28. The Adventurous Journey of Alexander the Great’s Corpse
By the time Alexander the Great’s corpse began its journey back home, his chief generals had worked out a preliminary rough division of his empire amongst themselves. One of them, Ptolemy, ended up with Egypt as his share. He decided that the prestige of his new realm would be greatly enhanced if it hosted the body of Alexander. Specifically in the city of Alexandria, founded by and named after the great conqueror. So Ptolemy set out to hijack the great conqueror’s corpse. In 321 BC, he intercepted Alexander’s funerary procession, seized the body, and took it back to Egypt.
Ptolemy and his successors built and maintained an impressive mausoleum for Alexander in Alexandria, which became one of the city’s biggest attractions. Over the centuries, powerful figures such as Julius Caesar, Augustus, and other Roman emperors, stopped by to pay their respects. Augustus accidentally broke Alexander’s nose, while other emperors pilfered mementos from the coffin. Over time, however, interest in the mausoleum waned. In 400 AD, a visitor noted that the Alexandrines did not know where Alexander’s tomb was. In the centuries since, there were scattered reports by visitors claiming to have seen Alexander’s tomb, but nothing specific enough to allow archaeologists to pinpoint a location. As of 2021, the final resting place of Alexander the Great is one of history’s unsolved mysteries.