The Susa Weddings was a mass wedding

Wedding

A wedding is the ceremony in which two people are united in marriage or a similar institution. Wedding traditions and customs vary greatly between cultures, ethnic groups, religions, countries, and social classes...

 arranged by Alexander of Macedon in 324 BC

324 BC

Year 324 BC was a year of the pre-Julian Roman calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Dictatorship of Cursor...

 in the Persian

Achaemenid Empire

The Achaemenid Empire , sometimes known as First Persian Empire and/or Persian Empire, was founded in the 6th century BCE by Cyrus the Great who overthrew the Median confederation...

 city of Susa

Susa

Susa was an ancient city of the Elamite, Persian and Parthian empires of Iran. It is located in the lower Zagros Mountains about east of the Tigris River, between the Karkheh and Dez Rivers....

.

Alexander intended to symbolically unite the Persian

Persian people

The Persian people are part of the Iranian peoples who speak the modern Persian language and closely akin Iranian dialects and languages. The origin of the ethnic Iranian/Persian peoples are traced to the Ancient Iranian peoples, who were part of the ancient Indo-Iranians and themselves part of...

 and Macedonian

Ancient Macedonians

The Macedonians originated from inhabitants of the northeastern part of the Greek peninsula, in the alluvial plain around the rivers Haliacmon and lower Axios...

 cultures, by taking a Persian wife himself and celebrating a mass wedding with Persian ceremony along with his officers, for whom he arranged marriages with noble Persian wives. The union was not only symbolic, as the new offspring were to be the progenitors of both civilizations.

Alexander was already married to Roxana

Roxana

Roxana sometimes Roxane, was a Bactrian noble and a wife of Alexander the Great. She was born earlier than the year 343 BC, though the precise date remains uncertain....

, the daughter of a Bactria

Bactria

Bactria and also appears in the Zend Avesta as Bukhdi. It is the ancient name of a historical region located between south of the Amu Darya and west of the Indus River...

n chief, but Macedonian and Persian customs allowed several wives. Alexander himself married Stateira

Stateira II

Stateira II , possibly also known as Barsine, was the daughter of Stateira I and Darius III of Persia. After her father's defeat at the Battle of Issus, Stateira and her sisters became captives of Alexander of Macedon. They were treated well, and she became Alexander's second wife at the Susa...

 (sometimes called Barsine, but not to be confused with Barsine

Barsine

Barsine was daughter of Artabazus, satrap of Hellespontine Phrygia, and wife of Mentor of Rhodes and after his death, Mentor's brother, Memnon...

, wife of Memnon

Memnon of Rhodes

Memnon of Rhodes was the commander of the Greek mercenaries working for the Persian king Darius III when Alexander the Great of Macedonia invaded Persia in 334 BC. He commanded the mercenaries at the Battle of the Granicus River, where his troops were massacred by the victorious Macedonians...

), the eldest daughter of Darius

Darius III of Persia

Darius III , also known by his given name of Codomannus, was the last king of the Achaemenid Empire of Persia from 336 BC to 330 BC....

, and, according to Aristobulus

Aristobulus of Cassandreia

For other use, see AristobulusAristobulus of Cassandreia , Greek historian, son of Aristobulus, probably a Phocian settled inCassandreia, accompanied Alexander the Great on his campaigns...

, another wife in addition, Parysatis

Parysatis II

Parysatis, the youngest daughter of Artaxerxes III of Persia, married Alexander the Great in 324 BC at the Susa weddings. She may have been murdered by Alexander's first wife, Roxana, in 323 BC.-Early life:...

, the youngest daughter of Artaxerxes III. To Hephaestion

Hephaestion

Hephaestion , son of Amyntor, was a Macedonian nobleman and a general in the army of Alexander the Great...

 he gave Drypetis; she too was the daughter of Darius, his own wife's sister, for he wanted Hephaestion's children to be his own nephews and nieces. To Seleucus

Seleucus I Nicator

Seleucus I was a Macedonian officer of Alexander the Great and one of the Diadochi. In the Wars of the Diadochi that took place after Alexander's death, Seleucus established the Seleucid dynasty and the Seleucid Empire...

 he gave Apama

Apama

Apama , sometimes known as Apama I or Apame I was the wife of the first ruler of the Seleucid Empire, Seleucus I Nicator. They married at Susa in 324 BC...

, the daughter of Spitamenes

Spitamenes

Spitamenes Sogdian warlord, leader of the uprising in Sogdiana and Bactria against Alexander of Macedon 329 BC....

 the Bactrian, and likewise to the other Companions the daughters of the most notable Medes and Persians, eighty in all.

The weddings were solemnized in the Persian fashion: chairs were placed for the bridegrooms in order of precedence; after the toasts the brides entered and sat down each by her groom, who took them by the hand and kissed them. The king was the first to be married, for all the weddings were celebrated in the same manner, and in this ceremony he showed even more than his customary approachability and comradeship. Then the bridegrooms took their wives back to their homes and Alexander gave each of them a dowry

Dowry

A dowry is the money, goods, or estate that a woman brings forth to the marriage. It contrasts with bride price, which is paid to the bride's parents, and dower, which is property settled on the bride herself by the groom at the time of marriage. The same culture may simultaneously practice both...

. All the other Macedonians who had previously married Persian women he ordered to be registered and these were found to number more than 10,000. To all of these Alexander gave wedding-presents.

By marrying the daughters of Darius and Artaxerxes, Alexander was both identifying himself with the Persians and also making his own position more secure. He could now claim to be the son and rightful heir of both previous Persian kings. He also wanted to honour Hephaestion by making him his brother-in-law.

What the Macedonians thought of these marriages is evident from the fact that the nobles all divorced their wives after Alexander's death, except Hephaestion, who died before Alexander, and Seleucus. So in spite of Alexander's precedent, the Macedonians were no more inclined to share equally with the Persians than before.