Karanos. Bulletin of Ancient Macedonian Studies

Gli oracoli sulla spedizione asiatica di Alessandro

2022-12-09T22:45:08+01:00

This paper aims to show that Alexander displayed more confidence in oracles or signs geographically external to Macedonia and Greek peninsula and related to the Asian territory. He mainly worshipped Athena and Zeus, after the stops at Ilium and Siwah, and disdained Apollon, before and after the diabasis to Asia.

Review of D’Agostini, Anson, Pownall (eds.), Affective Relations and Personal Bonds in Hellenistic Antiquity. Studies in Honor of Elizabeth D. Carney (2021)

2022-12-09T22:59:16+01:00

Review of Monica D’Agostini, Edward M. Anson, Frances Pownall (eds.), Affective Relations and Personal Bonds in Hellenistic Antiquity. Studies in Honor of Elizabeth D. Carney, Oxford, Oxbow Books, 2021, 287 pp. [ISBN 978-1-78925-498-3; eISBN 978-1-78925-499-0].

Review of Ferrara, Basileus e Basileia. Forme e Luoghi della Regalità Macedone (2020)

2022-12-09T23:01:02+01:00

Review of Francesco Maria Ferrara, Basileus e Basileia. Forme e Luoghi della Regalità Macedone, Roma, Edizioni Quasar, 2020, 437 pp. [ISBN 978-88-5491-047-8; eISBN 978-88-5491-030-0].

Review of Antela-Bernárdez, Apología de Olimpia de Épiro: Tres ensayos críticos (2021)

2022-12-09T22:21:02+01:00

Review of B. Antela-Bernárdez, Apología de Olimpia de Épiro: Tres ensayos críticos, Madrid, Ediciones Clásicas, 2021, 136.pp. [ISBN 978-84-7882-872-2].

Review of Degen, Alexander III. Zwischen Ost und West. Indigene Traditionen und Herrschaftsinszenierung im makedonischen Weltimperium (2022)

2022-05-29T10:17:55+02:00

Review of J. Degen, Alexander III. Zwischen Ost und West. Indigene Traditionen und Herrschaftsinszenierung im makedonischen Weltimperium. Stuttgart, Steiner Verlag, 2022, 489 pp. [ISBN 9783515132831].

Review of Braccesi, Alessandro al bivio. I Macedoni tra Europa, Asia e Cartagine (2020)

2022-12-09T22:54:53+01:00

Review of L. Braccesi, Alessandro al bivio. I Macedoni tra Europa, Asia e Cartagine, Roma, Salerno Editrice, 2020, 232 pp. [ISBN 978-88-6973-534-9].

Editorial

2022-12-13T14:31:59+01:00

Editorial of Karanos 5 (2022)

Archelaos I and the development of Macedon

2022-05-29T15:46:24+02:00

The aim of this paper is to examine the figure of Archelaos I and developments in Macedon during his reign and the 5th century as a whole. Literary accounts point to what might have been an attempt to improve the administration and organization of the kingdom. A careful analysis of the sources is essential to understand the role played by Archelaos I, together with the position that Macedon occupied in the Greek world, in a series of developments during those years which offered the kingdom the opportunity to increase its power.

Argead Women and Religion

2022-12-09T22:15:33+01:00

The studies on the relationship between religion and Macedonian monarchy have been mainly focused on male rulers. This paper tries to compile and analyse the evidence for Macedonian royal women. This article demonstrates the importance of public religion and patronage for those women through archaeological, epigraphical, and textual evidence. The corpus shows that religious affairs in Macedonia were necessarily entangled with political and cultural aspects, hindering straightforward conclusions about the range and evolution of the royal women in the public religion of Argead Macedonia.

Religion and Alexander the Great

2022-12-09T22:14:10+01:00

Alexander the Great was religiously both a man of his time and the catalyst for change in the pattern of Greek religious life. He accepted the ubiquity of divine presence in the world and participated actively in the practice of Greek paganism, but he was also imbued with his own importance which evolved over time into a belief in his own divinity. This belief and the desire for such recognition led to the worship of Hellenistic kings as mortal gods.

A New Book and Further Recent Scholarship on Seleukid Royal Women

2022-12-09T22:04:22+01:00

The article sets out by briefly surveying recent scholarship on the Seleukid kingdom and Hellenistic queenship. Two important works that fall into both fields: Women and Monarchy in the Ancient World edited by Beth Carney and Sabine Müller (2021) and Basilissa authored by Christiane Kunst (2022). The discussion, however, concentrates on the first monograph that systematically explores Seleukid queenship: Robin Hämmerling’s Zwischen dynastischem Selbstbild und literarischem Stereotyp. Königinnen der Seleukiden und der Mittelmächte Kleinasiens (2019). By investigating the roles of the sister and the mother of the king as well as inter-dynastic marriages, Hämmerling explores the extent of the basilissa’s autonomous agency. Revisiting the evidence leads the author of the present article to many alternative views, especially concerning the early Seleukid women from Apama over Stratonike to Laodike I-IV . While Hämmerling rightly identifies the sibling marriage among the Seleukids as ritual role play until the generation of Antiochos III, the same arguments should have induced him to challenge the standard claim that there was a radical change beginning with Antiochos the son of Antiochos III. Another shortcoming is the assumption of monogamy as the norm in the House of Seleukos, although the evidence clearly favours polygamy as the prevailing model. But Hämmerling’s main conclusion is confirmed: the political power of the Seleukid queen was limited and confined to some instances of troubled successions; her typical role was to represent the royal family rather than to rule. Yet he omits an investigation into the basilissa title. He follows the traditional view that it could be borne by every woman of the king’s family, whereas the present paper argues that it is mostly attested for only one woman, namely the mother of the designated successor, co-ruling king, or king after his succession. The position of the basilissa was thus to support the smooth dynastic transition at the polygamous court, it did not come with any institutional power.

Luisa Prandi

2022-12-09T22:36:45+01:00

Luisa Prandi (born in 1952) has showed a great interest in Classics and the Ancient World even from her earliest age. Her love for the Ancient Greek world arose during her studies at the University of Milan. As a student of distinguished scholars such as Marta Sordi (1925-2009), Luigi F. Pizzolato (1939-), Giuseppe Billanovich (1913-2000) and Orsolina Montevecchi (1911-2009), she learned from each of them a devotion for the study of the ancient sources that have made, with a great merit, that she becomes one of the best and most recognized scholars on the ancient world. She is, also, a main name in the research of the topic of the Historians of Alexander or Alexandrographers. These authors are fundamental for the knowledge of the Macedonian king: as she uses to argue, we cannot write a single word about Alexander overlooking them”. Writing about Alexander is a such a Herculean task, since there is no other figure of whom there are more historians with extreme contradictions among their accounts. It is almost impossible to say something new about Alexander, but to say about his historians, about whom so few fragments are available, is even more difficult.

Prof. Luisa Prandi’s brilliant versatility is quite a strange attribute among academics: she has showed many times her abilities to work directly with all kinds of sources (especially papyri), but always with a sober, serious, and noncontroversial approach. Readers will find in her a person of carefully taste concerning what to say and how to stress her opinions and views. That seriousness is reflected and witnessed when she writes, since she belongs to that wonderful school of researchers who are aware that theories will pass but the facts (sources) are the ones that remain. From that humility and that certainty, Luisa Prandi presents herself to our readers of Karanos.