Alexander the Great

by Philip Freeman

  Jewish culture was also ambivalent about Alexander and the value of Greek civilization. The Jews had prospered under Persian rule and many did not look kindly on the invader from the north. In the biblical book of Daniel, the Macedonian king appears as the last in a line of foreign rulers:

  There shall be a fourth kingdom on earth,

  that shall be different from all other kingdoms;

  it shall devour the whole earth,

  and trample it down, and break it to pieces.

  As in the Koran, the biblical Alexander has horns, though they are ten in number, representing the evil rulers of the Seleucid line who contended for control of Palestine after his death. Most notable among these was Antiochus IV Epiphanes, who sought to spread Greek culture actively among the Jews. This vision was endorsed by many influential Jewish leaders, who gladly accepted a Greek gymnasium and educational institutions even in Jerusalem. Young Jewish men competed naked in athletic contests alongside Greeks in the shadow of the Temple. Some, ashamed at the circumcision that set them apart from their Greek friends, even underwent a painful operation to restore their foreskins. For the small but dedicated group of Jewish pietists, all this was blasphemy. They launched a war against the Seleucid king, but were beaten down by his troops and a garrison of his soldiers was established on a citadel north of the Temple. Antiochus outlawed Jewish worship and defiled the Holy of Holies, prompting even the most accommodating Jews to rise up against him. They were led by the Hasmonean family, who with their band of guerrilla warriors known as the Maccabees, drove the hated Seleucids and their Greek ways from Jerusalem and reinstated Temple worship—an event still celebrated by the feast of Hanukkah.

  But not all Jews were opposed to the influences introduced by Alexander. In Egypt, Jews flocked to the newly established city of Alexandria on the Mediterranean coast and helped transform it into the greatest metropolis of the age. Only a century after the death of the king in Babylon, the Jews of Alexandria were translating their sacred scriptures from Hebrew into Greek as they became more comfortable with the language of Socrates than their native tongue. The result was the Septuagint, a rendering of the Hebrew Bible that became the standard edition for Greek-speaking Jews (and Christians) after them. But the Septuagint was just one of many notable products of the magnificent Hellenistic culture that grew up in Alexandria with the support of the Ptolemaic kings. The city became the center for Greek scholarship in the ancient world, outshining even Athens. Citizens were recruited from all over the Greek world who, along with the Jewish residents and the decidedly second-class native Egyptians, formed a cosmopolitan center unparalleled in history. The city’s famous museum and library became the home of the greatest scientists and scholars of the Hellenistic age. Aristarchus of Samos, who first theorized that the sun was the center of the solar system and the earth revolved on its own axis, was resident in the city, as was the geographer and polymath Eratosthenes of Cyrene, who calculated the circumference of the earth with great accuracy.

  But of all the lands that benefited from Alexander’s legacy, the one that most embraced Greek culture was a country Alexander never conquered—Rome. The legions seized Macedonia and Greece for their empire two centuries after Alexander, but the captured land in turn exerted a powerful influence on its captors. Any Roman who dared to call himself educated became fluent in Greek and immersed himself in Hellenic philosophy and literature. Not that Romans weren’t suspicious of foreign ways and mistrustful of any Greeks bearing cultural gifts inside their walls, but the allure of Greek civilization was too pervasive and powerful to resist. Hellenistic culture spread throughout the Roman world from Syria to Britain. Julius Caesar studied Homer and Herodotus as carefully as any Greek scholar and wept when he saw a statue of Alexander on display at a temple in Spain on the shores of the Atlantic. The Roman general explained his tears by saying he had accomplished so little by the age at which Alexander had died. Augustus also admired Alexander, but more for his unmatched military skill than his ability to govern an empire effectively. Many succeeding emperors modeled themselves on Alexander and tried to match his conquests in the East, though none was able to extend Roman rule beyond Mesopotamia.

  The spread of Alexander’s Hellenistic culture throughout the Roman world and beyond became a prime factor in the eventual success of Christianity. The New Testament and most other popular early Christian literature were written in the Greek language, not the native Aramaic of Jesus of Nazareth. The almost universal knowledge of Greek allowed the Gospels to be read with equal ease in Jerusalem, Egypt, and Rome. When the Apostle Paul wrote his New Testament letters to the native people of Asia Minor, Greece, or to the Romans themselves, they were composed in the tongue of Alexander. Indeed, one could make a persuasive case that without the conquests of the Macedonian king, the Christian religion would have remained a local phenomenon.

  The Greek language was also the initial means for the dispersion of the most famous version of the story of Alexander himself, The Alexander Romance. Only a century after the king’s death, a collection of entertaining and highly imaginative tales of his life had been published, probably in Egypt. These stories became incredibly popular and were translated over the following centuries into Latin, Aramaic, Hebrew, Arabic, Armenian, Sanskrit, Persian, and many other languages, including Icelandic and the Middle English of Chaucer’s age. The stories go far beyond anything recorded in Arrian and the other ancient historians. The Alexander of the Romance ascends into the air in a basket carried by eagles, explores the ocean depths in a diving bell, and searches for the fabled Water of Life. Through this collection of stories the classical and medieval world came to know Alexander as the greatest of ancient kings. The legend of Alexander spread even to medieval West Africa, where the famous prince Sundiata listened eagerly to tales of the Macedonian ruler.

  There was scarcely a country in the world that did not have its own stories of the great king Alexander. But, as in Persia, not everyone in history has viewed him in a positive light. The Italian poet Dante placed him in the seventh circle of Hell, boiling forever in the very blood of others he so freely shed. Many others since have readily agreed that Alexander was nothing more than a murderous tyrant with a gift for generalship. Views of Alexander have swung back and forth like a pendulum over the centuries, depending on the flow of history and the predisposition of those who have written his story. For the British Victorians, he was a mirror of themselves as enlightened purveyors of civilization through a superior culture backed by a powerful military. This rosy view of Alexander collapsed with the devastating wars of the twentieth century, when the horrific reality of absolute power swept away any romantic notions of benevolent tyranny. Today many modern scholars prefer to see Alexander as little more than a “drunken juvenile thug,” as one prominent historian has recently characterized him.

  This view of Alexander is much too simplistic. He was a man of his own violent times, no better or worse in his actions than Caesar or Hannibal. He killed tens of thousands of civilians in his campaigns and spread terror in his wake, but so did every other general in the ancient world. If he were alive today, he would undoubtedly be condemned as a war criminal—but he did not live in our age. Like the heroes of Thomas Love Peacock’s marvelous satirical poem “The War Song of Dinas Vawr,” Alexander conquered much of the ancient world simply because he could:

  The mountain sheep are sweeter,

  But the valley sheep are fatter;

  We therefore deemed it meeter

  To carry off the latter.

  We made an expedition;

  We met a host, and quelled it;

  We forced a strong position,

  And killed the men who held it.

  Alexander himself would not have disputed such reasoning nor would those who fell beneath his sword. If the Great King Darius could have crossed the Hellespont and slaughtered every Macedonian in his path to add their land to his empire, he would have done so without remorse.

  Whether we ap
prove of Alexander’s often brutal tactics, every reasonable student of history must agree that he was one of the greatest military minds of all time. No one but a true genius in battle could have taken on the entire Persian Empire at long odds and fought his way across Asia all the way to India. As for his motives, we err greatly when we try to make Alexander anything more than a man of supreme military ability who wanted passionately to rule the world. Views of the Macedonian king as Prometheus bringing the light of Greek civilization to the poor masses of Asia are both unsound and insulting to the advanced cultures of the ancient east. To truly understand Alexander we must realize that—perhaps more than any man in history—he hated to lose. Alexander was and is the absolute embodiment of pure human ambition with all its good and evil consequences. We can condemn the death and destruction he left in his wake as he strode across the world like a colossus, but in the end we can’t help but admire a man who dared such great deeds.

  The sarissa spear formation used by Philip and Alexander. The exceptionally long spears prevented attackers from reaching the Macedonian troops.

  Mount Olympus, home of the Greek gods, as viewed from Dion in northern Greece. In the fields of Dion, Alexander tamed his horse Bucephalas.

  The Acropolis of Athens, which Alexander visited when he was eighteen years old. Athena’s great temple, the Parthenon, stands at the center.

  The tomb of Philip at Vergina in northern Greece. Archaeological excavations have revealed magnificent jewelry and weapons deposited here.

  The ruins of Troy, Alexander’s first stop in Asia, in modern Turkey.

  The dedicatory inscription to Athena from the temple at Priene near the Turkish coast of the Aegean dating to around 330 B.C. It is one of the few surviving documents from Alexander’s lifetime that mention him by name. (The top line reads: “King Alexander.”)

  The harbor and town of Halicarnassus, modern Bodrum in southwest Turkey. Alexander’s defeat of this key city opened Asia Minor to his army.

  The Phoenician town of Tyre on the coast of modern Lebanon, which Alexander took after a brutal siege in 332 B.C. The causeway built by Alexander’s army became the isthmus still connecting the city to the mainland.

  The Alexander mosaic from Pompeii. Bareheaded Alexander on the left raises his spear to strike down King Darius on his chariot with outstretched hand at the battle of Gaugamela in northern Iraq.

  The pyramids of Giza. When Alexander visited Egypt in 332 B.C., these massive monuments were almost as old to him as he is to us.

  The palace of Darius at Persepolis in modern Iran, capital of the Persian Empire, taken and burned by Alexander in 330 B.C.

  The tomb of Cyrus the Great at Pasargadae near Persepolis. Alexander admired this founder of the Persian Empire and ordered the monument restored.

  The towering Hindu Kush mountains of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Alexander crossed this range with his entire army in winter.

  Coin celebrating the victory of Alexander over the Indian king Porus on the Hydaspes River in 326 B.C. Alexander is riding Bucephalas to attack Porus as he retreats on his elephant.

  Coin c. 300 B.C. minted by Lysimachus, one of the generals who divided the empire, showing Alexander with horns of the god Zeus-Ammon. Only twenty years after his death, Alexander was already becoming a god.

  GLOSSARY

  Achaemenid: The Persian royal house from the region near Persepolis. All Persian kings claimed descent from the supposed founder of the line, Achaemenes. The term is used interchangeably for the royal line of kings and the empire itself.

  Achilles: Greatest Greek hero of the Trojan War. Alexander claimed ancestry from him through his mother and emulated him in his quest for undying fame.

  Ada: Satrap of Caria until removed by her brother Pixodarus. She was restored to power by Alexander and adopted him as her son.

  Agis: King of Sparta and devoted foe of Alexander. Tried to reassert Spartan power in Greece in a coalition against Macedonian rule, but was killed in battle against Antipater at Megalopolis in 331.

  Ai Khanum: Possibly a colony founded by Alexander, this Bactrian Greek city on the banks of the Oxus (Amu Darya) in northern Afghanistan was excavated by the French, who unearthed evidence of a thriving settlement that survived until the mid-second century B.C.

  Alexander IV: Son of Alexander by Roxane. He was used as a pawn in the wars of succession and killed along with his mother in 310.

  Alexander of Epirus: Brother of Olympias and king of Epirus. His ties to Macedonia were strengthened when he married Philip’s daughter, Cleopatra. He died fighting in Italy in 331.

  Alexandria (Egypt): Founded by Alexander in 331 on the Mediterranean coast near the westernmost edge of the Nile delta. Ptolemy built a tomb for Alexander here after hijacking his body on its journey back to Macedonia. The city grew to be a major center of Hellenistic civilization with more than a million inhabitants, including a large Jewish community. It was famed for the Pharos lighthouse, museum, and library.

  Alexandria: The name given to a number of cities founded by Alexander from the Mediterranean to India.

  Ammon: The major Egyptian god Amun identified by Greeks with Zeus. His oracle at the oasis of Siwa on the modern border between Egypt and Libya was visited by Alexander in 331.

  Antigonus: A Macedonian nobleman known as Monophthalmus (“one-eyed”), who was a contemporary of Philip’s. Alexander appointed him satrap of Phrygia in Asia Minor. He was a major player in the wars of succession after Alexander’s death.

  Antipater: Trusted Macedonian nobleman and lieutenant under Philip. Alexander appointed him regent of Macedonia and Greece while he campaigned in Asia. He defeated Agis of Sparta when he revolted, but later fell from favor and faced replacement by Craterus. An important figure in the struggle for power after the death of Alexander.

  Arabia: The modern Arabian peninsula that in ancient times was a major source of incense and spices. Alexander was preparing to conquer it when he died in Babylon in 323.

  Aristander: An influential seer from Telmessus in Lycia skilled at interpreting omens to favor Alexander.

  Aristobulus: An engineer and architect who accompanied Alexander on his expedition. In his old age, he wrote a flattering account of Alexander that was a major source for Arrian.

  Aristotle: Student of Plato, tutor of Alexander, and one of the most influential and learned thinkers of ancient times. Born in Stagira in northern Greece in 384, he was the son of the court physician to Alexander’s grandfather, King Amyntas III. He spent part of his childhood at the Macedonian court at Pella. He taught Alexander and his young companions at Mieza in Macedonia and maintained contact with his royal pupil throughout his campaigns, receiving scientific specimens from many parts of Asia.

  Arrhidaeus: Half brother of Alexander and son of Philip II by one of his seven wives, Philinna of Thessaly. Reportedly mentally impaired, he was unexpectedly proclaimed king at Babylon in 323 along with Alexander’s infant son. He was a pawn in the hands of the successors and was later murdered by Olympias.

  Arrian: Most influential ancient biographer of Alexander, Arrian was born in Bithynia and served the Roman government in important political and military offices in Asia. A student of the Stoic philosopher Epictetus, his Anabasis of Alexander and Indica remain key sources for modern biographers of Alexander.

  Artabazus: Persian nobleman who revolted against the empire and fled to the Macedonian court in 352. He later returned to Persia and was loyal to Darius until the king’s murder. He then joined Alexander and was appointed satrap of Bactria. His daughter Barsine married Memnon and had a long affair with Alexander that produced a son.

  Artaxerxes III: Also known as Ochos, he ruled Persia from 359 to 338. He put down a revolt of satraps in Asia Minor and reconquered Egypt before he was assassinated. Alexander married his daughter in 324 at the mass wedding in Susa.

  Artaxerxes IV: Son of Artaxerxes III, he ruled Persia from 338 to 336. He was assassinated and followed on the throne by Darius.

&nbs
p; Athens: Longtime antagonist of Macedonia, it was one of the major cities of Greece and famed for its naval power.

  Attalus: Macedonian nobleman and son-in-law of Parmenion. He questioned Alexander’s legitimacy as a worthy heir to the throne and was killed soon after Philip’s assassination.

  Babylon: An ancient and celebrated city of Mesopotamia on the Euphrates south of modern Baghdad. It was the capital of the Neo-Babylonian Empire and an important city of the Persian Empire. Alexander visited it in 331 and died there in 323.

  Bactria: Region in central Asia between the Oxus River on the north and the Hindu Kush mountains to the south, it included much of modern Afghanistan. An important Persia satrapy. Alexander faced some of his fiercest resistance here.

  Bagoas: Not to be confused with the grand vizier of the same name who murdered two Persian kings, this eunuch, noted for his beauty, was the lover of Darius, then Alexander.

  Barsine: Daughter of Artabazus and widow of Memnon, she had an affair with Alexander that produced a son named Hercules (Heracles).

  Batis: Eunuch and governor of Gaza who resisted Alexander’s takeover. This so infuriated Alexander that he was dragged behind a chariot around the city walls of Gaza until dead.

  Bessus: Satrap of Bactria under Darius, he murdered the Great King and assumed the Persian throne to lead resistance to Alexander in the east. He was captured, mutilated, and executed by Alexander.

  Brahmins: Priestly caste of India, some of whom resisted Alexander and paid with their lives.