Alexander The Great

Alexander the Great, 356 – 323 B.C. The King of Macedon, the founder of a world power.

History

Alexander the Great, a prominent commander and conqueror, founded a huge power spanning many countries in Europe and Asia. His campaigns and conquests took Greek culture far to the East. This was the beginning of Hellenism — a new historic period and one of the first attempts at globalisation. He was nicknamed “the Great” back in ancient times. He became one of the most famous figures in the world history, and “Anabasis Alexandri”, the narration of his conquests and adventures, was widely known even in ancient times and still touches the minds today, shown in epic movies on historic subjects.

Alexander was the son of the Macedonian King Philip II who began a long process of submission of the Greek territories. After he was assassinated in 336 B.C., Alexander ascended the throne and continued his father’s work. The Macedonian army was well organised and acted swiftly. That is why Greece was in submission very soon and the young ruler started a war with the Persians, long-time enemies of the Greeks. The splendid victories over the forces of King Darius III brought Alexander success in the Persian war. His next step was to invade and conquer Egypt. Egyptian priests proclaimed Alexander their Pharaoh and the son of their god Ammon. Soon afterwards Alexander smashed the power of the Persian empire completely and conquered the former Persian provinces in Central Asia (329 – 327 B.C.).

Thus, Alexander became the ruler of all lands in the civilised world known to the Greeks. However, the great conqueror was not satisfied — he decided to reach the end of the world. This dream took Alexander as far as India. The Indian campaign was extremely challenging. Alexander’s soldiers died from diseases and in the battles with the Indians. The conqueror submitted most of the Indian lands, but then the exhausted troops refused to go further. This episode demonstrates the true wisdom of the leader: the commander decided to declare the end of the war and returned to Persia. Ien Susa, he married the daughter of King Darius. They had a spectacular wedding, and simultaneously 10 thousand Macedonians married local women and received generous gifts from the king.

Taking advantage of the break, Alexander initiated reforms in his vast empire and began planning an invasion of the Arabian Peninsula. Soon, however, he fell ill and died in Babylon, just a few months before he was to turn 33. He left no heir, and for that reason Alexander’s empire broke up into several parts and their rulers began fighting with each other. However, it was the great conqueror’s campaigns that laid the foundation of a new Hellenistic world in Asia, where the Greek influence lasted for centuries afterwards.

The Stone

The composition depicting one of the most legendary commanders in the history of mankind builds on the rules of the genre portraiture and conveys to the spectator both the character’s appearance and the nature of his achievements.

The sculpture rests on a hemisphere resembling half of the globe with seas of lapis lazuli and continents of limestone, which brings to mind the shores of the warm seas and the golden hued buildings of ancient Greece made of sandstone and golden hued marble. There is a friso at the bottom of the base that is made of ceramic tiles in various shades of terra cotta. Each of them shows the image of Shedu — a bull with a human head, a symbol of the ancient civilisations that were conquered by the Greek King of Asia Minor. This unusual pedestal is designed to show the vast expanses of the empire founded by Alexander the Great.

The stone-cutters expressed the swiftness and power of Alexander’s conquests by adding a huge rearing horse — the faithful Bucephalus cut from a large block of coal-black dolerite. The back of the horse is covered with leopard skin, with every dolerite spot embedded in the aventurine background using the inlay technique. The rider is pulling the reins with confidence, forcing the animal to obey his will. The cloak of light agate with dark brown spots, as if filled with wind, is a real eye stopper. The masters chose the position of the block in such a way that one of the spots forms a contrasting border on the edge. The hero is wearing a linothorax (atype of armour assembled from pieces of linen fabric and reinforced with metal plates) carved from Brazilian agate and hematite. The sheath with a short sword is fixed on the broad belt of carved pyrite. The pteruges (leather strips hanging from the bottom edge of the armour and designed to protect the hips) and the soft boots known as persikai are cut from flint of soft brown hues. The chiton of sapphirine, a soft-blue variety of chalcedony, is in harmony with the lapis lazuli seas on the hemispheric base.

While not without a certain degree of conventionality in the interpretation of individual elements of the ancient Greek armour, the image of the great commander conveys the idea of the legendary hero, his achievements, and epoch.