Who was Alexander IV?
Recorded history tells us that in 327 BCE, Alexander married Roxane, the daughter of a warlord who ruled a small territory within the Persian Empire. History doesn't tell us conclusively whether this was a marriage of love or a political union.

As he was dying, Alexander was asked who would be his successor. His generals strained to hear as he uttered his last words.

What those last words were is still a topic of debate among scholars, but it is generally thought that he said: "To the greatest." To those listening, this meant that Alexander's empire must go to the mightiest of them, and the struggle for the empire began shortly after.

Alexander's marriage to the volatile Roxane resulted in a son, who was born after Alexander died. This child was called Alexander IV (Alexander was Alexander III before he was called "the Great"). When Alexander IV was presented as Alexander's heir at the age of 13 (Roxane had wisely hidden him away until then to keep him safe), he was quickly murdered by rivals to the throne. The conquests that Alexander had held together until the end of his short life disintegrated in the power struggles that followed, and his own lineage died out with his murdered son.

In the story, we first meet Alexander IV as a young man in his late 20s. He has been effectively exiled, presumably for reasons of his own safety, to his ancestral homeland of Macedon. There, he is to be trained, watched over by Alexander's mother Olympias, and to await word about when (or if) he will be named Alexander's successor.

Gradually, we find out more about the prince's childhood--how he was sullen and withdrawn, constantly compared to Alexander, and found lacking.

Several alterations have been made to Alexander IV's history in The Golden Vine. Mainly, he is not the child of the warlord princess Roxane, but rather a Persian woman named Barsine, whom Alexander met as a boy while she and her father Artabazus were exiles in King Philip's court.

As the daughter of a diplomat and courtier, as a woman equally familiar with the customs of Greece as she was with those of her native Persia, and as one of the first Persians Alexander would have encountered, Barsine seemed like a better candidate for the mother of Alexander's heir. It is a historical fact that Alexander and Barsine were actually involved with each other, although she was seven years his senior and they never formalized their relationship.