Dorians

This article is about the population of ancient Greece. For the Armenian band, see Dorians (band). For the Mexican department store, see Dorian's. For other uses, see Dorian (disambiguation).

Part of a series on the
History of Greece
Map of Greece, drawn in 1791 by William Faden, at the scale of 1,350,000
Neolithic Greece
Greek Bronze Age
Ancient Greece
Medieval Greece
Early modern Greece
Modern Greece
History by topic
flag Greece portal

The Dorians (/ˈdɔːriənz/; Greek: Δωριεῖς, Dōrieîs, singular Δωριεύς, Dōrieús) were one of the four major ethnic groups into which the Hellenes (or Greeks) of Classical Greece divided themselves (along with the Aeolians, Achaeans, and Ionians).[1] They are almost always referred to as just "the Dorians", as they are called in the earliest literary mention of them in the Odyssey,[2] where they already can be found inhabiting the island of Crete.

They were diverse in way of life and social organization, varying from the populous trade center of the city of Corinth, known for its ornate style in art and architecture, to the isolationist, military state of Sparta; and yet, all Hellenes knew which localities were Dorian and which were not. Dorian states at war could more likely, but not always, count on the assistance of other Dorian states. Dorians were distinguished by the Doric Greek dialect and by characteristic social and historical traditions.

In the 5th century BC, Dorians and Ionians were the two most politically important Greek ethnē, whose ultimate clash resulted in the Peloponnesian War. The degree to which fifth-century Hellenes self-identified as "Ionian" or "Dorian" has itself been disputed. At one extreme Édouard Will [fr] concludes that there was no true ethnic component in fifth-century Greek culture, in spite of anti-Dorian elements in Athenian propaganda.[3] At the other extreme John Alty reinterprets the sources to conclude that ethnicity did motivate fifth-century actions.[4] Moderns viewing these ethnic identifications through the 5th and 4th century BC literary tradition have been profoundly influenced by their own social politics. Also, according to E. N. Tigerstedt, nineteenth-century European admirers of virtues they considered "Dorian" identified themselves as "Laconophile" and found responsive parallels in the culture of their day as well; their biases contribute to the traditional modern interpretation of "Dorians".[5]

  1. ^ Apollodorus, Library, I, 7.3
  2. ^ Homer, Odyssey, Book XIX (Line 177).
  3. ^ Will, Édouard (1956). Doriens et Ioniens: essai sur la valeur du critère ethnique appliqué à l'étude de l'histoire et de la civilisation grecques (in French). Paris: Belles Lettres.
  4. ^ Alty, John (1982). "Dorians and Ionians". The Journal of Hellenic Studies. 102: 1–14. doi:10.2307/631122. JSTOR 631122.
  5. ^ Tigerstedt, E. N. (1965–1978). The Legend of Sparta in Classical Antiquity. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell. pp. 28–36.