It’s Monday, so – did you know that a Byzantine manuscript shows Alexander the Great sending a version of the “dick pic?” Here’s that promised thread @tlecaque @thereallajones 1/20
The Internet seems pretty familiar with the Western medieval manuscript featuring the penis trees, yeah? Well let’s examine a Byzantine case of not-quite-subliminal messaging that I think beats penis trees any day 2/20 
Created for Emperor Alexios III Megas-Komnenos of Trebizond (r. 1349-1390), the 14th cent Venice Hellenic Institute Codex Graecus 5, aka the Trebizond Alexander Romance (TAR), is an extensively illustrated manuscript of the legendary adventures of Alexander the Great 3/20
One of Alexander’s most famous adventures is his encounter with the Amazons – this episode is visualized on TAR folios 168r-172v and 182r-v eib.xanthi.ilsp.gr/scripts_and_mi… 4/20
166v – 167r – Alexander leaves the Kingdom of Meroe and the powerful Kandake to seek out the Amazons. Alexander initiates contact by sending a letter emphasizing that he has won great victories but that he comes “in order to see your country and to benefit you”…mhmm 5/20
168r – Here the viewer sees the Amazons for the first time. Significantly, we (the viewers) see them before Alexander does, by several folios in fact. Notice their spears and shields – we’ll come back to those… 6/20
The Amazons and Alexander correspond, texting back and forth (poor messengers!), until Alexander orders them to submit “in order to save themselves”…right 7/20
171r – the Amazons say “alright, but send a selfie first,” and here’s where our story really starts to sound oddly modern. They ask Alexander for a picture (“ομοίωμα της μορφής”) so that they can honor him forever. 8/20
172v – Alexander agrees to their request for a likeness…but sends his SPEAR instead of that selfie we all expected – if that’s not a medieval dick pic then I don’t know what is 9/20
What’s more is the caption that accompanies the image (the red writing above the image field) confirms that the spear IS Alexander’s image = “…Alexander said to the Amazons: this is an eternal memorial for you, in place of King Alexander himself” 10/20
Here’s the original Greek for reference = Τέως το δόρυ αυτού εξαποστειλας ο αλεχανδρος, ειπε προς αυτας δη τας αμαζονιδας. Τούτο υμιν εστω εις μνημουσνον αιωνιον αντι αλεχανδρου του βασιλέως 11/20
Need I say more? Okay I will, because there are more layers to this. Let’s unpack this because Alexander knows what he’s doing. Alexios III and his court knew what was up. This is phallic imagery at its most potent. 12/20
168r – When we first see the Amazons of the TAR, though given spears and shields, they are dressed in medieval, Byzantine female dress – there’s no mistaking the Amazons for the male warriors depicted elsewhere in the TAR (ex = fol 107v) 13/20
As I noted, the viewer is in a privileged position and sees the Amazons before Alexander does. When we do – fol. 168r – look at their shields. Those shield patterns cue breasts and the vagina. Even their armor is feminized. We’re primed to see them as women. 14/20
Bear with me because it gets even MORE obvious that this dick pic is meant to be absolutely the be all, end all for the Amazons (in Alexander’s mind at least). Two earlier images in the TAR set up the sexualized imagery of the Amazons episode 15/20
1. Fol 34v = Alexander’s spear is a symbol of his conquest versus the Persians
2. Fol 143v = Kandake of Meroe secretly commissions a portrait of Alexander (a much less symbolic likeness and truer to life in this case)
3. The final layer is textual 16/20
2. Fol 143v = Kandake of Meroe secretly commissions a portrait of Alexander (a much less symbolic likeness and truer to life in this case)
3. The final layer is textual 16/20
As the Amazons put it, “If we conquer the enemy or put them to flight, that is regarded as a humiliation for them for the rest of time; but if they conquer us, it is only women that they have defeated. Now beware, Alexander, that the same thing does not happen to you” 17/20
So toxic masculinity is the problem here. Alexander CAN’T risk losing to the Amazons, so he sends them a symbolically and ideologically charged object in order to conquer the Amazons as women AND as warriors 18/20
For an art historian, this episode is in an incredible example of the elision of identity and symbol and of the ability of images to communicate. These images are also prime ground for conversations on consent, colonization, visual rhetoric, identity, etc. 19/20
Hope you enjoyed the thread! While you’re here - #BlackLivesMatter, check out #BlackInTheIvory, and support the Byzantinists of Color Fund @ByzStudNA
