In this richly illustrated account, Charles Henry Hanson covers the history of Greece and its antiquities. As noted in the preface this book “is an endeavour to combine with a description of the country and of its principal sites and ancient remains a sketch of the events which made those places memorable – to localize, as it were, something of the vast mass of traditions and historic records associated with Hellas from a period long anterior to the birth of Christ down to the present day.” The author also describes the reason for writing the book; “of the books about Greece, its history and its antiquities, there are enough and spare in our literature. Most of them, however, are too formidable in their dimensions for general circulation.”

This book targets a general audience of students and tourists alike, representing a new genre of travel literature which surfaced towards the end of the nineteenth-century and was in sharp contrast to the travel accounts published earlier in the century, generally written from a personal viewpoint. In pursuit of accuracy in the information provided, and better planning of a journey, ‘subjective’ comments tended to disappear, being replaced by a more standardized detached form of writing which combined many types of works. In this case, in order to compile his book, the author has consulted the works of George Grote, Connor Thirlwall and John Wordsworth.

The places described include Thessaly, Aetolia, Acarnania, the Ionian Islands, Thermopylae, Phocis, Delphi, Boeotia, Euboea, Athens, Aegina, Megara, Corinth, Sicyon, Argolis, Mycenae, Argos, Tiryns, Nafplio, Laconia, Sparta, Messenia, Arcadia, Elis, Olympia and Achaia.

Selected Works
Homer’s stories simply told, London: Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1882.
Stories of the days of king Arthur, London: Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1882.
The Siege of Troy and the Wanderings of Ulysses, London: Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1884.
The wanderings of Æneas and the founding of Rome [a paraphrase of the Aeneid], London: Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1884.


Bibliography

Dritsas, Margarita. “From Travellers Accounts to Travel Books and Guide Books: The Formation of a Greek Tourism Market in the 19th Century” in Tourismos: An International Multidisciplinary Journal of Tourism, Volume 1, Number 1, Spring 2006, pp. 29-54

Written by NIcolas Nicolaides