#jeannereames

[charleneferlay]

Drawing Alexander

Hi, and welcome on the first post of this blog!

Today, I'd love to talk about the thoughts and research behind some of the commissions I ordered from @elfinfen!

Let's meet the little dude (he's sixteen, and small, so let's call him that): Alexandros Philippou, best known as Alexander the Great!

Lots of thoughts below, so if you want to know how the pic was made, keep reading!

Okay so the first thing is: what did the real Alexander look like?

I have been using @jeannereames's website, which has been VERY helpful (so if she is ever reading this post, thank you, you are a great lady and I love your novel and your work). She pointed at a head currently in Athen called the "akropolis head", showing an idealized version of Alexander around the age of 18.

The nose of the statue is broken, so I let Elfinfen do whatever she wanted with it!

While most ancient statues were painted, we have no paint left on this one, so I had to figure out the colors for the picture. Plutarch tells us that Alexander's complexion was pale, so I went with that. One thing to note is that in the novel, Alexandros is the son of Zeus, granting him the privilege of having pale skin that never sunburns (does it outweight the very likely possibility of being cursed by Hera? I'll let you decide). One thing that Plutarch also said is that Alexander's scent was fabulous. That probably means he liked to wear perfume, but in the novel I decided to go with the most ludicrous things people said about Alexander, so he DOES have this divine scent, even when he's covered in dirty sweat.

What was Alexander's hair color? We don't quite know. It was probably something like dark blond or light brown. For my Alexandros, I always give the picture of this lion as a ref, because his hair are described in the novel as golden, honeyed, and various shades of light brown in winter.

So yup that's my Alexandros' hair and it looks like that in the middle of a campaign when he can't wash.

Now, moving to the eyes. I honestly can't remember where I read that Alexander's eyes were of different colors, but I decided to keep that trait, since it made him look a bit different from his friends. In the novel he hates that he as mismatched eyes, because he's an angsty teenager who believes that's why he can't get a boyfriend (no, Alex, the reason why is because you're scary). I usually describe his eyes as "one blue as a summer sky, the other like that of the sky in those hours between day and night".

In the novel we get to meet Hermes, Alexander's half brother, who shared the light blue eye. He also states Apollo has light blue eyes. For the darker one, let me share the awesome commission of the other dad :

The light on the Philippos portrait is slightly different, but they do share eye color. I have yet to decide if Alexandros was meant to have two fathers all along (like Theseus does with Poseidon and Aegeus) or if there were twins merged in the womb, but it's 100% certain that Philippos is his father... except it doesn't show much. The narrator once noted they have the same hands, but Alexandros looks more like some of his divine brothers, and is struggling with the suspicion the king isn't actually his father. You may notice they also have a different skintone, Philippos being described as very taned in summer. Their hair color couldn't be more different, which is a choice I made, because I haven't found anything, anywhere, about Philippos' hair color. People usually give him darker hair but I think that's a way to describe him as an opposite of Alexander.

Still comparing the two pictures, you may have noticed Alexandros is looking up while Philippos is looking straight at us. This is because Alexandros is described as small in the novel, so he is usually looking up to meet the eyes of his men. Elfinfen had the tough job of making him look like he's staring down at people while being smaller than they are, and I feel like she slayed that part!

Let's move to the clothes!

The main inspiration was the famous mosaic of the battle of Issos:

The look was used in the 2004 movie :

The shoulders are a bit different. I used the recreationg from this website because it looked amazing and those colors look really good on my Alexandros:

Back to the Philippos pic, you may notice that father and son share these colors: dark red, bronze and beige, though Philippos favors the darker colors and Alexandros the lighter ones.

I hope you liked this post! I love to share the thoughts behind the commissions I order, so feel free to comment <3

[girls-are-weird]

a quick word about @jeannereames's historical romance series about alexander the great.

[thefanficwriterscraft]

EPISODE 15 - 2022 WRAP-UP (OR, WE HAVE AT LEAST THREE LISTENERS)

We are one day late (apologies, work has been insane), but here is our latest episode! YAY!

This week, Jo (@pebblysand) and Lani (@copper-dust) do a 2022 fanfiction wrap-up. They look back on the year they’ve just had, talk about their feelings about fanfiction and fandom in general, and answer some of your questions (asked by @evesaintyves and @tofutti-rice-dreamsicle) about their personal favourites. Lani tells us about the impact the pandemic had on her writing and Jo gets fairly emotional answering one of the questions we received. We also talk about our plans for 2023, both with fanfic and the podcast, and give you all a few, end-of-year recommendations to take away. 

From the bottom of our hearts, we’d like to thank all of you for listening and engaging with this crazy project of ours, and we look forward to what the new year has in stock. Particularly, we would also like to extend our thanks to the amazing writers and creators we’ve been lucky enough to have on this first season: @venom0usbarbie, @tessiete, @crazybutgood, @newsom and @ala-baguette

Just a quick word of warning, in this episode, I read out one of the comments I got this year, which mentions the topic of sexual assault. If you want to skip that, it’s around the 39 minute mark, and lasts about 6 minutes. 

This week, we mention: 

castles, vicious as roman rule, the fault in faulty manufacturing and the wolf’s just puppy (and the door's double-locked) by @pebblysand 

Storge, The Seam Between, Check the Spindle and Merry Men by @copper-dust

Dancing With The Lion by Jeanne Reames (@jeannereames)

Jo’s tumblr post about controversial writing, the reasons behind chapter 8, and the ask. 

HP favourites: seven simple machines by fluorescentgrey (@yeats-infection) and thirty-five owls by letterblade

Non-HP favourites: Rous'd His Drowsy Blood by lanyon (The Iliad), A Matter of Apples by  Apollo_Xandos and Clean Dresses, Brass Tits, and the Importance of a Good Hatpin by voodoochild (@shes-a-voodoo-child) (podfic by originally) (Peaky Blinders)

castles playlist

Your recommendations for this week are:

Trying to set a low and achievable daily wordcount goal 

Patronising your local library

Having a good holiday season

You can find us online at:

The Fanfic Writer’s Craft: tumblr ; spotify

Lani (@copper-dust): tumblr ; AO3

Jo (@pebblysand): tumblr ; AO3

Thanks again to everyone for listening and engaging with us this year! We're looking forward to coming back after our break, on the 20th of January 2023!

[alessandroiiidimacedonia]

@jeannereames @triskelledizioni-blog

[charleneferlay]

Drawing Philip II of Macedon

After my first post on drawing Alexander, I'd like to talk about his father!

Here is the amazing portrait by @elfinfen:

More to read below!

Let's start with his face: I asked for a olive skin tone and dark hair. In the novel, Philippos is usually described as having very tanned skin, so his skin may get much darker than this at the end of summer.

You may have seen several pictures of Philip II. Here are some, just in case:

Philip in the 2005 movie, with brown hair.

Philip by J. F. Oliveras, with brown hair.

Unknown artist, Philip with black/brown hair:

There are a lot more pictures of him online, but all of them share two traits: Philip is missing an eye (more below) and he's got hair ranging from brown to black. Compared to him, Alexander usually has hair ranging from light to dark blond, sometimes light brown.

The truth is, we have no idea what Philip's hair color was. The frescoes in the tombs of Macedonia show us Macedonians with all hair colors, so Philip could have been blond, or have russet hair. I think the reason why he is usually pictured with darker hair is to set Alexander appart from him... but in the biographies I read, there was no hint that they didn't look like each other!

So why is my Philippos very dark haired? Since Alexandros is the son of Philippos and Zeus, I wanted to set him appart. In my story, all of Philippos' daughters, as well as his son Arrhidaios, his nephew Amyntas and his illegitimate son Ptolemaios look a lot like him. Some have straight hair, or some variations, but when the narrator meets the (dead) brothers and half brothers of Philippos, they also look so strongly like him that no one can doubt they are of the same family. This is almost a caricature, but it can be explained because Philippos' family has divine blood, descending from Herakles. There's a "type" in the family that runs strong, and they all look like each other... except Alexandros, who looks like his half siblings Hermes, Appolo and Artemis.

Now, moving to the eye: that is the result of an arrow wound in 354BC. The eye was removed surgically. We don't really know how the wound looked like, but since eye injuries ick me a lot, I asked the artist to make it a very clean wound. In Gemmel's story The Lion of Macedon, it seems like it didn't heal nearly as well.

You may have noticed that my Philippos' armor has the same shape as the one on the last picture. This is because we (and many other artists) use the same source for Philip's armor:

This is "Philip II's armor", now in the Museum of the Royal Tombs of Aigai in Vergina, Greece.

I'm using a recreation by Hellenic armors:

Now, the twist is that while this armor comes from a tomb which was named after Philip II, it is probably not his tomb but that of his son Arrhidaios. My source for that is @jeannereames, who knows way more about Alexander&Folks than I do, so if she thinks it's Arrhidaios' tomb, who am I to disagree? Still, I decided to use this armor as a reference, because it's pretty and because I didn't have a better one to use.

In my version, Philippos wears a scarf around his neck. There are two reasons for that: first, armor on skin isn't a nice feel, so I wanted to have some clothe visible to make it look like more comfortable. For this armor, I decided to go with a roman like scarf (picture from x-legio).

The second reason for the scarf is to link Philippos' picture with Alexandros:

Basically I needed to add some beige to Philippos to get the same color palette of dark red / bronze / beige.

Another link between those two pictures is the left eye. The first time I described Philippos' eye color was in the spin off, where he described himself:

I had been a small child, dark haired with forgettable brown eyes – my brothers had inherited my mother’s beautiful, deep blue irises, and I the boring muddy shade of my father [...]. Teenagerhood had ambushed me while I was stranded in Illyria; it had hit violently, spraying pimples all over my face, stretching hairy legs until they looked like knees holding sticks together, and I had a soft, ridiculous black fuzz over my upper lip.

Needless to say, I was suddenly overcome with nostalgia for Illyria, where people simply did not go naked in front of others.

A few things about this part: blue eyes were actually not favored in Ancient Greece and I have no idea if Illyrians liked to be naked or not. In between this scene and now, I changed my mind, and Philippos' eyes turned to dark blue, to share Alexandros' left eye's color. What didn't change, however, is that young Philippos describes himself as a pretty ugly teen, and though he's grown into a very confident king, in this scene with Kleitos, he is obviously not depicting himself as much prettier:

[For context, Philippos and Kleitos are discussing Philippos's relationship with one of his page, Hippostratos, while P&K have been lovers for 20years. Philippos just broke up with Pausanias, with whom he was getting along very well, except Pausanias was getting too old for that.] "He's really not the sharpest spear, that boy," Philippos mumbled [...]. "I could have told you that," Kleitos said with a smirk. "But you wouldn't have listened, right? Whenever you get rid of a boy you like, you always move to idiots who bore you to death." "What a friend you are." [...] "Oh no, believe me, I do pity you," Kleitos joked. "Your life is always so complicated compared to mine..." "Your choice," Philippos reminded you. "I've never forbade you to..." "Nah, you know, there's only one man I want." "I am really wondering why," Philippos laughed, "old and ugly as he is." "Because I'm young and pretty?"

In a later scene, after Philippos is wounded (and taking too much poppy milk to deal with the pain), he has a rather bitter conversation with the main character, Orestis/Hephaistion, who brought him a message from Pausanias, who is trying to get his former lover back:

"What does he want?" Philippos repeated. "Lands? A command? A high born spouse?" I blinked, surprised. "He told me he wanted to be with you, that's all." The laugh that followed was bitter, almost a bark - and then it turned into a great wave that shook the king with acidic mirth, until he rose his head again. "That is the most absurd thing I ever heard. Who would want to be with that? I used to be ugly, and now I need a fucking slave to get out of my bed. I'm too old for this bullshit... and even if I weren't, they come, they go, they don't care about what I feel about them and I don't care about what they feel about me. It's pointless." "He said he loves you." "Love? Was that love, when he told you to spread the rumors that killed Hippostratos?"

Okay Philou, we get it, you think you're really not pretty.

But are you? Are you really ugly?

(People usually agree that he's really handsome on this painting lol.)

At some point of the story, Hephaistion gets to see Philippos at fifteen, and his description of him is like that:

If Philippos had been at Mieza with us, and not a prince, he would have been one of those boys who, for a hopeful stare aimed at Pausanias, would have been laughed at for a full week. He was tall for his age, with too long limbs and the air of a newborn foal. With pimples all over his cheeks and a rather weak shin, heavy eyebrows, and a rather big nose, he looked like the can of boys who will try anything and everything to get his beard faster - and I had to admit, he looked much better with one.

... basically because the beard hides the acne scars and, with the right cut, strengthen the jaw and the shin. So while Philippos was probably an average teenager moaning that he is ugly (well, everyone is ugly compared to dashing Pausanias and Hephaistion in the book, even Alexandros moans that he's not pretty enough), as an adult he does know how to make the best of what he has, and actually has a fair share of charm (and the best and worst sense of humor, you DON'T want to get one of his jokes aimed at you). Oh, and the diadem of a king, which, according to Alexandros:

Hephaistion: "I don't get why Pausanias is so obsessed with him. I mean, with his eye, he is not exactly..." Alexandros : "Pretty? He is the king." Hephaistion: "So? Does being a king make you prettier?" Alexandros: "Obviously."

I'll be leaving you with a second commission drawn by the amazing Kloh.eh, of Philippos at fiften:

One funny thing about this pic is that according to the artist, this is the first time someone came to her to ask for a not-pretty character XD But I love him that way, and it seems my readers on AO3 also like that he's a rather bland teen!

[jeannereames]

The first of two Tiktok posts wherein I discuss the ancient sources on Alexander the Great. In this one, I discuss the sources generally, what is the Vulgate vs. other, and the missing, or lost historians of Alexander, including Kallisthenes, Kleitarchos, Ptolemy, Aristobulos, Chares, Marsyas, etc.

[alessandroiiidimacedonia]

Happy new year! 🎊 2023 will be an anniversary year to Alexander so I launched the hashtag #2023yearofAlexandertheGreat ✨and we start it in wonderful way! 🎉 In the next days I'll announce you several books coming out but now there's a big news for italian readers!

"Dancing with the Lion" by @jeannereames will be translated from 🇬🇧 to 🇮🇹 by @triskelledizioni-blog!

🇬🇧 🇮🇹 More infos 🔗 https://bit.ly/3IgBd7v

Thank you, Elena

#AlessandroIIIdiMacedonia #ἈλέξανδροςὁΜέγας #Alexandros #alexandertheconqueror #AlexanderofMacedon #alessandromagno #AlexandreleGrand #Alexanderthegreat #alessandroilmacedone #AlexanderderDerGroße #AlejandroMagno #DancingwiththeLion #DancingwiththeLionRise #DancingwiththeLionBecoming #JeanneReames #TriskellEdizioni #AlessandroilGrande

[kneelbeforeclefairy]

@jeannereames !!!!!!

WAKE UP BITCHES THEY FOUND NEW EURIPIDES FRAGMENTS

98 LINES, 80% COMPLETELY NEW MATERIAL

[slaygentford]

jeannereames replied to yourpost:miss-prision: bitch wht the fuck is a cuirass ...

A cuirass is armor to protect the chest and back. Originally, they were bronze, but over time, a linen version appeared, called a linothorax. Despite it being linen, it was actually quite good at turning blows and light arrows, and more flexible than bronze. One can’t ride wearing a full bronze cuirass. It has to be a “short” version. Otherwise, it tends to dig into tender parts of the mail anatomy on horseback. Ha.

slkjfskdksks I didnt know thats why they couldn't wear a full cuirass on rides im laughin

[nemainofthewater]

@jeannereames publicly, you are a really lovely person and thank you so much for chatting to me! To the 11 or so people who I believe follow me, please buy her upcoming book about Alexander the Great and Hephaistion, it’s going to be good! https://jeannereames.net/Dancing_with_the_Lion/buy_books.html

[lifeislikeawavewhorisesupanddown]

Happy Sunday everyone! It's @_elena_88 and I'd like to share with you my newest books arrived: #DancingwiththeLionBecoming by #JeanneReams #AlexanderTheGreatVolume2SourcesandStudies by #WWTarn #WilliamWoodthorpeTarn #ShadowoftheLionTheFieldsofHades by #WRuthKozak #ShadowoftheLion 💖 #AlessandroMagno #AlessandroilGrande #AlexanderTheGreat #alessandroilmacedone #AlessandroIII #AlessandroIIIdiMacedonia #Alexandros #alexandertheconqueror #AlexanderIII #AlexanderofMacedon #AlexandreleGrand #AlexanderIIIofMacedon #AlejandroMagno #AleksanderMacedoński #AleksanderWielki #Iskandar #CambridgeUniversityPress #MediaAriaCdm #RiptidePublishing https://www.instagram.com/p/B0eNhORI2zE/?igshid=zssowatubw83

[bestnoncannonship]

Today 2 years ago @kneelbeforeclefairy and I met the incomparable @jeannereames for the first time and I am eternally grateful for that!!!

[anticakitharadoro]

I was tagged by @baroque-poetess (thank you! <3) to list five things I like about myself and tag ten other people!

I’m pretty funny I think? I can make people laugh 

I’m a (very) anxious person but when I really care about something I throw away my insecurities and just do it

I’m open minded

I’m a pretty creative person 

I get very passionate about things

I’m tagging @warm-heart-and-beautiful-brain, @coalfinch, @petite-fille-de-la-melancolie, @odysscey, @pinklybronzed,  @winedark, @darkacademicc,  @jeannereames if you want to do it!

[jeannereames]

The second of two Tiktok posts wherein I discuss the ancient sources on Alexander the Great. In this one, I discuss the extant (still existing) sources, the biographies/histories and a few other places we find him such as Polyaenus, Athenaeus, Plutarch's Moralia essays.

[bestnoncannonship]

1) i actually don't know most of these, thanks!! I rarely buy online, I go to my local fabric guy, Abdul. We bonded over Thor and mixed race relationships and I bring so many people to him that I've officially stopped paying full price for anything and he never charges me for buttons and pins.

2) @jeannereames tell me what you want and I'll get it from Abdul for 1/16th of what you'll pay online and shove it in a box to send to you. I can send you pics of his silks. They're mostly middle eastern in manufacture. He goes back to his country, Pakistan and India every year and sources his supply and it's GORGEOUS stuff.

3) @actualshonenprotagonist you belong on this post, natural fiber guru that you are!!

4) Please don't support Mood Fabrics!!!! They overcharge and are very comfortable exploiting workers in a way that's all too common in the fashion industry. If you want a place to shop in NYC's garment district, go to one of the hundreds of independents in the same 3 block radius. A lot of them have online shops as well. You'll pay less for more from far more ethical people.

So my sister wants to start sewing more, because

a. She’s 5′ 11″ and can never find pants long enough for her legs or shirts long enough for her arms.

b. She hates synthetic fibers as much as I do and it’s difficult to find natural fiber clothes that aren’t made of cotton

c. She’s a biologist and would physically fistfight microplastics if given half a chance

So her gift from mom and dad for her birthday was a sewing machine. Not a super expensive one but a good solid serviceable one.

And recently she asked “So where do I GET wool or linen and thread that isn’t polyester” and mom was like ‘go ask your sister’

And I, of course, crashed into the group text like “GET A PEN I HAVE WEBSITES FOR U” and honestly I’m thrilled about this

[ittybittyprince]

Blame @jeannereames and her lovely books. Read half of the first of Dancing with the Lion last night.

Enjoy an extrely inaccurate Alexander the Great. I googled Ancient Macedonian Fashion and got some sort of colorful vests and shirts and such. Curly hair? Eh probably not. If you're looking for accuracy go read her stuff 😅

Drawn on my phone - Galaxy note 9