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Neither Agamemnon nor Thersites, Achilles nor Margites: The Heraclid Kings of Ancient Macedon*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 November 2015

E.P. Moloney
E.P. Moloney*
Affiliation:
Maynooth [email protected]
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Abstract

In modern scholarship a distinctly ‘Homeric’ presentation of the ancient Macedonian kings and their court still endures, in spite of recent notes on the use of ‘artifice’ in key ancient accounts. Although the adventures and achievements of Alexander the Great are certainly imbued with epic colour, to extend those literary tropes and topoi to the rule of earlier kings (and to wider Macedonian society) is often to misunderstand and misrepresent the ancient evidence.

This paper offers a fresh review of the presentation of the early-Macedonian monarchy in the ancient sources, and considers the depiction of the Argead dynasty in both hostile and more-sympathetic accounts. It highlights the importance of another mythological model for these ancient kings: one that was supremely heroic, but not Homeric. The Argead appropriation of Heracles, Pindar’s ‘hero god’ (ἥρως θεός: Nem. 3.22), was a key part of the self-representation of successive kings. Undoubtedly the crucial paradigm for Macedonian rulers, Heracles provided them with an identity and authority that appealed to diverse audiences, and it is time to consider the subtlety of the Argead presentation of their dynasty as Heraclid.

Type
Research Article
Information
Antichthon , Volume 49 , November 2015 , pp. 50 - 72
Copyright
© The Australasian Society for Classical Studies 2015 

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Footnotes

*

This piece is dedicated to former colleagues and students in the Department of Classics at the University of Adelaide. I would like to thank, first, Han and Angelique Baltussen, Jacqueline Clarke, Ron Newbold, and Margaret O’Hea – as well as Peter Davis, Stephanie Hester, Vicki Jennings, and Silke Sitzler – for their friendship and support. Two people, though, deserve special mention for their many kindnesses: the wonderful and indomitable Andrea Katsaros, and the much-missed David Hester. For convenience, Greek text and translations (adapted) are from the following editions: J.W. Cohoon, Dio Chrysostom: Discourses 1-11 (Cambridge MA 1932); C. Bradford Welles, Diodorus: Library of History. Volume VIII, Books 16.66-17 (Cambridge MA 1963); P.A. Brunt, Arrian: Anabasis of Alexander. Volume I, Books 1-4 (Cambridge MA 1976); A.D. Godley, Herodotus: The Persian Wars. Volume IV, Books 8-9 (Cambridge MA 1925); M.B. Trapp, Maximus of Tyre: The Philosophical Orations (Oxford 1997); Christopher Collard, Martin Cropp, and John Gibert, Euripides: Selected Fragmentary Plays. Volume II (Oxford 2004); A.F. Natoli, The Letter of Speusippus to Philip II (Stuttgart 2004); G.S. Shrimpton, Theopompus the Historian (Montreal 1991); G. Norlin, Isocrates. Volume I (Cambridge MA 1928), T.L. Papillon, Isocrates II (Austin 2004).

References

1 Zeitlin, Froma I., ‘Visions and Revisions of Homer’, in S. Goldhill (ed.), Being Greek Under Rome. Cultural Identity, the Second Sophistic and the Development of Empire (Cambridge 2001) 195-266CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 195. On Alexander and Achilles, see Ameling, Walter, ‘Alexander und Achilleus. Eine Bestandsaufnahme, in W. Will and J. Heinrichs (eds), Zu Alexander dem Großen. Festschrift Gerhard Wirth zum 60. Geburstag am 9-12-1986. 2 Vols. (Amsterdam 1988) II.657-692Google Scholar; Cohen, Ada, ‘Alexander and Achilles – Macedonians and “Mycenaeans”’, in J.B. Carter and S.P. Morris (eds), The Ages of Homer: A Tribute to Emily Townsend Vermeule (Austin 1995) 483-505Google Scholar.

2 Lane Fox’s, Robin J. epic, Alexander the Great (London 1986 [1973])Google Scholar, springs to mind, and his vivid presentation of a kingdom where the descendants of Homer’s heroic age lived on, a people who ‘at the call of a new Achilles . . . would prepare for Greece’s last Homeric emulation’ (67). Similar notes can be found across other key texts: Brunt, P.A., Arrian: Anabasis of Alexander. Volume I Books 1-4 (Cambridge MA 1976) xxxvGoogle Scholar (‘Macedonian institutions too, though they resemble those we find in the Homeric poems, were alien to the Greeks of Alexander’s time . . .’); Ellis, J.R., ‘Macedonia under Philip’, in M.B. Hatzopoluos and L.D. Loukopoulos (eds), Philip of Macedon (London 1981) 146Google Scholar (‘. . . this distinctive society retained some features that seem unusual, often anachronistic, in the fourth-century context – although perhaps not so out-of-place in Homer’s heroic world’). More recently: Holt, Frank L., Alexander the Great and the Mystery of the Elephant Medallions (Berkeley 2003) 7-8CrossRefGoogle Scholar (‘. . . In battles, brawls, and drinking bouts, the Macedonians measured a man from king to commoner by the implacable standards of Achilles and Agamemnon . . .’); Gabriel, R.A., Philip II of Macedonia: Greater than Alexander (Washington DC 2010) 6Google Scholar (‘In many ways the Macedonia of Philip’s day was very much the society of the Mycenaean age . . . where the Iliad was not only an ancient heroic tale but also a reflection of how men still lived.’); and also the excellent collection by Carney, Elizabeth and Ogden, Daniel (eds), Philip II and Alexander the Great. Father and Son, Lives and Afterlives (Oxford 2010)Google Scholar, where different contributors suggest that, even into the fourth century BC, Macedonian culture remained ‘naïve in a Homeric sense’ (p. 17), that Macedonian society was ‘archaic and semi-heroic in nature’ (p. 63), and that the Macedonian ethos was fundamentally ‘Homeric in nature’ (p. 120). Finally, one should mention the influence of Friedrich Granier’s, Die makedonische Heeresversammelung: Ein Beitrag zum antiken Staatsrecht (Munich 1931), and claims made there for the Homeric origins of the Macedonian monarchy (see pp. 4-28 and 48-57).

3 See Mossman, Judith, ‘Tragedy and Epic in Plutarch’s Alexander’, JHS 108 (1988) 83-93CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For Homer’s influence on ancient historiography, see Strasburger, Hermann, ‘Homer und die Geschichtsschreibung’, in W. Schmitthenner and R. Zoepffel (eds), Hermann Strasburger. Studien zur Alten Geschichte. Vol. 2 (Hildesheim and New York 1982) 1057-1097Google Scholar.

4 On Dio’s presentation of Alexander, and the central place of Homer in this dialogue, see Whitmarsh, Tim, Greek Literature and the Roman Empire (Oxford 2004) 200-206Google Scholar. John Moles offers the best introduction to these speeches, in ‘The Kingship Orations of Dio Chrysostom’, Papers of the Leeds International Latin Seminar 6 (1990) 297-375, at 337-47 on the Second Oration.

5 Borza, Eugene N., In the Shadow of Olympus. The Emergence of Macedon (Princeton 1990) 236Google Scholar. In his consideration of Macedonian political institutions, Borza points to the limitations of epic analogies, noting that efforts to make such comparisons are ‘. . . fraught with problems of evidence and method’. More recently, see excellent, Pierre Carlier’s, ‘Homeric and Macedonian Kingship’, in Roger Brock and Stephen Hodkinson (eds), Alternatives to Athens. Varieties of Political Organization and Community in Ancient Greece (Oxford 2002) 259-268Google Scholar. Carlier also highlights the ‘flimsy’ nature of epic assimilations, claims that ‘most historians assert . . . in a few sentences, as if they were obvious’ (p. 259).

6 For a fine summary of key points, see Raaflaub, Kurt A., ‘Riding on Homer’s Chariot: The Search for a Historical “Epic Society”’, Antichthon 45 (2011) 1-34CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 1-13. On the polis and the political in Homer, see Raaflaub, , ‘Homer to Solon: The Rise of the Polis (the Written Sources)’, in M.H. Hansen (ed.), The Ancient Greek City-State (Copenhagen 1993) 41-105Google Scholar, at 46-64.

7 Osborne, Robin, ‘Homer’s Society’, in R. Fowler (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Homer (Cambridge 2004) 211Google Scholar. Also Seaford, Richard, Reciprocity and Ritual. Homer and Tragedy in the Developing City-State (Oxford 1994) 22Google Scholar: ‘leadership in Homer tends to remain largely personal rather than institutional. There is no royal officialdom, taxation, judicial function, or legitimate monopoly of coercion of power.’

8 To paraphrase Grethlein, Jonas, ‘“Imperishable Glory” to History: The Iliad and the Trojan War’, in D. Konstan and K.A. Raaflaub (eds), Epic and History (Oxford 2010) 122-144Google Scholar, at 129.

9 Homer remained, as Plato notes, ‘the poet who has educated Greece’ (τὴν Ἑλλάδα πεπαίδευκεν οὗτος ὁ ποιητής: Resp. 10.606e). See Lamberton, Robert, ‘Homer in Antiquity’, in I. Morris and B.B. Powell (eds), A New Companion to Homer (Leiden 1997) 33-54CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Dué, Casey, ‘Homer’s Post-Classical Legacy’, in J.M. Foley (ed.), A Companion to Ancient Epic (Oxford 2005) 397-414CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

10 Quotation here from Hunter, Richard, ‘Homer and Greek Literature’, in Robert Fowler (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Homer (Cambridge 2004) 235-253CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Commenting on the importance of Homer for the Ptolemaic dynasty, Hunter observes: ‘At the political level, Homer carried a powerful charge through the traditionally cultivated closeness of the Macedonian elite to the epic world . . . and it is in Homeric terms that poets regularly depicted their royal patrons’ (p. 249).

11 Green, Peter, Alexander of Macedonia, 356-323 B.C. A Historical Biography (Berkeley CA 1991 [1974]) 6Google Scholar. Green highlights the fourth-century BC presentation of the kingdom as ‘frankly primitive, preserving customs and institutions which might have made even a Spartan raise his eyebrows.’

12 I thank my anonymous readers for the observation that the arrival of Olympias into the Argead royal house marked a key point in the changing presentation of the Macedonian kings. Certainly the heroic pedigree of the Epriote dynasty, and specifically their descent from Achilles, was well established by the fifth century BC (see Thetis’ prophecy in Euripides’ Andromache, 1238-52). For a discussion of those ties, see Allan, William, The Andromache and Euripidean Tragedy (Oxford 2000) 152-160Google Scholar, and Erskine, Andrew, Troy Between Greece and Rome. Local Tradition and Imperial Power (Oxford 2001) 122-124Google Scholar.

13 Philip as Agamemnon in Lane Fox, Alexander the Great (n. 2) 65, Philip as Achilles in Gabriel, Philip II of Macedonia (n. 2) 6.

14 Thalmann, W.G., ‘Thersites: Comedy, Scapegoats, and Heroic Ideology in the Iliad’, TAPA 118 (1988) 1-28Google Scholar (1).

15 Again I owe thanks to my readers for this observation. On the stock figure of Thersites in later literature – a ‘perfect allegory of an insubordinate citizenry’ for Maximus of Tyre (Or. 26.5) – see RE 5A.2463-8. On Philip’s post-Chaeronea revelling as a topos in the sources, see Pownall, Francis, ‘The Symposia of Philip II and Alexander III of Macedon. The View from Greece’, in Carney and Ogden (eds), Philip II and Alexander the Great (n. 2) 55-65Google Scholar, at 57-8.

16 See, first, Xen. Hell. 3.4.3. There is a more elaborate account in Plutarch, where a voice in a dream reminds the Spartan: ‘that no one has ever been appointed general of all Hellas together except Agamemnon, in former times, and now yourself’ (ὅτι μὲν οὐδεὶς τῆς Ἑλλάδος ὁμοῦ συμπάσης ἀπεδείχθη στρατηγὸς ἢ πρότερον Ἀγαμέμνων καὶ σὺ νῦν μετ᾽ ἐκεῖνον: Ages. 6.4-6). For a discussion of Agesilaus and Agamemnon (and Alexander), see now Nevin, Sonya, ‘Negative Comparison: Agamemnon and Alexander in Plutarch’s Agesilaus-Pompey’, GRBS 54 (2014) 45-68Google Scholar, at 50-9.

17 For Alexander I’s patronage of Pindar, see Dio Chrys. Or. 2.33. Hammond, N.G.L., The Macedonian State. The Origins, Institutions, and History (Oxford 1989) 209-210Google Scholar, suggests that Hellanicus, Herodotus, and Bacchylides too were welcomed to the royal court at Aegae in this period.

18 David Fearn, ‘Narrating Ambiguity: Murder and Macedonian Allegiance (Hdt. 5.17-22)’, in E. Irwin and E. Greenwood (eds), Reading Herodotus. A Study of the Logoi in Book 5 of Herodotus’ Histories (Cambridge 2007) 98-127, at 106-10. See also Fearn, , Bacchylides. Politics, Performance, Poetic Tradition (Oxford 2007) 27-86CrossRefGoogle Scholar; the quotation here is taken from this latter work (p. 51), as are the text, translations, and general discussion of the encomia that follows.

19 Fearn, Bacchylides (n. 18) 48.

20 Ibid. 51. The Argeads and Troy are also linked, briefly, in Arrian, who tells us Alexander III sacrificing to the Trojan Athena and to Priam on the altar of Zeus Herkeios (Anab. 1.11.8).

21 On Alexander’s careful use of Greek, non-Greek, and Persian connections to extend his kingdom’s power after the Greek defeat of Xerxes’ campaign, see Sprawski, Sławomir, ‘The Early Temenid Kings to Alexander I’, in J. Roisman and I. Worthington (eds), A Companion to Ancient Macedonia (Malden MA and Oxford 2010) 127-144Google Scholar, at 139-41. On a comparable presentation of a shared Greek and Trojan past in later Epirote traditions, see Erskine, Troy Between Greece and Rome (n. 12) 122-3 and 160-1.

22 To restate a point made by Carney, Elizabeth, ‘Artifice and Alexander History’, in A.B. Bosworth and E.J. Baynham (eds), Alexander the Great in Fact and Fiction (Oxford 2000) 263-285CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 285.

23 On the considerable influence of Heracles on ancient Greek ‘rulership’, see Huttner, Ulrich, Die politische Rolle der Heraklesgestalt im griechischen Herrschertum (Stuttgart 1997)Google Scholar. Also Malkin, Irad, A Small Greek World: Networks in the Ancient Mediterranean. Greeks Overseas (Oxford 2011) 119-140CrossRefGoogle Scholar, on Heracles/Melqart as mediating figures that provide ‘frameworks of identity’ for Greeks and non-Greeks alike.

24 The Argead dynasty first articulated a very specific claim to Heracles, promoting in Herodotus their own family legend (αὐτοὶ λέγουσι: Hdt. 5.22.1). On the political use of such myths, see the introduction offered by MacSweeney, Naoise, Foundation Myths and Politics in Ancient Ionia (Cambridge 2013) 7-12CrossRefGoogle Scholar, who notes: ‘It has long been established in literary and archaeological theory that texts, ideas, and objects have agency. This agency means that foundation myths are not passive objects reflecting social realities, but active subjects that influence and create social realities’ (p. 10).

25 Alexander I’s determination to have his Greek origins recognised has been much discussed. See Hammond, N.G.L. and Griffith, G.T., A History of Macedonia. Volume II 550-336 BC (Oxford 1979) 98-103Google Scholar, and Badian, Ernst, ‘Herodotus on Alexander I of Macedon: A Study in Some Subtle Silences’, in S. Hornblower (ed.), Greek Historiography (Oxford 1994) 107-130Google Scholar.

26 The mythological Temenus son of Hyllus, who, with Aristodemus and Cresphontes, restored the Heraclidae to the Argolid and then ruled over Argos. Thucydides also agrees as to the number of Macedonian kings and this line of descent from Temenus (2.99.3-6, see also 5.80.2). For a convenient review of the myths Alexander exploited, see Hall, Jonathan M., ‘Contested Ethnicities: Perceptions of Macedonia within Evolving Definitions of Greek Ethnicity’, in Irad Malkin (ed.), Ancient Perceptions of Greek Ethnicity. Center for Hellenic Studies Colloquia 5 (Cambridge MA 2001) 159-186Google Scholar.

27 On Alexander’s ‘revived’ contact with the Greek world, see Sprawski, ‘The Early Temenid Kings to Alexander I’ (n. 21) 141-3. Considering that Macedonia had previously been subordinate to Persia, this was now a time when political circumstances pressed Alexander to play the ‘genealogical game à la grecque’, as Hall, Jonathan M., Hellenicity: Between Ethnicity and Culture (Chicago IL 2002) 156Google Scholar, puts it.

28 Borza, Eugene, ‘Athenians, Macedonians, and the Origins of the Macedonian Royal House’, in Studies in Attic Epigraphy, History and Topography: Presented to Eugene Vanderpool. Hesperia Supp. (Princeton 1982) 7-13Google Scholar, at 10.

29 Thucydides offers notes, in passing, on Perdiccas’ struggles to maintain his position in the face of pressure from Athens (see 1.56-63; 2.29.6, 80.7, 93-102; 5.80.2, 83.4 and 6.7.3), repeated invasions by Sitalces the Thracian king (2.95-101), and the defiance of the Lyncestians from Upper Macedonia (see 4.79, 83, 124-128). For a review, see Roisman, Joseph, ‘Classical Macedonia to Perdiccas III’, in Roisman and Worthington (eds), Companion to Ancient Macedonia (n. 21) 145-65, at 146-154Google Scholar.

30 Bypassing Temenus and emphasising a descent from Heracles directly, see Nicogorski, Ann M., ‘The Magic Knot of Herakles and the Propaganda of Alexander the Great’, in L. Rawlings and H. Bowden (eds), Herakles and Hercules: Exploring a Graeco-Roman Divinity (Swansea 2005) 97-128Google Scholar, at 105. On Perdiccas’ coinage, see Doris Raymond, Macedonian Regal Coinage to 413 BC (New York 1953) 148-65, and Kremydi, Sophia, ‘Coinage and Finance’, in R.J. Lane Fox (ed.), Brill’s Companion to Ancient Macedon. Studies in the Archaeology and History of Macedon, 650 BC - 300 AD (Leiden 2011) 159-178CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

31 Thucydides himself offers the opinion that Perdiccas preferred this new alliance because ‘his own family was originally from Argos’ (ἦν δὲ καὶ αὐτὸς τὸ ἀρχαῖον ἐξ Ἄργους: 5.80.2). Hammond and Griffith, History of Macedonia II (n. 25) 120-1 situate the Heracles issue (and the clear connection between royal house and hero) in this context.

32 On the later circulation of the Heracles coin-type, see Mørkholm, Otto and Westermark, Ulla, Early Hellenistic Coinage from the Accession of Alexander to the Peace of Apamea (336-188 BC) (Cambridge 1991) 43Google Scholar, and Nicogorski, ‘The Magic Knot of Herakles’ (n. 30) 105-7.

33 For details of Archelaus’ reign, see Hammond, and Griffith, , History of Macedonia II (n. 25) 137-141Google Scholar and, primarily, Borza, Shadow of Olympus (n. 5) 161-79. Also Greenwalt, W.S., ‘The Production of Coinage from Archelaus to Perdiccas III and the Evolution of Argead Macedonia’, in I. Worthington (ed.), Ventures into Greek History (Oxford 1994) 105-134Google Scholar.

34 See Collard, Christopher, Cropp, Martin, and Gibert, John, Euripides: Selected Fragmentary Plays. Volume II (Oxford 2004) 338-341Google Scholar.

35 On the background to Euripides’ stay in Macedonia, see E.P. Moloney ‘“Philippus in acie tutior quam in theatro fuit . . .’ (Curtius 9.6.25). The Macedonian Kings and Greek Theatre’, in E. Csapo, H.R. Goette, J.R. Green, and P.J. Wilson (eds), Greek Theatre in the Fourth Century BC (Berlin 2014) 231-48, at 234-40. More on the Archelaus in Georgia Xanthakis-Karamanos, ‘The Archelaus of Euripides: Reconstruction and Motifs’, in D. Rosenbloom and J. Davidson (eds), Greek Drama IV. Texts, Contexts, Performance (Oxford 2012) 108-26.

36 See Huttner, , Die politische Rolle der Heraklesgestalt (n. 23) 43-64Google Scholar on Heracles and the Spartan kings. Although a descent from the great hero was claimed by all Lacedaemonians, only the Agiads and Eurypontids were supplied with a detailed pedigree to confirm their particular right to rule. Attempts by Lysander to extend the kingship even to ‘those judged like Heracles in aretê’ (Plut. Lys. 24.5) were not successful.

37 Hammond and Griffith, History of Macedonia II (n. 25) 5-11 suggest that Euripides’ tragedy was the prototype in this respect. Greenwalt, William, ‘The Introduction of Caranus into the Argead King List’, GRBS 26 (1985) 43-49Google Scholar, points out that in the 390’s BC, especially, a rivalry developed between three different branches of the Argead family, each of which was ‘concerned with the official record of early Macedonian history. Undoubtedly, this interest derived from a desire to strengthen their claim to authority by appealing to the past. This suggests that individual Argead kings hoped to enhance their status by glorifying their royal heritage as much as possible’ (p. 49).

38 Papadopoulou, Thalia, Heracles and Euripidean Tragedy (Cambridge 2005) 6CrossRefGoogle Scholar, notes that Heracles was at once a culture hero (dearest of men to Zeus: Hom. Il. 18.118), a positive civilising force (humankind’s champion: Pind. Nem. 1.62-6), and also a cruel worker of violence (dangerous and destructive: Hom. Il. 5.403-4; Od. 21.25-31).

39 Borrowing from the fine consideration of the manipulation of Melqart/Herakles/Hercules concepts by Carthaginians, Greeks, and Romans in Louis Rawling, ‘Hannibal and Hercules’, in Rawlings and Bowden (eds), Herakles and Hercules (n. 30) 153-84, at 166.

40 Demosthenes rejects Aeschines’ presentation of Philip II as ‘the most Greek of men, by Heracles, the finest speaker, and Athens’ greatest friend’ (εἶναι τε τὸν Φίλιππον αὐτόν, Ἡράκλεις, ἑλληνικώτατον ἀνθρώπων, δεινότατον λέγειν, φιλαθηναιότατον: On the False Embassy 19.308). For an analysis of the Greek response to Argead presentations, see Sulochana Asirvatham’s excellent ‘Perspectives on the Macedonians from Greece, Rome, and Beyond’, in Roisman and Worthington (eds), Companion to Ancient Macedonia (n. 21) 99-123, at 100-7.

41 The impact of these philhellenic policies is debatable, but Tanja Scheer suggests that by the time of Philip II the Argead ancestry was ‘largely recognised’: see ‘The Past in a Hellenistic Present: Myth and Local Tradition’, in A. Erskine (ed.), A Companion to the Hellenistic World (Oxford 2003) 216-31, at 218. Similarly, for Asirvatham, ‘Perspectives on the Macedonians’ (n. 40) 101, by the time Alexander III attained the throne, this young king may no longer ‘have felt the need to prove his ethnic Greekness and cultural education.’

42 Again, the Argead ‘identity’ does not just emerge fully formed in the middle of the fourth century BC. See Antonaccio, C.M., ‘(Re)defining Ethnicity: Culture, Material Culture, and Identity’, in S. Hales and T. Hodos (eds), Material Culture and Social Identities in the Ancient World (Cambridge 2010) 32-53Google Scholar: ‘. . . the notion that “individuals” freely constructed themselves from whatever material was in existence in the same time, space, and place is not tenable. . . . Cultures may not always have firm rules, but in order to be coherent there is patterning that, while malleable to some degree, is not infinitely flexible’ (p. 37).

43 Huttner, , Die politische Rolle der Heraklesgestalt (n. 23) 65-85Google Scholar: ‘Dafür, daß Philipp selbst sein Heraklidentum als Instrument der Propaganda in den politischen Auseinandersetzungen jener Zeit eingesetzt hätte, gibt es keinen Beleg. Womöglich hat er auf dem Mythos basierenden Argumenten mißtraut’ (p. 85).

44 Stafford, Emma, Herakles (London and New York 2012) 143Google Scholar, and similar observations made by Ritter, Stefan, ‘Review of Die politische Rolle der Heraklesgestalt im griechischen Herrschertum by Ulrich Huttner’, Gnomon 72.4 (2000) 337-343Google Scholar, at 339.

45 See Westermark, Ulla, ‘Remarks on the Regal Macedonian Coinage ca. 413-359 BC’, in G. Le Rider, K. Jenkins, N. Waggonder, and U. Westermark (eds), Kraay-Mørkholm Essays: Numismatic Studies in Memory of C.M. Kraay and O. Mørkholm (Louvain-la-Neuve 1989) 301-315Google Scholar. On the continued production of coins of the ‘old type’ (with Heracles/tripod) at Philippi, for example, see Dahmen, Karsten, ‘The Numismatic Evidence’, in Roisman and Worthington (eds), Companion to Ancient Macedonia (n. 21) 41-62Google Scholar, at 50.

46 See Natoli, A.F., The Letter of Speusippus to Philip II (Stuttgart 2004) 68-73Google Scholar, on the presentation of Heracles in the letter.

47 In particular, Speusippus promises that Antipater’s work will establish the legitimacy of the Argead claims to Amphipolis, claims that predate those of the Athenians (Ep. Socr. 30.6-7). See Markle III, M.M., ‘Support of Athenian Intellectuals for Philip: A Study of Isocrates’ Philippus and Speusippus’ Letter to Philip’, JHS 96 (1976) 80-99CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 93-6, and Hammond and Griffith, History of Macedonia II (n. 25) 514-17.

48 See Shrimpton, G.S., Theopompus the Historian (Montreal 1991) 270Google Scholar; Flower, M.A., Theompompus of Chios: History and Rhetoric in the Fourth Century BC (Oxford 1994) 101-102Google Scholar, on the place of this genealogy in the Philippica.

49 Earlier in the fourth century BC, Caranus (‘lord’) replaced Archelaus, who replaced Herodotus’ Perdiccas, as a more ‘neutral’ founder in the Argead register. See Greenwalt, ‘The Ιntroduction of Caranus into the Argead Κing List’ (n. 37) 48-9.

50 Flower, Theompompus of Chios (n. 48) 105, on the infamous presentation of Philip in the fragments as a ‘fast-living, impetuous, and uncouth individual . . . he was thoroughly and completely debauched.’ Philip proved to be ‘a Greek with a pedigree that went back to Heracles who lived as a barbarian among barbarians’, as Shrimpton, , Theopompus the Historian (n. 48) 109Google Scholar puts it.

51 As Speusippus notes in his own letter to Philip (Ep. Socr. 30.13). For a discussion of Isocrates’ proposals, see Weißenberger, Michael, ‘Isokrates und der Plan eines panhell-enischen Perserkrieges’, in W. Orth (ed.), Isokrates. Neue Ansätze zur Bewertung eines politischen Schriftstellers (Trier 2003) 95-110Google Scholar.

52 On the structure of the argument in this letter, see Heilbrunn, Gunther, ‘Isocrates on Rhetoric and Power’, Hermes 103.2 (1975) 154-178Google Scholar, at 156.

53 On Heracles and Athens, see Papillon, Terry, Isocrates II (Austin 2004) 82Google Scholar n. 25: ‘Isocrates describes Athens’ aid to the children of Heracles against Eurysthus in Panegyricus (4.54-60) and Panathenaicus (12.194).’

54 Steinbock, Bernd, Social Memory in Athenian Public Discourse: Uses and Meanings of the Past (Ann Arbor 2013) 269Google Scholar. Isocrates repositions competing narratives from different accounts in order to establish a general mythic background.

55 On myth as a key factor in ancient diplomacy, see Gehrke, Hans-Joachim, ‘Myth, History, and Collective Identity: Uses of the Past in Ancient Greece and Beyond’, in N. Luraghi (ed.), The Historian’s Craft in the Age of Herodotus (Oxford 2001) 286-313Google Scholar; 291-2, in particular, considers the importance of ‘good deeds’ (εὐεργεσίαι) in dealings between Greek states.

56 Considerations of ὁμόνoια were standard in epideictic oratory (as Isocrates notes in Panegyricus 3), but Heilbrunn, ‘Isocrates on Rhetoric and Power’ (n. 52), notes a shift in the meaning of ὁμόνια as an ideal in Isocrates, ‘from a term denoting harmony within the city to harmony between cities’ (156 n. 6). For de Romilly, Jacqueline, ‘Isocrates and Europe’, Greece and Rome 39.1 (1992) 2-13CrossRefGoogle Scholar, Isocrates’ ideas on harmony not ‘only suppose that one doesn’t encroach on the other’s freedom, but that one accepts a number of restrictions for a general advantage’ (p. 10).

57 See Too, Yun Lee, The Rhetoric of Identity in Isocrates: Text, Power, Pedagogy (Cambridge 1995) 132-133Google Scholar, dismissing suggestions that Agamemnon in Isocrates’ Panathenaicus (74-87) ‘serves as a second protreptic model for Philip’. Also Race, William H., ‘Panathenaicus 74-90: The Rhetoric of Isocrates’ Digression on Agamemnon’, TAPhA (1978) 175-185Google Scholar; again, Race does not see any veiled references to Philip in the Panathenaicus; instead Isocrates’ digression ‘constitutes a sophisticated rhetorical showpiece which is meant to attest to the orator’s personal character and set forth . . . a paradigm for constructive political action’ (p. 185).

58 See Apollodorus, Library of Greek Mythology 2.5.9 and 2.6.4 for the sack of Troy by Heracles and Telamon. Summaries in Stafford, Herakles (n. 44), 70-2, and Papillon, Isocrates II (n. 53) 99 n. 70.

59 Stafford, Herakles (n. 44) 156, who also notes the twenty-three different ancient cities across the Mediterranean called ‘Heracleia’ that we find in Stephanus of Byzantium’s Ethnica (303-304).

60 Malkin, , A Small Greek World (n. 23) 119-141Google Scholar for a full discussion of Heracles as a key ‘networking hero’ (quotation here from p. 132).

61 See Papillon, Terry, ‘Isocrates and the Use of Myth’, Hermathena 161 (1996) 9-21Google Scholar, and, in particular the excellent discussion of the use of myth in To Philip (pp. 11-13).

62 Mitchell, Lynette, ‘Isocrates’, in G. Shipley, J. Vanderspoel, D. Mattingly, and L. Foxhall (eds), The Cambridge Dictionary of Classical Civilization (Cambridge 2006) 467Google Scholar. Isocrates himself says he is unaware of any influence he may have had (To Philip 2.3). For a review of arguments, see Flower, Michael, ‘Alexander the Great and Panhellenism’, in Bosworth and Baynham (eds), Alexander the Great in Fact and Fiction (n. 22) 96-135Google Scholar, at 102-6, 126), and Weißenberger, ‘Isokrates und der Plan eines panhellenischen Perserkrieges’ (n. 51) 108-10.

63 The idea of a Panhellenic campaign against the Persian empire is common in fourth-century Greek political thought, and often made with reference to the Trojan and Persian Wars. Gorgias first advanced ideas of homonoia and a war against Persia (c. 392 BC), shortly after the short assault by Agesilaus. Lysias revived the suggestion at Olympia in 388 BC, adding also a campaign against the Sicilian tyrant Dionysius I. Isocrates sets out his proposals in the Panegyricus (380 BC), which may have been supported by Jason of Pherae (c. 374 BC, see Isoc. Phil. 119; Xen. Hell. 6.1.12). Notes here taken from the comprehensive summary offered by F.W. Walbank, A Historical Commentary on Polybius. Volume I: Commentary on Books I-IV (Oxford 1957) 308 (on Polyb. 3.6.13).

64 Flower, ‘Alexander the Great and Panhellenism’ (n. 62) 104 n. 38.

65 See also To Philip 116 and 140. Perlman, Shalom, ‘Isocrates Philippus: A Reinterpretation’, Historia (1957) 306-317Google Scholar, notes: ‘[Heracles’] φιλανθρωπία, εὔνοια, εὐεργεσίαι and πραότης towards the Greeks are particularly praised. The four characteristics of Heracles and especially his title of εὐεργέτης are very important for the understanding of the propaganda slogans current at the time in Athens and Greece’ (p. 314).

66 Asirvatham, Sulochana, ‘The Roots of Macedonian Ambiguity in Classical Athenian Literature’, in T. Howe and J. Reames (eds), Macedonian Legacies. Studies in Ancient Macedonian History and Culture in Honor of Eugene N. Borza (Claremont 2008) 235-255Google Scholar. See pp. 250-1 for a consideration of a division that ‘finds yet another means of accommodating the Macedonians politically by creating a new status for them between Greek and barbarian.’

67 Although in his last composition, a second Letter to Philip written in 338 BC, Isocrates modifies his position. If Philip follows victory at Chaeronea with a successful campaign in Asia, ‘there would be nothing left to do but become a god’ (οὐδὲν γὰρ ἔσται λοιπὸν ἔτι πλὴν θεὸν γενέσθαι: To Philip 2.5). On the authenticity of the letters to Philip, see Cawkwell, George, ‘Isocrates’, in T. James Luce (ed.), Ancient Writers: Greece and Rome. Vol. I (New York 1982) 313-329Google Scholar, at 316-17.

68 Certainly, the question of ‘Hellenic credentials’ of the Macedonians was a ‘familiar enough rhetorical topos’ by the middle of the fourth century BC, as Asirvatham, ‘The Roots of Macedonian Ambiguity’ (n. 66) 246, notes.

69 Aeschines, in Against Ctesiphon, tells of Demosthenes’ dismissal of the young Alexander when he succeeded to Philip’s throne, giving the new king the nickname Margites (3.160). See also Marsyas, FGrH 135 F3. As Lane Fox, Alexander the Great (n. 2) 60-1, notes, ‘Margites was one of the more extreme figures in Greek poetry. He was the anti-hero of a parody in Homer’s Iliad . . . By calling Alexander the new Margites, Demosthenes meant that so far from being Achilles, he was nothing but a Homeric buffoon.’

70 Presuming, of course, that the young king’s attempts to present himself as a ‘new Achilles’ were already widely known. See Green, Alexander of Macedonia (n. 11) 118, who also suggests that Demosthenes’ sneer that Alexander was ‘content to saunter around in Pella’ (ἐν Πέλλῃ περιπατοῦντα) may be a ‘hit at his Peripatetic studies under Aristotle’.

71 On Alexander the Great and Heracles, see Waldemar Heckel’s chapter, ‘Alexander, Achilles, and Heracles: Between Myth and History’, in P. Wheatley and E. Baynham (eds), East and West in the World Empire of Alexander. Essays in Honour of Brian Bosworth (Oxford 2015), which I was unable to consult prior to the submission of this article.

72 Hunter, Richard, Theocritus. Encomium of Ptolemy Philadelphus. Text and Translation with Introduction and Commentary (Berkeley CA 2003) 101Google Scholar. Elsewhere Hunter notes the ‘extra-ordinarily powerful influence which the protean figure of Heracles and his particular modes of heroism had upon Greek aristocratic ideology’; see his Theocritus and the Archaeology of Greek Poetry (Cambridge 1996) 12-13.

73 For Heracles in the Hellenistic period, see the summary notes in Hunter, , Theocritus. Encomium of Ptolemy Philadelphus (n. 72) 116-118Google Scholar. On the importance of Heracles to the identity of successive ‘Macedonian’ rulers, see Huttner, Die politische Rolle der Heraklesgestalt (n. 23) on Heracles and Philip II (65-85), Alexander III (86-123), the Ptolemies (124-45), Lysimachus (146-52), Pyrrhus (153-62), the Antigonids (163-74), and the Attalids (175-90).