Bucephalus

Bucephalus is a:
A.  Small edible mushroom.
B.  Venereal disease.
C.  Horse.
D.  Heavy wool tunic.
E.  Snail.

Want a clue?  Sure, why not.  For a change of pace, I asked Yoda to write the clue (he didn't really die in that light saber fight after all).  Here you go:

"Sick of the Mediterranean Fan Palms I was!  Nasty sharp thorns on the stems they had, fronds the rabbits always eating they were, the view each year more blocking they were.  The hell out, them I ripped; sprinkler heads I removed.  To local Mexican yard-art shop I went, there two metal sculptures I bought.  One a horse is."

The correct answer is horse.  Bucephalus was the name of Alexander (you can call me Al) the Great's war horse.

Al and Bucephalus

One sunny day in 343 BC, Al and his dad, Philip II of Macedonia, were in Thessaly on a horse buying expedition.  They spotted a superb black stallion with a superbly high price: 16 talents.  A talent equaled roughly 60 pounds of gold, so the owner wanted nearly a half ton of gold for the beast.  Phil wasn't about to pay that kind of money for an unbroken/unproven horse so he instructed his attendants to do a test drive.  The attendants did their best, but were unable to ride the horse.  Finally, Phil said, 'That horse is worthless.  We're outta here.'

'No!  Wait!' shouted 13 year-old Al.  'Dad, I'll wager the entire 16 talents that I can ride that horse!'  Everybody thought that was pretty funny.  When the laughing subsided, Phil told Al to go ahead, thinking, this will teach the lad not to make foolish bets.  Turns out, Al's a horse whisperer-type, plus he'd noticed the horse was afraid of its own shadow.  Literally.  He calmed the horse, faced it into the sun, mounted up and rode it around a bit.

Prior to inheriting the throne from his assassinated father at age 20, Al was tutored by none other than Aristotle.  At age 22 he hopped on Bu and headed off to conquer the world - which he pretty much did over the next 8 years, never losing a single battle.  Al was unable to complete his empire building plans because he was laid low by a deadly fever, malaria or typhoid most likely, and died at age 33.  Some sources say that Bu lived to a similar age.

I was gonna write about the 2 metal sculptures I just bought but got sidetracked with the story of Al and Bu.  The sculpture details will be in the next post.  So, why did I go on and on about Bucephalus anyway?  Because that's the name I gave to the new horse sculpture, and I wanted readers to know that it is indeed a noble steed.