[gothic-l] Re: Ostrogoths in Italy, Britain or China (or on the moon?)

[andreas.schwarcz at UNIVIE.AC.AT]

On 6 Feb 2001, at 10:51, dirk at smra.co.uk wrote:

>
> 
> Hello Andreas,
> 
> It seems to be quite a step to completely discredit an author like
> Prof. Goffart. The mathematician in me is always seeking logic and
> plausibility, which Goffart's interpretation offers masterly and which
> many others lack entirely. However, you may me right, and Goffart is
> wrong, but could you point me to some alternative publications
> (perferably your own ) on the subject, which are better than Goffart's
> book?
> 
> cheers
> Dirk
> 
Hello Dirk,
it is not my intention to discredit Walter Goffart, just to throw in a 
word of caution. His book makes good reading, it is an astonishing 
experiment in applying the literary theories of Hayden White (who 
analysed historians of the nineteenth century) and Northrop Frye 
(who worked on the Bible and Shakespeare) on selected writers of 
the early middle ages. But he sometimes oversteps the boundaries 
of interpretation and he tends to discredit the evidence of his 
sources, as in his treatment of Procopius criticised by Averil 
Cameron. He certainly is right in treating all books of Jordanes as a 
literary whole, but I do not share his doubt about Jordanes as a 
historical person. As for alternatives, the sad thing is that there are 
only older ones or partial ones.
To name some of them:

Max Manitius, Geschichte der lateinischen Literatur des 
Mittelalters (München 1931, old, but solid)

Pierre Courcelle, Histoire litteraire des grands invasions 
germaniques (3rd ed. Paris 1964) 
 
Historiographie im frühen Mittelalter I, ed. Anton Scharer und Georg 
Scheibelreiter (Wien 1994) 

Averil Cameron, Procopius and the sixth century (London 1985)

Berthold Rubin, Prokopios von Kaisareia. In: PW 23 (1957) 599-671

Pierre Riché, Education et culture dans l'Occident barbare, 6e-8e 
siècles (Paris 1964) 

to sum up, read Walter Goffart and enjoy his language and style, 
for which he is justly renowned, but check his conclusions against 
the sources and against other authors (and of course sometimes 
he is right and always original).
Regards
        Andreas
> 
> 
> 
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Ao.Univ.Prof.Dr.Andreas Schwarcz
Institut für österreichische Geschichtsforschung
Universität Wien
Dr.Karl Lueger-Ring 1
A-1010 Wien
Österreich
Tel.0043/1/42-77/272-16
Fax 0043/142-77/92-72

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