Spazi nelle Storie, spazi della storia. Osservazioni sugli istmi in Erodoto

Herodotus’ interest in isthmuses, as well as his perception of the geography of these peculiar lands, is shown especially in the accounts about important interventions of blockading or cutting isthmuses by different historical personages, at different times, which are aimed to turn a peninsula into an island. The historian is concerned about the issue whether it is appropriate to undertake such huge and expensive initiatives, or not. In fact, these raise doubts not only about their practical utility in military strategy, but also in relation to ethic-religious legitimacy of them, since interventions on isthmuses (cuts or blocks) modify radically the geomorphology of lands that has been given by the gods. In Herodotus’ narrative one can glimpse a lesson presumably intended to the historian’s audience, with allusions (perhaps) to Athenian thalassocracy of the mid-fifth century BC. It is advantageous to ‘insulate’ a peninsula, only when a state holds a navy, and naval hegemony allowing it to exploit the insular conformation of the territory for trade and safeguard. The experience made by Miltiades I through the fortification of the Chersonesus is a good proof. While the attempt made by the Peloponnesians to fortify the Isthmus of Corinth in 480 BC, during Xerxes’ expedition, is to be blamed. This episode is central in Herodotus’ reflection: the ‘insulation’ of the Peloponnese, separating it from the Greek Peninsula through the blockading of the Isthmus of Corinth, would be strategically inappropriate, as well as a damage menacing the unity of the Greek forces.