Talk:Alexander the Great/Archive 1

message: Need more on Hephaestion. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.165.239.234 (talk • contribs) 20:31, October 8, 2002 (UTC)
::I second this. Lizzie 05:27, 30 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hephaestion

message: I think this page should be moved to Alexander III of Macedon (is that right)? because native people of areas around Persia do not consider him to be "the Great." They really dont like him and think he's "the Terrible". -fonzy —Preceding unsigned comment added by Fonzy (talk • contribs) 19:32, March 2, 2003 (UTC)
:His name is Alexander the Great, regardless of what you actually think of the man.  At the time, different kings of the same name were not given numbers as they are now, but were given sobriquets.  For instance, Demetrius the Besieger, Seleucus the Victor, Ptolemy the Savior.  It would be silly to argue that Demetrius wasn't really a capable besieger or that Ptolemy wasn't actually a savior, and the same situation applies here.  It should be noted, though, that the other kings are typically referred to by number, so perhaps Alexander should be moved for consistency sake - but not because "the Great" is NPOV. --Josh Grosse 20:38, March 2, 2003 (UTC)
:I agree -- we shouldn't start calling Charlemagne "Charle," either. Slrubenstein 20:56, March 2, 2003 (UTC)
Why would i want to move Charlemagne to Charle?? Anyway I still think it should move ok, to me it does not mean anything but native people of those areas don't consider him "great." There he's not called Alexander the Great. I can't remember exactly what they call him. But names like Edward the Confessor are not as (abit?) an issue, as it's not really implying anything. But he was called the Great because the people who named him that believed that he was. -fonzy —Preceding unsigned comment added by Fonzy (talk • contribs) 11:17, March 3, 2003 (UTC)
: It would be absurd to rename the page. This is covered by policy already: "best known common name". Now Google isn't the be-all and end-all, sure, but are you seriously contemplating moving to a name that gets 306 Google hits from one that gets 199,000? Tannin 11:43 Mar 3, 2003 (UTC)
We shouldn't change the name, but I think we should change the sentence Alexander is remembered as a legendary hero in Europe and much of western and central Asia, where he is known as Iskander.  fonzy is I believe correct about Alexander's reputation in western Asia.  Incidentally, even referring to a monarch by number can be NPOV, e.g. Napoleon III, or Elizabeth II of Scotland. --Townmouse 00:59, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  I think this page should be moved to Alexander III of Macedon 

message: I learned in my HIS 101 class that Alexander the Great inherited the conquered Greek city-states, but that Sparta was not yet conquered, so he conquered Sparta then went on to conquer Persia.  Is this fact or fiction? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.0.154.225 (talk • contribs) 06:23, December 9, 2003 (UTC)
:He did not conquer Sparta.  Sparta was not part of Philip's League of Corinth, but was quiescent.  Upon Alexander's accession, he marched north to deal with some northern tribes.  Rumors came back that he was dead.  Thebes revolted, and he put down the revolt with prejudice.  Then he went off to Persia.  Antipater was left as regent, and during that time had to deal with a war with Sparta, which he won.  Sparta never did join the league, though. john 06:43, 9 Dec 2003 (UTC)
thread_title: Conquered Sparta?

message: Something that surprised me was the article's statement that he inherited a conquered Greece, and began his campaigns at the Dardannelles. (Well, I may have it wrong, but that is the impression I received.) What about him pacifying the revolts on the two sides of the Danube, and the subjugation of Thebes and selling its leading citizens into slavery; are those stories not historical? Pagan 07:47, 30 Dec 2003 (UTC)
thread_title: Inherited a conquered Greece?

message: The section on the Diadochi ought to be pruned severely, since it's only semi-literate and better described elsewhere anyway. Stan 21:15, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I and others have had a go at tidying it, but I agree - most of it should be merged into Diadochi - are there any other obvious overlaps?  -- ALoan (Talk) 01:57, 10 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Diadochi 

message: There are so many misstatements, misrepresentations and presentations of speculation and/or unreliable source accounts as fact in this entry that it's difficult to know where to begin correcting them - and, at the moment, I'm unwilling to make the effort at correcting them, given the amount of time that would be required. Nonetheless, if this is representative of what a Wiki encyclopedia has to offer, it's a damning indictment of the whole notion of open source history.
Here are just three examples:
* In the Early Life section, the contention that Alexander was responsible for spreading the "legends" (more properly "logos" or stories - legends are folklore, not propaganda) about Zeus fathering him. (Virtually this entire section is from Plutarch, btw.) The evidence for this viewpoint is shaky, mostly relies on hostile sources and is not generally accepted by historians. The most likely original sources of these stories are Callisthenes, his official campaign historian, or, especially, Onesicritus, his chief helmsman and author of a lost work entitled "The Education of Alexander" that was infamous for its many inventions and wild exaggerations.
* In the Period of Conquests section, it is stated as fact that Alexander was proclaimed Pharoah by the priests of Amon. In fact, no such statement is attributed to the high priest of the Libyan deity Ammon by any of the sources, although, according to several of the source historians, the high priest greeted him with the words "O Paidos", which translates as "O Son of God". He is specifically said to have been crowned as Pharoah at Memphis ONLY in the Alexander Romance, which is not considered a reliable source in any way by any one.
* In the Death section, the absurd speculation of the unnamed New Scotland Yard detective is presented as definitive. In fact, the described symptoms of Alexander's death do not in any way conform to those of hellebore poisoning and the poisoning theory is universally deprecated by modern historians. In the article "A Mysterious Death" in The New England Journal of Medicine, 38:1764-1769 (June 11), 1998, Eugene N. Borza (one of the most respected scholars of Alexander and Macedon of the 20th Century), David W. Oldach, M.D. (then Professor of Pathology at the University of Maryland Medical School), Robert E. Richard, M.D., Ph.D., and R. Michael Benitez M.D. (both also of the UM Med School) present a compelling case for Salmonella typhi enteritis, complicated by bowel perforation and ascending paralysis as the cause of Alexander's Death. Oldach's analysis notes, "If ascending paralysis developed during the course of Alexander's fatal febrile illness (presumably typhoid fever), this paralysis may have given the impression of death before it actually occurred," in addressing the stories in both Curtius and Arrian that Alexander's body showed no signs of corruption after several days of being locked in his bedroom at the height of the Babylonian summer.
There are any number of other, similar problems with this article - far too many for me to correct at the moment. However, I think you should definitely add Plutarch's "Life of Alexander" (particularly in view of the fact that the Early Life section is drawn almost entirely from that work), as well as the Roman rhetor Justin's "Epitome of the Phillipic History of Pompeius Trogus" and the Roman geographer Strabo's "Geography" to your list of Ancient Sources.
- Thom Stark —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.40.158.127 (talk • contribs) 15:32, September 17, 2004 (UTC)
:Response:  Callisthenes was comissioned to write by Alexander and he spread stories of Alexander's divine parentage at Alexander's behest so I feel obliged to correct you on that one. The Pharoah was the son of god so I think you are being slightly faceatious.  Many historians have chosen to interpret the high priests words in that manner. E.A.B —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.23.37.102 (talk • contribs) 10:27, October 14, 2005 (UTC)
I just couldn't stand the misinformation on this page, so I made time to correct most of the errors. I have also cited Plutarch's actual text for the discussion of Alexander's birth and origins, expanded the discussion of the Central Asian campaign and the death of Darius, added two of the primary sources and fine-tuned some of the grammar.
- Thom Stark —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.34.192.213 (talk • contribs) 03:26, September 21, 2004 (UTC)
:In general, this is good, thanks! In a couple places, you added "some historians" or "most historians", but without (presumably modern) attributions, so I don't know what books to go buy. :-) Ancient authors are fun, but only moderns, Peter Green for instance, are in a position to tell us who to believe. Stan 04:02, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  misstatements, misrepresentations and presentations of speculation and/or unreliable source accounts 

message: The summary mentions he was homosexual, but that word never even occurs in the rest of the article.  If it's important enough to be in the summary, you'd think it would make the main article. 170.35.224.64 18:27, 19 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text:  No kidding. The question of Alexander's sexuality is even in the news at the moment, thanks to Oliver Stone's film. There should be at least a paragraph explaining why Alexander is believed by some to have been homosexual. The Singing Badger 21:34, 19 Nov 2004 (UTC)

text: There is a whole section on 'Alexander's marriages and sexuality' now. --mav 16:56, 23 Nov 2004 (UTC)

text: I just discovered today that a homophobic anonymous user (64.12.116.13) had deleted many sources refering to Alexander's sexuality. Fortunately, there's always the history system so that we can restore old stuff :-) --dionyziz 10:33, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)

text: No, anonymous. It's 98% certain that Alexander the Great was bisexual, and he most likely preferred men. A number of sources discuss this. "No evidence" is a strawman argument, unless you expect photos of his homosexual liasons to surface on the internet. Alexander 007 01:01, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

text: Furhtermore, what are these "problems" to which you refer? In the time of Alexander, there would certainly not have been controversy over most of his alleged affairs with men. If this is what you meant, I don't really see your argument. Please explain. Hinakana 19:43, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

text: I don t get it. All archaelogical evidence show that Greeks practiced in their majority bisexuality (not homosexuality), so why bothering explainig that even thow he had a wife and women in his bed, he was homosexual? Who can interpret a bisexual society with modern terms of sexuality? I think it would be great to have an articel on ancient greek sexuality, so that the articles about ancient greek people and society can be placed in a better frame.88.7.64.204 (talk) 12:10, 10 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Homosexual, or not? 

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