Alexander the Great's 'Banquet at Opis': How the Present Influences Views of the Past скачать в хорошем качестве

Alexander the Great's 'Banquet at Opis': How the Present Influences Views of the Past

Like controversial moments in history? Well, Alexander the Great’s ‘Banquet at Opis’ provoked one of the most polarising debates about how we should view Alexander’s reign. Here, I take a deep dive into that event and its interpretations. We look at what the ancient evidence actually says and at how its been interpreted by historians. Then I show how historians’ life experiences have a huge influence on how they see the past. We talk about the lessons of that for you – and how you can use this knowledge to find innovative ways to study Alexander for yourself. Want more? Below you’ll find the texts mentioned in the video and some potential further reading. ------------------------------------ Ancient Evidence The only ancient source for the Banquet at Opis is Arrian’s ‘Anabasis of Alexander’ – the bit you want is Book 7, Chapter 11, Sections 8-9 (but look at the bit before this for the mutiny that preceded the banquet). In this video, I was drawing on the following edition of the Greek text: Arrian (trans. P.A. Brunt), Anabasis of Alexander, vol. 2 (Harvard University Press: Cambridge, MA, 1983). ------------------------------------ The scholarship mentioned here is: Badian, E. (1958). ‘Alexander the Great and the Unity of Mankind’, Historia (7.4), pp. 425-44. Badian, E. (1962). ‘Alexander the Great and the Loneliness of Power’, Journal of the Australasian Universities Language and Literature Association 27.1), pp. 80-91. Badian, E. (2000). ‘Conspiracies’ in A.B. Bosworth & E.J. Baynham (eds.) Alexander the Great in Fact and Fiction (Oxford), pp.50-95. Tarn, W.W. (1948). Alexander the Great, 2 vols. (Cambridge). Lots of Badian’s important articles were republished together as Collected Papers on Alexander the Great (2012). Many also appear in a 1964 collection called ‘Studies in Greek and Roman History’. For details about the lives of Badian and Tarn, I drew on: Adcock, F. rev. K.D. Reynolds (2004, revd 2016). ‘Tarn, Sir William Woodthorpe’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Harris, W. ‘Badian, Ernst, 1925-2011’. Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the British Academy 16, www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk, 25 April 2017. ------------------------------------ Oh and if you’re interested in my thinking about this event, I’ve written about it in: Harrison, S. (2025). Alexander the Great: Lives and Legacies (Reaktion Books), esp. pp. 162-170. Harrison, S. (2025). Kingship and Empire under the Achaemenids, Alexander the Great and the Early Seleucids (Edinburgh University Press), pp. 195-202.