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The head of a marble statue ofAlexander the Greatunearthed in Turkey shows the enduring popularity of the ancient swayer hundreds of years after his death , experts say .
The object was found amid the ruins of the upper horizontal surface of a papistical - earned run average theater at Konuralp , Frederick North of Düzce and near Turkey ’s northwesterly coast , and is thought to day of the month to the second hundred . Alexander the Great pass in 323 B.C , so the statue may have been made more than 400 years after his death .
The head of the marble statue was found last month amid the ruins of a second century theater at Konuralp, in northwest Turkey near the city of Düzce.
The corpse of other marble statues , include heads of the Grecian god Apollo and the mythic monster Medusa , have also been discover in the ruins of the theater , the Düzce Municipalitywrote in a instruction in Turkish .
Alexander was a popular number in the ancient world long after his untimely dying at years 32 at Babylon beside the Euphrates river , historianPaul Cartledge , a professor at the University of Cambridge and the author of " Alexander the swell : the Hunt for a New Past " ( Overlook Press , 2004 ) , told Live Science .
One reason for Alexander ’s enduring popularity was that his successors promoted him as an idealistic swayer whom they hoped to emulate . " The contenders for his throne , and therefore his empire , used his name and said ' he was terrific , ' " said Cartledge , who was n’t involve in the new find .
Experts say the marble head has many distinctive features from a statue of Alexander the Great, including a hairstyle meant to look like a lion’s mane and upward-looking eyes.
It also became common for late ruler to make coins containing Alexander ’s range of a function as a way to decriminalize their sovereignty , he said .
Macedonian king
After canvas the marble top dog , diachronic experts determined it was a depiction of Alexander , according to the command .
" [ He ] is depicted with deep and up - looking center … and a slightly open oral fissure that scantily reveals its teeth , " Düzce Municipality officials said in the statement , which also noted the typical hairstyle on the statue . " The two tufts of hair in the midsection of the os frontale , which are ramify to the back and sides , are like a king of beasts ’s mane , " they said in the translated statement . " This depiction is a hairstyle unique to Alexander the Great . "
Alexander was one of the most famous rulers of the ancient world . bear in 356 B.C. , he became the top executive of Macedonia , a dominion north of Greece , in 336 . His beginner , Philip II of Macedon , had already succeeded in connect Greece under his prescript .
Alexander the Great died in 323 B.C. but he remained a popular figure for hundreds of years and under the Roman Empire, which ruled this region at that time.
Although not born in Greece , Alexander was capture of Greek culture and spread it as he get a campaign of military conquests to the south and east , which culminated in his defeat of the powerfulPersianEmpire in a serial of fight between 334 B.C. and 331 B.C.
Mighty empire
At its height , Alexander ’s empire stretch from Greece and Egypt to Bactria , roughly in what ’s now Afghanistan , to the Punjab in what ’s now Pakistan . But his army turn down to go any farther , and Alexander returned to Babylon , where he died a few years later — probably from an illness , but possibly from drinking too much or because he was poison , Cartledge said .
When theRomansconquered much of the ancient world — including the realm of Bithynia , in the area where the new statue was found — they , too , regard Alexander the Great as an ideal ruler .
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Indeed , Alexander ’s habit of shaving his face — as opposed to sporting byssus , like most past swayer did — determine Roman emperors and lead Romans to shave , because it was thought to be the correct thing for rule to do , Cartledge read . Alexander seemed to have submit up the habit because he wanted to be seen like the Greek god Apollo , who was portrayed without a beard .
For the same reason , many statues of Alexander portrayed his eyes take care up , toward the gods , Cartledge suppose , and upward - attend oculus are one feature of the statue discover at Konuralp .
