ALEXANDER'S FAMILY C-D
Cadmeia Niece
Daughter of Alexander’s sister Cleopatra and Alexander of Epirus. Believed to have been born in 335 BC as her name commemorates Alexander’s victory over Thebes. Her father died when she was 4 and she remained in Epirus under the care of her grandmother when her mother returned to Macedonia after Alexander’s death. Her mother died in Sardis in 308 BC. Cadmeia was still alive in 296 BC, but when she died or whether she married is not known. Alexander would have met her as a baby when he took his mother to Epirus in 337 BC.
Campaspe Mistress
According to Aelian, she was a prominent citizen of Larissa in Thessaly who was Alexander's first mistress. He commissioned Apelles to paint her portrait but Apelles fell in love with her and Alexander relinquished her to Apelles. She is likely to have been a high class hetaira.
This affair may be fictitious.
Caranus Half-brother
Justin states that when Philip was murdered, Alexander ordered Caranus killed. "His brother Caranus, a rival for the throne, as being the son of his step-mother, he ordered to be slain."
Caranus may have been the son of Cleopatra, Philip's last wife, which would mean he was an infant at the time of his death. However, Olympias murdered Cleopatra and her infant daughter Europa, which would mean that Cleopatra bore Philip 2 children in under 2 years. As the earliest date for their marriage was spring 337, this seems unlikely.
Justin also states that Philip "had also many others (sons) by several wives, as is not unusual with princes, some of whom died a natural death, and others by the sword." It is therefore likely that Caranus was the son of one of Philip's other wives, perhaps Phila or Philinna. He may have been an adolescent at the time of Philip's murder, which would account for Alexander removing a potential rival. Alexander was also said to have later regretted killing his brothers, indicating he removed more than one rival brother.
Many historians doubt Caranus’s existence, citing Justin as being unreliable.
Child 1 Infant son
The Metz Epitome, a late Antiquity source, mentions a first child of Alexander and Roxane who died at the Indus in late 326 BC. The child may have died soon after birth, or could have been up to 9 months old as Alexander and Roxane had been married in spring of the previous year.
"There he found the ships which Porus and Taxiles had built, 800 biremes and 300 store-ships, and he put on board crews and provisions. In the meantime Alexander's son by Roxane died." (Metz Epitome, 70.)
Child 2 Potential infant
Queen Statira, wife of Darius III, was captured by Alexander at Issus in 333 BC. She is said to have died in childbirth before the battle of Gaugamela in 331 BC. (Plutarch, 30.) The question is: when exactly? Arrian tries to convince his readers that Alexander never touched 'the most beautiful woman' in Asia. However, if Statira died later than spring 332 BC, there is a slight chance that she might have carried Alexander's child, not the child of Darius. We will never know.
Written by nick
Child 3 Unlikely
Our classic sources seem to confirm - or suggest - that Alexander spent thirteen nights with Thalestris, the Queen of the legendary female Amazon warriors. This is supposed to have happened around 330/329 BC, near the shores of the Caspian. Thalestris begged Alexander to conceive a child with her. It probably did not happen and is a fictitious account to link Alexander with the Amazons.
Written by nick
Child 4 Legendary
Alexander is said to have conceived a child with the Indian Queen Cleophis of Massaga, now in northern Pakistan (326 BC). Our source for this is Justin. Cleophis is said to have achieved by sexual favours what she could not achieve by force of arms, and her son Alexander rose to sovereignity over the Indians. However: "Queen Cleophis was from that time called the 'royal whore' by the Indians." (Justin, 12.7.11.)
Written by nick
Child 5 Legendary
There are other tales of Alexander fathering children on Indian princesses. The Malay annals have him fathering a son on Shahru’l-Bariyah, daughter of Raja Kida Hindi. The son is left behind in India as Alexander has long since gone.
Written by nick
Cleopatra Sister
The daughter of Philip and Olympias. She was married to her mother's brother Alexander of Epirus in October 336 BC at Ageae when Philip was murdered. She was probably 16-18 at the time.
She bore Alexander two children, a daughter Cadmeia and a son Neoptolemus. Alexander went to Italy in 334 BC and died there in 331 BC. Cleopatra acted as regent for her son. In 324 BC, Cleopatra returned to Macedonia, while Olympias acted as regent in Epirus due to her strained relationship with Antipater.
Cleopatra and her brother Alexander are believed to have kept in touch during his campaigns, and when he was informed that she had taken a lover, he said he was glad she was enjoying herself. After Alexander's death, she negotiated with Leonnatus to marry him and, after his death, with Perdiccas. Antipater accused her of being involved in the death of Cynane, who was executed by Perdiccas’s brother. After Antipater's death in 319 BC she was captured at Sardis and was kept under house arrest by Antigonus, who ordered her execution in 308 BC on discovering that she was planning to marry Ptolemy. Her son was deposed in 313 BC and may have gone to live with her.
Cleopatra (aka Eurydike) Step-mother
Niece of Attalus, general of Philip. Sister of Hippostratus. Philip fell in love with her, and she was his seventh and final wife. At her wedding in 337 BC Philip and Alexander quarrelled when Attalus impuned Alexander’s legitimacy. Cleopatra bore Philip a daughter Europa in 336 BC shortly before Philip was assassinated. When Alexander was away from court, Olympias murdered mother and daughter.
Cleophis Alleged Mistress
Cleophis was the queen of Assacana. When Alexander was traveling down the Indus in 326 BC he besieged Assacana. After he was wounded in the fighting, his men made great efforts to take the city (Metz Epitome 40-41).
Cleophis, realising that her people could not hold out and wanting to do what she could for them, surrendered to the Macedonians. According to Curtius, the queen placed her son (grandson in the Metz Epitome) on Alexander’s lap while her ladies poured libations; and Curtius, as always looking for a good story, suggests that Alexander was inclined to pardon her because of her beauty, rather than because he was sorry for her (QC 8.10.34-35; Metz Epitome 45).
Justin provides a more lurid version, saying that Cleophis recovered her kingdom and position by sleeping with Alexander; Justin maintains that she bore Alexander a son. Curtius does concede that she later bore a son whom she named Alexander, he does not commit himself as to the identity of the father (Jus. 12.7; QC 8.10.36. The Metz Epitome makes no mention of the subsequent baby).
The story of Cleophis appears only in Curtius, Justin, and the Metz Epitome, which has led many to believe that it was not true, but concocted by the vulgate source, always happy to include a salacious story. It is generally accepted now that omission from Arrian does not make a story fictitious; but there is still debate about the veracity of Justin’s version—not least because Curtius’ version sheds sufficient doubt as to the more lurid details.
Written by marcus.
Cynna or Cynnane Half-sister
Daughter of Philip by the Illyrian Audata. Born about 358 BC, she was said to have personally led an army against the Illyrians in the mid-340s when she accompanied Philip on campaign. She was married to her cousin Amyntas (337 BC) and bore him a daughter, Adea Eurydike. After Amyntas’s execution in 336/5 BC, Alexander offered her in marriage to Langarus king of the Agrianes, but he died before this occurred.
After Alexander's death she led an army into Asia with the aim of marrying her daughter to Philip Arrhidaeus but she was killed by Perdiccas's brother Alcetas in the region of Ephesus. Alcetas’s army mutinied and forced the marriage.
Cynnane was later buried at Aegae alongside her daughter and son-in-law.
Darius III Father-in-law
Great King of Persia, son of Arsanes and Sisygambis. Alexander never met his adversary, merely corresponded with him after Issus in 333 BC when Darius offered peace terms to negotiate the return of his family. Alexander treated the Persian royal family with respect and married Stateira, Darius’s eldest daughter, in 324 BC at Susa. Darius was murdered by his kinsman Bessus in 330 BC.
Daughter Alleged
An alleged and unnamed daughter of Alexander and Roxane married Achaeus, the son of Seleucus and Apama (the daughter of Spitamenes). She bore Achaeus 4 children - Antiochus, Andromachus, Laodice, and Alexander. See http://www.american-pictures.com/geneal ... 1161.htm#0.
It is unlikely she was Alexander's daughter, or she would have gone westwards with Roxane and the kings, but she may have been the daughter of a woman from the royal harem.
Daughter of Atheas Step-mother
In 339 BC Philip defeated the Scythian king Atheas. He may have married Atheas’s unnamed daughter. She has been proposed as a candidate for the female burial in Tomb II.
Deidameia Prospective daughter in law
Daughter of Aeacides, Olympias’s nephew and king of Epirus. Betrothed to Alexander IV in bid to gain his independence. Captured at Pydna in 316 BC by Cassander. She was married to Demetrius Poliorcetes, son of Antigonatus and later king of Macedonia. She bore him a son called Alexander. Alexander would never have met her.
Drypetis Sister-in-law
Drypetis was the younger daughter of Darius III. She was captured by Alexander after Issus in 333 BC, along with her sister Stateira, her mother (also Stateira), and her grandmother Sisygambis, and brother Ochus. After their capture, the Persian women joined Alexander’s baggage train for around two years (Arr. 2.11.9; Diod. 35f; Pl. Alex. 20.6-21; QC 3.11.24-26).
Drypetis is not mentioned by name in any of the sources on the occasion of Alexander’s meeting with Sisygambis, although her presence (and that of her sister) is attested, especially in the description of their grief when they think that Darius has been slain, and particularly as they fear for their own lives (eg. QC 3.11.25, 3.12.3-5; Pl. Alex. 21.1).
However, Alexander is said to have treated Darius’ daughters with "as much respect as if they were his own sisters" (QC 3.12.21; see also Pl. Alex. 21.3, Athenaeus 13.603b-d); he also promised to ensure that the two princesses were given husbands of sufficient rank (Diod. 17.38.1; Jus. 11.9).
However, there was no doubt that the royal women were Alexander’s captives: in the exchange of letters between Darius and Alexander, before Gaugamela, Darius offered Alexander one of his daughters in marriage (we don’t know which, but we might presume it was Stateira, as the elder); Alexander’s reply was that what Darius offered was already his (Pl. Alex. 29.4; QC 4.5.1; Just. 11.12).
When Drypetis’ mother died the princess was at her side (QC 4.10.19).
When the army left Susa in late 331 BC the royal family remained at the palace. Alexander committed a grave faux pas at that time—having received some material from Macedonia he sent it to Sisygambis, suggesting that she might like to make some clothes and teach her grand-daughters (ie. Stateira and Drypetis) dressmaking. This was a deep insult to the Persian women, which Alexander was able to avert once he had explained his homeland’s customs (QC 5.1.17-22).
Drypetis disappears from Alexander’s history at this point, until the king’s return from India.
When he arrived back in Susa he arranged marriages for his companions with high-born Persian women. Alexander himself married Stateira, while Drypetis was given to Hephaestion. No source records whether the princesses were happy with their marriages, although Drypetis could not have aimed for a more powerful or wealthy husband, bar the king himself—Hephaestion was, at that time, very clearly the second man in the empire. (For the marriages: Arr. 7.4.4-8; Pl. Alex. 70.2; Diod. 17.107.6; Just. 12.10; Athenaeus 12.538B. Aelian Var. Hist. 8.7 gives a detailed description of the marriage feast, which is echoed in Pl. Moralia 329D-F.)
Whether her marriage was one of love or not, Drypetis did not enjoy it for long. In 324 BC Hephaestion died after a brief illness. When Alexander died she was in mourning for her husband with her grandmother Sisygambis in Susa, along with her brother Ochus. Some months later Alexander too died, and Roxane lured Stateira and Drypetis to her, and had the two princesses killed, with the connivance of Perdiccas—Roxane was pregnant and was determined that her son should be the undisputed heir to the empire (Pl. Alex. 77.4).
Written by marcus. Revised 2023