Alexander the Great

Alexander the Great (Alexander III), king of Macedonia, began his career of conquest in 335 BC. He overthrew the Persian Empire and laid the foundation for the territorial kingdoms of the Hellenistic world. Born in Macedonia in 356 BC, he was the son of Philip II and Olympias. He was taught by the great philosopher Aristotle from the age of 13-16. Alexander took power in Macedonia and mainland Greece in 340 BC when Philip left to attack Byzantium. By 332 BC, his arrival in Egypt ended the Persian occupation and he had already conquered much of western Asia and the Levant before his arrival in Egypt. In Egypt, Alexander made sacrifices to the gods at Memphis and visited the oracle of Amun-Ra where he was recognized as the god's son, thus restoring the true pharaonic line. He founded the city of Alexandria and then left Egypt in 331 BC to continue his conquest of the Achaemenid empire. His empire stretched from India to Egypt. After his death from a fever in 323 BC, his kingdom quickly dissolved.

Bom in 356 bc, Alexander was tutored for six years by the philosopher Aristotle before he succeeded his father Philip as king of Macedonia and the mainland of Greece. He realized the Greeks’ long-felt ambition to be free from Persian domination by crushing Darius, but extended the defeat of Persia into a programme of imperial aggrandizement, emerging as an oriental despot with an empire stretching from India to Egypt. After his death from fever in 323 bc this hastily assembled dominion showed immediate signs of dissolution, but a lasting achievement was the founding of the city of Alexandria on the Nile Delta.