Whats Hecuba To Her Or She To Hecuba?
[Note 04] [08] The idea that the Bard of Poteidaia artfully concealed her true identity gains further credence when one examines the names of her alleged parents, Herodotus and Hecuba. Others have commented that the names sound a bit too contrived, and so they do. There were two weird aspects to Gabrielle’s career as a bard. First, she was a female in an otherwise male field. Second, unlike all other known bards, she declaimed in prose, not in poetry. Most Greek literature was poetry; even tragedies and comedies arose from lyric poetry. Greek prose writing was slow to emerge and was confined mostly to history and philosophy. The first major Greek prose writer was none other than Herodotus, “The Father of History”. Just as many bards who specialized in epic poetry called themselves “the sons of Homer”, so as a prose writer, and the author of a “history” of Xena, Gabrielle was a “daughter of Herodotus”. [09] As for Hecuba, the use of this name was admittedly puzzling at first, but an exa
