Moreover, the story of Alexander, especially as adapted by the middle ages, contained a large amount of magic and science, more especially the former. The Epitome might omit a great deal else, but it kept intact the opening portion of the Pseudo-Callisthenes and of Julius Valerius concerning the adventures of Nectanebus, the sage and magician from Egypt, the astrologer and the natural father of Alexander. Indeed, the titles in some manuscripts suggest that Nectanebus came to rival Alexander for medieval readers as the hero of the story. Thus we find a History of Alexander, King of Macedon, and of Nectanebo, King of Egypt,[2305] or an account Of the Life and Deeds of Neptanabus, astronomer of Egypt,[2306] or a Latin metrical version by “Uilikinus” or Aretinus Quilichinus of Spoleto in 1236 entitled, The History of the Science of the Egyptians and of Neptanabus their king who afterwards was the true father of Alexander.[2307]
Who was Nectanebus?
Pliny in the Natural History describes the obelisk of Necthebis, king of Egypt, whom he places five centuries before Alexander the Great.[2308] Plutarch, however, in his life of Agesilaus and Nepos in his life of Chabrias mention a Nectanebus II who struggled against Persia for the throne of Egypt about 361 B. C. and later was forced to flee to Ethiopia. In the Alexander romance, however, it is to Macedon that Nectanebus retreats. A Nectabis is listed as a magician along with Ostanes, Typhon, Dardanus, Damigeron, and Berenice, by Tertullian, writing about 200 A. D.[2309] As a matter of fact, in the Thirtieth Dynasty were two kings named respectively Nektanebes or Nekht-Har-ehbēt, who ruled 378 to 361 B. C., and Nektanebos or Nekhte-nebof, who ruled 358 to 341 B. C. Both have left considerable buildings.[2310] It is the latter who was forced by the Persians to flee to Ethiopia nine years before Alexander conquered Egypt and who is the hero of our story. The stele of Metternich is covered with magical formulae ascribed to Nectanebo.[2311]
A scientific key-note.
A note suggestive of both natural science and occult science is struck by the opening passage of the Latin epitomes and of the oldest Greek manuscript; the first page of Julius Valerius is missing and has to be supplied from the epitomes. The first words are “The Egyptian sages,” and the first sentence describes their scientific ability in measuring the earth and in tracing the revolutions of the heavens and numbering the stars. “And of them all Nectanabus is recognized to have been the most prudent ... for the elements of the universe obeyed him.” In the opening sentences of the oldest Greek version and of the Ethiopic version even more emphasis is laid than in the Epitomes upon the learning of the Egyptians in general and of Nectanebus in particular, and of the close connection of that learning with astrology and magic.[2312] We read, “Now there lived in the land of Egypt a king who was called Bektanis, and he was a famous magician and a sage, and he was deeply learned in the wisdom of the Egyptians. And he had more knowledge than all the wise men who knew what was in the depths of the Nile and in the abysses, and who were skilled in the knowledge of the stars and of their seasons and in the knowledge of the astrolabe and in the casting of nativities.... And by his learning and by his observations of the stars Nectanebus was able to predict what would befall anyone who was about to be born.”[2313] In one Latin manuscript of the fifteenth century the History of Alexander the Great begins with the
5 sentence, “Books tell us how powerful the race of the Egyptians were in mathematics and the magic art.”[2314]
Magic of Nectanebus.
Next we are told, and the account is practically the same in all the versions of the story, how by means of his basin filled with water, his wax images of ships and men, his rod or wand of ebony, and the incantations with which he addressed the gods above and below, Nectanebus had been hitherto able to destroy all the armies and to sink all the fleets that had come against him. But when one day he found his magic unavailing to save him, he shaved his head and beard and fled to Macedon, where in linen garb he plied the trade of an astrologer.
Nectanebus as an astrologer.
In this he soon became so celebrated that the fame of his predictions reached the ears of the queen Olympias, who consulted him during an absence of Philip. When she asked Nectanebus by means of what art he divined the future so truthfully, he answered that there were many varieties of divination. Julius Valerius and the Latin epitomes mention specifically only interpreters of dreams and astrologers, but the Greek, Syriac, and Ethiopic versions give more elaborate lists of various kinds of diviners.[2315] Nectanebus next produced an astrological tablet adorned with gold and ivory and with each planet and the horoscope represented by a different stone or metal. With the aid of this he read the queen’s horoscope and told her that she would have a son by the God Ammon and would be forewarned soon to that effect in a dream. Olympias replied that if such a dream came to her, she would no longer employ Nectanebus as a magus but honor him as a god.