Volume III :Through the Doors of Greece

When her term came, Nectanebus came to her room and set up at her bedside a tablet made of gold, silver and acacia wood, which stood on a tripod and consisted of three belts — one with Zeus on it, surrounded by the thirty-six decans; then one bearing the twelve signs of the zodiac; and on the innermost the Sun and Moon. To these he fitted eight precious stones showing the positions of the planets. He begged her not to give birth until these were propitious — and when they were, with a flash of lightning and a thump of thunder, Alexander was born. We are not told of King Philip’s reaction on returning to discover the fait accompli; and indeed other accounts suggest that he and the queen merely employed an astrologer to tell the new-born child’s fortune. But of Alexander’s later successes, history tells us at length.