Alexander the Great by Anthony Everitt

Author:Anthony Everitt
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2019-08-26T16:00:00+00:00

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ON THEIR WAY TO Susa, the Macedonians came across unrefined petroleum oozing from the soil, so copiously that it formed a small lake. The substance was highly inflammable and could be set alight, Plutarch observes, “by a flame’s radiance without actually touching it.” One evening as it was growing dark, some Persians arranged a demonstration. They sprinkled a small quantity of petroleum, or naphtha, along the street that led to the king’s quarters and then set light to it at one end. In a fraction of a second the flames flashed to the other end, an effect that the ancient world had never before witnessed.

On another occasion, a servant boy called Stephanus was in attendance while the king took a bath and rubbed himself down with olive oil. Thinking that the flames moved so fast that they would not burn flesh, a courtier suggested that naphtha be tried out on Stephanus. Surprisingly, he agreed to the experiment and coated himself with the liquid. The fire took and Stephanus was enveloped in flames. Alexander was horrified, and if servants had not been able to put the fire out by pouring water over the boy, he would have died. As it was, he was badly burned.

Scientific experts of the day speculated (wrongly, it goes without saying) that naphtha flows from soil that is oily and combustible. It was no accident, they flatteringly inferred, that their king’s own nature was equally fiery. No wonder he was conquering the combustible soil of Mesopotamia with such ease. Although the sources do not name him, this was just the kind of sycophantic idea that Callisthenes would have thought up.

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