Alexander Iv.
（
*)Ale/candros), king of MACEDONIA, the son of Alexander the Great and Roxana, was born shortly after the death of his father, in B. C. 323.
He was acknowledged as the partner of Philip Arrhidaeus in the empire, and was under the guardianship of Perdiccas, the regent, till the death of the latter in B. C. 321.
He was then for a short time placed under the guardianship of Pithon and the general Arrhidaeus, and subsequently under that of Antipater, who conveyed him with his mother Roxana, and the king Philip Arrhidaeus and his wife to Macedonia in 320. (
Diod. 18.36,
39.) On the death of Antipater in 319, the government fell into the hands of Polysperchon; but Eurydice, the wife of Philip Arrhidaeus, began to form a powerful party in Macedonia in opposition to Polysperchon; and Roxana, dreading her influence, fled with her son Alexander into Epeirus, where Olympias had lived for a long time.
At the instigation of Olympias, Aeacides, king of Epeirus, made common cause with Polysperchon, and restored the young Alexander to Macedonia in 317. [AEACIDES.] Eurydice and her husband were put to death, and the supreme power fell into the hands of Olympias. (19.11; Justin,
14.5.)
But in the following year Cassander obtained possession of Macedonia, put Olympias to death, and imprisoned Alexander and his mother. They remained in prison till the general peace made in 311, when Alexander's title to the crown was recognized. Many of his partizans demanded that he should be immediately released from prison and placed upon the throne. Cassander therefore resolved to get rid of so dangerous a rival, and caused him and his mother Roxana to be murdered secretly in prison. (B. C. 311.
Diod. 19.51,
52,
61,
105; Justin,
15.2 ;
Paus. 9.7.2.)
