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The Legacy of the Great and the Hellenistic

Gregory H. James Ancient & Professor Anthony Daly College of Liberal Arts 12/9/2011

Did the conquests and achievements of and those of the Successor Kingdoms have any lasting effects on the peoples and were subjected to them?

In under ten years, Alexander the Great destroyed an that took the great conqueror thirty years to build. Out of the ashes of the Persian Empire

Alexander built his own, a vast territory stretching from Greece to the in modern- day , Alexander ruled over one of the most ethnically, culturally, and linguistically diverse the world has ever known. Upon his death in 323 B.., just one month shy of his thirty-third birthday, Alexander left behind not only an empire but a legacy that proved as equally monumental.

While every great general and conqueror since, from to and even

Napoleon, has weighed his accomplishments against those of the Macedonian conqueror.

However, the cultural legacy of Alexander has not merely been in . Alexander’s conquests laid the foundation for the spread of Hellenism, a common cultural and philosophical background that would not be seen again until the spread of centuries later. “As a result of Alexander, Greek athletics would come to be performed in the burning heat of the

Persian gulf; the tale of the would be told on the Oxus and among the natives of the ; … would practice as Buddhists and would be translated into an

Indian …”1 Moreover, the Successor Kingdoms, particularly the , the , and the Greek Kingdom of , also had a hand in shaping this

Hellenistic legacy. For it would be the who would fulfill Alexander’s dream of a

Hellenistic fusion and it would be the artisans of the -Bactrian Kingdom who would first depict Buddha as a man.2 Despite the great cultural achievements of the Hellenistic world, few have survived the centuries. Through the ravages of war and the slow decay of , much of this ancient legacy has been reduced to dust and . The conquests and achievements

1 , Alexander the Great (London: Ltd., 1973), 25. 2 C. A. Robinson, Jr., “The Greeks in the Far ,” The Classical Journal 44, no. 7 (April, 1949): 410

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of Alexander the Great and the Successor Kingdoms had profound effects during the Hellenistic era and in the immediate centuries after. However, these effects were mostly confined to the , and few of these have survived to the modern day.

With the death of Alexander in 323 B.C., one of the largest empires the world had yet known hung in the balance. Over a of ten years and , Alexander and his army carved an empire into the very of . Alexander’s empire, however, was not merely of land or wealth but of the . The seed of was planted by

Alexander throughout the soil of his empire. The Greek world would forever be transformed and the old system, once the cornerstone of Greek civilization, would never again be a viable means of governance in the Hellenic world. Though cities would remain as the political centers of Hellenic civilization, they were now cultural centers rather than sovereign townships.

“…in general the Hellenistic states were agglomerations of cities…”3

Greeks had had contact with much of the known world at this point, but the east, a common recurring theme in Greek since the time of Homer, remained relatively untouched. “ had already reached to ; Greeks had worked as craftsmen near modern or lived in the of the Adriatic south of , but no Greek from the had ever been east of or visited the steps of …”4 All of this would change in the wake of Alexander’s inexorable march east. Greeks would travel to every corner of the empire and establish themselves in an ancient and seemingly alien world. “Interaction between Greek and non-Greek cultures is one of the constants of Greek , and never was it more intense than in the .”5 However, Alexander’s greatest and most lasting

3 C. Bradford Welles, “Alexander’s Historical Achievement,” Greece & Rome 12, no. 2 (Oct., 1965): 225. 4 Fox, 25. 5 S. M. Burstein, “The Hellenistic Fringe: The Case of Meroë,” in Hellenistic History and Culture, ed. . (Los Angeles: University of California Press, Ltd., 1993), 38.

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legacy in Greece, and the rest of for that , was the change he brought about in the of . Prior to Alexander, the term “” in Greece was more a description of an office rather than a ; one would be a king as one might be a general.6 After Alexander, the deification of rulers, the notions of the divine right of and , would come to be mainstays for the two millennia. “Its consequences were an absolutism such as Europe – and for that matter Asia – had never known before and has never ceased to know since.”7

Despite his presence in the for almost ten years, Alexander’s imprint on Asia remains a paradoxical one. While the in question (, , , ,

Persia, etc…) undoubtedly benefited from the influx of Greek and technology, little seems to have changed in the daily life of the local populations. Alexander’s triumph in

Asia was the founding of cities, most notably the of in Egypt, which still survives to this day. “Each Alexandria was a full-blooded city where men had to vote on Greek decrees and agree to Greek …”8 Alexander is said to have founded some twenty cities throughout his lifetime. While they were intended to serve foremost as strategic bulwarks against tribes and local revolts, they also served as outposts of Greek culture and helped to knit together the fragile patchwork that was Alexander’s empire. In many ways, all that held the empire together were the cities.

Perhaps he could have held the empire together; but the very fact that his military successes were so rapid and unabating meant that, in effect, his armies had only cut a narrow track through the Persian empire. His Asiatic ‘empire’ can even be represented, by way of caricature, as little more than a thin strip of conquered land winding across Asia and back, leaving whole regions almost completely

untouched by his passing.9

6 Welles, 221. 7 Scott Ferguson, Greek (Kitchener, Ontario: Batoche Books, 2001), 76. 8 Fox, 488. 9 Graham Shipley, The Greek World After Alexander: 323-30 B.C. (New York: Routledge, 2000), 39.

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In spite of his founding of cities, Alexander had little effect on the peoples whose lands his army marched through. Alexander may have had a grand unifying vision that sought to reconcile Greek and barbarian and bring the two together, but he was never able to translate that vision into governance. Much of the governing of Asia was left to Greek generals whom

Alexander had installed as (regional ) in the model of the Persian he had destroyed. However, these hard military men had little tolerance for Alexander’s fondness of eastern culture and worked mostly to keep open his supply lines. The Persian locals too, it must be remembered, possessed a sophisticated culture as old or even older than that of the Greeks and saw no good to relinquish it.10 “And yet the of was not deep or wide enough for permanent results. It was competing with an alternative, the Iranian to whom a was more the sum of its great families than a self-governing citizenry in an expanse of royal land.”11 For at the time, the family was life’s one continuing facet.

No culture spread through cities and administrative officials could ever hope to change this.

Though Alexander possessed grand ideas, the is that Alexander brought no substantive change to the lands of the east. “The territory was still subject under precisely the conditions as under the Persian administration; the ruler was merely Macedonian and not

Persian, as was his , who retained the Persian title of office.”12 The locals still paid taxes, and were undoubtedly conscripted in of war as they had been while under Persian rule. The only difference now is that the person or persons ordering such things now had in an unknown language. “At the time of his death, he had established no system, and with

10 A. Flower, “Not Great Man History: Reconceptualizing a Course on Alexander the Great,” The Classical World 100, no. 4 (2007): 422. 11 Fox, 493. 12 A. B. Bosworth, Conquest and Empire: The Reign of Alexander the Great (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988): 229.

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the news his world fell apart.”13 Much of what is known about the Hellenistic world would be built not by Alexander but by his successors. Though they would lack his military and grand vision, the Ptolemies and Seleucids and others would be tasked with governing the world

Alexander left behind, albeit a more fractured and divided one. However, it should not be said that Alexander deserves no for what other men were able to accomplish. No one had gone as far as Alexander and no one has since. The Successor Kingdoms would not have been able to accomplish what they did had Alexander not founded Greek cities in the he did. His successors lacked the charisma and in many cases the will to repeat what Alexander had done.

Though Greek culture was already spreading eastward before Alexander crossed the Hellespont, it is unlikely that any Hellenistic kingdoms would have arisen had he not made his long march eastward.

He destroyed the Persian Empire and opened up the East to Greek rule and settlement; and neither Greeks nor Orientals were ever the same again. Contact between the two had existed for centuries of course…The process would have continued if there had been no Alexander, but it would have been slower and

14 more partial.

Within of Alexander’s passing, his generals were fighting like jackals for his corpse. For a time, the empire remained united behind Alexander’s son and mentally deficient half-brother as co-rulers with the general acting as . However, Perdiccas would eventually be assassinated and the empire would come to be divided into three parts: in Egypt, Antigonus in Greece, and Seleucus in the remainder of Alexander’s Persian territory.

Out of all the successors, Seleucus was the most successful militarily; after taking power he was forced to reconquer much of Alexander’s eastern territory which had broken away after his death

13 Welles, 219. 14 Welles, 219.

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and established the Seleucid Empire in 312 B.C.. After Alexander, Seleucus was the greatest founder of cities the east had yet seen. Among them were , a city built on the of the , and , the of the Seleucid Empire, based in Syria. With the exception of Greece and , Syria was the one of the Hellenistic world where Hellenism made a lasting impression on the populace.

The shining exception was Syria, always contested by the Successors’ armies. Circumstances forced Seleucus to found four cities on undeveloped sites, diverting the caravan trade from the through a backward patch of country. Hellenism surged through these cities and their nearby military

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Hellenism had a profound effect on the region of Syria. The city of Antioch would remain a major cultural center well into the Roman period, where it served as a regional capitol of the empire. The heavy imprint of Hellenism on Syria also had a secondary and more dramatic effect – the centuries later. had joined the common Greek culture and with that, adopted the common . “This culture lasted and became the chain for the spread of Christianity. Without the common language of Greek, Christianity could never have spread beyond Judaea.”16 Despite the uniqueness of Syria, the rest of the Seleucid

Empire failed to live up to Alexander’s belief of a united culture. The prejudices of his officers and the problems of time and distance meant that Alexander’s dream would remain just that, a dream. “By the third century the high court officials of the Successors’ kingdoms were almost exclusively Greeks… There is hardly an Iranian or servant known at the western court of the Seleucids; they are only known to have used Iranians in their army where they were too valuable to ignore.”17

15 Fox, 486. 16 Fox, 487. 17 Fox, 480.

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The very attitude of the Seleucids was one of Hellenistic supremacy. In their view,

Greek culture was not meant to fuse with eastern cultures but to dominate them. This attitude did all but assure them a weak hold on the peoples they ruled; eventually culminating in their loss of control over Judaea following the in 143 B.C.E. Like Alexander before them, the Seleucids were never able to maintain a strong hold over their eastern . With no strong cultural allegiance to the western court, the eastern lands would eventually fall under the galloping hooves of Parthian horsemen who seceded from the empire in 247 B.C.E. and over the next century quickly overran the Iranian plateau. With the help of

Roman pressure from the , they would eventually reduce the Seleucid Empire to a small, ineffectual kingdom confined to Syria with the hobnailed boot of Rome ever on its neck. The desiccated kingdom would linger on for another thirty-seven years in a of civil war until 63

B.C.E. when the Roman general had its last two feuding kings executed and made Syria into a Roman . Though Hellenism would live on in Syria and even in Persia under the

Parthians, the once mighty empire that ruled it had been reduced to dust.

Unlike the Seleucids, the Ptolemies would enjoy greater and longer lasting success in ruling their kingdom. Established by Ptolemy I , a former general under

Alexander, in 305 B.C.E., the Ptolemaic Kingdom is regarded as the most successful Hellenistic kingdom. Like the Seleucids, the Ptolemies preserved the local administrative structure rather than seeking to change it. Upon this structure they built a large and powerful centralized bureaucratic state that controlled the Kingdom’s entire . “All of the country’s economy was under their control. Planting was done according to an approved schedule, and industry was organized on a system of royal concessions or monopolies, under the eye of tax-farmers and

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officials.”18 Unlike the Seleucids whose belief in Hellenic supremacy caused them to spurn local

Persian culture, the Ptolemies took a keen liking to Egyptian and customs, though only to engender greater political control. In truth, the Ptolemies were something of a paradox within their own Kingdom. They ruled as , built Egyptian-style , and even adopted

Egyptian-style dress, yet none of the Ptolemies, with the exception of VII (of and Cleopatra fame), ever bothered to learn language. This paradox extended to their treatment of the population as well. Though they paid to the local and spent lavishly on the communities, the Ptolemies never intended the local to be full citizens in their new kingdom, especially in the upper classes. “The court was thoroughly Greek in culture, and particularly under Philadelphos and his successors no Egyptians are known to have held high office or military command…”19

Despite the exclusion of native Egyptians, Hellenic culture nonetheless flowered in Ptolemaic Egypt. Alexandria had become a center of Greek culture, science, and .

“The of experimental Greek science under the patronage of the Ptolemies in Egyptian

Alexandria is the purest tribute to the Greeks’ gifted intellect, for no Persian ever calibrated a , studied anatomy, applied power to toys or divided the world into zones of .”20 Alexandria’s great held copies of every new literary work that was brought to the city. Though the cultural diffusion in Ptolemaic Egypt produced one of the most technologically advanced states on at the time, it gained little in return from Hellenized

Egyptians. “The flowering of science and scholarship in the Ptolemies’ third-century Egypt was mostly the work of Greek immigrants from the old Aegean world; it stood as a tailpiece to the

18 C. Bradford Welles, Alexander and the Hellenistic World (Toronto: A. M. Hakkert, Ltd., 1970), 84. 19 Shipley, 219. 20 Fox, 491.

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history of , owing very little to westernized Egyptians.”21 Alexandria would remain a scientific and cultural seat of the world throughout the Roman and well into the medieval period. Despite its importance in the Hellenistic world, the Ptolemaic Kingdom could not survive the march of history. The history of the Kingdom is dominated by repetitious dynastic scandals and revolts, all of which severely strained the country. In many ways, the

Ptolemies’ fondness of Egyptian customs went too far, as and inbreeding in the royal family wreaked havoc as the government was often left with mentally deficient rulers. The

Ptolemaic Kingdom gradually ceded more and more influence to Rome and finally became a

Roman province with the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 B.C.E.

Though the Ptolemies came closer to fulfilling Alexander’s dream society, they would fall short of a lesser known kingdom that established itself in central Asia. Though originally a satrapy (province) of the Seleucid Empire, Bactria asserted its independence in 250 B.C.E., almost simultaneously with the neighboring Parthians. What followed was a state that that was arguably the purest reflection of Alexander’s dream of a united world. “Bactria remained for two centuries a strong Hellenic state, famous as ‘the land of a thousand cities,’ the Jewel of Iran, whose capital (Bactra, modern ) was called ‘the of the earth.”22 It is interesting to note that the native home of Alexander’s bride, Roxanne, would become the brightest of Hellenism in the East, and perhaps of Hellenism in general. After its break- away from the Seleucids, the Kingdom of Bactria quickly expanded outward over the next century, encompassing all of modern-day , as well as parts of , Pakistan, and . Despite cut off from contact with the west, Greek culture flourished in the cities of Bactria. “Nowhere in the world was the vitality of Hellenism more vividly exhibited than in

21 Fox, 486. 22 Robinson, 406.

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Bactria, a land confronted on every by and cut off from contacts with the West by

Parthia.”23

As the Kingdom expanded into India in the 180’s B.C.E., the Greco-Bactrians would unwittingly serve as the catalyst for one of the greatest cultural exchanges in history. The Greco-

Bactrian Kings, starting under I in the 180’s, began accepting local Indians and others not just as subjects but as citizens in the Greek style. “Indians of various Greek cities were admitted as citizens and held office as a matter of policy…”24 In spite of the granted to them by the Greek kings, the Indians took little from the Greeks. The same could not be said however, of the Greeks themselves. “Though the two peoples lived side by side on good terms, the Indians took little from the Greeks, nor did they become ‘culture-Greeks.’ It was otherwise with the Greeks…In India, however, most Greeks knew an Indian language and by 100 B.C. were Indianized…”25 This knowledge of the Indian language extended even into their economy, where a bilingual coinage was issued with a Greek legend on one side and an Indian on the other.26 All of this however, would pale in comparison to the greatest achievement of the

Indianized Greeks, the depiction of Buddha as a man.

It was the Indianization of the Greeks that led to the one great mark which they upon India and hence upon Farther Asia, the idea of representing Buddha as a man. Hitherto, the presence of Buddha had been shown in art by the -tree, by

27 the of Law, or by his footprints or , or by an empty .

The Greek artisans of the Bactrian Kingdom brought about an artistic that led to the creation of Greco-. and other depictions of the Buddha at the time show him wearing a Greek-style and having curly Mediterranean hair. The Buddha also

23 Robinson, 407. 24 Robinson, 410. 25 Robinson, 410. 26 Robinson, 410. 27 Robinson, 410.

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appears in a multitude of Greek Corinthian-style that have been found in the area, some of which have the Buddha standing alongside traditional Greek mythological characters such as

Heracles. “…in the Punjab, five hundred years after Alexander, Indian Buddhists still carved the tale of the Trojan Horse alongside the life of their Buddha…”28 This artistic style also went on to influence neighboring cultures, specifically the Chinese. “Until this time, Chinese reliefs had been merely incised drawings with a flat surface to the figures, but suddenly figures in high became common, and the have an appearance of depth. From the Graeco-

Buddhist influences spread to Korea and gave rise in the sixth century A.D. to Japanese art.”29

The adoption of Buddhist art by the Greeks was by no means a simple artistic curiosity of

Greek artisans who were trying to adapt to a local market. For many Greeks, it had become an act of faith. It is now believed that Greek Buddhists were not uncommon in the Greco-Bactrian

Kingdom.30 Even some of the Greek kings themselves may have become Buddhists. “ apparently became a Buddhist; at least he was interested in different and sought to learn about .”31 Though the Greco-Bactrian Kingdom would, like the Seleucids, fall under the of invading nomads (in this case, the ), their accomplishments in art and culture would live on.

The conquests and achievements of Alexander the Great and the Successor

Kingdoms had profound effects during the Hellenistic era and in the immediate centuries after.

However, these effects were mostly confined to the cities, and few of these have survived to the modern day. The Hellenistic world is often thought of as a situation where Greeks and natives came together in a cultural . The , however, is much less grand. In

28 Fox, 492. 29 Robinson, 412. 30 Fox, 494-495. 31 Walter Eugene Clark, “The Importance of Hellenism from the Point of View of Indic-. II,” Classical Philology 15, no. 1 (Jan., 1920): 3.

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truth, Hellenic civilization was not a co-ruling of Greek and non-Greek but, more often than not, a Greek civilization imposed upon eastern natives by a Greek ruling class. “It is hard to find evidence of a multiethnic society in the ‘Hellenised’ East…No doubt, in everyday life people in urban communities will have spoken several or pidgins, but his does not imply changes in the upper level of culture.”32 In this regard Alexander’s dream of a united world is a resounding failure. However, this is not to say that Hellenism itself failed because it did not live up to Alexander’s idealism. Had Alexander and the Greeks never made their long march eastward, who would have built the or depicted Buddha as a man? How would have

Greek science and literature and philosophy expanded? Unlike most cultures throughout history,

Hellenism was not an exclusive club based on ethnic heritage. Hellenic civilization was a first of its kind; a culture open to all who wished to join it, provided they adopt its language and .

The common language of Greek in the furthered the spread of

Christianity. Hellenism served as a blueprint for Rome, and perhaps, may have inspired our own civilization.

32 Giusto Traina, “Notes on Hellenism in the Iranian East (Classico-Oriental Notes, 6-8),” Iran & the 9, no. 1 (2005): 2.

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Bibliography

Primary Sources

Secondary Sources • Books Bosworth, A.B. Conquest and Empire: The Reign of Alexander the Great. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988.

This gives an insightful look into Alexander’s conquests and even delves somewhat into the effects of those conquests. The book is very readable and gives valuable insight into the effects of Alexander’s governing style.

Ferguson, William Scott. Greek Imperialism. Kitchener, Ontario: Batoche Books, 2001.

Ferguson’s book is an interesting look into a facet of that is often overlooked…Greek imperialism. While Ferguson examines all of history, he pays particular attention to Alexander’s conquests and notes that they were not an isolated incident in Greek history.

Fox, Robin Lane. Alexander the Great. London: Ltd, 1973.

Having read Fox’s book prior to this class, I can say unequivocally that this is my main source for this paper. Fox not only writes an impressive and examination of Alexander’s life, he devotes extensive space to examining the historical legacy of the man and how his conquests changed the East forever.

Green, Peter, ed. Hellenistic History and Culture. Los Angeles: University of California Press, Ltd, 1993.

Despite being a collection of essays, this book is a good source for information on life in the Hellenistic world. The essay on the Ptolemies is of particular value to my paper, and should prove an invaluable source.

Holt, Frank L. Into the Land of Bones: Alexander the Great in Afghanistan. Ewing, New : University of California Press, 2005.

While primarily focused on Alexander’s of Afghanistan, Holt’s book commits extensive time to what happened to the country after Alexander’s death, and notes that

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Hellenism was able to create a small but durable foothold on the territory. A truly fascinating look at Alexander’s most difficult campaign.

Robinson, Jr., Alexander. Alexander the Great: Conqueror and Creator of a . New York: Franklin Watts, Inc., 1963.

Despite being a rather short read, this book gives some examination to the legacy of Alexander’s conquests. While more of a supporting source, it should still prove valuable to my paper.

Shipley, Graham. The Greek World After Alexander: 323-30 B.C. New York: Routledge, 2000.

This will probably serve as my second most important source after Fox’s book. Shipley has provided a dense but readable insight into the entirety of the Hellenistic world after Alexander’s death. Examining everything from daily life to the legacies of the Successors, this book is invaluable to my paper. Wheeler, Benjamin Ide. Alexander the Great: The Merging of East and West in . Freeport, New York: Books for Press, 1900.Though yet another dense historical examination of Alexander the Great, this book denotes a rather large chapter toward looking into the effects of his death and gives some insight into the actions of his Successors. This will most likely another supporting source.

• Journal Articles Clark, Walter Eugene. "The Importance of Hellenism from the Point of View of Indic- Philology. I." Classical Philology (University of Press) 14, no. 4 ( 1919): 297-313.

A very interesting that examines the effects of Hellenism on Indian culture. Though it focuses primarily on the Bactrian Kingdom, it provides good insight into the effects of the merging of cultures.

Clark, Walter Eugene. "The Importance of Hellenism from the Point of View of Indic- Philology. II." Classical Philology (University of Chicago Press) 15, no. 1 ( 1920): 1-22.

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A second part to the article above, this one goes much deeper into Indian culture to examine its Hellenic routes. A very fascinating source.

Robinson, Jr., C. A. "The Greeks in the ." The Classical Journal (The Classical Association of the Middle West and South) 44, no. 7 (April 1949): 405-412.

This article examines the influence of Greek thought and Hellenism as far as China. The article notes that the world was not as isolated as one would think back then, and that even distant cultures were in contact with each other.

Tarn, W. W. "Notes on Hellenism in Bactria and India." The Journal of (The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies) 22 (1902): 268-293.

Possibly my best journal article, it provides a look into the Greek Kingdom of Bactria and its contact with India, which probably represented the best fusion of Greek and eastern cultures.

Traina, Giusto. "Notes on Hellenism in the Iranian East (Classico-Oriental Notes, 6-8)." Iran and the Caucuses (BRILL) 9, no. 1 (2005): 1-14.

Similar to the journal above, this article examines the effects of Hellenism on Persia, which was the proposed center of Alexander’s empire.

Welles, C. Bradford. "Alexander's Historical Achievment." Greece & Rome 12, no. 2 (October 1965): 216-228.

This article delves into the historical legacy of Alexander the Great, and provides good insight into whether he has had any lasting effects on our modern world. A fairly good source for my paper.

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