Extract
[...] Finally, the article opens up reflection on the performative dimension of ancient political violence. The destruction of Thebes is not just an act of repression but an act of communication, « The ruin of Thebes, far from being a simple episode of repression, constitutes a warning addressed to the entire city. It inaugurates a new era where Macedonian authority can no longer be contested without punishment. (P. 253). Jouanno reveals, sometimes in the background, the logic of Macedonian power: striking hard, fast, and in an exemplary manner to prevent any pan-Hellenic coalition similar to the one that had taken shape after the death of Philip II, we will find similar outbursts of violence in Alexander's conquests at the time of the destruction of Persepolis. [...]
[...] Jouanno emphasizes that the capture of Thebes became very quickly a canonical example, an episode to which authors return to illustrate the effects of Macedonian authority on the cities. This allows me to integrate into my thesis a reflection on the reception of the event: how the Greek cities, still under the shock of the destruction of a major polis, perceived the hegemony of Alexander? How did this episode influence their subsequent behavior, particularly their absence of revolt during the first years of the Asian campaign? [...]
[...] hégémôn of the Greeks. The extreme violence of the repression, its rapidity, its exemplary nature, and the symbolic consequences of the annihilation of a prestigious city sent a perfectly clear message to the rest of the Greek world: the period of hesitations, regional resistances, and political oscillations inherited from the Peloponnesian War was over. Regardless of how the ancient authors tried to soften the narrative, the event had the primary function of installing, by force, a new political order where Greek cities were no longer sovereign entities but subordinate components of an uncontested Macedonian hegemony. [...]
[...] His article thus presents itself as an indispensable resource, both for the study of the founding violence of Macedonian power and for reflection on the narrative instruments by which authority is elaborated in Antiquity. In this sense, it constitutes a decisive contribution to the elaboration of my thesis and to the global understanding of the hegemony that Alexander imposes on the Greek world until his victory at Gaugamela, and then on the Persian world via the elaboration of a new monarchical model that will see the Macedonian empire extend to the battle of the Hydaspes against King Porus. [...]
[...] This observation allows me to understand that Macedonian domination in the Greek world does not rely solely on an institutional structure - namely the Corinthian League - but on the king's ability to impose his power by force, to use terror as an instrument of government, and to inscribe this violence in a legitimizing narrative. Without the destruction of Thebes, Alexander's hegemony would not have the same scope: it would be contested, fragile, and questioned. Thanks to this episode, Alexander appears to the cities not only as the legitimate successor of Philip, but as a sovereign capable of enforcing the order he claims to embody. [...]
