The Book of Kings V: Sekandar's world tour

The Myth: Tales of Ancient Persia! Kings! Princes! Heroes! Demons! Giant birds! Battles! Conquest! Divine kingly radiance! The grandest sweep of history!
The Book: Shahnameh, the Persian Book of Kings
The Author: Abolqasem Ferdowski, some time in the tenth century.
This text: a 2006 translation by Dick Davis.
Price: This one cost me $29.99 from Dymocks, and it was money well spent. Seems to be pricier on the internet, though.

Alexander is not technically a Persian king, but since he ruled Iran for a decent period, he has been taken into the Book of Kings as the half-Persian, all-heroic king of the world Sekandar. 

Greece and Persia
Darab, King of Persia, dies, and is succeeded by his second son Dara. Dara is a one of the better kings: pretty solid on the world-conquering, rather good on justice to the poor, fairly middling on the not-lopping-off-heads.

Darab's first son, Sekander, inherits the Greek throne when his royal grandfather dies. His first act is to appoint the smartest man in Greece, Arestalis, as his advisor. Arestalis demonstrates his wisdom by advising that a king that doesn't listen to his advisors is a stupid, stupid king.

Arestalis understands job security.

Egypt
Dara greets Sekander's ascension with a letter of congratulations and an invoice for Greece's tribute. Sekander refuses. He decides that a young man must travel the world, and so he gathers an all-conquering army and sets out. First stop is Egypt, where his invasion is so successful that there is more loot than he can carry and more surrendered officers than he can handle.

Persia again
Sekander decides that he wants to meet his brother, so he presents himself as his own envoy. He tells Dara that 'Sekander' has no intention of invading Persia, he just wants passage for his conquering army on his trip around the world. He points out that he doesn't technically need Dara to approve this. Dara refuses, though he is impressed with the handsome envoy who is glowing with divine kingly radiance. The Persian soldiers who had gone to Greece with the tribute invoice recognise Sekander, and tell Dara. Sekander expected this, however, and disappears into the night with a bag full of treasure and important strategic insights.

Three battles later, Sekander is in control of Persia and Dara is suing for peace. Sekander offers him safe passage for his family and the rulership of Persia as a satrap. Dara decides that this isn't quite what he wanted, and sends to Foor, an Indian prince. Sekander gets wind of this and sends out his troops. Dara's forces decide that they've had enough of being beaten by Sekander's all-conquering army, and Dara is stabbed by his chief advisor and his treasurer.

On his deathbed, Dara commends Persia to Sekander, as well as offering him his daughter's hand in marriage. Sekander agrees to respect the beliefs and customs of the land. Then he has the murderers put to death, because no king wants a pair of king-killers hanging around.

Qanuj
Sekander gathers his all-conquering army at the borders of Qanuj, ruled by King Kayd. Kayd's advisors recommend not going to war with Sekander's all-conquering army. They point out that Sekander is first and foremost a seeker of knowledge, and will probably be satisfied with a gift of Qanuj's four magnificent and irreplaceable treasures: a goblet that always remains full of water (or wine, if one so desires); a physician who can tell you everything that's wrong with you from a single drop of urine; a philosopher who can infallibly read the prophecies of the stars; and his daughter, who's gorgeous.

This all seems like a good deal to Sekander, who sends nine sages to collect them. However, he does express a certain skepticism, and puts all of the treasures to test.

Kayd's daughter passes more or less immediately, and Sekander marries her "according to the Christian fashion," presumably to distinguish the marriage from his marriage to Dara's daughter. He engages the philosopher in a battle of metaphors, and the philosopher comes out ahead. The physician tells him he eats to much and sleeps with too many women, and he gives him an unguent to help with that; Sekander refuses to take the medicine but sleeps alone. The physician deduces this from his urine, saying he doesn't need the medicine if he sleeps alone, that was the whole point. The goblet,  sure enough, it never runs out; a philosopher tells him that it's basically a really subtle and effective condenser, nothing magic as such.

Sekander is suitably impressed, and gives Kayd a pile of treasure and a peace treaty.

India
Sekander sends a letter to Foor, Prince of India, saying that he's a bit sick of all this fighting and that Foor can save everyone a lot of hassle by immediately offering his fealty. Foor refuses, and marshals his war elephants.

Sekander's spies alert him to the issue of the very large number of basically invincible Indian war elephants. Sekander delegates the problem to his wise men, who delegate it to a party of twelve hundred blacksmiths. The blacksmiths come up with a plan involving an iron horse filled with oil.

Great, says Sekander, I'll take a thousand.

So it turns out that the natural response of an Indian war elephant to an iron horse filled with burning oil is to panic and to run in random directions; Sekander's forces are less affected by panicking elephants and get the upper hand.

Sekander tells Foor that he can do things the easy way, involving single combat, or the hard way, involving the slaughter of thousands. Foor, twice Sekander's size, opts for the easy way, but is distracted a crucial moment and Sekandar slices him in half.

Sekander rules India himself for two months, then appoints a regent and moves on.

Mecca
Sekander, a Christian, decides to undertake the pilgrimage to the Ka'abeh, a move which pleases and confuses his army in equal measure. He pauses only to pray, conquer the surrounding area and kill an evil king.

Andalusia
Sekander returns to Egypt for a while, where he is treated well by the local king who doesn't want to be conquered again. Nearby(-ish) Andalusia is ruled by Queen Qaydafeh, who hears of Sekander's fame and sends a painter to Egypt to capture his likeness on silk. She likes what she sees and removes the painting to her private quarters for further examination.

Sekander, meanwhile, sends a letter to Qaydafeh asking exactly how much tribute she should be paying to him. Qaydafeh refuses to pay any, and Sekander moves his all-conquering army to the borders of Andalusia. His troops capture Qaydafeh's son, Qaydrus. Sekander proposes a ruse: he asks one of his advisors to sit on the throne pretending to be the king, while he acts as a courtier and begs for Qaydrus' life. Pretend-Sekander agrees to spare Qaydrus, and sends real-Sekander as envoy to Andalusia to negotiate with Qaydafeh.

Qaydrus returns to his mother and counsels sending Sekander his tribute. He introduces the "envoy" as the one who saved his life; Qaydafeh sends for her tapestry, and then asks to be left alone with Sekander. Qaydafeh tells Sekandar that she has a large collection of likenesses of various kings and heroes, and he's both. She notes that she doesn't actually want to kill Sekander, and suggests that they come to some sort of arrangement. She agrees to keep his identity secret so that her other son Taynush doesn't kill him and start a war.

The two swear oaths of amity and Sekander returns to his forces.

A different bit of India
Sekander takes his army to the land of the Brahmins, a group of ascetics. Somewhat bemused, they point out that they have completely eschewed wealth and power they don't actually have anything worth conquering. They explain their philosophy, and Sekander agrees that conquering would be completely pointless. He offers them expensive gifts, which they refuse, because: duh.

Abyssinia
Sekander takes his all-conquering army west, and quickly conquers Abyssinia. Then his army is attacked by a rhinocerous, which does about as much damage as the Abyssinian forces did.

A Land Where the Men Have Soft Feet and also there's a dragon
Sekander's all-conquering army arrives at a land where men have soft feet. The warriors are tall, but poorly armed and naked. They attack with rocks, and lose pretty quickly. Sekander's army finds itself in a huge and friendly city. The inhabitants ask him if he's a hero, because they need one: their city is plagued by a dragon.

Sekandar accepts the challenge. Where Rostam might have swatted it with his ox-headed mace, Sekandar approaches the task with one of his own preferred weapons: a battalion of archers. The dragon turns on the all-conquering army, but is scared off by the war drums. Sekander fills five cow skins with oil and poison and rolls them down to the hillside. The dragon eats the poison cows, and dies.

"You never tried poisoning the thing?"
"We're not heroes, sire."

Leaving this particular city, Sekandar comes across the mysterious tomb of a long-dead king. He can't help but notice that the king is (a) fabulously wealthy and (b) dead, and which leaves him in a fairly melancholy mood.

Harum
Sekandar and his chieftains press on ahead of the all-conquering army, and come to a town called Harum, which is ruled - and populated - entirely by women. Sekandar sends a letter saying that he would like very much to enter the city in pursuit of knowledge, as a friend, but he does happen to have an all-conquering army that might come into play if he is refused. The people of Harum write back telling him that it will do his reputation no good at all to be beaten by a bunch of girls, but that's pretty much inevitable if he doesn't back off. He is entirely welcome to take his all-conquering army around Harum, and they'll even throw a party for him if he does.

Sekandar sends back that he really really did want to see the city, but since he's only really after knowledge he'll be happy if the leaders come out and talk to him. The leadership sends out two thousand of the wisest and most eloquent women of Harum and a staggering tribute, and the plains see a pretty amazing party.

The next morning Sekandar is allowed into the city alone. What he learns there is not recorded, but he stays there until he has no more questions left to ask.



Various wondrous lands
Sekandar hears tell of the waters of life. A wise man tells him that a man must ride past the edge of the world on a young horse. Sekandar orders ten thousand young horses. He sends a scout ahead with a magic water-detecting amulet, and follows with the rest of the all-conquering army. Unfortunately, in the darkness beyond the edge of the world the army takes a wrong turn, and ends up at a great shining mountain instead. (The scout, happily, makes it to the waters of life; he has a bath, drinks his fill, and heads home.)

On the shining mountain, Sekandar meets two allegorical birds, who ask him about the meaning of life and so forth. They are happy with his answers ("Drinking and singing are pretty great, but seeking knowledge is pretty important.") and tell him to climb the mountain to see something really interesting and upsetting.

On top of the mountain, Sekandar does see something really interesting and upsetting: Esrafil, the angel of death. Esrafil tells him to piss off and keep travelling. Sekandar knows at this point that he's going to be travelling until he dies.

At this point the all-conquering army is more or less wandering aimlessly, and they come to a town that is beseiged by brutes with huge ears, the faces of animals and a remarkable fecundity. The brutes are led by the unstoppable warriors Yajuj and Majuj. Sekandar knows that he can solve such a problem by throwing enough blacksmiths at it: he summons a hundred thousand of them and has them build a wall as large as a mountain with Yajuj and Majuj on the other side. 

Sekandar comes across a palace of topazes, and in it finds a corpse with the head of a boar. It turns out this is another death/transience of earthly existence omen, and Sekandar freaks out a bit. He seeks comfort in conversation with a talking tree, but the tree tells him he's going to die soon, and without making it back to Greece.

China
The all-conquering army arrives in China, and Sekandar sends his usual "I come in peace, but note the all-conquering army" letter and sends himself as envoy. The emperor of China sends a response berating Sekandar for his lack of humility, and refuses to surrender. He lists Sekandar's shortcomings to the Sekandar-as-envoy, who is ashamed. The Chinese emperor sends extravagant gifts and an invitation to his hospitality; Sekandar accepts, saying that actually, he was quite impressed by the emperor of China.

Babylon, and the end of Sekandar's world tour
The weakening king makes it as far as Babylon. He sends to Arestalis, saying that he's going to invite every non-Greek royal to his court, where he will murder them all. Arestalis writes back telling Sekandar that this is an exceptionally bad plan, and isn't going to do anything to save Greece from future threats, in that if, say, Persia, is critically weakened, then all that will happen is that someone will conquer it and then threaten Greece. Sekandar sees the merit in this, and relents.

A monstrous child is born with the head of a lion; this is taken as an omen that Sekandar will soon be dead. He writes to his mother putting her in charge of Greece unless he happens to have a son by Dara's daughter. He orders Kayd's daughter back to her father.

Sekandar dies in Babylon and, after some bickering among the nobles about the most appropriate burial place, is buried in Alexandria.

As far as Persia is concerned, Sekandar's legacy is two hundred years of peace and prosperity, where there aren't actually any Persian kings. But the Book of Kings picks up again after that...