Diogenes’ Wit
The folks at Mental Floss tell us Diogenes was the “Henny Youngman of philosophers” …
rogueclassicism
quidquid bene dictum est ab ullo, meum est
Archive for the month “July, 2010”
This Day in Ancient History: ante diem xii kalendas sextilias
ante diem xii kalendas sextilias
- Lucaria (day 2) — the followup to a similar festival on the 19th commemorating the Sack of Rome by the Gauls; this day marked Rome’s subsquent victory
- ludi Victoriae Caesaris (day 2) — games instituted by/adjusted by Octavian to honour his adoptive father shortly after the latter’s death (possibly moving Caesar’s own ludi Veneris Genetricis)
- 64 A.D. — the Great Fire of Rome (day 4)
Pompeii Poop
Image via Wikipedia
Tip o’ the pileus to the fine folks over at Blogging Pompeii for bringing our attention to an article in the Discovery Channel Magazine highlighting the work of Dr Andy Fairbairn and crew who have been poking around the potties of Pompeii to learn more about what the folks were eating etc. … very interesting article (pdf).
Amphora 9.1
In addition to the job listings (see below), new at the APA site today is the latest edition of Amphora, which appears to be the only one we’ll be seeing this year, alas, due to financial constraints … I’m still trying to decide whether it is reasonable to expect folks to pay 10.00 for two issues; I also wonder if this actually needs to be a print publication at all … it would look awfully nice on an iPad …
JOB: APA Job Listings
… at the APA site, of course …
Classical Words on Youtube
Image via Wikipedia
Well, today my twitterfeed and Facebook feed has been inundated with this video on the plural of octopus (tip o’ the pileus to Terrence Lockyer, Francesca Tronchin, and a few others):
… fwiw, being a Classicist, rogue or otherwise, using octopodes is one of the few times you get to use your Greek plural endings in public, so that’s what I do. And just so you don’t have to just blindly believe an editor at Merriam-Webster, here’s amicus noster Terrence Lockyer’s comments on matters similar brought up on the Classics list a year and a half ago, inter alia:
People will tell you that this should be “octopi”,
because it is from Latin, and Latin words ending “-us”
are pluralized in “-i”. This, however, ignores two
facts: (1) in Latin, common words ending “-us” may
belong to one of three different classes (called
declensions), and while it is true that the most common
class (the second declension masculine) pluralizes in
“-i”, the others simply do not – the second class
(third declension neuter) pluralizes in “-ra” (e. g.,
“opus > opera” [work], “corpus > corpora” [body], to
mention two words adopted by English), while the third
class has plurals spelled with “-us” like the
singulars, though pronounced slightly differently; and
(2) “octopus” is not originally a Latin word at all,
and does not belong to any Latin class.In fact, “octopus” comes from ancient Greek (where it
could mean an eight-legged thing, specifically an
octopus, or a scorpion), and contains the elements
“octo” (eight) and “pous” (foot, leg: this is also
found in the famous name “Oedipus”, from Greek
“Oidipous”, but it is less common to pluralize personal
names; and the Latin equivalent is the word “pes”,
plural “pedes”, from which English gets words like
“pedal” and “pedestrian”). The hyperpedantic who wish
to pluralize “octopus” strictly according to derivation
should therefore use the correct Greek plural, which
would be “octopodes” (pronounced “ok-top-odd-es”), or
in English perhaps “octopods”. For the rest of us,
“octopuses” will do just fine.
That said, it has just come to my attention that this ‘ask the editor’ thing is an ongoing series from the fine folks at Merriam-Webster and there are a couple of others worth taking a look at. This one, ferinstance, looks at the Classical Roots of some English words:
Here’s one that’s another one of my personal bugbears (and I don’t have any qualms about correcting folks):
Enjoy!
CFP: Gods in Ruins
Seen on Classicists (please send any responses to the people/institution mentioned in the post, not to rogueclassicism!)
Gods in Ruins: The archaeology of religious activity in Protohistoric,
Archaic, and Republican central Italy
FIRST CALL FOR PAPERS
Gods in Ruins is a two-day conference to be held over March 20-22, 2011 at
Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford.This conference invites presentation of the results of current or ongoing
work on archaeological evidence for religious activities in central Italy,
with a particular view to advancing scholarly debate on periods, places,
and phenomena under-represented in the literary sources. We aim to bring
together researchers across a range of fields including archaeology, art
history, history, anthropology, archaeozoology, and religious studies; and
to stimulate discussion of shared methodological concerns as well as
sharing new results.Topics for discussion may include, but are not limited to:
• Methodologies for an archaeology of religion
• Cult sites
• Ritual objects and their cultural biographies
• Votives and dedicators
• Religious landscapesWe welcome abstracts from advanced postgraduate students, postdoctoral
researchers, and early career academics whose work engages in whole or in
part with the material remains of religious activities – sanctuaries,
religious architecture, votives, and organic and inorganic residue of
ritual practices – from any period or region in central Italy prior to
c.200 B.C. The language of the conference will be English. Presentations
will be limited to 20 minutes and followed by time for questions and
discussion. Abstracts of approximately 300 words should be sent to
charlotte.potts AT lmh.ox.ac.uk by September 30, 2010 with ‘Gods in Ruins’ as
the email’s subject.Please note that this will be a residential conference at Lady Margaret
Hall, Oxford. Generous support from Oxford’s Craven Committee means that we
hope to subsidise accommodation for speakers with accepted papers on a pro
rata basis.
CONF: Second Qumran Institute Symposium
Seen on Classicists (please send any responses to the people/institution mentioned in the post, not to rogueclassicism!)
Second Qumran Institute Symposium, 21-22 October 2010
Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies, University of Groningen, the Netherlands
The Jewish War against Rome (66-70/74): Interdisciplinary Perspectives
For more information on the conference, short abstracts and to register, please go to www.rug.nl/qumraninstitute
Programme
Thursday, 21 October 2010
8.30 Coffee and tea
9.15-9.30 Opening
9.30-10.15 1. Steve Mason: History as Narrative or Argument? Using Josephus for the History of Roman Judaea
10.15-11.00 2. Jan Willem van Henten: Rebellion under Herod the Great and Archelaus: Analogies, Tropes and Josephus’ Reliability
11.00-11.30 Break11.30-12.15 3. Julia Wilker: Josephus, the Herodians and the Jewish War
12.15-13.00 4. Daniel Schwartz: Josephus on Albinus: The Eve of Catastrophe in Changing Retrospect
Lunch14.30-15.15 5. Robert Deutsch: The Coinage of the First Jewish Revolt, 66–73 c.e.
15.15-16.00 6. Donald Ariel: Identifying the Mints, Minters and Meanings of the First Jewish Revolt Coins
16.00-16.30 Break
16.30-17.15 7. Jodi Magness: A Reconsideration of Josephus’ Testimony about Masada
17.15-18.00 8. Pieter van der Horst: Philosophia epeisaktos: Some Notes on Josephus, A.J. 18.9
18.00 Reception19.30 Dinner
Friday, 22 October 2010
8.30 Coffee and tea
9.15-10.00 9. Andrea Berlin: Identity Politics in Early Roman Galilee
10.00-10.45 10. Jonathan Price: The Jewish Population of Jerusalem from the First Century b.c.e. to the Early Second Century c.e.
10.45-11.15 Break11.15-12.00 11. Werner Eck: Die römischen Repräsentanten in Judaea: Provokateure oder Vertreter der römischen Macht?
12.00-12.45 12. Brian Schultz: Not Greeks but Romans: Changing Expectations for the Eschatological War in the War Texts from Qumran
Lunch14.30-15.15 13. George H. van Kooten: The Earliest Literary Witnesses to the Jewish War: Mark, 2 Thessalonians and the Revelation of John
15.15-16.00 14. James McLaren: Going to War against Rome: The Motivation of the Jewish Rebels
16.00-16.30 Break
16.30-17.15 15. Uriel Rappaport: Who Were the Sicarii: Terrorists? Urban Terrorists? A Suicidal Sect (Group)? Religiously Motivated? Dynastic? Messianic? Territorial?
17.15 Reception19.00 Dinner
Scythian Burial from Kazakhstan
From Eurasianet:
Archeologists in Kazakhstan have discovered the grave of a gold-clad ancient Scythian warrior who has already earned himself a nickname: “The Sun Lord.” Researchers uncovered the find in a Scythian grave consisting of seven burial mounds in Karaganda Region east of the capital, Astana.
The opulence of the warrior’s burial indicates that he was a leader as well as a fighter, expedition leader Arman Beysenov explained. “He was probably a ruler and a warrior simultaneously,” Beysenov said in remarks quoted by the Kazinform news agency on July 16. “The person’s torso was entirely covered with gold. The figure of a leader like this was associated with the sun. He was a sort of ‘sun lord.’”
The warrior was likely buried in the 4th or 5th century BC in a grave that was actually discovered half a century ago, though excavation work only started last year.
Robbers had looted the grave in ancient times, Beysenov said, but it still contained quite a horde of ancient treasure. One of the burial mounds alone yielded 130 gold objects that included the figure of a feline predator, pendants and parts of sword belts. Archeologists also found hundreds of gold beads and 14 bronze arrowheads in the grave.
Inevitably, the archeological discovery is being trumpeted as comparable to that of the Golden Man, found in the Issyk burial mound just outside Kazakhstan’s commercial capital, Almaty, in 1969. The Golden Man, who’s believed to have been a young Scythian prince who lived in the 4th or 5th century BC, was interred wearing some 4,000 gold ornaments.
He has become a national symbol — the image of the Golden Man, with his trademark conical gold headdress, decorates the monument to independence on Almaty’s Republic Square, and in 2006 President Nursultan Nazarbayev unveiled a statue of him outside the Kazakh Embassy in Washington. The original is on display at Almaty’s Museum of Gold.
Archeologists are now hoping that their digs in eastern Kazakhstan will reveal more information about the glorious “Sun Lord,” the latest find from the Scythian past.
… no photos, alas, but here’s a photo of the monument in Almaty’s Republic Square if you need some imagination prodding …
This Day in Ancient History: ante diem xiii kalendas sextilias
- Image by wallyg via Flickr
ante diem xiii kalendas sextilias
- ludi Victoriae Caesaris (day 1)
- 1262 B.C. — based on the ‘Canicular Cycle’ (a.k.a. the Sothic cycle) of the Egyptians, this day is suggested for the foundation of the Pythian Games and the embarkation of Jason and the Argonauts (!)
- 356 B.C. — birth of Alexander the Great (one suggested date)
- 64 A.D. — the Great Fire of Rome (day 3)
- 1304 — birth of Petrarch
Housekeeping
Image via Wikipedia
It seems to be a bit of a slow news day, and while I procrastinate finishing the office clean up, I’ve done some housekeeping items which I’ve had on the list for a while. Specifically, my ‘Classical Blogosphere’ (i.e. the blogroll) is now in the sidebar ‘below the fold’. At the bottom of the page are a number of items also of interest: the repaired ‘Classical Words of the Day’ feed (not sure why it stopped working), along with the news feeds from Ephemeris and Radio Finland’s Nuntii Latini (now on hiatus, so things won’t show up for a while). The middle column has feeds from BMCR as well as my twitterfeed of book reviews from the popular press. In the third column at the bottom of the page are assorted other items from my twitterfeed, including reviews of ancient dramas, sword and sandal flicks, etc.. Enjoy!
Villa Farnesina Frescoes On View Again
- Image via CrunchBase
From the New York Times:
“A blinding vision.” That’s how the first century B.C. Roman architect and theoretician Vitruvius described the fresco technique popular during his time, and it’s an apt description for the newly revamped rooms of an ancient villa that is showcased at the Palazzo Massimo, part of the Roman National Museum.
Actually, Vitruvius “was criticizing the exuberance of the frescoes of his time and the excessive use of rich colors to create fantastic effects,” explained the museum’s director, Rita Paris. But the staff of the museum has chosen the phrase to ballyhoo the new arrangement the frescoes of the Villa Farnesina (Largo di Villa Peretti 1; archeoroma.beniculturali.it), which opened on July 1.
“We wanted to recreate an environment that would give a better sense of the original villa,” Ms. Paris said. Now, gray walls that mimic the original floor plan separate the various rooms — two bedrooms, a dining area, and various corridors — while a video depicts a 3-D reconstruction of the villa.
A sophisticated and unique lighting system that recreates daylight hours from dusk to dawn in 100-second cycles lets visitors hone in on the details of the frescoes and vault stuccoes, which depict mythological scenes as well as more mundane activities. “It’s akin to seeing through the eyes of ancient Romans,” said Stefano Cacciapaglia, one of the architects who worked on the project.
The villa was discovered in 1879, in the Roman neighborhood known as Trastevere, while Rome was building up the banks of the Tiber. Though hypotheses are still open on its original owners, Ms. Paris suggested that recent research had singled out the first century B.C. general (and close friend of Augustus) Marco Vipsanio Agrippa as a possible proprietor.
The frescoes were restored when the Palazzo Massimo was opened in 1998. It is one of four branches of the National Roman Museum and admission price (7 euros, about $8.50) is valid for three days for all four sites.
via: Frescoes Revamped at Ancient Roman Villa | New York Times (blog)
There’s an url up there which doesn’t work and I can’t seem to find what it was supposed to point to (possibly this, but I can’t find any specific info on this there)…
Marathon 2500th Anniversary
I’m semi-surprised there hasn’t been a bit more hype for this upcoming anniversary … I know they’re planning a number of ongoing events at Oxford, but really haven’t heard much else. This item comes from Reuters:
Exactly two and a half millennia after the Battle of Marathon, an event widely acknowledged to have ensured the democratic legacy of Western culture, two veteran Greek distance runners will aim to bring to life the incredible feat of legendary messenger Pheidippides.
Greek women’s marathon record-holder Maria Polyzou and the first man to repeat Pheidippides feat in 1992, Panayiotis Skoulis, have announced they intend to run the 520 km (325 miles) from Athens to Sparta and back to Marathon virtually non-stop within six days to mark the celebrations of the battle’s 2,500-year anniversary.
The pair will set off from the Acropolis in Athens on Monday, July 26, aiming to reach the southern Peloponnesian city of Sparta on July 29 before running back to the Tomb of Marathon for August 1. This will entail running a double marathon every day for a week, with minimal rest in between.
“This is a special year for the sport and I want to be a part of our history,” Polyzou told Reuters. “Put simply, the marathon is part of my soul. You can’t undertake something like this if you do not believe in the whole idea of the marathon.”
The marathon celebrates the run of a soldier, Pheidippides, from the battlefield near Marathon to Athens in 490 B.C. Pheidippides was carrying the news a Greek victory over the Persians and is said to have collapsed and died at the end of his effort. Out of that legend, the marathon race was born.
But the original legend, whose first report was 600 years after the battle was that the messenger first went to Sparta to ask for help, was rebuffed, and ran back to Marathon, before going to Athens to announce victory.
Polyzou is well placed to spread the marathon spirit. At 42, she has been running marathons for 23 years. She is also the director of the Museum of Marathon and vice-president of her country’s athletic federation SEGAS.
“It’s difficult to say what is more important because each and every part of my career has been equally significant,” added Polyzou, when asked if this would be the pinnacle of her achievements. “It’s a cliché but life is like a road and every part of that road takes you further forward. Perhaps after finishing this challenge though I will answer differently though.”
Greek celebrations of the Battle of Marathon’s 2,500-year anniversary will culminate with the 28th Athens Classic Marathon on October 31, where a record turnout of over 20,000 participants will take part.
via: Greeks to recreate the marathon run of Pheidippides | Reuters
Ages ago I compiled a ‘golden thread’ from the Classics list which had some info on Pheidippides …
Douglas MacDowell’s Classical Legacy
- Image via Wikipedia
Tip o’ the pileus to Tim Parkin for this one from the Glasgow Herald, but which appears to be only available from findarticles.com for some reason; I don’t think we had an obituary for Dr MacDowell:
AN esteemed professor has stunned the Scottish academic world by leaving a pound(s)2 million fortune to the institution where he worked for 30 years.
Professor Douglas MacDowell left the money in his will to Glasgow University on the basis that it is used to reintroduce his old position of Professorship of Greek
The job was mothballed when he stepped down nine years ago after serving the longest period in office of any Glasgow Professor of Greek since 1877.
Professor MacDowell died in hospital of renal failure aged 78 in January this year but the details of his will totalling pound(s)2,157,176.28 have just been revealed.
As well as expressing shock at the reportedly modest-living professor’s wealth, classics experts say the return of the post will be a welcome boost.
MacDowell is credited with establishing the Greek department’s reputation as one of the most revered seats of learning anywhere in the world.
Alan Milligan, 53, classics teacher at the High School of Glasgow, and his wife Dr Susan Milligan, 51, from the Classical Association of Scotland, both studied under the professor.
Mr Milligan said: “It’s one of the oldest chairs at Glasgow University. It will be great to have that tradition kept up.”
Dr Milligan said: “It will give the subject a great boost. It never stopped being taught but there wasn’t a specific chair of it.
“He was absolutely dedicated and was a superb teacher and a scholar who published prolifically. He was a quiet person, very thoughtful.
“He was very precise and had a terrific sense of humour. Nobody would have guessed he had a huge amount of wealth. It’s typical of him it has only come out after his death.”
An only child who never married, London-born MacDowell lived a modest lifestyle in a pound(s)100,000 flat in Glasgow’s Byres Road. He drove a pound(s)1228 Daihatsu hatchback car and his furniture and personal belongings were valued at pound(s)2767 after his death.
He also had a stamp collection worth pound(s)900 but the bulk of his riches were made up of stocks and shares including pound(s)115,000 of BP shares and pound(s)82,000 of shares in mining giants Rio Tinto.
However, in his obituary published in The Herald in February it was noted: “More than one impoverished postgraduate student benefited financially from his generosity.”
He left pound(s)90,000 to friends and pound(s)10,000 to the National Trust for Scotland.
Though the university refused to comment officially, one university source said: “This is a wonderful gesture from Professor MacDowell and has taken everyone by surprise.
“After he stood down as the Professor of Greek the position was frozen and not readvertised.
“I think he felt very passionately that it should be reinstated.
“Discussions are currently ongoing between solicitors handling his estate and the university to decide if and how the wishes in his will can be implemented.”
- via: Professor of Greek leaves pound(s)2m to revive his former post | Glasgow Herald-findarticles.com
This Day in Ancient History: ante diem xiv kalendas sextilias
Image via Wikipedia
ante diem xiv kalendas sextilias
- Mercatus
- Lucaria (day 1) — an obscure festival which seems to be associated with commemorating Rome’s being saved from the Gauls (by hiding in groves?)
- 37 A.D. — the emperor Gaius (Caligula) gives the people a congiarium
- 64 A.D. — the Great Fire of Rome (day 2)
Latest from Silchester
The incipit of a piece in the Guardian:
A battered and corroded thumb-sized piece of bronze has turned out to be a unique find, the earliest representation of an Egyptian deity from any site in Britain – and appropriately, after almost 2,000 years hidden in the ground, it is Harpocrates, the god of secrecy and silence.
The little figure was found at Silchester, site of an abandoned Roman city in Hampshire, in last summer’s excavation, but his identity was only revealed in months of careful conservation work. His Greek and Roman designation as Harpocrates, the god of spymasters, is actually a transcription error.
“In Egyptian mythology the figure is known as Horus, the child of Isis and Osiris,” said Professor Mike Fulford of the University of Reading, director of the Silchester excavation. “He is often shown with his finger in his mouth, a gesture that in Egypt represented the hieroglyph for his name, but was misinterpreted by the Greeks and Romans, resulting in his adoption as the god of silence and secrecy.”
He was originally an ornament on an object, which is itself unique. “The figurine was attached to part of a charcoal-burning brazier which would have been used to provide heating and lighting. This brazier is the only one found in England so we are doubly excited,” Fulford said. “The brazier, the sort of thing you would expect to find in Pompeii, is the first evidence of such a luxurious item from Roman Britain.”
The context of the find suggests the brazier was imported, and later thrown out into a rubbish pit, in the first century AD. [...]
via: Relic of Harpocrates, the god of secrecy and silence, found at Silchester | Guardian
Alas, no photo of the object, either at the Guardian or at the dig website (unless in the latter case it’s one of the blobs of iron that has been cleaned up a bit). We have a nice image of Harpocrates in a previous post … we have had a fair bit of coverage of the Silchester (Calleva Atrebatum) in the past:
Citanda: Aristotle and Ayn Rand Smackdown
Interesting little debate …
York Gladiators Redux
The BBC has a very nice little slideshow of some of the skeletons from that dig at York which are claimed to be of gladiating victims. There’s actually some good stuff here, and since I can’t really embed the slideshow, I do want to make some comments (the numbers refer to the slide):
1. 60 of 80 appear to have died violent deaths; the implication is that all sixty were gladiators?
2. The one arm longer than the other “being consistent with one-sided work from an early age …” I’m not sure how this fits in; I highly doubt we’re dealing with people ‘raised’ to be gladiators. If this is an indication they were non-Roman warriors or something, that could work.
3. Very impressive deep cut going upward; does seem consistent with a gladiator-fight-style wound …
4. Very impressive bite marks; it should be possible to identify the animal from these, no?
5. shackled burial; I really wish we’d stop getting this sensationalism like “yet he received a proper burial” … outside of tossing emperors into the Tiber, the Romans seem to have long allowed execution victims’ remains to receive a proper burial.
6. the ‘hammer’ victim … shouldn’t there be some ‘point of impact’ mark? And shouldn’t the cracks radiate therefrom? This looks more consistent with being hit with a large sword across the top of the head …
7. very nice vertebrae cut; They might be solid ground with this one, although the ‘dispatching’ cuts in gladiating situations tended to be down the windpipe toward the heart rather than across the neck, no? 50 of the 61 skeletons had been so dispatched. In some of the early coverage from this site, though, there was the suggestion that many of the marks indicate the cuts had come from ‘behind’.
Taken together, I think 3, 4, and 6 have me leaning toward the ‘gladiator’ theory. At the same time, though, I think we should remind folks of Anthony Birley’s theory from a few years ago, that these might be victims of Caracalla‘s ‘killing spree’ shortly after Septimius Severus‘ death in 211. This ‘killing spree’ is hinted at in the first three sections of Dio 78, but it’s not clear whether this ‘spree’ happened at York. The Historia Augusta hints similarly, but is far too compressed to be useful. Again, I wonder aloud whether anyone has thought whether many of these victims might not be examples of decimation (although, of course, proving such would be difficult) Whatever the case, I think it safer to suggest that we’ve got a pile of execution victims … some of them might have died in the arena that hasn’t been found (yet?).
Puddle Question: What Killed Alexander the Great?
- Image by brewbooks via Flickr
Those who teach grade-school level math or science are familiar with the concept of a ‘puddle question’. These are usually word problems of some sort which have more than one possible answer. From a teacher point of view, they are designed to assess how a student approaches a problem, comes up with a plan, then solves the problem. They tend to be ‘strange’ things in a math class like “How many raindrops make up a puddle?” (whence comes the name of this type of question) or “How many hours have you spent watching TV your entire life?” In Ancient History, we also have puddle questions, although not known by that name, and possibly the most common/famous one relates to “solving” why Alexander the Great died. Today, Discovery News presents a completely new theory, related to a bacterium from the Styx. Here are some excerpts:
An extraordinarily toxic bacterium harbored by the “infernal” Styx River might have been the fabled poison rumored to have killed Alexander the Great (356 – 323 B.C.) more than 2,000 years ago, according to a scientific-meets-mythic detective study.
[...]
“Indeed, no ancient writer ever casts doubt on the existence of a deadly poison from the Styx River,” Mayor, author of the Mithradates biography “The Poison King,” said.
The researchers believe this mythic poison must be calicheamicin. “This is an extremely toxic, gram-positive soil bacterium and has only recently come to the attention of modern science. It was discovered in the 1980s in caliche, crusty deposits of calcium carbonate that form on limestone and is common in Greece,” author Antoinette Hayes, toxicologist at Pfizer Research, told Discovery News.
Now called Mavroneri, “Black Water,” the Styx originates in the high mountains of Achaia, Greece. Its cold waters cascade over a limestone crag to form the second highest waterfall in Greece.
“Unfortunately, the geochemistry of the river has not yet been studied by modern scientists; therefore, there is no scientific data to support the plausible and interesting calicheamicin theory,” Walter D’Alessandro, hydro-geochemist at the Italian National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology in Palermo, told Discovery News.
Whether Alexander really died from poisoning, as some of his closest friends believed, is pure speculation, Mayor and Hayes concede.
“We are not claiming that this was the poison that killed Alexander, nor we are arguing for or against a poison plot,” Mayor said.
[...]
Retrodiagnoses for his mysterious death have included poisoning, heavy drinking, septicemia, pancreatitis, malaria, West Nile fever, typhoid, and accidental or deliberate poisoning (hellebore, arsenic, aconite, strychnine).
“Notably, some of Alexander’s symptoms and course of illness seem to match ancient Greek myths associated with the Styx. He even lost his voice, like the gods who fell into a coma-like state after drinking from the river,” Mayor said.
The poisoning diagnoses were rejected by many experts because few poisons induce fever. Furthermore, even fewer such poisons were available in Alexander’s time.
However, naturally occurring calicheamicin, which is extremely cytotoxic, could still be the culprit.
“Cytotoxins cause cell death and induce high fever, chills, and severe muscle and neurological pain. Therefore, this toxin could have caused the fever and pain that Alexander suffered,” Hayes said.
According to Richard Stoneman, the foremost expert on the myths of Alexander, the theory offers a good explanation for the Styx’s ancient reputation.
“I personally think that Alexander probably died of natural causes — either typhoid or an overdose of the hellebore used to treat his illness — but other views are possible,” Stoneman, author of “A Life in Legend: Alexander the Great,” told Discovery News.
via: Alexander the Great Killed by Toxic Bacteria?
Back in December of 2004, when West Nile Virus was being suggested as a possible cause of Alexander’s death, I said I would present a summary of the various theories ‘after Christmas’. I don’t appear to have actually ever done that but, fortunately for me, in the mean time an incredibly excellent article on the subject has appear in the January issue of Acta Classica and it’s online at the Free Library:
- Atkinson, John, Truter, Elsie, and Truter, Etienne, “Alexander’s last days: malaria and mind games?”
In brief, it presents Alexander’s symptoms, provides a timeline of what happened when according to the ancient sources, and then has an incredibly useful appendix of all the proposed causes of death and their merits or lack thereof. Just to give you an idea of the things that have been proposed:
- malaria
- alcohol-related problems (this one seems to be the most popular current belief, to judge from some Twitter reactions to the Discovery.com article; recent movies probably contribute to this view)
- typhoid fever
- West Nile Virus/encephalitis
- Schistosomiasis
- some water-bourne illness leading to pneumonia
Whatever the case, both the Discovery article and the Acta Classica one are must reading …
