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Was he great cuz he had had a one-tracked ambition to conquer new lands? Is that a definition of a great man? He is a hero to the Greeks because he avenged earlier Persian invasions of Greece.After his Pan-Hellenic crusade was finished he was in a position to capitilize on the defeat of the Persians since no credible army could challenge him.He siezed the opportunity to make himself king of Asiatics by the use of combining local traditions of conquered people with Macedonian military might and his native Greek culture.The result was a blend of Greek and Asiatic culture that had a powerful effect on world civilization. Some such as Tarn refer to him in a utopian manner in the sense that he wanted to create a new brotherhood by merging all the cultures he conquered with his native culture.Others such as Green view him in an Orwellian tyranical type manner and others take an even more extreme position and claim he was nothing more then a meglomanic delusional drunk (sic). Alexander was a complex man deeply spirtual in the sense that he was devoted to the native Gods of Olympus and was decendent from Achilles a semi god
Greek warrior hero of the Illiad.He was also a very literate that could recite passages from the Illiad and Euripides and was tutored by Aristotle.Of course he was trained in the most potent means of military arms of his time and even those who do not admire him acknowlege his generalship as among the greatest ever.It would be wrong to fit him into a defined category of great liberator or mega tyrant since he could be said he contain a little of both attributes. What makes him great is the effect he had on history .Specifically the spread of both Greek and Asiatic ideas.Greek thinking to Asia and Asiatic ideas to Europe that resulted from his empire.Whether this was simply a by product of his conquests or part of his visionary insight is debatable.Probably the truth lies some where in the middle.

When I was teaching, I had a poster in my classroom for my students, which said that the measure of a man was the number of friends that he had had, and especially those who showed up for his funeral. With that measuring stick in mind, I believe that Alexander is proved to have been very great indeed!

Funny I always thought the Greeks hated him and revolted as soon as he died both in Europe and in Asia. Eastern influences on the West? There had been influence from early times and nothing great came from Alexander's conquests; the Hellenisation of the East is a different matter and the freeing up of the hoarded treasure of the Achaemenids, to de-stabilise the world economy another.The talk of unity masks the creation of an anti-Macedonian power-base specifically to counter the checks with which the Macedonian tradition countered the power of their kings, and to get the army back in line. Yes, he was great because of the extent of his conquests and the sheer determination he showed in achieving them, but this was no Mahatma Ghandi, not even a Salman Rushdie,

The masses in the western world never herd of Gandhi until Ben Kingsley gave his masterpiece performance and Salman Rushdie still lives in insecurity and will do so the rest of his days. Alexander Laid the foundation for the Roman Empire, it was the East that lasted for over a thousand years not the west (Italy and west). Because of the billions of dollars in Gold and Silver Alexander coagulated throughout key regions Hellenian culture survived for centuries and was found well into Eastern China.