The Inner Garden · An ancient story

Alexander and Diogenes

Corinth · Fourth century BCE

Diogenes rests in sunlight with only a simple bowl beside him.

Alexander, king of Macedon, would one day rule an empire stretching from Greece and Egypt to northwestern India.

Diogenes was a philosopher who chose a simple life, with few possessions and little interest in wealth or rank.

Alexander and two companions approach the philosopher in the garden.

When Alexander arrived in Corinth, many came to greet him.

Diogenes did not.

So the king went to find him.

Alexander makes an offer while his shadow falls across Diogenes.

The philosopher was resting in the sunlight. Alexander stood before him and asked whether there was anything he wanted.

Diogenes gestures toward the sunlight blocked by the king.

Diogenes looked up.

“Stand a little out of my sun.”
Alexander looks back thoughtfully as Diogenes rests in the sunlight.

The king’s companions laughed.

But Alexander admired the independence of a man who asked so little of him.

As they walked away, he said:

“If I were not Alexander, I would be Diogenes.”
Read as text

Alexander, king of Macedon, would one day rule an empire stretching from Greece and Egypt to northwestern India.

Diogenes was a philosopher who chose a simple life, with few possessions and little interest in wealth or rank.

When Alexander arrived in Corinth, many came to greet him.

Diogenes did not.

So the king went to find him.

The philosopher was resting in the sunlight. Alexander stood before him and asked whether there was anything he wanted.

Diogenes looked up.

“Stand a little out of my sun.”

The king’s companions laughed.

But Alexander admired the independence of a man who asked so little of him.

As they walked away, he said:

“If I were not Alexander, I would be Diogenes.”
About this story & sources

An ancient story, retold from Plutarch, Life of Alexander, 14. The account was written centuries after the reported encounter, not as an eyewitness record. Alexander’s great conquests lay ahead of him. The artwork is Alrewaq’s imagined Inner Garden, not a reconstruction of ancient Corinth.