Alexander the Great in the Quran called them the Caspian Gates. Twenty and two Kings did I shut up therein. These pseudepigraphic letters from Alexander to his mother Olympias and his tutor Aristotle, describing his marvellous adventures at the end of the World, date back to the original Greek recension α written in the 4th century in Alexandria. The letters are "the literary expression of a living popular tradition" that had been evolving for at least three centuries before the Quran was written. Several historical figures, both Muslim and Christian, searched for Alexander's Gate and several different identifications were made with actual walls. During the Middle
David Bostock (philosopher) David Bostock (philosopher) David Bostock (born 1936) is a British philosopher and an Emeritus Fellow of Merton College, Oxford. Bostock was one of four children of Edward and Alice Bostock. He was educated at Amesbury School in Hindhead, Surrey, and at Charterhouse School, before undertaking his National Service as a 2nd Lieutenant in the Surrey Regiment. Having read Literae Humaniores at St John’s College, Oxford, and after stipendiary posts at Leicester University (1963), the Australian National University at Canberra (1964) and Harvard University (1967), Bostock served as a Fellow and Tutor in philosophy at Merton College, Oxford between 1968 and