That everie wight that hath discrecionne
Hath horde somewhat or al of his fortune;”
but we would not have the reader think that here is an exhaustive list, even along the line of descent we have traced, of the forms of the Alexander Story. Amongst other European versions are the German prose version (printed in 1478, Aug. Vind., fo.), made by John Hartlieb Moller, at the command of Albert, Duke of Bavaria. There are further, early Spanish, Italian, Norse, Swedish, Dutch, and Russian versions. An early rhyme, preserving an incident of the story, is printed by Schiller, “Thesaur. Antiq. Teuton,” t. i., in the Rhythm. de S. Annone, xiv., xv.
It hardly comes within our province to refer to other forms of the Alexander Story in Europe, except in the briefest possible way. A work often mistaken for the “De Proeliis” is the compilation of Radulphus of St Albans, who compiled from Quintus Curtius and other authors a Life of Alexander. In 1236 William of Spoleto wrote a Life of Alexander in Latin elegiacs, a work quoted by Warton as of Aretinus Quilichinus.
Independent Legends—Persian, Arabic.
The Pseud-Callisthenes is often spoken of as the work of Simeon Seth, protovestiarius of the palace of Antiochus at Constantinople, and was in the last century considered a translation from the Persian about the year 1070. Other reasons apart the dissimilarity between the Egyptian and the Persian forms of the story would disprove this theory. Just as the Egyptians represented Alexander as the son of the last of their native kings, so the Persians represented him (in the popular legend) as the son of Darius (Codomannus of the Kayanian dynasty), and of a daughter of Philip of Macedon, who was brought up by his grandfather, and afterwards overcame his elder brother. An independent tradition seems to have grown up among the Arabs, making him the son of an old woman, and born in obscurity, his name being originally Mazban (Lord of the Marches), son of Marzabah, descended from Yunan, son of Japhet (Burton, “Arabian Nights”).
Syriac Versions.
An early Arabic version of the Greek must have been made about the eighth century, from which the Syriac version we have at present was made, but unfortunately this has not been found. A Syriac version was made in the eighth century, of which parts exist; but our most complete version is that made in the seventh-ninth century, and published with a version by Budge. Eight chapters of this are missing, and it is noticeable that the source of the translation did not contain the interpolations from Palladius (367-431) which the Greek text now does. An Armenian version is attributed to Moses of Chorene (fifth century), who certainly knew the story.
Armenian, Hebrew, Arabic, Persian, Ethiopic, Coptic.
The story early passed into Hebrew. It is found in Jos. ben Gorion (lib. II. p. 94, ed. Oxon. 1704, 4to), and a pseudonymous translation of the work of Ptolemy, son of Lagos, by Samuel ben Judah ben Sibbon of Granada, appeared in the thirteenth century. (See a French translation of a Hebrew version by J. Levi, “Revue des Etudes Juives,” III. 241.) It is found in the Arabic of Said ibn Batrik (939 A.D.), Patriarch of Alexandria (Eutychus., ed. Pocock, Oxon. 1606), and in Gregory Abul Farag (1265). Mohl believed that Firdusi had an Arab author before him when writing of Alexander. Among the Persian writers may be named Firdusi (1024), Nizami (1203), and Mirkond (1497). An Ethiopic version will shortly be published by Budge; and among others existing are versions in Coptic, Malay, and Siamese. Several detached incidents connect themselves with the story. Thus we may mention the “Iter ad Paradisum,” twelfth century (of Talmudic origin), printed at Konigsberg, 1859; the Gog and Magog story, &c.