New: Alexander the Great in India – A Reconstruction of Cleitarchus

The most influential account of the career of Alexander the Great was penned by Cleitarchus the son of Deinon, a Greek writing in Alexandria in the decades after Alexander’s death. Most of the surviving ancient texts on Alexander were more or less based upon his work, but every single copy of the original was discarded or destroyed in antiquity. To what extent might it be possible to reconstruct it from the secondary writings? This book argues that a considerable degree of reconstruction is feasible and demonstrates the point by presenting a full reconstruction of Cleitarchus’ version of Alexander’s campaigns in India, the first time that this has been done.

Click HERE for details!

Previously published: The Quest for the Tomb of Alexander the Great

In these pages the author lays bare the forgotten secrets of one of the greatest mysteries bequeathed to us by the ancient world. His new perspective will surely fascinate any reader with a sense of curiosity about the past. It remains significantly possible that the fate of Alexander’s tomb will turn out to be the greatest archaeological story of the 21st century. In addition, the author’s published academic articles on the subject of Alexander’s mysterious death and elusive tomb are reproduced as appendices. Over 80 illustrations, 324 pages.

Click HERE to download the Press Release for The Quest for the Tomb of Alexander the Great in a 162kByte pdf file.

Click HERE for details!

The second part of Andrew Chugg’s reconstruction of the History Concerning Alexander by Cleitarchus of Alexandria has now been published. This deals with events from the end of Alexander the Great in India (the preceding book) through to Alexander’s death and the ensuing turmoil in Babylon. For more details see the Death of Alexander page on this site.

Valerio Massimo Manfredi, the Italian author of a best-selling series of novels about Alexander, published a non-fiction account of the enigma of Alexander’s tomb in November (currently only available in Italian). Andrew Chugg’s research on the subject is much referenced and discussed from a sceptical point of view.

The Italian magazine Fenix, dedicated to enigmas and mysteries of history and religion, has an article by Emanuela Cardarelli in its October 2009 edition (No. 12) on Andrew Chugg’s hypothesis that the supposed body of St Mark in the Basilica di San Marco in Venice might actually be the corpse of Alexander the Great. After discussing the matter in detail, the article concludes that an investigation of the remains would be appropriate. See:-
http://ilblogdiadrianoforgione.myblog.it/archive/2009/10/03/fenix-e-x-times-di-ottobre-in-edicola.html

Following the successful publication of Alexander the Great in India: A Reconstruction of Cleitarchus at the beginning of 2009, the next part of the reconstruction dealing with the death of Alexander and its aftermath is scheduled to be published at the beginning of 2010. Watch this column for further announcements.

New graves have recently been found at Aegae (modern Vergina) in Macedon in the marketplace. The archaeologist (Chrysoula Saatsoglou-Paliadeli, a professor of classical archaeology at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki) is also now speculating that the remains discovered in a nearby grave last year are those of Heracles, Alexander's illegitimate son by Barsine. You can read the full story here:
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5j90gd4jX6JB-oH0-Ev2k_MkJFZVAD9AC26CG0

Most of what we know about Heracles and Barsine may be read in the Barsine chapter of my book on Alexander's Lovers. This chapter can be downloaded free of charge as a pdf from here:
http://www.alexanderslovers.com/main/sample.html

The find a year ago, now said to be the tomb of Heracles, comprised a large copper vessel containing a high quality gold wreath covering bones of a teenager in a golden vessel. It is shown in the adjoining image, which is a photo taken looking down into the copper vessel just after its discovery, when it was partly filled with water and a tangle of tree roots, but the gold of the wreath can be glimpsed beneath the surface.

We have designed an Alexander’s Tomb 2010 Calendar. Please click on the adjoining image of its cover to see thumbnails of all twelve months. If you would like to order a copy, please send an email via the Contacts page (here). The calendars will be printed individually to your order (takes about a week) in a high quality glossy 14” x 11.5” format, so the cost is £25 or $40 or €29 plus postage to your location from the UK. Your calendar can optionally be signed by Andrew Chugg. Payment is normally by Paypal.

This small coin is a Macedonian bronze of chalkon or dichalkon weight (2.3g).  It depicts a Macedonian shield on its obverse with the royal starburst on the boss or episema. The reverse has a helm with the inscription BA. There is some dispute whether it was minted under Alexander the Great (BA = Basileos Alexandrou) or Antigonus Gonatus (BA = Basileos Antigonou) or during the Interregnum of 288-277BC (BA = BAsileos). Its interest in the matter of Alexander’s tomb is that it connects the shield with an eight-pointed starburst boss to Macedon during Alexander’s era, since this coin shield closely resembles the shield on the ancient sculpted block found embedded in the foundations of St Marks in Venice (see below)

Coming Soon: Andrew Chugg’s latest book

Alexander the Great in India: A Reconstruction of Cleitarchus

The most influential account of the career of Alexander the Great was penned by Cleitarchus the son of Deinon, a Greek writing in Alexandria in the decades after Alexander’s death. Most of the surviving ancient texts on Alexander were more or less based upon his work, but every single copy of the original was discarded or destroyed in antiquity. To what extent might it be possible to reconstruct it from the secondary writings? This book argues that a considerable degree of reconstruction is feasible and demonstrates the point by presenting a full reconstruction of Cleitarchus’ version of Alexander’s campaigns in India, the first time that this has been done.

Check back regularly for further announcements on its publication.

 
New Documentary on Alexander’s tomb in Egypt

Atlantic Productions has produced a series of documentaries for National Geographic TV on the theme of “Secrets of Egypt”. Andrew Chugg appears in one of these, entitled “Alexander the Great’s Lost Tomb”, which was premiered on the National Geographic channel in the USA at 20:00 ET on Friday 21^st November 2008. The series is also being shown on Channel Five in the UK and the programme on Alexander’s Tomb is expected to be broadcast early in 2009. Andrew was filmed on location in Alexandria at the end of March 2008.
 

 
View Andrew Chugg’s Library at LibraryThing

You can now browse the catalogue of Andrew Chugg’s extensive library of books on Alexandria and Alexander the Great at: http://www.librarything.com/profile.php?view=amchugg
 

The second and final part of the new article by Andrew Chugg entitled “Where is Alexander?” on the subject of the possibility that Alexander’s remains are in Venice has been published in the August-September 2008 edition of “Archaeological Diggings” magazine.

Click HERE to visit the “Archaeological Diggings” magazine.

A new article by Andrew Chugg entitled “Where is Alexander?” on the subject of the ancient and possible current locations of the king’s remains has been published in the June-July 2008 edition of “Archaeological Diggings” magazine.

Click HERE to visit the “Archaeological Diggings” magazine.

A selection of photos from Andrew’s visit to Alexandria at the end of March is now available in the new Alexandria Now gallery under the Image Library menu item HERE.

In his new best-selling novel, The Venetian Betrayal, Steve Berry has used the hypothesis that St Mark’s corpse in Venice might actually be that of Alexander as part of his plot. In his Writer’s Note on page 472 Steve has observed, “The possibility that the remains of St Mark in Venice may actually be those of Alexander the Great is not mine. Andrew Michael Chugg in his excellent The Lost Tomb of Alexander the Great postulated the theory.” See http://www.steveberry.org/ for more details.

The Proceedings of the Eroi, Eroismi, Eroizzazione conference (held 18^th September 2006) have just been published by the University of Padua.

Andrew Chugg presented a paper entitled “Famous Alexandrian Mummies: The Adventures in Death of Alexander the Great and Saint Mark the Evangelist” at this conference and the full text has now been published (with 28 illustrations) in these Proceedings.

Archaeology Magazine has published a poll of 2200 visitors to its website in its January-February 2008 issue, which confirms that Alexander's is the missing tomb that people would most like to see found. Alexander’s tomb received 47% of the votes, with Genghis Khan’s and Cleopatra’s tied for second place on 18%. See http://www.archaeology.org/curiss/trenches/poll.html for more details.

Andrew Chugg gave a two-hour lecture on the subject of The Lost Tomb of Alexander the Great to a well-attended meeting of the Sussex Egyptology Society in Worthing on Saturday 26^th May 2007. Andrew’s presentation was well received by an enthusiastic audience, many of whom declared themselves fascinated by this remarkable detective story.

A year after its launch Alexander’s Lovers has now been published in a second impression incorporating a range of minor corrections and mentioning some new details and additional strands of evidence. This has mainly been guided by feedback and discussions with some of the hundreds of readers of Alexander’s Lovers. See www.alexanderslovers.com

Andrew Chugg will be presenting on the subject of Alexander’s Tomb at the meeting of the Sussex Egyptology Society (SES) on Saturday 26^th May 2007. The meeting will be held at Davison High School for Girls in Selborne Road, Worthing, Sussex at 14:00. Non-Members may attend for a fee of £3. For further information see http://www.egyptology-uk.com/

Andrew Chugg’s research on Alexander's tomb was mentioned on Sunday 15^th April during the weekly broadcast of "Passepartout" (see http://www.passepartout.rai.it/), which is the leading art review programme on Italian TV and is presented by Philippe Daverio on channel RAI3. This edition was dedicated to Hellenistic art and Andrew’s work was introduced at the end of the episode, leaving hanging the question of the true identity of St.Mark's body.

An article on The Journal of Alexander the Great by Andrew Chugg has now been published in the Ancient History Bulletin, Issue 19.3-4 (please click on the adjacent thumbnails for the contents page and the first page of the article). Fragments of Alexander's Royal Journal survive which describe his final illness and death, but historians have doubted their authenticity. This new article argues that the Journal must be genuine, because Ephippus, a man once employed by Alexander, wrote a commentary upon it. This leads to the conclusion that the King is likely to have died of a fever, rather than through poisoning. This issue of the Ancient History Bulletin can be ordered for $15 from its website at http://www.uwinnipeg.ca/faculty/classics/ahb.html

Article on Alexander's Tomb in BBC Focus Magazine (Feb 07)

There is a 6-page article on Alexander's tomb in the February 2007 edition of BBC Focus magazine, written by Robert Matthews, visiting Reader in Science at Aston University. It is available from 18^th January 2007 in most larger UK Newsagents. Unfortunately the BBC Focus website at www.focusmag.co.uk only seems to have a two sentence summary: “Alexander the Great conquered the ancient world, but the whereabouts of his body remains unknown. A new theory, however, suggests that it might have been under our noses all this time.”

The cover of the magazine poses the question, “Alexander’s tomb found?” This is a reference to Andrew Chugg’s theory that the Alexandrians may have used Alexander’s body in creating their new tomb of St Mark, when the worship of Alexander was made illegal by the Emperor Theodosius in AD391. The article points out that the body, said to be St Mark, was taken to Venice in AD828 and that it currently lies in the Basilica di San Marco in that city, hence the comment that Alexander’s body may have been beneath our noses.

The article seems fairly balanced and includes short interviews with (and other quotes from) both Andrew Chugg and Nicholas Saunders. It also quotes Jean-Yves Empereur, the head of the CEA in Alexandria, on the matter of the location of the famous tomb in Alexandria.

This article contains the first publication in print of Andrew Chugg’s recent suggestion that a visual inspection of the remains in the Basilica di San Marco may suffice to resolve the question of their identity, since Alexander is said to have suffered distinctive wounds that damaged his skeleton (leg and chest).

An article on The Journal of Alexander the Great by Andrew Chugg is scheduled to be published in the Ancient History Bulletin, Issue 19.3-5 in November or December 2006. It shows that the surviving fragments of Alexander’s Royal Journal are very probably authentic. This means that the King is likely to have died of a fever, rather than through poisoning. This issue of the Ancient History Bulletin can be ordered for $15 from its website at http://www.uwinnipeg.ca/faculty/classics/ahb.html

This article was the subject of a newspaper story in the Independent in 2005, which can be found here: http://news.independent.co.uk/world/science_technology/article304278.ece

Programme now available for the conference “Eroi, Eroismi, Eroizzazioni Dalla Grecia antica a Padova e Venezia” (Tombs of the Greek Heroes) to be held at the University of Padua in Italy, 18^th-19^th September 2006, and at which Andrew Chugg will present on “Famous Alexandrian Mummies: The Adventures in Death of Alexander the Great and St Mark the Evangelist”.

Download the Programme here (214kBytes)

Please click here for more information.

Please click here for more information or to order your copy.

The Lost Tomb of Alexander the Great is now available directly within a few days to customers in the USA at Amazon.com as well as on the UK, French, Canadian, German and Japanese Amazon sites. To find it at Amazon.com search on tomb chugg or try this link.

More information about Alexander's Death