THE GREEK WORLD AFTER ALEXANDER: 323–30 BC

             This survey of hellenistic society and culture took its initial inspiration from earlier works by Claire Préaux and FrankWalbank, to whom I must acknowledgea substantial debt.
             Given its limited size, the work cannot pretend to complete coverage, particularly in areas where the author is not an expert. For particular topics and regions it will be obvious that I have relied heavily on earlier investigators; this is particularly the case with Egypt and the Seleukid empire, for I have no knowledge of the non-Greek languages.              The book is designed to interlink two aspects often left disconnected in earlier studies: on the one hand, the political, economic, and administrative changes that took place after Alexander the Great, which are explored through examinations of distinct geographical areas (Macedonia, Greece, Seleukid Asia, and Egypt); on the other hand, the cultural and intellectual output of the period (religion, philosophy, and particularly literature and science). The latter, I believe, cannot be understood without the former. I am not the first to have suggested that the element of continuity from classical times may be at least as significant as the element of change. I would also submit that many of the new formations are evidence, not of changes in popular mentality, but of innovations in
discourses conducted at an élite level of society; they were not without influence at the grass roots, but the degree of continuity in popular culture was surely far greater.