Ancient Macedonians in the Greek & Roman Sources: From History to Historiography(Greece, Rome & Beyond)

Recent scholars have analysed ways in which authors of the Roman era appropriated the figure of Alexander the Great. The essays in this collection, by an international team of scholars, cast a wider net. They show how classical Greek, hellenistic and Roman authors reinterpreted, sometimes misinterpreted, information on ancient Macedonians to serve their own literary and political aims. Although Roman ideas pervade the historiographical tradition, this volume shows that the manipulation of ancient Macedonian history largely occurred much earlier. It reflected the complicated dynastic politics of the Argead royal house, the efforts of Alexander himself to redefine Macedonian kingship, and the competing strategies of the Successors to claim his legacy. Facing the complexity of the source tradition about the ancient Macedonians yields a richer and more balanced reflection of both the history and the historiography of this important and controversial people.

Table of Contents:
PART I SUCCESSION AND THE ROLE OF ROYAL WOMEN 1 A Founding Mother? Eurydike I, Philip II and Macedonian Royal Mythology Timothy Howe, St. Olaf Collegem Royal Women as Succession Advocates Elizabeth Carney, Clemson University 3 A Roman Olympias: Powerful Women in the Historiae Philippicae of Pompeius Trogus Rebecca Frank, University of Virginia PART II PHILIA, POLITICS AND ALLIANCES 4 Was Kallisthenes the Tutor of Alexander’s Royal Pages? Frances Pownall, University of Alberta 5 Hephaistion – A Reassessment of his Career Sabine Müller, Philipps University Marburg 6 Friendship and Betrayal: The Alliances among the Diadochoi Alexander Meeus, University of Mannheim PART III ROYAL SELF-PRESENTATION AND IDEOLOGY 7 The Animal Types on the Argead Coinage, Wilderness and Macedonia Victor Alonso Troncoso, University of La Coruña 8 Alexander as Achilles: Arrian’s use of Homer from Troy to the Granikos Hugh Bowden, King’s College London 9 The Grand Procession, Galaterschlacht, and Ptolemaic Kingship Paul Johstono, The Citadel PART IV THE MEMORY OF ALEXANDER 10 Legends of Seleukos’ death, from omens to revenge Daniel Ogden, University of Exeter and UNISA 11 The memory of Alexander in Plutarch’s Lives of Demetrios, Pyrrhos, and Eumenes Sulochana Asirvatham, Montclair State University Index Contents

About the Author :
TIMOTHY HOWE (Professor of History and Ancient Studies at St. Olaf College, Minnesota) is a field archaeologist and literary scholar. His research focuses on Macedonian elites and the methods by which they maintained power. As editor or author he has published widely: Pastoral Politics: Agriculture and Society in Ancient Greece; Folly and Violence in the Courts of Alexander the Great and his Successors; Ancient Historiography on War and Empire; Macedonian Legacies; Greece, Macedon, and Persia, and Brill’s Companion to Insurgency and Terror in the Ancient Mediterranean. Professor Howe is Senior Editor for the journal Ancient History Bulletin. FRANCES POWNALL (Professor, University of Alberta) is the author of Lessons From the Past: The Moral Use of History in Fourth-Century Prose (Michigan 2004), as well as a number of lengthy translations and historical commentaries on fragmentary Greek historians in Brill’s New Jacoby. She has published widely on Greek history and historiography of the classical and hellenistic periods.