Ancient empires and early modern colonialism in William Alexander's Monarchicke Tragedies (1603‐07)

Abstract

This article examines discourses of empire in William Alexander's Monarchicke Tragedies (1603–07) and shows that the dramas actively engage in early Jacobean debates about geopolitical expansion. Drawing on contemporaneous philosophies of leadership and state as well as on theories of Renaissance imperialism, the essay suggests that The Monarchicke Tragedies were partly devised as counsel for James VI and I on foreign politics, both in Europe and abroad. Alexander's plays resort to the stories of Croesus, Darius, Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar to warn against excessive empire‐building and to promote instead a philosophy of imperial moderation that would make James both a peaceful and a successful world ruler. Each drama grapples with a different moral and political issue of empire, ranging from Croesus’ greed to Darius’ recklessness, from Alexander the Great's imperial megalomania to Caesar's ambivalent stance as popular but ultimately tyrannical emperor, and the general question whether or not empire‐building is politic. The article closes with a consideration of how the critique of ancient empires in The Monarchicke Tragedies relates to early Stuart expansion ideologies in general and to Alexander's colonial endeavours in particular.