title: Four Hooves and a Horn: How (Not) to Poison Alexander the Great
metadata.name: dc.contributor.author
metadata.value: Tolić, Isidora
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.accessioned
metadata.value: 2023-02-21T20:21:07Z
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.available
metadata.value: 2023-02-21T20:21:07Z
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.issued
metadata.value: 2022-12
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.identifier.citation
metadata.value: Tolić I. Four Hooves and a Horn: How (Not) to Poison Alexander the Great. Philologia Classica 2022, 17 (2), 269–276. https://doi.org/10.21638/spbu20.2022.206
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.identifier.other
metadata.value: https://doi.org/10.21638/spbu20.2022.206
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.identifier.uri
metadata.value: http://hdl.handle.net/11701/39154
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.description.abstract
metadata.value: Several ancient authors tell a puzzling story of treason to murder Alexander the Great by presenting
  him with poison or poisonous water carried in a curious vessel — a hoof of a horse,
  a mule, or an ass. Porphyry of Tyre, citing Kallimachos and Philo the Paradoxographer, gives
  us a reason to believe that the mention of hoof-made vessels was a misinterpretation of hornmade
  chalices, or put otherwise, drinking horns. Presuming that the vessel in question indeed
  was a drinking horn, we are left with an unusual image — Alexander the Great perished after
  drinking the poisonous water from the horn of a hornless animal. We can look into the development
  of this legend and propose its origins by examining mutual features of two distinct
  traditions — the Greek legend of the river Styx and its lethal streams and the Indo-Iranian
  tradition of several miraculous features of a unicorn’s horn, attested in Iranian, Indian, and
  Greek sources. After the survey of relevant sources, we see that the horn from Philo’s story represented
  a legendary present of Indian rulers intended to save Alexander the Great from harm.
  Various layers of misapprehension transformed the legendary gift into a device contracted to
  harm him. This way, the author demonstrates two points: 1) that the story told by Porphyry in
  Styg. 375F is a part of an Indo-Iranian tradition about unicorns and their miraculous features;
  and 2) that the legend of Alexander’s poisoning represents a transformed and misinterpreted
  story of Alexander’s grandest gift.
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.description.sponsorship
metadata.value: The contents of this paper were presented during the Spring Seminar in Indo-European Linguistics
  2022, organized by DIEUS — Society of Indo-European Scholars in Serbia. The realization of this research was
  financially supported by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development of Republic of
  Serbia (No. 451-03-68/2022-14/200163).
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.language.iso
metadata.value: en
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.publisher
metadata.value: St Petersburg State University
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.relation.ispartofseries
metadata.value: Philologia Classica;Volume 17; Issue 2
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: the river Styx
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: unicorn
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: royal gift
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Indo-Iranian traditions
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Alexander the Great
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: paradoxography
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.title
metadata.value: Four Hooves and a Horn: How (Not) to Poison Alexander the Great
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.type
metadata.value: Article
metadata.lang: en_GB
resources.filename: 15354-Текст статьи-51287-1-10-20230209.pdf
resources.url: https://dspace.spbu.ru/bitstream/11701/39154/1/15354-%d0%a2%d0%b5%d0%ba%d1%81%d1%82%20%d1%81%d1%82%d0%b0%d1%82%d1%8c%d0%b8-51287-1-10-20230209.pdf
resources.format: Adobe PDF
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