Preview (Alexander’s successors and the creation of Hellenistic kingship)
Preview (Royal traditions and the consolidation of power by Alexander’s successors)
In these two monographs, John Holton presents new approaches to the development and consolidation of the Hellenistic monarchies following Alexander the Great. Although the basic ideas of both books are not directly dependent on each other, they can be easily combined and complement each other by offering theory-based studies of the early phase of Hellenistic kingship.
In the first volume to be discussed here, Alexander’s Successors and the Creation of Hellenistic Kingship, Holton addresses the initial question: How did monarchies develop after 323 BC and the death of Alexander? Holton offers one of the first specialised studies to examine the beginnings of Hellenistic kingship in a comprehensive and detailed manner. The initial question ultimately gives rise to three possible explanations for the history of the origins of Hellenistic kingship: Was it merely a continuation of Macedonian royal power, the adoption of the Achaemenid imperial tradition, or a pragmatic solution to administrative necessity? Holton bases his answer on his thesis that the early phase of Hellenistic kingship should be understood as a dynamic comprehensive process: early Hellenistic kingship developed in a multipolar competitive space through performative, symbolic and ideological practices that transformed military power into institutionalised monarchy. Holton answers the initial question in five points, which correspond to the five main chapters of the book and are concluded at the end with an overview summary.
At the beginning, in Chapter 1 (“Approaching the World of Early Hellenistic Kingship”), Holton starts with the events of 306 BC: the victory of Antigonus Monophthalmos, his subsequent assumption of the royal title, and the imitation of this by Ptolemy, Seleucus, Lysimachus and Cassander. The author considers this series of self-coronations to be the birth of Hellenistic kingship. He also interprets this development as a conscious ideological construction of rule and contradicts older research, which generally does not interpret the Hellenistic monarchies as a uniform model. Holton, on the other hand, perceives numerous similarities within this first generation of kings: their origins in the collapse of Alexander’s empire, a Macedonian-Greek background, similar institutional development, and common forms of royal ideology. After Alexander’s death, the hegemonic order could not be maintained due to the vacuum he left behind; instead, a world of competing states emerged. This multipolarity, which was characteristic of Hellenism, had three consequences: 1) a permanent comparability between rulers emerged, 2) it became necessary for individual rulers and royal houses to assert themselves symbolically, and 3) rulers were under constant pressure to innovate with regard to questions of rank and status. Holton concludes that competition between rulers was not a side effect of the new world of states, but rather a structural principle.
The first chapter thus forms the theoretical foundation for the entire book. The focus is on the theoretical concepts of ideology and performance and the international perspective within the world of states. The idea of competition serves as an analytical model. The following chapters examine specific case studies that support and substantiate the theoretical framework established in Chapter 1. The main thesis of the chapter is that Hellenistic kingship did not arise simply or even by chance, but was actively constructed by leading figures and developed out of the competitive environment of the multipolar world of states. And since Holton’s entire theoretical concept is based on the hypothesis that the first generation exhibits strong structural similarities, ideology and symbolic performance became decisive tools for the formation of power, and the accompanying competition became, in a sense, the necessary engine of institutional and ideological development.
The second chapter, entitled “The Performance of Status in the Early Hellenistic World: Craterus of Delphi,” focuses on the monumental votive offering made by the Macedonian general Craterus to the Panhellenic sanctuary at Delphi. It depicts a lion hunt in which Alexander is rescued by Craterus. The elaborately designed group of figures served both to heroically portray Alexander and to represent Craterus himself, who was able to present himself as the legitimate heir to the Macedonian elite, Alexander’s closest confidant and militarily superior. Holton analyses the monument not as a work of art, but as a political act, concluding that it was a deliberate performance of status. This idea of performance then becomes the theoretical basis of the chapter. According to this, rule was not only considered a legal status, but also a repeated public representation. To support his argument, Holton draws on numerous performative examples, such as heroic pictorial programmes, the diadem as a sign of sovereignty, the coinage of individual rulers and their titles. He thus identifies three functions of performance: the visualisation, stabilisation and hierarchisation of sovereignty and status. However, by providing comprehensible evidence that these practices of self-promotion had already developed before the formal elevation to kingship, Holton is able to illustrate that Hellenistic kingship did not arise abruptly and unexpectedly, but rather evolved from an existing system of symbolic competition. In this context, the memory of Alexander became symbolic capital. Overall, it is evident that the royal ideology of early Hellenism emerged from competition, performance and international visibility.
The third chapter (“Heroic Paradigms of Rulership and the Politics of imitatio”) focuses primarily on the image and usefulness of heroes (especially Heracles) as an ideological model for Alexander and his successors. Holton pursues the thesis that early kingship developed not only out of political competition, but also out of a deliberately constructed heroic interpretative framework. After a general description of the complexity of imitation, he draws on three rulers to illustrate their references to Heracles and their imitation of Alexander: Ptolemy Aegiochus, Lysimachus and Pyrrhus of Epirus. The focus is primarily on their coinage. This proves that Heracles in particular—first for Alexander, then for his successors—became the mythological model of imperial rule and served as a symbolic transitional form between the Macedonian military leader and the sacralised monarchy. With the help of the heroic paradigm, the Diadochi succeeded in resolving their legitimacy dilemma and legitimising their status as Alexander’s successors, their own greatness and their monarchical exceptionalism.
The author uses the diadem as a symbolic condensation, which he examines in Chapter 4 (“Diadem and basileia: A Zelotypic Model”). Holton uses the diadem as a key analytical example because it became the central symbol of power, especially for early Hellenistic kingship, and thus could make power visible as a performative sign. The diadem marked monarchical sovereignty, especially in the ‘Year of the Kings’ (306–304 BC)—not through wearing it, but through self-coronation, which on the one hand manifested one’s own claims and autonomy and on the other hand challenged one’s rivals. By feeling compelled, in a sense, to follow Antigonus I in accepting the title of king—symbolised by the diadem—the other Diadochi signalled international equality. And thus, the diadem became not a sign of an already existing monarchy, but a tool for its creation, enabling it to generate monarchical identity. All this was disseminated, among other images, through the deliberate depiction of the diadem in the respective coin portraits, of which Holton discusses numerous individual examples in detail. This constructed visibility in turn stabilised the institution of monarchy. And as a counter-thesis to Roland Smith (Hellenistic Royal Portraits [1988], 36), the chapter concludes: “I would suggest instead that it was the diadochoi who filled the diadem with meaning and established it is the defining symbol of basileia in the Hellenistic world—and indeed beyond—in support of the creation of their new kingships“ (125).
In the final chapter (“Spear-won Land in Hellenistic Imperial Discourse”), Holton interprets the well-known and widespread phenomenon of spear-won land not as a mere military platitude of Hellenistic rulers, but as an ideological justification of monarchical sovereignty. Through military successes, the rulers, following in Alexander’s footsteps, were able to legitimise and consolidate their rule, making war and violence the basis of their sovereignty. Conversely, Holton also mentions the downside of this ideology: if rule was based solely on military victory, it must be concluded that military defeats could result in a loss of legitimacy, which in turn led to structural instability.
This conclusion to the argument reveals the common thread running through all the chapters: early Hellenistic kingship appears to be the result of symbolic, military and performative construction—and not merely a political necessity, as was often assumed in earlier research.
In the summarising thoughts of the last chapter (“Conclusion”), Holton revisits these ideas and makes it clear that the early Hellenistic monarchies had recognisable common political features, whose political culture developed out of symbolic competition and emerged as institutions from performative practice.
Overall, Holton’s approach challenges some central positions in classical studies, but also demonstrates compatibility with and a certain proximity to cultural theory approaches, primarily political performance theories, symbolic anthropology and cultural-historical ideology analysis.
Now to the strengths of the book: the monograph presents a clear, coherent and well-argued overarching model and thus demonstrates systematic consistency. The focus on the early phase (323–276 BC) appears methodologically convincing, which in turn plausibly explains the shift away from a purely regional approach towards an international perspective. The combination of the history of ideas and political practice also creates a new integration of ideology and power. A particular achievement is the combination of source genres, which are systematically integrated into the model and methodologically reflected upon.
However, Holton’s decision to base his study on the similarities among the first-generation rulers results in a certain overemphasis on this coherence. The actual regional differences between the Seleucids, Ptolemies and Antigonids may be greater than Holton’s model suggests. This also leads to generalisations that are not without problems in terms of source work. Furthermore, the interpretations sometimes seem to be strongly guided by theories, models and concepts. This allows him to offer a convincing all-encompassing explanation; at the same time, however, the question remains as to whether the observed correlations are directly evident from the sources or are only made visible in part through the application of modern concepts such as “performance,” “symbolic capital,” or “political communication.”
Overall, Holton’s monograph offers a clearly structured, comprehensible and coherent theory on the emergence of early Hellenistic kingship as a competitively generated, performatively stabilised and ideologically structured form of rule in a multipolar world.
Holton’s parallel work, entitled Royal Traditions and the Consolidation of Power by Alexander’s Successors, further examines the new traditions that developed during the consolidation of these newly formed empires. He analyses the establishment of long-term kingdoms after Alexander the Great and examines how his successors legitimised their power by appropriating and reshaping royal ideologies and traditions. The monograph focuses primarily on the strategies that led to the stabilisation and consolidation of these new Hellenistic empires.
Following on from his work on the emergence of monarchies, Holton pursues the core thesis that the Hellenistic monarchies did not arise through military enforcement, but through the conscious development of royal traditions that were intended to lead and did lead to the long-term consolidation of rule. With his approach, he shifts the traditional focus of the research perspective by viewing the Diadochi period not as a phase of power struggles, but as a process of institutionalisation, making consolidation rather than violence the key to this process and thus evaluating the concept not as personal dominance, but as structured monarchy. In the four main chapters, Holton uses different research approaches and case studies to support his main thesis.
In the first chapter, Holton also lays the theoretical foundation by addressing the question of how Alexander’s successors legitimised their rule and were able to consolidate it in a particularly lasting manner (“New Royal Traditions and the Consolidation of Power”). While older research has relied primarily on Max Weber’s typology with its concepts of charismatic, traditional and rational-legal rule, Holton considers these categories insufficient to plausibly explain early Hellenistic kingship. Instead, he advocates a stronger focus on the process of consolidation. By this he means the institutional stabilisation, ideological anchoring and social embedding of rule. Holton demonstrates how important the consolidation of rule must have been in the early phase of the Hellenistic monarchies by citing a negative example, namely the reign of the Macedonian Perdiccas (323–320 BC), which was based exclusively on violence, military coercion and the elimination of political opponents. However, Perdiccas was unable to stabilise his rule with the help of sustainable ideological or social mechanisms. After his military ventures failed, he lost the support of the army and was assassinated. Holton concludes that without sustainable consolidation, legitimation could only lead to unstable and short-lived rule. Conversely, a monarchy could only remain stable if it was perceived as normal and self-evident—in other words, if it was consolidated. With this in mind, some of the Diadochi seemed to be experimenting with new forms of monarchical self-representation even before assuming the title of king. From these initial practices, Holton deduces that the Hellenistic monarchies could not have emerged suddenly, but rather developed gradually from experimentation with symbolic power. And with these ideas, he ties in with certain points in the monograph published in parallel.
He substantiates this thesis with that the case study of the satrap Peucestas, who succeeded in consolidating his rule beyond its early stages with the help of generosity, religious performance and cultural mediation.
This first chapter also sets out the theoretical framework for the entire book. The period after Alexander was not only a phase of power struggles, but also a process of transformation in which military commanders became ideologically secure monarchs. The Hellenistic kingdoms thus also emerged as a result of deliberate stabilisation strategies. Accordingly, it is not the seizure of power by the early monarchs that should be regarded as innovative, but rather its lasting consolidation, which made the monarchy the political norm. The following three chapters serve to deepen the theoretical framework with further arguments.
The second chapter (“Gods and Mortals: Structures of Divine Kingship”) begins by discussing the sacralisation of kingship as a stabilising factor. According to this view, deified kingship should not be understood as an expression of hybris, but rather as an instrument for increasing the symbolic distance of the ruler, who thus became politically untouchable. The cultic honours bestowed upon rulers thus fulfilled a threefold function: binding loyalty, public visibility and institutionalisation of rule. Alexander in particular became a charismatic reference figure for all early rulers, as Holton demonstrates particularly vividly based on the respective coinage of individual rulers. Thus, the divinity of the ruler did not serve as an end, but as a means of consolidating power and stabilising the regime, because it could make rule timeless and imbue loyalty with religious significance.
In the third chapter (“Institutional Symmetry: Joint Kingship and Indivisible basileia”), Holton advocates a reassessment of the practice of joint rule by father and son: not as an expression of weakness or insecurity, but as a means of ensuring dynastic continuity. According to this view, early rulers were able to eliminate potential threats to the monarchy, namely succession disputes, the minority of heirs to the throne and military rivalry, with the help of co-regency and the early appointment of heirs to the throne. This goes hand in hand with the concept of indivisible basileía: despite the existence of several kings, the monarchy remained ideologically indivisible, so that dynastic unity could be placed above individual power. The institution of the monarchy was thus abstracted from a single individual, so that communal rule could in turn become an instrument of consolidation because it could stabilise succession, routinise monarchical power and reduce violent transitions.
In the final chapter (“Royal Death and Ideological Legacy”) Holton concludes by discussing the death of a ruler as a potential moment of crisis that threatened loyalty, military unity and dynastic continuity. To avoid these threats and neutralise potential ruptures, Hellenistic monarchs developed ritualised processes for funerals, tomb monuments and heroisation, Holton argues, citing individual studies such as the last journey of Demetrius Poliorcetes or the career of Ptolemy Ceraunus as evidence. By controlling the image of the deceased king, the narrative of his reign and the connection to the dynasty, his successors were able to turn memory into an instrument of power. And thus, death was also integrated into the consolidation process.
The Hellenistic monarchies, as presented in Royal traditions, appear to be a strategic development of new royal traditions, whose central mechanisms included sacralisation, dynastic institutionalisation and ritualised memory. As the monarchy was able to develop into the normal form of political order on this basis, the once charismatic leadership became a routine, stabilised and consolidated dynasty.
Holton’s descriptions allow us to identify a three-stage model of development, at the end of which the monarchy emerges as the normal political form. The early period of military power (323–315 BC) is regarded as an unstable, personality-driven and violence-based phase. This was followed by a period of symbolic experiments with sacralisation, dynastic approaches and representation. From 306 BC onwards, we can finally speak of an institutionalised monarchy with royal titles, co-regency and ritualised continuity.
By classifying these developments and phenomena as part of a transformation process, Holton implicitly revises older research approaches, emphasising above all the tendencies towards innovation, system formation and stabilisation and presenting them as deliberate strategies. This is also the main achievement of his innovative approaches and arguments. He makes an important contribution to the development of theory on the Hellenistic monarchy in general, focusing primarily on institutional and ideological dimensions. Overall, he succeeds in linking phenomena that have previously been treated rather disparately (cult, dynasty, ritual) into a coherent consolidation model in a comprehensible and sharply argued manner. The argumentation is particularly convincing where Holton succeeds in linking different types of sources.
As in the first monograph, one could criticise the model’s strong theoretical focus, as this cannot always be substantiated by case studies. The various sources are sometimes interpreted in a highly functional manner, and the heterogeneous evidence tends to be systematised. In addition, the macro-institutional orientation leaves little room for consideration of possible regional differences and regionally heterogeneous practices of rule. Furthermore, non-Greek elites or locally adapted concepts of monarchy are hardly considered.
In both works, Holton succeeds in innovatively reassessing the early phase of Hellenistic monarchies through the use of clear analytical concepts, the integration of political theories, and a focus on development, long-term stability, and the accompanying stabilisation process, thereby making a valuable contribution to the study of the phenomenon of the multipolar Hellenistic world of states.
Both monographs are recommended reading for anyone interested in the early phase of Hellenistic kingship.