Alexander the Great conquered India, China, Arabia, Rome... and found America

[Blue3]

Let's say Alexander the Great, while resting in Babylon, did NOT die at the age of 32, in the year 323 BC.

Instead, he strengthened Babylon as the center of his empire, and conquered the Arab tribes to the south, and then conquered all the major outposts on the Mediterranean, which included Rome and Carthage.

Renewed and confident again, and now in his 40's... Alexander, now knowing what to expect in India, launches a new campaign there and succeeds. He sends scouts to learn about China, and succeeds in conquering it too.

The islands of Japan and hills of Mongolia fall too, almost an afterthought, and his generals conquer Ethiopia and begin spreading through Africa, while other generals expand further into Europe. Alexander continues his policy of having his loyal soldiers marry the natives, and founding new cities called Alexandria in these lands.

Alexander, in his 50's or 60's now, ever seeking to push the limits, sends scouts to follow the coastlines in eastern Asia, Indonesia, and northern Europe. They discover Australia and the America's. He orders the settlement of new Alexandria's in these new worlds, and begin trading with and marrying the natives.

In his 70's, Alexander feels his health is finally beginning to slip. A strong succession plan has been developed over the decades, and Alexander begins the transition while he's still alive. He eventually dies in Babylon, peacefully in his sleep, and is buried in Macedonia.




Just how would different would our history be?

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

I find this implausible.  As I already mentioned once toady, conquest is easy but control is hard.  Alexander simply did not have the manpower and infrastructure to conquer the whole world.  Now had he lived longer, he might well have successfully established an enduring Greco-Persian-Egyptian Empire that would have either withstood Rome or conquered it.

[Frodo]

The most he could have done in his lifetime (as far as additional conquests) was add Arabia to his dominions -which was on his to-do list before he involuntarily revealed to the world that he was in fact a mortal.  Now if you want to debate whether his successors could extend the boundaries of the empire to include India and beyond (after a lengthy period of consolidation of his OTL + Arabia conquests), that's another matter entirely.  

[Blue3]

But I'm not asking if this was possible... I'm asking what would have happened if this actually happened?

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Okay, leaving aside the utter impossibility of it happening, if it did, here's what I see happening after the death of Alexander III (the Great) of Macedon.

While his son, Alexander IV, would have inherited the empire his father built, sustaining it would be essentially impossible.  Once the inevitable civil wars began the colonies placed in areas with no pre-existing civilization would rapidly revert, leaving Alexander and his army merely a part of myth in those parts but otherwise having no cultural impact.

In Mesoamerica and Peru, there would be a longer lasting influence.  The introduction of the wheel and iron would be a technological boon to those civilizations. Between that and the introduction of Old World diseases to the Americas some two millennia earlier, there would be a considerable amount of beneficial destruction.  When contact with the Old World was reestablished,  the conquest of the Americas would not be inevitable.  However, by 100 BCE, while there would continue to be discernible Greek influences, in the New World Alexander himself would have passed into the realm of legend and myth.  Perhaps the Mesoamericans eventually end up with the dominant world civilization and temples where human sacrifices to the great ancestor-god Alexander would be held would be found in every major city today.  But that is but one of many possible speculations.

In the Old World, the empire would largely fragment back into the old polities.  Some notable differences would be that a Greek dynasty that headed China instead of the Qin, but other than an infusion of Greek philosophy into that of China, the course of development in East Asia would not be significantly changed by the brief interlude of Alexander's world wide empire.  At the other end of the Old World, Naples (which likely got renamed as one of the Alexandrias and retains the name) would likely be the primary city of the central and western Mediterranean instead of either Rome or Carthage. If not Naples, then one of the other cities of Magna Graecia would be dominant.