Introduction

This is a (mostly) historical commentary on the anonymous late work, vari- ously referred to in modern academic literature: Historia Alexandri Magni, the Alexander Romance or Ps.-Callisthenes. The issues of its date and authorship will be discussed briefly later in this introduction. For now it suffices to say that no matter how complex the process of transmission of stories about Alexander, and how many strata of the Historia Alexandri Magni can be identified, the earliest version of the Alexander Romance of which we have exact knowledge, the so-called α recension, must have had an author or editor. For lack of a better solution, this person will be referred to here as Ps.-Callisthenes. Out of the many existing versions of the Alexander Romance (see Section 8 below), this commentary concentrates almost exclusively on ms. a, which is the best Greek rendition of the lost archetype (α). This version is perhaps least important to the study of Ps.-Callisthenes’ influence on cultures of Europe, Africa, the Mediterranean and the Middle East and Central Asia in the Middle Ages and early modern times, as it lacks many episodes and motives popular after the end of antiquity.1 Its value may lie, however, in best preserving the earliest stratum of the Alexander Romance, and with it some evidence of the life and exploits of Alexander the Great and the development of his legend in antiquity. This commentary was born out of the need to explore all possible sources of information on Alexander, which can be found almost exclusively in this earliest surviving version of the Alexander Romance.

1 Author, Title and Date of Composition

The ancient work commented upon in this book is most commonly referred to in modern literature as the Alexander Romance, or more formally Pseudo- Callisthenes, Historia Alexandri Magni. This second title is ultimately derived from the incipit in the Greek manuscript Parisinus graecus 1685 (belonging to β family) kept in the Bibliothèque nationale in Paris dated to 1468. The learned scribe, Monk Nektarios of the St. Nicholas Monastery in Otranto says this about the contents of the manuscript:

1 About the AlexanderRomance in Europe, Asia and Africa in the Middle Ages see now Zuwiyya 2011.

Καλλισθένης ἱστοριογάφος ὁ τὰ περὶ τῶν Ἑλλήνων συγγαψάμενος. Οὗτος ἱστο- ρεῖ Ἀλεξάνδρου πράξεις

Historian Kallisthenes, who wrote about the affairs of the Greeks, this way describes the deeds of Alexander.

Nektarios did not invent this attribution: it belonged to the Byzantine cultural tradition from at least the twelfth c. and was known already to IoannesTzetzes.2 The author named in Nektarios’ incipit, Kallisthenes of Olynthos, was a well- known Greek historian whose works have sadly disappeared save for small fragments collected by F. Jacoby.3 Cousin and collaborator of Aristotle, he earned his reputation as historian through a monograph of the Third Sacred War and through the Hellenika or the Greek history of the period 386–356bc. Recommended by Aristotle, Kallisthenes accompanied Alexander to Asia as the official historian of his expedition. With Alexander’s approval he sent his work back to Greece book by book, already contributing to the development of Alexander’s legend within the king’s own lifetime. For all the rhetorical embellishment, this was an extremely valuable work written by a first-class professional historian and an eye-witness, and it was surely consulted by many later Alexander historians. Kallisthenes did not cover the whole history of Alexander, having fallen victim in 327bc to the “proskynesis affair” in which he demonstrated civic disobedience against what in the Near East was a universal gesture of respect, which the Greeks (and Macedonians) wrongly interpreted as the sacrilegious granting of divine honours to a living person, Alexander in this case. Kallisthenes’ use of proskynesis disqualified him as a courtier and led to his downfall and death. He was soon accused of inspiring potential assassins of Alexander in the “Conspiracy of the Pages,” arrested, tortured and either executed or left to die in prison.4 The sheer fact of Kallisthenes’ death preceding Alexander’s makes his authorship of the Historia Alexandri Magni impossible, since it runs to the death (323bc) and burial of Alexander in Memphis (321bc). This was noticed by the first modern scholar to deal with the manuscript Parisinus graecus 1685, Isaac Casaubon, a famous humanist and the keeper of the Royal Library in Paris. In a letter dated 15 August 1605 to Joseph Scaliger, another leading humanist, he

2 Chiliades i 316–329, iii 390, 885–889. Stoneman 1996, 601; Bounoure 2004, xii. 3 FGrH 124: 95 fragments printed in 27 standard pages. 4 Plu. Alex. 54.2–55.9; Arr. An. iv 14.1–3; d.l. v 5; Just. xii 6.17, 7.1–3; Suda, s.v. Καλλισθένης. Brown 1949; Rubinsohn 1993; Nawotka 2010, 288–294.