Alexander the Great - king of Macedonia
Alexander the Great became King of Macedonia when his father was assassinated in 336. King Philip had conquered most of the Greek peninsula. The Greeks believed they could free themselves of Macedonia rule, since the new king was a "mere boy." Alexander proved them wrong by capturing the city of Thebes. He destroyed the entire city as a warning to the others. Alexander then conquered Persia, the longtime enemy of Greece, and the mightiest empire in the world.
Alexander was a military genius, possibly the greatest warrior of all time. His troops were better trained and organized than the Persian army. His soldiers also admired Alexander because of his personal courage. Alexander led his soldiers in battle instead of remaining behind the lines. The troops saw that Alexander was sharing their danger, and was not asking them to take any risks he would not take himself.
Once he conquered the Persians, Alexander quickly assembled a huge empire. In 332 BC, he moved south to Egypt, where he rested his troops. The Egyptians welcomed Alexander as a hero because he freed them from harsh Persian rule. They crowned him Pharaoh and declared him a god. Alexander eventually created an empire that reached India. Aristotle taught him that the Greeks were the most advanced people in the world, and that all other cultures were barbarians. Once he defeated the Persians, he came to see them very differently. He saw that many Persians were intelligent people and were worthy of his respect. Alexander accepted many Persians into his army and married the daughter of a Persian king.
In 323 BC, when Alexander was only thirty-three years old, he fell ill from a fever and died a week later. Alexander had created a huge empire in less than thirteen years, but it quickly crumbled. Alexander's mother, wives, and children were all killed in the struggle for power that followed his death. In the end, his empire was divided among his generals in three parts.
Alexander changed the world, but not through his accomplishments on the battlefield. Alexander carried the ideas of the Greeks and their love of learning throughout his empire. He founded the great city of Alexandria, which became a center of learning and culture in Egypt. A library in Alexandria housed the accumulated knowledge of the Greeks. This would become very important in the centuries that followed because Greece and Rome would fall to barbarian tribes who could not read.
Source: Mr. Dowling's Electronic Passport