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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;kirispupis, post: 7767450, member: 118780&quot;]Hello everyone! </p><p><br /></p><p>This is one of the latest coins in my collection. I debated about this coin for some time due to the flan crack, but I really liked the condition and I was dead set on this helmet type being my representative for Kassander, so I went ahead with it. I&#039;ll probably redo these photographs, since my setup was created with silver in mind and hasn&#039;t worked well for bronze.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1331866[/ATTACH] </p><p><br /></p><p>However, the topic I&#039;d prefer to bring up is: was Kassander really a bad guy? I present the evidence for and against.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>The Schmuck Things</b></p><p>1) There were ancient accusations, especially by Olympias, that Kassander was directly involved in Alexander the Great&#039;s death. </p><p>2) He executed Olympias, Alexander the Great&#039;s mother, despite agreeing to spare her life as terms for her surrender. Execution was by stoning, and Kassander then denied her burial rites.</p><p>3) He ordered the deaths of both the 14-year-old Alexander IV, and his mother Roxana.</p><p>4) His own father didn&#039;t seem to find him fit to be regent, and appointed Polyperchon instead. Kassander then took things into his own hands and seized the throne.</p><p>5) He died of gout. Sure, he was one of the few rulers of this period to not be killed (others were Ptolemy and Antipater), but he had probably the most painful death of all. One could argue that&#039;s a sign of major karma.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>The Explanations</b></p><p>1) We don&#039;t truly know what killed Alexander. There&#039;s a lot of speculation that no poison of the day would have taken 11 days to finish him. Also, Olympias was Kassander&#039;s primary enemy, and she had a lot to gain by spreading such a rumor.</p><p>2) Olympias herself had been cruel to Philip III and his wife Eurydice. Kassander had also ordered a more stately death for Olympias, but no soldier would carry out a sentence on Alexander the Great&#039;s mother.</p><p>3) The other diadochi - Lysimachos, Antigonos I Monophthalmos, Ptolemy I Soter, and Seleukos I Nikator, didn&#039;t shed many tears over the act and soon declared themselves kings. There&#039;s much speculation that Kassander ordered the executions with agreement from the others. In reality, at that time there was no unified empire for Alexander IV to inherit.</p><p>4) It&#039;s possible Antipater was worried that the other diadochi would not respond well to dynastic succession, and appointing Kassander may have resulted in a war they would not have won.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Potential good points</b></p><p>1) Macedonia under Kassander was peaceful and flourished.</p><p>2) He named the city of Thessalonika, one of several he either founded or rebuilt, in honor of his wife Thessalonike. She was raised by Olympias, so probably didn&#039;t have happy-feely thoughts about marrying Kassander. She bore him three sons.</p><p>3) Several of his siblings weren&#039;t so bad. His sister Phila was married to Balakros, Krateros, and Demetrios of Macedon, and was highly respected. She in particular had a major impact on the reckless Demetrios.</p><p>4) Kassander allowed his brother Alexarchus, who was a bit on the loony side, to found the utopian city Uranopolis.</p><p>5) Unlike Ptolemy, Lysimachos, and Seleukos, Kassander never minted silver in his own name. He did mint bronze. Only Antigonos never minted either bronze or silver in his own name.</p><p><br /></p><p>So, given the evidence, what do you think? Was Kassander just a pragmatist who knew how to play the game of thrones, or was he a major schmuck?</p><p><br /></p><p>For what it&#039;s worth, even if he does justify the schmuck label, he&#039;s only the #2 schmuck in the diadochi annals. First place has to go to Ptolemy Keraunos.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Ptolemy Keraunos: Chief Macedonian Schmuck</b></p><p>1) Led to the downfall of the Lysimachos regime (of whom he was a guest), but conspiring with his sister to trick Lysimachos into killing his son.</p><p>2) Volunteered to go pray with Seleukos I Nikator, then stabbed him in the back.</p><p>3) Was considered unfit for rule by his father Ptolemy I Soter, hence his presence in Lysimachia.</p><p>4) Arranged to marry Arsinoe II, in exchange for sparing her two young sons. On their wedding day he murdered both.</p><p><br /></p><p>However, there are no coins fully attributed to Ptolemy Keraunos today. There are some rare bronzes with the portrait of Arsinoe II, but strong arguments now have moved the attribution to Ptolemy II Philadelphos.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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