pothos.org

But Alexander's central policy with Persia was not destruction but co-optation. Same empire, under new management -- that's why he dressed like what they knew as a Great King. He rehired all the bureaucracy, co-opted people such as Oxyartes, Mazaios, Nabarzanes etc etc etc., brought Persians into th...

Dear Professor Paralus:

Tis true, 'tis true, what you point out in your signature. Many of us can justly wear the mantle "old" -- but only a select and honourable few can claim "ancient." I salute you.

Vergina Sun, thanks for the yahoo link. Thanks also for your perspective as a young person. Some of us think we're all a bunch of old fogies on here. Nice to find out that's not true! :wink: The schools here concentrate on WWI and WWII and barely mention Vietnam or Desert Storm. Theseus, if you have...

I’ve argued this before to some degree – IMO it would have been undesirable on Alexander's part to forbid the Macedonian army to rape. He needed his army to be happy and his army desired women. And captive women, even if they end up as “partners,” are initially subjected to rape. It's not important...

I can't get the link to work -- I get part of the page but the section where the text of the article should be is blank. Anyone else having this problem? Got a link that works?

Well, Paralus, it's interesting that you write of "months of pent-up anger and fury" unleashing itself on Tyre... when I actually edited out of my last message a mention that Alexander's army, not just Alexander, had some responsibility for these things... for fear that you might accuse me...

No really -- this one's sourced. The manner, however, of the production of naphtha admits of a diversity of opinion... of whether this liquid substance that feeds the flame does not rather proceed from a soil that is unctuous and productive of fire, as that of the province of Babylon is, where the g...

I agree with Derek, that Alexander's atrocities were generally calculated. Be kind to those who surrender, belligerent to those who fight and merciless to those who pretend to surrender and then fight was his standard operating procedure, he followed it consistently, and it was very effective. I'd l...

Some more interesting reviews here (including some quite thoughtful ones.)

I hope you will not label me a pollyanna, Paralus, for noting that it did not become routine for Alexander to slaughter mercenaries, Greek or otherwise, as Bosworth implies. Quoting from a footnote by Hamilton in the de Selincourt (Penguin) translation of Arrian, emphasis added: This massacre was a ...

SAME GUY!!

They really were faithful to the graphic novel, weren't they? Yikes.

Hi Marcus, et al: If we remove Alexander as a conspirator in his death, though, the main difference between the two would have been what each had to endure in his youth. Phillip gained his throne over his own kin. Alexander may have quarreled with his father, but if he did not murder him or assist i...

Just a quick answer to one small aspect of your post, Phoebus: Phillip gained his throne over his own kin. Put this way, it sounds like he knocked off his father or some number of brothers or the like who were in line before him. That wasn't the case at all -- his father, Amyntas II, died of natural...

Hi Amyntoros (et al): If it had appeared to be just on the Internet, and wasn't sourced from an actual book that purports to have some scholarly rigor, I'd never have started this thread. Reading the excerpt, I think I can leave aside thoughts of scholarly rigor. I read somewhere else, a wiki on the...

Hi everyone: On a whim tonight I made saffron shrimp for dinner, and afterwards, curious, went a-googling about the spice. On the history of saffron wiki, I found: Later, Persian saffron was heavily used by Alexander the Great and his forces during their Asian campaigns. They mixed saffron into teas...