systlin:

wilddragonflying:

… I am intrigued. Elaboration?

When he was still a young teenager, his dad, King Philip of Macedon, went to look at a super awesome horse that a horse breeder was showing off trying to get the king to buy. Philip took his son along because horse shopping was the sort of father/son bonding ritual you did back in the day. 

Well, turns out this horse is beautiful and strong and fiery and wonderful and no one can ride it. Philip and his advisers agree that it is a gorgeous example of a horse, but regretfully they don’t want a half-wild and unmanageable stallion and they’re gonna turn the deal down.

At this point Alexander, who’s been watching very carefully, says “It would be a shame to lose such a wonderful horse” and just fuckin goes over to the half-wild stallion, catches hold of the bridle, and hops up on the 1500 pound half-wild horse. 

(This is a good way to get super dead, if anyone is wondering, but Alex never, once in his life, gave even a single fuck.)

Phillip and all his advisers are slightly freaking out now, visions of tragically dead and trampled prince and heir flashing before their eyes. And Alex, the little shit, proceeds to ride that horse around the paddock as calmly as a lamb. The horse quiets down and behaves beautifully. Everyone goes “What the actual fuck.” Philip is crying tears of manly pride, and according to legend says here “My son, you must find a kingdom big enough for you.”

(What happened, see, is that Alexander, being an observant sort, noticed that the stallion was shying from his own shadow. And so he turned the horse towards the sun, where Bucephalus did not see his shadow and therefore calmed down.)

Bucephalus would go on to carry Alexander through battle after battle, to an empire that reached from Greece to Africa to India. When the stallion died, Alexander gave him a hero’s funeral.