How Did Alexander Conquer Egypt

After seeing Alexander’s relations with the Egyptians, it is evident that it helped him conquer Egypt, but also caused him problems later with his military forces. The way that it helped him conquer Egypt was that he became viewed as a living God or Pharaoh. Instead of being satisfied with invading Egypt and overcame the Persians, he wanted to win over the hearts of the Egyptian people. He did this by accepting Egyptian traditions and not challenging them with his Greek traditions at first. This led the Egyptians to believe that he was one of them and loved him. Then Alexander visited a temple where he was believed to be the divine ruler on and took on the appearance of a Pharaoh. Thus, effecting a sympathetic regime change. Though, he still wanted more and needed to find a city that would hold his name forever. This led him to meet with Homer. He told him he would find this city on the island in the sea of
Egypt, called Pharos. Eventually, Alexander would link Pharos to Egypt by creating a causeway and made a man-made harbor. This created one of the richest and multicultural city. Although, his relations with the Egyptians caused him problems with his own military forces as well. This caused problems because Alexanders was adopting elements and customs outside of Greek culture. He was viewed as trying to deify himself and his Greek countrymen did not like this. This caused tension within his own Greek armies and plots against his life started to develop. Those who were aware of these plots but didn’t speak up were executed for treason. Another problem ensued when Alexander wanted to have the Persian royal court ceremony in Greece. This was because the Greeks refused to bow before him and caused Alexander to punish those who defied him. Then his foster brother declared that all Macedonians helped him achieve his accomplishment. When Alexander heard this, he grabbed a spear and killed him.
2) Through watching a documentary that demonstrated life in Alexandria in Hypatia’s time, I believe that Aristotle would have enjoyed life during this time. This is because the library in Alexandria tried collecting every book that they could. With a massive number of books, it meant the more knowledge and power a person could obtain. Aristotle would have enjoyed this because he could obtain more knowledge on the world. He believed that education was a necessity to produce a society of happy and productive people. By having an endless supply of material, it would allow for people to be more educated and produce this society that Aristotle wanted. Since this city encouraged people to speak their ideas, I believe it would have added on to Aristotle’s enjoyment for life here. Mainly because he could preach his ideas and strengthen them with the ideas of others. Additionally, he would have enjoyed it here because of the advancements Hypatia made in Algebra and Astronomy. This is because Aristotle revolutionized knowledge into subjects. By living in this city during this time, he could have added on to these subjects even more and developed them further. Tools such as the astrolabe weren’t developed during his time. By having the ability to use something like this, he could have accomplished even more in his lifetime. Though, I don’t believe he would have liked living here when Christianity became to challenge everything. This is because those who followed this religion didn’t promote a happy society of people. By seeing what they did to Hypatia, we can see that they were violent to those who had beliefs outside of theirs. Aristotle would not have liked this because he wanted a happy and productive society. Not one who would destroy members of society so that they could achieve absolute power. He certainly would not want or enjoyed meeting the same fate as Hypatia.
3) Hypatia was born sometime around 350 A.D in Alexandria, Egypt. She was beautiful and was the daughter of Theon, who was a well-distinguished professor at the University of Alexandria. The reason she is a favorite of historians today is due to her accomplishments in the world. Since she was a woman living in a world dominated by men, it made these achievements even more impressive. Some of her achievements were running a philosophy school, revolutionizing astronomy, and making groundbreaking advances in algebra. Through her former student’s letters, we can see their intimate conversations that reveal how they valued and respected her. She was a philosopher in the truest sense because of her love for wisdom. Another interesting thing about her was that she didn’t just deal in abstract thought, but rather had a practical application for her ideas. For instance, using math and geometry to redesign an astrolabe. This newly redesigned astrolabe allowed for telling the time of the day, telling someone’s latitude, telling someone’s altitude, measuring the highest of mountains, and measuring the width of rivers. This was considered a powerful instrument because it changed the way people functioned. It allowed men to explore, trade, and conquer new lands. Thus, these characteristics, qualities, and achievements make her a favorite to historians today.
4) The main event that led to Hypatia’s death was Alexandria allowing any person from anywhere to voice their ideas and opinions. Eventually, ideas that were voiced would clash with others and is what led to Hypatia’s death. Since people were free to voice their ideas, it attracted key leaders of the religion of Christianity to preach their ideas. Specifically, a gospel writer named Mark. He believed that Alexandria was the ideal place for Christianity to gain a foothold. Though, reconciling the multi-faith environment with a religion that believed in one good, would prove to be a challenge. From Mark preaching his faith, it led to his death at the hands of pagans. This was just a taste of the violence that would soon unravel itself in Alexandria. Although, the main problem with Christianity arose when they wanted not only spiritual power but wanted temporal power as well.
Since they wanted this, it led Hypatia to come into conflict with the greatest political operator of her time. The problem escalated when the new bishop Cyril was ordained in the city. This is because he didn’t want to settle for just Spiritual authority, but wanted also wanted power on earth. He didn’t want to share any of these with the pagans in society. This changed Alexandria forever because he wanted to have control over everything. Since Hypatia was weather and an educated pagan, it meant she was a witch in his eyes. This led to him putting about rumors about this and required her to die. When Hypatia was found, she was dragged out of her carriage and had her clothes ripped off. This was considered degrading to someone of her stature. Then she was pulled into a temple and flayed alive with anything people could get their hands on. When this was done, they pulled her body limb from limb and burned them at the edge of the
city. After reflecting upon Hypatia’s death, I can conclude that someone like her in a civilized world would not die under similar conditions now. This is because we have many freedoms and a judicial system in the world. With the judicial system in place, it doesn’t allow people to kill others in the world without serious consequences. We also possess many freedoms now that weren’t previously available in Hypatia’s time. People get to choose their religion now and we don’t have people preaching their ideas for total control. With these freedoms and equality in the world, we couldn’t just kill someone for being a witch. Instead, we would have to treat them properly until they did something that harmed others. Even then this problem would get taken to our judicial system where they would deem the necessary punishment. Death is harsh and in the world today it would be hard kill someone for having different views. Though, I specifically only say this is the case in a civilized world. This is because anything can happen in the world. Especially so with people living in parts of the world that are uncivilized were there are no rules. It’s hard to predict people’s actions who would live in conditions here because people are unpredictable. For example, things such as genocides happen in our world today for no reason. Perhaps here someone like Hypatia could die under the same circumstances.