On September 30, 331 bc, the fate of two empires was decided on a plain 70 miles north of present-day Irbil, Iraq. Lying near the hamlet of Gaugamela, the plain was part of a vast territory north of the Persian provincial capital of Babylon where King Darius III, also known as Darius Codomanus, had mustered an army formidable enough, he hoped, to halt the invasion of the Persian-dominated lands of the eastern Mediterranean by Macedonian forces. But King Alexander III, only 25 years old, his reputation preceding him like thunder before a storm, led his men into Asia. To the king’s soldiers, their invasion would avenge half a century of devastation wrought on Greece during the Persian wars between 499 and 448 bc. Alexander’s personal ambition, however, was nothing less than to eclipse the great Persian empire by conquering its lands and bringing it under his aegis.

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Preceding his invasion, a period of continuous skirmishing and political intrigue between Persia and the Hellenic city-states had prevailed up to the assassination of Alexander’s father, King Philip II of Macedon, in 336 bc. Although the person responsible for Philip’s murder was never conclusively determined, many historians regard his divorced wife, Olympias, princess of Epirus and mother of Alexander, as the most likely suspect. Personal animosity had also prevailed between Philip and his son, who favored his mother at the time of the divorce. His complicity in his father’s murder is highly unlikely, however, and inconsistent with his character; Alexander publicly blamed Persian agents for Philip’s death. Upon inheriting the kingdom, after only one year of armed conflict Alexander had consolidated Macedonian control over the rest of Greece’s city-states. He then organized a campaign that promised the Greeks revenge in the conquest of their Persian enemies.

Leaving his trusted general, Antipater, with little more than 10,000 soldiers to exercise control over the newly conquered sections of Greece, in 334 bc Alexander crossed the Hellespont with 30,000 infantry and 5,000 cavalry. The resistance he met along the way—aside from the Persian and Greek mercenary troops he met in battle—at first was minor. Within a short time he established a reputation for justice, tempered by tolerance, as well as invincibility. He reduced the people’s tax burden, using Persian treasuries in the cities he captured to build bridges, roads and irrigation channels. The popularity of his policies, coupled with decisive victories at the Granicus River in May 334 and again at Issus in November 333, required him to post no more than small garrisons in the satrapies of the Persian empire that submitted to him as he advanced into Darius’ kingdom.

It may have been Alexander’s success at Issus—his defeat of a powerful Persian force that considerably outnumbered his own, as well as the astonishing capture of Darius’ family—that contributed to the strategy he would use at Gaugamela. But for Alexander to assume the title Basileus—“Great King”—he would have to capture Darius himself. In the closing stages of the battle at Issus, the Persian sovereign fled. Roughly 4,000 of his men also made good their escape, including about 2,000 Greek mercenaries. Together they sought a safe haven in Babylon, the capital of Persian-held Mesopotamia, where Darius hoped to gather his wits, make plans and put together a stronger, more capable army.

Alexander, showing great sagacity, did not pursue Darius immediately. He wanted first to secure his conquests on the eastern side of the Aegean, which meant having to deal with the powerful Persian navy. To neutralize that fleet, Alexander spent the 12 months that followed Issus seizing ports on the western Asiatic seaboard. Along the way he recruited all the battle-ready men he could find who were willing to join his expeditionary force. At the same time, in preparation for his attack on the Persian throne, he dispatched a force of bridge builders led by his lifelong confidant, Hephaestion, east to the Euphrates River to await his advance.

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