Alexander on Mount Athos

[rocktupac]

Can anyone tell me where the story of Dinocrates wanting to carve Alexander (or a godlike figure that mirrored Alexander) on the face of Mount Athos appears? Supposedly this took place before the building of Alexandria in Egypt and Alexander rejected the idea. I have read this in a number of online articles but have failed to locate the source. Thanks!

[marcus]

Can anyone tell me where the story of Dinocrates wanting to carve Alexander (or a godlike figure that mirrored Alexander) on the face of Mount Athos appears? Supposedly this took place before the building of Alexandria in Egypt and Alexander rejected the idea. I have read this in a number of online articles but have failed to locate the source. Thanks!

Plutarch, Alexander, 72.3-4 (this trans by Bernadette Perrin)

[3] ... He therefore longed for Stasicrates above all other artists, because in his innovations there was always promise of great magnificence, boldness, and ostentation. [4] This man, indeed, had said to him at a former interview that of all mountains the Thracian Athos could most readily be given the form and shape of a man; if; therefore, Alexander should so order, he would make out of Mount Athos a most enduring and most conspicuous statue of the king, which in its left hand should hold a city of ten thousand inhabitants, and with its right should pour forth a river running with generous current into the sea. This project, it is true, Alexander had declined; but now he was busy devising and contriving with his artists projects far more strange and expensive than this.

It doesn't say that Stasicrates proposed the project before 331BC, although it does suggest it was some time prior to Hephaistion's death (at which time it is mentioned by Plutarch).

Hope this helps.

ATB

[amyntoros]

It doesn't say that Stasicrates proposed the project before 331BC, although it does suggest it was some time prior to Hephaistion's death (at which time it is mentioned by Plutarch).

Could have been prior to 331 'cause Strabo (who also mentions the Mount Athos project) says Stasicrates (Cheirocrates) was the architect of the rebuilt temple at Ephesus. Assuming, reasonably, that he and Alexander were in communication at that time it seems likely he would have brought up the subject.

Strabo Book XIV. Chapter I. 23. Ionia. Ephesus.
After the completion of the temple, which, he says, was the work of Cheirocrates (the same person who built Alexandria, and also promised Alexander that he would form Mount Athos into a statue of him, which should represent him as pouring a libation into a dish out of an ewer; that he would build two cities, one on the right hand of the mountain, and another on the left, and a river should flow out of the dish from one to the other,)* - after the completion of the temple, he says that the multitude of other sacred offerings were purchased by the Ephesians, at the value set on them by artificers, and that the altar was almost entirely full of the works of Praxiteles. They showed us also some of the performances of Thraso, namely, the Hecatesium, a Penelope, and the old woman Eurycleia.

Then there's the quote from the Moralia's On the Fortune or the Virtue of Alexander II.

Plutarch, Moralia 335c—f Among the other artists at his court was Stasicrates the master-sculptor, not seeking to make something flowery or pleasant or lifelike to look upon, but employing a magnificence in workmanship and design worthy of a king's munificence. He followed Alexander into Asia and found fault with the paintings, sculptures, and moulded likenesses that had been made of him, on the ground that they were the works of timid and ignoble artists. "But I, your Majesty," said he, "have conceived the project of placing your likeness in living and imperishable material, with roots that are everlasting and weight immovable and unshakable. For Mount Athos in Thrace, in that part where is its highest and most conspicuous summit, has well-proportioned surfaces and heights, limbs and joints and proportions that suggest the human form. When it has been properly carved and worked into shape, it can be called Alexander's statue, and Alexander's statue it will be; with its base set in the sea, in its left hand it will encompass and hold a city with ten thousand inhabitants, and with its right pour from a bowl of libation an ever-flowing river down into the sea. But as for gold and bronze, ivory, wooden timbers, and dyes, which make those paltry images that can be bought and sold, stolen, or melted down, let us reject them all!" Alexander listened to his words and admired but declined with thanks the lofty designs and the boldness of the artist. "But," said he, "let Athos remain as it is. It is enough that it be the memorial of the arrogance of one king; but my imprint the Caucasus shall show and the Emodian range and the Tanaïs and the Caspian Sea; these will be the image of my deeds.

Now, I know that Plutarch may have been putting words into Alexander's mouth but I suspect that had the conversation taken place at a later date then Alexander's "image of my deeds" would have encompassed much more than is listed above.

Best regards,

[rocktupac]

Marcus and Amyntoros: thank you both so much! This definitely helps.

[marcus]

Marcus and Amyntoros: thank you both so much! This definitely helps.

Amyntoros (unusually) forgot a couple of references:

Lucian How to Write History 12

This is what happened to Aristobulus when he wrote of the single combat between Alexander and Porus; he read this particular passage in his work to Alexander thinking to give great pleasure to the King by ascribing falsely to him certain deeds of valour and inventing achievements too great to be true. They happened to be sailing on the River Hydaspes at the time, and Alexander took the book and threw it straight into the water with the remark: “You deserve the same treatment, Aristobulus, for fighting single-handed duels for my sake like that and killing elephants with one throw of the javelin.” Indeed it was certain that Alexander would be angry at such a thing – he had not put up with the effrontery of the engineer who had promised to fashion Athos into his portrait and shape the mountain to the King’s likeness. Alexander at once realized that the man was a flatterer and had no longer employed him.

And another Lucian reference:

Lucian Essays in Portraiture Defended 9

She <Panthea> did not want you to think her less intelligent than Alexander. In his case, when the master-builder undertook to remodel the whole of Athos and shape it into his likeness, so that the entire mountain would become the image of the king, holding a city in either hand, Alexander would not agree to the monstrous proposal. Thinking the project over-bold for him, he stopped the man from modelling colossi on a scale that transcended convincingness, bidding him to let Athos alone and not to diminish so great a mountain to similarity with a tiny body. She praised Alexander for his greatness of soul, and observed that thereby he had erected a monument greater than Athos itself in the minds of those who should think of him ever and anon in time to come; for it took no little determination to contemn so marvelous an honour.

ATB