The chronicle of the embalming of Alexander the Great
Mrs. Mendoni during the press conference for journalists from the Culture Minister Kostas Tasoulas, on Saturday (22/11), on the progress of investigations, said that the skeleton was not embalmed.
She also stressed that the bones of the skeleton were found inside and outside the trench, a fact that is examined with interest by the experts.
The skeleton, as she said, is in a relatively good condition, however, is still doubtful if a DNA examination can be done.
Experts say that if the body of a dead was embalmed, there should be traces left, on the bones. The embalmed bodies were usually sealed in a sarcophagus. In the tomb of Amphipolis were found no traces of embalming in the skeleton, nor sarcophagus.
The fact that the bones show no embalming of the dead, something that we know with certainty that happened to the corpse of Alexander the Great, belies the estimates that the skeleton which was found in the tomb of the Kasta hill belongs to the Macedonian commander.
The denial from Mr. Mendoni "flares up" again the theories about who is ultimately the dead of Amphipolis. At the same time, there is increased interest on the anthropological examinations and DNA analysis, to be made by Greek scientists and will give answers to the gender and age of the deceased. Regarding the identity of the dead, most likely, according to experts, is Nearchus or Hephaestion, the childhood friend of the Great Macedonian.
Alexander the Great died on 13 June 323 BC
The soldiers, just before he died, passed before him, to bid farewell for last time their bedridden leader.
Alexander the Great died in Babylon in 323 BC. According to Herodotus, Strabo and Stobaeus the dead in Babylon were neither mummified nor cremated, but were buried, covered in honey or wax.
Was Alexander the Great embalmed or not?
According to the written sources, his grave is in Alexandria. There are detailed descriptions of ancient writers who talk about a pompous procession in 321 BC, which was carrying the embalmed corpse of Alexander the Great from Babylon, where he died (323 BC). According to the descriptions, the deceased Alexander was placed in a decorated golden urn, which was placed in a golden chariot, pulled by 100 horses.
Alexander himself had asked to be buried in the temple of Zeus Ammon in the oasis of Siwa (Quintus Curtius Rufus, History of Alexander the Great). The transporting of the body was commissioned by the assembly of members and bodyguards of Alexander (Perdiccas, Leonnatus, Ptolemy, Python, Aristonikos and Aridaios) in Aridaios.
Diodorus Siculus (80 BC-20 BC), who lived closer to the events, says: The procession started from Babylon to Egypt led by Aridaios and the gold-trimmed brougham, which was followed by the entire army and crowds (Diodorus, H, 26).
On the border of Egypt with Syria, Ptolemy of Lagus, comrade of Alexander, decided to change the way of the procession and not buried the great marshal in the temple of Amun, but in a luxurious mausoleum in the center of Alexandria, (Diodorus Siculus, eighteenth, 28, 3-5).
Most ancient writers said the same, that Alexander was buried in the mausoleum, where they were the royal tombs. Strabo (Geography, XVII, C, 794, 1, 8), Arrian ("After Alexander» Jacoby, F. Gr. The., 156, fr. 9, 25) and Dio Cassius (Rom. Hist. 51, 15-16).
Visit of Caesar
There are widespread reports for the visits of famous people in the tomb of Alexander in Alexandria. Dio Cassius mentions in the "Roman History" that Julius Caesar, Septimius Severus and Caracalla, visited the tomb. He notes, in fact, that when Julius Caesar entered the mausoleum, stayed silent for hours, standing, looking at the perfectly preserved dead.
His emotion was so great that when he touched the face of Alexander, broke a piece of the nose of the dead! (Cassius Dio, 51, 16).
Caesar August also went and bowed the grave after his victory at Actium in 31 BC, when defeated Mark Antony and Cleopatra. He went on to offer the illustrious dead a wreath and when his drivers invited him to visit the tombs of the Ptolemaic dynasty, Augustus replied:
"I came to see a king, not the dead!.
The traces of Alexander are lost
The traces of the mausoleum fade towards the end of the 3rd century AD. A reference of Patriarch George in 361 AD, however, seems to imply that the mausoleum was intact. In 365 AD Alexandria experienced a major earthquake and a tsunami seems that destroyed the mausoleum.
Towards the end of the century there are reports that the body of Alexander was there. Focal points in the loss of the tomb and the body is what says John Chrysostom in Corinthians: "Where is the tomb of Alexander, show me" something which means that the tomb of Alexander the Great, was lost.
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