ABSTRACT
In the autumn of the year 332 BC an army of Macedonians and Greeks, numbering some 40,000 men, invaded Egypt. It was led by the young king of Macedonia, Alexander, who had gone forth two years before, Captain-General of the states of Hellas, to assail the huge Persian Empire. The thing of most enduring importance which Alexander did in Egypt was the founding of Alexandria. In the summer of 332 Alexander had taken and destroyed the great commercial port of the Eastern Mediterranean, Tyre. From Siwah, Alexander and his company returned to Egypt, according to Ptolemy, by the direct way across the Nitrian desert to Memphis. Aristobulus said he returned as he came by Paraetonium, but Ptolemy is here the better authority. "Cleomenes the Alexandrine, satrap of Egypt, when a severe famine occurred in the neighbouring countries, but in Egypt only to a small extent, forbade the exportation of corn.
