Abstract
Elephants were first deployed in warfare by Indian and Persian armies. The Greco-Macedonian troops first encountered these fearsome creatures in battle during the campaign of Alexander the Great. Subsequently, the Successors and later Hellenistic rulers similarly used elephants in battle. From this time, the animal began to appear in Greco-Roman art. Tracing the appearance of the elephant in Hellenistic history and art, I suggest that the elephant not only continued to be associated with its Asian and African origins and came to symbolize military triumph over exotic foes, it retained religious and mythic proportions as a fearsome, fabulous monster connected with the martichora and unicorn, griffon and sphinx, dragon and hippocampus. In particular, I re-examined the posthumous portrait of Alexander the Great in which he wears an elephant scalp as a headdress, similar to Heracles’ lion scalp. This deified portraiture not only depicts Alexander as descendant of Heracles and Dionysus, both sons of Zeus, but also—through connections with Ammon and Indra—as the legitimate ruler of the three continents of the known world, Europe, Africa, and Asia.
Highlights
Arts 2019, 8, 160 to spark the imagination—much like the Leviathan mentioned in Job
If the Leviathan might be understood as the great whale, perhaps the Behemoth reflects the great pachyderm?
A generation later, the Greek physician and historian Ctesias—who must have seen the elephant for himself as he worked at the Achaemenid court—described the animal in his Indica
Summary
Greek and Macedonian soldiers first encountered the elephant when Alexander the Great (356–323 bce) took his army on campaign into Persia. Arrian (fl. ca. 130–145 ce) stated that Darius arrayed 15 elephants at the Battle of Gaugamela (331 bce), but their absence in any of the descriptions of the actual engagement would seem to lead to the conclusion that they were not deployed on the battlefield itself. The use of elephants for hunting and battle was at any rate a practice that had spread to Persia from India, where they may have served that purpose since the Harappan Civilization (ca. 3rd–2nd mill. bce). The symbolic significance of the elephant is strikingly expressed, for instance, on a steatite seal stamp from Mohenjo-daro, Pakistan (Figure 1). After the Battle at Gaugamela, Alexander’s general Parmenion captured the elephants from the Persian camp, along with. Greek and Macedonian soldiers first encountered the elephant when Alexander the Great (356–323 bce) took his army on campaign into Persia.. Bigwood (1993); Charles (2007, 2008a, 2008b, 2014, 2016); Charles and Rhodan (2007); Epplett (2007); Schneider (2009); Alonso Troncoso (2013) ; Kosmin When Pyrrhus of Epirus (319–272 bce) set out on his Italian campaign (280–275 bce), he took with him 20 elephants.50 It remains unclear whether he had captured the animals from Antigonus’ son DemetriusA, rotsr20h19a,d8, xreFOceRiPvEeEdR RtEhVeIEmW either from Lysimachus or Ceraunus.. 182 BCE), crossed the Pyrenees from the Iberian peninsula with 50,000 infantry and 9000 cavalry, his forces included 37 war elephants.
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