ALEXANDER THE GREAT

Socrates taught Plato; Plato taught Aristotle; and, Aristotle taught Alexander. When Alexander grew up, he became so powerful and famous that he was called “Alexander the Great.”

From the time that he was very young, Alexander’s mother told him that he would do wonderful things. From his teacher, Aristotle, Alexander learned much about the world, about people, and about how a good king should rule. From others, Alexander learned how to fight well.

Alexander was the son of King Philip, the ruler of Macedonia in the northern part of Greece. The time Alexander was a young man, his father had already led his armies to the south and conquered many Greek city-states, including Athens.

There is a story that, one day, King Philip took the twelve-year-old Alexander to a sale of horses. One horse kept snorting and bucking furiously. “No one can ride so wild and savage a beast,” the men said. King Philip ordered the servants to take the horse away but Alexander spoke up. “Those men do not know how to treat him,” he said.

“Perhaps you can do better?” said his father doubtfully.

“Yes,” said Alexander confidently. He ran to the horse and quickly turned his head toward the sun, because he had noticed that the horse was afraid of his own shadow. He then spoke gently to the horse and patted him with his hand. When he had quieted him a little, he quickly leaped on the horse’s back.

Everybody expected to see the boy tossed to his death. But Alexander held on tight and let the horse run as fast as he could. By and by, the horse became tired, and Alexander rode him back to where his father was standing.

“My son,” said King Philip, “Macedonia is too small a place for you. You must seek a larger kingdom that will be worthy of you.”

A few years later, after his father died, that is just what Alexander did. When he was twenty-two years old, Alexander set off on his horse, which he named Bucephalus, to conquer the world.

Alexander was a strong, intelligent ruler, but he could also be hot-tempered and cruel. Not long after he became king, the Greek city-state of Thebes decided that it no longer wanted to be ruled by Alexander. The young king moved quickly to show his strength: he burned the city to the ground and ordered that the citizens be sold as slaves.

Alexander and his army could not be stopped. With Greece under his control, he marched eastward.

There is a famous legend about Alexander. The legend says that, hundreds of years before Alexander, a king named Gordius made a knot with so many twists and turns that nobody could untie it, a knot more tangled than the worst knot you’ve ever gotten in your shoelaces. This famous knot, called “the Gordian knot,” was tied in a rope on an oxcart. People said that anyone who could undo the knot would have the world for his kingdom.

When Alexander heard about the Gordian knot, he said, “Take me to it.” The people took him to a little temple. There stood the oxcart, with the famous knot tied to it.

“Tell me again,” said Alexander, “what you believe about this knot.”

“It is said,” the people replied, “that the man who can undo it shall have the world for his kingdom.”

Alexander looked carefully at the knot. He could not find the ends of the rope—but what did that matter? He raised his sharp sword and, with one stroke, sliced through the knot. The rope fell to the ground, and the people cheered.

“The world is my kingdom,” said Alexander.

Over the next few years, Alexander conquered a huge empire. He led his armies into Egypt. There, near the Nile River, he built a splendid new city which he named after himself, Alexandria. He then attacked the heart of the once mighty Persian empire, near the Tigris River. The people of Persia accepted Alexander as their king.

Alexander now ruled over most of the ancient world. But that was not enough for Alexander. Always, as soon as he had conquered one land, he would ask, “What lies beyond?” He pushed his army forward into battle after battle. But the soldiers were tired of fighting. They grumbled and argued and often drank too much wine. Finally, they refused to go any farther Alexander was furious, but many of his men had been marching and fighting for eight years, and they had had enough. And so Alexander gave the order to return home.

We will never know whether Alexander would have been a good ruler of his empire, because he soon fell ill and died. He was only thirty-three years old.

In just ten years, Alexander had conquered the largest empire the world has ever known. But soon after his death, his empire fell apart. Other leaders got into fights about who should rule, and none of these leaders was as strong as Alexander. Still, even though his empire did not last, Alexander had a lasting effect on the world because everywhere he went, he spread Greek ideas and learning that are still important today.