Two case studies on ethnography in novels

Two cases of ethnographical excursus in ancient Greek novels are studied and compared and contrasted with previous ethnographical traditions from Classical Greek historiography and rhetoric. Chariton, in his presentation of Persia, adopts stereotypes from earlier traditions, but uses them to a different end. The study of the boukoloi in Heliodorus further demonstrates that, within the context of the Second Sophistic and the novelistic genre, ethnography operates in different ways than the established norms inherited from Classical Greek literature. The ambivalence of ethnographies in novels reflects the complexity of questions of identity in Late Roman Imperial times.