ABSTRACT
Few problems in the history of Alexander the Great have been a greater vexation to the historian than the execution of Philotas and the murder of his father, Parmenion, events that shed an unfavourable light on Alexander's character and on the relationships of his younger Macedonian generals.2 For scholars such as W.W. Tarn and C.A. Robinson Jr., the Philotas-affair became a moral issue, its discussion, ultimately, a conscious effort to exculpate Alexander. 3 So it is with understandable regret that Tarn concludes that Parmenion's death was ‘plain murder and leaves a deep stain on Alexander's reputation’ (1.64). But in the last two decades the gentleman scholar and the gentleman conqueror have fallen out of favour, yielding to a new breed of sceptics. From this group E. Badian emerges as one of the most sound but, as I think, unduly suspicious in the case of the Philotas-affair.
