Alexander the Great and His Legacy

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Alexander the Great and His Legacy

Alexander III ascended to the Macedonian throne at the age of 20.

Overview

• The rise of Alexander the Great set the stage for the Hellenistic Age, a period when Greek culture was dominant.
• As Alexander and his armies swept across the Western world, he brought Greek influences that reshaped the cultures of Egypt, the Near East, and South Asia.
• Through physical artifacts such as weapons, pottery, and architecture, as well as written historical records of the Mediterranean and Asia, scholars and historians have become more aware of the achievements and cultural impacts of Alexander the Great.

Macedonia is on the Balkan Peninsula north of Greece. Macedonians spoke Greek and drew much of their culture from their neighbor to the south. Macedonia, being the buffer between Greece and the barbaric tribes to the north, produced a warlike people. The region was ruled by multiple kings who struggled for dominance. When a power vacuum occurred in 359 BCE, one man seized power over all of Macedonia: Philip II. By 352 BCE, Philip ruled southern Greece. Then he conquered Thrace up to the Black Sea and the border of Persia, the primary enemy of Greece at the time. In 336 BCE, before he could launch an invasion of Persia, Philip was assassinated.

Rise of macedonia

Alexander then took up his father’s goal of conquering Persia. In 334 BCE, he sailed across the Aegean Sea with a force of 40,000 men.

Philip had a son named Alexander. As a teenager, Alexander had been tutored by the renowned Greek philosopher Aristotle. This instilled in him a respect for rhetoric, science, medicine, and philosophical thought. Alexander also was adept at military tactics. Alexander was only 20 years old when his father died. He took the Macedonian throne as Alexander III, but he would soon earn the name by which he is remembered: Alexander the Great. After Philip’s death, rebellions flared up in Macedonian-held Greece. Alexander’s first military action as king was to suppress the revolts. The swiftness and strength of his armies overwhelmed the Greeks and brought them into his expanding empire.

Alexander takes the reins of power

The Macedonians continued their march eastward. They reached the upper end of the Indus River Valley in the Hindu Kush. Then the Indian king Porus put up an armed resistance to Alexander’s empire-building invasionDuring a raging thunderstorm at the River Hydaspes (in modern-day Pakistan), Indian forces mounted on 200 elephants attacked the Macedonian armies.

the macedonian empire is established

The Macedonians swept through Asia Minor, laying siege and conquering cities as they went. Alexander left occupying forces and went south to claim Persian lands in Tyre and Gaza. After lengthy sieges, the victorious Macedonians then marched south to take Egypt. At the arrival of Alexander’s armies, Egypt’s Persian governor immediately surrendered. The Egyptians, under 200 years of Persian occupation, rejoiced and proclaimed him the son of a god.Alexander still had pressing business with Darius, the Persian king. The Macedonians chased Darius’s army throughout Persia, defeating them again at Gaugamela in northern Iraq. Darius fled and was killed by his own cousin.

the showdown with persia begins

Though Alexander and his men had never seen elephants, they emerged victorious. In an act of cunning diplomacy, Alexander spared the defeated King Porus and appointed him satrap of the conquered region, opening India to Hellenic influence. This marked the easternmost reaches of Alexander’s empire. In only 11 years, Alexander the Great had unified Eurasia from Greece all the way to India, an area of over 5 million square miles. In 323 BCE, while heading homeward, Alexander stayed at the palace of Nebuchadnezzar II in Babylon. Suddenly, Alexander took ill. He died 12 days later, possibly of malaria, at age 32. His body was brought to his namesake city of Alexandria in Egypt, where it was installed in a lavish tomb.

the macedonian empire is established (continued)