It's often said that Alexander the Great conquered "The Known World", a statement that obviously encapsulates a very specific world-view as any Chinese or Native American can tell you. But his accomplishments, and overall impact on the world that stretched from the Europe to Egypt and India cannot be ignored.
Something I hadn't realized before this trip was that he is one of those key figures that enters into the age-old question of whether or not history is governed by individuals or by broader historical trends. To understand why, it's important to realize he became King at age 20 (see his wikipedia page), when his father Philip II was assassinated at a wedding. The reasons for the assassination were complex at the time; there were about as many theories even then as there are now about JFK. Philip II was driven to punish the Persians for their invasion of Greece years before by invading them in turn and conquering them, and was about to begin the assault when he died.
Alexander then became King by proclamation, a twenty year old military savant on a mission to fulfill his father's objective. Is it any surprise that he went on to also conquer Egypt and parts of India as well as the Middle East, spreading Greek ideas far beyond anywhere they'd been before? Would Philip II have gone so far if he had lived? The questions, and debates, will continue for centuries.
Before Alexander began his invasion of Persia, however, he had to convince his army to go. What better way to start than to throw a truly epic party, in this case a nine-day affair at the temple to Zeus at Dion, in the shadow of Mount Olympus. As the Greek historian Diodorus Siculus recounted about 400 years after the original event, it was quite the affair:
"Thereupon the king returned with his army to Macedonia, assembled his military commanders and his noblest Friends and posed for discussion the plan for crossing over to Asia. When should the campaign be started and how should he conduct the war? Antipater and Parmenion advised him to produce an heir first and then to turn his hand to so ambitious an enterprise, but Alexander was eager for action and opposed to any postponement, and spoke against them. It would be a disgrace, he pointed out, for one who had been appointed by Greece to command the war, and who had inherited his father's invincible forces, to sit at home celebrating a marriage and awaiting the birth of children. He then proceeded to show them where their advantage lay and by appeals aroused their enthusiasm for the contests which lay ahead. He made lavish sacrifices to the gods at Dium in Macedonia and held the dramatic contests in honour of Zeus and the Muses which Archelaüs, one of his predecessors, had instituted. He celebrated the festival for nine days, naming each day after one of the Muses. He erected a tent to hold a hundred couches and invited his Friends and officers, as well as the ambassadors from the cities, to the banquet. Employing great magnificence, he entertained great numbers in person besides distributing to his entire force sacrificial animals and all else suitable for the festive occasion, and put his army in a fine humour."
and here is a more distant view, showing the field where the animals would have been held waiting to be sacrificed. Note that wandering tourists are not to be sacrificed.
And finally, here is the field is where King Alexander of Macedon pitched the tent for his 100 best "Friends and officers," kicking off the campaign that made him Alexander the Great. He picked a good location -- that's Mt Olympus in the background, and you can see the amphitheater in the middle distance.
Some side notes learned on this trip: "Mount Olympus" is not a single peak, but rather a collection of them, like the Alps. Essentially all of the mountains you see there are part of it. Also, there was a sanctuary to Zeus built on top of one of the peaks, so the mountains were climbed in antiquity, something else I hadn't known....
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