ABSTRACT
This chapter examines Herodotus' treatment of religious themes and how religious ideas affect his attitude to history. He endorses the Poteidaeans' belief that Poseidon sent the flood that saved their city. Neither Zeus nor, a fortiori, any other divinity has any real room for manoeuvre once the broad decisions have been taken. Small instances of the hand of fate are casually dropped throughout the work: 'The Naxians were not destined to fall to this expedition'; 'Candaules was destined to come to a bad end'; 'Artaynte was doomed to a bad end, with all her house' and others. 'The story of Croesus' trial of the oracular world need not delay us long; apart from theological unlikelihood of Delphi allowing itself to be tested in the way described, the list of oracles allegedly put to the test is highly suspect. The large and fascinating body found in Herodotus, public and private, political and ethical, includes some that are the responses genuinely given.
