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Alexander was born on 356 B.C. He was born in Pella
the ancient capital of Macedonia, was the son of Philip II, king
of Macedonia, and of Olympias, a princess of Epirus. His tutor
was Aristotle, who trained him in rhetoric and literature and
stimulated his interest in science, medicine and philosophy.
Unfortunately in the summer of 336 B.C. his father
was assassinated and he ascended to the Macedainian throne. Also
unfortunate was that by that time he found his empire in disorder.
He had enemies all over, in home and people threatening rebellion
abroad. He did quickly deal with this by killing all of the threats
and restoring order to his small empire. Then he restored order
to Thessaly which had attempted independence. Before the end of
summer he had reestablished his position in Greece and was elected
by a congress of states at Corinth.
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In 335B.C. as general of the Greeks in a campaign
against the Persians, originally planned by his father, he carried
out a successful campaign against the defeating Thracains, penetrating
to the Danube River. On his return he crushed in a single week
the threatening Illyrians and then hastened to Thebes, which had
revolted. He took the city by storm and razed it, sparing only
the temples of the gods and the houses of the Greek lyric poet
Pindar, and selling the surviving inhabitants, about 8000 in number,
into slavery. Alexander's promptness in crushing the revolt of
Thebes brought the other Greek states into instant and abject
submission.
As you can see Alexander had started his way to being a great and powerful ruler. It is said that while visiting Athens to seal a pact, Alexander visited the Oracle at Delphi, despite it being a day when prophecy was forbidden . In his attempts to drag the priestess to the place where she gave her Oracles, she screamed:
"My son, you are invincible!"
That was apparently all he needed to hear and in
the spring of 334 he departed to Asia.
Near the point of his death he begin to believe he
was a god so he begin to tell his people that he was descend from
Hercules by printing coins that had them both on them. His mother
also told him that a serpent had impregnated her rather then his
father adding to his thoughts that he was a god. also before his
death he had some of his cities worship him as a god.
His death is still shrouded in mystery to this day.
It does seem hard to believe that a 33 year old man could one
day out of the blue just die. Modern historians have tried to
piece together what happened.
Something of defiant interest is the theory that
Alexander the Great may possibly have been gay. Although he did
have a wife and a son and it is likely that he slept with women.
The 1956 epic film showed his life more as an asexual though,
him being so busy he never had the time for women. This is a misconception,
for it is generally accepted that he had a preference for men.
Unfortunately, he did not have many lovers and the ones he did
have never spoke about it.
Hephaestion was, by far, Alexander's closest friend.
They were notorious for spending lots of time together, philosophizing
on life, sharing ideas and discussing the future. When his mother
Olympias once sent Hephaestion an angry note, he replied, "
Stop quarreling with me; not that in any case I should care. You
know Alexander means more to me then anyone." Whether this
was a physical relationship was never documented. However, according
to Mary Renult, "In spite of Homer's reticence, classical
Greece assumed the heroes' love to be sexual."
It is important to consider Alexander's relationship
with his mother, Olympias, as affecting his sexuality. It is widely
thought that Alexander had an Oedipal attraction to his mother.
As a child, he saw his parents' relationship deteriorate as they
became virtual enemies to each other. Philip had many concubines
and eventually married one of them. Naturally, this left a great
impression on the young boy, stuck in the middle of the feud,
and it was only natural that he identified with his mother. Mary
Renault remarks that, " for Alexander, his father's constant
absences on campaign, combined with his mother's possessive love,
made this a certainty." So great a bond was formed with his
mother, that it may have prevented other women from entering his
life.
Most of Alexander's life was either his boyhood when
he was being tutored or his manhood when he was campaigning far
from home in other lands. He took control of almost the entire
known world and most of his people and troops believed him to
be godlike and invincible.
