Before and After Alexander: The Legend and Legacy of Alexander the Great

by Richard A. Billows

In the arc of western history, Ancient Greece is at the apex, owing to its grandeur, its culture, and an intellectual renaissance to rival that of Europe. So important is Greece to history that figures such as Plato and Socrates are still household names, and the works of Homer are regularly adapted into movies. The most important hero of all, though, is Alexander the Great, who was not fictional in the least.


While many historians have studied Alexander’s achievements at length, author and professor Richard A. Billows delves deeper into the obscure periods of Alexander’s life before and after his reign. In his definitive biography Before and After Alexander, Billows explores the lesser-known years of Alexander, who, without the foundation laid by his father, Philip II of Macedon, would not have had the resources or influence to develop one of the greatest empires in history.


The years following his death were even more momentous. Alexander’s unexpected demise at the age of thirty-three created such a power vacuum that it incited decades of conflict among his generals, ultimately leading to the decline of Hellenistic civilization and the rise of the Roman Empire.

Genres: History, Ancient History, Nonfiction, Greece, Military History

304 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2018

About the author

Richard Billows is a professor of history at Columbia University. His specialty is the Classical Mediterranean, especially the Hellenistic World post-Alexander. He holds an undergraduate degree in History from Oxford University, and a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley.

Reviews

[Juliew. · Rating 3 out of 5]

While I can't say I agreed with the author's theory that Alexander's success was all based on Phillip and his successors I can say there are some debatable ideas in this work.The author credits Philip with inventing the Macedonian state and providing a system that united Macedonia in a way that had never been done before thereby paving the way to turn Macedonia into the ancient superpower that it became.While I agree with this assessment without Alexander in command I think Macedonia would most likely have stayed a backwater country little more than a blip in history.Alexander's personal magnetism,drive to succeed and military genius played a serious part in the country's world domination and to regard it otherwise is delegating Alexander little more than a puppet on the stage of Philip.As for his generals who does the author suppose gave the orders to these generals?And yes some were Philip's generals but Philip wasn't commanding them from his grave.Making the rounds after Alexander's death they spread what they knew and who they were(Alexander's generals not Philip's) to their various kingdoms.Had Alexander been less of a king and only accomplishing reasonable deeds in his lifetime I don't see that happening.I think I saw a total of four ancient sources used in chapters four and five but there are eight chapters in here and I think that speaks volumes.Alexander's conquests and who he really was is a mystery that has baffled many down through the ages and I don't think it can all be explained away by a father complex.Nevertheless it's great to have new theories thrown out there and I did enjoy the writing,organization and black and white photos of buildings,coins and art works.

[Jason Pettus]

DID NOT FINISH. Although this book certainly takes on a fascinating conceit -- that it was actually Alexander the Great's father, Philip II, who laid most of the groundwork for Alexander's later famous exploits, while it was his generals after his death who did most of the hard work of establishing the "Hellenistic World" that Alexander usually gets the credit for -- unfortunately, like a lot of history books about Classicism, this feels like the publisher took someone's dry, tedious doctoral thesis and slapped a pretty cover on it, with the text getting into so much minutiae about minor regional chieftains and the endless skirmishes that led to their defeats that a general reader like me will soon find themselves bored out of their skull. I actually made it further into this book than I was expecting, about halfway altogether, but I too eventually gave up out of sheer tedium.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this book, the classical scholar Richard Billows offers something different from the histories of the Alexander-centric historians who have preceded him. Rather than concentrating on Alexander, Billows expands his focus to encompass the pre-Alexander history of his homeland of Macedonia and the fate of his empire that followed. Though these subjects have been addressed by others, by bringing them together into a single book, Billows assesses Alexander's achievements from a different perspective — and the result is quite different from what might expect from previous books on the Macedonian conqueror.

The greatest consequence of Billows's approach is the highlighting of the achievements of Alexander's father, Philip. A great conqueror in his own right, while his reign has been overshadowed by his son, Billows makes clear how much of Alexander's success were due to his father's accomplishments. It was with Philip's army and Philip's commanders that Alexander waged his campaigns, which often used tactics that predated Alexander to win in battle. Yet Billows also notes that Philip himself was hardly an innovator, as he drew upon the experiences of decades of Greek wars in building his army into the Asian-conquering force of legend. This army was also the product of a region ripe for success, for as Billows details, its climate and geography gave it several natural advantages over the more tenuously-existing Green city states to the south.

From this perspective, Alexander's achievements were less as a creator than as an exploiter. This Billows underscores by emphasizing the unsustainable nature of his empire. As their abandonment so soon after Alexander's death makes clear, the Indian and Afghan territories comprising the easternmost edge of his conquests were simply too far off to be controlled from his resource base in Macedonia. While his plans for campaigns in North Africa and southern Europe may have been more realistic, they demonstrate that the essence of Alexander's achievements was conquest rather than construction. In this respect, his successors — the diadochi — deserve more credit for developing his legacy than Alexander himself merits, yet they too are often given only passing mention in most Alexander-centric considerations of the period.

All of this Billows lays out in an accessibly fluid text that makes for easy reading. He pulls no punches in his assessment of the "great" conqueror, and in doing so offers a valuable corrective to the overlarge reputation Alexander enjoys today. This is a book that anybody interested in a measured assessment of the legendary figure, one that details just how much of it rested on the shoulders of his predecessors and depended on the achievements of his successors.

[Ellen Marcoux · Rating 3 out of 5]

honestly? not great scholarship. would benefit from tighter editing. there are some good "big picture" insights (e.g., alexander rode his father's coattails, his father's acolytes picked up the mess alexander left). the author makes a lot of facile conclusions, particularly where he evaluates alexander's character, that caused me to question his authority. for example, he writes that "[s]ome may see drunkenness as some sort of excuse [for cleitus' murder]; but though intoxication lowers the inhibitions, it surely only reveals what is in a man's character when the normal civilized restraints are off" (p. 162). am i supposed to just take it on his word? i don't think so . . . . also, did anyone else see that maps #3 and #5 are exactly the same? what am i missing? on the other hand, there's a lot of interesting and credible military history that was new to me and that i enjoyed thinking about and, as always, it's good to be exposed to a chunk of history that i probably should have learned in school, lol.

[Jim Bogue · Rating 5 out of 5]

Billows does an excellent job of explaining the rise of Macedonia, and especially of evaluating the contributions of Phillip II. He walks the reader through the troubled and divided history of the kingdom to show how difficult the task was.
In particular, Billows’ discussion of how Phillip organized and equipped his army is masterful. He carefully explains how a sarissa works and how a phalanx is trained.
From there Billows narrates Phillip’s conquests, the training and successes of Alexander, and carries the story down to the coming of Rome (and even after, as it pertains to culture). And he does it all without seeming rushed.
My only argument with this book is the author’s diminution of the role of Alexander. Certainly the emphasis on Phillip is plausible and well argued, but Alexander had the dream that drove his men onwards, and his ability to communicate this had to be remembered.
Having said that, this is an exciting and incisive book well worth reading.

[Rebecca Hill · Rating 3 out of 5]

Anything with Alexander the Great will capture my attention. He was a powerhouse in the ancient world. However, upon reading this book, I found that I was disappointed on many levels.
While Alexander DID push the boundaries of his territory far beyond what had been done in the ancient world to that point, much of what was through some of the foundations that his father put into place.
As a historian, I felt that there were several places where information could have been laid out better, while giving more credence and credit to Alexander's father - and even more so - to the troops that fought, followed, and died to create this empire.

There are so many different theories around Alexander, but I felt this barely scratched what should have been done.

[Christine · Rating 3 out of 5]

The less enthusiastic rating is due to my disagreement with Billows's assessment on Alexander and Philip. The book itself is well researched and written. I learned quite a bit about Hellenistic cities and organizations. However Alexander was not a mere passage between Philip the great(author's opinion) and the Diadochi. Without his personal charisma and pursuit history simply would not have been the same.

[Preetam Chatterjee · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the tome ‘Alexander the Great in his world’, the author begins thus: “In the world of ancient Greece, two subjects have drawn exceptional attention from antiquity to the present – Homer and Alexander III of Macedon. It is valuable to recall their connection: Alexander claimed descent from Achilles and he was reported to have slept with a copy of the Iliad – as well as his sword, of course – within reach. The subjects are linked in another way, one that helps to explain their attraction through the ages: both present serious questions, many of which seem to be unanswerable given the nature of the surviving evidence. Learning the true identity of Homer or of Alexander may be impossible.

It has been argued that Homer was a title, not the name of a real person: rather Homer is the imaginary first epic singer imaged for themselves of all singers of Greek epic. Thus there were many “Homers” whose tales were eventually collected into a single long poem. Many are not convinced by this argument, however, and so debate continues. Difficulty in discovering the true nature of Alexander is due to the nature of surviving evidence that endows him with multiple, different characters.

Although the reality of an individual known as Alexander III of Macedon is not in doubt, we are confronted with many Alexanders. Consequently, scholarly debate regarding both Homer and Alexander has deep roots and has provoked heated discussion.”

The likely invented declaration by the Delphic Oracle that Alexander was unconquerable was in fact proven correct as he went from one victory to another. Where his father had complicatedness besieging rather small cities, Alexander, in 335, captured the city of Thebes within days of his entrance on the scene, and, later, fell the cities of Miletus and Halicarnasus in 334, and Tyre and Gaza in 332.

An army assembled from the forces of the Persian satraps in Asia Minor was vanquished at the Granicus River in 334; at Issus in Cilicia, where, although greatly outnumbered, Alexander defeated the Great King of Persia himself in battle in 333, and again with a measure of conclusiveness at Gaugamela in 331.

Alexander marched unimpeded into Egypt in 332, into Babylonia in 331, and was welcomed excitedly by both the Egyptians and the Babylonians as a liberator. Indeed, his entrance into Babylon was likely, looking at Alexander’s mission as a whole, his peak.

Alexander the Great’s life, vocation, and accomplishments have been studied over and over by historians, giving rise to literally hundreds of books and probably thousands of detailed articles about the great conqueror. Much less studied, however, are the growth of the Macedonian state and army under Alexander’s father Philip II, which made Alexander’s career likely, and the activities and policies of Alexander’s successors, which created the organizational scaffold in which Hellenistic civilization urbanized and flourished.

The author has divided his book into the following eight chapters:

1. Macedonia before Philip II
2. Philip’s Childhood
3. The Reign of Philip
4. Philip’s New Model Army and New Model State
5. The Reign of Alexander
6. The Wars of the Successors
7. The Hellenistic World and Hellenistic Civilization
8. Aftermath: The Lingering Impact of Hellenistic Culture

This book first offers a wide-ranging study of the career of Philip II (Chapters 1–4). The state of Macedonia before Philip’s run to the throne was a muddled and disunited backwater, nonessential to the local great powers of Athens, Sparta, and Persia.

Philip II built up a completely new type of army with a new style of warfare, and through this army united Macedonia, expanded its borders, and turned it into the greatest power in the ancient world by his death at the age of 47, assassinated by a displeased officer in his own bodyguard.

It was the state and army built by Philip that provided Alexander with the tools to embark on his career of conquest.

After a moderately concise review of Alexander’s conquests (Chapter 5), the book treats in some detail the 40 years after Alexander’s death, showing how his greatest generals—men who, like Alexander, had been trained in the army and wars of Philip II—took power of Alexander’s conquests and built the three great Hellenistic empires in those lands: a) the Antigonid Empire in the Balkan region, b) the Seleucid Empire in western Asia, and c) the Ptolemaic Empire in Egypt and Libya.

By settling tens, if not hundreds of thousands of Greek colonists, for whom they built hundreds of new Greek cities in western Asia and Egypt, and by encouraging many natives to settle in these new cities too, adopting Greek names, the Greek language, and Greek culture as their own, these rulers helped to establish Hellenistic civilization as the culture of the eastern Mediterranean world for over half a millennium (Chapters 6–7).

This book thus covers a topic of massive interest and importance to the history of western civilization, that of the establishment of Greek culture as a universal culture from the rivers of Iraq to the Adriatic Sea, and from the Black and Caspian Seas to the deserts of Arabia and the border of the Sudan.

Everywhere within this gigantic and assorted territory, between 300 BCE and 300 CE (and later) there were to be found Greek cities with Greek citizens, speaking and reading the Greek language, and living their lives consistent with the social, cultural, and political patterns established in Classical Greece in the 6th, 5th, and 4th centuries BCE.

This remarkable civilization left, as is well known, a rich cultural heritage that has deeply influenced western (and indeed Muslim) culture and civilization ever since.

It is as the facilitators who made possible this spread of Greek culture, and its establishment throughout the eastern Mediterranean and western Asia as the dominant culture, that Philip II of Macedonia, his son Alexander, and Alexander’s Successors remain an important and fascinating topic of study.

It is almost prophetic as well as prosaic in its beauty to peruse the conclusion offered by the author.

He writes: ‘It is clear that Hellenistic civilization did not just die out at the end of antiquity. Its high literary, philosophical, and scientific culture and ideas lived on in the successor civilizations of Islam and Christianity, influencing them until the present day. We have moved a long way in this chapter from that self-confident young man in fourth-century BCE Macedonia who looked disaster in the face in 360 and decided that he would not allow his family and people to pass away, who decided instead that he would build a new and better Macedonia that could dominate the world as he knew it. Philip of course had no inkling, as he built his army and state up from the ruins of defeat, that the effects of his actions would still be felt two millennia later. But if not for Philip’s new Macedonia, if not for his unification of Greece, if not for his bold plan to invade and conquer the Persian Empire and spread Greeks, the Greek language, and Greek culture all around the eastern Mediterranean, it is very debatable whether Greek literature and ideas would or could hold the place in western and even Islamic culture that they do. For millennia it has been the custom, if one recognized this phenomenon at all, to give the credit to the romantic young conqueror Alexander. I think the analysis offered in the chapters above shows clearly that Alexander is one of the most overrated figures in world history. The truly great man was Alexander’s father Philip; and credit belongs too to the generals—Antigonus, Ptolemy, Seleucus—who took on the role of governing the lands Alexander had merely marched through and fought battles in, and of turning those lands into viable empires with Greek cities and Greek culture. Without their efforts, the history and civilization of the lands and cultures of western Asia, Europe, and north Africa would be very different than they are today.’

Grab a copy if you’re a Greek history buff.

[Peter Goodman · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Before and after Alexander: the legend and legacy of Alexander the great,” by Richard A. Billows (overlook Duckworth, 2018). Billows is a professor at Columbia University specializing in ancient Greek and Roman epigraphy. His argument in this book is that Alexander wasn’t so great. It was Alexander’s father, Philip, who created Macedonia, created the Macedonian army, developed the weapons and tactics, subdued the surrounding states, defeated the Greeks, and was planning to invade Asia and the Persians. But Philip was assassinated before he was able to do that. Alexander was ready to take over, he was charismatic, he was a good general, and he took his father’s armies and his father’s plans and his father’s officers and went through Asia. Billows spends a good deal of time trying to determine who the Macedonians actually were. He decides that they were probably Greek because the language they used was Greek, the names they used were Greek, and they considered themselves Greek. They were northern Greek not southern Greek. He talks about the period leading up to the accession of Philip. He describes Macedonia as a potentially wealthy state but one that was weak, full of warring families, and unable really to exert itself among the Greek states. Philip, he says, first tamed the fractious Macedonian nobility; he developed a sort of Macedonian middle-class; through the development of the sarissa, the 16 or 17 foot long pike that the Macedonian phalanx was able to use to subdue the Greeks and then the Persians. He spends a brief time on Alexander’s life and campaigns. He says that basically the first battles that Alexander won were essentially Phillip’s battles following the tactics that Philip would’ve used. He points out that the Army that Alexander used was Philip’s army; that the officers were Phillip’s officers whom he had trained and chosen. He also argues that Alexander may have been unstable: he had a violent temper, he was vicious and vengeful, he killed some of his best friends or closest allies. He was probably homosexual, though that was not really a problem among the Greeks, since a great deal of their society their civilization accepted homoeroticism. Then, after the death of Alexander he spends a great deal of time examining what he calls the Successors: these were the Macedonian leaders who were left after the death of Alexander. Most of them were in fact Phillip’s officers they fought among one mother for privacy; and they eventually created three great empires. He said that they spread Greek culture, the Hellenistic culture, which was the dominant civilization throughout the Mideast and Eastern Asia for hundreds of years after the death of Alexander and after the death of the Successors. He spends a good deal of time talking about how they built up libraries about how the cities were governed, how they were designed and planned, and the kind of urban civilized life that existed throughout Greece the Mideast and Central Asia as a result of the dominance of Alexander and the generals who followed him. The book really has changed my picture of what was going on during the time of Alexander and after Alexander. His explanation of why the Romans were able to defeat the Greeks is not entirely satisfactory. He says it was because the Romans were citizen soldiers, and therefore had much larger numbers and could keep their armies growing, while the various Macedonian armies, no matter how well they fought, could not sustain themselves. They could not replace their casualties as well as the Romans could. Which meant that when the Greeks lost the battle they were destroyed. But when the Romans lost the battle they came back with another army and for another one. I am going to think about this book quite a bit.

https://newbooksnetwork.com/richard-a...

[Phillip Zhu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Coming from this book after finishing Thucydides' classic, I found this read to be a well-researched and entertaining read, not-the-least because of its mix of anthropology, archaeology, literary excerpts, and traditionally narrated history. I've seen other reviews discussing the at-times seemingly inconsequential levels of detail for which Billows dives into certain events; while they are not necessary for the book, I believe they supplement a broader understanding of the ancient world.

However, there are multiple instances where the editing has frankly ruined the otherwise engaging prose—I counted at least three instances of placeholder text, (see map x). Had the editor/author stuck to relying on the reader's own geographical knowledge, or had they decided to fill this edition replete with dozens of maps and other relevant figures, I would be satisfied. But the edition on print is stuck in the middle, lacking the specificity a map of Greece should provide for a history centered on Macedonia, and lacking the polish necessary to dissuade arguments that the book is anything more than a published thesis.

But what an engaging thesis. If one is an avid reader of history, especially in classical history centered in the West, this book will likely offer a nice overview of some periods and regions frequently covered in commentaries and histories. At the same time, it highlights the less glorious and mythologized elements, especially the wars of succession to Alexander. Be warned, however, this book is not an introduction to Macedonian history so much as it is an exploration, and the sections within chapters are built to come-upon and supplement the main thesis. Knowledge of geography or the willingness to do your own research will illuminate some of the captivating perspectives captured by this motivated and knowledgable author.

[Pete Strycharske · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book and it was written by a definite historian. The author did a great job helping us to understand the world that Alexander inherited and all the work it took to give the opportunity to be "Great". In point of fact, it was his father, Philip II, who should be considered the "Great" one.

Philip inherited a weak and disorganized Macedonia. Using a combination of skillful diplomacy and timely military action, he consolidated his rule and country into a powerful Greek state. With the natural wealth of Macedonia, he helped to build cities and develop a collective Macedonian identity. By developing schools and conscripting the sons of Macedonian nobility, he was able to ensure loyalty and a consistently excellent education for all the leaders of his armies and society. Combining all of these developments, along with his military innovations (wedge shaped cavalry, the sarissa (a 19 ft spear)), Philip was able to conquer virtually all of Greece and southeastern Europe. In fact, because of Philip's successes, Alexander and all of his other generals (trained in Philip's schools), were primed and ready to take over the vast Persian empire and Egypt.

So successful was Philip's training, that it enabled his generals to launch the Hellenistic empires after the death of Alexander. These empires introduced great enhancements that influenced Roman, Christian, Islamic and Western European cultures that we still feel to this day.

I definitely came away from this book with my views of Alexander changed. We should be celebrating Philip "the Great" as he is the one who actually helped transform the Greek and Western world.

[Antonin · Rating 3 out of 5]

For me, the main reason to read this book is its detailed description of the structure of the Macedonian army that Philip built, the rise of Macedonia as a European superpower, and the struggles between Alexander's successors over the pieces of his empire.

The author loses a lot of credibility, in my opinion, for his obsessive and often petty effort to completely discredit Alexander as a military leader and empire-builder. Did Alexander come to think of himself as descended from the gods and the great heroes of ancient Greece? That should surprise no one. He was not the first and would not be the last powerful man of antiquity to claim divine ancestry or allow it to be claimed on his behalf. Those were different times.

I actually laughed out loud at Billows' conclusion that "Alexander is one of the most overrated figures in world history." The fact is that the Macedonians followed him...and followed him...and followed him...out of Europe, through Persia, Egypt and Bactria, and on to the Indus River. There must have been some reason.

[Vassilis Xanthakis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Η περίοδος βασιλείας του Φιλίππου Β' και η εποχή των ελληνιστικών βασιλείων δεν έχουν καλυφθεί αρκετά από τους σύγχρονους ιστορικούς και αυτό το κενό επιθυμεί να καλύψει ο συγγραφέας. Το καταφέρνει εν μέρει παρέχοντας κάποια χρήσιμα στοιχεία, πλην όμως θα ήθελα να υπάρχει περισσότερο αναλυτική περιγραφή των ιστορικών γεγονότων, ειδικά σε ό,τι αφορά τα ελληνιστικά βασίλεια μέχρι και τη ρωμαική κατάκτηση.

[Helena Scutt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although I don't tend to read non-fiction, I found Billows' book to be accessible and interesting in equal measure.
I must say he has definitely swayed me to his view point as he made light of all the work that they did in enabling and securing the kingdom Alexander created.
A great, new viewpoint that rightly-so challenges a legendary figure in Greek history.

[David D. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book

Billows does an excellent job of weaving a narrative about Philip, A!exander, and their impact on the Western world. This is a highly readable text that makes some compelling arguments.

[Panagiotis Efraimidis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Το διάβασα με μεγάλο ενδιαφέρον. Θα μάθετε την ιστορία του ελληνικού πολιτισμού κυριολεκτικά πριν τον Μ. Αλέξανδρο μέχρι και την πτώση της Βυζαντινής αυτοκρατορίας. Η συμβολή του Φιλίππου Β στην εδραίωση και διαδοση του ελληνικού πολιτισμού αποδυκνυεται καθοριστική στα βάθη των αιώνων!

[Joyce Grenis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not what I expected. The author made the case that Alexander the Great really did not deserve "the Great". Excellent background on his father Phillip I. You will need to make your own judgements. Well-written.

[Mitchell Kaufman · Rating 3 out of 5]

A decent history that covers its title subjects well. Alexander himself appears as not so great, but merely building on the legacy of his father.

[Geoff Walling · Rating 2 out of 5]

This explores the lesser known years of Alexander, which are lesser known for good reason.

[George Hodgson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book, especially early on, gets a bit too detailed, however it ends up a really good read. Gives a good alternative view of Alexander.