Death in Babylon: Alexander the Great and Iberian Empire in the Muslim Orient

271 Pages·2010·2.79 MB·English

by  Vincent Barletta

d e at h i n ba b y l o n

d e a t h i n b a b y l o n
Alexander the Great & Iberian Empire
in the Muslim Orient
Vincent Barletta
the university of chicago press
Chicago and London
vincent barletta is associate professor of Iberian studies at Stanford Uni-
versity. He is the author of Covert Gestures: Crypto- Muslim Literature as Cultural
Practice in Early Modern Spain (2005), winner of the La corónica International
Book Award of the Modern Language Association, and the translator of Francisco
Núñez Muley’s A Memorandum for the President of Royal Audiencia . . . and King-
dom of Granada (2007), the latter published by the University of Chicago Press.
Frontispiece: Anon., Alexander the Great (“Inopos”). Marble, 95 cm. high (MA855).
Hellenistic Delos, Greece (ca. 100 BCE). Louvre, Paris, France. Photograph ©
Réunion des Musées Nationaux / Art Resource, New York. Photograph: Hervé
Lewandowski.
The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London
© 2010 by The University of Chicago
All rights reserved. Published 2010
Printed in the United States of America
19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 1 2 3 4 5
isbn-1 3: 978- 0- 226- 03736- 3 (cloth)
isbn- 10: 0- 226- 03736- 3 (cloth)
The University of Chicago Press gratefully acknowledges the generous support of
the Program for Cultural Cooperation between Spain’s Ministry of Culture and
United States Universities toward the publication of this book.
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Barletta,Vincent.
Death in Babylon : Alexander the Great & Iberian empire in the Muslim
Orient / Vincent Barletta.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn- 13: 978- 0- 226- 03736- 3 (cloth : alk. paper)
isbn-1 0: 0-2 26-0 3736-3 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Alexander, the Great, 356–323 b.c.—In literature. 2. Spanish literature—To
1500—History and criticism. 3. Portuguese literature—To 1500—History and
criticism. 4. Spain—History—711–1516. I. Title.
pq6060.b37 2010
860.9'351—dc22
2009034994
o The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for
Printed Library Materials, ansi z39.48- 1992.
For Laura, my most signifi cant Other

contents
Preface i x
Acknowledgments xv
chapter 1. Death and the Other: An Introduction 1
chapter 2. The Stinking Corpse: Alexander, the Greeks,
and the Romans 33
chapter 3. Oblivion: Iberian Empire in the Maghreb 79
chapter 4. Immortality: The Promise of Asia 117
chapter 5. Judgment: The Aljamiado Alexander 159
chapter 6. Conclusions 197
Notes 203
References 2 35
Index 2 49

preface
In the preface to the 1991 reprint of his own history of
Alexander the Great, Peter Green describes with some candor the diffi cul-
ties that he faced in 1969 as he attempted to develop an adequately objec-
tive vision of the Macedonian king. At one point, he confesses that he even
found himself obliged to “retreat” to the remote Greek island of Astypalaia
to produce the fi rst draft of his manuscript. As he puts it, t wenty-t wo years
aft erward:
I needed to get away, clear my head, re- establish a sense of perspective and
try to see Alexander plain, free from that distracting chorus of confl icting
ideological claims. It was, of course, a vain endeavor. Propaganda (some of
it self-g enerated) surrounded the King all his life, and mythifi cation took
over the moment he was dead—had, indeed, been developing at an alarm-
ing rate during the last few years of his life.
The image of Green sailing out of Athens (accompanied by his family, one
imagines) with several books and a portable typewriter in his luggage forms
a dramatic, if somewhat ironic, scene of nascent Alexander scholarship.
Green was sailing 117 nautical miles to a remote Greek island in order to
escape the “distracting chorus of confl icting ideological claims” that sur-
rounded Alexander; however, that same island had once served as an Aegean
port for Ptolemy I of Egypt (367–283 BCE), a Macedonian noble who had
been a general in Alexander’s army and was one of the earliest and most in-