Re: Alexander IV Aegos

[susan]

Goat: Very important for Macedonians. The legend was: 3 brothers came to Macedonia, descended from Temenos, king of Argos. The youngest, Perdiccas, became king. From Hammond:
In one version of the legend, Perdiccas was led by a she-goat to the spot where he was to found his city, which he called Aegae. In later times she-goats went in front of the Macedonian army on the march, even as a goat precedes the Welsh regiment on parade; and the goat was portrayed frequently on Macedonian coins."There's a statue of Alexander III in a goat-skin ( or aegis) either in the British Museum or the Louvre. My guess is that it was a significant name for Macedonians, and they called Alexander IV by that name to emphasise that he was Macedonian and not really half-Sogdian.
It was also important in Dionysiac religion, so maybe Olympias had a hand too.
Athena had an aegis too.So, it's probably old, although I can't recall the title being used in the main sources.
Susan

[amyntoros]

Hi Susan, Andrew.Yes, "goat" would make sense in this context. However, I couldn't sleep last night so I spent an hour or so Googling strings of keywords to see if I could find any legitimate source reference. The only thing I came up with was this which dismisses the idea of an ancient source for the name:http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext95/pge0112.txt"The Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia is a reproduction of a 1911
edition of a famous encyclopedia. . . ."His son by Roxana, the so-called ALEXANDER ``AEGUS,'' was
born a few months later. He and his uncle Philip, as joint
kings, were placed under the guardianship of Perdiccas,
Peithon and Antipater in succession. After the death of
Antipater (319) Roxana fled with him to Epirus, and was
afterwards taken back to Macedonia, together with Olympias, by
Polyperchon. All three fell into the hands of Cassander;
Alexander and his mother were in 310-309 put to death by
order of Cassander (Justin xiv. 6, xv. 2). The meaningless
surname of Aegus, still given in some books to this
Alexander, is derived simply from a modern misreading of
the text of the Astronomical Canon, AIGOU for ALLOU."Despite being lectured here some time ago for not learning ancient Greek, I still haven't studied the language, although I did buy a couple of books! Anyway, it means I've no idea how Aigou can be misread for Allou, or, indeed, what the words mean although presumably the one means "goat." And I'm assuming the Astronomical Canon referred to is Ptolemy's, but I couldn't find a version online and one would probably need to read it in the original Greek anyway. Still, I thought I'd throw this out there.Best regards,Amyntoros

[abm]

Hi Linda,this looks like a plausible explanation. Aigou is the genetive of Aigos. Allou is the genetive of allos: other. Thus the text would simply say: another Alexander. It does not seem unlikely to me that someone listed Alexander IV as "another Alexander" after Alexander III. I'm not a specialist of paleography, but neither does it seem unlikely that in certain stages of the history of Greek script aigou en allou looked quite alike.regards,abm

[Taphoi]

Well done Linda!Sorry you lost sleep, but the idea that this is a modern mistake rings true. It explains why it is so difficult to find information on this point. This seems to be something that continues to mislead modern scholars, so it is useful to have solved it. Perhaps it should be added to the Pothos list of apocryphal stories. I think Wikipedia uses Aegus too!To add to Alexander's excellent explanation of the Greek, the Greek alpha-iota seems to have been pronounced like the y in fly. In classical Latin ae had the same sound, hence Caesar was pronounced Kaisar. This is why my advice would be to use the Greek spelling of Hephaistion in modern English texts, because the Latinisation is particularly misleading in this case.Best wishes,Andrew

[susan]

Hi AmyntorosYes, well researched, this seems quite plausible - there certainly seems no ancient reference to Aegos that I can find. I did find a poem by Paulinus, (http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/paulinus.poemata.html)a Christian Latin poet, that refers to Aegeos in the context of Macedonia, but I think that this refers to the Aegean seaIbis Arctoos procul usque Dacos,
Ibis Epiro gemina videndus,
Et per Aegeos penetrabis aestus
Thessalonicen. So, it seems as if someone could well have misread Allou as Aigou - I wonder when this happened - sometime in the 1800s maybe ?Susan

[agesilaos]

There is an online Ptolemy tetrabiblos at Lacus; Alexander does not get a mention other than for the co-ordinates of the so-called Altars of Alexander in Sarmatia.
I tried the Babylonian Astronomical Diary but that is blank too; Alexander IV is mentioned in the Diadochoi Chronicle but is not styled 'the other Alexander' so I'll keep looking.
Carelessly written and/or read Aigou could be read as allou but the reverse seems more difficult.

[agesilaos]

OK I am not an astronomer, The Astronomical Canon or Basileion Kanon (Royal List) is part of a work called 'Handy Tables' and only one text has been printed, in Paris 1823-5 by N Halma as 'Tables manuelles astronomiques de Ptolmee et de Theon', the error must originate with him.
Sadly whilst the lists are on the web there is no way of seeing the original manuscript nor even Halma's text.

[amyntoros]

I sometimes forget that source material wasn't always translated directly into English! Now I'm not saying that the writers of Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities couldn't read French, but working from one language to another must allow for further errors. In this instance I'm sure you're right and the mistake lies with Halma, but it does make one wonder about other works. The Bohn's 1856 publication of Strabo that I transcribed for Susan's site used the translations of Gossellin, Du Theil, Groskurd and Gustav Cramer for their first English translation. The intro to the book says "The translation was, in the first instance, entrusted to Mr. H. C. Hamilton, whose knowledge of the subject, and familiarity with the various languages concerned, peculiarly fitted him for the undertaking." Presumably if any of these other translations disagreed, the two writers of the Bohn's edition simply made an "informed" choice. Makes me realize why Loeb direct translations are so valued (and especially why you do your own translations!) yet I've been told by a professor of at least one error in a Loeb book. Interesting. . . ATBAmyntoros

[abm]

unfortunately a lot more than one error can be found in loeb translations

[agesilaos]

The good thing is that you have the text available to check! And an apparatus for variant readings, although this is not always as full as it could be.