Uploaded December 2025 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
An entry-level introduction to a new playlist about aspects of the court (by request). But before we can talk about Philip and Alexander's courts--and how they changed--we should look at earlier Macedonia.
Correction: I mention with Argead males being "archon" that Philip did this "for" but meant to say UNDER his brother Perdikkas.
EDITED TO ADD: The new book by Giamakis that I mention I am/was looking forward to reading on Archaic Macedonia just got a rather *blistering* review by Vivi Saripanidi on Brynn Mawr Classical Reviews (a really useful online site for recently published monographs/collections). It's too bad, as I had high hopes, but apparently it's full of factual errors. And Vivi would know:
https://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2025/2025.12.19/
I'll still read it, but with (as she suggests) due caution. Getting the details right matters, especially when we're working with such small statistical samples.
Further secondary texts mentioned at the beginning:
Cambridge Companion to Alexander the Great, ed. Daniel Ogden, Cambridge, 2024
King and Court in Ancient Macedonia: Rivalry, Treason and Conspiracy, Elizabeth Carney, Classical Press of Wales, 2015
"Constructing Continuities with a 'Heroic' Past: Death, Feasting and Political Ideology in the Archaic Macedonian Kingdom." Vivi Saripanidi, in Constructing Social Identities in Early Iron Age and Archaic Greece, A. Tsingarida & I. S. Lemos, eds., 'Etudes D'Archeologie 12, Merton College Oxford, 2017
Identity, Power, and Group Formation in Archaic Macedonia (600-400 BCE), Christos Giamakis, Sidestone Press, 2024
Alexander's Successors and the Creation of Hellenistic Kingship. John Holton, Bloomsbury, 2025
An entry-level introduction to a new playlist about aspects of the court (by request). But before we can talk about Philip and Alexander's courts--and how they changed--we should look at earlier Macedonia.
Correction: I mention with Argead males being "archon" that Philip did this "for" but meant to say UNDER his brother Perdikkas.
EDITED TO ADD: The new book by Giamakis that I mention I am/was looking forward to reading on Archaic Macedonia just got a rather *blistering* review by Vivi Saripanidi on Brynn Mawr Classical Reviews (a really useful online site for recently published monographs/collections). It's too bad, as I had high hopes, but apparently it's full of factual errors. And Vivi would know:
https://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2025/2025.12.19/
I'll still read it, but with (as she suggests) due caution. Getting the details right matters, especially when we're working with such small statistical samples.
Further secondary texts mentioned at the beginning:
Cambridge Companion to Alexander the Great, ed. Daniel Ogden, Cambridge, 2024
King and Court in Ancient Macedonia: Rivalry, Treason and Conspiracy, Elizabeth Carney, Classical Press of Wales, 2015
"Constructing Continuities with a 'Heroic' Past: Death, Feasting and Political Ideology in the Archaic Macedonian Kingdom." Vivi Saripanidi, in Constructing Social Identities in Early Iron Age and Archaic Greece, A. Tsingarida & I. S. Lemos, eds., 'Etudes D'Archeologie 12, Merton College Oxford, 2017
Identity, Power, and Group Formation in Archaic Macedonia (600-400 BCE), Christos Giamakis, Sidestone Press, 2024
Alexander's Successors and the Creation of Hellenistic Kingship. John Holton, Bloomsbury, 2025
