John of Garland on Satraps and Satrapies
I got a blog post (and a sentence in a scholarly encyclopedia) out of what Niccolo Machiavelli thought about the fall of the Persian empire. I found another comment by the medieval scholar John of Garland who was active from c. 1220 to 1252.
Hic satrapa, -pe, gallice vavasur a satrapea regione quam Alexander Magnus liberatum esse concedit. Gloss: Quia fidaliter adiuverunt eum contra Porum regem.
“Hence satrap, French vassal, from satrapy, a region which Alexander the Great considered to be freed. Gloss: because they faithfully helped him against king Porus.”
Tony Hunt, Teaching and Learning Latin, vol. i p. 208 (John of Garland’s Commentarius)
I wonder where he learned about satrapies? Was it in Isidore of Seville? Among the ancient Latin authors it seems to be only in book 6 of Pliny’s Natural History and Curtius Rufus’ History of Alexander.
As I think I have said before, this suggests to me that to medieval people, ancient Jews, Greeks, and Persians were all equally exotic and equally available to use as models. Only later did some people divide pagan antiquity into ‘the west’ and ‘the rest’ and decide that part belonged to them and part was foreign and exotic.
I may slow down to posting every 2 weeks for the rest of the year. I have a backlog of posts but I am doing some thinking about myself and about the Internet and social media.
(scheduled 18 May 2023)
“I may slow down to posting every two weeks”: just as long as you keep doing some, eh? (That’s meant as encouragement.)
Sorry for being so late, but this is a very interesting question! I was wondering the same thing myself when learning about a land grant wherein King Cnut calls himself in one place “Cnut basileus” and some of his lords in respons sign themselves as “satrapa” rather than “minister”:
(http://www.anglo-saxons.net/hwaet/?do=get&type=charter&id=958)
Wow I did not know that! Greek words also show up in medieval texts dealing with material culture (gloves can be cheirothec’ rather than plain old French gants) Maybe there is something about satraps in Justin’s epitome of Pompeius Troagus (Florus seems too Roman-centric).
This is also interesting to learn; am not very familiar with mediaeval sources. Me and a friend, upon discovering Cnut’s charter, tried to search through Isidore for the words; if I remember correctly we found both of them, but not together. Doing a quick check of other online editions, I can find no satraps in Justin, but a few mentions in Curtius at least (6.2.11, 6.6.10, and 10.1.33 for some examples)