In Search of the Lost Testament of Alexander the Great

by David Grant

  39.Suetonius Caesar 82.2 and Plutarch Caesar 66.9. Kai su is more convincingly a threatening accusation than a philosophical lament. Ovid Metamorphoses book 15 lines 794-797 for ‘upheavals’.

  40.The existing popular line of Shakespeare appeared in Richard Fede’s Latin play Caesar Interfectus of 1582 and The True Tragedie of Richard Duke of Yorke & co of 1595, a source work for Henry VI, Part 3. See discussion in Malone The Works of William Shakespeare, Chapman and Hall, London, 1866, p 648.

  41.The words read ‘Good friend for Jesus’ sake forbeare, To dig the dust enclosed here. Blessed be the man that spares these stones, And cursed be he that moves my bones.’

  42.Kaufman (1932) p 165 for Asinius Pollio’s role as a defence lawyer in accusations of poisoning.

  43.Discussion in Wright (1995) and also Roller (1997) pp 109-130. A fulsome account of the death is Plutarch Cicero 46.3-5. For the proscriptions see Cassius Dio 47.8.4.

  44.Cicero Second Philippic 12.

  45.Cicero Ad Familiares 10.28.

  46.For Callisthenes’ death see Lane Fox (1980) chapter 3, footnote 15. For Pyrrhus’ death see Hornblower (1981) citations p 248, Plutarch Pyrrhus 34, Pausanias 1.13.8 gave two accounts; Hieronymus provided another derivative.

  47.Livy claimed both hands were cut off. Appian, Cassius Dio and Valerius Maximus claimed just one.

  48.Cassius Dio 47.8.4.

  49.Seneca the Elder recorded that Cicero’s death was a popular oratory topic.

  50.Plutarch Cicero 46.3-5.

  51.For Valerian’s death see Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum 5; Plutarch Gaius Gracchus 17 for reports of Gracchus’ death.

  52.Aristophanes Frogs 116-26.

  53.The nature of Socrates’ poison has been disputed since the publication of Johannes Weepers’ treatise Cicutae aquaticae historia et noxae, Basel, 1679. See full discussion in Brickhouse-Smith (2001). Full paper of the authors titled Hemlock Poisoning and the Death of Socrates: Did Plato Tell the Truth? can be read in the Journal of the International Plato Society, State University of New York at Buffalo.

  54.Theophrastus Enquiry into Plants 9.16.8.

  55.Plutarch Phocion 36.3-4. The executioner refused to ‘bruise’ more hemlock unless he paid 12 drachmas. Blackwell (1999) p 63 for discussion of Phocion’s career. Aelian 11.9 for Phocion’s gift from Alexander.

  56.Tacitus 15.60-62.

  57.Following Collins (2008) p 43 using Plato Laws 11.933a as examples.

  58.Collins (2008) p 134.

  59.Strabo 10.5.6, see full discussion in Griffin (1986) p 192.

  60.Theophrastus Enquiry into Plants 9.16.2 for aconite and 9.11.5-6 for strychnine, referenced in Engels (1978) pp 224-228 although this apparently refers to the non-lethal and less bitter variety. See Kaufman (1932) p 164 for discussion about masking poison in wine and Juvenal 1.69-70 and 6.663

  61.Ovid Metamorphoses 7:404-424 where Medea attempted to poison Theseus with an aconite mix.

  62.Full story in Ogden (2001) p 169; Ovid Metamorphoses 7.406 ff and Pliny 27.4 for the link to Cerberus and Heracles.

  63.Quoting D Feeny in the Introduction XIX to Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Penguin Classics edition, 2004. Whilst the charge against Ovid is unknown, it seems his Ars Amatoria, The Art of Love, offended the conservative Augustus.

  64.Mayor (2003) p 72 for ‘spear poison’. In Latin strychnos (the root of strychnine) – ‘a king of nightshade’ – became the generic word for plants with similar effects. Pliny 21.177-182 and Celsus stated that what the Greeks knew as strychnos (acrid) was known as solanum by the Romans.

  65.Hutchinson (1997) p 314, Mayor (2003) p 41 and Luch (2009) p 2.

  66.The compact Scythian bow was so-called due to its double-curved shape, reminiscent of a heart. Discussion of its effectiveness in Snodgrass (1967) p 82. The arrows were most likely held in the draw-hand for rapid horseback firing.

  67.Collins (2008) p 30 and Cilliers-Retief (2000) p 90 for the rhizomotoi.

  68.Homer Odyssey 1.300-310. Helen’s actions discussed in Collins (2008) p 144 quoting Homer Odyssey 4.230.

  69.Diodorus 17.103.7-8 and Curtius 9.8.22. Ptolemy suffered the consequences and allegedly nearly died before an antidote was found. Discussion of the Laws of Manu in Mayor (2003) p 91. Strabo 15.2.5-7 for a description of the snakes and their effects in India.

  70.Diodorus 17.90.5-6 and 17.103.5 for the venomous snakes and the preparation of poison, and quoting 19.33.2-4.

  71.Blyth (1906) p 573.

  72.Diodorus 17.5.6.

  73.Hesiod Work and Days 342, Photius Epitome 72 of Ctesias’ Persica, 29; Plutarch Artaxerxes 19 for Parysatis’ poisoning of Stateira.

  74.The list of assassinations discussed in Bosworth-Baynham (2000) p 53; Anson (2013) pp 80-81 for a list of the Argead kings who died in court intrigues.

  75.Pausanias 9.7.2 for the allegation of poison at the death of Alexander IV and Heracles.

  76.Green (1970) p 259.

  77.Green (1970) p 260.

  78.See Atkinson-Yardley (2009) pp 148-149 and Atkinson (2009) pp 28-46 for a useful summary of the theories propounded to date on a natural death. Renault (1975) pp 228-230.

  79.A mule or ass’s hoof according to Plutarch 77.4, Pliny 30.149, Vitruvius 8.3.16; Justin 12.14; Pausanias 8.17-18; the Romance 3.31 on the other hand claimed lead inside an iron container was used; it made no mention of Aristotle. The Metz Epitome stated that Antipater ‘prepared some poison in a small iron box. This he locked within an ass’s hoof with an iron clasp, that the virulence of the poison might be contained.’

  80.Lucian Dialogues of the Dead 13. The Lethe was one of the five rivers of Hades, also referred to as Ameles potamos, the river of oblivion (the broad translation of lethe). Orphic mythology demanded the dead drink not from Lethe (Forgetfulness) but from the pool of Mnemosyne (Memory). Author’s interpretation – Lethe water as a cure for Aristotelian ‘Goods’ (plural) rather than ‘Good’ and here seen as a sarcastic play upon the poison Aristotle allegedly furnished to Cassander from the Styx…thus he refers to hellebore in the previous sentence as it was a known purge and assisted in vomiting to empty the stomach of poison.

  81.Plutarch 77.5, Aelian 12.64 claimed thirty days unburied; Aelian 13.30 for Olympias’ grief upon hearing it.

  82.Curtius 10.9-13; Aelian 12.64.

  83.Blyth (1906) p 573.

  84.Milne (1968) pp 256-6 argued for strychnine poisoning; Engels (1978) pp 224-228. See Atkinson-Yardley (2009) pp 232-233 and Atkinson (2009) p 26 for the coma theory. Curtius 10.9.1, Plutarch 77.5 and Aelian 12.64 for references to the corpse remaining fresh for days (or a month – Aelian) after being pronounced dead. The clinicopathological protocol was established by Dr DW Oldach in the New England Journal of Medicine 338, no. 24 (11 June 1998), pp 1764-1769.

  85.Schep-Slaughter-Vale-Wheatley (2013) p 4.

  86.Plutarch 41.7. For antimony use see U Arndt The Philosopher‘s Magnet – Alchemic Transmutation of Antimony, first published in the magazine Paracelsus, November 2005, pp 12-17.

  87.Schep-Slaughter-Vale-Wheatley (2013) p 5.

  88.Schep-Slaughter-Vale-Wheatley (2013) p 4.

  89.Virgil Aeneid 1.657-694, translation by Theodore C Williams, Houghton Mifflin Co. Boston, 1910.

  90.Diodorus 21.16.4-6.

  91.Kaufman (1932) p 166 for the Twelve Tables.

  92.Full discussion of the early tradition of poison in Kaufman (1932) pp 156-157.

  93.See Kaufman (1932) pp 157-158 for full discussion.

  94.Kaufman (1932) pp 158-159 for examples.

  95.Many references appeared in Pliny 2.197; at 20.197-199 he recorded suicide by opium; 21.177-182, the use of deadly nightshade; 25.35-27 henbane, 25.47-61 hellebore; 16.50-51 and the effects of yew; 22.92-99 toxic mushrooms; 24.93-96 Spanish fly; 29.66-68 snake venom; various other references are made to spiders and other venomous animals, see Kaufman (1932) pp 161-164 for full details. Pliny’s vivid description of hemlock can be found at 25.151-154.

  96.Discussed in Cillers-Reti
ef (2000) p 89.

  97.See Kaufman (1932) p 166 for Sulla’s law and its ramifications and also Cilliers-Retief (2000) p 89 referring to Tacitus 1.5.2, 4.10.2, 6.33.1, 12.66.3.

  98.Appian Mithridatic Wars 16.3. For Crateus see Cillers-Retief (2000) p 90.

  99.Plutarch Demetrius 20.3-4. Translation from the Loeb Classical Library edition, 1920.

  100.Hojte (2009) pp 121-130. Snodgrass (1967) p 129 for Mithridates’ battle technique involving the Macedonian sarissa-type phalanx. The antidote was also referred to as mithridatacum.

  101.Cassius Dio 37.13, also Appian Civil Wars 16.111. Full discussion of Pompey’s imitatio Alexandri in Hojte (2009) pp 121-130.

  102.For his alternative death Cassius Dio 37.13.

  103.See Cilliers-Retief (2000) p 89.

  104.See Kaufman (1932) p 156 for discussion on drug manufacture in Rome.

  105.Tacitus 12.66 and 13.15 recorded that Martina was suspected of poisoning Germanicus. Citing the observation made in Atkinson (2009) p 239 on venenum. Cilliers-Retief (2000) p 89 for the possible roots of venenum.

  106.Suetonius Nero 33.3-34. For Locusta, Suetonius Nero 33 and 47.

  107.Discussion of the tasters’ roles in Kaufman (1932) p 160.

  108.Suetonius Claudius 44.

  109.Suetonius Claudius 44.3.

  110.Tacitus 12.66-67.

  111.For Iolaos as official cupbearer see Romance 3.31.4, Metz Epitome 96, Arrian, 7.27.2 and Plutarch 74.2. For Ptolemy’s role as ‘taster’ see Robinson (1953) p 78 for full citation from Chares.

  112.Metz Epitome 99, translated from Heckel-Yardley (2004) pp 218-289; also Romance 3.32.

  113.Aurelius Meditations 10.27.

  114.Translates loosely as ‘what an artist dies in me’; Nero’s alleged last words.

  115.Suetonius Nero 33, confirmed by Cassius Dio 60.35 who stated Nero’s quip meant that once Claudius had eaten the mushrooms he joined the gods.

  116.Suetonius Claudius 44 claimed he was in Rome whereas Tacitus 12.66 stated he was in Sinuessa. His death is additionally recorded by Josephus 20.148 and 151, Cassius Dio 60.34, Pliny 2.92, 11.189, 22.92 citing Halotus, his taster, Xenophon, his doctor and Locusta as the assassins.

  117.Suetonius Nero 1 for the origins of Nero’s name. Suetonius Nero 19 for his personal phalanx. Curtius 10.10.18-19.

  118.Suetonius Nero 35-39 and for his planned poisoning of the Senate, Suetonius Nero 43.

  119.Suetonius Nero 49.1.

  120.Alexander died either on June 10th or 11th. If the 10th, it is likely, from the body’s continued state of preservation, that physical death took place hours after it was announced. Modern astronomical calculations suggest the 11th rather than the 10th; full chronological discussion in Depuydt (1997) pp 117-135, Hannah (2005) p 95, Stoneman (1991) p 159. For Nero’s death on the 11th see C Murison, Galba, Otho and Vitellius: Careers and Controversies. Spudasmata 52. Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1993, p 6.

  121.The goblets were smashed in a rage when Nero heard of the defection of his northern Italian legions. The goblets were termed ‘Homeric’ as they were engraved with scenes from Homer’s poems. For recent reinterpretations of Nero’s exclamations see Pitcher (2009) pp 50-51.

  122.Suetonius Nero 47. For Seneca and Agrippina, Nero 52 and 38.

  123.July and August, after Julius Caesar and Caesar Augustus.

  124.Suetonius Nero 55.

  125.Historia Augusta, Life of Commodus 10.8.

  126.Nietzsche (1974) pp 137-8.

  127.Ovid Metamorphoses book 15 lines 87-90.

  128.Pythagoras allegedly forbade the consumption of kidney beans. The Egyptians did the same relating its shape to the male testicle. In fact there may have been sound medical grounds for the advice or it may have been religious and to do with transmigration: ‘eating broad beans and gnawing on the head of one’s parents are one and the same’; Grmek (1989) p 218 and pp 210-244. On the Eating of Flesh appears in Plutarch Moralia.

  129.Lucian The Double Indictment 5.

  130.Plutarch Demosthenes 29-30.

  131.Lucian Demosthenes: an Encomium 15.

  132.Pliny 10.3.6-8; Aelian De Natura Animalium 7.16, Valerius Maximus Factorum et Dictorum Memorabilium 9.12.2 also has a version in which blinded by the sun’s reflection from Aeschylus’ bald head, the eagle was dazzled into dropping the tortoise. For his part at Marathon, see Lattimore (1953) pp 1-3. Aeschylus’ reference to Homer is at Athenaeus 8.347e.

  133.Plutarch Marcellus 19.4-6. The text describes how Archimedes defied arrest telling the soldier he was in the middle of a mathematical problem. These were Archimedes’ last words. The reply has since evolved.

  134.Plutarch Pyrrhus 8.1. Translation from the Loeb Classical Library edition, 1920. Plutarch Pyrrhus 1.4 and Justin 17.3.4 for Pyrrhus’ descent.

  135.See discussion in Green (2007) pp 46-48. Pyrrhus allegedly exclaimed ‘another such victory over the Romans and we are ruined!’ after the battle at Asculum; Plutarch Pyrrhus 17.4 and 21.4 ff. The ancient Greeks would have termed a self-defeating victory ‘Cadmean’ after Cadmus’ loss of all his companions when trying to slay the water-dragon.

  136.Plutarch Pyrrhus 5.3-7. Pyrrhus always wore a helmet with goat horns protruding.

  137.Plutarch Pyrrhus 34 for Pyrrhus’ death in Argos and Pausanias 2.22.8-25.8 for the Homeric story attached to the tomb of Licymnius. He was the illegitimate son of Electryon, the son of Perseus and Andromeda.

  138.Plutarch Demosthenes 28.4, Arrian Events After Alexander 1.13 for the cutting out of Hyperides’ tongue and Plutarch Moralia 849f or Life of the Ten Attic Orators 9, Hyperides, for linking that to his proposing honours for Iolaos.

  139.A claim possibly inspired by or backed up by Plutarch 28.4 in which Alexander claimed Anaxarchus wanted to see a row of satrap heads on the dinner table, rather than humble fare. Diogenes Laertius 9.59 and Valerius Maximus 3.3.ext 4 for the ‘tale’ of his biting off his own tongue.

  140.Diogenes Laertius Anaxarchus 9.2-3. Also Zeno 9.5. According to Hermippus he was crushed with mortar and pestle but the common tradition was that Zeno bit off his own tongue and spat it at ‘the tyrant’.

  141.Borza (1995) pp 175-176 for discussion of the Eudaimonic school of philosophy.

  142.Quoting Borza-Palagia (2007) p 108.

  143.Plutarch 75.5.

  144.Ovid Metamorphoses 9:159-210.

  145.Herodotus 1.204-216. The Massagetae was a tribe with close links to the Scythians. See Arrian 4.11.9 and 5.4.5 for Cyrus’ death at the hands of the Scythians. Also referred to in Lucian’s Charon of the Observers 13.

  146.Xenophon Cyropaedia 1.7.9. For Ctesias see Photius Epitome 72 of Ctesias’ Persika, in which Cyrus dies in battle against the Derbices of Hyrcania. Also Cook (1983) p 21 for the Cunaxa references.

  147.Diodorus 2.32.4, discussed in Grafton (1990) p 9. Herodotus 1.214 for Cyrus’ death.

  148.Xenophon Agesilaus as proposed by Brown (1949) p16. For Alcibiades see Xenophon Hellenika 11.1.25.

  149.As suggested by Pitcher (2009) p 123.

  150.Pausanias 1.23.9 claimed Thucydides was murdered on his return to Athens, which, due to his exile, must have been after the city’s surrender in 404 BCE. However evidence exists that he lived past 397 BCE. Plutarch claimed he was interred in Cimon’s family vault; Plutarch Cimon 4.1.

  151.Plutarch Camillus 19 for the date of Marathon; Plutarch dedicated the paragraph to how unlucky the month of Thargelion was for ‘barbarians’.

  152.Plutarch Antony 4 for his emulation of Heracles, and for Commodus see Cassius Dio 72.15.5 and Historia Augusta, Commodus 9. For a summary of the Roman emulation of Alexander, see discussion in De Polignac (1999) p 8.

  153.Historia Augusta, Commodus 17; Cassius Dio 72.22.

  154.The Return of the Heracleidae is also known as the Dorian invasion, when the scattered sons of Heracles come home to claim their rightful ancestral lands, including Sparta; see Herodotus 8.73, Pausanias book 1.32, 1.41, 2.13, 2.18, 3.1, 4.3.3, 4.30.1; Euripides Herakleidai 6.52 and 9.27.
/>   155.Riedweg (2002) p 161.

  156.The Plato reference from Plutarch Moralia 718b-720c.

  157.Theopompus proposed Pythagorean philosophy was not more than an attempt at tyranny, FGrHist 115 F73, also Diogenes Laertius Pythagoras 8.39, discussed in Riedweg (2002) pp 101-108. See further discussion in Riedweg (2002) Preface, p X, quoting Russell (1946) p 60.

  158.See discussion in J Chadwick and WN Mann The Medical Works of Hippocrates, Blackwell Scientific Publications, Oxford, 1950 pp 1-3.

  159.Hippocrates Aphorismoi 1.1 and Prognosis 7.

  160.Pliny 26.7. Discussion of Asclepiades rhetorical career in E Rawlinson The Life and Death of Asclepiades of Bithynia, Classical Quarterly 32 (ii), 1982, pp 358-370. Plato described Hippocrates as an Asclepiad in his Protagoras suggesting he was a priest of the Asclepion of Kos.

  161.Diogenes Laertius Empedocles 5 and 8.69-71. See discussion in Gottschalk (1980) pp 14-20.

  162.Suetonius Nero 33-34. For mithridatium see Cilliers-Retief (2000) p 90 and Mayor (2003) p 150 ff. Hyppokras was a spiced wine traditionally credited to Hippocrates.

  163.Pliny described how mithridatium actually contained the blood of ducks that had been fed multiple poisons, also cited by Aulus Gellius 17.16. Agrippina took antidotes and Nero, despite repeated attempts, was unable to poison her; see Suetonius Nero 33-34. For the Roman-expanded recipe for mithridatium see also Celsus De Medicina V.23.3, Cassius Dio 37.13. Galen prepared mithridatium for Nero and Marcus Aurelius too.

  164.Two versions of the origination of the expression exist. The etymologist C Ammer traced it back to the Latin expression cum grano salis, citing Pliny’s description of mithridatium in Natural History, 29.24-25, which first used the expression; the alternative tradition traces its first use in the English language back to 1647, see Oxford English Dictionary, as simply the flavouring for bland dishes.

  165.For the punishment of the gods at the Styx see Hesiod Theogonia 775-819.

  166.Pausanias 8.17-19 and quoting from Mayor (2010) p 4.

  167.Full discussion of the waters of the Styx at Nonacris in Mayor (2010) pp 1-29. Modern theory suggests that if indeed this was its source, the effects came from naturally occurring corrosive acids, lethal minerals from (non-evident) ancient mining close by, toxic salts from the venting of a thermo-active fault-line, or the seasonal flooding and washing-in of local toxic plants. A case has also been made for the presence of the killer bacteria Calicheamicin occurring in Micromonospora echinospor thought to be present in adjacent limestone and soils. Discussed in Mayor (2010) pp 9-13.