The Death of Alexander the Great

THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT

The Life and Death of Alexander the Great

THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT PAGE 1 OF 5

In researching this I utilized five books . Each had there strong and weak points . Bury 's A History of Greece was the most exhaustive of the books , but suffered a bit from the amount of detail that was presented and the archaic writing style . Fox 's Alexander the Great had a good balance between writing style and content . Wood 's In the Footsteps of

Alexander the Great was written to accompany a PBS mini series , and suffered for that in content and detail . It was useful though , to fill in some areas . Lamb 's Alexander of Macedon , contained several primary source quotes that were useful , especially those of Arrian . Finally , O 'Brians 's book , Alexander the Great : The Invisible Enemy suffered a little from the constant insertion of Alexander 's dreams in a format that I found quite distracting

Alexander the Great was born in 356 BCE . His father was Philip , King of Macedonia . Philip had married Alexander 's mother , Olympias , just the year before (Bury 417 . Alexander inherited his ruthlessness and political savvy from his father . Olympias was a firm believer in the occult , and she passed that on to Alexander . Alexander consulted the oracles and believed in omens to an excess . His temperament also matched the volatility of his mother (Wood 24

Alexander 's youth was one of violence . Philip prosecuted wars with Phocis , Thrace , and Chalcidice (Bury 425-427 . Philip made peace with Athens in 346 BCE . This peace would only a short time . By 341 BCE Philip realized that peace with Athens was impossible . Philip defeated Athens and Thebes at the battle of Chaeronea in 338 . Alexander , then 18 , commanded the Macedonian cavalry . In the battle Alexander decimated the Thebans , allowing Philip to take the Athenians from the flank (Bury 439-440

Philip was murdered in 336 BCE . Alexander at that point became the King of Macedonia . He marched in Greece , where in the late summer of 336 he was elected the General of the Greeks . He was preparing his invasion of Asia when rumblings in Thrace and Illyria drew his attention . But even as he solved these issues , Thebes rose up in rebellion (Bury 447-448

The rumor had started that Alexander had perished in Thrace Demosthenes , long an agitator against both Philip and Alexander displayed a man who had reportedly seen Alexander slain . Theban Fugitives , wanting to stir the feelings of insurrection , fled back to Thebes . The Thebans blockaded the citadel and Athens sent arms . When the report came that Alexander was camp just a few miles away , it was assumed it was Alexander of Lyncestis , since Alexander the Great was dead in the fields of Thrace (Bury 448-449

Unfortunately for the Thebans , the rumors of Alexander 's demise had been greatly exaggerated . Alexander captured the city and then destroyed it . This example did not go unheeded in...