The Persian History is a curious work. Likewise the career of its author: Ctesias of Cnidus was a physician, prisoner of war, guest at the Persian royal court, diplomat and, eventually, composer of several literary works. At least two of his works survived for more than 1,250 years - one of them being the "Persica" or Persian History - in spite of the allegedly debatable trustworthiness of their author. Intrigued by the longevity of the Persian History, Dutch classicist Jan Stronk became interested in the quality of this historical work. More to the point, given Ctesias' own claims of having drawn on particular literary sources, Stronk wondered as to whether these sources really existed? Could Ctesias have made use of them? Did he actually employ them? These are but a few of the questions the work of Ctesias evokes. However, things are even more complex, for the work itself is no longer extant other than in numerous fragments that have been reassembled from later writers. For the most part, the fragments are rather short, consisting of no more than a few words; other fragments, however, are longer, some are even quite extensive. Together they constitute what remains of the Persian History today. In this edition, J. P. Stronk presents a revised Greek text of all known fragments together with a facing translation. Drawing on recent scholarship in the fields of Classics and Near Eastern studies, the substantial Introduction discusses the life of Ctesias and places his work in its historical context. This is the first English translation of all the fragments since John Gilmore's translation published in 1888, making this interesting material more easily accessible to scholars and students.

Born in 1947, Jan Stronk read history (major: ancient history) and archaeology (major: cultural prehistory) at the Universiteit van Amsterdam. From 1984 to 1992, he acted as the Field Director of the Bulgarian-Japanese-Dutch excavations of the settlement hill of Dyadovo in central Bulgaria. A research associate at the Dept. of Ancient History at the Universiteit van Amsterdam since 1998, his work focuses on the intercultural relations in the Eastern Mediterranean basin. Currently he is involved in the Brill’s New Jacoby project and serving on the editors board of Talanta. His publications include The Ten Thousand in Thrace: an Archaeological and Historical Commentary on Xenophon’s Anabasis VI.iii-vi – VII, Amsterdam 1995 (PhD thesis) and numerous papers and reviews in Mnemosyne, Scholia, Talanta, Thracia, Thracia Pontica, and the BMCR.

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