Countdowns

Top 10 Reasons Alexander the Great Was, Well ... Great!

In the wake of Oliver Stone's epic movie about the Macedonian conqueror's life we at LiveScience believe a reassessment of his triumphs is needed to right the wrongs inflicted by Colin Farrell's hair, Angelina Jolie's lips and Val Kilmer's performance.Alexander III (356-323 B.C.), king of Macedon, parlayed his father Philip II?s conquest of Greece into an empire that expanded from the Balkans to the Nile to the Himalayas, subduing tens of millions of people along the way.

Like Napoleon, Alexander was rather short (Note: Read Freudian interpretation here). He was blond with a ruddy complexion, and according to one source, had one eye as dark as night, the other as blue as sky (Hmm, maybe they should have cast David Bowie.) He was raised by his mother, Olympias, to believe he was descended from the mythical characters Achilles and Herakles.

His father, Philip II (382-336 B.C.), consolidated power in Macedonia, then subdued the Greek city-states to the south. Although the Macedonians spoke Greek, they were considered hicks by the sophisticates of Athens and Thebes.

But Alexander was quite enamored with Greek philosophy, science and art. His empire fell apart soon after his death, but his lasting legacy was that he spread the Greek language and civilization to all the lands that he conquered. The unifying nature of this cultural tradition, called Hellenism, was the basis of more permanent institutions, like the Roman Empire and Christianity.

Above all things, Alexander was a great military commander, leading his troops into every encounter. A bit of an over-achiever, the historian Plutarch wrote that Alexander wept upon learning that the universe was infinite. When asked what was wrong, he replied: "There are so many worlds, and I have not yet conquered even one."

-- Micheal Schirber