I’m happy to tell you that a special adapted version has been published on Karanos. Bulletin of Ancient Macedonian Studies and is available at this link
RECENSIONE IN ITALIANO: QUI
Hello everyone, I’m Elena and thank you for being on Alexander III of Macedonia: blog on Alexander the Great and Hellenism. Today I talk to you about my beautiful (even if it’s an understatement) reading:
Alessandro al bivio. I Macedoni tra Europa, Asia e Cartagine
by Lorenzo Braccesi
Roma, Salerno Editrice, 2020
ISBN: 978-8869735349, 232 pp.
E se Alessandro fosse arrivato a Cartagine?
Lorenzo Braccesi, storico e saggista, è stato professore ordinario di Storia greca nelle Università di Torino, Venezia e Padova.
Se i Macedoni avessero oltrepassato il canale d’Otranto e, con Annibale, un secolo dopo, si fossero diretti verso Roma?
La storia non si fa con i “se”, eppure è concretamente esistita la possibilità che Alessandro avanzasse contro Cartagine prima di dirigersi a Oriente. Lo dimostra in questo libro Lorenzo Braccesi, tra i massimi storici dell’antichità.
L’autore indaga l’espansione macedone con una nuova chiave di lettura: quella di un circolare progetto di conquista, che viene qui inteso come il sogno di Filippo di allargarsi allo spazio mediterraneo. Tale padre, tale figlio dunque. Le gesta dei Macedoni – indomabile popolo di stirpe greca, originario di un piccolo territorio periferico dell’area balcanica – vengono intese come un’unica grandiosa impresa durata due secoli.
Dalla Macedonia comincia dunque la conquista del mondo, che avrebbe dovuto cingere sotto un unico dominio i Balcani e, attraverso il controllo dei canali adriatici ed ellespontici, l’Asia, l’Europa e Cartagine. Il grande sogno nasce con Filippo, sarebbe diventato il bivio di Alessandro e dei suoi successori.
Per la Salerno Editrice ha pubblicato Livia (2016), Zenobia l’ultima regina d’Oriente. L’assedio di Palmira e lo scontro con Roma (2017), e Olimpiade regina di Macedonia. La madre di Alessandro Magno (2019). Il suo ultimo libro è Arrivano i barbari. Le guerre persiane tra poesia e memoria
(Roma-Bari 2020).
INDEX:
INTRODUZIONE 7
I. PRIMA DI FILIPPO
1. Tra due Alessandri 9
2. Alessandro il Filelleno e la politica dell’ambiguità 9
3. Archelao e l’ellenizzazione accelerata 13
4. La crisi, l’espansionismo in Tessaglia e l’ingerenza di Tebe 17
II. DAL REGNO DI MACEDONIA AL MONARCATO DI EUROPA
1. Un regno accerchiato 21
2. L’assoggettamento dei Peoni e la vittoria sugli Illiri 24
3. Olimpiade, il Molosso e l’Epiro 28
4. L’accumulo di metallo monetabile 31
5. Dall’Egeo al Danubio 34
6. Il processo di ellenizzazione 37
7. Il predominio in Grecia 41
8. Dalla Macedonia all’Europa 47
III. AL DI LÀ DELL’EUROPA, IL DISEGNO INTERROTTO
1. Una testa di ponte oltre l’Adriatico? 54
2. La via di transito per il Mar Nero 57
3. Il dissidio tra padre e figlio 59
4. Un matrimonio e un regicidio 61
5. Quale il mandante? 66
6. L’ambiguità di Alessandro 72
7. Padre e figlio, l’inaspettata commemorazione 76
IV. IL MOLOSSO IN OCCIDENTE
1. Alessandro e i mari dell’Occidente 78
2. La spedizione del Molosso 81
3. L’ambiguo comportamento di Arpalo 85
4. I nuovi equilibri territoriali 87
5. La disfatta e la morte del Molosso 91
6. Alessandro e l’obiettivo delle spedizioni del Molosso 94
V. LA SPEDIZIONE NELL’ORIENTE MEDITERRANEO
1. Alessandro successore di Filippo 97
2. La battaglia del Grànico 100
3. La battaglia di Isso 103
4. L’assedio di Tiro 106
VI. ALESSANDRO AL BIVIO
1. Quale il disegno? 112
2. La molteplicità di conferme 115
3. La proiezione futura 118
4. Le trattative di pace 122
5. La consacrazione a prole divina 125
VII. DALLA CIRCOLARITÀ MEDITERRANEA ALLA SPAZIALITÀ ASIATICA
1. La battaglia di Gaugàmela 132
2. Il successore degli Achemenidi 136
3. Il nuovo corso 139
4. La marcia nel cuore dell’Oriente 142
5. La campagna indiana 144
6. L’arrivo nell’oceano 149
VIII. LO SLANCIO ECUMENICO E L’EREDITÀ CULTURALE
1. Le nozze di Susa 153
2. I messaggi alla grecità 157
3. La morte fulminea 162
4. L’eredità culturale 165
IX. DOPO ALESSANDRO: DA UN FILIPPO ALL’ALTRO
1. I due re 168
2. La Macedonia dagli Antipatridi agli Antigonidi 173
3. Corcira, l’isola contesa 182
4. L’Illiria, Roma, la Macedonia e Cartagine 191
X. LA PROSPETTIVA CAPOVOLTA
1. Circolarità mediterranee 196
2. L’intesa tra la Macedonia e Cartagine 197
3. L’indugio e il logoramento 201
4. Annibale dall’uno all’altro versante della penisola 204
5. Una giustificazione e un epilogo 209
BIBLIOGRAFIA 215
INDICI
Indice dei nomi 225
Reading time: from October 22 to October 31 2022.
There aren’t many essays that excite me so much and leave me with the feeling of having known something new but this book was an incredible discovery.
In the Introduzione professor Braccesi explains us that this book talks about the history of the Macedonians and of Philip and Alexander in particular but it won’t stop with them because it will tell us about the history of Macedonia when it is hegemon but also when it is no longer so and Carthage and Rome are instead. The two key ideas are that Philip was aiming for control of the Straits, not only in the East but also in the West and that Alexander wanted to clash with Carthage to control the Mediterranean. With these promising premises we move on to the first chapter Prima di Filippo which focuses on the history of Macedonia up to 359 BC. According to the Greeks, it is enclosed between two Alexandrians, the first is Alexander Philhellene, the first Macedonian ruler of which there is traces in Greek historiography, and the other is our Alexander, both were despised by Athenian orators. What we get is that in Macedonian history, reading the vicissitudes of Philhellene, of his son Archelaus, of Amyntas III and of his son Alexander II up to Perdiccas III, is that it was customary for almost everyone with rare exceptions to adopt the double track policy, to establish an alliance with a city and then break it and ally with its enemies and that the Macedonian aristocracy has always been reluctant to acquire Greek spirituality (9-20).
The title of the second chapter, Dal regno di Macedonia al monarcato di Europa, it already lets us understand how much Philip II has profoundly changed Macedonia’s history through wars and diplomacy, sharpness and intelligence. Philip made Macedonia from the semi-barbarian periphery of Greece to the hegemonic power that will export its culture to Balkan Europe and with his son to the Mediterranean world also to Asia. Braccesi also notes that the historian of Philip Theopompus wrote his exploits in 58 books, at the time of Diodorus five were lost but he was still more fortunate than us because not even one has arrived. The extraordinary strategic and warlike skills of Philip are then explained, certainly derived from the years spent in Thebes, an acuity that he also adopted in marriages for diplomatic reasons or for dynastic continuity. Braccesi then does a nice study on the Olympics and we remember his book Olimpiade regina di Macedonia. La madre di Alessandro Magno always published by Salerno Editrice in 2019, explains the reasons that led Philip to marry her. Olympias we know her by this name because Philip wanted to de-provincialize, like Philhellene, the prestigious Panhellenic agons for the Greek world, but Epirus is also analyzed.
On page 30 there’s a very beautiful sentence that contains Olympias’ essence:
Per un figlio la cui vicenda terrena ne segnerà l’apice dell’esistenza, la delirante caduta e l’ansiosa sete di vendetta. Mentre l’ombra del fratello – ucciso in battaglia e restituito smembrato al nido familiare – l’accompagnerà come malefico presagio anche quando si esalterà per l’aureola sacra che pare avvolgere il figlio Alessandro che ella reputa immortale. Altra però sarà la propria aureola.
The author doesn’t fail to tell us how and to what extent the interests of the parents of the great Alexander converged or not. Philip’s Macedonia became an autonomous state and the first territorial state in Europe, powerful and rich with a powerful army and was the oldest definition of political Europe. Philip split his roles between the person Philip, of his political strength and economic power, and the state of the Macedonian kingdom. A common interest of Alexander’s parents was precisely in the son who had “premature doti di multiforme ingegno” (38) and wishing to de-provincialize Macedonia in the eyes of the Greeks, Alexander had the best of education. Philip wanted Athens to be his collaborator but then he was forced to use weapons and planned a revenge against Persia and in the West the liberation of Magna Graecia from the Italic populations.
In chapter III, Al di là dell’Europa, il disegno interrotto the author focuses on Philip’s project of the Molossus expedition in Italy with domination over the Otranto’s canal and according to Oxyrynchus Papyri, 865 hypothesizes that he embarked on two expeditions, the first when Philip was still alive and with the siege of Otranto, the second would be the one in 334 two years after Philip’s death. This would result in a less nebulous project to control the Bosphorus, the Dardanelles and the coasts of the Hellespont to control maritime trade. However, the author follows the events chronologically and returns on events of Philip’s last years. In commenting on the disagreement between Philip and Alexander at the wedding, Braccesi uses Athenaeus which depends on the fragment from the Life of Philip of Satyr and draws a more complete account of it, then explains Alexander and Olympias’ exile, the regicide during Cleopatra and Molossus’s wedding with the preparation of the thirteen statues and then analyzes three hypotheses of Philip’s regicide, defining as more probable that of Olympias for a private revenge and to protect Alexander’s dynastic rights (66-72). The author also explains us how Alexander distanced himself from what happened but how he was ambiguous in any case by citing the passage from Medea and in the questions he posed to Siwah’s Oracle (72-76).
In chapter IV, Il Molosso in Occidente, there’s a reconstruction of Alexander relations with the Romans (78-81), the Molossus expedition parallel to Alexander’s and the former was seen as the victorious according to the sources of Justin and in Livy we find a hostile a posteriori vision. Braccesi throws new light on Harpalus’ escape in 333 who may have been sent on a secret mission by Alexander himself, doubtful of his uncle who died (85-87). But why did Taranto ask Molossus for help? And why did he accept? Why then did Taranto leave him alone? (88-91). Livy tells us about Molossus’ death and describes him as a valid knight, with dramatic and epic tones (91-94) and Braccesi with the data crossing the sources comes to think that he died in the winter of 332 or in the spring of 331 and would be in sync with the founding of Alexandria in Egypt (94). Molossus would have had a very specific plan and task: to control Magna Graecia to reach Africa and support Alexander in the conquest of Carthage (94-96). It’s interesting how Braccesi connects the two Alexanders’ expeditions to control the Mediterranean.
In chapter V, La spedizione nell’Oriente mediterraneo, Braccesi explains how Alexander behaved at his father’s death, then in the battles of the Granicus and Issus and analyzes in depth the siege of Tyre (106-111). Why in the speed of his Asian conquest did he lose eight months for this siege when he handed over his lieutenants to Halicarnassus? According to Braccesi Tyre had to fall because it was the Carthage’s metropolis, Tyre would have been the fundamental step before arriving at the Phoenician city and on p. 109 states:
Se l’obiettivo assegnato al Molosso era Cartagine, se la dimensione di conquista era stata (originariamente?) concepita come mediterranea, ben si comprende in tutto il suo significato l’importanza operativa e simbolica dell’espugnazione di Tiro.
Alexander declared war to Carthage (Curtius Rufus IV 4,18) not referring to the projects that remained unfulfilled due to his untimely death, nor did he do so ten years in advance. The explanation is another.
In chapter VI, Alessandro al bivio, Alexander thought to wait for his uncle in Paraetonium (113) to wage war on Carthage but there he would have learned of his uncle’s death.
Ora i nodi venivano al pettine: cadeva il comune obiettivo di marciare uniti contro Cartagine e di soffocarla nella morsa di due forze congiunte dopo averla privata di aiuti fenici da parte di Tiro e – stando al piano originario – di rinforzi punici dalla Sicilia.
Indubbiamente una nuova e affascinante ricostruzione quella che abbiamo qui proposto.
Braccesi then explains the arguments in favor of his thesis: Curtius Rufus says that in Memphis Alexander receives forces in help from Antipater (III 5,19) and Amyntas (IV 6,30); to Pelusium, symmetrically opposed to Paraetonium Alexander rebuilds the fleet (Arrian III 1,1); Diodorus (XVII 49,2) says that Alexander received three hundred war horses from Cyrene at Paraetonium (116-117). If things had gone differently, Alexander probably would have clashed with Molossus against Carthage and the Mediterranean would have become Macedonian (118). He will continue to have this thought but it will remain unfinished due to his death.
La storia dei “se” è sempre sbagliata, ma, per quanto le nostre siano solo speculazioni sul non accaduto, non si sarà lontani dal vero nel congetturare che Alessandro mirasse proprio a scontrarsi con Cartagine, il cui assoggettamento avrebbe davvero coronato il progetto ecumenico di una monarchia universale. [..] Ma la cosa non stupisce, perché, già in vita, sono per Alessandro troppo angusti i confini di una singola compagine statale. Il suo eroe non è Teseo, creatore di identità municipali, bensí Eracle che libera l’universo dai mostri che l’opprimono.
In 324 the Marseillaise Pytheas made the first researches on Atlantic space, probably commissioned by Alexander who reorganized the empire on his return from India, to learn the secrets of the ocean like Carthage, a similar research that Nearchus did for the Indian (120-121). But Alexander suddenly dies.
Spesso i successori di un grande monarca riscrivono a proprio uso e consumo la storia di eventi già accaduti. Qui siamo in un caso limite, nel quale viene riscritta la storia del non accaduto. Storia che presto si tramuta in leggenda, ampliando a dismisura la gamma delle proprie valenze evocative, le quali, per ricorrenti processi di imitatio rerum gestarum, finiranno per proiettare l’immagine del condottiero nella rifrangenza emulativa di sempre nuovi conquistatori.
Da quanto abbiamo detto, unendo il prima al poi, l’eventualmente programmato al non compiuto, non ci appare priva di costrutto l’ipotesi che Alessandro, di intesa con il Molosso, avesse progettato una conquista circolare della costa meridionale del Mediterraneo, dal Bosforo a Gibilterra, ai danni della Persia e di Cartagine. Alla luce dell’inconcepibile che in effetti avvenne della marcia vittoriosa dall’Egitto all’India, impensabile per qualsiasi teorizzatore di geografie di conquista – non sorprende che i suoi storiografi abbiano codificato in forma rettilinea e già prestabilita in partenza gli obiettivi della sua campagna di guerra, cancellando ogni traccia di precedenti progetti e programmi.
If Molossus hadn’t died, Alexander would have gone to Siwah for quite other reasons, namely to gather information for the war against Carthage due to the links between the oracle of Ammon and the Punic power. But History went differently and Alexander instead wanted to make his Asian conquest divine (122-123). Otherwise Alexander would probably have accepted Darius’ peace proposals:
Le proposte di pace erano vantaggiosissime. Alessandro le avrebbe con tutta probabilità accettate, seguendo il consiglio di Parmenione, se avesse marciato contro Cartagine insieme al Molosso, dal quale si aspettava l’assoggettamento della Sicilia punica. Ma ora, tramontato il suo primario obiettivo di espansione mediterranea, dal Bosforo a Gibilterra, è al bivio: poteva sí tornare da vincitore in Macedonia, onusto di gloria e di bottino, ma egli con tutta probabilità aveva sognato qualcosa di piú: una completa rivoluzione geopolitica di respiro mediterraneo con controllo del “limite” delle Colonne di Eracle, e quindi della via di accesso all’oceano. Il progetto, incompiuto e rimandato a tempi piú maturi, poteva essere sostituito nella sua mente inquieta e sempre inappagata con un obiettivo espansionistico di dimensioni analoghe o superiori.
The a posteriori reasons for the pilgrimage to Siwah are propaganda (125-131): to follow the path of his ancestors Heracles and Perseus to present himself as the legitimate heir of the Achaemenid monarchs and successor of the pharaohs; as the son of Zeus he addresses the Greeks and the Macedonians giving them a clear political signal. Alexander is the greatest theocratic dynast of the ancient world.
The project was no longer circular as it was originally planned but there was the expansion to the East that we know. Braccesi’s theory seems valid to me because is supported by evidence and it would explain many actions that otherwise have a more hazy sense, such as wanting to rebuild a fleet that he then didn’t use. With Braccesi’s vision we find an Alexander even more intelligent, shrewd and cunning than we know him, able as a young man to inherit a project from his father by making it his own and to modify it by adapting and indeed distorting it for the obligatory circumstances in which he found himself.
Alexander with Molossus’ death found himself at the crossroads of having to decide what to do, so he switched to B plan and did what we know him for. Here are explained the title, the subtitle and the double cover image by Alexander Helios and they are nailed it!
In chapter VII the author describes in detail the battle of Gaugamela and Alexander proposed himself as a non-demolishing continuator of the Persian empire thus clashing with the “old” Macedonian mentality. With Cleitus’ episode Alexander has his nerves uncovered because his new project is all based on the idea of his divine filiation from Zeus, not because of the wine (138). The episodes of Philotas and Callisthenes too show how Alexander represses in blood those who don’t want or can’t understand him. Alexander in Ecbatana dismissed the Greek contingents because by now the attacks of Persia were avenged but he found himself at another crossroads: to return to his homeland which was now on the outskirts of the kingdom or to extend the conquest (142)? He again chooses the second way and after the Indian conquest he has the twelve altars built on the Hyphasis’ bank, not columns, to mark the end of his dream, of his failure and testify his great regret (147-149).
Per questa ragione, infine, non si fregiano di epigrafi commemorative. Queste sono assenti perché Alessandro non può scrive di sé ciò che avrebbe voluto scrivervi: che egli non è soltanto l’eroe invincibile, l’herōos aníkētos, ma anche il signore del mondo, cioè il kosmokrátor.
Tale sarebbe stato se non fosse stato costretto a desistere dal raggiungimento del traguardo, dal conseguimento della sua ultima meta.
[…] Ma il fatto che gli altari, donde parte la ritirata, siano dodici, e non tredici, può indurci al sospetto che egli avverta con incombente sofferenza il peso della sconfitta e, con esso, il forzato ritorno alla dimensione umana.
Alexander wanted to see the Indian Ocean to arrive at the end of the world as the end of the conquest and in Babylon he didn’t go with Nearchus to explore the “great sea” of the south to understand if it was possible to circumnavigate Libya because he was still disappointed he had failed but always with the idea of arriving in Carthage (151-152).
Chapter VIII analyzes the last period of Alexander’s life and his cultural heritage. His idea of a universal monarchy would only come about through the fusion of cultures, which began with Susa’s marriages, but which was actually fulfilled only after his death. In 323 there’s a lack of a solid centralized and administrative structure and the great wealth of the generals are a further incentive for disintegration.
The IX chapter is on the post Alexander, with the struggles between the Diadochi and the strategic importance of the island of Corcira, an obligatory route between Greece and Magna Graecia and Otranto’s channel. The narrative is focused on the Eastern Mediterranean to see how it changed in the Hellenistic period.
The last chapter highlights how a century after Alexander, Macedonia is no longer hegemon to the detriment of Rome and Carthage. In the parallel Alexander plus Molossus against Carthage we now find Hannibal allied with Philip V against Rome. Hannibal came out victorious in Canne but he waits in vain for reinforcements from Philip V who won’t arrive because the messengers were intercepted by the Romans, he wastes time until it’s too late, which Alexander didn’t do, who suddenly changed his program.
Pari è la genialità strategica di entrambi i condottieri, ma ciò che li differenzia è la capacità di sapere abbandonare un progetto, elaborato a tavolino, allorché esso, per fattori esterni, si dimostra non più attuabile. Fulminea è l’abilità decisionale del Macedone nell’invertire la rotta e nel mutare programma operativo, e ciò lo porterà a coronare un programma di conquista che dall’Egitto lo conduce in Mesopotamia, e dal corso dell’Eufrate a quello dell’Indo. Lento e faticoso sarà, viceversa, l’angoscioso travaglio del Cartaginese nel desistere da un piano di azione che finisce per avvitarsi su se stesso e nel rinunziare a battere una via che, giorno dopo giorno, si rivelava nella realtà impercorribile. […]
In quanto a Filippo V, anche se giovane come Alessandro, non ne ha né il genio né lo slancio vitale, né in altro gli assomiglia. È un sovrano in maturazione, ancora non affrancatosi dai propri interessati consiglieri. Non persegue, in proprio, forme di imitatio Alexandri, e nulla ha in comune con il conquistatore argeade. Semmai, forse anche per omonimia, è più disponibile a fare sua l’immagine del padre, del grande Filippo, sforzandosi di riproporne, dopo oltre un secolo, uno slancio espansionistico di respiro europeo, proiettato sul controllo della regione adriatica, dall’una a all’altra sponda.
Anyone who reads negatively this thesis, namely that this is proof that Alexander wouldn’t have been able to win against the West, is a demonstration in my opinion of Alexander’s awareness, which other great generals in history didn’t have. Yes, Alexander without Molossus’ help wouldn’t have won against Carthage, in fact he preferred to postpone this war (never again given his premature death). Although Alexander was backed by the allies, Carthage remained a maritime power and he understood this. What’s “small” about this awareness? Obviously I’m not objective but this argument doesn’t seem suitable for criticizing him.
It’s difficult that reading an essay excites me so much but following the sources Braccesi wants to rewrite the story, almost like in a novel, in a ucronia, but with reasons to support his thesis that I don’t see why it shouldn’t be true. Braccesi confirms himself as a great scholar: his analysis is always clear and precise because he comments on the passages he cites and doesn’t fail to include references to what he affirms.
Alessandro al bivio it’s a text for the general public, because it tells us about the history of Macedonia, from its dawn to its maximum splendor until its decline, but it is also a text for researchers and academics because the theory supported by Braccesi is, in my opinion, extremely interesting and new and for this reason I’m curious to know how it will be received by the specialists.
Alessandro III di Macedonia 
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