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by Xenophon
Tue Jan 17, 2017 2:49 am
Forum: Discuss Alexander the Great
Topic: Alexander the Great...Good or Bad King, or neither? An Essay
Replies: 81
Views: 54886

Re: Alexander the Great...Good or Bad King, or neither? An Essay

Whether Barsine gave birth to a son is highly debatable – she apparently had only one child, a daughter by Mentor, who ended up married to Nearchus at Susa – and Heracles was more likely a pretender claiming to be a son of Alexander and Barsine, as argued convincingly by Mary Renault. That would se...
by Xenophon
Wed Jan 04, 2017 6:44 am
Forum: Discuss Alexander the Great
Topic: Alexander the Great...Good or Bad King, or neither? An Essay
Replies: 81
Views: 54886

Re: Alexander the Great...Good or Bad King, or neither? An Essay

Xenophon, I think we cannot mark as propaganda the stories we don't believe were true according to our own standards. We have to demostrate it , or leave for good to study ancient history Hiphys, no good historian accepts source material uncritically - one must carefully examine such that has come ...
by Xenophon
Thu Dec 29, 2016 2:30 am
Forum: Discuss Alexander the Great
Topic: Alexander the Great...Good or Bad King, or neither? An Essay
Replies: 81
Views: 54886

Re: Alexander the Great...Good or Bad King, or neither? An Essay

A most interesting post of 26 Dec, Alexias. Xenophon wrote:One of my points is to show that we should not apply our own standards, but rather those of the time, to determine if Alexander was ‘good’ or ‘bad’, or neither.......” Yet the whole point of your posts is that you are judging Alexander by mo...
by Xenophon
Mon Dec 26, 2016 10:40 am
Forum: Discuss Alexander the Great
Topic: Alexander the Great...Good or Bad King, or neither? An Essay
Replies: 81
Views: 54886

Re: Alexander the Great...Good or Bad King, or neither? An Essay

The yearning of Atum wrote: “A good response, but your allegation that Alexander was a rapist is still unfounded. As I said, his chasteness was legendary, and a primary characteristic of his personality, displayed both when he was described as refusing gifts of men and women as sexual partners from ...
by Xenophon
Mon Dec 26, 2016 3:02 am
Forum: Art and Culture
Topic: The Macedonian Rhombus
Replies: 1
Views: 4910

Re: The Macedonian Rhombus

I don't really have time to research and discuss this subject, but being one of the "Tactics geeks" Sean refers to, I'll make a couple of brief comments. The Hellenistic manuals describe cavalry squadrons forming up in rhomboid formations as a 'Thessalian' tactic ( with an alleged attribut...
by Xenophon
Sun Dec 18, 2016 10:03 pm
Forum: Discuss Alexander the Great
Topic: The excavation of Amphipolis continues
Replies: 11
Views: 8112

Re: The excavation of Amphipolis continues

Many thanks for posting this news, Pauline :) Unfortunately, the project is limited to much needed conservation rather than 'continuing' excavations, or extending the site. ""The project will be the finalization of the tomb, the restoration of the burial monument of the enclosure and gener...
by Xenophon
Tue Dec 13, 2016 5:44 am
Forum: Art and Culture
Topic: Books on Military Organization and Institutions
Replies: 23
Views: 11362

Re: Books on Military Organization and Institutions

POSTSCRIPT: Just to tidy up loose ends, should anyone have any lingering doubts about whether Alexander used catapults to destroy walls at Miletus, let us note that both Diodorus and Arrian say that Alexander used engines to "rock/shake down" the walls (using the same Greek word 'esaleue'...
by Xenophon
Mon Dec 12, 2016 9:28 pm
Forum: 'Off-topic' forum
Topic: Latsis Foundation .Thera
Replies: 2
Views: 2383

Re: Latsis Foundation .Thera

A new volume in the excellent Latsis series! Something to savour over Christmas! :)

Many thanks for drawing attention to this, Pauline.
by Xenophon
Fri Dec 09, 2016 1:20 am
Forum: Art and Culture
Topic: Books on Military Organization and Institutions
Replies: 23
Views: 11362

Re: Books on Military Organization and Institutions

There are not many translations of Arrian around ( though I note a new one by M.Hammond has been published by Oxford University Press in 2013), and I have ready access to just three - the Penguin one by De Selincourt, the version by Chinnock, and the original Loeb one by E. Iliff Robson. ( there is ...
by Xenophon
Thu Dec 08, 2016 1:14 am
Forum: Art and Culture
Topic: Books on Military Organization and Institutions
Replies: 23
Views: 11362

Re: Books on Military Organization and Institutions

Sean wrote: Also, for the record: when Alexander besieges Miletus at Diodorus 17.22.2-3, we are told that the defenders had many soldiers, projectiles (βέλοι), and everything else useful in a siege, but Alexander persisted, in a way which was very eager for honours (φιλοτιμότερον), and among other t...
by Xenophon
Thu Dec 08, 2016 1:09 am
Forum: Art and Culture
Topic: Books on Military Organization and Institutions
Replies: 23
Views: 11362

Re: Books on Military Organization and Institutions

Sean wrote: I have clearly said many times (back to the original blog post ) that I see a distinction between catapults (which includes things like the katapeltikon or gastraphetes which were held and operated by one man and shot arrows similar to those shot by a hand bow) and ones which could throw...
by Xenophon
Sat Dec 03, 2016 3:34 am
Forum: Discuss Alexander the Great
Topic: Alexander the Great...Good or Bad King, or neither? An Essay
Replies: 81
Views: 54886

Re: Alexander the Great...Good or Bad King, or neither? An Essay

“ Alexander then, is an absolute ruler, and whilst ‘bad’ by modern standards – mass murderer, killer of even those closest to him through paranoia or genuine self-defence, rapist, pillager and thief on the grand scale, by the standards prevailing at the time, such behaviour may be regarded as normal...
by Xenophon
Tue Nov 29, 2016 6:19 am
Forum: Art and Culture
Topic: Books on Military Organization and Institutions
Replies: 23
Views: 11362

Re: Books on Military Organization and Institutions

Sean wrote: Well, I don't think that there is any "alleged" about it. Petroboloi "stone throwers/stone-throwing" can be either men or machines, and its hard to explain what stone-throwing engines are doing that early in that context. The completely unsubstantiated allegation is t...
by Xenophon
Thu Nov 24, 2016 6:26 am
Forum: Art and Culture
Topic: Books on Military Organization and Institutions
Replies: 23
Views: 11362

Re: Books on Military Organization and Institutions

Sean wrote: This reminds me that I found some new evidence about Polyaenus 2.38.2 on Onomarchus surprising Philip with "stones and stone throwers" and Marsden's decision to translate this as "stone-throwing machines" https://bookandsword.com/2014/02/04/409/ Whilst this illustrat...
by Xenophon
Sat Nov 19, 2016 1:27 am
Forum: Art and Culture
Topic: Books on Military Organization and Institutions
Replies: 23
Views: 11362

Re: Books on Military Organization and Institutions

Sean wrote: ...there seem to have been ways of using anyone who could send stones in the general direction of the enemy. That's right. Karunanithy may be correct, but I doubt if this occurred in 'pitched battle' situations, because of course the heavy infantry would be formed into their ranks, not ...