| Abrocomes | Brother to Xerxes the Great; killed in Battle of Thermopylae. |
| Ada of Caria | Member of the House of Hecatomnus (the Hecatomnids); ruler of Caria, first as Persian Satrap and later as Queen under auspices of Alexander III. |
| Aeschreas | A city leader in Delphi. |
| Aetolians | The people of Aetolia. |
| Agenor | King of Sidon. |
| Agesilaus | Brother to King Agis? |
| Agis | Spartan king who rebelled against Alexander III. |
| Agrianians | Paeonian-Thracian tribe; in the time of Philip II, the territory of the Agrianes was administered by Pella; crack javelin throwers and an elite unit of Alexander III’s light infantry, who fought under the command of General Attalus. |
| Alexander I | Philip II’s brother-in-law; husband of Cleopatra, Philip II’s daughter. |
| Alexander II | Brother of Philip II. |
| Alexander III | King of Macedon; son of Philip II; Alexander the Great. |
| Alexander Lyncestes | Native of the upper-Macedonian district called Lyncestis. |
| Amastris (Amastrine) |
Persian princess; daughter of Oxyathres, the brother of Persian King Darius III. |
| Amphitryon | King of Thebes. |
| Amyntas | Macedonian officer in Alexander III’s army. |
| Amyntas III | Father of King Philip II. |
| Amyntas IV | Infant nephew of Philip II who was the heir to the throne; Philip II usurped him. |
| Amyntor | Macedonian nobleman and general in the army of Alexander; father of Hephaestion. |
| Anaxandridas II | King of Sparta between 560 and 525 BCE; father of Leonidas I. |
| Androsthenes | Childhood friend of Alexander III; admiral during Persian campaign. |
| Antipater | Macedonian general who served under Philip II and Alexander III. In 320 BCE; regent of Alexander’s entire empire. |
| Apollonius Rhodius | Apollonius of Rhodes; best known as author of the Argonautica, an epic poem about Jason and the Argonauts and their quest for the Golden Fleece. |
| Archelaus | King of Macedon from 413 to 399 BCE; founded Pella as capital of the kingdom. |
| Archytas of Tarentum | Philosopher, mathematician, astronomer, statesman, and strategist; lecturer at Plato’s academy. |
| Ardiaei | Illyrian tribe residing inland; eventually settled the Adriatic coast of the Balkan Peninsula. |
| Ariobarzanes | Persian satrap of Persis; fought against Alexander III at the Battle of the Persian Gate as Alexander’s forces were making their way to Persepolis in 330 BCE. |
| Aristander of Telmessus | Greek from Caria; Alexander III’s favorite seer; already in Philip’s entourage in 357/6, when he correctly interpreted a dream as revealing Olympias’ pregnancy. |
| Aristotle | Greek philosopher and scientist born in the Macedonian city of Stagira, Chalkidice. |
| Arsinoe II | Ptolemaic Greek Princess of Ancient Egypt; through marriage was Queen of Thrace, Asia Minor, and Macedonia as wife of King Lysimachus; later was co-ruler of Egypt with her brother-husband Ptolemy II Philadelphus. |
| Artabazus | Persian general and satrap; son of Persian satrap of Phrygia, Pharnabazus, and younger kinsman to Ariobarzanes of Phrygia who revolted against Artaxerxes II around 366 BCE. |
| Artonis | One of 80 noble Persian women married to the elite Macedonian officers of Alexander III in a mass ceremony in Susa. |
| Arymbas | Bodyguard to Alexander III. |
| Ascalaphus | Brother to Pannenion; one of the generals of Alexander III. |
| Assakenoi | Highland chieftain who refused to submit to Alexander III. |
| Atropates | Persian nobleman who served Darius III, then Alexander III, and eventually founded an independent kingdom and dynasty named after himself. |
| Attalus | Important courtier of Philip II. |
| Autophradates | Persian commander in the Aegean who faced the Macedonians. |
| Axiothea of Phlius | Woman who studied at Plato’s academy. |
| Bactrian | People of Bactria. |
| Barsine | Daughter of Artabazus, satrap of Hellespontine Phrygia; wife of Mentor of Rhodes and after his death, Mentor’s brother, Memnon. |
| Batis | Commander of Persian garrison at Gaza. |
| Bessus | Prominent Persian satrap of Bactria |
| Brisēís | Queen in Asia Minor at time of the Trojan War; concubine to Achilles; Agamemnon stole her from Achilles. |
| Bucephalus | The favorite steed of Alexander III. |
| Cabeiri (Cabiri, Kabeiroi, or Kabiri) |
Group of enigmatic chthonic deities; worshiped in a mystery cult closely associated with Hephaestus; centered in the north Aegean islands of Lemnos and possibly Samothrace—at the Samothrace temple complex—and at Thebes; distant origins of the Cabeiri and the Samothracian gods may include pre-Greek elements, or other non-Greek elements, such as Hittite, Thracian, proto-Etruscan, or Phrygian. |
| Cadmus | King of Tyre; brother to Queen Europa. |
| Callicrates | One of the architects of the Parthenon. |
| Carians | Inhabitants of Caria in southwest Anatolia. |
| Cassander | King of Macedonia kingdom from 305 BCE until 297 BCE. |
| Cersobleptes | Thracian prince conquered by Philip II. |
| Chaldean | People of Chaldea, a small Semitic nation that emerged between the late tenth and early nine century BCE; Chaldean tribes were absorbed into the native population of Babylonia. |
| Choerilos | Astronomer traveling with Alexander’s army; author’s fictional character. |
| Cleitus the Black | Officer of Macedonian army led by Alexander III; saved Alexander’s life at the Battle of the Granicus; was killed by Alexander in drunken quarrel several years later. |
| Cleodaeos | A biologist who travels with Alexander’s army; author’s fictional character. |
| Cleomenes | Agiad King of Sparta; pursued an adventurous and at times unscrupulous foreign policy aimed at crushing Argos and extending Sparta’s influence both inside and outside the Peloponnese; during his reign the Peloponnesian League came formally into existence. |
| Cleopatra | Daughter of Philip II; half-sister to Alexander III. |
| Cleopatra Eurydice | Mid-fourth century BCE Macedonian noblewoman; niece of Attalus; last of the seven wives of Philip II of Macedon. |
| Cleophis | Mother of Assakenos (Assacanus), the war-leader of the Assakenoi (Assacani) people at the time of Alexander III’s invasion. |
| Clysonymus | Murdered by his friend, Patroclus, during an argument over a game of dice. |
| Cnemon | Main character in Menander’s Dyskolos. |
| Coenus | Aon of Polemocrates and son-in-law of Parmenion; one of the ablest and most faithful generals of Alexander III in his Persian expedition. |
| Cossaeans | Tribe of mountain people settled in modern-day western Iran; situated somewhere in the Zagros mountains between Media on the north and Susiana in the south; reportedly, when Persian kings went down from Ecbatana, where they usually spent the summer, into Babylonia they made gifts to the Cossaeans—perhaps a kind of toll. |
| Crantor | Scholar at Plato’s academy. |
| Craterus | Macedonian general under Alexander III; one of the Diadochi; son of Macedonian nobleman, Alexander from Orestis, and brother of Admiral Amphoterus. |
| Crateus | Son of Tegeates, founder of Tegea; father to Aerope. |
| Critias | Athenian political figure and author; born in Athens; son of Callaeschrus; first cousin of Plato’s mother, Perictione; became leading and violent member of the Thirty Tyrants. |
| Cyrus the Younger | Son of Darius II of Persia and Parysatis; Persian prince and general; died in 401 BCE after failed battle to oust his brother, Artaxerxes II, from the Persian throne. |
| Darius III | Originally named Artashata (and called Codomannus by the Greeks) he adopted the name Darius as a dynastic name; last king of the Achaemenid Empire of Persia from 336 BCE to 330 BCE. |
| Demaratus | Friend of Alexander; mediated reconciliation between Alexander and his father, Philip II. |
| Democritus | Influential pre-Socratic philosopher primarily remembered for his formulation of an atomic theory of the universe. |
| Demosthenes | Prominent Greek statesman and orator of ancient Athens; orations constitute a significant expression of contemporary Athenian intellectual prowess and provide an insight into the politics and culture of ancient Greece during fourth century BCE. |
| Diadochi | Rival generals, families, and friends of Alexander III who fought for control over his empire after his death in 323 BCE; The Wars of the Diadochi mark the beginning of the Hellenistic period. |
| dikasts | Athenian citizens chosen by lot to serve as jurors. |
| Dorians | One of the four major Greek ethnē (along with Aeolians, Achaeans and Ionians) into which the Greeks—or Hellenes, those in the ancient period considered themselves—divided; earliest literary mention in Odyssey, where they already can be found inhabiting the island of Crete. |
| Drypetis (Drypteis) |
Princess of the Achaemenid dynasty in Persia; born between 350 and 345 BCE; daughter of Stateira I and Darius III of Persia. |
| Eleusinians | The people of Eleusis. |
| Epaminondas | Theban general and statesman of fourth century BCE who transformed Ancient Greek city-state of Thebes, leading it out of Spartan subjugation into a preeminent position in Greek politics. |
| ephebe | Young man between ages of eighteen and twenty who has petitioned for full citizenship. |
| Ephialtes | Malian Greek traitor at the Battle of Thermopylae. |
| Epigonoi | Sons of the Argive heroes who had fought and been killed in the first Theban war, the subject of the Thebaid, in which Polynices and six allies (the Seven Against Thebes) attacked Thebes because Polynices’ brother, Eteocles, refused to give up the throne as promised. |
| Ergastines | Young women in charge of weaving the peplos over-garment offered to Athena. |
| Erigyius | Childhood friend of Alexander III; exiled by Philip for his role in testing the king’s loyalty to his son, Alexander. |
| eromenos | An adolescent boy courted by an older man, or in an erotic relationship with an older man. |
| Eudoxus | Scholar at Plato’s academy. |
| Eumenes | Greek general and scholar; participated in Wars of the Diadochi as a supporter of the Macedonian Argead royal house. |
| Euripides | Tragedian (writer of tragedies) during classical Athens. He is one of the three whose plays have survived; other two were Aeschylus and Sophocles. |
| Europa | Daughter of Cleopatra Eurydice and Philip II; murdered at the bequest of Olympias, Alexander III’s mother, when he ascended the throne. |
| Eurydice I | Mother of King Philip II; wife of Orpheus. |
| Eurydike | Queen of Nemea; mother of Opheltes. |
| Eurymedon the Hierophant | Representative of Demetra of Eleusis; with the school of Isocrates and Demophilos they brought a charge of impiety against Aristotle. |
| Getae | Several Thracian tribes inhabiting the regions to either side of the Lower Danube, in what is today northern Bulgaria and southern Romania. |
| Glaucias (Glaukias) | King of the Taulanti. |
| Guraeans | One of three Kamboja highlander clans—Aspasioi of the Kunar/Alishang valleys, Guraeans of the Guraeus (Panjkora) valley, and Assakenoi of the Swat and Buner valleys—conquered by Alexander III. |
| Harpalus | Childhood friend of Alexander III; exiled by Philip for his role in testing the king’s loyalty to his son, Alexander. |
| Hecataeus | Historian who believed Uranus, Cronus, and Zeus were ancient rulers who came to be worshipped as gods as a way to honor their roles as generous benefactors to their subjects. |
| Hephaestion | Childhood friend of Alexander; general in Alexander’s army; escort to the narrator. |
| Heraclides | Scholar at Plato’s academy. |
| Heromenes | Mathematician and scholar, who travels with Alexander’s army; author’s fictional character. |
| Hesiod | Poet generally thought by scholars to have been active between 750 and 650 BCE, around the same time as Homer. |
| Hippodamus | Greek architect, urban planner, physician, mathematician, meteorologist, and philosopher; considered the father of urban planning; namesake of Hippodamian plan of city layouts (grid plan). |
| Hisarlik (Hissarlik) |
Modern name for the generally agreed site of ancient Troy (also known as Ilion); located in modern-day Turkey. |
| Hittites | Anatolian people who established an empire centered on Hattusa in north-central Anatolia. |
| Homer | Author of the Iliad and the Odyssey; believed to have been the first and greatest of the epic poets in Ancient Greece. |
| Hydarnes | General at the Battle of Thermopylae. |
| Hypaspists | Elite infantry force of Alexander III’s army; carried the traditional panoply and weapons of the Greek hoplite—thorax or linothorax, greaves, the dory (spear), and xiphos (shortsword). |
| Hyperanthes | Brother to Xerxes the Great; killed in Battle of Thermopylae. |
| Ictinos | One of the architects of the Parthenon. |
| Iollas | Son of Antipater, cup-bearer to Alexander III; may have poisoned Alexander to bring about his death |
| Iphicles | Twin brother to Heracles; son of Amphitryon and Alcmene. |
| Ismarus | Son of Eumolpos; married to daughter of King Tegyrius. |
| Jason, Tyrant of Pherae | Ruler of Thessaly during the period just before King Philip II of Macedon came to power. |
| Kallisthenes | Official court historian of Alexander III’s reign. |
| Karademas | General who implied to Darius III as a Greek, he was a better general than any Persian and should lead the army and made derogatory comments about Persian culture; Darius ordered him executed, but realized he had just executed the only competent general; Darius took Karademas’ army and left Babylon to intercept Alexander. |
| Lacedaemonians | Inhabitants of Sparta or Lacedaemon. |
| Laomedon | Childhood friend of Alexander III; admiral during the Persian campaign, |
| Lasthenia of Mantinea | Woman who studied at Plato’s academy. |
| Leochares | Athenian sculptor. |
| Leodamas of Thasos | Mathematician; lecturer at Plato’s academy. |
| Leonidas I | Greek warrior-king of Sparta; led forces during the Second Persian War; remembered for his death at the Battle of Thermopylae; third son of Anaxandridas II of Sparta; descended from the demigod Heracles. |
| Locrians | Ancient Greek tribe inhabiting the region of Locris in Central Greece, around Parnassus. |
| Lycomedes | Also known as Lycurgus; king of Dolopians on island of Scyros near Euboea; father of a number of daughters including Deidameia; grandfather of Pyrrhus or Neoptolemus. |
| Lykourgos | Priest-King of Nemea; father of Opheltes. |
| Lysander | Spartan admiral who commanded Spartan fleet in the Hellespont, which defeated the Athenians at Aegospotami in 405 BCE; forced the Athenians to capitulate, bringing end to Peloponnesian War; organized the dominion of Sparta over Greece in the last decade of his life; was worshipped as a god during his lifetime. |
| Macedonians | Inhabitants of Macedon. |
| Magadha Empire | One of the sixteen mahajanapadas of ancient India; core of the kingdom was the area of Bihar south of the Ganges. |
| Medes | Ancient Iranian people who lived in an area known as Media (in modern-day northwestern Iran). |
| Medius of Larissa | Son of Oxythemis; native of Larissa in Thessaly; friend of Alexander III; commanded a trireme during the descent of the Indus river; Alexander supped just before his last illness. |
| Melqart | Tutelary god of the Phoenician city of Tyre; considered to be the ancestor of the Tyrian royal family; identified with Heracles and referred to as the Tyrian Herakles. |
| Memnon | General from Rhodes sent by King Darius III to surge against Macedonian troops in Ionia. |
| Menander | Greek dramatist (writer of dramas); best-known representative of Athenian New Comedy; author of more than a hundred comedies. |
| Menidas | High commander in the army of Alexander III. |
| Menoetius | Alexander III’s sailing master; husband to Polymele; father to Patroclus, Achilles’ dearest friend. |
| Meroes | Friend of King Porus who Alexander enlisted to deliver a message requesting submission. |
| Mothakes | Citizens of other places who have been raised as Spartans. |
| Nabataean | Arabic people who inhabited northern Arabia and the Southern Levant; settlements included the assumed capital city of Petra; gave the name of Nabatene to the borderland between Arabia and Syria, from the Euphrates to the Red Sea. |
| Nearchus | Childhood friend of Alexander III; exiled by Philip for his role in testing the king’s loyalty to his son, Alexander. |
| Neoclides | Companion to Plato; lecturer at Plato’s academy. |
| Neoptolemus I | Greek king of Epirus; son to Alcetas I; father to Troas, Alexander I of Epirus, and Queen Olympias; maternal grandfather to Alexander III. |
| Odyssey | Ancient Greek epic poem attributed to Homer; in part, a sequel to the Iliad. |
| Oenomaus | King of Pisa. |
| Olympias | Mother to Alexander III. |
| Onomarchus | One of two generals who led Phocis in the Battle of Crocus Field and the Battle of Thermopylae. |
| Opheltes | Son of Priest-King Lykourgos of Nemea and his queen, Eurydike. |
| Ops | Philosopher traveling with Alexander’s army; author’s fictional character. |
| oracle | A priestess or priest who conveys the god’s messages; a place where priests or priestesses live; a prophecy issued by a priest or priestess. |
| Orontobates | Persian married to daughter of Pixodarus, the usurping satrap of Caria; sent by the king of Persia to succeed him; upon approach of Alexander III, he and Memnon of Rhodes entrenched at Halicarnassus. |
| Oxyartes | Bactrian; father of Roxana, the wife of Alexander of Macedon; one of the chiefs who accompanied Bessus on his retreat across the Oxus river into Sogdiana. |
| Pammenes | Guardian of Philip while he was being held hostage in Thebes. |
| Parmenion | King Philip II’s second in command; defeated Illyrians on day of Alexander III’s birth; became Alexander’s second in command; father of Philotas, Alexander’s commander of the Companion Cavalry; all entered Persia. |
| Parysatis | Illegitimate daughter of Artaxerxes I, Emperor of Persia and Andia of Babylon; half-sister of Xerxes II, Sogdianus, and Darius II. |
| Pausanias | Assassinator and captain of Philip II’s bodyguards. |
| Peithon (Pithon) |
Son of Crateuas, a nobleman from Eordaia in western Macedonia; of Illyrian origin; known as one of the bodyguards of Alexander III; became satrap of Media; claimed to be one of the Diadochi. |
| Pelasgians | Used by some ancient Greek writers to refer to populations that either were the ancestors of the Greeks or preceded the Greeks. |
| Pelopidas | Advocate of the Sacred Band of Thebes; Philip II is thought to have been his eromenos; translated as beloved. |
| Penelope | Wife to Eumaeus. |
| Perdiccas | One of Alexander III’s generals. |
| Perdiccas III | Brother of Philip II. |
| perioikoi | Freedmen living in Sparta. |
| Pharmuches | Commander in Alexander III’s army; wiped out by Spitamenes. |
| Pharnabazus | Persian commander in the Aegean who faced the Macedonians. |
| Pheidias | Sculptor of the statue of Zeus. |
| Philemon | Athenian poet and playwright of the New Comedy; born either at Soli in Cilicia or at Syracuse in Sicily, moved to Athens some time before 330 BCE, when he is known to have been producing plays. |
| Philip Arrhidaeus | Alexander III’s half-brother. |
| Philip II | King of Macedon; father to Alexander III (Alexander the Great). |
| Philip of Opus | Scholar at Plato’s academy. |
| Philomelus | One of two generals who led Phocis in the Battle of Crocus Field and the Battle of Thermopylae. |
| Philotas | Macedonian general serving under Philip II and Alexander III. |
| Phocian League | A mixed race of Aeolians and Achaeans who laid claim to partial management of the temple at Delphi and its treasures. |
| Phocians | Residents of Phocis. |
| Phocion | Nicknamed, The Good; an Athenian statesman and strategos; subject of one of Plutarch’s Parallel Lives. |
| Phoenix | Theban general, who along with Prothytes, led insurrection against Alexander. |
| Phrasaortes | General appointed by Alexander III general to succeed Ariobarzanes. |
| Pixodarus | Persian satrap of Caria; daughter married Alexander’s half-brother, Philip Arrhidaeus. |
| Plato | Philosopher and mathematician in Classical Greece; essential figure in the development of philosophy; founded the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world; along with his teacher Socrates and his most famous student, Aristotle, Plato laid the foundations of Western philosophy and science. |
| Pluratus | King of the Ardiaioi (Ardiaei) who fought Philip II in a battle that left Philip wounded in the lower-right leg. |
| Porus wiz Puru (Poros) |
King of Pauravas, territory spanning the region between the Hydaspes (Jhelum) and Acesines (Chenab) rivers in modern-day Punjab, Pakistan; famously fought and lost to Alexander III in Battle of the Hydaspes in 326 BCE; impressed by his adversary Alexander not only reinstated him as satrap of his own kingdom, but also granted him dominion over lands to the north extending until the Hyphasis; was assassinated by one of Alexander’s generals, Eudemus, sometime between 321 and 315 BCE. |
| Prodicus | Greek philosopher; part of the first generation of Sophists; came to Athens as ambassador from Ceos; became known as a speaker and a teacher; Plato treated him with greater respect than other sophists. |
| Prothytes | Theban general who, along with Phoenix, led insurrection against Alexander. |
| Ptolemy | Childhood friend and Macedonian general under Alexander III; became ruler of Egypt and founder of both the Ptolemaic Kingdom and the Ptolemaic Dynasty; exiled by Philip for his role in testing the king’s loyalty to his son, Alexander. |
| Ptolemy II | King of Ptolemaic Egypt from 283 BCE to 246 BCE; son of the founder of the Ptolemaic kingdom, Ptolemy I Soter and Berenice; educated by Philitas of Cos. |
| Pythia | Apollo’s oracle at Delphi. |
| Queen Sisygambis | Queen of Issus who mistook Hephaestion as king. |
| satrap | Provincial governor in Persian empire. |
| scholarch | Head of a school in ancient Greece; especially remembered for its use to mean the heads of schools of philosophy, such as the Platonic Academy. |
| Seleucus (I Nicator) | One of the Diadochi; served as an infantry general under Alexander III; eventually assumed title of basileus and established Seleucid Empire over much of the territory in the Near East, which Alexander had conquered. |
| Socrates | Classical Greek (Athenian) philosopher credited as one of the founders of western philosophy; enigmatic figure known chiefly through the accounts of classical writers, especially the writings of his students Plato and Xenophon and the plays of his contemporary Aristophanes. |
| Somatophylakes | Alexander III’s personal bodyguards. |
| Spartiates | Citizens of Sparta who enjoy full rights; Males of Sparta known to the Spartans as peers or men of equal status. |
| Speusippus | Scholar at Plato’s academy; nephew of Plato. |
| Spitamenes | Sogdian warlord; leader of the uprising in Sogdiana and Bactria against Alexander III in 329 BCE. |
| Spithridates | Satrap of Lydia and Ionia under the High King Darius III Codomannus; Persian commander at Battle of the Granicus. |
| Stasicrates (Dinocrates of Rhodes) |
Greek architect and technical adviser for Alexander III; known for city plan of Alexandria, monumental funeral pyre for Hephaestion, and reconstruction of Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, among others. |
| Taulanti | Cluster of Illyrian tribes; Taulas, one of the six sons of Illyrius, was the eponymous ancestor of the Taulanti. |
| Theaetetus of Sunium | Mathematician; lecturer at Plato’s academy. |
| Thersander | One of the Epigoni, who attacked Thebes in retaliation for deaths of their fathers, the Seven Against Thebes, who had attempted the same thing; son of Polynices and Argea. |
| Thesprotians | Ancient Greek tribe of Thesprotis, Epirus, akin to the Molossians; Homer frequently mentions Thesprotia, which had friendly relations with Ithaca and Doulichi. |
| Thessalus | Corinthian actor Alexander engaged to test Philip II’s loyalty. |
| Timotheus of Miletus | A Greek musician and dithyrambic poet; exponent of the new music; added one or more strings to the lyre, whereby he incurred the displeasure of the Spartans and Athenians. |
| Triballi | Ancient tribe of the plains of modern, southern Serbia and western Bulgaria. |
| Tyndarids | People of Tyndaridae. |
| Tyrians | People of Tyre. |
| Uxians | Tribe of Uxian; fought Alexander III in Battle of Uxian Defile; battle raged on mountain range between key Persian cities of Susa and Persepolis, the ancient capital of the Persian Empire that held symbolic value among the native Persian population, who believed if the city were to fall into enemy hands, then, in effect, the whole Persian Empire would fall into the hands of the enemy. |
| Xenocrates | Scholar at Plato’s academy. |
| Xerxes | Also known as Xerxes the Great; ruled from 486 BCE until his murder in 465 BCE; commander of the royal bodyguard; invaded Greece in 480 BCE. |
| Zethus | Strategist traveling with Alexander’s army; author’s fictional character. |
| Zeuxis | Artist who lived in Pella and painted the palace’s halls. |
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