36 NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2019off several claimants to the throne, but many en-
emies still threatened. The marriage of Olympias
and Philip would unite the northern kingdoms in
an alliance and enhance Philip’s power.Life at Court
By 357 b.c. Olympias had arrived in Pella (Phil-
ip’s primary residence) and married him, thus
becoming one of his seven wives. Macedonian
kings were typically polygamous, but Philip’s
polygamy was on a grander scale, employed to
unify his kingdom and expand his territory.
In 356 Olympias gave birth to her son Alexan-
der; a year or two later, her daughter Cleopatra
(“Cleopatra” means “fame of the father” and was
a popular name among the Macedonian elite)
followed. Philip had only one other son (later
known as Philip III Arrhidaeus) by another wife,
and it became apparent that he was mentally
disabled. Alexander appeared to be the likelyheir, which made Olympias the most prestigious
of Philip’s wives (there was no formalized chief
wife). Since kings could have many sons and
no formal rules for succession seem to have
existed, mothers tended to become succession
advocates for their sons, and Olympias became
that for hers.
Olympias was not the only Molossian at the
Macedonian court: Several relatives, including
her brother (the future Alexander I of Molos-
sia) soon arrived. This Molossian Alexander
remained at court for a number of years. About
343, Philip forced Arybbas into exile to put
Olympias’s brother on the Molossian throne.
This move was a logical development of the al-
liance that had begun years before, not neces-
sarily a demonstration of Olympias’s influence
with her husband, but it did increase her pres-
tige. Olympias remained close to her Molossian
roots the rest of her life.ZEUS AND OLYMPIAS, 16TH-CENTURY FRESCO BY
GIULIO ROMANO. PALAZZO TÈ, MANTOVA, ITALYOLYMPIAS AND THE
THUNDERBOLT OF ZEUS
B
Y THE END of his life, Alexan-
der the Great was claiming
that his real father was not
Philip II of Macedonia, but
the god Zeus. Alexander’s desire to
transcend the merely mortal echoes
his mother’s belief in her family
origins: Olympias grew up believ-
ing her Molossian royal dynasty
was descended from Achilles, the
demigod hero of The Iliad. Accord-
ing to the first-century historian a.d.
Plutarch, Olympias told her son
that he had been conceived when
a thunderbolt—interpreted as
Zeus—entered her womb: “When
she sent Alexander forth upon hisgreat expedition, [Olympias] told
him, and him alone, the secret of his
begetting, and bade him have pur-
poses worthy of his birth.” Alexander,
by all accounts, went on to confirm it
and took a highly dangerous journey
across the Libyan desert during his in-
vasion of Egypt. He visited the oracle
of Ammon-Zeus at the remote oasis
of Siwa in the Libyan desert, where
a priest confirmed to him that he
was the son of Zeus. Plutarch also
recounted a tale that relates Alex-
ander’s mother—and, implicitly, his
own conception—to supernatural
and mysterious forces. A serpent
was once seen lying stretched out
by the side of Olympias as she slept,
Plu tarch wrote. This perturbed Philip,
who consequently was reluctant to
share her bed, “either because he
feared that some spells and enchant-
ments might be practiced upon him
by her, or because he shrank from her
embraces in the conviction that she
was the partner of a superior being.”ERICH LESSING/ALBUM