Lame in one leg and therefore exempt from military service, Harpalus did not follow Alexander into the
Persian Empire, but was nevertheless given a post in
Asia Minor. Alexander is said to have contacted him to request some reading material for his leisure time. Harpalus sent the king plays by
Aeschylus,
Sophocles and
Euripides, the History of
Philistus and
odes by
Philoxenus and Telestes.
Harpalus Affair In 324 BC, Harpalus sought refuge in Athens. He was imprisoned by the Athenians at the instigation of
Demosthenes and
Phocion, despite the opposition of
Hypereides, who wanted an immediate—and certain to fail—uprising against Alexander. The Ecclesia, at the suggestion of Demosthenes, he escaped and travelled around
Calauria,
Aegina and
Troezen. The Athenians soon overturned the sentence and sent a ship to Aegina to bring Demosthenes back to the port of
Piraeus. Demosthenes did not return to Athens until nine months later, after Alexander's death. The geographer also tells the following story: "The steward of his money fled to Rhodes, and was arrested by a Macedonian, Philoxenus, who also had demanded Harpalus from the Athenians. Having this slave in his power, he proceeded to examine him, until he learned everything about such as had allowed themselves to accept a bribe from Harpalus. On obtaining this information he sent a dispatch to Athens, in which he gave a list of such as had taken a bribe from Harpalus, both their names and the sums each had received. Demosthenes, however, he never mentioned at all, although Alexander held him in bitter hatred, and he himself had a private quarrel with him.". Harpalus appears in the historical novel
Fire From Heaven by
Mary Renault. In it, he is entrusted by his teacher
Aristotle with the task of observing and recording the lives of wild animals. Renault speculates that this would explain some of the fantastic accounts in Aristotle's zoological writings as Harpalian hoaxes. == References ==