Changes In Ancient Greece, Alexander Character Image And Why

Alexander Ⅲ, King of Macedon (356BC-323BC), is the world-famous conqueror. From334BC, he spent a decade in campaigning eastward and established Alexander Empire. It was in the4th century BC that the crisis of Greek city-states continued and Rome did not rise yet. Alexander created a new era-the Hellenistic Age through his conquest. Alexander’s historical achievements and his legendary life still draw much attention. Everyone has his or her own image of Alexander; fact and fiction mixes and constantly forms new Alexander legends with original charm. As the era changes, the image of Alexander also changes. In the opinion of Droysen who hoped to witness the unification of Deutschland, Alexander was an iron-fisted monarch creating a new age; Tarn (1869-1957) as a aristocrat living in Victorian British thought that Alexander was a philosopher king whose aim was to establish a single community intermingling Greeks and Barbarians; after World War Ⅱ, scholar Badian viewed that Alexander was amoral and ruthlessly pragmatic...Comparing with the great importance attached to modern interpretation of Alexander’s images, attention to his images of the ancient Greek period is relatively less. If we go deep into the historical background of the ancient Greek period, analyze Alexander historical materials and combine with the achievements of archaeological research, it is not difficult to find the images of Alexander do have change that can be detectable in the ancient Greek period.According to the characteristics of change on Alexander’s images in ancient Greek period, the article will be divided into two stages to explore, namely during Alexander’s lifetime and the Hellenistic age. Combined with the historical background of Alexander’s lifetime, depending on the historical and archaeological achievements, explore Alexander’s inner religious world and find his image experience the changing process from man to hero and God. Under the Greek religion background of hero cult tending to worship man as hero or god, Alexander grew strong heroism. During his conquest, he repeatedly imitated the heroes in his heart Achilles, Hercules, Dionysus and Alexander gradually made himself worshipped as God in his lifetime. In the Hellenistic age, Alexander’s images showed a complex and diverse feature. But considering he still had tremendous political value, Alexander’s successors used the images of Alexander in order to prove the legitimacy of their rule, especially Ptolemy. Their use led his images continuously to be uplifted, thus legend was fit to define the main feature of this stage. In the arts of the Hellenistic Age and the coins issued by the successors, Alexander was often presented with the attributes of God or as God incarnate. In written records, Ptolemy had more rights to speak; in the widespread work of Cleitarchus, Alexander experienced the romance story, which undoubtedly made his image legendary. Deep exploring background of the late ancient Greek period, research the reason for the changes of the Alexander’s image. At some level, the development of Greek religion, the tendency from city-state toward greater political entity, historical records and Oriental sacred monarchy caused the changes of his image. The change of Alexander’s images was always closely related to the development of each era and his image had a deep imprint of the times. From a broader perspective, exploring the changes of Alexander’s image in ancient Greek period could be an important window for further understanding of the series of changes in the late Western classical era.The paper is divided into introduction, main body and epilogue three parts.Introduction section introduces main Alexander historical materials of the classical era and modern academic research on Alexander’s image in ancient Greek period and discusses the significance of choosing the subject and research methods.Main body consists of3chapters.The first chapter starts from the background of Alexander’s deification, talks about the developing trend of hero worship, Alexander’s religion and his imitation of heroes during the conquest. Then combined with historical sources, discusses the Alexander’s deified process by analyzing and interpreting the trip to Siwa, the introduction of the proskynesis and decree ordering the Greek to worship him as god. Finally, by analyzing the worship of the Greek city-states to Alexander, explore the relationship between the city-state and the rulers, and thus leads to the significance of Alexander’s deification.The second chapter describes the images of Alexander in Hellenistic Age whose main feature is legend. Consider the political situation of the early Hellenistic Age, rely on the archaeological achievements, analyze Alexander historical materials in this period and explain the changing images.The third chapter analyzes the causes for the changes of Alexander’s image in ancient Greek period. The development of the Greek religion, the era’s need of city-state to greater political entity, historical records and Oriental sacred monarchy exert impact on the images of Alexander in terms of religion, politics, culture and the East-West exchange. In the epilogue, systematic summary of core content and deepening the theme is made. The change of Alexander’s image in ancient Greek period has its own internal logic. Analysis should focus on both the history of the diachronic study and understanding and interpretation of the synchronic multi-elements. Alexander’s image changed and the change was detectable. That behind this difference was more profound and complex change of era background.