Soon after his death his generals disputed as to who should succeed
him; they made war on one another for twenty years, at first under the
pretext of supporting some one of the house of Alexander--his brother,
his son, his mother, his sisters or one of his wives, later openly in
their own names.
Each had on his side a part of the Macedonian army or some of the
Greek mercenary soldiers. The Greeks were thus contending among
themselves who should possess Asia. The inhabitants were indifferent
in these wars as they had been in the strife between the Greeks and
the Persians. When the war ceased, there remained but three generals;
from the empire of Alexander each of them had carved for himself a
great kingdom: Ptolemy had Egypt, Seleucus Syria, Lysimachus
Macedonia. Other smaller kingdoms were already separated or detached
themselves later: in Europe Epirus; in Asia Minor, Pontus, Bithynia,
Galatia, Cappadocia, Pergamos; in Persia, Bactriana and Parthia. Thus
the empire of Alexander was dismembered.
=The Hellenistic Kingdoms.=--In these new kingdoms the king was a
Greek; accustomed to speak Greek, to adore the Greek gods, and to live
in Greek fashion, he preserved his language, his religion, and his
customs.
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