Alexander the Great
356 BC-323 BC

King of Macedonia. Born at Pella in 356 B.C. to the first wife of King Philip II of Macedonia. At age 20, Alexander became the king of Macedon, the leader of the Corinthian League, and the conqueror of Persia. He succeeded in forging the largest Western empire of the ancient world.

As a teenager, Alexander was educated by the Athenian philosopher Aristotle. By the year 337 B.C. all of the Greek city-states had been conquered or forced into an alliance by King Philip II. He was planning to lead their joint forces in an invasion of the Persian Empire when he was assassinated in 336 B.C. at the wedding of Alexander's sister to the king of one his vassal states. Alexander succeeded to the throne of Macedonia at the age of 19. The unhappy Greeks immediately revolted but were quickly put down by Alexander who quickly showed his genius as a military leader. Having subdued all of Greece, he picked up his father's plan and headed east to fight the Persians.

Alexander's army crossed the Hellespont--now called the Dardanelles--in the spring of 334 B.C. He stopped at the site of the ancient Greek city of Troy, scene of Homer's Iliad. He met the Persians in battle for the first time on the Granicus River, which flows into the Sea of Marmara, and smashed the opposing army. Alexander himself narrowly missed being killed during the battle. Following this victory, Alexander pressed on through Asia Minor, being checked briefly by the Persians at the city of Miletos. He was near present-day Iskenderun in southern Turkey when he learned that the newly-crowned King Darius III of Persia and his army were at Issos, to his north.

Alexander encountered Darius at Issos in October 333 B.C. Alexander's army attacked while the Persians were trying to retreat to the sea in order to escape. He cut them off and inflicted a crushing defeat with an enormous number of Persian dead. Darius fled. Alexander then turned south and invaded Syria and Phoenicia, intending to take the Mediterranean ports where the Persian fleet had its bases. It took a siege of eight months to conquer the Phoenician city of Tyre, on an island of the coast of Lebanon. It is said that in the final battle in July 332 B.C. 8,000 of the inhabitants were killed and 30,000 were taken as slaves.

During the siege, Alexander received an offer of peace from Darius. The terms were seemingly so favorable that Alexander's second-in-command, Parmenio, is said to have said that he would accept them if he were Alexander. "That," replied Alexander, "is what I should do were I Parmenio."

Alexander then turned south and took the fortress of Gaza, with a Persian garrison inside, after a siege of two months. He crossed over into Egypt, where he was welcomed as a liberator from the hated Persians. He founded the port city of Alexandria in place of the old Greek trading port of Naukratis. This was the largest of the 70 cities that Alexander founded during the course of his conquests. He visited the ancient oracle of Zeus Ammon. Alexander never revealed what the oracle told him, but his soldiers spread the rumor that he had said that Alexander was destined to rule the world.

Alexander left Egypt with an army of 400,000 foot soldiers and 7,000 cavalry. He crossed the Euphrates and entered Mesopotamia where in 331 B.C. he met the Persian king once more at Gaugamela, east of the Tigris River. In spite of the fact that his army was smaller than that of the Persians, Alexander's superior tactics won the field, and Darius was forced to flee again. By this victory he effectively won the war, although much more fighting was necessary before the Persian Empire finally disappeared. It took three years to subdue all of eastern Iran. After the Battle of Gaugamela, Alexander entered the ancient city of Babylon as a conqueror. From there he moved on to the great cities of the Persian Empire: Susa, Persepolis, and Pasargadae. In 330 B.C. he defeated an army that was guarding the narrow pass known as the Persian Gates by finding a track that led around it and attacking from the rear. This gave him entrance to the Persian capital of Persepolis, where he and his men went on an orgy of destruction and burned down the palace of Xerxes.

Having penetrated this far into modern-day Iran, Alexander's army was now in country that was unmapped by and virtually unknown to the Greeks. Still pursuing Darius, he turned northwest toward Ecbatana (modern Hamadan) then northeast to Rhagae (near Teheran). Darius had been taken hostage by Bessus, the ruler of the province of Bactria. Alexander caught up with him as he was dying. Alexander had his body taken back to Persepolis to be buried in the royal tombs. At the death of the Persian king, Alexander adopted the title of Lord of Asia--as the ruler of the Persian Empire was called.

When Alexander learned that Bessus had adopted the title of Great King and was leading a revolt in the eastern provinces of the empire, Alexander led his army toward Bactria. The Greek army crossed the Hindu Kush mountains north of Kabul by the Khawak Pass, which lies more than 11,500 feet above sea level. When the army descended into Bactria they learned that Bessus had devastated the countryside and fled north, over the Oxus River (Amu Darya). By the time Alexander's men overtook him, he had already been overthrown. Alexander had him formally tried for the murder of Darius and had his nose and ears cut off and then sent him to Ecbatana where he was publicly put to death by crucifixion.

By this time Alexander was becoming more and more despotic. He killed his own foster brother, Clitus, in a drunken brawl after Clitus had insulted him. He antagonized many of his Greek and Macedonian followers by marrying a Persian princess, Roxane. When a plot was discovered to murder him, he had his old teacher and historian Callisthenes put to death. Alexander spent the year 328 B.C. subjugating Bactria and in early summer 327 B.C. recrossed the Hindu Kush to the south headed for India. Sending half of the army ahead by way of the Khyber Pass with orders to build a boat bridge across the Indus River, Alexander himself fought his way to the river through the hills north of the pass. He spent the winter fighting the local hill tribes.

His greatest accomplishment in this campaign was in scaling and taking Mount Aornos (Pir-Sar), which was supposed to be unconquerable. Following this victory, Alexander led his army to the banks of the Indus where they rested until spring. They then crossed the river and marched three days to the city of Taxila, where he was greeted by the king with much pomp and ceremony. He then continued on to the Hydaspes (Jhelum) River, where he met and defeated King Porus in what was to be his last great battle. He pushed on to the east, but on the banks of the Hyphasis (Beas) River--his army rebelled. They were tired after the long years of war and were anxious to see their families back in Greece. Alexander could not persuade them otherwise and after sulking in his tent for two days agreed to lead them back home.

Alexander shared the classical belief that the Indus and Nile Rivers were the same. He resolved to test this theory and see whether he could return to the Mediterranean that way. On the Hydaspes River, he constructed a large number of boats in which part of his force sailed downstream. The remainder were divided into three groups and made the journey by land. They departed in November 326 B.C. Going downstream Alexander engaged in constant warfare. The Indians would not supply his troops without a fight. At a city that is thought to be present-day Multan, Alexander climbed a ladder to lead the attack and was badly wounded. For several days it seemed as though he would die, and his men went berserk destroying everything and everyone who got in their way. They reached the mouths of the Indus in the summer of 325 B.C.

Alexander explored both arms of the river and proved that it was not connected to the Nile. Before the expedition had reached the Indian Ocean, Alexander sent Craterus, one of his senior officers, back to Persia with the largest part of the army. He instructed Nearchus to wait until the monsoon in October and then to sail along the coast to the Persian Gulf to find a sea route back to the mouth of the Euphrates. Alexander and the remainder of the expedition made their way along the unexplored Makran coast of what is now Pakistan. He intended to follow the coastline and set up supply depots for the ships along the way, but the Taloi Mountains forced him to turn inland. Nearchus and the fleet were left to find their own supplies along a very desolate shore.

Alexander's journey through what he called the Gedrosia Desert in the months of August, September, and October 325 B.C. was among the most difficult he made. The expedition, including many women and children, had to walk over the waterless desert at night to avoid the intense heat by day. They did not have enough food or water, and many of them died before they reached Pura, the capital of the province of Gedrosia. Alexander then went to Kerman where he was met by Craterus and his forces. It was another six months before Alexander and Nearchus met at the Persian port of Ormuz.

Alexander's army reached the Persian city of Susa in the spring of 324 B.C. Alexander adopted more and more of the customs of the Asian despots, taking a second wife and integrating non-Greeks into his army. These measures alarmed his Greek and Macedonian veterans, and they voiced their discontent. Alexander discharged them and many headed back to Europe. During this time, however, Alexander laid the basis for future expeditions. He sent Heraclides to explore the Caspian Sea, to find out whether it was joined to the ocean that was supposed to circle the world. He also planned to send a fleet under Nearchus to sail around Arabia, hoping to discover a route between India and the Red Sea. He seems to have had plans to conquer Arabia as well. All of these projects were abandoned, however, when Alexander became ill at a banquet on June 1, 323 B.C. He died on June 13 at the age of 32, possibly as a result of having been poisoned.