This is the third blogpost in the series looking at the women that Diodorus wrote about, following our reading of the history of Alexander the Great in Diodorus’s Library[1] for the Kosmos Society Book Club in the summer of 2023. I extended my reading to Plutarch[2] and Arrian[3] to get a wider picture of Alexander’s life. The first blogpost described some of the social and religious contexts of the time,… Read more
This series of blogposts originated in the Kosmos Society’s Book Club reading, in the summer of 2023, of Diodorus Siculus’ Library, Book 17, which concerns the campaigns of Alexander the Great[1] in the fourth century BCE. As we read, it became evident that more contextual material was available in Books 16, 18, 19 and 20 of the Library, and also in the works of Plutarch[2] and Arrian[3]. Wikipedia dates Diodorus… Read more
Alexander saw that the campaign against the Gandaridae would not be easy, but he was not discouraged. He had confidence in the fighting qualities of his Macedonians, as well as in the oracles which he had received, and expected that he would be victorious. He remembered that the Pythia had called him “unconquerable,” and Ammon had given him the rule of the whole world. 17.93.4, tr. Oldfather For August we… Read more
To accompany our July–August Book Club readings about Alexander the Great, here is a gallery of just a few of the many images, ancient and more modern, depicting Alexander. Plutarch, in his ‘Life of Alexander,’ says: The outward appearance of Alexander is best represented by the statues of him which Lysippus made, and it was by this artist alone that Alexander himself thought it fit that he should be modelled.… Read more
Alexander accomplished great things in a short space of time, and by his acumen and courage surpassed in the magnitude of his achievements all kings whose memory is recorded from the beginning of time. In twelve years he conquered no small part of Europe and practically all of Asia, and so acquired a fabulous reputation like that of the heroes and demigods of old. But there is really no need… Read more