Alexander the Great dies at 32

Alexander of Macedon conquered the Persian Empire and marched as far as northwest India before dying in Babylon. His generals divided the empire, spreading Greek culture across a huge area.

Exact date and cause of death are debated.

Context

Alexander became king of Macedon in 336 BCE at about age 20 and crossed into Asia in 334. He defeated the Persian king Darius III in major battles and reached the Indus region, but his troops refused to go farther east, and he turned back. He fell ill in Babylon and died in June 323 BCE, a few weeks short of 33.

Ancient accounts describe a fever lasting around ten days. Explanations proposed over the years include malaria, typhoid, alcohol-related illness and poisoning, but the surviving sources are written long after the events and no diagnosis is settled. Even the exact day is debated, with most scholars favoring about 10 or 11 June.

He left no clear successor, and his generals, known as the Diadochi, fought for decades over the empire. It broke into several Hellenistic kingdoms, including the Ptolemaic kingdom in Egypt and the Seleucid empire, through which Greek language and culture spread widely across the eastern Mediterranean and western Asia.

Alexander's tomb in Alexandria became a famous site in antiquity, but its exact location is now unknown, and its fate remains a long-running puzzle.