« Rien dans les mains, rien dans les poches ». Louis Gernet e Jean-Pierre Vernant e lo studio della tirannide in Grecia

Abstract

The article aims both at exploring the contribution of L. Gernet and J.-P. Vernant to the study of tyranny in Greece and at reconstructing the intellectual and academic context in which these considerations were developed. These two scholars devoted only a couple of short essays to that topic, managing to trace the behavioural patterns of the Greek tyrants in the mythical past. The results that they reached and the approach they applied to the ancient sources arose a wide debate and had a considerable impact on the later studies on the tyranny.