Macedonian Empire

Before the 4th century BC, Macedonia was a small kingdom centered in Aegae, outside of the area dominated by the city-states of Athens, Sparta, and Thebes, and briefly subordinate to the Achaemenid Empire. During the reign of king Philip II (359–336 BC), Macedonia with its capital in Pella, subdued mainland Greece, Paeonia, and the Thracian Odrysian kingdom through conquest and diplomacy. With a reformed army containing phalanxes wielding the sarissa pike, Philip II defeated the old powers of Athens and Thebes in the Battle of Chaeronea in 338 BC. Philip II's son Alexander the Great, leading a federation of Greek states founded by his father, accomplished the objective of commanding the whole of Greece when he destroyed Thebes after the city revolted. During Alexander's subsequent campaign of conquest, he overthrew the Achaemenid Empire and conquered territory that stretched as far as the Indus River. For a brief period, his Macedonian Empire was the most powerful in the world – the definitive Hellenistic state, inaugurating the transition to a new period of Ancient Greek civilization. Greek arts and literature flourished in the new conquered lands and advances in philosophy, engineering, and science spread across the empire and beyond. Of particular importance were the contributions of Aristotle, tutor to Alexander, whose writings became a keystone of Western philosophy.