Elizabeth Carney

Macedonians and Mutiny: Discipline and Indiscipline in the Army of Philip and Alexander

SOMETIMES WHAT WE LABEL something profoundly affects our understanding of it. Historians commonly refer to two events in the reign of Alexander the Great as mutinies.1 In the summer or early fall of 326, camped on the banks of the Beas or Hyphasis River after an arduous but victorious campaign in India, Alexander wanted to proceed further east. His troops, exhausted from years of fighting, troubled by unfamiliar terrain and climate, and anxious about the future, did not want to continue. In the end, the troops got at least some of what they wanted: the army turned south and the kings original intention was thwarted.2 At Opis, about two years later, Alexanders dismissal of many Macedonian troops triggered a second confrontation. The outcome of this second confrontation was in many respects the reverse of the earlier trouble: this time the army entirely failed in its goals and the king succeeded.3 Were these two incidents mutinies and is it appropriate for us to apply such terminology to them? Scholarship about the incidents on the Hyphasis and at Opis has been shaped by modern expectations and ideals (not necessarily reality) about the behavior of armies and their generals, and especially by the concept of mutiny in modern military history. It is suggestive that scholars have been uncertain about what term to apply to the Beas incident; some have admitted their uneasiness with calling the incident a mutiny and others have rejected this terminology outright.4 While those who doubt that events on the Beas constituted a mutiny are wise, their discussions seem somewhat misdirected. Similar problems surround scholarship on the

Symposia and the Macedonian Elite: The Unmixed Life

This paper will evaluate the degree to which, during the reigns of Philip II and Alexander III (an era which produced most of our evidence about Macedonian drinking), court symposia actually differed from those of southern Greece. It will argue that Macedonian drinking practices were distinctive in some significant respects and reflect upon the relationship between these drinking habits and the nature of Macedonian monarchy and elite culture. It will suggest that the “unmixed” quality of Macedonian elite culture was more than a mere construct of Demosthenes and other Greek authors.

Introduction: Royal Women and Dynastic Loyalty

Dunn and Carney discuss the development of scholarship on royal women, starting in the late 1970s, and consider the various ways royal women became involved in the creation of dynastic loyalty, its maintenance, and its destruction. They introduce a collection of articles ranging from the Hellenistic period to the nineteenth century, from Europe to Asia Minor. This wide scope allows students and scholars to see the often-neglected roles played by women and to grasp patterns of formal and informal influence often disguised by narrower studies of government structures and officials. At the same time, these articles demonstrate the degree to which royal women’s involvement in issues of dynastic loyalty was shaped by the nature of specific monarchic institutions.

King and court in ancient Macedonia : rivalry, treason and conspiracy

The Hellenistic courts and monarchies have in recent years become one of the most intensively studied areas of ancient history. Among the most influential pioneers in this process has been the American historian Elizabeth Carney. The present book collects for the first time in a single volume her most influential articles. Previously published in a range of learned journals, the articles are here re-edited, each with a substantive Afterword by the author bringing the discussion up to date and adding new bibliography. The main themes of this volume include Macedonian monarchy in practice and as an image; the role of conspiracies and violence at court; royal women; aspects of court life and institutions.