Volume 39, Number 14 · August 13, 1992
When Pericles Spoke
By Gordon M. Messing
In response to The Art of Abraham Lincoln
(July 16, 1992)
To the Editors:
In his review of Lincoln at Gettysburg by Garry Wills [NYR, July 16], James M. McPherson makes an apt comparison between Lincoln's speech and the Funeral Oration of Pericles as reported by Thucycides. But I noticed, and I suppose many other readers noticed, that he assigns the Periclean speech to 531 BC, a whole century too early.
We can at least be thankful that no classical author ever claimed that Pericles jotted down his notes for the Funeral Oration on the verso of a used sheet of papyrus.
Gordon M. Messing
Emeritus Professor of Classics and Linguistics
Cornell University
Ithaca, New York