Alexander The Great: Alexander The Great

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Alexander the Great might be by far the most impressive conqueror of the ancient world. He adopted the progression of an empire that his father Philip II started and then created a cross continental empire. Heavily influenced by his father’s success Alexander the Great adopted many of the skills, mental and military, that King Philip II had. During his thirteen years of rule he achieved more as a conqueror than any man before him was ever able to accomplish. Although his short-lived reign was great and effected many societies massively he didn’t have an heir that lived to adopt his empire from him to continue the domination of the world. This lead to him saying one of his most well known quotes “I leave it to the strongest”, which started a power struggle between his generals that lasted for years. All of these events were very significant and heavily influenced the following era.
King Philip II, ruler of Macedon, set out to destroy the existence of the city-state as an institution (lecture). He was a military innovator and a great conqueror. King Philip II led his cavalry, lost an eye at forty-six years old and was sustained a serious injury in his right leg in 345 BC (lecture). King Philip II was also a great diplomat. He knew that money was an extremely powerful weapon and believed that anyone could be bribed. All of these traits allowed him to conquer all of Greece in twenty years, some time during 338 BC (lecture, Hollister 147).
Alexander the Great grew up seeing his father conquering what seemed to be everything within reach. This amazing feat instilled the mentality that someone who is “strong” can conquer everything (lecture). Exposed to his father’s achievements as a child, coupled with the teachings of the famous phil...

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...ng care of the kids, they were able to own property and take part in business activity (Hollister 153). Even the historically sexist Greeks started thinking that husbands and wives should be considered equals, a view that would have been considered radical a few decades prior (Hollister 153). The Greeks also became less into politics and according to one historian “roughly 40 percent of all Greeks lived in colonies” (Hollister 149). The Hellenistic Age was a very historically significant period in ancient history. It was a time period where the mindset and culture of many countries across two continents changed significantly and it was the decisions of one man who caused this revolutionary change in society. Alexander the Great can rightfully be called the greatest conqueror of the ancient world due to the massive impact he had on a very large part of the world.

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