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, was born in June, 356 BC, in Pella, the ancient capital of Macedonia. His parents were Philip II and Olympia. Some say that Zeus was his father but it is probably just a myth. Aristotle taught Alexander in his early teen years. He stimulated his interest in sci ....

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.... of to Thebes, which had revolted. He took the city by storm and razed it, sparing only the temples of the gods and the house of the Greed lyric poet Pindar, and selling the surviving inhabi¬ tants, about 8000 in number, into slavery. Alexander's promptness in crushing the revolt of The¬ bes brought the other Greek states into instant submission. Alexander began his war against Persia in the spring of 334 BC by crossing the Hellespont (now Dardanelles) with an army of 35,000 Macedonian and Greek troops: his chief officers, all Macedonians, included Antigonus, Ptolemy, and Seleucus. At the river Granicus, near the ancient city of Troy, he attacked ....