To What Extent Was Alexander The Great Cruel

Deo-Dixit, Ameyaa
4/17/2023
Period 5
Ms. Wright
Alexander the Cruel

What if Alexander had never sold thirty thousand people into slavery? What if he had never crucified two thousand men? How would that have impacted the world today? Alexander III of Macedonia is commonly known as Alexander the Great. For a long time, he has been considered great because he streaked through the ancient world, conquering place after place. However, recently historians have started to contradict this opinion. Though many people think Alexander was great, he was not a great leader because he did not plan for his death, he thought himself better than he was, and he used brutal methods to conquer land. A great ruler should provide a good example to their people,

By this I mean that his empire only held together for ten years after his death (Doc E). A great conqueror would want his empire to go down in history as the best, but Alexander did not even tell the people who would rule after he died. His grand empire took up a great chunk of his life to build and not caring what happened after his death shows that he was not concerned about what happened to others after his death. In the background essay, it says that, “For reasons that are unclear, he [Alexander] had not named an heir. After much fighting, Alexander’s generals split up the land. More quickly than it took to build the empire, it began to fall into pieces,” (Background Essay). If an empire takes less time to fall apart than it took to build, that says quite a lot about the leader’s ability to plan well for the

He could not have been related to the gods, but he told people that he was related to any god that he looked up to and wanted to be like. “Alexander developed a rather high opinion of himself, including the growing belief that he was a god,” (Background Essay). All evidence disproves this belief. However, he continued to make others believe this and believe it himself. He named his new cities after himself, which proves that he was full of himself because of the way he was raised early on. In addition, in the Legend of the Hat Band, he rewarded an innocent person who had done a service to him by killing him, showing that he relied so much on the legends that he was willing to kill a loyal soldier because it was thought that he might be a threat. He cared so much about legends that he was willing to sacrifice one of his own men. This does not seem like the act of someone ethical or wise as a great leader should be.
A third reason that Alexander should not be considered great is that he used brutal methods to conquer land. He killed over 100,000 men in only four major battles. Alexander went on a “ferocious manhunt” (Doc C) and ended up crucifying two thousand men and selling 30,000 into slavery. Only immoral men crucify and enslave just because they can’t have something. He can never be great because of how brutal he was. A bad person can never