This book is about time and history in the Greek world. It argues that choices concerning the articulation and expression of time, especially time past, reflect the values and aspirations of both those who narrate it and their audiences. Time is thus not only constructed, but also negotiated. Katherine Clarke's study ranges from the widespread awareness of time's malleability and the perceived value of the past by the citizens of the Greek polis to the formal analysis of time-systems by Hellenistic scholars. It addresses the development by historians of ways to articulate the long span of historical time, from the chronological strategies developed by those who wrote universal narratives to those whose stories were about the individual polis. The negotiation of time is of interest in any social context, but it carries particular resonance in the world of Greek polis, where each community had its own calendar and ran to its own time. Both the articulation of time and the establishment of 'shared' histories have been seen individually as modes of self-expression for communities. An exploration of their intersection is, therefore, especially illuminating.

By focusing on the phenomenon of city history, the creation of the past within a relatively restricted community, it is possible to examine more closely the dynamics of how time and the past were constructed. Therefore, this study brings together the wider theme of 'managing time', with an exploration of how history was created at a local level, within a civic context. It looks at the construction of the past as a social activity, which both reflects and contributes towards the sense of a shared identity. Book jacket.