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Alexander's ὑπομνήματα and the ‘World-Kingdom’

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

W. W. Tarn
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Extract

So far as authority goes, Kaerst founded his theory of Alexander's worldkingdom on two passages in Diodorus and on nothing else. The first, 17, 93, 4, alludes to Ammon having conceded to Alexander the power over the whole world, τὴν ἁπάσης τῆς γῆς γῆς ἐξουσίαν the reference is to 17, 51, 2, where Alexander says to the priest of Ammon, εἶπέ μοι εἴ μοι δίδως τὴνἁπάσης <τῆς> γῆς ἄρχην and the priest replies that the god grants this. The second passage is 18, 4, 4, the story of Alexander's supposed plan to conquer Carthage, etc., and go to the Pillars, from his alleged ὑπομνήματα Every one will agree with Kaerst when he says that the political information in the Arrian tradition is imperfect, and that it is very desirable to supplement it; but the real question, which has to be faced, is, are we in a position to supplement it? It is no good using unsound material as a supplement; it is better to say we do not know, if it comes to that. My object here is to examine the Diodorus passages and see what kind of material they offer.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 41 , Issue 1 , 1921 , pp. 1 - 17
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1921

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References

1 See e.g. Strabo 17, 814 (possibly Eratosthenes' criticism), and the very just remarks of Foucart, P., Étude sur Didymos, Mém. de l'Acad. des Inscr. 1907, 136Google Scholar seq., on Callisthenes' panegyric on Hermeias.

2 Reuss, F., Rh. Mus. 57 (1902), 581 seq.Google Scholar; 63 (1909), 58 seq.; Schnabel, P., ‘Berossos und Kleitarchos,’ 1912Google Scholar; and see Lenschau, Th., ‘Bericht über griechische Geschichte 1907–14,’ p. 191Google Scholar, in Bursian-Kroll's, Jahresbericht, 1919Google Scholar.

3 Moret, A., ‘Le rituel du culte divin journalier en Égypte;’ Annales du Musée Guimet, Bibliothèque d'Etudes, 14 (1902), p. 128Google Scholar. Moret mentions other hymns to the same effect.

4 Breasted, , Ancient Records of Egypt, II. 203Google Scholar.

5 Ib. II. 265.

6 Ib. IV. p. 142.

7 Comment Alexandre devint dieu en Égypte, 1897; republished in his Études de mythologie et d'archéologie égyptiennes, vol. 6 (1912). See esp. p. 265, “Cérémonial et discours, tout y est conforme au rituel des temples pharaoniques,” etc.; and p. 274, “Il serait difficile de rencontrer roi si piètre que les dieux ne lui eussent fait la même promesse” (world-rule) “à satiété ; Amon terminait son entretien avec Alexandre comme il l'avait commencé, par un compliment emprunté au rituel en usage depuis le commencement de la monarchie égyptienne, et qui n'avait rien que d'ordinaire dans son esprit.”

8 A History of Egypt under the Ptolemaic Dynasty, 1899, p. 16.

9 The story is that, after McNeil had dined, his piper used to proclaim that now the other kings of the earth might dine. Marco Polo has a similar story of a chief in Central Asia.

10 The Latin versions (Curtius, Justin) cannot, of course, represent this; and neither Arrian nor Strabo gives the world-dominion promise of the oracle. Plutarch has kept but has interpreted it away.

11 Geschichte dea Hellenismus l2 (1917), p. 493, n. 2.

12 ‘Alexander der Grosse und die absolute Monarchie’ (Kleine Schriften, 1910), p. 299, n. 1.

13 ‘Hieronymos’ in Pauly-Wissowa (1913).

14 Die Quellen zur Geschichte der Diadochenzeit (1914), p. 29.

15 ‘Krateros, Perdikkas, und die letzten Pläne Alexanders,’ Rh. Mus. 1917–18, 437.

16 ‘Die letzten Ziele der Politik Alexanders des Grossen,’ Klio 16 (1920), 209. Kornemann professes not to go the whole way with Kaerst; but he goes a pretty long way.

17 ‘der Grosse, Alexander,’ in Reden aus der Kriegszeit 5, XI. (1916), p. 18Google Scholar: für die phantastischen Pläne, die man ihm damals und heute unterschiebt, spricht es nicht, dass die nachweisbaren Unter nehmungen Nutzbauten und Entdeckungsfahrten in grossen Stile sind.

18 O.G.I.S. 8 (v) and Syll. 3. 311 (his first year); I.G. II2, 401 (before Antipater's death).

19 An enormous literature. Much the best is Laqueur, R., Zur Geschichte des Krateros, Hermes 54 (1919), 295Google Scholar, who saw in effect that the regency was put in commission.

20 So Parisinus R; only in the inferior MSS. (Laqueur).

21 The other passages usually quoted for Perdiccas being regent merely show some form of power, which nobody doubts: Curt. 10, 10, 4, general of the army; Nepos, , Eum. 2Google Scholar, 1 and 2, summa, i.e. de facto power (vague); Just. 13, 4, 5, Meleager and Perdiccas generals with regum cura jointly. Contra, Just. 13, 6, 10 (Perdiccas when in Cappadocia has regum cura) and App., Syr. 52Google Scholar (at some time before his death he was ) agree with Diod. 18, 23, 2, i.e. Hieronymus; Memnon § 4, also refers to this later period. The only document which, for what it is worth, agrees with (b) is the Heidelberg Epitome, where Perdiccas from the start is

22 He does repeat from himself; e.g. 17, 114, 2 from 17, 37, 5.

23 This phrase, though Diodorus' own (17, 23, 5 and 6, of Memnon's extraordinary command), is used regularly in book 18 as equivalent to the regency; see 18, 36, 6 and 47, 4, where the two are formally identified each time. Cf. 18, 23, 2 and 3.

24 Arr., Diad. § 5Google Scholar, Cf. App., Syr. 42Google Scholar; Schubert, p. 134.

25 Diod. 16, 11, 4; cf. 16, 69, 4 and 17, 9, 1.

26 τάξις = hipparchy; Arr. 5, 21, 1; 7 14, 10.

27 The commanders of the battalions of the hypaspists (Arr. 1, 22, 7; 4, 30, 5; 5, 23, 7) and of the archers (4, 24, 10) are called chiliarchs. See generally 7, 25, 6.

28 This conies out clearly in Arrian's account of the Hydaspes battle. It is given formally Arr. 7, 6, 3–4, where it (like Alexander's Persian dress) relates to past events. Droysen's theory of 8 hipparchies was a mere misunderstanding of in 4, 22, 7; means ‘some of,’ as Droysen himself saw clearly in 5, 13, 1, where no doubt is possible.

29 This follows from Diod. 18, 7; Perdiccas can only spare Peithon 800 horse, but orders the eastern satraps to give him 8000, which they do.

30 E.g. Kallines', Arr. 7, 14, 6; cf. Arr. Diad. § 33, The statement in Arr. 7, 6, 4 that the fifth hipparchy, formed after the others, was not entirely ‘bar barian,’ points to the existence later of hipparchies that were entirely Asiatic, like many of the cavalry formations of the Successors.

31 Arr. Diad. § 3; Dexippus fr. 1.

32 Arr. Diad. § 2 cannot be made to support this.

33 He often anticipates. See the reference to the argyraspids, 17, 57, 2, and the long reference to Agathocles, 17, 23, 2.

34 Heracles son of Barsine, in this number of this Journal.

35 16, 65, 6.

36 Plut., Eum. 3Google Scholar, with full details.

36a The formal commencement of Hieronymus may have teen the old document Diod. 18, chs. 5 and 6, which (obvious additions apart) dates from 324/3, i.e. before the partition of Babylon:—the Caspian is a lake, the Ganges and Chandragupta are unknown, Media is still undivided and Armenia still a satrapy (a fiction abandoned at Babylon), and Susiana ‘happens to be’ part of Persis, i.e. is under Peucestas,—the of Dexippus, fr. 1.

36b Whatever be the right reading (see Wilhelm, A., Attische Urkunden 1, 1911, p. 16)Google Scholar, the sense is not in doubt.

37 Wilcken, U., Ὑπομνηματισμοί, Philol. 53 (1894), 80Google Scholar.

38 If Lehmann-Haupt, (Hermes 36, 319)Google Scholar were right in attributing Plutarch's excerpt to Hieronymus, my argument would be greatly strengthened. But this depends on his belief that there were only two copies of the Journal in existence, an idea entirely in the air.

39 There were, of course, many other ‘plans’ beside Alexander's, as can be seen from writers like Pliny. Some were extremely wild, like Seleucus' alleged intention to cut a canal from the Caspian to the Black Sea.

40 Arr. 7, 11, 9; cf. Plut., de fort. Alex. 330Google Scholar E

41 16, 20, 6; 60, 3.

42 It is supported, for what it may be worth, by Curt. 9, 7,1, Graeci milites nuper in colonias a rege dedueti.

43 17, 10,4; 50,1; 52,3; 87,5; 105, 1. I have not, however, searched books 1–15.

44 Diod. 20, 81, 3, Alexander's ‘Testament’ deposited at Rhodes; see Ausfeld, , Rh. Mus. 56 (1901), 517Google Scholar seq.

45 Demosth. de Corona 270; Hyperides, , Epitaph., 20Google Scholar.

46 Libyans, Bruttians, Lucanians, Etruscans; Arr. 7, 15, 4. As all embassies appeared in the Journal, it is difficult to credit any not in Arrian.

47 Curt. 4, 2, 11 and 3, 19; Just. 11, 10, 12; Diod. 17, 40, 3.

48 Arr. 7, 15, 5. If it came in Cleitarchus, as Pliny says, it is impossible to see why Diodorus omits it. The new theory advanced by Steele, R. B., Clase. Philol. 13 (1918), p. 302Google Scholar, does not meet this difficulty. The Pliny passage contains another gross Hunder (Schnabel, op. cit., p. 48) and is quite untrustworthy.

49 The largest fleets of the 4th and 3rd centuries are:—Dionysius I. (reputed 400) ; Athens, 413 in the docks in 325; Persia in 334, reputed 400; these largely triremes. For fleets of a larger average size; Demetrius in 306, about 330, not all at sea; Ptolemy II., circ. 250, some 336 (on paper); Rome in 208, 280, all at sea. References, etc., in Tarn, , Antigonos Gonatas, 82Google Scholar seq., 154 seq.

50 Arr. 7, 19, 4. The basin was primarily for merchantmen; warships were not kept afloat. I note that Aristobulus does not say that docks were built for 1000 ships, but that (some) docks were begun—naturally.

51 It is likely enough that Alexander may have meditated' sending out expeditions of exploration and discovery, whether round Africa, or in the Atlantic like Pytheas; precisely as he did send an expedition to explore the Caspian.

51a Newell, E. T., The dated Alexander coinage of Sidon and Ake, 1916, p. 31Google Scholar, has noted an ‘unprecedented activity’ in the Sidonian mint in 323, which he refers to the Carthaginian expedition. It was really due to the coining of the 500 talents which Miccalus brought to Phoenicia to hire or buy settlers for the Persian Gulf (Arr. 7, 19, 5). A local cause would stir up one mint; see the activity at Tarsus prior to Balacrus' attack on Isaura (Newell, in Am. J. Num., 1918, 81)Google Scholar. But preparations for an expedition against Carthage and Spain must have been reflected in every mint.

52 Cassander's anxiety to prevent Olympias speaking shows that she was tried for treason and not mere murder; for on murder she had no case, but as to treason she could have said some very awkward things.

53 16, 35, 2. 17, 84, 6; 107, 4; 109, 2. So 17, 56, 2; 18, 39, 4.

54 17, 79, 6; 80, 1. 18, 36, 7; 37, 2; 39, 3. 19, 51, 2 and 4.

55 Macedonian troops: 16, 3, 1; 4, 3. 17, 74, 3; 94, 5; 108, 3; 109, 2. 18, 36, 6. Other troops: 16, 18, 2; 79, 2. Macedonian troops: 18, 39, 4. 19, 51, 1. Other troops: 16, 10, 3; 18, 3; 78, 2.

56 There is a third case of this κοινὸν in Arr. 7, 9, 5, Alexander's speech at Opis, which dates the composition of the speech.

57 Tarn, , Antigonos Gonatas, 54Google Scholar, n. 36; 390 n. 61.