The case of Alexander of Lyncestis

The name Alexander is already very popular in the days of Alexander the Great and may lead to confusion. 

For a start, there was King Alexander of Epirus, Olympias’ brother and Alexander’s uncle. I usually refer to him as Alexandros to make the difference. He is the one who married Alexander’s sister Cleopatra in 336 BC, the day King Philip of Macedonia was assassinated. 

[Expansion of Macedonia from Wikipedia]

Then there is Alexander of Lyncestis, in Upper Macedonia, son of Aeropus and son-in-law of the general and later regent Antipater. He had two brothers, Heromenes and Arrhabaeus, who were soon accused of plotting the murder of Philip II and put to death. Brother Alexander is said to have been the first to proclaim Alexander of Macedonia as king and thus avoided punishment, for now at least. 

In Alexander’s campaign, the Lyncestian was soon appointed to command the Thracian detachment and later the Thessalian cavalry. However, two years later, Parmenion, who was spending the winter near Gordion, caught a messenger carrying a secret letter from the Persian King Darius for Alexander of Lyncestis. It revealed that Darius promised to pay him a thousand talents of gold to kill Alexander and would proclaim him King of Macedonia instead! Parmenion sent the messenger with a trusted escort to Alexander, where the man repeated the same story. 

This was an extremely serious matter that Alexander put before his assembled Companions in order to make the appropriate decision. It was agreed to send a trusted man, a brother of Craterus, to Parmenion. He would travel incognito, dressed as a local and accompanied by guides from Perge, and deliver his message verbally, as it was thought better not to write down anything on a matter of this importance. Alexander’s envoy reached Parmenion without being detected and reported the instructions he was carrying. Alexander of Lyncestis was arrested and put in chains. He was tried for plotting against his king and put in prison. Being the son-in-law of Antipater, acting as the king’s Regent in Macedonia, was an important factor in his favor. 

The Lyncestian was dragged around for about three years, when in 330 BC, in the wake of Philotas’ trial and execution for a similar plot, the Macedonians demanded that he should be tried and punished accordingly as well. When he was brought in from confinement to plead his case, he was faltering and nervous, and found no words to reply and defend himself. This was perceived as a guilty conscience, and the bystanders ran him through with their spears. 

It should be noted that Queen Eurydice I, Alexander’s paternal grandmother, was born in Lyncestis. She married King Amynthas III of Macedonia, the father of Philip II, in 390 BC to consolidate the relations between the two countries.

Time to reconnect with Princess Amastris

Amastris is much less known than her cousins, Barsine/Stateira and Drypetis, although she too was the granddaughter of Queen Mother Sisygambis.

She was born as the daughter of Oxyathres, a younger brother of Darius, the later King Darius III. At the Susa Wedding in 324 BC, Alexander married her to Craterus. She was of true royal descent, and as an infant, she had already been promised in marriage to the ruling King Artaxerxes III, who died shortly afterward.

[Picture from Archaeology News Network]

As Craterus’ wife, she could look forward to a powerful life since the general had been appointed by Alexander to replace the old Antipater as Regent of Greece. We’ll remember that Craterus had not yet arrived in Pella when Alexander died, and Antipater may well have seized the opportunity to convince the general to consider their king’s plan voided by his death. Under the influence of Antipater, who wanted to have closer control over Craterus, he agreed to marry one of his daughters, Phila. Amastris had her pride, and she refused to be pushed aside as a mere Persian concubine.

We don’t know exactly which strings she pulled, but Amastris married King Dionysios of Herakleia Pontus in 322 BC. Dionysios reportedly was a friend of Alexander’s sister Cleopatra who had pleaded for the king’s protection with her brother. After Dionysios’ death seventeen years later, Amastris ruled with excellence over the kingdom in Bithynia as a widowed queen.

With the War of Alexander’s Successors still raging, Lysimachos, by now king of Thracia, proposed to Amastris in 302 BC and she accepted. Not for long though. When Lysimachos decided to marry Arsinoe, daughter of Ptolemy Soter (or Ptolemy Philadelphus), Amastris left her husband and returned to Herakleia Pontus. It was at this time that she founded the city of Amastris on the coast of the Black Sea. The town was created through the fusion of four Ionian colonies, Sesamus, Cromma, Cytorus, and Tium (which detached itself from Amastris again later on). By 300 BC or so, she minted her own coins – no small matter for a woman!

This city of Amastris has been in the news recently when archaeologists discovered some columns and pillars that may have belonged to the queen’s sanctuary. Pending in-depth excavations, it has been established so far that the sanctuary was about five to six meters high. It will be quite interesting to see what treasures the archaeologists will uncover at this site of which so little is known but where great history was written.

Queen Amastris was killed by her own sons Dionysios, Clearchus, and Oxyathres, who coveted their mother’s power. They arranged for her to be drowned around 284 BC. It must be said, however, that Lysimachos avenged his former wife by killing the matricides, if not out of love or admiration for her, then to add Herakleia Pontus to his own adjacent realm.

All Alexander’s Women by Robbert Bosschart (3rd edition - meanwhile replaced by his 5th edition)

This is the third edition of All Alexander’s Women by Robbert Bosschart (actually replaced in March 2025 by his 5th edition). It is rare and rather exceptional to find a book on Alexander the Great looking at this world conqueror from an entirely different and unusual angle: the women who were part of his life in one way or another. This is what Robbert Bosschart has accomplished.

The role of these women was widely developed in his previous two editions, in which he stated that Alexander the Great would have introduced equal rights for men and women had he lived long enough! This status of women’s equality was not something Alexander created but existed already in the Persian Empire he conquered. It is said to go back to the Zoroastrian doctrine backed by Cyrus the Great and even before that in a matriarchal era. The leading power was the goddess Inanna, equaled by Anahita and blended later on with Ishtar, Isis, Cybele, and the entire Greek female pantheon; she was still venerated in the Sassanid era.

In this third edition, Robbert Bosschart talks us through the relations Alexander had with women, the best known being his own mother Olympias and his sister Cleopatra, Queen Ada of Caria and Queen-Mother Sisygambis of Persia, the two latest having adopted him as their son. This was not a small matter, for in the case of Persia it meant that Alexander was accepted to rule “by the power of Ahuramazda” together with that of the goddess Anahita.

It is a vast topic hardly mentioned in our Western literature since ancient Greeks generally treated women as mere trade goods. It is easy to understand why this concept of equality - which must have looked very “Barbarian” in their eyes – was willfully left out of their literature. The macho Roman writers did the same and as a matter of course our Western world was unaware of the customs and habits of the East.

Robbert Bosschart is taking us a step further as he develops the Persian point of view on the matter of equality, which he only touched on superficially in his previous versions. He is digging even deeper into the subject exploring many oriental sources. One of them is the Persepolis Fortification Tablets, an archive of thousands of clay tablets containing over 15,000 texts from the Achaemenid Period which are only partially translated till now.

Another aspect highlighted in this book is the Persian version of the Alexander Romance, the Darab-Nama, and the Sikandar-Nama, a mixture of Old Persian tradition with Hellenistic and Muslim themes. Also discussed is the Liber de Morte, a fictional last will which is often but not always attached to the Alexander Romance. Last but not least, the author reminds us that Alexander is elevated to the status of prophet in the Koran, hence his nickname the “Two-Horned”. The book also includes an interesting chapter about the “King’s Eyes”, integer secret keepers that were responsible for reporting to the king (a kind of Persian Intelligence Service avant-la-lettre) and controlling the implementation of his laws and orders all through the King’s huge empire.

To complete his extensive research and to take it to a level to be comprehended by all, Robbert Bosschart has added several helpful lists and tables: Historical Dates/ Facts in Alexander’s Life; Chronological list of Persian kings; The Classical sources on Alexander’s era; Reference works; Biographical/Geographical Index (alphabetical); and an extremely useful list of Where Alexander’s Women appear in the Classical Sources”.

I find the subject of this book truly fascinating! The Persian viewpoint for one, is unique. And just imagine what our world would have looked like had Alexander lived long enough to realize his “merging” of East and West as he undoubtedly planned when he celebrated the mass wedding in Susa. Not only would our world have known one single ruler, one single currency, and one single vehicular language (Greek), but we also would have lived in a society where men and women were each other’s equals.

P.S. For those who can’t wait, a select extract of a good 50 pages of this book is available (free of charge) at Academia.edu.

Sardes, the capital of ancient Lydia and a key-city for Alexander’s Successors

My last visit to Sardes goes back several years and it seems that Turkey is finally promoting this unique site. Tourism is definitely on the rise, but whether that is a good thing or not, depends on how we want to look at things. The tourists bring in the badly needed cash but too many people treading the ancient floors is not necessarily a blessing.

Sardes is being praised as the capital of Lydia ruled by wealthy King Croesus from 560 until 546 BC when the envious Persians conquered the city. We will remember that the first gold coins ever were issued by Croesus. Yet I have not seen any traces of the Lydians in Sardes itself – maybe one day something will surface, who knows? What we see today is mainly Roman but the place has been occupied from about the 7th century BC till the 7th century AD and has seen Persians, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, and Ottomans occupying its houses and streets. One of the highlights definitely is the Temple of Artemis, the fourth largest Ionic temple in the world that was converted into one of the seven holy churches of Christianity. There is evidently a lot to see and to explore.

Wherever I go, I always automatically look for Alexander the Great simply because he has been to so many places, and that includes Sardes. I already followed Alexander to Sardes in a previous article “Heading for Dascylium and Sardes”, but since the city is in the news once again it may be worth elaborating a little more about its important role.

Licensed under CC BY-SA2.5-2.0-1.0 via Wikimedia Commons 

To begin with, Sardes was the start of the main road built by the Persians to connect it with Susa in the heart of the Persian Empire. That shows how important this city in Asia Minor was. Seleucos, Alexander’s successor in Asia, later had palaces all over his kingdom since it was simply too large to have a fixed center. This means that his capital was wherever he happened to be, which was either at Susa, Seleucia-on-the-Tigris, Antioch-on-the-Orontes, Celaenae, or Sardes. I wish there were some remains to confirm Alexander’s passage or Seleucos’ pal ce at Sardes.

Closer to Alexander, there is the role his sister, Cleopatra, played. She was Queen of Epirus after her husband, Alexandros, had died, and she was an excellent match for anyone aiming for more power after her brother’s death. She was first ready to marry Leonnatus, but he died while fighting on Antipater’s side during the siege of Lamia. At Olympias’ instigation, Cleopatra moved to Sardes to marry Perdiccas, who was preparing his wedding to Nicaea, Antipater’s daughter. We know that Antipater was Olympias’ constant enemy, and she would have loved to see her daughter married to Perdiccas. This general had led the Babylon Conferences (see: What if …?) and was on his way to Macedonia escorting Alexander’s corpse, accompanied by the two kings (the simple-minded Arrhidaeus/Philip and the infant Alexander IV) at the head of the veteran’s army that had campaigned on Alexander’s side. As a matter of course, Perdiccas was tempted by Cleopatra, for through this marriage, he would rule the empire, but on the other hand, he could not ignore Antipater; so, he went ahead to marry Nicaea. Shortly thereafter, however, he sent Eumenes, once Philip’s and Alexander’s secretary and presently Olympias’ messenger, to Sardes, loaded with gifts for Cleopatra and a marriage proposal. At this stage, Perdiccas even installed his bride-to-be as satrap of Lydia.

Perdiccas was moving at a slow pace, escorting Alexander’s body to Macedonia and the entire train and army. Events took a sharp turn when Ptolemy “hijacked” Alexander’s corpse and took it to Memphis, leaving Perdiccas no choice but to set in pursuit to recuperate the body. Ptolemy was ready to meet Perdiccas, whose attack ended in disaster as part of this army drowned in the Nile. He failed his duty to his troops, and a group of his senior officers decided to simply murder Perdiccas.

Now the road was open for Ptolemy, who approached Cleopatra soon after, asking for her hand in marriage. She agreed, and they soon saw themselves as king and queen on the throne of Macedonia. But this time, it was Antigonus Monophthalmus, who by now ruled over most of Asia Minor, who thwarted the plan by preventing her from leaving Sardes and eventually had her killed so she would not fall into the hands of any of the successors who would use her to rise to a higher power.

Poor Cleopatra, she was widowed while in her early thirties and ended up being a pawn in the Successors’ fight for legitimation. She cannot have been much older than forty-five when she died. Love and/or happiness were no issue in those days, and in a way, I am glad Alexander did not live to witness this.

The last time Sardes was in the news in connection, although remotely, with Alexander, happened during the final confrontation between Lysimachus and Seleucos, the last two of the Successors. This was in 281 BC during the battle of Corupedium, the “Plain of Plenty”, just west of Sardes. It was here that Lysimachus was killed. Seleucos became the last of the Successors still alive.

Well, much of this part of history will most certainly be ignored by the guides taking the tourists around Sardes. King Croesus and King Alexander III are certain to steal the show, but even …

[Click here for more pictures of Sardes]

Is the Mother of Alexander the Great in the Tomb at Kasta Hill near Amphipolis?

Andrew Chugg just has published a third analysis about the Tomb at Amphipolis in an effort to tie it to Olympias, the mother of Alexander the Great.

Here he elaborates his earlier theory about the snake basket on the head of the caryatids and about their dress (see: Additional scrutiny of the Caryatides of Amphipolis by Andrew Chugg), referring to ancient writers and similar depictions from antiquity.

[Picture from The Greek Reporter]

Andrew Chugg’s argumentation is that after Olympias was murdered, her relatives would have felt it their duty to give her a proper burial, to which Cassander must have agreed. Cassander was married to Thessalonica, Alexander’s half-sister and daughter of Philip II, and as such, she might have exercised some pressure on her husband. And then there was Cleopatra, by now Queen of Epirus, Alexander’s sister and daughter of Philip II and Olympias, who could have been involved in the burial. Olympias had many rich and influential relatives who might have been more than willing to build her tomb. Chugg goes even as far as involving Roxane and her son by Alexander as well since both were kept at Amphipolis for another seven years after Olympias’ murder. Funeral rites were sacred in ancient Macedonia, and Cassander knew that, as well as all the generals previously fighting alongside Alexander, meaning that Cassander may not have had much of a choice.

The author does not accept the idea of this being an abandoned cenotaph built for Alexander since, in such a case, the painstaking job of sealing the access walls and filling the chambers with tons of sand would make no sense.

Those wanting to unravel Andrew Chugg's ideas can consult his full story in The Greek Reporter.

Amphipolis/Kasta Hill … here we go again!

A strange statement was made yesterday by Mrs. Katerina Peristeri “in about a month we finish”. Did she mean that excavations at Amphipolis would be stopped for the season or does she expect to round up the excavations in a month?

Once again speculations about the possible occupants are listed in this article by Newsbomb.gr. Why are they rubbing in all these theories time and again, I don’t understand. Anyway, just to be complete, here follows the list of the possible names:

1. Megas Alexandros himself
2. Roxane
3. Alexander IV, the son of Alexander the Great
4. Olympias, the mother of Alexander the Great
5. Cleopatra, the sister of Alexander the Great
6. Cassander, son of Antipater, who murdered Olympias, Roxane, and Alexander IV
7. Nearchus or Laomedon or Androstenes, all generals of Alexander the Great
8. Antigonus Monophthalmus, general of Alexander the Great and one of the Diadochi
9. Hephaistion, a childhood friend and general of Alexander the Great who died in Ecbatana
10. Heracles, the illegitimate son of Alexander the Great, and Barsine, his mistress
11. Polyandrion
12. Polyperchon, general of Alexander the Great
13. Philip-Arrhidaeus, half-brother of Alexander the Great
14. Philip II, Alexander’s father as many still doubt that he was buried in the tumulus of Aegae

I am not going to comment on any of these suggestions – that have been amply discussed in earlier articles. For those who still want to read more on this argumentation, please click on this link for Newsbomb.gr.

The least I can say is that they covered every possible candidate, except maybe Queen Eurydice who married Philip-Arrhidaeus. Why has she been left out?

[Picture from Newsbomb.gr]

Interview with Nicholas J. Saunders on the Tomb of Kasta Hill near Amphipolis

Thanks to Boro who commented on "First peep inside the Tomb of Amphipolis" I received this article published in Mediterráneo Antiguo - arqueología e historia. It is written by Mario Agudo Villanueva who interviewed Nicholas J. Saunders, professor at the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Bristol on the Tomb of Amphipolis that keeps us all busy over the past weeks.

He gives us a clear overview of the possible occupants of the tomb beyond all journalistic guesswork, while at the same time he clarifies why this cannot be the tomb of Alexander the Great.

Great reading!

AUG

30

Interview with Nicholas J. Saunders: "the best qualified people to interpret Amphipolis tomb are the professional Greek archaeologists now excavating it"

Access to the tomb, with two great sphynx. Photo: Hellenic Ministry of Culture

Regarding the great Amphipolis tomb, Greece, have been already written many lines, although the research team led by Katerina Peristeri has not finished yet the excavation of the site, discovered in 2012. Mediterráneo Antiguo has sought to find an authoritative voice, Nicholas J. Saunders, professor at the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Bristol, author of The tomb of Alexander in 2006, published in Spain by Editorial Planeta in 2007 and one of the most importants recent studies about the question of the tomb of Alexander the Great. Here is our conversation with him. 

Question - What do you think about the Amphipolis tomb? Could it be the burial of Laomedon or Nearchus?  
Answer - I think the tomb is a wonderful discovery, and the best qualified people to interpret it are the professional Greek archaeologists now excavating it. Whoever is buried inside (as long as it’s not looted), it could be a very important discovery for tourism and the local community. So, in my opinion, the tomb could belong to several possible individuals: it could be one of Alexander’s Companions and high-ranking successors, such as Nearchus or Laomedon, as neither of them would have been buried at Aegae. Also Nearchus at least came from Amphipolis so it would be natural to build a high-status tomb nearby for one of Alexander’s great men. Also, it could perhaps be Roxanne as she (and her son Alexander IV) were murdered by Cassander at Amphipolis. Roxanne could be buried here as she was not Argead royal blood, but Alexander IV was, so it is likely he was buried at Aegae, which would perhaps agree with Andronikos’ identification – I agree with Andronikos (though I think some experts still argue about it). It could also perhaps be Alexander’s sister Cleopatra who was murdered at Sardis but probably on Cassander’s orders – though again one would think that because she was Argead royal blood she would be at Aegae. Macedonians and especially those of Amphipolis, hated Cassander for his murders of Alexander’s family, and when Cassander died they welcomed Demetrius his successor – so it would be no surprise that they built a massive tomb nearby – possibly for reburying Roxanne (and others?). It could of course be a ‘surprise’ multiple burial with several burial chambers as at Vergina - with some permutation of Nearchus, Laomedon, Roxanne, Cleopatra, or perhaps even Heracles – Alexander’s illegitimate son by his Persian mistress Barsine? Interesting question about Heracles being Alexander’s son and therefore Argead blood – but maybe not buried at Aegae because of his illegitimacy? Almost nothing is known of the deaths/burials of these individuals. It’s a real mystery – and more exciting because of it.

Question - What about the possibility of a massive burial of Macedonian soldiers?

Inside de tomb. Photo: Hellenic Ministry of Culture

Answer - Interesting idea which recalls the mass burial of the Sacred Band inside the polyandrion at Chaeronea (338 BC) – and with a Lion on top as well. The Amphipolis tomb could be something similar – but it’s so huge – much bigger than the Chaeronea tomb so it is probably unlikely in my opinion. I think that with this new tomb – size relates to status not the number of bodies. Also it’s intriguing because it is so huge that it rivals Aegae in this way, but is not actually in that sacred dynastic landscape so is ‘inferior’ in that way – so it’s an intriguing mix – perhaps a compromise paid for with silver from the famous Amphipolis mint.

Question - Manolis Andronikos identified the corpse of a young man of 13-14 years as Alexander's son, Alexander IV, in Vergina (ancient Aegae). What do you think?
Answer - There is still some disagreement about the identification of Alexander IV at Vergina – though in my opinion Andronikos is correct in saying it is Tomb III at Vergina. As a legitimate heir, Alexander IV would have been buried at Aegae, the objects in the tomb are about the right date – 308 BC, and analysis of cremated bones indicates a youth – and he was murdered at 13 years old. So I think that most experts would agree with Andronikos – so it may be that after their bodies had been discovered from the secret places where Cassander had hid them, the mother Roxanne was re-buried at Amphipolis and her royal son at Aegae.   

Detail of a polychrome capitel. Photo: Hellenic Ministry of Culture

Question - About Alexander's tomb, it is sure that he is not buried in Greece. All historical sources talk about his tomb in Alexandria. What do you think?
Answer - Yes, I agree, it is almost impossible to imagine that the new Amphipolis discovery is Alexander’s tomb for many archaeological, historical and literary reasons. It is an intriguing possibility that it was designed and built for Alexander (his body was destined for Macedonia when Ptolemy hijacked it to Egypt), but the problem with this is that he would have been buried in his ancestral royal burial ground at Aegae/Vergina – it would have been impossible to bury him anywhere else in Macedonia – and Amphipolis was very secondary to Aegae. So, all the sources are correct – he was buried (several times) in Alexandria, where his mummy was visited by Julius Caesar and several Roman emperors. Those sources must be right. I think Alexander’s tomb (or at least the remaining foundations of it) are still there many meters down below the modern city streets in Alexandria at the location I pinpoint in my book. It’s difficult to believe that there would be much left of the building itself, however. As for his mummified body, that’s a quite different matter. It could be destroyed (burnt) in the Christian riots; it could have been hidden somewhere else in Egypt – perhaps in the huge Ptolemaic period cemetery at Bahariya (Valley of the Golden Mummies); but my own favourite explanation is that his body was broken into pieces and sold as powerful talismans to Alexandrians (who still loved him even when many of them became Christians) – this was a very popular phenomenon, and in my opinion, it was the beginning of the subsequently well-known Christian practice of Saint’s body-parts as sacred powerful objects. So, in a sense, Alexander’s body could have been returned in small pieces to the inhabitants of his own city!? 

Author
Mario Agudo Villanueva

Aegae, where Alexander’s world changed forever

The Theatre of Aegae was one of the largest in Greece in the fourth century BC, but nowadays we need a good amount of imagination to picture its size and shape. Except for the front row reserved for the most prominent guests, the theatre was not built of stone. The hillside adjacent to the Royal Palace was probably lined with wooden seats, of which nothing remains. During my last visit in early spring 2011, the terrain was overgrown and the grass stood high, revealing dimly the rough shape of the cavea divided into wedges separated by corridors. Work is still in progress with new excavations, and there is hope for a better understanding of the theater that is anchored in history. Enigmatic is still the place reserved for the king, which usually was a special seat in the front row, but no single hint has been found. Manolis Andronikos, the great archaeologist who discovered the Tomb of Philip II in modern Vergina, tentatively suggests that either a special throne seat was carried into the theatre or that the Macedonian king would have sat in his own comfort on the northern porch of his palace which is only 60m away front the edge of the orchestra. 

 [Picture from Hellenic Macedonia]

Anyway, it was here that in the early morning hours of a summer day in July 336 BC, Alexander’s world was going to change forever. The day before, King Philip II of Macedonia had celebrated the marriage of his daughter, Cleopatra, with King Alexandros of Epirus. Besides the noblemen and the Macedonian people, representatives and envoys from all over Greece had been invited to attend the ceremony. For Philip, the wedding was also an opportunity to show his own success as he had brought prosperity and peace to Macedonia, and more importantly, peace to all of Greece since he had been acclaimed as Hegemon of Greece by the League of Corinth. As an additional festive note, his new wife had given birth to a daughter, Europa, only a few days earlier.

Today would be filled with musical contests and lavish banquets for the king’s friends and all his guests. As ruler of the Greek world, he felt safe walking alone to the center of the large orchestra (28m in diameter). It is here that Pausanias, one of his royal bodyguards, suddenly rushed in and stabbed the king to death. It is almost as if we can hear the shouting, the cries of disgust and fear, the tumult, and the general chaos of people witnessing this atrocity and running in every direction. No Greek tragedy had ever been so real! Alexander could not have been far away when it happened, but all help came too late. Pausanias was caught soon enough and killed on the spot.

Alexander was now King of Macedonia, but his kingship started in blood, his father’s blood, and more blood was going to be shed over his succession to the throne (read more: Philip’s Apogee and his Assassination). Was it chance/fate or premeditation/ conspiracy that led to the murder, we’ll never know.

Only the day before, Alexander had been worrying about his role as heir to the Macedonian throne. His father had sent an advance party of 10,000 men to Abydos across the Hellespont, under the command of his closest generals Parmenion, Attalus, and Amyntas. After the wedding, Philip would join them. Alexander must have felt uncomfortable about his father’s inner circle, in which Attalus had now become his son-in-law. Attalus, in turn, was married to a daughter of Parmenion, and so was General Coenus. These men occupied important posts within the army, of which Alexander was excluded. It is most probable that Philip destined his son to stay in Macedonia as Regent and deputy hegemon of the League of Corinth. Although this role was of the utmost importance, it meant that Alexander would sit at the royal desk - a very far cry from his desire to fight and conquer. In Philip’s eyes, it would have been unwise to leave Macedonia together with his son, for he would have left his country exposed should they both be killed in Asia.

But in these early hours of what was supposed to be a festive day, Alexander’s life and, evidently, his destiny took a very sharp turn. He now had to think quickly and instantly assume his role as king. Luckily, the Macedonians were quick to accept him and swore allegiance to their new king. After that, everyone who could have been involved in the murder of his father and those who could be a threat to his place on the throne had to be eliminated. That evidently included Amyntas, the true heir to the throne entrusted to Philip when he was still a minor. Amyntas was now in his twenties and could have claimed his rightful title. Another threat was Attalus, who was soon executed. Queen Olympias took care of Philip’s last wife and her baby.

Alexander’s next priority was to organize his father’s funeral. The dead king’s body was placed on a pyre, together with his arms and outfit, and the entire Macedonian army in polished outfits marched by for a last salute. Afterward, as was the custom, Philip’s bones were washed with wine and placed inside a gold larnax, which in turn was placed inside a stone sarcophagus. Meanwhile, Alexander had constructed an appropriate tomb to receive the king’s remains along with funerary goods made of silver and gold. Then the tomb was covered with earth to form a 43-meter-high tumulus that was to be revealed only two thousand five hundred years later (see: The Great Tumulus of Vergina).

It seems that from now on, magnificent Aegae was stained with blood. It was the old capital of Macedonia, founded in the last years of the 4th century BC, showing off all the pomp and circumstance we can expect of a kingdom at its apogee. It was the most magnificent building of Macedonia in its days, measuring roughly 105x88m, with all rooms arranged around a central open courtyard. It had a monumental entrance on the eastern side composed of three or four successive hallways. This facade is the only side of the palace that has an upper floor where traces of dark-blue and red paint have been found – a colorful statement visible from far away to any visitor.

The open inner courtyard was surrounded by a colonnade of 16 columns on each of the four sides, a square in which each side was 44.5 meters long. The best reconstruction of the palace, although partial, was shown at the exhibition at the Louvre “Alexandre le Macédonien” for on the terrain it is very difficult to mentally rebuild it. This may change when the ongoing restoration works come to a conclusion, I hope at least.

To the left, just before entering the courtyard, there is the Tholos, most probably used as a shrine or as a court of judgment, although it may also be seen as the Throne Room.

The rooms on the south side of the courtyard, i.e., on the left, have a suite on either side of the entrance space and seem to indicate that they were used for public services. The asymmetric entrance door and the raised platform along the walls tend to indicate that these were androns where banquets would be held. Two of the three rooms have yielded fine pebble mosaics.

Opposite the main entrance to the Palace are located three larger, nearly square rooms. They measure roughly 17x17m, and the floors were covered with marble slabs still in situ. Here also, there is a slight elevation running along the walls, making believe they were used for couches for bigger banquet events, probably reserved for the palace guards. These rooms were roofed as plenty of tiles have been found on top of the marble floor, but it puzzles archaeologists how a roof could span such a wide space.

The northern rooms were bordered by a one-meter-wide veranda, accessible through a small corridor from the central yard, offering a wide view over the Macedonian plain below. This definitely was an innovation, and no other example of a veranda has so far been found.

A short update of the excavations was published in early 2012 in this article.

It is hard to imagine the kind of luxury and refinement that surrounded Alexander since boyhood, either here at the Palace of Aegae or at the Royal Palace of Pella, of which even less is known. Yet all this beauty faded when, with the death of his father, Greece saw a great opportunity to revolt in a serious effort to throw off the Macedonian yoke. The tribes along the northern borders of Macedonia also considered that this was the right time to regain their independence. These themes will be handled in the next episode, “The King is dead, long live the King”.