Callisthenes was just one in a string of people who pissed off Alexander in one fashion or another and found themselves executed. Usually, the executees were people who threatened Alexander's primacy in the army (Philotas, Parmenion) against whom Alexander would trump up false charges of conspiracy, force a military court to return a guilty verdict, and skip promptly to the execution. Callisthenes, his court historian, was executed basically for Speaking Ill of the monarch. As Alexander ordered reverence to be paid to him, Callisthenes saw it as the beginning of tyranny, and said as much, and sooooo he got deaded. He probably overstated his case, but if every academic were executed for producing an over-blown thesis things would be, well, actually probably better, but that's not the point... hmmmmm....

- Count Dolby von Luckner