Alexander The Great Essay

ALEXANDER 1

The Rise and Fall of Alexander the Great

Terry L Byrd

History 1150 World Civilizations

ALEXANDER 2

Alexander the Great

Alexander is considered by many to be one of the greatest military figures of the ancient world. He was destined for greatness at an early age by his parents in which his father Philip II the wanted to unite all of Greece’s city states as one Greece. This was also prevalent by his education by the great Aristotle. When Alexander became king his army conquered most of the known world at that time. He was also very young when he died because of wounds suffered in his last battle.

When Alexander was growing up in Macedonia which is located in

Alexander said, “The Strongest” and thus the generals started their feud of control. Alexander’s empire would be divides up by the four generals Cassander, Ptolemy, Antigonus, and Seleucus. Although Plutarch and Arrian, would claim that Alexander passed his reign to Perdiccas the generals ignored these wishes of Alexander and thus assassinated Perdiccas. Cassander then proceeded to go after Alexander’s wife, son and mother in threat to their claim to the empire. Cassander was later lose the Kingdom of Macedon to Antigonus. Ptolemy succeeded over Egypt and thus created the Ptolemy dynasty. Seleucus created the Seleucid Empire in his reign he controlled much of Persia and parts of India. (http://www.historyofmacedonia.org, 2013)(Mark, J., 2013)(Plutarch, 2004)(Brunt, P.

Just image if Alexander had not succeeded in his conquest of Persia, the Greeks and the rest of the ancient world would be speaking a form of the Persian language. Greek ideas and values would have been lost forever. Democracy as we know it, started in Greece. If the Persian culture had spread, democracy would have been cast aside, and we could have powerful despots ruling over the world. Alexander’s intellect opened the gates for science, math, architecture, and literature, the world is the way it is today. Alexander was a true leader and inspired his men to go further and further than no man of this time had done before. Even though Alexander died at the young age of thirty two he changed many nations by introducing the way of war tactics, Greek culture and many ways of doing things around the world. Many people wonder what if Alexander did not die what more things in the world would have changed what other boundaries would he have tried to conquer would he

ALEXANDER 7 have taken his army to Western Europe like the Romans did, or would he have tried to make it to China and other Asian lands besides India because of the experiences that his army had already seen in India would he have taken a different route. The unknown is there about the short reign of Alexander, thus this is why we call him “Alexander the Great”, because he had accomplished so much in a short amount of time he was ruler of the ancient