Herodotus on Melampus This chapter takes the two stories that
Herodotus tells about the mythical seer, Melampus. It explains
how his treatment combines his heritage of inquiry, poetry, and
storytelling, and in the process creates new myth. Herodotus
displays his historical inquiry in the passage in which he has
Melampus introduce the rites of Dionysus into Greece from Egypt,
but also creates or develops the pattern of story in which the
‘culture hero’ introduces new customs into Greece. He develops
the use of Melampus by the poets as an exemplum in his account
of the battle of Plataea, where in order to enhance the
greatness of that battle, he compares the request of the seer
Tisamenos for Spartan citizenship as a reward for his service in
the battle to Melampus' request for Argive kingship as a reward
for curing their women; but he also patterns his story according
to the traditional motif of the bargain, bringing Melampus into
the world of the storyteller. Oxford Scholarship Online requires
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