# Ep. 80: Il Sodoma's Scenes of Alexander the Great

An episode of [The Italian Renaissance Podcast](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1612265937), 21 Sep 2026, 28 min.

Audio: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1947899/episodes/19832964-ep-80-il-sodoma-s-scenes-of-alexander-the-great.mp3

Among the many artists employed by Agostino Chigi, Giovanni Antonio Bazzi, better known as Il Sodoma, painted a remarkable fresco cycle of Alexander the Great in Rome's Villa Farnesina. At the center of the discussion is a question: what happens when an ancient story of Alexander, Hephaestion, and Roxana is filtered through the erotic and social culture of Renaissance Rome? Alexander the Great's relationship to his childhood friend and general Hephaestion has long been a subject of debate. Were they lovers, or simply life partners? Here, in the Villa Farnesina, close observation tells us that Renaissance artists and patrons were asking the same questions, and creating visual answers. Ultimately, how these frescos are read informs us about the social construction around Sodoma, his patron Agostino Chigi, and the world they inhabited in the early 16th century. Watch/Follow/Support: https://linktr.ee/italian_renaissance_podcast Works Discussed: Il Sodoma, Marriage of Alexander and Roxane, ca. 1519 https://www.villafarnesina.it/en/percorso-di-visita/the-wedding-hall/ The Florentine Renaissance Course Support the show

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