142 2'ransactions. 



5. The Burial Place of Alexander the Great. 



By E. J. Chinnock, M.A., LL.D. 



I have recently seen in English and American magazines the 

 statement that a sarcophagus has been discovered at Sidon 

 supposed to have contained the body of Alexander the Great. 

 As arguments have been adduced to support the theory that 

 Alexander may have been buried at Sidon, I have collected the 

 following passages to show that he was buried at Alexandria. I 

 can find no mention of any other place where he is said to have 

 been buried. 



1. 4rriaTO(apud Photium, lib. 92) says that Arridaens conveyed 

 Alexander's body fi-om Babylon through Damascus to Ptolemy 

 in Egypt, in spite of the efforts of Perdiccas to get possession of it. 



2. Diodorus (XVIII., 2 and 26-28) says that the generals elected 

 Arridsens, the son of Philip, and the half brother of Alexander, 

 king of the Macedonians, and assigned to him the duty of con- 

 veying Alexander's body to Ammon for burial. Arridsens spent 

 two years in preparing a magnificent car and other ornaments 

 for the tomb, and then conveyed the body towards Egypt. 

 He was met in Syria by Ptolemy, who escorted it with military 

 honours to Alexandria, where he deposited it in a sanctuary 

 specially prepared for it, deciding not to convey it for the present 

 to Ammon. 



3. Curtius Rufus (De Gestis Alexandri X., 31) says that the 

 body was embalmed by Egyptians and Chaldaeans, and placed by 

 Ptolemy at Memphis, and a few years after transported by him 

 to Alexandria, where, says Curtins, " every honour is paid to his 

 memory and name." Curtins is supposed by Zumpt to have lived 

 in the reign of Augustus. Others assign him to the time of 

 Claudius or Vespasian, and he cannot have lived later than the 

 reign of Trajan. 



4. Aelian (Varia Historia XII., 64) also says that Ptolemy 

 conveyed the body of Alexander to the city of Alexandria, using 

 stratagem to delude the regent Perdiccas, who wished to get 

 possession of it. 



5. Jicstin (XIII., 4) says that Arridsens was ordered by the 

 Generals to conduct Alexander's body to the temple of Ammon. 



6. Suetonius (Life of Augustus 18) says that Augustus 



