The Ancients - Alexander the Great: Man and Myth

Episode Date: November 27, 2022

Alexander the Great is one of the most famous figures from history. Legends and fantastical versions of his life were told almost immediately upon his death, often merging fact with fiction. Through his interaction, both good and bad, with so many different empires and societies, Alexander the Great is viewed through many a lense; hero, villain, demi-god - the list goes on.Despite dying at a young age, his achievements have been immortalised throughout history, with the help of some extraordinary tales, Alexander the Great is intertwined with more cultures and religions than you would expect.In this episode, Tristan interviews Dr Peter Toth, the curator of the new British Library Exhibition on Alexander the Great. Together they discuss the idea of an Alexander Romance culture, and the layers of Alexander's mythical past that have helped keep this giant of history alive.Edited by Thomas NtinasFor more Ancients content, subscribe to our Ancients newsletter here. If you'd like to learn even more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe today!If you'd like to learn even more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe today!

Hi, I'm Tristan Hughes, and if you would like the Ancient ad-free, get early access and bonus episodes, sign up to History Hit. With a History Hit subscription, you can also watch hundreds of hours of original documentaries, including my recent documentary all about Petra and the Nabataeans, and enjoy a new release every week. Sign up now by visiting historyhit.com slash subscribe. Alexander the Great. He's one of the most famous figures from the whole of history, and he's been the subject of several Ancients podcast episodes over the past couple of years. You might know that I have a particular fascination in the events, the chaotic events, that follow his death in 323 BC. But another extraordinary aspect of Alexander's story is his mythical afterlife. How his story evolves in the centuries following his passing and is embraced by so many different cultures,

but often with lots of fictional mythical exploits attached. Exploits that include Alexander venturing to the bottom of the sea in a submarine, another where he soars into the sky in an ancient flying contraption, another where he combats mythical beasts in India. Various romantic mythical versions of Alexander the Great emerge in cultures across the world in the millennia, in the many centuries following his death. So much so that by the time we reach the medieval period, these romance stories of Alexander have become medieval bestsellers. And what's so extraordinary about them is, as hinted, there are so many different versions of this Alexander romance

that emerge in these centuries. You have a version, for instance, that associates Alexander with the Christian tradition. You have another which associates this conqueror with the Christian tradition. We have another which associates this conqueror with the Jewish tradition and another where he also interacts with the Islamic world too. He becomes a hero of so many different cultures across the world. He is embraced by so many different parts of the world

for their own purposes, including in Persia. This mythical afterlife of Alexander is so extraordinary. So I'm delighted we're doing a podcast episode on this and with the British Library, who have just released a new exhibition all about the mythical afterlife of Alexander the Great.

Their exhibition, which is called Alexander the Great, The Making of a Myth. A few weeks back, I headed to the British Library to interview this exhibition's curator, Dr Peter Toth. It was a wonderful chat and we delve into so many of these mythical exploits that become attached to Alexander's story in the centuries following his passing and I know you're going to absolutely love it. So without further ado, to talk all about this mythical afterlife of Alexander,

these Alexander romances. Here's Peter. Peter, it is wonderful to have you on the podcast today. Thank you very much for coming. Well, thank you very much for inviting me, yourself and your colleague Alice today, because to come to the British Library and see this incredible new exhibition on the mythologising of Alexander the Great, because Peter, sometimes it's easy to get really amazed by the actual historical life of Alexander the Great, but what happens after his death, his afterlife, and the mythologising of his story by so many different people in the world for so

many different purposes, it is absolutely extraordinary, isn't it? It is, and we found that these legends and myths about Alexander are actually more powerful than historical facts, about Alexander are actually more powerful than historical facts, because histories of Alexander are still a bit untrustworthy and not reliable. And what we found during the process of putting the exhibition together was that even the histories themselves, which are regarded as historical sources, contain a lot of legends and they are not unbiased at all. They were put together often with an agenda, with a bias. They wanted to depict Alexander as the ideal ruler, someone with a divine origin,

a legitimate king of a particular country, or just to represent him as a villain. And then they created and designed new stories and new legends about him to make him exactly what the actual propaganda needed for. So the truth about Alexander, the real, true Alexander, is very hard to grasp in the forest and jungle of all these legends. Because that is really interesting, because we saw you had a copy of Plutarch's

Life of Alexander in the exhibition, someone who we might think is a historical source, but actually when talking about Alexander, even in sources like that, you do get those legendary elements. Absolutely. And it's very, very important to read the introduction, the preface of Plutarch's Life of Alexander, where he says that this is the life of Alexander of Macedonia I'm writing. But I have to tell you that this is not history, this is biography. And for a biography, one particular feeling, impression, or phrase of a character is much more important than a whole series of battles and dates. And I think this introduction put right at the beginning of the life is very important for us to know what the intention of the author is. He's writing a biography,

a life of Alexander, and not a newspaper article about what happened, and not just the chronology of his life. So do we have any idea, therefore, as to when the whole mythologising of Alexander's story begins? It must have started very early, and it must have started with Alexander himself in his own lifetime. There were stories spreading around even in his childhood, maybe even before he was born. We know that his mother, Queen Olympias of Macedon, spread stories about her particularly close relationship to the god Zeus of the Greek mythology. And actually Plutarch himself records a story that Olympias was very keen and fascinated

by snakes which he kept next to her bed. And these snakes were the symbols of the god Zeus. And then Plutarch records a legend which was actually, he says, it was spread by Olympians, that these snakes are the evidence that Alexander's real father was the god Zeus. And so he had a divine origin and his father, Philip of Macedon, was just a stepdad. And the real origin, the real father is as a divine figure. The real father is a divine figure. And I think that's also something interesting to point out straight away. So the origins and the mythologizing of Alexander, it may well very much begin with his contemporaries, with important figures that surrounded Alexander during his lifetime and indeed people who outlived him too.

That's right. And he was very clever in creating his political propaganda. And he probably believed in his gods, but he used religion as a propagandistic tool. So when he went to Egypt and he visited the famous oracle of the god Amun in Egypt in the desert, he was told by the god, by the priest, that he was the son of Amun, the two-horned. And then he was very happy to use this as his own propaganda to be accepted as the legitimate pharaoh of Egypt, as the son of the great god of Egypt. And we know that the pharaoh was often regarded as the son of Re and son of Amun, the son of the sun god and the son of the main god of Egypt, the traditional names of the Egyptian pharaohs. So he must have been very happy to have this. And then he spread this legend about himself that he's actually the son of the main god of Egypt.

We mentioned two horns. We will definitely get back to that. But one or two words that we notice again and again and again as we go through the exhibition is the Alexander Romance. Now, what is the Alexander Romance? The Alexander Romance is a legendary life of Alexander, originally written in Greek, probably in the Greek-speaking capital of Egypt, Alexandria, around the turn of the third and the fourth century. Someone, an intellectual working in Alexandria, collected all the legends that were spreading across the eastern Mediterranean about Alexander, his origins, his birth, his campaigns, conquest, and put all this stuff together into a grand narrative of Alexander's life, starting with his

origins and birth and ending with his death. All the legends are put into this order, which has become the canonized life of Alexander the Great in Greek. And how does this story evolve over the following centuries? How does it develop? It was a bestseller of late anti-Greek literature, I should say. Only in the Greek tradition there are at least a dozen different versions of the Greek text only, which then get translated into various other languages of the Eastern Mediterranean, including Egyptian Coptic, Syriac, Armenian, Arabic, Persian, and then, of course, Latin.

There are two or three translations of the text, various versions of the text into Latin, which was, these Latin translations were the starting point of the very rich medieval vernacular traditions about Alexander in French, in English and in other languages as well. So across the medieval world, more than a millennia after Alexander's death, these mythical stories of Alexander that we'll get into as this podcast goes on, they've become always Arthurian bestsellers. Absolutely. And it's very fascinating to see that after more than a thousand years have passed after Alexander's death, people are still very much interested in hearing about

his conquest. He became an exemplary king, some often with a very positive connotation and often with a negative one. In the Church Fathers he's an evil conqueror, but for great rulers like Charlemagne and the others he was an example to follow because he built a huge world empire which they also aspired to do and for this reason the legends of Alexander the Great they were very important for the medieval western tradition as well. Well let's focus in on a few of these particular legends now I'd love to do that and first of all I want to talk about the whole birth and the family, the parentage of Alexander

the Great. So talk to me first of all, let's go right back to the beginning in the first Alexander romance traditions in the Greek. Talk to me about this link between Alexander and Egypt. The Alexander romance, as I mentioned before, it was created in Alexandria and the origins of Alexander bear the trace of the origins of the narrative in a sense that they twisted the traditional story of Alexander, which is recorded by sort of historians like Plutarch in a particular way. The legend says that the last pharaoh of Egypt, who was the last proper Egyptian person to

rule the country, called Nectar Nebo II, who was also a magician. With the magical practices, he could foresee that the Persian army is invading or is about to invade Egypt. So he escaped from Egypt on time and took shelter in Greece, in Macedon, actually at the court of Philip II, who was Alexander's father. But by the time he arrived there, the king was not II, who was Alexander's father, but by the time he arrived there the king was not there, only the queen. And the legend says that Nectar Nebus, the great Egyptian magician, approached the queen, who was alone, and

predicted that on a particular night she will be visited by the great Egyptian god Amun. But it will not be a human form of the god visiting her in her bedroom, but it will be a particular one disguised as a dragon or a snake. The queen was very excited. The other sources recall that she didn't really like her husband, so she was very fascinated by a divine lover. And she was taught to prepare everything, leave the door open, put a candle next to her bed and was waiting there silently expecting the arrival of the god. And then the god did come. A dragon entered her door and her bedroom chamber. But the dragon was not a real god. It was Nektonibu the pharaoh, the magician himself, who with his magical practices could turn into a snake. And as a snake, he slipped into the bed of the queen

and they spent the night together. And then from this relationship, it is that Alexander derives. So the real father of Alexander is not Philip of Macedon, but Nectanebo, the Egyptian pharaoh. So with this twist, he becomes of Egyptian origin, a proper Egyptian royal offspring. So is that the whole purpose of it? So when Alexander conquers Egypt, he's returning home?

Exactly. He becomes a proper, a legitimate heir to the throne of Egypt. And then when he takes over Egypt, he actually expels the Persian governor from Egypt, who was not a proper Egyptian ruler of the country, but an invading foreign army. And when he comes home, he's not just a liberator, but he's the real pharaoh of Egypt, who is the successor of the last Egyptian pharaoh, by some twists, but he is still an Egyptian pharaoh. Fascinating. I mean, are there any other areas of his empire which he conquers, any other parts of the world,

which later, I guess, maybe appropriates or they make Alexander their own as well to kind of explain that when he conquers that area of the world, he is also coming home to. Yes, I mean, he is surprisingly accepted and adopted in all the traditions and cultures he conquered in a very positive way. And this was another surprising thing we discovered when we were putting the exhibition together. For example, in the Persian tradition, there is a twist added to the origin story of Alexander the Great, recording legends about his grandparents. The Persian legend says that her grandmother was a gift wife sent to the Persian court to the Emperor Darab as a gift, but unfortunately the smell of

the princess was quite stinky and Darab did not like the woman. But they still spent the night together before the Emperor decided to send the princess back to Macedon. So by the time the princess arrived back in Macedon, she was already pregnant by the Persian emperor and the future son of the princess was Alexander's father Philip and with this twist Alexander's lineage goes back to Persian ancestors so when he conquers Persia in the great battle of Gaugamela over King Darius he is not a foreign invader he is coming home as a Persian emperor who is the legitimate heir and the ruler of the Persian empire. I mean, how interesting. Focusing on that then for a bit therefore, Peter, when do the Persians start embracing Alexander the Great in this way? Do we know when the first

pieces of literature come about that really embrace Alexander as this heroic returning king? He is described as a heroic king in the great Persian poets Nizami and Firdousi. So Peter I'd love therefore to talk about seeing also in your exhibition something which is also really interesting which was Alexander against monsters, against these great beasts and they're fascinating depictions of them aren't there but talk to me about this key piece of literature that focuses on this letter to Aristotle. What is this? That's a fascinating piece.

It was probably written in Greek around the time the Alexander Romans was put together, or maybe before that. Originally, it was a writing practice. People and students in the classroom were instructed to write proper letters in the right form and shape by writing fake letters, practice letters in the name of other persons. And maybe the letter written by Alexander to Aristotle was such a homework, a task in the classroom, a very successful one. And it spread on its own as an independent text. And it describes in the name of Alexander what he saw in the mythical east beyond India. And he describes

all these fantastic beasts and amazing people who live in the unknown parts of the world beyond India, which was regarded in late antiquity as the home of incredible beings and unbelievable wonders and marvels. And Alexander, of course, is taken there in this letter, and he gives a travelogue of all his discoveries and explorations in this letter. And it's spread on its own separately quite widely. It has a Latin translation, and we have a very nice copy exhibited in the exhibition, which is included and inserted as part of the Chronicle of the Word from the creation up to the 13th century.

Talking about Alexander's time, someone incorporated this letter into this big Chronicle of the Word as an evidence how widespread it was. But the main prompt for its spreading was its inclusion in the Alexander Romans. In a particular version of the Greek text, it was included and put at the right place of the narrative, which describes how Alexander leaves India and goes beyond it. And then the letter is inserted at that place to tell us about his adventures in the mythical East. And this was the actual starting

point of the spread of the stories of Alexander's encounters with mythical beasts and fantastic people. Because various versions of the romance, they really love this story, don't they? And you showed me in the exhibition, you have these beautiful medieval depictions of these various monsters that Alexander faces in this mythical East. Yes, it's a very interesting part of the Alexander romance

because many of the stories go back to various Greek mythological stories and the beasts themselves appear in other stories in Greek mythology. But the way they were put together in the Alexander Romans sort of guaranteed and prepared the way for adoption and adaptation in various other cultures which have nothing to do with Greek mythology, which is very exciting for us to see how the characters and the beasts and the monsters are transformed in these new traditions. So we have the mythical nation of the Blamidus who were regarded as

headless giants, sometimes with many hands, and this is an ancient Greek tradition. But we see when the text was translated, often with illustrations, how the tradition of the headless giants is adopted in medieval or early modern Russian tradition, medieval Persian tradition, medieval German tradition. They all represent the same mythical being, but in so surprisingly different ways. In what kind of different ways? In different visual ways. So we have the translation of the same text, the same Greek original in all these languages,

the translation of the same text, the same Greek original in all these languages, illustrated by Persian illuminators who depict these headless giants as monkeys. In the Russian tradition, they become many-headed beings whose faces are on their breasts, and that's what we have in the exhibition from an 18th century Russian engraving. And in the German tradition, in engravings in printed books, we see the same kind of representation of the headless nation of the Blamedists as we have in the Russian tradition. So it's exciting to see the similarities and the differences between the visual representation of these stories. Okay, I mean, keeping on that, those similarities and differences of a particular event, let's keep on that area of Alexander's conquest, that mythical east idea, because one other part we saw very close to that part of the exhibition was the trees of life. Now what are these? Because this is such another really interesting part of

the story and it develops differently in the different traditions. Absolutely, so there's another exciting part, the Greek Alexander romance in basically all versions include a story about Alexander's visit to a sacred grove well beyond India, which is famous for two oracular trees that can foretell you your future. There are two trees in the Greek tradition. One is the tree of the moon, who is supposed to talk in a female voice in Greek, and then there's the other one, the tree of the sun, who is talking in a female voice in Greek. And then there's the other one, the Tree of the Sun, who's talking in a male voice in Indian. And the text says that if you perform the right sacrifices

and clean yourself, you can enter this grove, which is actually initiated by the priests of the trees. And then you kneel down and ask the trees about your future. And Alexander does this and asks if he can see his family, especially his mom, again, if he can return home after all these conquests. And the tree of the moon tells her that it's not possible. He's got to die. His time is up. There's not much left. So no one can avoid that, even the greatest rulers. And this tradition of the two trees becomes, in the Persian tradition, a legend about only one tree with two trunks coming from the same root, which has something to do with the Persian local legend of the Wakwak tree, which was a holy tree in the Persian tradition.

And to help people imagine how a tree could talk, we have a very nice representation, a Persian representation of the talking tree exhibited in the gallery, which depicts it with talking hats of animals and people put on the tree. And Alexander is represented under the tree with a very surprised and awestruck face as he is listening to his very gloomy future by the talking cat. Hello everyone, James Rogers here, the host of the Warfare podcast by History Hit.

I'm a war historian who works with the UN, NATO and governments around the world. Twice a week, every week, we bring you the defining wars of history and learn about the history of emerging wars. The passengers and crew of 149 were trapped. Trapped and delivered into the hands of Saddam Hussein. We hear from the veterans who served. Guards there would grab a machine gun and fire at us as we went over and could see the splinters flying in all directions. Through to world-leading historians providing context to understand

current conflicts. Finland obviously couldn't join NATO, which makes the two Finnish leaders' statements about Finland deciding for itself whether it will join NATO, that makes those statements even more important. Subscribe to Warfare from History Hits on Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. And join us on the front lines of military history. Very gloomy future. I tried that out and i got pride will will be before a fall or something like that so very ominous but hopefully that won't happen but but peter okay well let's go back to some other of these stories that you talk about in the exhibition there's some really great stories i'd like to ask first about let's talk about the religious part of Alexander's mythologising.

First of all, Alexander as this Jewish hero, that is also another version that emerges. Yes, that is another surprise for us to see how various religious traditions adopted Alexander. Religious traditions that often conflict and contrast each other in various ways, but still want the peace of Alexander in a very positive way. That's another interesting example of his extremely surprisingly positive adaptation and adoption in the Jewish tradition, which you mentioned. He appears nowhere else than in the Holy Book of the Talmud, which is a very important source for the Jewish tradition, a legal code which records sayings from the most famous rabbis of the Jewish tradition about various things.

And one of the rabbis tells the inquirer a story, which he probably took from the Greek-speaking Jewish historian Josephus Flavius, who records this story that Alexander allegedly visited Jerusalem when he was off to Persia, and he had a vision. And in his vision, he saw a white-robed figure with a long white beard, whom he had to venerate and respect. And then when he approached Jerusalem, the high priest of the city, the high priest of the Temple of God, was absolutely worried and terrified by the approaching Macedonian army. So he went out to accept the head of the army, the ruler of Macedon, trying to convince him to avoid the city.

But when Alexander saw him coming towards him, he recognized the person from his vision, from his dream, that this is someone whom he has to venerate. So he got off his horse and kneeled down and venerated the high priest of Jerusalem, who was very surprised. He must have been very surprised. The army actually questioned Alexander that this is a foreigner. He's not a Greek. He's a barbarian. How can you do this? And then he said, I had a vision that I have to respect this person. The respect of the high priest and the Jewish tradition went so far ahead that led by the high priest of Jerusalem, Alexander was admitted to the temple in Jerusalem and performed a sacrifice and was shown the

prophecy in the book of Daniel about the battle of a ram and a goat, which was taught him to predict his triumph win over the Persian empire. He was really encouraged by this and sort of with a divine blessing by the God of the Jews, he went off to battle the Rives. And this was the starting point of his integration in the Jewish tradition. And later in the Middle Ages, there is a Hebrew retelling of the Alexander Romans in Hebrew, where the appropriation goes even further than this and includes a story about his secret circumcision where he actually literally becomes a Jew himself. There you go, so that's really interesting how that evolution in that religious sphere for Alexander's character and is a similar case therefore in the Christian tradition.

For which the starting point was Josephus' story about Alexander's visit to Jerusalem and his respect shown to the high priest, which was so important for the Jews that he was included in the Talmud. But this was the starting point of his Christianization. So with this, he was almost regarded as an Old Testament prophet. In the Christian tradition, there are many heaven pagan figures who were, despite being heavens, you know, pagans, they were still regarded as forerunners of Christianity. And Alexander reached almost this status because of his visit and respect to the Jerusalem temple, which is why the visit to the temple and the sacrifice performed there is visually represented in medieval

vernacular translations and adaptations of the Alexander Romans. But Oriental Christian traditions, such as the Ethiopian Christian tradition, goes even further than that, and building on this tradition creates a new story about Alexander, where he is completely Christianized and becomes a pagan prophet of Christ Who is actually talking to the Holy Spirit itself? The story describes how the Holy Spirit approaches Alexander and inspires him to tell about the forthcoming incarnation of Christ by the Virgin Mary and in this Ethiopian text Which is a new Alexander Romans written in Ethiopia, in the Ethiopian language. He becomes a real saint of the Ethiopian church.

And you have in the exhibition that incredible visual depiction of Alexander as an Ethiopian, well, Christian king. Talk to me what that piece of parchment, what it shows, because the imagery there with the angels and demons is fascinating. It is, and that shows another aspect of the Ethiopian appropriation of Alexander as a Christian monarch, because there is a legend which is quite widespread in all versions of the Alexander Romans that lifted up by the mythical beasts, the griffins, in a little throne or in a carriage, Alexander ascends to heaven quite high on. And in the Ethiopian tradition, he meets the angels of God. He talks to him and transmits to him the secret spells

by which the demons can be expelled from the human lives. He memorizes these spells. And the little scroll we are exhibiting, this 18th century manuscript, parchment scroll in Ethiopian language, which is nicely illustrated, records all those spells. And of course, as the source of all these magical spells, the scroll opens with a representation of Alexander as, according to the text, the enemy of all the demons. And he's represented there as a Christian ruler of Ethiopia, with hands raised in blessing, with a black Ethiopian face, which is very interesting. And then the spells come after the representation of Alexander,

with angels binding the demons, expelling them from the earth. And on there, Alexander becomes a real Christian hero, who has a magical function, a saint-like figure. A saint-like figure indeed, absolutely incredible. And if we move on, I did mention we go back to the two-horned aspect of Alexander because he's also mentioned in the Qur'an. Interestingly, he is indeed, but not by name. So he's not mentioned in the Qur'an as Alexander, but the person who is mentioned in the Qur'an is named Dulqarnar 9, the two-horned figure. There has been much

speculation about who the two-horned one of the Quran could be. Well, the Quran says that the two-horned hero went to the edge of the world and built a huge wall against the mythical nation of Gurgan Mago, who were associated with the end of the world, with the apocalypse. And the wall built against them keeps them safely far from the human world. And as long as the wall stands and keeps them far, the earth can stand and the end of the world is not coming. And because this story is associated with Alexander, in other sources as well, people think that Dulqar IX should be Alexander. But even in the Islamic culture there has been much speculation by the scholars, the medieval scholars themselves as well,

who Dulqar IX could be. Many of them agree that it could be Alexander, but the reason for the name, the explanation of the name is given in different ways in Islamic scholarship. It's so interesting therefore that in the Christian tradition, Jewish tradition, potentially in the Islamic tradition as well, you have Alexander potentially being represented, being depicted as this heroic figure being used for different purposes to suit the own agendas of these different cultures across the world for centuries, millennia following his death, isn't it? It's extraordinary. Yes, but there are also negative images. There are negative as well.

Negative images, because when he conquers Persia, according to all versions of the Alexander Romans, he promises the dying Persian emperor that he will look after the family of the emperor, marries his daughter, and will keep the religion of the country, the Zoroastrian religion, untouched and unharmed. And this promise he doesn't keep. According to the Persian sources,

he destroys the fire temples of the Zoroastrians. He burns the holy books of the Zoroastrians and completely destroys, wants to eliminate the Persian Zoroastrian religion completely. And which is why in the Zoroastrian tradition, he's often named as the cursed Alexander, the villain who destroyed the great tradition of the ancient religion. That's very interesting, Tal. I wish I could ask more on that, but we've got to move on because it's limited time. There's so many interesting parts of your exhibition I still want to talk about. One of them is something I had no idea about until you showed me it just earlier. The Secret of Secrets? Am I correct in saying that? What is this? The Secret of Secrets is a text, a collection of letters, which originates in

the widespread tradition of a relationship, a pupil-teacher relationship between Alexander and Aristotle. All sources, including Plutarch and the sort of histories and the legends as well, agree that Alexander was instructed and taught by Aristotle, the famous ancient Greek philosopher and scientist. But we don't know what exactly they talked about, but there are many, many texts which claim to originate from this relationship. Texts which were allegedly written by Aristotle for Alexander and there are others, as we have mentioned it before, which claim to have

been written by Alexander for Aristotle, like his letter about India. So the relationship was a starting point of new legends and stories and new texts. There are texts mainly in Arabic which claim to originate from this relationship. There is an interesting one in Arabic about magical talismans which contains spells and other things about magic written by Aristotle, actually dictated to Aristotle by the great god Hermes and then dedicated to Alexander by him. But the most famous text of all this tradition is the one which you mentioned, the Secret of Secrets. It's 10th century compilation, probably written in Arabic and spreading widely in the Islamic world. These are letters, instructions by Aristotle to

Alexander, instructing him about statecraft, just rulership, magic, alchemy, and many other things which were important for a medieval ruler to rule his country. And it was very popular in the Islamic world, spreading widely in manuscripts. As the Arabs approached Spain in the Middle Ages, they took the text with themselves to Spain. And together with many other Aristotelian Arabic texts, this one was also translated into Latin by intellectuals, probably monks, who spoke Arabic and Latin as well. And this one was translated, The Secret of Secrets, which is this collection in Arabic, was translated by a certain Philip of Tripoli in Spain in the 13th century with the name Secret of Secrets, written allegedly by Aristotle.

So you can imagine the authority this title and this authorship could have provided for this text. And then once translated, people started to read it and it has become an integral element of princely education in the medieval west so the latin translation was present at almost all medieval courts of medieval europe so we have in the exhibition a very nicely richly decorated copy of the latin translation of this philip of tripoli dedicated to the future king edward iii of England, who may have read it with great admiration. And Alexander and Aristotle and the discussion between the two is often represented

in a very richly decorated way in the manuscript and with a clear agenda to compare the future King of England to the great Alexander and, humbly enough, the compiler of the manuscript as Aristotle who is instructing the king in this way but then the translation about the text the secret of secrets the Arabic one appeared in other languages as well not just in Latin there is a Russian translation which was said to have been translated from the Hebrew translation of the Arabic so So it's a very twisted, very interesting story there. But the Latin was the starting point of medieval French and various English versions of the text. So we have Middle English versions as well.

Peter, it's absolutely fascinating to think that potentially at the same time that Edward is reading that Secret of Secrets in England, you might have an Arab prince reading about Alexander, that same source, as far away as Afghanistan and Russia as well. It's fascinating to see how Alexander was read by princely figures all across both the Christian and the Arab Muslim worlds. Yes, this is one of the great surprises and surprising features of Alexander's legacy. Again, we talked about it a lot, how positive his reception and afterlife is. Despite being a conqueror, he's always adopted in a very positive way as an

example for rulers. And all the legends around him were adopted and used in a very positive light. One last thing on the Muslim connection there, because actually we did have a look at it in the exhibition. I remember you mentioning it as well. Alexander visits Mecca in one of these traditions too. Yes, so his appropriation in the Muslim faith, in the Islamic tradition, is sort of full by the creation of a story which is recorded by Firdowsi in the Persian tradition, as sort of a little digression in the story

that he visits the famous Muslim pilgrimage site in Mecca and venerates the Kaaba. But in this manuscript we have exhibited, it's a nice Persian manuscript, his pilgrimage is represented in a very beautiful and telling way. He's kneeling in front of the Kaaba, his crown is set aside on the floor to express his ultimate veneration of the Kaaba, and his head is completely shaven and bald, just like it should be. And he's surrounded

by all the pilgrims and here we have a figure of Alexander completely Islamicized. It's absolutely incredible. Now I could ask questions about this all day I think we're going to have to skip the death of Alexander the Great much to my annoyance but I want to focus on something else quickly before we wrap up and this is another interesting part of the exhibition. Peter talked me through this whole story of Alexander, on the one hand, going to the bottom of the ocean, and then on the other hand, going in a flying contraption up into the sky. Alexander was depicted in the Alexander Room

as not just as a conqueror, but someone who was really keen to see and know as much as possible for a human being. So he wants to know all the secrets of the created world. And the two further edges of the creation, the heaven and the depths, the floor of the ocean, are not exemptions of this. He wants to know and see these as well. So according to the Alexander Romans, he tames the mythical beasts, the griffins, which have lion bodies, eagle hearts and huge wings, and somehow connects them with a rope to a little throne. And then he puts some raw meat at the end of his lances and stretches them out of the throne. And as the griffins are trying to eat the raw meat, they are pulling the throne up and up into heaven.

This story is represented in various cultures with the translations of the Alexander Romans in various ways. So we wanted to illustrate this transmission of the story, the visual transmission of the story in the exhibition, by exhibiting various illustrations from different cultures. So the first is a medieval French illustration of the story, with different cultures. So the first is a medieval French illustration of the story where Alexander and his griffins are represented in a unique way that Alexander is sort of locked in a little hut, a little house, and he's sitting in the little house, he's being lifted up by the griffins. In the Persian tradition, which does not depict Alexander's ascent to heaven, but talks about another ruler, a Persian ruler,

who is following Alexander's example in the same way, creating a similar flying machine. This throne and the griffins, they become a flying carpet, almost like a stage, and the griffins are eagles, lifting up this ruler into heaven. And we have a very nice loan generously lent to us by the Victoria and Arbott Museum in London. Whether you're in your running era, Pilates era, or yoga era, dive into Peloton

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From the 12th century, in a little gold plaque, which represents Alexander's flying machine as a carriage, which is a visual reference to the biblical carriage of the prophet Elijah, who ascends to heaven with fiery horses in a fiery carriage. But Alexander is using his griffins, and the griffins are pulling this carriage up. It's the same story again, adopted in various ways in different cultures. And there's also that depiction of him in a diving bell with a cat and a cockerel to tell the time

and to be able to breathe all day. Exactly. He's credited to invent the first submarine ever, which is a glass diving bell, which he connects to his ship on the surface of the sea with a rope. That's basically the story. But then in the later medieval Western tradition, there are additions to this story, which talk about him taking various animals in the diving bell with him.

So he's got a cockerel to tell him the passing of time. It serves like an alarm clock down in the sea. And he has a little cat with him, which was believed to supply fresh air by its breathing. So Alexander was fully equipped in the diving bell. And there's an extra story which is represented in the nice 15th century French manuscript, which surprisingly derives from the German tradition, telling us that the rope adjusted to the ship was almost cut by Alexander's lover, a woman,

who wanted to get rid of Alexander for a younger and nicer man who was also travelling on the ship. So she was trying to cut the rope to lose Alexander forever in the sea. But Alexander discovered the trembling of the rope, and by this, he went up again. So the evil plan of the younger was not successful, but Alexander unfortunately could not fully conduct his visit to the sea floor because he was lifted up by the evil

woman. Interesting little stories there. I mean, Peter, this is absolutely incredible. There's so much more to the exhibition. We've just scratched the surface. I think for me personally, kind of wrapping up here and let me know what your thoughts on this, what I found so interesting going around the exhibition was those visual depictions of these various myths of alexander whether it's the medieval beautiful medieval depiction of him in his diving bell or him marrying the beautiful roxana in another story or the people surrounding his deathbed and bosephalus crying in one of those depictions or so many others that you showed me as we went through the exhibition.

It's so beautifully illustrated in these later medieval bestsellers. In a way, you can kind of understand, therefore, why they were so popular, because at the same time as this beautiful text that you have passed down in these incredible stories, you also have these amazing visual depictions of Alexander's legendary exploits too, don't you? Yes, it's a very important aspect, and I'm very glad that you mentioned this because the Alexander Romans was believed to have an iconographic cycle from the earliest times on, so from the time it was put together in Alexandria at the turn of the third and fourth century. It was maybe right there and right then or soon after it was illustrated with its own iconographic cycle, which was an important

way for the sort of late antique illustrations and the late antique iconographic tradition to survive. Because it was secular, it maintained and preserved much of the sort of pagan iconography of legends, mythical beasts and ancient rulers as well. And the illustrations were part of the Greek tradition and somehow adopted in the other traditions as well. So when the Greek Alexander Romans was translated into another languages, the images illustrating the original Greek text were also translated into the other cultural tradition as well. And this is a very important fact and the starting point for the beginning of iconographic traditions all across the Eastern Mediterranean. So the late antique, the classical iconographies associated with the Greek Alexander Romans

meant a very important influence, for example, in the Russian tradition, as they engaged with this late Antiquarian heritage and they illustrated their own Russian version of the Alexander Romans. And the same is true for the Middle Eastern traditions and the medieval Western traditions as well. Well, Peter, this has been an absolutely great chat. Last but certainly not least, you've already talked about it quite a bit, but talk to me a bit more about the exhibition itself and the whole mission of the exhibition. The exhibition, as we've mentioned it quite a bit, but talk to me a bit more about the exhibition itself and the whole mission of the exhibition.

The exhibition, as we've mentioned it many times before, talks about the myths of Alexander, not about the real Alexander. So what we show here is the richness. It's a celebration of the diversity of the legacy of Alexander. It's the multicultural afterlife of one historical figure, which is surprisingly positive in many traditions. And it's also a representation of the British Library's extremely diverse collections, because as you may have seen and spotted, many of the items exhibited come from the British Library's own collection. We were very, very happy to show the extreme, extreme, I should say, diversity of the Library's collection that we could show Alexander's legacy in modern day comics

from our own collections, in 18th century music, for which we have the music itself, the musical manuscripts themselves. We could show his legacy in modern day novels and science fiction and scientific literature as well. So it's about the long lasting tradition, a story which has been told many times, but it's still being retooled nowadays. And people are still engaging with it and they can choose who Alexander is for them. Everyone may have their own Alexander with this exhibition.

I love it. The legacy lives on indeed. Well, Peter, this has been a brilliant chat. Thank you for your time today. And it just goes for me to say, thank you so much for taking the time to come on the podcast today. Thank you very much for coming over and see the exhibition. Well, there you go. There was Dr. Peter Toth shining a light

on this extraordinary mythical afterlife of Alexander the Great in their new exhibition at the British Library, Alexander the Great, The Making of a Myth. It's such an extraordinary aspect of Alexander's story, how this ancient conqueror is adopted, is embraced by so many different cultures in the centuries following his death and all these incredible romantic fictional stories that become attached to his

story in those centuries it's a fascinating it's a brilliant topic so i really do hope you enjoyed the episode i really enjoyed recording that one now last thing from me you know what i'm going to say but if you'd be kind enough to leave us a lovely rating on Apple Podcasts on Spotify wherever you get your podcasts from or we the whole team we greatly appreciate it as we continue our infinite mission

to spread these ancient history stories to share them with as many people as possible to give them the spotlight that they deserve but that's enough from me and I'll see you in the next episode.