Lykophron: Alexandra

The Alexandra, attributed to Lykophron is a minor poetic masterpiece. At 1474 lines, it is one of the most important and notoriously difficult Greek poems dating from the Hellenistic period.

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Traditionally ascribed to the early third-century BCE tragedian Lykophron, the Alexandra is a powerful Greek poem by an unknown author, probably written c. 190, when Rome had defeated Hannibal and the Carthaginians and was poised to humble the Seleukid king Antiochos III. The poem is an ingeniously constructed masterpiece, a generic mix with elements of tragedy, epic, and history.

Priam's beautiful daughter, the prophetic Kassandra, foresees her rape in Athena's temple by the hateful Greek warrior Ajax after Troy's fall, and warns of disastrous returns (nostoi) for all the Greek 'heroes'. But Troy will rise again as Rome, founded by Trojan refugees. Alexandra (another name for Kassandra), narrates these Mediterranean foundation myths, adopting a bitterly disillusioned female perspective, but culminating in prophecies of Roman rule over land and sea.