Civilization #12: The Tyranny of Alexander the Great
The Father-Son Dynamic
We discussed the father-son dynamic between Philip II and his son Alexander. We said that the father is the founder and the builder of a great organization, and as such, he will have three particular characteristics unique to him.
- First of all, he will exercise really good judgment because he's starting with nothing and he has to build up slowly his nation or his organization. Second, he will promote talent. He will be a very generous and fair-minded individual who will actively spot talent and create a meritocracy. Third, this person will be selfless, extremely disciplined, and this person will put the greater good before his or her own interests. That will inspire loyalty from his or her workers or soldiers.
We also said the son will be very different. Because the son is inheriting this enterprise or this nation, the son will focus on expansion. The son will be a very aggressive risk-taker. The second characteristic of the son is, because he is under the father's shadow, he will promote obedience and loyalty.
The final contrast between the father and son is the son will be very selfish because the son will be focused on personal glory. The reason why is the son is insecure. The son will hear people in the background, in shadows, whispering, "Everything you've achieved, it's because of your father." The son is desperate, very anxious to prove his own self-worth.
We see this dynamic in literature, in history, in our own lives. This is a very common dynamic. This is really a thought experiment, but if you think about it, this is also an analytical model. It's a way to understand the world around us. In an analytical model, we have to test if it's true or not. If it's true, it does two things.
The first thing it does is it explains. Does it help us better understand the motivations and behavior of people around us? We focused on Philip II, and that really helped us to understand his motivations and behavior. But the second thing it must do is predict. It has to predict the future. If this analytical model that we have is correct, then it will allow us to predict future events and behavior. That's what I propose: to use this model to predict the life of Alexander the Great.
- From this model, we can extrapolate three characteristics of Alexander's reign when he takes over as king. What's the first characteristic of Alexander when he becomes king? What will he do as king? The first thing we will say is that he will focus on expansion. He'll be a very aggressive risk-taker. He will take risks that are not strategically wise. That's the first prediction we can make about him.
- What's the second prediction we can make about him based on this? We call this a tyrant. He'll become a tyrant. A tyrant is someone who demands obedience from everyone. If he's a tyrant, what is he going to do to all these talented people that his father promoted? He's going to kill them. He's going to get rid of them because he needs to promote his own people and because these talented people will counter his tyranny. We predict he will demand complete and total obedience from his followers.
- What's the third prediction we can make about him? The question is, will he ever be happy? When will he stop his ambition? Never. His ambition is boundless.
These are the three predictions we can make about Alexander if he were to become king, just based on our understanding of the father-son dynamic. The first is that he will focus on aggressive expansion. He will take risks that his father will not take. Second, he's going to become a tyrant who will demand total loyalty and obedience from his followers. If you, for his own good, speak up and try to reason with him, he will see you as a threat, as disloyal, and as an enemy who must be eliminated. The third prediction we can make is his ambition is boundless. He will never stop expanding; he will never stop going to war. These are three predictions we can make based on this analytical model.
It turns out these three predictions basically capture the essence of Alexander's life. I will slowly explain the life and times of Alexander the Great. We are using this analytical model to understand the life and times of Alexander the Great, and when we're doing this, we're trying to see if there are problems with this model. We have to take a very skeptical attitude. We have this prediction model, we're going to use it, we're going to apply it to Alexander the Great, and we're going to see that on the surface it does actually capture well or explain well his life.
At the same time, we want to be generous and skeptical. We want to ask ourselves: is it possible that we are blinded by our prejudice, and maybe we are being unfair to Alexander the Great?
Philip's Death and Alexander's Succession
Let's start with the first major event in Alexander the Great's life, which is the death of his father in 336 BCE. Alexander right now is only 20, and when his father dies, he is automatically coronated as king of the kingdom of Macedon.
I want to explain the circumstances of Philip's death because it's very important for us to understand the psychology of his son. Two years before his death, Philip actually remarried. Remember that Macedon is a society that promotes polygamy. Philip at this point already has six or seven wives. The problem is that only one of his wives, named Olympias, has given birth to a son and therefore an heir. The son is Alexander. The other wives have failed to give birth to an heir, and it seems Alexander will be anointed king after the death of his father.
When Philip marries Cleopatra Eurydice, it's extremely controversial. It sort of disrupts the political order of Macedonia. The first reason is Cleopatra Eurydice is actually Macedonian. Before, Philip married foreign wives for diplomacy reasons. What this means is, if Cleopatra Eurydice gives birth to a son, this son will be a more legitimate heir than Alexander, and this pushes Alexander out of the line of succession. This is extremely controversial, and it's like dynamite almost. That's the first problem.
Second problem: Eurydice is the wife of one of Philip's great generals, Attalus. After the wedding ceremony between Eurydice and Philip, Attalus gave a toast, and he said:
Here's a toast, and I pray that Macedon will soon have a legitimate heir.
This is a direct insult to Alexander. The other problem is that Attalus's father-in-law is Parmenion, who is really Philip's partner, the greatest general that Macedon has, the person in control of the army. It seems like Alexander is being pushed out of the line of succession, and Alexander and his mother, Olympias, are both freaking out.
In 336 BCE, Philip is assassinated by his bodyguard, and no one knows why this happened. But we know what happened afterwards. First of all, Olympias killed Eurydice and her daughter and son. The son was going to be the legitimate heir to the throne; now they're all dead. That's the first thing that happens.
The second thing that happens is Attalus becomes afraid, and he's about to rebel. Attalus, again, is a general. At this point, Parmenion is now the kingmaker. Because Parmenion is now head of the army, he can choose to support Attalus, his son-in-law, and rebel, and maybe become king himself, or he can support Alexander. At this point, the fateful decision that Parmenion makes is he supports Alexander and he kills Attalus. Attalus, again, is his son-in-law. This makes Alexander now the legitimate heir to Philip. He's now king of Macedon.
From this event, we can surmise some things. The first thing we can surmise is Olympias and Alexander are extremely ambitious. They will not be pushed aside. If they see any risk to their power, they will act viciously. They're not afraid to kill. They will even kill the king in order to assure their power.
The second thing that's more important for us is Parmenion is absolutely loyal to Alexander because, if you think about it, he's loyal to the memory of Philip. Philip promoted Parmenion to be his partner, and in a show of loyalty and gratitude, Parmenion now is being loyal to the son, Alexander. That's the first major event in Alexander's life.
Rebellions and Thebes
The second thing that happens is, remember, Philip is now in charge of this wide kingdom across Greece, and when people hear about his death, people start to rebel. The Athenians want to rebel, the Thebans want to rebel, the Spartans want to rebel, and then to the north the Illyrians rebel. There are these rebellions.
The first thing that Alexander does is he mounts this extremely fast and decisive campaign to quell all internal dissent because ultimately his ambition is to complete the dream of his father: the conquest of Persia. He goes to Illyria, which is north of Macedonia, and destroys all opposition. The next thing he does is he marches against Greece itself, against Thebes. Thebes is the main source of opposition, and Sparta and Athens both promised to send troops to support Thebes.
The problem is Alexander gets there really fast, and he lays siege to Thebes and destroys it completely. The next thing that he does is he decides to massacre all the males and enslave all the women. This is actually common practice back then in terms of warfare, but this is not done to Greek cities. The Greeks consider themselves special. In 404 BCE, when Sparta defeated Athens in the Peloponnesian War, remember that Sparta did not do anything. Sparta just basically said, "Guys, will you promise not to bother us again?" Athens says, "We promise." That was it.
What Alexander the Great did, destroying Thebes, which is one of the great cultural centers of the Greek world, was like basically setting off a nuclear bomb. From then on, the Greeks were committed to overthrowing Alexander when the opportunity arose. At the same time, Alexander, by doing this, by showing his ruthlessness, was able to, for now, pacify all discontent. People are now afraid of him, and that's what Alexander wants. He wants fear.
The Invasion of Persia
Now that internal dissent has been pacified, now that his leadership has been legitimized, he will now embark on the massive invasion of Persia. Originally, his father Philip II's dream was a unified Greek world, what we call the Hellenic world. Remember, at this point, you have these Greek poleis spread all across the Aegean and the Mediterranean, in North Africa, in Italy, in Asia Minor, in Anatolia. Philip's vision was to unify all these places. But Alexander the Great's vision was actually to conquer Persia. He's expanding his father's vision.
He lands in Anatolia, which is like modern Turkey, with this massive invasion force, and he's going against the Persian Empire. The way that the Persian Empire is designed, it's not really an empire. It's more like a confederation or alliance. The provincial governors, who we call the satraps, are the ones responsible for defending their own territory. At this point, the King of Persia, Darius III, is not really bothered by Alexander. He doesn't realize that Alexander will pose a threat to his rule. He thinks, "This guy, he's like 20 years old, he's an upstart, doesn't really matter." Darius doesn't really bother himself.
But he sends an advisor, a Greek, Memnon of Rhodes. He's Greek, and he understands Greek warfare. They have this war council between the satraps, the local governors, and Memnon of Rhodes. What Memnon of Rhodes proposes is the safest strategy to defeat Alexander, which is basically what we call a war of attrition. The idea is they will not fight Alexander on the battlefield because Alexander right now possesses the greatest army in the world.
Let's not fight him. We will burn all the crops and starve his troops. At the same time, what we will do is we will bribe Athens and Sparta to rebel against Alexander. Once he's overextended, he has no choice but to go home. The war is over. It doesn't cost us anything.
The satraps refuse this plan because it would mean destroying their own property. The satraps are like, "No, we can overwhelm him." At the Battle of the Granicus in 334 BCE, Alexander's forces destroy the Persians. This is the first major battle of this war. There will be three major battles.
What's important for us is, during this battle, Alexander displayed tremendous recklessness. He rushed to the front of the battle, he led his cavalry in, and he was almost overwhelmed. One of the satraps knocked him down, and one satrap was about to kill him, slash him. But then at the last minute, a man named Cleitus the Black comes running in, and he cuts off the satrap's arm, thus saving Alexander's life.
At this point, there are two individuals that Alexander should be most grateful for: Parmenion, who was a kingmaker, and he announced that the army would be always loyal to Alexander; and Cleitus the Black, who saved Alexander's life in battle. Both of these men were individuals promoted heavily by his father for their talent. Basically, it was his father's men that saved Alexander. You would think Alexander would be very grateful to these men. Unfortunately, he would end up killing both men, and this would forever change the course of his life.
After the Battle of the Granicus, Memnon of Rhodes was given complete freedom to do what he wanted. Memnon of Rhodes tried to stop Alexander, and when he realized he couldn't do it because Alexander's army was too powerful, Memnon of Rhodes set sail for Greece. He was hoping to bribe Athens and Sparta to join the war and rebel against Alexander.
Here, something happens, and Alexander gets really lucky. We will find this in his life: he gets very lucky a lot of times. What is it that happens when Memnon of Rhodes sets sail for Greece, and he's about to unite the Greeks and rebel against Alexander? Remember, Athens and Sparta at this point really hate Alexander. What happens? He dies. He gets sick, and he dies. When Memnon of Rhodes dies, there's no more contact with the Greek world, and now Persia is left to basically defend itself. The Greeks cannot be counted on. There will be Greek rebellions against Alexander, but they will be sporadic. They will not be coordinated.
Issus and Gaugamela
Darius has no choice but to confront Alexander in two massive battles. The first massive battle is in southern Turkey, Anatolia, called the Battle of Issus, in 333 BCE. The second battle will happen two years later in Gaugamela, in Mesopotamia. Both of these battles are about the same. I'll explain what happened in both battles so you can understand Alexander's strategy of war.
Usually in battles, there are three major forces. There's something called the left flank, the center flank, and the right flank, and both armies are like this. In both battles, the Persians heavily outnumbered the Greeks, two to one. It's a massive difference, and the cavalry is usually on the sides.
There are some certain differences. The first difference is the Persians have one leader, Darius, and he's in the center, protected by his bodyguard called the Immortals. The Immortals are the best troops of the Persians. The Macedonians have two leaders, Parmenion and Alexander. Alexander is in charge of the cavalry; Parmenion is in charge of the infantry, what we call the phalanx.
In both battles, the same thing happens, which is, on the left side, Darius commits most of his forces against Parmenion. Parmenion is being overwhelmed by superior numbers, but here the discipline of Parmenion is just incredible because, even though they're being overwhelmed, being outnumbered, and they're about to be all overrun, they hold their ground.
In the center, there's so much conflict that eventually what happens is there's a small gap that allows Alexander to rush to Darius. Remember, Darius is being protected heavily because he's a king. At this point, Alexander and his forces are overwhelming the cavalry of Darius, and they're getting close to Darius.
At this point, what does Darius do? This is something you can never do in a battle. He does this in both battles, Issus and Gaugamela. What does he do now? He sees Alexander closing in, but his left flank is about to overwhelm Parmenion. What does Darius do now? In both battles, he runs away. When he does that, Alexander is now free to go back and rescue Parmenion, and then the Persians flee. This is what happens in both battles, Issus and Gaugamela.
Now that you have the basic overview of both battles, let's analyze this to ask ourselves: how great a commander is Alexander? I want to make the argument that he's actually not a great strategist. He's a great soldier, he's very brave, but he's not a great strategist, not like his father.
Cohesion, Discipline and Devotion
The first thing I will say is this: when military historians look at battles, they look at the wrong things. They're usually looking at manpower, technology and resources, what we call wealth. If we look at battles from this lens, manpower, technology and resources, wealth, then we can argue that the Persians were heavily favored in this battle, in this war. We can say that. But I think this is a wrong way to look at military strategy.
I think if you really want to understand who's the favorite, who's the underdog, you have to look at three different things.
- These three different things are cohesion. The idea of cohesion is unity. Are these soldiers loyal to each other? Are they friends with each other?
- The second thing you want to look at is discipline. How well-trained are these troops?
- The third thing you want to look at is the idea of devotion. Devotion just means, how loyal are they to their leaders? How much purpose do they have in the battle?
What I want to show you today is that looking at these three things gives you a much better overview or analysis of who the better military is. If you just look at manpower, technology and resources, then clearly the Persians are the heavy favorites. If you change your frame of reference and you look at cohesion, discipline and devotion, then the Macedonians are far superior.
Because look, cohesion means they have a similar culture. They're all Greeks, whereas the Persians are a multicultural empire. They don't speak the same language, which means that all these different units that Darius has are basically fighting by themselves. They're not coordinated. That's the first thing.
The second thing is the idea of discipline. If you're an empire, the problem with an empire is your soldiers don't fight that many battles because you're an empire. No one's going to challenge you. These soldiers, even though they have very expensive armor and horses, weren't disciplined. They didn't have experience in battle, whereas Alexander's army is Philip's army, and for the past 30 years, all they did was fight battle after battle against the Greeks. In terms of discipline, the Greeks are far superior.
Then you look at devotion. Darius is king. Why are people loyal to him? Because he pays them. It's profit, it's interest. Whereas the soldiers under Parmenion and Alexander love their leaders. Their leaders have taken them to lots of victories, so they're very loyal to them.
Just in terms of these, if you just look at cohesion, discipline and devotion, we can predict that Alexander's army would win regardless of the strategy. Now you can also make the argument that the strategy that Alexander employed, "We will confront the Persians head-on," Philip would have thought this was a stupid idea.
Because, first of all, you're outnumbered. Second of all, you're in enemy terrain. You're in enemy terrain; therefore, they are able to deploy the resources much better than you are. The third problem is this: you cannot afford to retreat. There's no place to retreat. If your army ever breaks, if Parmenion gets overwhelmed, then you're all dead. Why take that risk?
Also, before both battles, Issus and Gaugamela, Darius wanted to negotiate with Alexander. Basically, Darius said, "I will give you half my empire." That's pretty generous. Alexander says, "No, I need all of it."
Historians will tell you that Gaugamela shows the military prowess of Alexander. But if you analyze it properly, I think you will see there are lots of problems with his strategy in both battles. He was taking risks that he shouldn't have, and he sacrificed a lot of men that he didn't really need to sacrifice. For example, it was all about winning the war, personal glory, whereas Philip was concerned about the safety and well-being of his soldiers. Philip would not have engaged in such a battle. He would have preferred negotiation and then, over time, to slowly overwhelm Persia.
The Greeks and the Macedonian Army
Actually, he didn't really trust the Greeks. The Greeks didn't consider the Macedonians Greek. When Alexander developed his invasion force of Persia, there weren't that many Greeks actually in it. It was mostly Macedonian. But you're right, given what Alexander did in Thebes, he could not really trust the Greeks anymore. They could switch sides. Also, there were a lot of Greek mercenaries fighting for Darius in this battle. Memnon of Rhodes was Greek, and he sort of knew the Greeks really didn't like Alexander.
It's more like a tribal army. That's right. But again, we see this throughout history, where a tribal army, because of cohesion, discipline and devotion, is basically able to conquer the world. You look at Muhammad, you look at Genghis Khan, and you look at Tamerlane. You look at a lot of people. They were all tribal armies, but because they had cohesion, discipline and devotion, they were able to basically conquer most of the world before they themselves devolved into civil war.
The Temple of Zeus-Ammon
While Alexander was campaigning against Persia, he was doing things that sort of annoyed his soldiers. For example, he conquered Egypt without much resistance. He went to Egypt, and basically the Egyptians hated the Persians. For centuries, the Egyptians were trying to rebel against Persia without success. When Alexander came, they saw him as a liberator, so Egypt fell without resistance.
The first thing that Alexander does is he takes a trip into the desert. He disappears for weeks. He goes to a place called the Temple of Zeus-Ammon. Ammon is the highest Egyptian god, and Zeus is the highest Greek god, so they're like a synthesis. This is the highest god in the world, and this is found in an isolated oasis. He goes to this oasis in order to seek counsel. He wants to see his future.
When he's at the Temple of Zeus-Ammon, he's told that Philip is not really his father. Philip is not really his father. Actually, his true father is—take a wild guess who the true father is—Zeus-Ammon. Alexander is the first Son of God. He's the Son of God. He's like Heracles and Dionysus. He's actually the Son of God.
When Alexander returns to his soldiers after this revelation, he expects his soldiers to acknowledge this fact. In the Macedonian army, there's a lot of equality between soldiers and officers. If you're a soldier, you are allowed to speak your mind. But now Alexander demands, if you come into his presence, you must first kiss his feet, which is a Persian custom. You must kiss the feet of your king, and the Macedonians, of course, didn't really like this. Now there's growing concern about the tyranny of Alexander.
People like Parmenion and Cleitus the Black, who were promoted heavily by his father, are kind of annoyed. Basically, Alexander renounced his father: "Philip's not really my father. I'm really the son of a god, Zeus-Ammon." Now there's growing discontent among his soldiers.
Parmenion and Philotas
In 331 BCE, the Battle of Gaugamela happens, and Alexander wins this incredible victory against the Persian king Darius. Darius runs away, but then he's eventually killed by one of his generals, and the Persian Empire now is basically conquered. There's some resistance, but not organized resistance. At this point, Alexander starts being a tyrant.
The first major sign that he's changing is in 330 BCE, Parmenion is killed. Remember, you can argue Parmenion was the man responsible for all of Alexander's victories because Parmenion is the one who's doing all the heavy lifting. He's being overwhelmed by most of the Persian forces. He stands his ground, which allows Alexander to claim his victory. In 330 BCE, Alexander orders Parmenion to be killed.
There's a lot of controversy around what happened. I'll just tell you the basic facts, and then we'll analyze what happened. There's a lot of resentment against Alexander in the army, and now and then there are these conspiracies. They don't go anywhere, but there are these conspiracies amongst officers to assassinate Alexander.
One of these conspiracies is found out, and one of the officers who finds out about this conspiracy goes to Parmenion's son and tells the son, "Hey, go tell the king people are trying to assassinate him." Parmenion's son doesn't think this is a big deal, and he's kind of drunk, so he forgets to tell Alexander.
The plot is uncovered, and the son, Philotas, is implicated, and he's tortured. He had nothing to do with the assassination, but he's implicated because he didn't tell Alexander. While he's being tortured, he also confesses to his father being part of the plot, even though there's no evidence implicating his father. In fact, you can make the argument that his father is completely loyal to Alexander.
Just based on this forced confession under torture, which is completely unreliable, Alexander and the army decide to have Parmenion killed. An assassin is sent, and Parmenion is killed. These are the basic facts, and there's a lot of argument about what happened.
The most generous interpretation is Alexander didn't want Parmenion killed. He knows Parmenion is innocent, but because Alexander was forced to kill his son Philotas, Alexander didn't feel he had a choice in the matter, because Parmenion might want revenge. To maintain stability and peace within the army, he had to get Parmenion killed. That's the most generous explanation.
But there's another explanation that makes more sense, which is Alexander has always been jealous of Parmenion because Parmenion has the most legitimacy in the army. Troops feel more loyal to Parmenion than they do to Alexander because they're more experienced with Parmenion than with Alexander, and Parmenion was responsible for many great triumphs. Alexander was jealous of Parmenion.
Also, there were these new young officers who want to climb the ranks, and to do so, they need to get rid of people like Parmenion. Maybe the conspiracy was a fake conspiracy, and it was organized by these low officers to implicate Philotas and then in order to get rid of Parmenion.
But regardless of how you interpret this, what we do know is, after Parmenion was killed, basically all the shackles, all the restraints on Alexander went away because now there's no one in the army who can resist Alexander. There's no one who can basically urge restraint and caution.
Cleitus the Black
The next thing that happens is this: in the year 328, Cleitus the Black is killed. Remember, Cleitus the Black is the person who saved Alexander's life at the Battle of the Granicus. But Cleitus the Black, again, is a loyal officer promoted by his father, and now Cleitus the Black has the same authority as Parmenion once had. Cleitus the Black is now a threat to Alexander.
What Alexander does is he basically orders Cleitus the Black to take some soldiers and go off to a faraway place. It's basically exile. Alexander is basically exiling him from the main army, and Cleitus the Black knows basically he's finished.
Before Cleitus the Black is meant to go into exile, they have a large banquet, and they're all drunk. Cleitus the Black now is angry, and he gets into a vicious argument with Alexander. Cleitus the Black basically says to Alexander:
You've betrayed your people, the Macedonians. You've come to Persia, and you could only conquer Persia with our help, and now you're turning into a Persian. You're adopting Persian customs, like forcing officers to kiss your feet. You're promoting Persian officers in your army. You're turning your back away from the culture that made you great.
Then he says something that really pisses Alexander off. What is one thing that you can say to Alexander that would really piss him off? In fact, he would want to kill you now.
Everything that you've achieved, Alexander, it's because of your father. This is not you. This conquest of Persia, it's not you, it's your father. It's your father who built this amazing army. It's your father who developed this plan to conquer Persia.
Alexander gets so angry that he's about to lunge at Cleitus the Black. But before he can do so, his bodyguard surrounds him and stops him, and they pull away his sword. This makes us think he's been doing this a lot. Alexander the Great gets drunk a lot and kills a lot of people, basically.
Cleitus the Black is taken out of the room, but Cleitus the Black is so strong he forces himself back in the room. He starts to continue arguing against Alexander. Alexander then goes and takes a spear and throws it at Cleitus the Black, killing him on the spot. Cleitus the Black is now dead. The two men who are most responsible for Alexander's victories in Persia are now both dead, and he's becoming more and more of a tyrant.
The Pages' Conspiracy
Soon afterwards, there's a real conspiracy to kill him. What happens is this: the King, Alexander, goes on a boar hunt with his pages, his servants. The custom in Persia is the king has the right to the first kill. But his pages are Macedonians, so they don't know this. One of the pages is the first to kill the boar. Alexander is so angry he beats the crap out of this page.
The pages get together that night, and they resolve to kill this tyrant. They organize a schedule so that on one night they would be all in the bedroom looking after Alexander while he sleeps, and then, of course, they would take out their daggers and stab Alexander to death. That's the plan.
What happens is that night they were supposed to do this act, Alexander goes out drinking. He gets drunk, and he does not come back until the early morning when the pages are gone. At this point, one of the pages gets nervous and tells Alexander about the conspiracy, and Alexander has everyone killed. But during the trial, the pages accused Alexander of being a tyrant.
India and Arabia
Then what happens is, in 326 BCE, after Alexander has conquered all Persia, he decides to take his army to India. His army is not happy about this because, look, there are lots of good reasons to invade Persia. The first reason is Persia is very wealthy. The second reason is Persia invaded Greece, so Persia was always a threat to the Greek mainland. The third reason is there are lots of people who suspect it was the Persians who killed Philip. There are lots of good reasons to invade Persia.
There's absolutely no reason to invade India. They've never been to India. They have actually no idea what they will find in India. It's a different geography. But Alexander forces his army to invade India, basically modern-day Pakistan. There, they win these victories, but the soldiers are really pissed off because they're far away from home. They have absolutely no idea when this war will end, and the weather in India really sucks. They basically mutiny. They refuse to fight.
Alexander at this point has no choice but to retreat, to return back to Babylon. But he does two things to show his anger. The first thing he does is he kills all the leaders of the mutiny. Those who spoke up on behalf of their fellow soldiers were all killed one by one. The second thing that happens is, rather than take his soldiers back the original way, Alexander made them march through a desert, which killed many of them. Many died because of dehydration and starvation. It was a brutal march across the desert.
Alexander takes his army back to Babylon, and at this point, Alexander decides he can't invade India, so he'll go invade Arabia. He'll go invade Arabia, which is desert. There's a reason why no one invaded Arabia, and the reason why is it's all desert. There's no reason to invade Arabia. But Alexander wants to be the first to conquer Arabia because his ambition is boundless. He has to prove he's the greatest conqueror in the world. The only way he can do that is by conquering the entire world.
He's very suspicious of his own soldiers because they mutinied against him in India, so he's starting to replace his army with Persians who are much more obedient. He wants obedience.
Alexander's Death
Then something else happens. Back in Macedonia, the general in charge, Antipater, who again is one of Philip's most loyal generals, gets in an argument with Olympias. Olympias, Alexander's mother, and Antipater don't see eye to eye. Olympias tells Alexander, and Alexander invites Antipater to Babylon, where they will settle matters. Antipater knows what happened to Parmenion. He knows what happened to Cleitus the Black. At this point, most of Alexander's generals aren't happy with the fact that the army is being Persianized. They're being replaced by Persian officers who are more loyal to Alexander.
In 323, Alexander dies. Again, no one will ever know what actually happened, but the theory is this. I think the theory that makes the most sense is basically the top echelon of the Macedonian army, Antipater and the other generals, basically decided Alexander has to go because he's a tyrant, and eventually he's going to kill everyone.
What happened was there was a banquet, and Antipater's son is the cupbearer to Alexander, the person who pours the drinks to Alexander during meals. The son puts poison in the cup. Alexander drinks from it, and he starts to vomit. Alexander leaves the room to vomit, and then Antipater's son brings a feather laced with more poison to help Alexander vomit some more. Alexander should have died on the spot, but Alexander is so tough, he's such a strong man, that he lasts for a few more weeks, and he dies in bed. Alexander now is dead.
Greek Culture and Alexander's Legacy
This is important because, even though he's dead, in the 10 years that he's been around, he's been able to conquer most of the world, which includes Egypt, Mesopotamia, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan. He's able to conquer most of the known world. This creates a problem for the generals who succeed him because, once you conquer most of this world—and remember, the plan was not to conquer most of the world, it was just Alexander's boundless ambition that made them do so—now the question is, how do you govern?
Because of this pressure, they have no choice but to develop something called Greek culture and spread it in order to create legitimacy for themselves. The legacy of Alexander: he's conquered the world, and now his generals must govern it. To govern it, they must use something called Greek culture. They must invent Greek culture and then spread it around the world. When they do so, what will happen is the Greek culture will merge with local cultures to create new ideas.
One of these cultures that Greek culture will merge with is called Judaism. When these two cultures merge, a new idea will emerge from this mixture called Christianity that changes the world forever. That's why Christians love Alexander the Great, because they feel that without his conquest, Christianity could not have been born. There are many Christians who feel like Alexander the Great, yeah, he was a tyrant, but he was part of God's plan. It was all part of a plan. He did what he did because he truly is the son of Zeus-Ammon, and Zeus commanded him to conquer the world. But again, that is a Christian perspective.
Let's review what we did. We basically looked at this analytical model. We made three predictions about Alexander based on this analytical model. The first is that he would focus on expansion. Second is he would become a tyrant. The third is that he would never stop expanding. It turns out he was exactly like this. This explains, this predicts his life and times.