#diodoros

Alexander and the Delphic Oracle

First, before answering, let’s do a quick PSA. I’m sure the asker meant to address me in the most polite way they knew how, and I’ve run into this error frequently with undergrads, who (at least in American public schools) are told to address a female teacher as “Ms.” or “Mrs.”

Thus, I offer this correction as gently as possible. But it’s important in an era when titles are being withheld from women as a means of belittlement—then, if a woman dares to object, they’re made fun of or called uppity and “sensitive.”* Again, I’m sure the asker here did not mean anything unkind (or they wouldn’t be asking me something in the first place!). So this is NOT a slap at them. But I’m not a Mrs. (I'm not married, and Reames is my birth name). I’m Dr. Reames or Professor Reames. You can even call me Jeanne (as long as you’re not a student in my class, ha). If you’re a (US) college student and unsure if your instructor has a PhD, “professor” is always safe. 😊

Now, to the question….

Plutarch tells a rather peculiar little story of new King Alexander, on his way home from a meeting of the Corinthian League (in Corinth), stopping at Delphi to ask the oracle a question. I should add, this event occurs right after Plutarch’s description of ATG’s meeting with the Cynic philosopher Diogenes. (E.g., it’s part of a “theme.”)

Now, the Delphic oracle wasn’t open for consults all the time. She only heard them a day or so a month…and that for only some months of the year. He came at the wrong time of year (winter, when Dionysos held the oracle, not his half-brother Apollo). So she told him, “No.” Reportedly, he stormed to her little house in the village of Delphi to manhandle her, intending to drag her to the oracle for his query. She replied, “Son! You’re invincible!” Pleased with that, he let her go.

And Plutarch presents this as if it’s all a-okay.

This is weird. It’s weird that Plutarch, a priest of Delphi from Chaironeia, wasn’t up in arms about this clear affront to an honored oracle (and an old woman). It’s an act of asebia (impiety). But it would be even weirder if Alexander had actually done it. Alexander, the uber-pious.

Plutarch is the ONLY one to tell this story. Anywhere.

Yet there’s a story remarkably like it with different players set during the Third Sacred War when the Phokians had seized the Oracle. It’s this event that set off the war, and which brought ol’ Philip into southern politics and eventually landed him a seat on the Amphictyonic Council as a staunch “Defender of Apollo.” Philomelos was the leader of the Phokians early in the war. Below are both accounts, starting with Diodoros’s (original source likely Kallisthenes, who wrote a history of the war).

With the oracle in Philomelus’ hands, he instructed the Pythia to continue prophesying from the tripod in the traditional way. When she refused, he threatened her and compelled her to mount the tripod. To this display of excessive force, she responded by declaring that he could do whatever he wanted—and he was pleased by this and declared that he had the oracle that suited him. He immediately had the oracle inscribed and set up for all to see, in order to make it clear that he had the god’s permission to do whatever he wanted, and he convened an assembly at which he boosted morale in the ranks by telling them about the prophecy (Diod. 16.27.1-2, Waterfield trans).

And now, wishing to consult the god concerning the expedition against Asia, [Alexander] went to Delphi; and since he chanced to come on one of the inauspicious days, when it is not lawful to deliver oracles, in the first place he sent a summons to the prophetess. And when she refused to perform her office and cited the law in her excuse, he went up himself and tried to drag her to temple, whereupon, as if overcome by his ardour, she said: “Thou art invincible, my son!” On hearing this, Alexander said he desired no further prophecy, but had from her the oracle which he wanted (Plut. Alex. 14.4, Perrin trans.)

With Philomelos, there is no question later in Diodoros that his act was impiety. His eventual death is (partly) attributed to it. Plutarch picks up this event, dusts it off, recasts the “inquirer,” and—moreover—uses it as affirmation of Alexander’s “invincibility.” Remember “The Invincible” was his nickname in Greece in his own day. The Romans called him Magnus (the Great).

In short, Plutarch retooled the story to suit his own purposes.

So no, it never happened. At least, not with Alexander. (And he’d have been horrified, I think, to hear he’d been accused of any such thing.)

Plutarch makes these detail changes when it suits him. I have an article coming out in a year or so where I discuss this tendency and bring the receipts (of quite a few examples)—including one I think a lot of folks here will find VERY interesting. But I’m not the only one saying it about this event in particular. It’s been noted as an “odd” episode before, including by Hamilton, if I recall (who did the commentary on Plutarch). But Lara O’Sullivan really showed where it came from, source-wise, in her “Callisthenes and Alexander the Invincible God,” P. Wheatley and E. Baynham, eds., East and West in the World Empire of Alexander: Essays in Honour of Brian Bosworth. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press (2015), 35–52.

Some may still wonder why Alexander wouldn’t have gone to the oracle?

He didn’t need to. His father already had. And if later historians (such as Diodoros) reinterpreted her pronouncement to be about Philip’s murder, not the fall of Persia, it was a positive reply at the time. Going to Delphi again might risk something less flattering/hopeful. Not to mention, it was the wrong time of the year, and Alexander knew that. He had more important fish to fry. He wasn’t going to hang around, waiting (for months) for an auspicious day.

He was good with the oracle his father had got. After all, he’d been trumpeting for months that “only the name of the king had changed.” The original oracle would do just fine.

------------------------

“You’re still feeling sick?” Roman had reached out to wrap his fingers around the other’s wrist, feeling the weakened energy inside his friend’s body. The Vidalis coven had been relatively silent as of late, and the earth witch was concerned ever since hearing Anastasia had woken up. “Your mother – is she okay? What’s going on, Dio?”

Historians of Alexander the Great

I suspect there is some name confusion here.

Aelian is an ancient author, and his work the Varia Historia does mention Alexander, but not much, relatively. The Loeb Classical Library translated it in 1997 (before that, it was only in Greek, which is how I first encountered it when I used it for my dissertation). His more popular On Animals (5 vols.) has been available in English for a while. So I'm thinking this probably isn't the author you mean.

Claudius Aelianus wrote in the 3rd century; he's best known in Alexander fandom circles as one (of two) authors (Epictatus in Arrian is the other) who frankly claims Alexander was Hephaistion's lover (erastes). But because it's late, and even in antiquity he was, as the Loeb library charmingly calls him, "light reading" for Romans, he can't be given a lot of credit. E.g., dramatic exaggeration was the stock-in-trade of his style of writing.

Now, who I think you actually mean IS the Arrian mentioned just above: The Anabasis of Alexander. He's probably the most popular ancient author on Alexander, although Plutarch rivals him because Plutarch's Life of Alexander is both shorter and has more colorful stories. Arrian is also often cited as the most reliable Alexander historian, and that's not wrong...for some things (particularly details of military campaigns). But he's also not always right and the so-called "vulgate" of (at least) Diodoros and Curtius should, imo, be read for correctives and things Arrian glosses/doesn't want to talk about.

If I had to give someone a single ancient history on Alexander, it would be Arrian. That said, I wouldn't give just one. I really do suggest you read all four of the major ones (Justin is a crap-shoot, honestly).

For more on the Big Five, as I call them, this video might be useful. (And part of why I made them! Now I can just point and say, "Go there.") It even includes suggested translations.

In fact, the entire playlist called "Introducing the Sources on Alexander and ancient Macedonia" might be of use, if you've got the time. The one linked above is actually the longest at about 32 minutes. The rest are all under half an hour, and a couple under 15 minutes.

This is super easy. Diodoros, Book 17. Because he's part of the so-called "vulgate" and shorter than either Arrian or Curtius, and he can abbreviate events to the point they're not clear, he's sometimes discounted.

Yet he's not only our chief source for both Philip's reign (book 16) and that of the early Successors after Alexander (books 18-20), he records things not found in the others (like the alternative version of the battle of Granikos and several events in India that were not found in Kleitarchos, which he shares with Curtius [and Justin]). He also gives events going on in the same year in OTHER places. This helps us time things better such as Agis's Revolt. He can get dates wrong, but it was his dating that I used when writing Dancing with the Lion. He may be briefer (after all, he's writing a World History, not a specifically Alexander history), but he's not a bad historian. After reading back through books 16-18 a couple summers ago (didn't need 19-20), I decided I actually quite like his straightforward style.

So I think Diodoros is our most underrated source. I just wish we had 1) the missing pieces (several lacunae, especially over events I'd like to know more about), and 2) a commentary. Although I understand Frances Pownall is planning to work on one, bless her! She's a top tier scholar and her work on Brill's New Jacoby is stellar.

Dio was one of Roman’s few friends, and the witch wondered if the Vidalis understood what that meant to boy who grew up with no one. Solitude had become Roman’s only friend, until the Vidalis witch coaxed him out of his bubble unknowingly. After the whole fiasco from the party that Roman had promptly ignored, social gatherings weren’t exactly his thing, but it involved his friend’s mother, and the last thing he wanted the other to feel was alone. “Dio – hi,” Roman held out a bag containing spanakopita, “I brought this for you. I just wanted to see how you were doing.”

So I’m currently reading back through all the Alexander historians, in toto, from front to end, to get a feel for the text itself, what each emphasizes with regard to several research questions. I’m using the Loeb, so I have the Greek, which is the old Welles translation, not the recent, better one by Robin Waterfield. So if you don’t need the Greek, read that one.

Anyway, I get to a passage in Diodoros’s very different account of Granikos (which is interesting in itself, how much it differs from the more widely accepted accounts in other sources, including others of the so-called “Vulgate” tradition)...at the end of the battle, Welles says, “...the king by common consent won the palm for bravery.” And I sat up, thinking, “WTF? I didn’t think the Macedonians used that sort of award structure.” Crowns, yes, but they didn’t seem to have the award organization the Roman army used.

Anyway, I look over at the Greek, but I don’t know the Greek word for “palm,” so I run back inside to translate the line, which in Greek reads (h = eta, w = omega):

...o men basileus omologoumenon tes andragathias to prwteion aphnegkato...

Yeah...there’s no PALM in there, turns out.

And the king was acclaimed unanimously to take away with him the prize for first in high bravery.

Welles...this is not the damn US army with a Gallantry Palm. Quit translating loosely and subbing modern phrases or anachronistic symbols.

I wasted fifteen minutes messing around with this only to discover I’d been right in the first place, and Macedonians didn’t employ that military award.