Alexander the Great (356 B.C.E - 323 B.C.) was a famous Macedonian Greek king and commander, reported to have never been defeated in battle. He was named as one of the many that Lucifer stated had failed to free him from his prison in Lake Cocytus. He was never seen in-game.
History[]
Early Life[]
Alexander the Great was born in 356 B.C., to King Phillip II of Macedon and his fourth wife, Olympias of Epirus. Being his only son, Alexander was automatically made Phillip's heir apparent, barring future male children. As such, he was given an education typical of Greek youths, and was personally tutored by the philosopher Aristotle until the age of 16. The young prince soon became a highly competent warrior and general, accompanying his father on several war campaigns. However, when Phillip married Cleopatra Eurydice, the daughter of one of his generals, Attalus, Alexander's position as heir to the throne was put in danger, especially when Attalus implied that Alexander was not a legitimate son to Phillip. After a fight with his father during which the king defended his general, Alexander fled to Illyria. The king and prince were reconciled six months later. In 336 B.C., at the wedding of his daughter Phillip was assassinated; presumably this was an act of vengeance by one of the king's bodyguards and former lovers, although Olympias is speculated to have had a hand in it. Alexander, aged 20, then ascended to the throne of Macedon as Alexander III.
Rulership and Conquests[]
As King of Macedon, after destroying all other competitors to the throne and reestablishing his power over several Greek nations, Alexander set out to conquer Persia in 334 B.C. Despite overwhelming numbers from the Persian king, Darius III, in 331 B.C. Alexander successfully defeated Darius's forces. Alexander then continued on to Egypt, where he was proclaimed a demigod and founded the city of Alexandria. Moving into Assyria and Babylon, at the Battle of Gaugamela Darius was defeated once more and forced to flee to Ecbatana, leaving Alexander unchallenged as the conqueror of the Persian Empire. Unfortunately, when Alexander went in pursuit of the fallen Persian king, he found that Darius had been murdered by one of his own satraps, who now declared himself to be Darius's successor, Artaxerxes V. Alexander countered by claiming Darius had named the Macedonian king as his true successor, and hunted down Artaxerxes. The new Persian king was ultimately handed over to Alexander's general, Ptolemy, and executed. At this time, Alexander fell in love with and married Princess Roxana of Bactria, who bore him a son. This move also gave him a stronger foothold as ruler of Persia.
It was also at this stage that Alexander wished to combine Greek and Persian cultures into his empire. However, with this notion the seeds of dissent among his men began to take root. The Macedonian Greeks were loath to combine their own traditions with those of the Persians, especially as one particular Persian custom was interpreted by the Macedonians as Alexander declaring himself to be a god; this was equivalent to blasphemy. An assassination attempt against him was discovered, and Alexander had one of his officers killed for not alerting him to it. Alexander additionally had the officer's father, the general Parmenion, killed as well to avoid the father attempting revenge. The king also executed Cleitus the Black, an officer who had saved Alexander's life once, for daring to argue against his adoption of Persian ways, and his own court historian, Callisthenes, for participating in another assassination plot.
Campaign in India[]
The majority of his army remained loyal, though, even when in 329 BC, he marched them into India. After taking the region of the Punjab, he made an enemy of King Poros of Nanda. Poros confronted Alexander with an intimidating army, which included elephants. This terrified the Macedonians, having never seen elephants before, and Poros only used them against the Macedonian cavalry because horses did not like the smell of elephants. Ironically, Poros was captured and defeated, but Alexander reinstated him as a sign of mercy. Alexander reached the Beas river, where he established two new cities, one in honor of his beloved warhorse, Bucephalos.
A two-to-three-week march from the Beas was a far greater river: the Ganges. It was ruled by Chandragupta Mayura of Maghada, and he had many more war elephants than Poros had. Alexander made plans to conquer Maghada, but his demoralized and exhausted men did not follow him, mutinying against the king. Reluctantly, Alexander agreed to take them back home. He sent a naval party to sail down the Indus River and a land force to march into the desert. The two forces were devastated by the heat and storms along the Persian Gulf, but managed to reach safety at Susa in 324 B.C.
Upon his return to the Persian Empire, in an act of reconciliation with his men, Alexander held a mass wedding celebration in which he had many of his soldiers married to Persian noblewomen. Alexander himself was wed to two more women: Darius III's daughter, Stateira II, and his niece Parysatis II, further solidifying his power. However, soon after the weddings Alexander's general and childhood friend, Hephaestion, died, which left the Macedonian king devastated. He held a magnificent funeral for Hephaestion in Babylon, and remained there to plan his next military campaign, targeting Arabia, but he would not live long enough to enact these plans.
Death and Aftermath[]
In 323 B.C., at the age of 32 Alexander the Great died. It is unclear how the king had met his end; two accounts hold that Alexander had died after engaging in a drinking binge and falling sick, while some have proposed that the king may have been poisoned. Upon his death, his empire was divided among his remaining generals: Antigonos took Macedonia, Antipater took Greece, Seleucus Nicator took Persia and India, and Ptolemy took Egypt (Ptolemy also seized Alexander's body, encased on a sarcophagus filled with honey, to avoid any challenges to his claims to rule. The body would later be transported and kept in Alexandria for many centuries.) These independent kingdoms would eventually fall centuries later to the Roman Empire.
To eliminate threats to her son's ascension to the throne of Macedon, Alexander's widow Roxana had both of Alexander's other wives, Stateira and Parysatis, murdered. Her son, with the support of his grandmother Olympias, was declared Alexander IV, but in 310 B.C. both Roxana and Alexander were assassinated by Cassander, the son of Antipater, who then declared himself king of Macedon.
Trivia[]
- In "Inferno" it is believed Dante Aligheri mentioned him being among the souls tortured in the Plegethon, within Violence. However, the text is ambiguous. Modern historians now believe Dante was probably talking about Alexander IV, who committed horrendous acts of mutilation and genocide during his reign.
- One of the Damned, Thais, had a personal connection to Alexander, having been one of his concubines. She is infamous for goading Alexander into burning down the palace of Persepolis, and she later became the minor wife of one of his generals, Ptolemy I Soter. Thais is also in Hell, in the eighth circle for the sin of Flattery.