Continued, see the previous parts here:
So, apart from being an extremely entertaining tale even after about 2350 years, why should we care about these events?
Hellenization. I have already mentioned it as the legacy of Greeks winning the Greco-Persian wars, as well as the significance of Greek culture when compared to others in the development of the modern civilization. And, likely, one way of the other the steady spread of Greek culture all over the Mediterranean and Near East would have happened even without Alexander due to many favorable conditions.
The Greco-Persian warsYuretzius·August 2, 2023Read full storyBut Alexander sped this process up and widened its reach to an incredible degree. One thing is some trade contacts and perhaps local wise-men getting a few scrolls of interest written in Greek. The other is a few tens of thousands living and breathing Greeks arriving out of the blue and camping in your town, some of whom later remain and build their own colony next door. This might not be something out of the ordinary in Southern Italy or Western Anatolia, but in Mesopotamia, Middle Asia or India?!
Moreover, in a few decades a lot of unlikely territories fell in the orbit of newly formed Greek kingdoms, starting to depend on Greece and its legacy not only in a narrow cultural sense, but governmentally and militarily. The impact of this is difficult to overestimate.
Alexandrian Renaissance. One kingdom in particular and even one city of that kingdom really attract attention with regard to the Hellenistic renaissance of science, literature, arts, and culture in general: Alexandria. Out of more than 20 cities of that name founded by Alexander, this one can be easily recognized and identified by its name even today. It really became the center of the Greek intellectual universe for centuries.
Establishment and generous support by the Ptolemies of the two new institutions, Museion, a sort of an open research university by modern standards, and Library, played a key role in attracting there both famous and accomplished scholars and creators, and young talents. An additional institution, Serapeion, or the Temple of Serapis, a syncretic Greco-Egyptian deity taken as a sort of titular by the Plolemies, also played a role, since it had its own library and in many ways supported the main Library and Museion.
An enjoyable 2min animated mini-documentary on YouTube,
recreating the Serapeion of Alexandria.1It would not be a great exaggeration to say that literally everything that we know today of the Classical Greek culture, we know thanks to the work done in Alexandria in ancient times. Especially prominent during the Ptolemaic era of 3d – 1st centuries B.C., Alexandria remained an important scholastic center under Romans too, until at least about mid-3d century A.D.
It was also a translation center, where numerous texts were translated to Greek from Egyptian, Persian, languages of Mesopotamia (maybe even as old as Sumerian), Jewish, and some others. Jewish is of note here, since the Septuagint2, the Greek translation of Jewish Bible, was also performed there during the rule of Ptolemy II Philadelphus, in the first half of the 3d century B.C. Due to the role Jewish Bible plays in Judeo-Christian tradition and the fact that Greek was the main language of Christianity in the first centuries of its spread, just this one thing may be considered a consequence of epic proportions.
But whatever the significance of Alexandria to humanities, both then and now, it is eclipsed by the role it played in the development of STEM fields: mathematics, astronomy, mechanics, and engineering. Euclid (fl. 300 B.C.) is said to have established a school of mathematics and written his famous textbook there — it remained in use for about two millennia and all the modern geometry is still strongly influenced by it — at the end of the 2nd – beginning of the 3d century B.C.
Just the list of a few other names shows how great Alexandria was in math and sciences:
Archimedes of Syracuse (c. 287– c. 212B.C.): probably the most famous graduate of Museion, does not need to be introduced, everyone knows of him since elementary school;
Apollonius of Perga (c. 240– c. 190B.C.): the father of modern analytic geometry, probably only a few recognize his name, but hardly anyone does not know the curves, “conic sections”, he introduced and studied extensively: ellipse, parabola, and hyperbola;
Eratosthenes of Cyrene (c.276– c. 195 B.C.): measured the circumference of the Earth with an incredible precision of just 2%, also the Earth’s axial tilt, introduced the modern type of map grid with parallels and meridians;
Heron of Alexandria (fl. 60 A.D.): not only a geometer (of Heron’s formula for the area of a triangle fame), but also an experimental scientist and engineer, a sort of da Vinci of his time. He worked on wind- and steam-powered engines3, formulated the principle of the shortest path of light, invented a coin-operated vending machine, fire-engine’s pump, types of automaton, fountain, syringe, thermometer, and many other things and concepts that are normally thought to have been invented only a millennium or two later;
Claudius Ptolemy (c. 100– c. 170 A.D. and with no relation to the ruling dynasty): most famously the author of the book later known by the name of “Almagest” because of its Arabic translation, which remained the most influential astronomical text until the times of Copernicus. Although controversial and plainly erroneous in some of its ideas and facts, it remained a stimulating read for many centuries, and even today people argue if Ptolemy was a genius or a fraud.
Founding of cities, support of local shrines and temples. We can laugh all we like at 20+ Alexandrias, but a couple of those are bustling metropolises to this day4. And the care Alexander expressed in supporting local religious and historical places (even of hostile people) is really surprising for that time. Of course, he probably cared about fame and honoring gods, but as a result promoted local culture and tradition.
Military theory. Alexander’s legendary success and the record of about 20 major battles, all decisively won, attracts attention of all who try to master arts of tactics and strategy. From Hannibal and Caesar to modern military academies his battles have been analyzed and contributed to the art of war ever since. Not everyone would consider this a positive contribution, but it is definitely something that changed the world.
Myth. His life is an example of a historical figure that during their lifetime acquired a divine significance. Studying Alexander provides us some clues to forming of myths and legends among Greeks and other peoples, and understanding other mythical figures with probable or possible historical background, like Achilles, Odysseus, Heracles, or Dionysus.
And this myth have endured over the following millennia and to this day. Many of the illustrations I have used in this essay come from different eras, they display the fascination that the story of Alexander evokes in everyone.
Influences in Rome. Combining military theory and myth, it is easy to understand why many Romans were enchanted or even obsessed with Alexander. Just the history of his life itself formed and motivated many an ambitious Roman youth, including such giants as Pompeus, Caesar, and Augustus. Of course, in Rome his life was also a cautionary tale, an example of how an unchecked autocracy, egoism, hubris, and desire to glorify himself led an extremely talented young man to ruin despite all of his accomplishments. Still, Rome in many respects was created by his example, just like Alexander himself followed the guiding star of Homeric heroes.
End of the Achaemenid empire. It is difficult to judge in the terms of good and bad, but the Persian empire had been completely extinguished in just a few years solely because of Alexander. Being exploited and robbed of frontier territories by wise older politicians like Philip II, it would have endured much longer, and then perhaps the tides of history would have changed and it would have been reborn. But thanks to Alexander it just disappeared, like “puff”, creating a power vacuum and giving birth to Hellenistic states of completely different background. This pushed falling dominoes of the future events in a completely different pattern.
Actions of an extremely energetic and ambitious youth, who by sheer luck got enormous power at his age, changed the world to the extent that is impossible to compare with influences of most of other historical figures before or since Alexander. How unique this is we can see comparing with actions and legacy of young Roman emperors with similar or greater resources at their disposal, who hardly lacked ambition and even tried to emulate Alexander. They mostly ended up forming the top of the worst emperors list: Caligula, Nero, Commodus, Caracalla…
Does not matter how hard I try, I would not be able to cover all the significance of such an enormous figure to the history of civilization. Even if we include persons of the scale of Caesar, Augustus, Jesus of Nazareth, Paul the Apostle, Augustine of Hippo, Constantine the Great, Muhammad, Charlemagne etc., Alexander still easily makes to top 10, if not top 5. You can treat it both ways, as something good or as something, that we, as his followers in many respects, should not be proud of. But in reality he was what he was, just a man of an extremely amazing and rare fate, who did a lot of great and terrible deeds, a strange fluke of history and a hero of stories for ages to come.
1
Actually, the animated sequence comes from Assassins's Creed Origins videogame, but if it is cool with YouTube, it is cool with me. Actually it neatly makes my main point of how the mythology and cultural narratives of that time are still quite alive.
2
Meaning “the translation of the seventy”, in accordance with the legend it was done by 6x12 = 72 translators, equally representing all the 12 tribes of Israel.
3
You can often hear that there was no experimental science in Roman times or that Romans had no idea of windmills etc. They certainly were very far from everyday use, maybe like the gravitation wave study or quantum computing right now, but the best minds of the Roman era, especially in the centers of knowledge like Alexandria, studied and developed these concepts.
4
Everybody knows the Egyptian Alexandria, of course, but another famous and large city that started its life as an Alexandria might take you by surprise: Kandahar, Afganistan, current population above 600,000.
