Named for Thucydides (ca. 460–400 BC), the greatest of the ancient Greek historians, who wrote strictly contemporary history of events through which he lived. His best known work, History of the Peloponnesian War, recounted the fifth-century-BC struggle between Athens and Sparta. He was filled with a passion for truth, keeping him free from vulgar partiality against the enemy: “I have written not for immediate applause, but for posterity”. (M 35493) _ _.