Hermolaus of Macedon () was a

page Page most commonly refers to: * Page (paper), one side of a leaf of paper, as in a book Page, PAGE, pages, or paging may also refer to: Roles * Page (assistance occupation), a professional occupation * Page (servant), traditionally a young m ...

Alexander the Great Alexander III of Macedon (; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), most commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia (ancient kingdom), Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip ...

in 327 BC, who was executed for planning

regicide Regicide is the purposeful killing of a monarch or sovereign of a polity and is often associated with the usurpation of power. A regicide can also be the person responsible for the killing. The word comes from the Latin roots of ''regis'' ...

Early life

The son of hipparch

Sopolis of Macedon Sopolis (), son of Hermodorus, was Hipparchus (cavalry officer), hipparch of the ile of Hetairoi from Amphipolis, since at least the Triballian campaign of Alexander the Great 335 BC. That he belonged to the Macedonian aristocracy is indicated not ...

, Hermolaus was one of the Macedonian youths drawn from sons of the aristocracy who, according to a custom instituted by

Philip II of Macedon Philip II of Macedon (; 382 BC – October 336 BC) was the king (''basileus'') of the ancient kingdom of Macedonia (ancient kingdom), Macedonia from 359 BC until his death in 336 BC. He was a member of the Argead dynasty, founders of the ...

, attended

as pages.

Conspirator

It was during the residence of the king at

Bactra Balkh is a town in the Balkh Province of Afghanistan. It is located approximately to the northwest of the provincial capital city Mazar-i-Sharif and approximately to the south of the Amu Darya and the Afghanistan–Uzbekistan border. In 20 ...

in the spring of 327 BC, that a circumstance occurred which led him, in conjunction with some of his fellow pages, to form a conspiracy against the life of Alexander. Among the duties of the pages, who were in almost constant attendance on the king's person, was that of accompanying him when hunting, and it was one of these occasions that Hermolaus gave offence by slaying a wild boar without waiting to allow Alexander the first blow. Highly incensed at this breach of discipline, the king ordered him to be chastised with stripes, and further punished by being deprived of his horse. Hermolaus, a lad of high spirit, already verging on manhood, could not brook this indignity: his resentment was inflamed by the exhortations of the philosopher

Callisthenes Callisthenes of Olynthus ( /kəˈlɪsθəˌniːz/; Greek: Καλλισθένης; 360 – 327 BCE) was a Greek historian in Macedon with connections to both Aristotle and Alexander the Great. He accompanied Alexander the Great during his Asiati ...

, his former tutor, and by the sympathy of his most intimate friend and

eromenos In ancient Greece, an ''eromenos'' was the younger and passive (or 'receptive') partner in a male homosexual relationship. The partner of an ''eromenos'' was the ''erastes'', the older and active partner. The ''eromenos'' was often depicted as b ...

among his brother pages, Sostratus. Together the two youths eventually formed a scheme to assassinate the king while he slept, the duty of guarding his bed chamber devolving upon the different pages in rotation. They revealed their plan to four of their companions, and the secret was kept, though 32 days are said to have elapsed before they had an opportunity. But on the night, during which Antipater, one of their number, was to keep watch, Alexander happened to stay out all night drinking, possibly on the recommendation of a Syrian soothsayer. The next day the plot was divulged by another page who had been informed in the hope of enlisting him.

Execution

Hermolaus and his accomplices were immediately arrested, and subsequently brought before the assembled Macedonians, by whom they were

stoned to death Stoning, or lapidation, is a method of capital punishment where a group throws stones at a person until the subject dies from blunt trauma. It has been attested as a form of punishment for grave misdeeds since ancient times. Stoning appears t ...

. It appears, however, that they had been previously submitted to examination by torture, when, according to one account, they implicated Callisthenes also in their conspiracy ; according to another, and on the whole a more probable one, they maintained that the plot had been wholly of their own devising. Some authors also represented Hermolaus as uttering before the assembled Macedonians a long harangue against the tyranny and injustice of Alexander.

References

*Who's who in the age of Alexander the Great: prosopography of Alexander's empire {{DEFAULTSORT:Hermolaus of Macedon 4th-century BC births 327 BC deaths Royal pages of Alexander the Great Failed regicides Executed ancient Macedonian people Conspirators against Alexander the Great People executed by Alexander the Great People executed by stoning 4th-century BC Macedonians People executed for attempted murder Ancient murderers