Justin's comparison of Philip and Alexander

[Paralus]

Perhaps the entire passage might do well to be posted?

Justin, 9.8:

Philip died at the age of forty-seven, after having reigned twenty-five years. He had, by a dancing girl of Larissa, a son named Aridaeus, who reigned after Alexander. He had also many others by several wives,11 as is not unusual with princes, some of whom died a natural death, and others by the sword. As a king, he was more inclined to display in war, than in entertainments; and his greatest riches were means for military operations. He was better at getting wealth than keeping it, and, in consequence, was always poor amidst his daily spoliations. Clemency and perfidy were equally valued by him; and no road to victory was, in his opinion, dishonourable. He was equally pleasing and treacherous in his address, promising more than he could perform. He was well qualified either for serious conversation or for jesting. He maintained friendships more with a view to interest than good faith. It was a common practice with him to pretend kindness where he hated, and to counterfeit dislike where he loved; to sow dissension among friends, and try to gain favour from both sides. With such a disposition, his eloquence was very great, his language full of point and studied effect; so that neither did his facility fall short of his art, nor his invention of his facility, nor his art of his invention.

To Philip succeeded his son Alexander, a prince greater than his father, both in his virtues and his vices. Each of the two had a different mode of conquering; the one prosecuted his wars with open force, the other with subtlety; the one delighted in deceiving his enemies, the other in boldly repulsing them. The one was more prudent in council, the other more noble in feeling. The father would dissemble his resentment, and often subdue it; when the son was provoked, there was neither delay nor bounds to his vengeance. They were both too fond of wine, but the ill effects of their intoxication were totally different; the father would rush from a banquet to face the enemy, cope with him, and rashly expose himself to dangers; the son vented his rage, not upon his enemies, but his friends. A battle often sent away Philip wounded; Alexander often left a banquet12 stained with the blood of his companions. The one wished to reign with his friends, the other to reign over them. The one preferred to be loved, the other to be feared. To literature both gave equal attention. The father had more cunning, the son more honour. Philip was more staid in his words, Alexander in his actions. The son felt readier and nobler impulses to spare the conquered; the father showed no mercy even to his allies. The father was more inclined to frugality, the son to luxury. By the same course by which the father laid the foundations of the empire of the world, the son consummated the glory of conquering the whole world.

[Taphoi]

For example, Caesar arrested and killed Pothinus at a banquet.

No, at best Caesar had the execrable Egyptian eunuch killed.

Then, as everybody was feasting to celebrate the reconciliation, a slave of Caesar's, his barber, who left nothing unscrutinized, owing to a timidity in which he had no equal, but kept his ears open and was here, there, and everywhere, perceived that Achillas the general and Pothinus the eunuch were hatching a plot against Caesar. After Caesar had found them out, he set a guard about the banqueting-hall, and put Pothinus to death.

The descriptions of Philip’s court paint a picture of a King at pains to have his nobility, particularly the closest of them, close and to feel part of the process. Philip took pains to appear little different to his nobles who, though lesser in rank in reality, shared a common bond with their king who looked and acted little if any different to them.

That Philip, from a mean and inconsiderable origin, hath advanced to greatness; that suspicion and faction divide all the Greeks; that it is more to be admired that he should become so powerful from what he was, than that now, after such accessions of strength, he should accomplish all his ambitious schemes: these, and other like points which might be dwelt upon, I choose to pass over. But there is one concession, which, by the influence of your example, all men have made to him, which hath heretofore been the cause of all the Grecian wars. And what is this? an absolute power to act as he pleases, thus to harass and plunder every state of Greece successively, to invade and to enslave their cities.

They plainly shared nothing like the relationship that Philip and Alexander had. Caesar and Pompyt were no more father and son than were Philip and Attalus.

This was the end of Pompey. But not long afterwards Caesar came to Egypt, and found it filled with this great deed of abomination. From the man who brought him Pompey's head he turned away with loathing, as from an assassin; and on receiving Pompey's seal-ring, he burst into tears; the device was a lion holding a sword in his paws.

Best wishes,

Andrew

[amyntoros]

Taphoi, words from one of Demosthenes’ Philippics can't give us a meaningful assessment of Philip’s character or tell us about his treatment of Macedonian nobles (which is what Paralus was discussing). The very word, Philippic, has come to mean “a verbal denunciation characterized by harsh, often insulting language; a tirade.” Demosthenes knew Philip only as an enemy of Athens – he had no real insight into the workings of the Macedonian court; Macedonian culture; Philip’s true character, etc. That Demosthenes considered a man of Argead royal descent to be of “mean and inconsiderable origin” is a clue in and of itself.

Best regards,

[Paralus]

We can cherry pick sources all day.

Rather than severely truncate my position to a ten word sentence, let’s look at the whole:

No, at best Caesar had the execrable Egyptian eunuch killed. His co-conspirator, Achillas, is variously reported as having escaped or been murdered by Cleopatra's eucnuch. Plutarch who describes this has Caesar’s barber as reporting the eunuch’s plot and Caesar having the hall “surrounded and the eunuch killed”. I’d suggest that the killing of an Egyptian eunuch, already proven a murderous and untrustworthy conveyance, is a far stretch from Alexander murdering, by his own hands, a Macedonian noble.

I too have Plutarch. The point I raise above is far more ranging than the fact that Caesar “had the eunuch killed” (to employ my translation or, rather, the translation I have). I note that you have singularly failed to address it.

As well you skirt the point I’ve raised about Philip. Of course he was king and the final decisions were his. The point is:

Philip took pains to appear little different to his nobles who, though lesser in rank in reality, shared a common bond with their king who looked and acted little if any different to them. By his end in Babylon, it would be a bit strange to suggest that the Macedonian rank and file shared this view of Alexander.

Your selective choice of Demosthenes is obviously based on the orator’s well known love and respect for the Macedonian king and the picture he paints. Would you as easily quote him – in isolation – to prove that Philip and the Macedonians were barbaroi, uncouth and uncivilised?

The last in your line up of quotes – Caesar’s reaction to Pompey’s murder – provides absolutely nothing in the way of substantiation for your loose use of language in stating that “Caesar and Pompey were also father and son” or that they in any demonstrable way shared a “father –son relationship just like Philip and Alexander”. Caesar is reacting to the murder of a Roman citizen – an erstwhile very important one – and a former ally in the first Triumvirate. He will have envisioned a more appropriate – if not entirely different in effect – accounting of the ledger than murder at the hands of an Egyptian eunuch.

This was the last play in a theatre that had involved and seen the death (neutralising or exiling) of Cato, Clodius, Crassus, Pompey and Cicero ( to name a few) as well as Caesar. It had involved Pompey divorcing his wife so as to progress his career by marrying Cato’s daughter (he refused) and the subsequent offering of Julia by Caesar in a purely political alliance to strengthen both against Crassus and Cato.

[abm]

Ancient historiography was literary genre and while ancient historians certainly cared about the truth, they also liked to show off oratorical talent. I usually dislike arguments which try to denounce a source simply by pointing to its rhetorical character. This passage of Justin, however, is so rhetorical and so indifferent about historical details, that I would not assume that the author - be it Justin or Trogus - aimed at giving a 'scholarly' judgement. This is typically the kind of passage where the orator had the better of the investigator in the ancient historian.

Secondly, I agree with those who consider Andrew's parallels too far-fetched. If you want, you find can always find some points of comparison between the lives of two statesmen. Moreover, we should not assume that everything which is wrong, is propaganda (cp Waldemar Heckel's most recent article 'Polyperchon as Brigand. Propaganda or Misunderstanding', Mnemosyne 60 (2007), 123-126).

[Taphoi]

I agree with those who consider Andrew's parallels too far-fetched. If you want, you find can always find some points of comparison between the lives of two statesmen.

Well abm, all you need do to persuade us is specify a third pair of historical figures with some kind of father-son relationship, such that all the remarks of Justin/Trogus apply equally to them as to either Philip and Alexander or Pompey and Caesar. This is a challenge that you have defined for yourself. If you succeed, we may have to agree that the resemblance could be coincidental and that Trogus resisted any temptation to be influenced by the history of his own times when he expressed his opinions of Philip and Alexander.

he might just as well have written of Philip and Attalus.

Whereas it might be argued that Attalus began the conquest of the whole world when he led Philip's expeditionary force into Asia, that would have the effect of putting him into the Philip role in Justin's peroration. Therefore Philip would be in the Alexander role, which clearly doesn't work at all!

Best wishes,

Andrew

[amyntoros]

Well abm, all you need do to persuade us is specify a third pair of historical figures with some kind of father-son relationship, such that all the remarks of Justin/Trogus apply equally to them as to either Philip and Alexander or Pompey and Caesar.

Actually, I don’t think the above needs to be done to persuade anyone. All the remarks of Justin/Trogus do not apply equally to Pompey and Caesar – only some of them do. As abm said, “If you want, you can always find some points of comparison between the lives of two statesmen.”

Best regards,

[Paralus]

Whereas it might be argued that Attalus began the conquest of the whole world when he led Philip's expeditionary force into Asia, that would have the effect of putting him into the Philip role in Justin's peroration. Therefore Philip would be in the Alexander role, which clearly doesn't work at all!

Caesar succeeded Pompey in effect and he did complete the establishment of the Roman Empire...

As it so clearly does not for the "father" (Caesar) completing the work of the "son" (Pompey) in your flawed analogy. Which, of course, is the point.


I notice you steadfastly refuse to address the rest of the points raised.

I would think that the onus of persuasion here rests on the one who made the claim that Caesar and Pompey were "father and son". To date, I have seen little that is persuasive; only a massaging of the language used into a "father and son relationship".

Trogus will have been writing under Augustus - the eventual winner of more than sixty years of struggle. He seemingly was not at all moved to make observations about of any of the other major figures who loomed large in this upheaval. The most logical will have been that winner, the adopted son (Octavian), to whom it actually fell to complete the father's (Caesar) work. There would, then, be a reason for its cloaking in a discussion of Alexander and Philip.

Your arguments fail to flatter.

[karen]

Hi all:

Without getting into the analogy argument (though I think Caesar and Pompey as father and son is a stretch), I'd like to take on a possible debate topic that Amyntoros expected (and perhaps hoped for? ) and make the observation that Justin here:

The one wished to reign with his friends, the other to reign over them.

...would seem to be referring to Alexander as the one who wants to reign with and Philip reign over, judging by part of the paragraph above, viz:

[Philip] maintained friendships more with a view to interest than good faith. It was a common practice with him to pretend kindness where he hated, and to counterfeit dislike where he loved; to sow dissension among friends, and try to gain favour from both sides.

If these are your habits, you actually don't have any real friends, let alone can be said to want to rule with them.

Karen

[Paralus]

The one wished to reign with his friends, the other to reign over them.

...would seem to be referring to Alexander as the one who wants to reign with and Philip reign over, judging by part of the paragraph above...

Hi Karen,

You'd be hugely surprised to learn that I disagree. As I wrote to Andrew:

The descriptions of Philip’s court paint a picture of a King at pains to have his nobility, particularly the closest of them, close and to feel part of the process. Philip took pains to appear little different to his nobles who, though lesser in rank in reality, shared a common bond with their king who looked and acted little if any different to them. By his end in Babylon, it would be a bit strange to suggest that the Macedonian rank and file shared this view of Alexander.

My italics, of course. Nonetheless, the Macedonians certainly held Alexander in a much less favourable light at his end than they did Philip. Why might that be?

[karen]

Hi Paralus:

I figured this would get your goat

Nonetheless, the Macedonians certainly held Alexander in a much less favourable light at his end than they did Philip.

Can you substantiate this?

Warmly,
Karen

[Paralus]

I am going to bed. Birthday and all...

How many tales of the Macedones being upset with their king does one hear during Philip's reign? How much "insurrection"?

Compare with Alexander's last years. Please let's not go to the death bed scenes. Those are irrelevant. When Aexander was alive and kicking, the Macedones made their feelings about their king well known in a fashion we never hear about in Philip's reign.

In Alexander's last year or so he was "loved" by the Macedonians like an abusive husband is loved by an abused wife: neither could conceive life without the abuser.

[athenas owl]

Well, Paralus, off the top of my head, didn't Philip have a mutiny on his hands in the mid 350's? And possibly at the beginning of his reign, as well after the death of his brother in a battle which he lost (going from memory here).

I really like Philip, he's much more "likable" than Alexnader, but to think his dealings with his army were always smooth sailing is not correct.

Opis, what an odd mutiny...after all the travels, battles and the Beas...they didn't mutiny becuase he was taking them on yet another perilous journey, but because he was sending them home. Most of the mutineers were NOT veterans of the Gedrosian, but the infantry that came back with Craterus, right?

The real and final mutiny may have been one that proved fatal to Alexander, but a very subtle one it would have been..if he was poisoned. But that's a whole other can of worms.

[karen]

Happy birthday Paralus (though probably belated at this point, since you're not going to read this until tomorrow...)

I'd say that's a bit slim on the substantiation.

Besides, you said Makedonians were much less pleased with Alexander at his end compared to Philip. It's specifically that that I'm challenging.

Philip's end was brought about by a Makedonian who was clearly not pleased with him (understandably, imo). Unlike in assassination attempts against Alexander, insofar as there was a conspiracy, no one was sympathetic enough with Philip to tip him off. Yes, Alexander had arguments with nobles and army both, but in the end, they were still with him. (When it comes to the cause of Alexander's death, I'm in the malaria/stress camp.) I think both nobility and army, in the cases of both Alexander and Philip, were in the main and to the end loyal to and pleased with their respective kings, except for the odd few. (And I don't think we can reasonably judge a king's character based on anyone's displeasure when it runs along the lines of "He is king and I'm not, dammit.")

Besides, my original argument was that Justin's own words bely his claim (if he was indeed claiming) that Philip wanted to rule with his friends, and Alexander over. You disagree but only cite yourself, and even in that quote talk about "the rank and file" in relation to Alexander, not the nobles or his friends, which I don't think is an effective rebuttal.

Warmly,
Karen

[amyntoros]

I don’t know enough about Philip to say if Justin’s assessment is accurate here. I wish we had Theopompus’ works on Philip or even some of the lesser writers, but we don’t, unfortunately.

As for Alexander wanting to reign “over” his friends, well, Justin shows Alexander sending back to Macedon with Craterus “his own friends, too … Polysperchon, Clitus, Gorgias, Polydamas, Amadas, and Antignenes.” One presumes that these men were not happy to leave and that Alexander was pleased to dispense with them, although, strangely, Justin has the cause of the army’s mutiny the fact that the regular veterans really wanted to go! He begins the tale with Alexander discharging “some” of the veterans and the rest complaining that they too should be dismissed, and after Alexander’s speech about bringing Persians into the army we have:

At this proceeding the Macedonians were much dissatisfied, exclaiming that “their enemies were put into their places by their king;” and at length they all went to Alexander in a body, beseeching him with tears “to content himself rather with punishing than ill-treating them.” By this modest forbearance they produced such an effect upon him, that he released eleven thousand veterans more.

Furthermore, Justin supports the poisoning of Alexander, blaming Antipater as the author of the conspiracy because “Antipater, who seeing that his dearest friends were put to death, that Alexander Lyncestes, his son-in-law, was cut off, and that he himself, after his important service in Greece, was not so much liked by the king as envied by him …”

I’m not saying Justin/Trogus is an accurate historian – far from it – but from his own interpretation of events I can understand why he might say that Alexander wanted to rule over his friends. It’s his view that we are discussing and obviously our own may differ. Personally I think that Alexander’s decisions were his own – there seems to be no strong evidence of him submitting to the counsel of his friends if he disagreed with them – so one could say that he ruled “over” his friends in that respect.

Best regards,