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The Mourning Of Alexander The Great, Jeanne Reames

History Faculty Publications

To say that Hephaistion's death devastated the conqueror merely repeats a commonplace. But was Alexander's subsequent bereavement excessive, or-to use clinical terms-pathological?l Pervading popular opinion has been a guarded (or not-so-guarded) "yes." Nonetheless, I propose to argue that a number of actions heretofore seen as abnormal are in fact behaviors typical of the bereaved. The difference in Alexander's case was due to his wealth and his authority: he could both afford such gestures and have them enforced.