More Research (on Classical Tradition and the British Empire)

In many ways, the revisionary analysis of Alexander the Great by 19th-century intellectuals of Western Europe reflect largely the looming anxiety of a world possessing of great authority and cautious of its own sovereignty. There are three major themes that seem to possess the dialogues of 19th-century intellectual discourses on politics and power regarding Alexander the Great, particularly referred to as either a symbol of moral excellence, unfathomable tyranny, or both by way of his moral ‘corruption’ following his conquest.

One theme is the debate of ‘Empire and liberty,” a phrase coined by Cicero and Tacitus, common to the discourses of empires presented throughout the western world from antiquity forgotten during the middle ages but revived during the movement of early humanism (Vance 251). This debate weighs the principles of (Athenian) Democracy against the giant of Alexander’s forces and asks what was lost in the wake of Greece’s Golden Age to the exchange of Alexander’s kingship. To quote George Grote in his voluminous History of Greece, “…Alexander had in fact been responsible for ‘the extinction of Grecian political freedom and self-action, but also the decay of productive genius, and the debasement of that consummate literary and rhetorical excellence which the fourth century B.C…” (Hagerman 370) Grote’s critical view of Alexander was not a popular contemporary conception of this King during the 19th-century but accompanied a serious skepticism about Imperial power and its corrupting elements that possesses a direct threat to democratic and moral value (something of great concern to Utilitarians of the 19th century).

The second theme is the critique of Alexander’s role as an agent of Greek (thought ‘Western’) culture in the Asiatic East, and the extent of his influence as a ‘civilizing’ and ‘law’-giving entity (a view that reflects the Eurocentric perspectives of Imperialism and Colonization as ‘civilizing,’ ‘modernizing,’ and ‘progressive’ processes within Asia and Africa.) This perspective gives justification to European meddling in the Indies and Africa, complementing antique and modern views of European culture (Greek Philosophy and Arts in the past and Christendom to the British Empire) as the savior of a ‘barbaric’ lot, much like that of Alexander. In this romantic context, the expansion of British power did not need explanation, as history explains enough; to quote Percy Gardiner in his retrospective analysis of Alexander’s campaign, “The Greek as everywhere the lord of the barbarian, as founding kingdoms and federal systems, as the instructor of all mankind in art and science and the spreader of civil and civilised life over the known world.” (Hagerman 374) This, however, is a false view of cultures outside of the Greek paradigm, which already established much of its own kingdoms and systems.

The third theme is regarding the European belief of a ‘stagnant’ and ‘retrograde’ culture within Asiatic and African society, often supporting and supported by the notion of Tabula Rasa and 19th-century Empiricism. To believe these cultures have not at all evolved since the days of antique scholarship, something largely remarked by British orientalist authors renders the view of a people completely blank and in urgent need of ‘culture’ (i.e. British culture & society.)

I will have more to come. What I found most interesting (that I am looking into) about this topic was the discussion of how the influences of Eastern cultures corrupting the value of Alexander, a symbol of European supremacy, and I think this is something still manifested within debates today as nationalism and other political movements take form to oppose the assimilation of mixture of cultures stemming from the traditional western vs. eastern dichotomy. For example, “If he [Alexander] raised the Asiatics, he brought down the Macedonians and the Greeks, to meet them at the same level.” This sentiment seems oddly similar to the rhetoric of right-winged politicians opposing immigration in their states right now. I will need more time to explore this subject.

Hagerman, Christopher A. “In the Footsteps of the ‘Macedonian Conqueror’: Alexander the Great and British India.” International Journal of the Classical Tradition, vol. 16, no. 3/4, 2009, pp. 344–392., www.jstor.org/stable/40388969.

VANCE, NORMAN. “Anxieties of Empire and the Moral Tradition: Rome and Britain.” International Journal of the Classical Tradition, vol. 18, no. 2, 2011, pp. 246–261., www.jstor.org/stable/41474705.