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Alexander The Great: The Macedonian King Who Conquered Persia and Reshaped the Ancient World
Paperback
Series: The Ancient Greece Library, Book 7
Ancient GreeceAncient RomeGeneral Middle Eastern History
Publisher: Independently Published
Published: Jul 18 2026
Pages: 96
Weight: 0.54
Height: 0.20 Width: 8.50 Depth: 11.00
Language: English
In 336 BC, a twenty-year-old king inherited a kingdom many considered a backwater on the edge of the Greek world. Within thirteen years, he had conquered the largest empire the ancient world had ever seen, reaching from the shores of Greece to the banks of the Indus River in India. This is the story of how he did it, and what it cost.
Alexander the Great traces the full arc of one of history's most consequential lives, from the political turmoil of fourth-century Macedon and Alexander's education under Aristotle, through the assassination that placed him on the throne, to the campaigns that toppled the mighty Persian Empire at Granicus, Issus, and Gaugamela. It follows his march beyond the limits of the known world into Bactria and India, the mutiny that finally turned him back, and the sudden death in Babylon that left his empire without an heir capable of holding it together.
Drawing on the surviving accounts of ancient historians including Arrian, Plutarch, Diodorus Siculus, Quintus Curtius Rufus, and Justin, this book presents Alexander's story with careful attention to what the historical record actually supports, rather than the legend that grew up around him in the centuries after his death. It examines his tactical brilliance and his personal courage alongside the brutality he showed toward cities that resisted him, and it explores the complicated, often contradictory relationships that shaped his life, from his fierce and ambitious mother Olympias to Hephaestion, his closest companion, whose death left him inconsolable.
Beyond the battles, this book explores what Alexander's conquests set in motion. It follows the fracturing of his empire among his own generals in the decades after his death, the rise of the Hellenistic world that spread Greek language and learning from Egypt to Central Asia, and the enduring fascination Alexander held for later rulers, from Julius Caesar to Napoleon Bonaparte.
Readers will come away with a clear understanding of how Macedon rose from the periphery of Greek civilization to reshape the ancient world, how a series of decisive battles and difficult decisions built and ultimately unraveled an empire, and how one man's life continues to influence how history remembers ambition, conquest, and the price of greatness.
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