Macedonia
- colder climate
- people lived in mountain villages
- rough terrain (mountains)
- barbaric people- not as civilized
- greeks treated spartans and macedonians barbarically
- post-peloponnesian war greek city states weak economically and militaristically
- Macedonia was a predetor when they were weak
- leadership-Phillip II king of macedonia- brilliant, take over greece and avenge persian invasion, trained pheasants into warriors
- used phalanxes (16x16), 256 men working together, after line is broken cavalry crushes disorganized groups
- Demsthenes warned greeks of Phillip, athens and thebes decide to stand up to him, too late, greek independence lost to Macedonia
- Next was to invade persia, stabbed by former guardsman, son; Alexander the Great proclaimed himself king
- Alexander- taught by Aristotle, Hellinstic culture, intellectual, when thebes rebelled he destroyed the city and took 6,000 lives and survivors were slaves
- Attacking persia- alexander with 35,000 men, persians with 40,000 men, alex attacked first with cavalry easily defeated persians
- Darius III- king of persia, wanted to make an army of 50 to 75 thousand men
- Alex sent surprise attack for the king with best troops, persian army and king fled
Do you think that Alex should have punished the people of Thebe so harshly?
I think that Phillip should have gone easier on the Thebes people.
Phillip could have punished them by making them join the army, but he shouldn't have killed 6 thousand of them and destroy their town. All the people did was rebell and I think that Phillip could have done something less harmful to them. They probably didn't think he was a good leader, so he should have listened to their reasons for rebelling and tried to make a compromise. The people of Thebes could have made his army stronger so he made a mistake by killing 6,000 of them.
Peace?
- Darius was ready to give up land in hopes alex would stop his conquest after two major battles lost
- Alex refused- his goal was to conquer all of the empire
- Alex went into egypt and they crowned him a pharaoh
- named a city Alexandia after himself which was common for him to do
- alex still wanted to kill king darius of persia so he pursued him
- pusuit made him a great conquered but bad at governimng the land he conquered
- he eventually found king darius, dead, one of his own men had killed him
- when he found him dead they thought his conquest would stop but he didnt
- he invaded certain areas of india adn successful defeat of them there as wel
- only problem alex struggled with was the low morale(attitude) of his army
- Alex's troops had been fighting for 11 years and marched 11,000 miles in bad conditions
- very disappointed, he returned home
- when alex reached babylon, he announced that he wanted to unite his empire by building new cities, roads, and harbors an conquer arabia
- became seriously ill witha fever adn died at the age of 32
- Legacy- married a persian princess, wore a persian dress and presided over a mass marriage of 80 of his men to persian women
- very interesting cultural impact- spreading hellenistic culture
- at time of death he conquerred vast amount of land
- generals fought over who got power of the empire
- Generals- three generals got control of land
- Antigonous- king of macedonia and took control of the greek city states
- Ptolemy- seized egypt, took the title fo Pharaoh adn began a dynasty
- Seleucid- got control over the old persian empire, didnt take the democtratic approach with him, the rulers had all the power not the people.
What is my overall opinion of Alex the great?
I dont think that alex was a very good leader because he focused more on extending his empire than he did focusing on the good of greece. He shouldn't have concentrated killing Darius so much, because it sidetracked him from ruling the empire he had. I think he was too full of himself and he thought he could do whatever he wanted. The people of greece should have tried to over rule him or something. Also, he killed over 6,000 people so I think the people were just afraid of him and his barbairicness.
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