Here is something I just wanted to share.......

Occasionally I buy cheap books at yard sales, one of which happened to be written by Mary Renault, a name I had heard of but knew little of.  It is called Fire from Heaven and is a historical novel about Alexander the Great (a name I had heard of but knew little of).

Well, it turned out to be a fascinating story about Alexander's youth and the beginnings of his life-long relationship with his friend Hephaistion. Forget about the movie, --this book captured my heart and imagination.  

From Fire from Heaven by Mary Renault 1969, an excerpt;

[Alexander and Hephaistion, when teenagers] They were sitting in the trough between two of the Palace gables; a private spot, since only Alexander had climbed there till he showed Hephaistion the route...

[they talk a bit, and Alexander asks]..."What is it pulling at my hair?" 

"It's a stick from the tree we came up".  Hephaistion, who was not very neat-handed, unwound with anxious care the walnut twig from its shining tangle...This done, he slid his arm down to Alexander's waist. He had done it the first time almost by accident; though not rebuffed, he had waited two days before daring to try it again. Now he watched his chance whenever they were alone; it had become a thing he had thought about. He could not tell what Alexander thought, if he thought at all. He accepted it contentedly, and talked, with ever more ease and freedom, about other things. 

...He looked deeply into Hephaistion's eyes, as always before a confidence. As always, Hephaistion felt as if his midriff was melting. As always, it was some moments before he could follow what he was being told. ...Hephaistion tightened his arm. His feelings were confused; he wanted to grasp till Alexander's very bones were somehow engulfed within himself...Hephaistion was thinking how fragile his rib cage seemed, how terrible were the warring desires to cherish and crush it.

..."I can't breath." 

Hephaistion, who could have said the same, let go quickly... [Alexander] had not withdrawn, but, backed to the sloping gable-roof, sat propped lightly against Hephaistion, trustful and warm. 

..."Alexander. You won't ever go to war without me?" 

Alexander sat up staring; Hephaistion was jolted into taking his hand away. "Without you? What do you mean, how could you even think of it?  You're my dearest friend." 

Hephaistion had known for many ages that if a god should offer him one gift in all his lifetime, he would choose this. Joy hit him like a lightning bolt. "Do you mean it?" he said. "Do you really mean it?" 

"Mean it?" said Alexander, in a voice of astonished outrage. "Did you doubt I meant it? Do you think I tell everyone the things I've told to you? Mean it - what a thing to say!" 

Only a month ago, Hephaistion thought, I should have been too scared to answer. "Don't fight me. One always doubts great good fortune." 

Alexander's eyes relented. Raising his right hand, he said, "I swear by Herakles." He leaned and gave Hephaistion a practiced kiss; that of a child who is affectionate by nature, and fond of grown-up attention. Hephaistion had hardly the time to feel the shock of delight before the light touch had gone. By the time he had nerved himself to return the kiss, Alexander's attention had been withdrawn. He seemed to be gazing at heaven. 

"Look," he said pointing. "You see that Victory statue, on the top gable of all? I know how to get up there." From the terrace, the Victory looked as small as a child's clay doll. When the dizzy climb had brought them to its base, it turned out to be five feet tall. Its hand held a gilded laurel wreath, extended over the void. 

Hephaistion, who had questioned nothing all the way because he had dared not think, clasped in his left arm, at Alexander's bidding, the bronze waist of the goddess. "Now hold my wrist," Alexander said. 

Thus counterpoised, he leaned out, off balance, into empty space, and broke two leaves from the wreath. One came easily; the second he had to worry at. Hephaistion felt clammy sweat in his palms; the dread that it would make his grip slide off turned his belly to ice, and crept in his hair. Through this terror he was aware of the wrist he held. It had looked delicate, against his own big frame; it was hard, sinewy, the fist clenched on itself in a remote and solitary act of will. After a short eternity, Alexander was ready to be pulled back. He climbed down with the leaves in his teeth; when they were back on the roof, he gave one to Hephaistion, saying. "Now do you know we shall go to war together?"

Apparently, Alexander's relationship with Hephaistion was generally more socially accepted during those hundreds of years before the onset of christianism condemning same-sex love throughout much of our world today.  I recall mention in National Geographic, (Nov. 1994);

Discoveries by other teams at Metaponto may document a triumph of the human spirit - the emergence of democratic ideas - years before Athenian citizens introduced their revolutionary demokratia, or rule by the people, in 507 B.C. Ancient historians wrote that the last tyrant of Metapontion was killed by a man named Antileon because the tyrant lusted after Antileon's young lover. After slaying the tyrant, Antileon fled with the youth. Unfortunately, they ran into a flock of sheep tied together in the street. Slowed down, both men were caught and killed. Citizens celebrated the death of the tyrant by erecting bronze statues to the lovers - and by forbidding shepherds to tie their sheep together while driving them through the streets. Later, in Athens, a similar assassination by two lovers preceded that city's democratic revolution. That tyrannicide was so glorified by the Athenians that scholars assumed that the Metapontion slaying was just a fable based on the Athenian tale.

Alexander and Hephaistion together made sacrifices at the shrines of two hero-lovers; Achilles and Patroclus, which I find sweetly sentimental but it was probably meant more to indicate publicly the practical significance of their relationship as much as the sexuality.  Gay, Bi, Straight, etc. are reactionary creations of our times to confront modern prejudices. (so too is this article and this website).  

Anyway, when Alexander was about 18, (338 bce), he participated with his father, King Philip, in a decisive battle against Athens, at Chaeronea, leading a cavalry wing and annihilating the 'Sacred Band of Thebes', a special corps of 300 which had never before seen defeat.  Mary Renault provided a few historical details about this 'Sacred Band' and wrote that they

...were given the heroes' right of a common tomb, and remained together; above them the Lion of Cheironeia sat down to its long watch.

 I had to find out more....

(from The New England Magazine. Volume 22, Issue 1, March 1897) 

The Lion of Chaeronea
By Frank B. Sanborn.

A Greek friend of the writer, Captain Rizos-Rangabe, has lately purchased an estate near the village of Kapraina,  the ancient Chaeronea, at the foot of one of the spurs of Parnassus, and including a considerable part of the famous battlefield where Philip of Macedon and his son Alexander conquered the Thebans and Athenians in August, 338, B.C. It was this victory which gave Macedonia the control of Greece, and of which Milton spoke in his sonnet to Lady Margaret Ley, whose father, Sir James Ley, Earl of Marlborough, died in consequence of King Charle's dissolving the Parliament of 1628-29, as Isocrates did at the news from Chaeronea: "Till sad the breaking of that Parliament Broke him - as that dishonest victory At Chaeronea, fatal to Liberty, Killed with report that old man eloquent."

As at Pharsalia, where, nearly three centuries later, Caesar became master of Greece and Rome by the over-throw of Pompey, there are few evidences, in the great plain extending from Chaeronea towards Thermopylae, that ever thousands of men in arms were there slain. All is peaceful now, and the Beotian sheep, with their Wallachian shepherds, roam where Alexander charged and routed the illustrious Sacred Band of Thebans. But the patriotism of Thebes and the magnanimity of the Macedonian princes created and permitted one memorial of that part of the battle, which has survived till our day, and is of unusual interest. This is the Theban Lion of Chaeronea, erected soon after the fight, over the remains of the valiant Thebans slain by Alexander, but lost to view for centuries until an Englishman discovered it nearly eighty years ago. It was briefly described by Pausanias in his tour of Greece, late in the second Christian century, -who, after declaring that the Macedonians did not erect battle-monuments and giving the traditional reason why, goes on to say: "As you approach Chieronea (from the next town, Lebadea) there is a sepulchre of many Thebans who fell in the fight against Philip; no inscription is carved on it, but a lion stands upon it as an emblem, -signifying eminently the spirit of those dead men. Now the inscription is lacking, as I guess, because the gods did not give them results accordant with their valor."

Apparently Plutarch, though he lived in Chaeronea, did not see fit to describe this monument; nor do we find it mentioned by any successors of Pausamas, -Plutarch was earlier by a century, -until Dr. Clarke, the English tourist, passed through Chaerionea in 1800; and he saw nothing of the Lion, --only a mound or tomb, which from his account could not have been on the spot where the Lion now is. But in 1818 another Englishman, following the steps of Clarke and Dodwell and Lord Byron, actually saw the buried fragments of the Lion, and, setting some peasants to dig, he found the great head and so identified the spot. This was one J. Crawford; the date of his visit was June 3, 1818, and his account appeared in the London New Monthly Magazine for June, 1824.  Welcker, the German archaeologist, says of Crawford: "As he passed along the road to Chaeronea he saw a block of marble exposed to view, and soon found that it belonged to a much greater mass buried in earth and covered with shrubbery. As his men dug on, there appeared the colossal head, a piece of the hind leg, and several other fragments; while the earth thrown out contained stone and mortar which plainly had made a part of the basis". Crawford carefully covered the whole up again; yet fragments of it, exposed through the dirt and rubbish, were noticed by later tourists -of whom Welcker names Edouard Gerhard before 1837, H. N. Ulrichs in 1838, Brandis and Gottling in 1840 or earlier. But he does not name Col. William Mure of Caldwell, who saw the Lion in 1838 (March 6) and published an account of it at Edinburgh in 1843. Ulrichs, who saw it about the same time as Mure, says (Reisen und Forschungen in Griechenland, 1840): "This colossal work of grey Beotian marble has not only separated into the parts of which it was originally composed, but those are broken here and there. Yet the destruction is not so complete but that it could be set up again, -perhaps entire. It seems not to have been purposely broken, but rather that the weight of so huge a mass caused it first to sink into the soft soil and then to fall apart. Judging by the fragments visible, this Lion crouched on his hind feet but rose on his fore paws, lifting his proud, un- conquered head. He may have measured twelve feet from tip to tip." 

Gottling (Abhandlungen, I. 147-153) mentions seven distinct fragments seen by him in 1840, and says: "They show no serious injury, and doubtless the statue fell in pieces of itself, when the ruined mound gave way on which it stood. Originally it was put together in pieces, and the body was made hollow in order to diminish the immense weight." Brandis (Mittheilungen aus Griechenland, I. 249) correctly describes the place where he saw it, "at the foot of the low ridge which divides the valley of the Cephissus from that of the Hercyna of Lebadea", and confirms the view of Ulrichs and Gottling as to the falling apart of the monument. I mention this because there is an unsupported but persistent tradition in Greece that the Lion was blown apart with gunpowder by some chieftain of the Greek Revolution, Odysseus the friend of Trelawny being generally named. Thus G. A. Perdicaris, a Greek, in a book published by him in New York in 1846 (Greece of the Greeks) says: "Ulysses the modern (Odysseus Androutsos), being led to believe that the mound contained hidden treasures, undertook the excavation. Instead of treasure he found a Megatherion, the use of which he did not exactly comprehend; but either suspecting or being informed by some wiser head that the treasure was to be sought for in the body of the animal, he took the Lion to pieces, and found nothing but a scroll of paper on which was written, 'The lentils require oil'. It is supposed that this trick was the work of some of the laborers who, during the excavation, were fed on lentils. without oil. As Crawford unearthed the Lion, already in fragments, some years before Odysseus appeared in that part of Greece, it is plain that this story is fabulous; but possibly it might be true of his father, Androutsos, who lived for a time in Lebadea and exercised control there late in the 18th century. [Alexander Rangabe, the father of my friend the captain, and a distingnished archaeologist, ascribed the vandalism to Ali Pasha, the patron of Odyssens]. 

Colonel Mure (grandfather of the present Lord Ribblesdale and of Reginald Lister, an amateur archaeologist) entered Greece from Zante in the winter of 1838, came up through the Peloponnesus, crossed the Gulf of Corinth, climbed the side of Parnassus, by Delphi and Arachova, and reached Chaeronea in March, a little earlier in the season than I was there in 1890. He was the first Briton to write an extended notice of the Lion, and was enthusiastic over it. He says (Travels in Greece, Edinburgh, 1843): "This may be pronounced the most interesting sepulchral monument in Greece, perhaps in Europe. It is the only one dating from the better days of Hellas with the exception of the tumulus at Marathon -the identity of which is beyond dispute. It is also an ascertained specimen of the most perfect period of Greek art. The language of Pansanias describes very happily the expression which the artist has given to the countenance of the animal, that mixture of  fierceness and humiliation, of rage, sorrow and shame, which would agitate the breasts of proud Hellenic freemen compelled to yield up their independence to the over- whelming power of a semi-barbarous enemy. 

Dean Stanley, who passed through Chaeronea in 1840 without seeing the Lion, was equally enthusiastic when, in company with Sir Thomas Wyse, he finally saw it in 1858. He said: "It is a large lion of gray marble, now broken into fifteen pieces; but there remain distinguishable a claw, two legs and happily the whole of the grand impressive head. As Pausanias says, it does express clearly the three conflicting emotions which its erection was intended to convey. The fine forehead, brought out by the force with which its hair and mane are brushed back, give the nobleness of the cause; its large eyes give the sentiment of melancholy, plaintive grief; its open mouth, filled with two rows of gnashing teeth, give the sense of fierce, unconquered indignation.", This mouth shows the skill of the artist in a peculiar manner, whose effect Stanley noticed, without observing the cause. Gottling, the watchful German, first remarked that "the head of the Lion, which has a very noble expression, has the mouth in front tightly closed, while on each side the jaws open and show two round apertures, to indicate a fierce, half-suppressed growl. My two views of the head, taken from different sides, vindicate this remark; but no photograph can give the sad expression of the eyes, unless it were taken full in front, and from above, as I saw it by climbing up by the mane and looking down into this majestic countenance. 

When F. A. Welcker, who has written the fullest account of the Lion (Alte Denkmaeler, 1856 and 1864), first saw it, May 21 1842, he made this entry in his journal: "A few hnndred steps back from Chaeronea, towards Lebadea, on the old paved road, is the Lion, the fine head and neck, four great pieces and three or four smaller ones; so that the collection and setting up and piecing out the statue would be no great task. The excavation has cut across a knoll, in the crater-like depression of which the fragments lie". This description is still tolerably exact. Some of the stones of the basis wall have been built into the great fountain described by Clarke and figured in almost all the views of Chaeronea and Puckler-Muskau carried off a few bits of the Lion, many years ago. Welcker formed a plan for restoring the monument to its original form, at a cost which he estimated at $4,000 in 1843; but the Greek government, on whose good will he depended for the opportunity, soon changed, and he gave up the scheme. It has lately been taken up by the Greek Archaeological Society, which has excavated so successfully in Athens, Eleusis, Epidaurtis, etc.; and Captain Rangabe writes me (Dec. 5, 1896): "You will be glad to hear that on the proposal of our Crown Prince, who is now president of the Archeological Society, that body has decided to have the Lion of Chareronea erected again on its ancient site. . . . The modern village of Kapraina (Capraena) consists of about fifty houses, with an old church and a schoolhouse, some re- mains of Byzantine baths, and a ruined Frankish castle towering above the village. The carriage road from Lebadea to Atalanti (a town on the gulf near which is Thermopylae) passes just in front of the village; and next to it is to be the station of the future railroad from Athens to Lamia, Larissa and Salonica, -thence to Vienna and Paris. There is a lovely range of hills just behind the village, on one of which we intend to build, when the railway shall have been put through, -which we hope will be in two years. In front of the village is a fine stretch of cotton fields and meadows, down to the river Melas, whose excellent and plentiful waters it is proposed to bring to Athens by an aqueduct." 

The distance of Chaeronea from Athens, in a straight line, over mountain and meadow, would not perhaps exceed sixty miles; but as the new railway will run, for the sake of good grades, it will be farther. Between them lies the mountain range of Parnes, which must be crossed in a pass; then comes the plain of Beotia, in which lie Tanagra (the railway, which I crossed in 1893, runs within a mile or two of the graves which yield the lovely figurines) and Thebes. Lebadea lies a little above and off the line, to the northwest, but will be reached by a branch. When this railway is completed to Salonica, Greece can be reached from Paris or Antwerp by an all-rail journey, and will be brought one day nearer to Boston. But I should not look for the opening of the line through Tempe and under Mt. Olympus so early as my friend mentions. He probably has in mind only the line from Athens to Thebes, Lebadea and Lamia. 

The New York 'Atlantis' correspondent in Athens, December, 1896, gives some new facts, saying: "The ephor of antiquities, Stamatakes, about 1876, discovered the skeletons of the heroes who fell in the fight, but gave them back to Mother Earth, at the same time placing upright little bits of metal (plaques) to mark by rows the position of the head of each corpse. Along the west side of the tomb lie scattered the fragments of the monstrous Lion. There is a tradition ascribing the breaking of the monument to the soldiers of Odysseus Androutsos, who blew it up with powder, expecting that it concealed treasures. This tradition is not incredible, but does not seem exact. The manner in which the Lion is broken shows that it was not the work of an explosion of powder. He is not exactly broken in pieces, but rather fallen apart; the separation of the parts occurred where they were fitted together with iron clamping inside. The monument was upset by the settling of the ground, but was then split apart either by blameworthy neglect, or by the lack of sufficient means to set it up again. The only care that was taken of the 242 skeletons of heroes, after their exhumation (bearing marks evident enough of the wounds inflicted by the soldiers of the Macedonian phalanx), was the placing in the Central museum in Athens of some of the skulls and funeral trappings (kterismata) of the dead, the other remains, as indicated above, being reburied. The Frenchman, Isambert, in his Guide Book, says that nothing would be easier than to set up again this finest artistic memorial of ancient days; but nothing gives a clearer evidence of the contempt of the Greeks for the preservation of their monuments." This last slur is no longer merited. Isambert's 'Itineraire' was published at Paris in 1873. I have seen no other mention of these Theban skeletons.... 

but I was so pleased to have found this:

         
This photo is protected by copyright.
It is reproduced here with the kind permission of JazzhavenGallery.  

(There is more to be enjoyed at http://gallery.jazzhaven.com)

For a brief description of the monument and its restoration, visit
http://gallery.jazzhaven.com/lion-monument-6365i.htm

And,  The Sacred Band ?

( From 'Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia' )

The Sacred Band of Thebes was an elite Greek troop of 150 pairs of homosexual lovers, according to Plutarch (in the Life of Pelopidas) formed by the Theban commander Gorgidas. The idea was that every man would be motivated to fight to his maximum ability both to protect his lover and to avoid shaming himself in front of his lover.

The motivation for the use of such an "Army of Lovers" in battle is also stated by Plutarch:

"For men of the same tribe or family little value one another when dangers press; but a band cemented by friendship grounded upon love is never to be broken, and invincible; since the lovers, ashamed to be base in sight of their beloved, and the beloved before their lovers, willingly rush into danger for the relief of one another."

According to Plutarch, Gorgidas initially distributed the Sacred Band of Thebes throughout his battle lines as an elite to strengthen the others' resolve, but later Pelopidas, after the Band had fought successfully at Tegyra, used it as a sort of personal guard. For about 33 years, the Sacred Band of Thebes stood undefeated and remained an important part of the Greek infantry.

Its defeat came at the Battle of Chaeronea, the decisive battle in which Philip II of Macedon and his son Alexander the Great ended the hegemony of the city-states.... The remainder of the Theban army fled when faced with the overwhelming forces of Philip and Alexander, but the Sacred Band, surrounded and refusing to surrender, held their ground and fell where they stood. Plutarch recounts that upon encountering their corpses heaped together and understanding who they were Philip exclaimed:

"Perish any man who suspects that these men either did or suffered anything unseemly."
Though Plutarch claims that all three hundred died that day, other writers claim that two hundred and fifty four died and all the rest were wounded. That claim was substantiated upon the excavation of their communal grave at Chaeronea, in which two hundred and fifty four skeletons were found, arranged in seven rows.

Finally, a couple of  footnotes;

• whose lion? another mystery of history?
  
  

• and this.....

In 1893, George Ives,  shortly after meeting Oscar Wilde,  founded a secret society called the Order of Chaeronea, named "after the battle where the male lovers of the Theban Band were slaughtered in 338 BC." New members of the Order were required to swear "That you will never vex or persecute lovers" and "That all real love shall be to you as sanctuary."