an intertextual relationship between Ammianus’ Res gestae and Xenophon’s Anabasis is proposed and contextualized. This intertextuality, which occurs in the form of a narrative allusion, is founded upon the thematic and structural similarities shared between the death narratives of Julian in book 25.3.3-6 of the Res gestae and that of Cyrus in book 1.8.6, 19, 24-27 of the Anabasis . An attempt at interpreting this particular narrative allusion reveals that Ammianus constructed this allusion intentionally with two specific goals in his mind. First, he made a subtle retort to Gregory of Nazianzus’ negative comparison between Julian and Cyrus ( Or . 5.13-14) by reversing Gregory’s comparison into a positive one, and second, which is of a more personal note, he cast himself by implication as Julian’s Xenophon in the Persian campaign of 363 CE , with whom he shares several loci of contact

Allusion · Art · Intertextuality · Literature · Narrative · Parallels · Byzantine Studies and History · Classical Antiquity Studies · Historical and Linguistic Studies · History · Philosophy

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