Bagoas (courtier)

Bagoas is mentioned in three surviving sources and is distinct from Bagoas the Elder, who attempted to assassinate Darius III.{{sfn|McIlvain|2020}} In Parallel Lives, he is only briefly mentioned during a dance competition, but in the Histories of Alexander the Great by Quintus Curtius Rufus he is given a more elaborate role in Alexander's court.{{sfn|Tougher|2008|pp=77-89}} Only the elder Bagoas is elaborated upon in the source by Diodorus Siculus.{{sfn|Siculus|1935}}

Historian William Woodthorpe Tarn rejected the stories of Bagoas as fabricated in ancient times to defame Alexander, mainly referring to the Rufus's fairly fictionalized biography of Alexander that criticized the Macedonian's "degeneration" in embracing foreign Persian customs.{{sfn|Tougher|2008}} In 1958, Ernst Badian rejected Tarn's analysis, suggesting that Alexander was more of a ruthless dictator and that Tarn was blinded by bias.{{sfn|Badian|2012|pp=ii, xiv, xv.}} Author Mary Renault also addressed Rufus's biased animosity towards Alexander, stating: "[Rufus's account of Alexander] is bent that way by recourse to Athenian anti-Macedonian agitprop, written by men who never set eyes on him, and bearing about as much relation to objective truth as one would expect to find in a History of the Jewish People commissioned by Adolf Hitler."{{sfn|Tougher|2008}}

According to Plutarch,{{sfn|Clough|1865}} Bagoas won a dancing contest after the crossing of the Gedrosian Desert and the Macedonian troops applauded and demanded that drunk Alexander kiss Bagoas, and he did so.{{sfn|Rufus|1714|loc=[https://archive.org/details/quintuscurtiushi00curt/page/n168 Book X, Chapter I]|p=169}}{{sfn|Roisman|2003|p=300}}

{{Blockquote

|text=… one day after [Alexander] had drunk pretty hard, it is said, he went to see a prize of dancing contended for, in which his favourite Bagoas, having gained the victory, crossed the theatre in his dancing habit, and sat down close by him, which so pleased the Macedonians, that they made loud acclamations for him to kiss Bagoas, and never stopped clapping their hands and shouting till Alexander put his arms round him and kissed him.

|author=Plutarch

|source=Parallel Lives (second century AD)

}}

The fullest surviving account of Bagoas is given in the Latin Histories of Alexander the Great by Rufus, a first century Roman historian.{{sfn|Getty Museum|n.d.}} Rufus focuses on the degeneration of Alexander, and illustrates this with an account of the machinations of his eunuch, Bagoas. Bagoas is described as "in the flower of his youth,"{{sfn|Rufus|1714|loc=[https://archive.org/details/quintuscurtiushi00curt/page/330/mode/2up? Book IV, Chapter V]|p=331}} and was appointed first by Darius III and later given to Alexander by Nabarzanes. In this account, Bagoas weaponizes his inherited place in Alexander's court to destroy his enemies. The Persian satrap Orxines earns the enmity of Bagoas by refusing to pay him respect in court, claiming it is not Persian custom to pay respect to men used as women, and refers to Bagoas as a whore. Bagoas thus manoeuvres to have Orxines accused of plundering the tomb of Cyrus the Great, and the satrap is executed for this crime. In his final words, Orxines decries the state of affairs: "I had heard that women were once rulers in Asia but this really is something new – a eunuch a king!".{{sfn|Tougher|2008}}

• Bagoas is the narrator and title character of The Persian Boy, the historical novel by Mary Renault, which portrays him sympathetically. He reappears in a smaller but still significant role in the sequel Funeral Games.{{sfn|Baynham|Ryan|2018}}{{sfn|Tougher|2008}}
• He appears in Les Conquêtes d'Alexandre by Roger Peyrefitte. Peyrefitte's Bagoas rides to battle by the side of Darius.{{efn|Un jeune cavalier de seize ans, d’une radieuse beauté, paré d’or et de perles, portait l’insigne royal, une aigle d’or aux ailes déployées, fixée sur une pique d’argent: c’était Bagoas, l’eunuque et mignon favori de Darius. - A young rider of sixteen, of radiant beauty, adorned with gold and pearls, wore the royal insignia, a golden eagle with outstretched wings, fixed on a silver pike: it was Bagoas, the eunuch and favourite mignon of Darius.{{sfn|Peyrefitte|1979|p=259}}}}
• He is played by Francisco Bosch in the Oliver Stone film Alexander (2004), which is based in part on Renault's writings, and contains the dancing scene, although a love scene was cut from the film.{{sfn|Tougher|2008}}
• He is also a major character in Jo Graham's novel Stealing Fire, part of her Numinous World series.{{sfn|Baynham|Ryan|2018}}

{{notelist}}

{{reflist|2}}

{{refbegin|2}}

• {{cite book |title=The Deipnosophists, or Banquet of the Learned |title-link=Deipnosophistae |author=Athenaeus of Naucratis |author-link=Athenaeus |translator=Charles Duke Yonge |translator-link=Charles Duke Yonge |location=London |publisher=Bohn's Classical Library |lccn=2002554451 |oclc=49415755 |year=1854 |volume=XIII |chapter=Chapter 80 |chapter-url=http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:2013.01.0003:book=13:chapter=80&highlight=bagoas |via=Perseus Digital Library |ref={{harvid|Athanaeus}}}}
• {{cite book |url=http://penelope.uchicago.edu/aelian |first=Claudius |last=Aelianus |author-link=Claudius Aelianus |title=Various Histories (Varia Historia) |translator=Thomas Stanley |publication-place=London, United Kingdom |year=1670 |orig-year=1665 |edition=2nd |publisher=Thomas Basset }}
• {{cite book |title=The Deipnosophists, or Banquet of the Learned |author=Athenaeus of Naucratis |translator=Charles Duke Yonge |publication-place=London, United Kingdom |publisher=Bohn's Classical Library |lccn=2002554451 |oclc=49415755 |year=1854 |url=http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2013.01.0003%3Abook%3D1%3Achapter%3D13 |via=Perseus Digital Library }}

• {{cite journal |last1=Badian |first1=E. |title=The Eunuch Bagoas |journal=The Classical Quarterly |date=November 1958 |volume=8 |issue=3–4 |pages=144–157 |doi=10.1017/S0009838800021765}}
• {{cite book |last1=Badian |first1=Ernst |title=Collected Papers on Alexander the Great |date=12 March 2012 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-136-44934-5 |language=en}}
• {{cite journal |last1=Baynham |first1=Elizabeth |last2=Ryan |first2=Terry |title="The Unmanly Ruler": Bagoas, Alexander's Eunuch Lover, Mary Renault's The Persian Boy, and Alexander Reception |journal=Brill's Companion to the Reception of Alexander the Great |date=26 April 2018 |pages=615–639 |url=https://brill.com/display/book/edcoll/9789004359932/BP000028.xml?language=en |access-date=12 June 2024 |publisher=Brill |doi=10.1163/9789004359932_026 |isbn=978-90-04-35993-2 |language=en}}

• {{cite web |title=Livre des fais d'Alexandre le grant (The J. Paul Getty Museum Collection) |url=https://www.getty.edu/art/collection/object/103RW0 |website=The J. Paul Getty Museum Collection |access-date=17 June 2024 |language=en |ref={{harvid|Getty Museum|n.d.}} }}

• {{cite journal |last1=McIlvain |first1=Lynnie |title=Bagoas the Younger: Who Was Alexander the Great's Little-Known Lover? |journal=TheCollector |date=20 November 2020 |url=https://www.thecollector.com/bagoas-the-younger-who-was-alexander-the-greats-little-known-lover/ |language=en}}

• {{cite book |last1=Peyrefitte |first1=Roger |title=Les conquêtes d'Alexandre |date=1979 |publisher=A. Michel |isbn=978-2-226-00878-7 |quote=Un jeune cavalier de seize ans, d’une radieuse beauté, paré d’or et de perles, portait l’insigne royal, une aigle d’or aux ailes déployées, fixée sur une pique d’argent: c’était Bagoas, l’eunuque et mignon favori de Darius.|language=fr}}
• {{cite book |translator=John Dryden |editor-first=Arthur Hugh |editor-last=Clough |editor-link=Arthur Hugh Clough |author=Plutarch |title=Parallel Lives |year=1865 |orig-year=1859 |edition=2nd |publication-place=London, United Kingdom |url=https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Plutarch%27s_Lives_(Clough) |via=Wikisource |publisher=University College, London |ref={{harvid|Clough|1865}}}}

• {{cite book |last1=Roisman |first1=Joseph |title=Brill's companion to Alexander the Great |date=2003 |publisher=Brill |location=Leiden |isbn=9789004124639}}
• {{cite book |volume=I |translator=John Digby |publication-place=London, United Kingdom |year=1714 |via=Archive.org |author-link=Quintus Curtius Rufus |title=Histories of Alexander the Great |publisher=W.B. for Bernard Lintott |collaboration=Foreword by Johann Freinsheim |first=Quintus Curtius |last=Rufus }}

• {{cite book |first=Diodorus |last=Siculus |title=Library of History: Loeb Classical Library |translator=Oldfather, C. H. |location=Cambridge, MA. |publisher=Harvard University Press |year=1935}}

• {{cite journal |last1=Tougher |first1=Sean |title=The Renault Bagoas: The Treatemnet of Alexander the Great's Eunuch in Mary Renault's The Persian Boy |journal=New Voices in Classical Reception Studies |date=2008 |issue=3 |pages=77–89 |url=https://fass.open.ac.uk/sites/fass.open.ac.uk/files/files/new-voices-journal/issue3/Tougher.pdf |access-date=12 June 2024}}

{{refend}}

• [http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=5750&handle=li "Bagoas Pleads on Behalf of Nabarzanes,"] illuminated parchment by the Master of the Jardin de vertueuse consolation, in the collection of the J. Paul Getty Museum

Category:Male lovers of royalty

Category:People from the Achaemenid Empire

Category:Iranian eunuchs

Category:Trierarchs of Nearchus' fleet

Category:Lovers of Alexander the Great

Category:Courtiers of Alexander the Great

Category:4th-century BC people

Category:Ancient slaves