and warmly curious, kindly and sensitive physician, a clinician quite willing to listen to
local “experts” as much as he might cite earlier medical authorities. Wanderlust touches
Alexander as he combines current and local details drawn from districts of Asia Minor
and Thrace as easily as those derived from Africa, Gaul, Spain, and Italy; his prose is clear
and direct, and the numerous pharmaceutical recipes scattered throughout his books have
precise weights, measures, and dosage forms, so that one could “test” ingredients in a
modern laboratory. Alexander recommends the fern the ̄lupterion for flatworms (Letter, 2.595,
597 Puschm.; Brunet, 2.110–111) and opium poppy latex and meadow saffron in the
treatment of gout (Podagra, 2.275, 563, 565 Puschm.; Brunet, 4.246–251). Ferns, esp. Dryop-
teris filix-mas (L.) Schott. (cf. Diosk. 4.184), but also Pteris aquilina L. (cf. Diosk. 4.185),
remain in modern pharmacopeias as potent vermifuges, especially for tapeworms, and
Colchicum autumnale L. (the autumn crocus or meadow saffron) contains the alkaloid colchi-
cine, a prescription drug still one of the most effective against gout, rheumatism, eczema,
and bronchitis.
Uniquely among Byzantine physicians, Alexander gains admiration from modern
doctors, who sometimes call him the “third H,” mirrored in enthusiasm for
Alexander the Clinician by Puschmann (editor and German translator) and Brunet (French
translator). Extant are Alexander’s remarkable Letter on Intestinal Worms (the first parasitologi-
cal tract worthy of the name), the detailed Twelve Books on Medicine (ailments and pathologies
in the traditional “from head to heel”), and the minutiae-packed Books on Fevers. Arabic and
Latin sources indicate Alexander composed lost works on gynecology and obstetrics, oph-
thalmology, pulse lore, and perhaps on toxicology.
Ed.: Th. Puschmann, Alexander von Tralles. Original-Text und Übersetzung 2 vv. (1878–1879; repr. 1963);
Idem, Nachträge zu Alexander Trallianus. Fragmente aus Philumenus und Philagrius nebst einer bisher noch ungre-
duckten Abhandlung über Augenkrankheiten (1887; repr. 1963); F. Brunet, Médecine et thérapeutique byzantines.
Oeuvres Médicales d’Alexandre de Tralles (1933–1937); M. Stoffregen, Eine frühmittelalterliche lateinische
Übersetzung des byzantinischen Puls- und Urintraktats des Alexandros (1977); D.R. Langslow, The Latin Alexan-
der Trallianus. The Text and Transmission of a Late Latin Medical Book (2006).
I. Bloch, “Alexandros von Tralles” in HGM 535 – 544; A. Cameron, Agathias (1970) 1–11; Scarborough
(1985b) 226–228; Temkin (1991) 231–236; John Scarborough, “The Life and Times of Alexander
of Tralles,” Expedition 39.2 (1997) 51–60.
John Scarborough
Alexias (350 – 280 BCE)
Pharmacist, T’ student. T acclaimed his skill and general know-
ledge of medical science (HP 9.16.8). The name, rare at Athens, is known widely through-
out the Mediterranean from the 5th c. BCE on (LGPN).
RE 1.2 (1894) 1464 (#6), M. Wellmann.
GLIM
Alfius Flauus (ca 50 – 75 CE)
Child prodigy born ca 35, primarily a rhetorician (Sen., Con. 1.1.22, 1.7.7), cited in P’
index as a source for the story about a boy and a dolphin in the Lucrine lake (9.25).
RE 1.2 (1894) 1475 (#6), P. von Rohden.
Arnaud Zucker
ALFIUS FLAUUS