Odontotyrannos

Odontotyrannos (Greek: όδοντοτύραννος), also odontotyrannus or dentityrannus[lower-alpha 1] ("tooth-tyrant") is a three horned beast said to have attacked Alexander the Great and his men at their camp in India, according to the Latin Letter from Alexander to Aristotle[lower-alpha 2] and medieval romances that incorporated it.[2]

The Macedonians attacked by the dent-tyrant or Odontotyrrannus.
—14th century, ms. of Thomas de Kent's romance.
Bibliothèque nationale fr. 24364[1]

Descriptions

According to the Latin Letter from Alexander, it had a black, horse-like head, with three horns protruding from its forehead, and exceeded the size of an elephant. It was undeterred by the sight of fire, killing twenty-six[lower-alpha 3] Macedonians and incapacitating fifty-two, before being put down by thrusts of hunting spears. The local Indians called the beast "tooth-tyrant"[3] (dentityrranus or odontatyrannus).[lower-alpha 4][6]

Valerius's biography of Alexander[lower-alpha 5] (beginning of the 4th century) spells the beast's name as "odontotyrannus" and states that the strength of 300 men were required to drag its body out of the river.[lower-alpha 6][7][5] In the Syriac version of Pseudo-Callisthenes, it is the Mashḳělath or Mashklet (Syriac: ܡܫܩܠܬ‎[8][9]) which causes 26 casualties among Macedons and requires 300 men to tug out of a ditch,[10] and in the Armenian version 1,300 were needed for the job.[lower-alpha 7][11][12]

In the Ethiopic version, it was an elephant-sized beast with tusks that attacked (unnamed but corresponding to the odontotyrannus). When it was eviscerated, the Macedonians discovered among the stomach contents scorpions as well as large fish the size of an ox.[13] In the Greek writings of Palladius (5th century)[lower-alpha 8] and George the monk (9th century), the odontotyrannus (όδοντοτύραννος) was an amphibious carnivore that can devour an elephant.[14]

In Li roman d'Alixandre of Alexandre de Bernay, the beast is named tirant,[9] and in Thomas de Kent's Roman de toute chevalerie, the Old French name is dent-tyrant.[1] In the Middle English King Alisaunder, "deutyrauns".[lower-alpha 9][9][15]

Zoological identifications

Many scholars have proposed various large beasts in the animal kingdom as to its identity. Budge suggested it may be a crocodilian native to the Ganges, and hinted the Syriac name might be a corruption of the makara, a composite creature in Hindu mythology.[10] It may also be based on Ctesias's description of the giant fanged Indus worm.[16] The makara theory and Ctesia's influence is also supported by Gunderson.[17][12] Others proposed a rhinoceros, though conceding it may just be an imaginary creature.[18]

Reconstructed Sanskrit name

Christian Lassen in the 19th century reconstructed the original name of this beast to be *dantešvara "lord of teeth", from danta "tooth" and īšvara "the Lord".[19] This unattested form was rejected by Roger Goossens,[20] who proposed instead dvijarāja which carries the dual meaning of "king of reptiles" or "king of teeth".[21][22]

Explanatory notes
  1. Also dentes tirannus, dentestyrannus
  2. Latin: Epistola Alexandri ad Aristotelem.
  3. Or thirty-six, according to variants.
  4. Some manuscripts and Kübler's edition read "odontatyrannum" with an "a".[4][5]
  5. Res gestae Alexandri Macedonis.
  6. Latin text reads:".. vix trecentorum hominum manus nisu extractus de flumine"
  7. In the Armenian, the beast is called a "unicorn" or "one horned beast" (Wolohojian tr.)
  8. On the Life of the Brahmans; one abridged recension is referred to as "Commonitorium Palladii de Bragmanis" (Stoneman 2012, pp. xxv; 113n).
  9. Skeat 1886, p. 309n's "deutyrans" appears to be a typographical error.

References
Citations
  1. Cary, George (1956). The Medieval Alexander. University of Cambridge Press. pp. 35–36.
  2. Harf-Lancner, Laurence (2012), Maddox, Donald; Sturm-Maddox, Sara (eds.), "From Alexander to Marco Polo, from Text to Image: The Marvels of India", Medieval French Alexander, SUNY Press, p. 237
  3. Stoneman (2012), p. 9.
  4. Rypins (1924), p. 88 n2.
  5. Gunderson, Lloyd L. (1980), Alexander's letter to Aristotle about India, Hain, p. 54
  6. Orchard (2003), pp. 126–7.
  7. Skeat (1886), pp. 221, 309n.
  8. Budge 1896, p. 150, n1
  9. Perkins, Justin; Woolsey, Theodore D. (1854), "Notice of a Life of Alexander the Great", Journal of the American Oriental Society, 4: 379n, JSTOR 592285
  10. Budge (1889), pp. 98.
  11. Wolohojian, Albert M. (1969), The Romance of Alexander the Great by Pseudo-Callisthenes (from the Armenian), Columbia University Press, pp. 126–7
  12. Pritchard, Roger Telfryn (1992), The History of Alexander's Battles: Historia de Preliis, the J1 Version, PIMS, p. 157
  13. Budge (1896), pp. 149–150.
  14. Stoneman (2012), pp. 38, 31–32.
  15. Weber, Henry William, ed. (1810), Kyng Alisaunder, George Ramsay, v. 5416 (p. 223)
  16. Stoneman (2012), p. xxiii.
  17. Gunderson (1980), pp. 103ff.
  18. Dr Kees Rookmaaker. "Source Book of the Rhinoceros" (PDF). Rhino Resource Center. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  19. Lassen (1858), p. 375
  20. Goossens (1929).
  21. Seldeslachts, Erik (1998), "Translated Loans and Loan Translations as Evidence of Graeco-Indian Bilingualism in Antiquity", L'antiquité classique: revue semestrielle, 67: 286
  22. Jalabert, Louis (1930), "Bulletin du Byzantinisme", Recherches de science religieuse, 20: 468–469
Bibliography
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