Was Alexander the Great poisoned by arsenic?

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Alexias
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Re: Was Alexander the Great poisoned by arsenic?

Post by Alexias »

This is the quote from Bosworth "Conquest and Empire" 1988
The record is vivid but its authenticity has been questioned. There are discrepancies, some of them serious, in the versions quoted by Plutarch and Arrian, and the common tradition has one apparent glaring anachronism: seven senior officers are said to have enquired about Alexander by incubation in the sanctuary of Sarapis. Now the Hellenistic deity Sarapis is generally acknowledged to be a creation of the reign of Ptolemy I, and there can have been no temple in Babylon during Alexander's reign....A solution is not easy, and, even if the Diary were vindicated as a contemporary compilation by Eumenes, that would not guarantee the total reliability of the document. Given that there were rumours of poisoning, it was natural that Eumenes, who was a guest at the fatal banquet, edited an account which made the death seem due to illness, possibly exacerbated by drink.
...In that case the record is too partial for any diagnosis of the illness to be attempted. We can rule out the violent and rapid demise described in the vulgate tradition, but all that remains is a fever intensifying over ten days and ending in coma. Whether the disease was malaria or some other tropical ailment will never be known. It may well have been assisted by the indubitable of Alexander's constitution after his chest wound at the Malli town and the continual epic carouses of his court, and the progress of the illness could have been artificially and maliciously accelerated. Under the circumstances fould play was bound to be alleged, but the evidence, then as now, is too scanty for any allegation to be sustained.
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