Alexander the Great and the Mystery of the Elephant Medallions

Political and literary considerations alike suggest that the Alexandra dates from about 190 BC and that its closing sections celebrate the victory of the Roman consul Titus Quinctius Flamininus over Philip V of Macedon at the battle of Kynoskephalai in 197 BC. Lykophron’s world is essentially the Mediterranean and Black Sea zones. It ranges from Spain across to Phoenicia. All the kingdoms which succeeded Alexander the Great are featured in the poem, but the Seleukids less prominently than the rest. The poem’s Spartan and Theban myths are shown to have resonance for the Hellenistic period. Only Athens is regarded as a place of memory. Some great federations, notably the Boiotian, Aitolian, and Lokrian, are traceable in the poem, and with a particularly Hellenistic twist.

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Corruption and Anticorruption in Democratic Athens

10.1093/oso/9780198809975.003.0002 ◽

2017 ◽

Author(s):

Claire Taylor

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Participatory Democracy ◽

Collective Decision ◽

Civic Culture ◽

Collective Decision Making ◽

Alexander The Great ◽

Political Equality ◽

Individual Judgment ◽

Collective Judgment ◽

Hidden Knowledge

The chapter examines a major corruption scandal that involved the Athenian orator Demosthenes and an official of Alexander the Great. This episode reveals how tensions between individual and collective decision-making practices shaped Athenian understandings of corruption and anticorruption. The various and multiple anticorruption measures of Athens sought to bring ‘hidden’ knowledge into the open and thereby remove information from the realm of individual judgment, placing it instead into the realm of collective judgment. The Athenian experience therefore suggests that participatory democracy, and a civic culture that fosters political equality rather than reliance on individual expertise, provides a key bulwark against corruption.

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