Little is known about Alexander's beginnings and his life in Macedonia. Ancient sources give us the bare bones of history, but a series of archaeological discoveries in northern Greece, which today includes the territory of ancient Macedonia, are transforming scholars' understanding of this kingdom and, with it, the history of the young Alexander . They reveal the world that shaped the future king
One October morning in 336 BC, the small theater at Aigai, the ceremonial center of ancient Macedonia, began to fill with honored guests. They had come from all over Greece and the Balkans to take part in the wedding celebrations of King Philip II's daughter. One day, the party led to the wedding, and every seat was taken long before dawn. As the sun rose, the royal procession began. With the atmosphere reaching its peak, Philip finally made his entrance.
This was meant to be a triumphant moment, the pinnacle of his career. Philip was already the most successful Macedonian king ever. During his 24-year reign, he had strengthened the army, built up the kingdom's infrastructure, and expanded Macedonian control throughout the northern Aegean. Now, he was ready to conquer Persia. But then, he was assassinated. A bodyguard quickly rushed to the king and plunged a knife into his chest. Philip fell to the ground, dead. After the riots, a new king was proclaimed: Philip's son, Alexander. This young king was now young in age as well, only 20 years old, but he had already led armies and founded his first eponymous city. During his father's extraordinary reign, Alexander had acquired all the skills and experience necessary to make his mark on history. He would be known as Alexander the Great.
Alexander, who ruled from 336 to 323 BC, is best known for his 11-year campaign in Asia, during which he conquered the Persian Empire before dying mysteriously in its capital, Babylon, when he was only 32 years old.
Little is known about Alexander's beginnings and his life in Macedonia. Ancient sources give us the bare bones of history, but a series of archaeological discoveries in northern Greece, which today includes the territory of ancient Macedonia, are transforming scholars' understanding of this kingdom and, with it, the history of the young Alexander .
The capital of ancient Macedonia and the birthplace of Alexander, was Pella, which now lies many kilometers inland, but was originally a port, connected to the Aegean Sea by a lagoon. Archaeologists have been excavating at Pella since the early twentieth century and have discovered large townhouses, wide streets, luxurious baths, temples, and a huge agora, or square, one of the largest in the ancient world. Some of the richest houses, including the House of Dionysus, were decorated with intricate river pebble mosaics depicting hunting and mythological scenes. These finds show that, at its height, Pella rivaled the grandeur of other great cities of the Hellenistic era (323–31 BC)—Alexandria in Egypt and Pergamon and Antioch in Anatolia, or modern Turkey. But much remains to be discovered.
In 2021, archaeologists from the Ephorus of Antiquities of Pella and the University of Michigan launched the "Pella Urban Dynamics" project. Through analysis of the finds and new excavations, they hope to further investigate the history of the city and understand how its inhabitants lived. They are also studying Pella's wider connections.
"How did the city function in relation to the larger region?" asks archaeologist and project co-leader Lisa Nevett of the University of Michigan. “How did it relate to the counterpart cities it was interacting with? We're trying to get away from seeing these places just as places and see them as cities."
Most of the visible ruins of Pella date from the Hellenistic period. The aim of the project is to find evidence of the Classical period (480–323 BC) city of Pella that Alexander would have known. Over the past few years, the team has used geophysics in the search for answers. "We started by surveying the area south of the Hellenistic city, where, according to ancient sources, there was a lagoon or wetland in the Late Classic period," says archaeologist and project co-director Elisavet Tsigarida of the Ephorate of Pella Antiquities. "The results were very good. We have been able to reconstruct the southern coastline and a small island, Phacos, which was connected to the city by a wooden bridge. Phacos, according to the Roman historian Livy, was the site of a castle and treasury. The island was one of the most recognizable features of Pella, and the team believes that the core of the classical city was located in the area in front of it. Alexander's Pella seems to have been small compared to its later Hellenistic incarnation and was mainly centered around the coast. More than two millennia ago, it would have been alive with the sights and sounds of life in a harbor – fishermen going about their daily fishing, ships unloading their goods, merchants selling everything from metalwork to wine.
The team has also begun researching the royal palace of Pella – Alexander's possible childhood home. This large complex, covering nearly 20 hectares, was located on a low hill and included numerous buildings located on terraces on the slope. In 2017, they began excavating and conserving the buildings. But their work has not been straightforward at all.
"Poor preservation of buildings is the biggest challenge," says Tsigarida. This, she explains, is mainly due to the looting by the Romans in the second century BC, the use of the site throughout the Byzantine period and the looting of the buildings in modern times. Despite the state of the ruins, archaeologists have determined that two buildings adjacent to the courtyard at the center of the complex, both dating to the mid-fourth century BCE, were among the palace's most important structures.
"So far, the project has completed the excavation of a building where the king received representatives of other cities or states and where he performed rituals for the continuity and well-being of the state," says Tsigarida. This was also the building that housed the great andron, a hall for symposia or drinking parties and where all royal decisions were made. Excavations are underway in the other courtyard building and in the gymnasium or exercise yard of the palace, where a large swimming pool has recently been discovered. It may soon be possible to walk Pella's corridors of power as the young Alexander once did.
Alexander was born in 356 BC and grew up in a rapidly changing world. His father's reign, which began in 360 BC, brought wealth and prestige to Pella. Macedonian kings could be polygamous, and Philip pushed the custom to extremes, taking a total of seven wives. Olympias, Alexander's mother and Philip's fourth or fifth wife, was a Molossian princess from Epirus in present-day northwestern Greece. Her position in the ultra-competitive royal family rested on Alexander, her only son, remaining the favored heir. Macedonian succession was often highly contested and depended on who had the strength, experience and support to seize the opportunity. There were other royal male children and the prospect that more might be born was ever-present. Philip's extensive military campaign also put him in constant danger of death.
The young prince's education began when he was about seven years old. He was surrounded by an army of teachers who taught him the essentials of Greek reading, writing, music and athletics. Homer's epics were already well-known classics, and Alexander had a special relationship with the Iliad – his mother's family claimed they could trace their descent from the Greek hero Achilles. A properly educated Macedonian prince also had to be skilled with horses, and Alexander became a talented horseman. The first-century AD biographer Plutarch reports that, on one occasion, when Alexander was 11 or 12 years old, he tamed a stallion named Bucephalus, something no one else had done. Philip witnessed this event and, according to Plutarch, responded with the prophetic words: “My son, you must find a kingdom equal to you. Macedonia is too small for you".
A few years later, Alexander began secondary education. At this time, he likely entered the royal children's school, a Macedonian institution that brought aristocratic boys from all over the kingdom to the royal court, where they were educated at the expense of the state. The school was either founded or reformed by Philip and combined liberal studies with intensive military training aimed at producing men who were useful to king and kingdom. At any one time, about 150 boys between the ages of 14 and 18 were present. During this period of his life, Alexander was mentored for some time by the Greek philosopher Aristotle. In his biography of Alexander, Plutarch writes that their lessons took place in the nymphaeum, or sanctuary of the nymphs, at Mieza, a Macedonian city about 55 kilometers west of Pella.
The sanctuary was discovered in the 60s of the last century hidden among lush vegetation and bounded by a fast-flowing stream. At the time it was thought to be the site of the royal children's school. Nymphaeum consists of a large outcrop of volcanic rock that has been deliberately carved. There are remains of a covered passage, parts of columns and three natural caves. But archeologist Angeliki Kottaridi, director of the Ephor of Antiquities of Imathia, is not convinced that the shrine functioned as a royal school.
"I'm sure you can't teach, feed and house 150 students there," she says. Kottarid also believes that Alexander's time at school was very different from that idealized in ancient sources. "It's a very romantic approach to imagine Aristotle and his student sitting and discussing metaphysics," she says. "It wasn't like that. It was a very tough education to produce warriors and above all to produce officers capable of commanding the army."
Kottarid suggests that the school may have been located in a massive building in the courtyard to the northeast. This structure was excavated in the 1980s and at first, Kottaridi explains, archaeologists thought they were tracking down a sanctuary of Asclepius, the god of healing and medicine. Then, in the late 1990s and early 2000s, researchers thought they were exploring a market, until it became apparent they were outside the city limits.
"We didn't find any objects, the theater is there and we have graves", says Kottaridi, and all this points to a location outside the city walls. She believes that this structure is a type of school building known as a gymnasium. The size of the complex, about 45 square meters, suggests that it was more than just an exercise facility. Usually located outside the city walls, gymnasiums played a key role in the education of teenagers in the Greek world – the Academy in Athens, where Plato taught, and the Lyceum of Athens, where Aristotle taught, were also public gymnasiums. The Mieza complex includes a grand entrance, banqueting rooms, and a series of elongated halls that may have been used as barracks. Based on pottery found at the site and the architectural style of the complex, archaeologists have dated it to the mid-fourth century BCE and believe it was the setting for Alexander's time under Aristotle's tutelage.
To be continued in the next issue of the Culture Supplement
Taken from Archeology magazine (Alex Rowson). Translated by: Enis Bytyqi
