Though no substantial part of any of the work of Theopompus has survived, more than four hundred references to him or quotations from him by other ancient authors indicate his importance and offer the possibility of assessing his work. Because Theopompus incorporated most of the earlier varieties of historical research, his work may be called the crowning achievement of classical Greek historiography. His grouping of events by subject, references to geography and ethnography, and encyclopedic range of interest suggest the influence (...) of Herodotus, while his decision to write a contemporary political history owes most to the example of Thucydides. However, by enlarging the traditional view of the world, by adding utopianism and philosophy to mythography, and by introducing moral judgments and instruction to biography, he also became the forerunner of Hellenistic historiography. (shrink)