The early years

[amir]

Dear Friends Allow me to introduce myself, as this is my first post. I am a Persain-Irannian living in Athens. after 2 years, I just finished a comic-book based on the story of the parthenon marbles and lord elgin. It was while I was working on this project that many irannian friends of mine pointed out the fact that " the greeks burnt Persepolis " and so from that angel my fasination started with Alexander. Than while I was in Iran a friend gave me the book ,The Persian Boy. To be honest I started to read with anger in my heart, but I soon realized that the story was much more complicated, so I started reading other books like alexander of Macedonia ( twice ) and now I have in my research watched all the documentarys. In the same time I found this forum, I like to compliment the founders and all those great posts that I have read here.
So to my point...I have hired a team of cartoonists-illustrators and an academic advisor and I would like to invite all those here whom are intrested to follow this story from the start.
We have just finished the first sketches. For now I am very intrested in Alexanders early years. From his birth up to him becoming king.
I like to know who gave him the illiad book ? was it aristotle or leonidis ? or someone else . Also the time alexander spent in Mieza is complicated for me. who was there with him that later became important charachters in his story.
I have so many questions...Thanks for nowAmir

[marcus]

Hi Amir,Welcome to the forum. I think you will find that there are many of us who will be very willing to try and answer as many questions as you can post! One of the things about the history of Alexander, however, is that there are so many things we don't know. You will be able to make up your own mind (so long as you don't ignore those facts that we know to be true!).With regard to your question about Alexander's copy of the Iliad, we do not know for sure. It is unlikely that Aristotle gave him his *first* copy, because it is almost certain that he had a copy many years before he was taught by Aristotle. Personally, I would imagine that his first copy was given to him by Philip or Olympias (or both together), although it is probably that he had been through two or three copies by the time he went to Mieza.All the bestMarcus

[yiannis]

Hi Amir and let me welcome you as well in this forum! Moreover I like comics very much (although I'm 34:-) and I live in Athens so I have more reasons than our common interest on Alexander!
As Marcus mentioned, it's not certain who gave him his copy of Iliad, but as this book was the most common one for boys in Greece at the time it must have been easily accesible to him by any source in the court. So it doesn't really matter!
You'll find most of the info that you need at any time simply by using the "search" function of this site.
Enjoy it!
Kind regards,
Yiannis

[xxx]

Welcome to the Forum!As for his copy of the Iliad - one should remember that in those times books were few and far between being done by hand and only the wealthy could afford (since they consisted of scrolls. A novel of the Iliad's length would have consisted of many many scrolls)or even read them. It is Plutarch who mentions that Alexander kept a special annotated (by Aristotle) copy under his pillow (which of course means it was not a full copy of the Iliad) which he transferred to a chest that was part of the booty he found in Darius' tent. We do know of course that it was his favorite book and that his favorite line was "to be a great king and a great warrior." he referred to it as "his book of war."The ancient Macedonians worshipped all things Homeric, and the Iliad was their instruction book for how they were supposed to live their lives.

[xxx]

As for who attended Mieza with the Prince, we don't really know. Most likely candidates are those who were his Somatophylakes at the end (see Arrian for the list), excluding Peucestas as these were his closest and most trusted friends. We do know that Aristotle kept up a correspondence with Hephaistion and dedicated a book of letters to him and it is pretty well certain he was among the chosen.

[marcus]

Hi Tre,I have to disagree with one comment you make, that Alexander's annotated copy of Iliad was not a complete text. It was annotated, not abridged, which means that not only was it more than likely a complete copy, but it was even longer than the original because it had Aristotle's explanatory notes throughout.It must have been a heck of a lot of scrolls! :-)All the bestMarcus

[maciek]

Hi Amir and welkome!!
I wanted to say something answering Your question but theese guys said everything we can about this. I like to add that it was not importand in Alex's history who gave him first copy of Iliad because I suppose many greek works were in macedonian court so it was only the metter to read it. What was importand - that he got his copy from Aristotele tith his comments - and it was even more precious for him because of it (I have no doubts it was complete).Maciek

[Linda]

I think I read that Aristotle thought the copy of the Iliad Alexander was reading was not up to scratch, or substandard in some way, and provided a better copy. There must have been a huge number of different copies around - fascinating, isn't it? I would imagine that we don't even know if the one we read is the same as Alexander read - unlikely I would have thought, but how close/different we will never know.

[ruthaki]

Be sure and read Mary Renault's "Fire From Heaven" which is about Alexander's childhood and youth. It's by far one of her very best novels.

[marcus]

Hi Linda,I'm not aware of anything in the sources about that, but it might have been supposition by a later writer.Still, I might be wrong - I haven't read much Aristotle, so perhaps he says something in one of his works about it.All the bestMarcus

[John]

OK Here's my $.02:The Iliad was standardized by the 6th century BC Athenian tyrant Peisistratus, who was trying to make sure that everybody's copy of the Iliad said the same thing. And he was so successful that even today, the Iliad we have is almost exactly like the the standardized version of Peisistratus. (You can prove this by the ancient writers who quote the Iliad; it always matches up practically word for word with what our Iliad today says.)As for Alexander, he had the standard text of the Iliad, annotated with Aristotle's pedantry.John

[marcus]

Well, there you go then!That was worth far more than $0.02, John.Marcus

[davej]

That also explains the unusual fact that Iron weapons, not invented at the time appear in the work. Could also explain why Athens Is listed amongst the ships. When they did'nt go. I think Xena may have been there, she was from the amphipolis, only a short walk from troy. Or maybe not.Ps I know when the amphipolis was settled. It was just a joke.. (not good I know)

[davej]

Welcome Amir,Nice to have a Persian perspective on Ascanda (is that right?). Is he still the boggy man in Persian folk law?I have been to Athens twice, could'nt live there butI did enjoy it. Are you Athens itself or a liittle out of town. The area around sounion is very nice. I also liked Phaleron, I walk around from the Pireas to Phaleron train station one Hot Athens day. There is some nice coast there.

[amir]

Davej I love Athens , Greeks and specially the Parthenon. I live in the center and I know Athens has its critics but as a foreigner living in a foreign land I dont think I should be one of themAmir