Tristan Hughes

It's been a difficult journey.

But nevertheless...

But through that, they've learned.

They've then, from then on, know there is a sense of, okay, this is India.

How does it connect to the heartland of the Persian Empire?

So they have learned things.

I mean, there is some positive, I suppose, from this, but it's all been expensive, sort of overly costly.

There's a move altogether in that a lot of the people he executes are Asians and they're local people that he's kept in power.

So as well as some of the Greeks and others who've gone off the rails, as far as he's concerned, there's an emphasis more, you get more Greeks and particularly Macedonians appointed subsequently.

And then you get this big ceremony where he marries off

particularly prominent Macedonians, but also some others more generally, to aristocratic Persian and Asian women.

Now, this used to be, you know, you've got the old stuff from Tal and people like that.

This was all to do with this idea of brotherhood of mankind.

You would bring the different races together and all mingle together.

The significant thing is that you don't marry any Persian men to a Macedonian wife.

It's all one-sided.

It is purely Alexander's officers get...

pretty and wealthy, well-connected local women as their wives.

So it might be a sense of, well, I'd like you all to settle in Asia and think of these as your main estates.

Significantly, all but one, the exception being Seleucus, will, as soon as Alexander's dead, they get rid of these wives, divorce them or just dispose of them.