::Thursday, November 18, 2004 5:50:16 AM::

ante diem xiv kalendas decembres

• Mercatus -- in the wake of the lengthy ludi Plebeii, the Romans needed a few days to restock their cupboards
• 303 A.D. -- martyrdom of Hesychius of Antioch

::Thursday, November 18, 2004 5:35:43 AM::

Travlang's word of the day (reservation in assorted languages) is translated as condicio ... I can't help but wonder, though, whether people who come to the site are thinking in terms of that sort of thing, or restaurant reservations, or the places where the U.S. confined their aboriginal peoples (in Canada we have 'reserves'). But I'll get over it. Elsewhere:

clerisy @ Dictionary.com (good word)

caduceus @ Merriam-Webster

::Thursday, November 18, 2004 5:31:06 AM::

::Thursday, November 18, 2004 5:20:45 AM::

As a piece in the Globe and Mail suggests, some non-Classicists appear poised to cash in on the impending Alexander boom:

When you see the movie about Alexander the Great starring Colin Farrell opening next week, pay attention to the enactment rather than the acting.

Lance Kurke, a management professor at Pennsylvania's Duquesne University, and an Alexander buff, says leaders are in the reality creation business. They make the world the way they want it to be, a process he calls enactment.

Reality creation involves four distinct processes at which Alexander the Great excelled.

The first step is to reframe problems, transforming an unsolvable task into another solvable one. "Alexander the Great did not accept the perceptions of his environment as limitations to be accommodated," Prof. Kurke points out in The Wisdom of Alexander The Great.

The classic example was when Alexander became the first commander to defeat a navy from land. Not having time to build and train a fleet to overcome Darius III, he looked for enemy weaknesses, settling on the need to dock every couple of days to get fresh water. Alexander garrisoned all sources of fresh water such as rivers and wells -- or poisoned those he couldn't or didn't want to control.

The remaining obstacle was Tyre, which had unlimited fresh water from an aquifer and was selling fresh water to Darius. It was also an impregnable island that had survived being besieged for 13 years in one instance.

Alexander's solution was to build a half-mile causeway to reach the city. The Tyrians tried everything to stop him over the seven-month construction effort, but he built specialized towers and mobile battlements to ward off their fleet. Tyre then fell in two weeks, the Persian fleet was rendered ineffective, and Alexander had provided a lesson for naval war colleges -- and business.

Later, at the River Hydaspes, Alexander faced enemy forces three times his in size. As well, King Porus had elephants and, because Alexander's horses had not been acclimatized when young to elephants, they would throw their rider and bolt when smelling them.

Alexander choreographed a battlefield ballet that won the day. His cavalry feinted and then fled, luring their opponents to give chase and fall into a trap in which Porus's cavalry was decimated. Then skilled archers simultaneously shot arrows at the mahouts (elephant drivers). After the mahouts were disposed of, the archers quickly gave way to javelin throwers, who hurled their projectiles at the already confused elephants' eyes, causing a stampede. Another victory for Alexander.

The three other enactment processes are:

Building alliances: Alexander often treated the countries and leaders he conquered as friends and allies, unlike many acquisition-happy companies these days, Prof. Kurke notes. Alexander adopted the clothing, customs and manners of other cultures -- even marrying into other cultures.

Establishing identity: Leaders must create an identity for themselves when young and then establish their organization's iden