Alexander conquered the world, and was a very great man, brave and dauntless and generous to his followers.1 You’re probably thinking of course Alexander the Great was great, that’s why he’s called that! But you probably didn’t know what he did that was so great, so let me tell you.
Alexander was born in 356 BCE in a kingdom on the edge of northern Greece called Macedonia2. He learned academic subjects, politics, sports, and warfare from Aristotle so that he could prepare for kingship. Pretty cool, right? In 336 BCE, his father, King Philip of Macedonia was assassinated! I know, it was so sad. Alexander was soon declared king. He was 20 when he inherited the empire! That’s pretty young!
Alexander was concerned about other, especially his men. I know, I know, we are all concerned about others, but Alexander wanted to be as equally miserable as men when they were crossing the desert. Which means he wanted to be just as thirsty and tired as them. That’s surprising because he was their king and he could tell them what to do. So he could be all like “ Hey you! I want a root beer float right now and I mean now! Chop, chop! “ (I don’t think root beer floats existed yet, but you get my point). So what happened was that some of his soldiers went to look for water and they found some. Before they went back to Alexander and the rest of their crew, they made sure to fill a helmet with water. They brought it back to Alexander and he took it and said thanks. He held the helmet high in the air, in full view of his army, and poured the water onto the ground. So extraordinary was the effect of this action that the water wasted by Alexander was as good as a drink for every man in the army.3 I mean that is just amazing! He didn’t want to be selfish so he poured the water instead of drinking it! That was definitely GREAT of him to do that. Great, get it? Ha, ha, ha! No? Sorry about that.
As you can see Alexander not selfish and was kind to his men. Even though he was their king, he wanted to be as equal as them. Alexander definitely earned the title, “Alexander the Great!”
1 In the Footsteps of Alexander the Great - Michael Wood
2 The Mini Q - How Great was Alexander the Great?
3 The Campaigns of Alexander - Lucius Flavius Arrianus
