Furman Classics. Dramaturg Editions. C. Blackwell, 2026. CC-BY-NC. Code and instructions on Github.

Plutarch, Life of Alexander

Plutarch, Life of Alexander. Based on Plutarch's Lives with an English Translation. Bernadotte Perrin, ed. Cambridge, MA. Harvard University Press (1916). Original SGML digital edition by The Perseus Project, G. Crane, ed. This derived edition, C. Blackwell, Furman University. 2026. Source texts and code for this page (and others) on GitHub. Licensed CC-BY-NC. urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0007.tlg047:

Table of Contents

Sections 1 – 8
Section 1
Section 2
Section 3
Section 4
Section 5
Section 6
Section 7
Section 8
Sections 9 – 16
Section 9
Section 10
Section 11
Section 12
Section 13
Section 14
Section 15
Section 16
Sections 17 – 24
Section 17
Section 18
Section 19
Section 20
Section 21
Section 22
Section 23
Section 24
Sections 25 – 32
Section 25
Section 26
Section 27
Section 28
Section 29
Section 30
Section 31
Section 32
Sections 33 – 40
Section 33
Section 34
Section 35
Section 36
Section 37
Section 38
Section 39
Section 40
Sections 41 – 48
Section 41
Section 42
Section 43
Section 44
Section 45
Section 46
Section 47
Section 48
Sections 49 – 56
Section 49
Section 50
Section 51
Section 52
Section 53
Section 54
Section 55
Section 56
Sections 57 – 64
Section 57
Section 58
Section 59
Section 60
Section 61
Section 62
Section 63
Section 64
Sections 65 – 72
Section 65
Section 66
Section 67
Section 68
Section 69
Section 70
Section 71
Section 72
Sections 73 – 77
Section 73
Section 74
Section 75
Section 76
Section 77

Plutarch

Plutarch (Greek: Πλούταρχος; c. AD 46 – c. AD 120) was a Greek Mddle Platonist philosopher, biographer, essayist, and lifelong priest at the Temple of Apollo in Delphi. Born in Chaeronea, Boeotia, he studied in Athens and traveled to Rome, where he lectured on philosophy and formed connections with prominent Romans. His most renowned work, the Parallel Lives, comprises 23 paired biographies of illustrious Greeks and Romans—such as Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar—designed to illuminate moral virtues and vices through comparative historical narrative rather than exhaustive chronology. Complementing this, the Moralia encompasses over 70 essays addressing ethics, politics, religion, science, and antiquity, reflecting his commitment to practical philosophy and civic improvement. Plutarch's writings profoundly shaped Renaissance humanism and later authors, including Shakespeare, by emphasizing character over events in historical understanding.

Parallel Lives: Life of Alexander

The Parallel Lives (Greek: Βίοι Παράλληλοι; Latin: Vitae Parallelae), form a series of comparative biographies pairing eminent Greeks with Romans to illuminate moral character through historical exemplars. Of the original 50 planned biographies, 48 survive: 22 pairs (44 lives) and four unpaired ones, including those of Artaxerxes, Aratus, Galba, and Otho. The lost pair involved the Theban general Epaminondas and the Roman Scipio Africanus.

In the LIfe of Alexander, Plutarch compares Alexander the Great with the Roman Gaius Julius Caesar, the great military strategist and Dictator.