Above the history of Europe, there were four major military commanders, and Alexander the Great was at the top. The empire established by Alexander was the first country that truly spanned the three continents of Europe, Asia and Africa, but just as he was preparing to further expand his territory, he died suddenly and unexpectedly. What's going on here? What is the mystery of Alexander the Great's death? If you want to know, let Xiaobian reveal the secret for you:
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In the face of various pressures from work and family, modern people always like to ridicule themselves as "pressure mountain", indicating the embarrassment and embarrassment of the situation. Where does the term "stress mountain" come from? In fact, it originates from the name of a person, who is Alexander the Great. Alexander the Great was born in 356 BC to Frederick II, the head of the Macedonian kingdom. From an early age, Alexander showed unusual wit and bravery, so his father also found the wise man Aristotle as a teacher to teach him all kinds of knowledge.
After Alexander succeeded to the throne, his great talent began to gradually appear, he successively unified the whole of Greece, then sent troops to sweep through the Middle East, and even under the strong political manipulation, he occupied all of Egypt without a single soldier, and also defeated the invincible Persian Empire, making Darius III's mother and wife his captives.
The territory of the world's three major ancient civilizations, only ancient China was exempted from Alexander's iron hoof, and the entire territory of the territory conquered by it was about 5 million square kilometers. At this time, China was still in the Warring States period, and Alexander controlled more territory than the total territory of the Seven Heroes of the Warring States, such a great achievement, only took Alexander 13 years.
By June 10, 323 BC, Alexander the Great, who was preparing to lead a large army on an expedition to the Arabian Peninsula, suddenly fell ill without any unusual signs and died violently 12 days later, leaving a mystery that was difficult to solve for posterity.
At this time, some readers will surely ask, how did Alexander the Great die? After all, he was young and strong, only 33 years old when he died, and the history books have never recorded a history of major diseases. For the death of Alexander the Great, historians have done a lot of research and exploration, and at the same time got a lot of relevant answers and evidence. Today, Xiaobian will briefly explain to you three theories about the mystery of the death of Alexander the Great:
1. Plague said
Due to the limitations of the development of science and technology, the ancients' cognitive ability to understand nature is quite limited, so there are also many superstitious words of gods and monsters. In ancient China, there has always been a saying of ominous omens, and after the anti-thief Dong Zhuozhong Wang Yun made a series of calculations, he thought of replacing the Han Emperor and coming to the world. Unexpectedly, on the way to the destination, the big car rut was damaged and the big flag suddenly broke, and the subordinates all thought that this was an ominous omen, but Dong Zhuo did not believe it at all and still marched forward, who knew that just after getting off the car, he was stabbed to death by Lü Bu.
Coincidentally, in the course of his research by American infectious disease expert John Marr, he also discovered "ominous omens" about Alexander the Great before his death, which led to associations. In the data, John learned that when Alexander's army attacked Babylon, he had seen birds pecking at each other in the sky and then falling to the ground and dying, and that this unusual state of death of birds was precisely due to a plague disease called "West Nile fever".
John also added that the data showed that Alexander the Great could not get out of bed in the later period, which was fully in line with the onset of "West Nile fever", so Alexander was likely to die of the plague disease at that time.
2. Say drunk
The death of Alexander the Great is described in the Encyclopædia Britannica, which states: "After a very long wine feast, he (Alexander the Great) suddenly fell ill and died ten days later, on 13 June 323 BC". The description in the book seems simple, but when the author describes Alexander's death, he does not mention his other causes of death, but points the finger directly at drinking.
As we all know, although alcohol is a good drink, once it is consumed in excess, it is very likely to lead to alcohol poisoning. According to the data, 8 months before Alexander's violent death, his good friend Hephasdion died in battle, which made Alexander extremely devastated, so he drank a lot of wine at night to relieve his sorrows, as to whether Alexander was poisoned by drinking too much alcohol because of this incident, there is no definite evidence.
3. Poisoning said
There is also a theory that Alexander should have been poisoned, because his subordinate Kasander had been wrongfully beaten by him, so he held a grudge and killed his master by poisoning. What was the poison that killed Alexander? Under the stripping of the cocoon by the experts, the famous 25 poisons of ancient Greece were screened one by one, and finally based on the symptoms before Alexander's death, it was found that the poison that caused his death was a sunflower.
Also known as "winter sunflower", it is a common plant distributed in the temperate zone of the eastern hemisphere, and Tang Materia Medica believes that "sunflower, cold, is unfavorable for urination", that is, it belongs to a special convenience laxative. Greek doctors also discovered this and used it as a specific drug.
When studying the poisoning theory, experts pointed out a key point, the amount of toxin in the sunflower must be very high to kill an adult, and Alexander could not take so many sunflowers at once even if he drank a lot of alcohol, so the poisoning theory seems to be untenable.
It was only later, after experts had adopted a method that simulated human testing for the side effects of sunflower poisoning, that a completely new idea was that Alexander was indeed poisoned and died, but his original intention was to treat the disease with the sunflower. However, in the process of repeated taking, unfortunately, a large amount of anthraxin was accumulated in the body, which eventually led to death.
But then again, because archaeological documents are too scarce, and the history of Alexander the Great has passed about 2500 years, almost all the evidence is buried in the long river of history, and it is difficult to restore the original face of the event. However, Xiaobian believes that with the further deepening of archaeological work in the future, the answer to the mystery of Alexander's death will surely come out.
Wen xiucai, editor-in-chief of Wenlan Hairun Studio, written by: Special history writer: Changshan Zhao Zi worm