Alexander IV

Son of Alexander III the Great and Roxane the Sogdian princess, born late summer 323 BC at Babylon, three months after his father's death. Joint king of Macedon and the Asian provinces from birth as the Argead heir, with Philip III Arrhidaeus as senior co-king under successive regencies (Perdiccas, Antipater, Polyperchon, Cassander). After Cassander's victory in the second Diadochic war, the boy and his mother were taken into custody at Amphipolis in 316. Diodorus 19.105.2: 'Cassander, seeing that Alexander the son of Roxane was growing up... determined to make him out of the way.' The boy and his mother Roxane were poisoned at Amphipolis in secret in 311/310, the bodies disposed of, the announcement of the deaths made the following year. Diod. 19.105.3: 'no one of the kings now ruled Macedonia in the name of Alexander.' The Argead dynasty ended in 310. Tomb III of the Great Tumulus at Vergina — the so-called 'Prince's Tomb' — is conventionally read as Alexander IV's burial, though the attribution is contested.

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