We appraise Alexander’s court. We ask what constituted a ‘court’, as well as considering problems with assessing Alexander’s and those of the earlier Macedonian kings. A brief bibliographic survey follows, with salient literature about the court and institutions, Macedonian prosopography, and related topics. We then examine elite offices, specifically the Hetairoi or Companions, the Royal Pages or King’s Boys, the Royal Bodyguard, and specialized army units populated by the elite, such as the Royal Hypaspists. Finally, we consider two institutions exploited by the kings to engage with the Companions and read their mood: the royal symposium and the royal hunt.

Greek personal names are attested in the legal tablets from the city of Uruk, in the Astronomical Diaries, the Babylonian Chronicles, in royal inscriptions, and in documents from the cities of Babylon and Borsippa. After introducing the Greek language and its background, the chapter considers the types of Greek names attested in the cuneiform texts, the lexical items and theophoric elements used to form compounds, and the naming practices. Special attention is devoted to the rendering of Greek names with Babylonian script, especially because of the difficulties and constraints due to the use of a mixed logo-syllabic writing system to express onomastic items originally rendered in an alphabetic script and due to the differences between the Babylonian and Greek phonetic systems. The diffusion of Greek names in Babylonian is linked to the more general matter of the contacts between the Greek world and Mesopotamia, and to the debate on the significance of the Greek presence in Babylonia in the first millennium BCE; the chapter thus concludes – taking into consideration Greek royal names, Greek female names, and double (Greek and Babylonian) names in the sources – with a discussion of the social dimension of the use of Greek names in Babylonian society.

This chapter examines the religious role of Alexander as king and military commander in the Greek world and the territory of the Achaemenid empire. It explores how he used sanctuaries of the gods to develop his relationship with the Greek cities, as locations for the meetings of associations of Greek cities, and as sites for making dedications. It considers the honours offered to Alexander by the Greek cities, arguing that these were offered spontaneously, and were not a response to any request from Alexander. It discusses his use of diviners and other religious experts while on campaign. It considers the extent to which Alexander engaged with the religious practices and expectations of the territories he conquered, including in particular Egypt and Babylon. It discusses the evidence that Alexander consciously attempted to emulate Heracles and Dionysus, and suggests that this is unlikely to reflect any historical reality. It then explores the story of Alexander’s visit to the oracle of Ammon/Amun at the Siwah oasis, suggesting that while Alexander was aware of the significance of his pharaonic titulary, including the phrase ‘son of Amun’, this did not lead to claims of divine filiation beyond Egypt.

The Neo- and Late Babylonian text corpus, from the time of the Assyrian (Sargonid) rule until the Seleucid period, contains a very small number of Phoenician anthroponyms. Their patterns and theophorous elements generally correspond to those recorded in the general Phoenician–Punic onomasticon. They are discernible mainly by two criteria, namely theological – the typical Phoenician theophorous elements – and phonological – the Phoenician shift of á to ó. A hybrid Phoenician name is Aštartu-šezib, with the Phoenician–Punic theophorous element ˁAštart followed by an Aramaic–Akkadian predicative element. The identification of two individuals as Moabites and one as Ammonite is based on the fact that the theophorous elements of their names are Moabite (Kemosh) and Ammonite (Milkom). The Ammonite and one of the Moabites bear hybrid names, as their predicative element (in both cases) is Akkadian, viz. (DN-)šarru-uṣur, thereby being also basilophoric names, a fact betraying their link to the palatial sector. The occurrence of hybrid names is due to the Akkadian and Aramaic dominant linguistic milieu of Babylonia in the aforementioned periods.

After an introduction to the modern and ancient terminology of the languages involved as well as to the socio-historical background of the Babylonian texts with Anatolian names, this chapter describes the morphology and semantics of the Anatolian names, with ample examples both from Anatolia and Babylonia, in order to facilitate their recognition.

This chapter presents and discusses the Sumerian names in the Neo- and Late Babylonian onomasticon. Since Sumerian was not a spoken language for at least 1,500 years by this period, this is a very small corpus, comprising of a few family names (and not names of individuals). The family names are mostly associated with scholars and cultic practitioners who in turn associated themselves with the Sumerian language through their ritual recitations, or through their scholarly study. The chapter presents the Akkadian rendering of these Sumerian names when known, and also discusses the relationship between the Sumerian family names and the different cities in which they are attested.

The Argead Kingdom in Macedonia knew only primitive political institutions until the middle of the fourth century. Its Kings came from a family that had been divinely chosen and was differentiated from the rest of the population by a collective charisma. It was kept in power through its association with a Hetairoi (Companion) class, with which it socialized in symposia, which it fought with as cavalry in war, with which it hunted, sometimes for reasons of state. The royal hunt was sometimes more than a leisure activity, more than a bonding experience, and more than a preparation for war: it was one of a series of orchestrated showcases which validated and legitimized a King’s rule. In special hunts the King acted out the role of a hero, whose responsibility it was to protect all of his subjects from the forces of chaos both physical and metaphysical. As observers of the King’s prowess, the Hetairoi testified, where appropriate, to the King’s right to rule. Things began to evolve in Macedon at the end of the Peloponnesian War, but only picked up steam after the accession of Philip II. However, even as late as Alexander III, Macedonian expectations remained conservative and tradition-bound.

This chapter provides an introduction to Elamite personal names attested in Neo- and Late Babylonian texts. The typology of Elamite anthroponyms is discussed, from the standard composition of Elamite personal names to hypocoristica and hybrid names. A remarkably high number of Elamite hypocoristica is attested in Neo-Babylonian texts due to the omission of the theophoric element. Since the Elamite language has no linguistic ties with the various dialects of Akkadian, Elamite onomastic conversions into Babylonian texts are actually transcriptions. These transcriptions follow certain patterns, which are explained in the Elamite–Babylonian conversion rules formulated in this chapter. General features for these Akkadian renderings of Elamite anthroponyms are the reduction of consonants, a consonant shift, and/or vowel alterations. The chapter further analyses the ethno-sociological profile of persons bearing Elamite names in Neo-Babylonian texts. Roughly two groups can be distinguished. One group consisting of Elamite kings and high officials is mentioned in official Neo-Babylonian state documentation. Another group of Elamites appears in dispersed Neo-Babylonian private archives, generally in connection with trading activities or in the context of Babylonian-Susian borderland communities.

The purpose of this book is twofold. On one hand it intends to provide a survey and analysis of the colonate in the Roman Empire from the legal point of view, embedded as much as necessary in the social and economic context of Roman society. On the other hand, it is meant to show how to approach the sources in a case like this and, in general, how to work with the codes of Theodosius and Justinian, in a way that does justice to the place of the texts in the whole of these codifications, that is, taking account of their function within a codification. The individual texts have their value as historical sources, yet one must be aware how they have come to us, in which context and to which purpose they were selected and edited, or else their historical value might diminish or even disappear.

The image of Alexander flourished across the disiecta membra of the empire he created and far beyond it. Consideration is given here to the appropriation of the king’s image in the broader sense – and principally through the medium of texts – in relation to the founders of the greater two of the Successor dynasties, those of the Ptolemies and the Seleucids. The legend of Seleucus was richly bathed in Alexander-imagery, and this imagery was focused, in different ways, on the person of Seleucus himself. Some of the tales focus syntagmatically on his personal interaction with the king, whilst he yet lived, and indeed in one case even after even he had died. Others serve to establish paradigmatic or typological parallel between the actions of Alexander and those of Seleucus, and some seek to do both. The case of Ptolemy is different: whilst there is again some focus on Ptolemy’s personal interaction with Alexander, much of the legend-generation focuses rather on Alexander’s relationship with Ptolemy’s city of Alexandria, the glory of which was the king’s tomb. So long as Ptolemy remained ensconced in the city, he could afford to bask in a more indirectly reflected variety of the king’s charisma.