亚历山大在埃及求得神谕后，马其顿联军出发前往幼发拉底河。马其顿人筑桥时，受大流士之命的马扎亚斯就在河对岸。著名历史学家罗宾·莱恩·福克斯（英语：Robin Lane Fox）就推断此时马扎亚斯和赫费斯提翁之间有过交往：“高加米拉的胜利有一部分就是此时在幼发拉底河畔赢得的。亚历山大之后让马扎亚斯继任原职，与其说是宽宏大量，倒不如说是早就安排好的奖赏。”[18]
从印度回到波斯后，赫费斯提翁已经正式成为亚历山大的左膀右臂，也是他的内兄。N·G·L·哈蒙德（英语：N. G. L. Hammond）在自己书中描绘两人的公开关系时写道：“亚历山大待赫费斯提翁如此亲密，有如阿喀琉斯对待帕特洛克罗斯，这一点儿也不叫人惊讶。”[56]“赫费斯提翁身亡时已是位极人臣，统率伙友骑兵，更是亚历山大亚洲宫廷的第二把手。赫费斯提翁既是亚历山大最亲密的朋友，也在他麾下诸将中排名第一。”[57]
阿里安和普鲁塔克都记载亚历山大与赫费斯提翁将自己比作是荷马史诗中阿喀琉斯和帕特洛克罗斯的化身。亚历山大向来钟爱《伊利亚特》，远征亚洲之前，他率领一支军队前往特洛伊，向阿喀琉斯之墓献上花环，而赫费斯提翁则对帕特洛克罗斯之墓献花。[63]接着二人全裸竞速，以此向死去的英雄致意。[64]荷马并未提及阿喀琉斯与帕特洛克罗斯是同性恋人，但托马斯·R·马丁（英语：Thomas R. Martin）和克里斯托弗·W·布莱克威尔认为“后世的作家”已确定了这一理论，[59]其中甚至包括亚赫二人同时代的巨擘埃斯库罗斯[65]和柏拉图[66]。雅典的演说家埃斯基涅斯曾明确谈及这一问题：“荷马确实没有定义阿喀琉斯和帕特洛克罗斯之间是爱或友谊，因为他觉得二人之间彼此的爱意如此明显，早已在读者心中根深蒂固，无需赘言。”[67]而罗宾·莱恩·福克斯得出的结论则是：“此次祭献颇为重要，是赫费斯提翁第一次出现在亚历山大的生平之中，而此时他们已经亲密无间。在亚历山大的时代，阿喀琉斯和帕特洛克罗斯之间的关系无疑就是两人的映射，直到他们生命的终结。”[68]
前324年春，完婚不久的赫费斯提翁离开苏萨，陪伴亚历山大与军队前往厄克巴特纳。大军在秋日抵达，随即开始举办竞技会和庆典。恰在此时赫费斯提翁开始发烧。阿里安记载他烧了七日，随即病危，亚历山大从竞技会赶赴他的病榻，但没来得及。[86]普鲁塔克则说赫费斯提翁年轻力壮，久经沙场，未遵医嘱。趁着医官格劳西亚斯（英语：Glaucias (physician, 4th century BC)）去看戏的时候，他大快朵颐，咽下一整只鸡和一大罐酒，随即发病去世。[87]
^Joseph Bidez; Albert Joseph Carnoy; Franz Valery Marie Cumont. L'Antiquité classique. Imprimerie Marcel Istas. 2001: 165 [2022-02-08]. （原始内容存档于2022-03-24）.
^Plutarch, Alexandros 45,2–4; Arrian, Anabasis 4,7,4; zum persischen Festornat vgl. auch Curtius 6,6,2 ff.; Ephippos von Olynth, Über den Tod von Hephaistion und Alexander, FGrHist 126 aus Athenaios, Deipnosophistai 7,537e–538; zum „persischen“ Krönungsornat als Götterornat, der den persischen Großkönig in das menschliche Abbild des Sonnengottes Mithra verwandelte, Volker Fadinger: Attentat auf König Philipp II. 1997, S. 106 f.
^Plutarch Alexandros 47,3 und 71,1–2; zu den 30.000 sog. Epigonen vgl. auch Arrian 7,6; zu dem dahinter stehenden neuen politischen Programm der Völkerverständigung vgl. hier das Schlusskapitel: „Zusammenfassung“ mit den einschlägigen Quellenbelegen.
^so zu Recht Plutarch, Alexandros 47,7–8 und Arrian, Anabasis 4,19,5–6; zum Ritus des gemeinsamen Verzehrens eines Brotes, der heute noch in Turkestan bei Hochzeiten üblich ist: Curtius 8,4,27
^Arrian, Anabasis 4,12,3–6; Plutarch, Alexandros 54,5–6 im Anschluss an Chares von Mytilene, FGrHist II 66
^Heckel et al. harvnb模板錯誤: 無指向目標: CITEREFHeckelTritle2009第47–48頁 (幫助)
^Durant, Will. The Life of Greece. The Story of Civilization 2 (New York: Simon and Schuster). 1939: 550.
^Plutarch, Moralia 330 = Eratostenes bei Strabon, Geographica 1,4,9,66 C,23–9,67 C,7 in der deutschen Übersetzung von St. Radt (Hrsg.): Strabons Geographika. Mit Übersetzung und Kommentar Bd. 1: Prolegomena Buch I-IV: Text und Übersetzung, Göttingen 2002, 167; zur Umsetzung des neuen Programms eines Weltfriedens und der Völkerverschmelzung durch Alexander, bes. durch die Heirat mit Rhoxane und dann die Massenhochzeit von Susa, vgl. auch Alexander Demandt, a. O. 39 ff., der „die größte Hochzeit der Weltgeschichte“ zu Recht auch als „eine Sternstunde der Menschheit“ (S. 41) charakterisiert.
^Alexander Demandt: Alexander der Große. Leben und Legende., München 2009, p. 236f; Robin Lane Fox: Alexander der Große. Eroberer der Welt., Stuttgart 2004, p. 61; Elizabeth D. Carney: Woman in Alexander's Court, in: Roisman, Joseph (Hg.): Brill's Companion to Alexander the Great, Leiden, Boston 2003, p. 243
^ 59.059.159.2Martin, Thomas R.; Blackwell, Christopher W. Alexander the Great: the story of an ancient life. Cambridge University Press. 2012: 99–100. ISBN 978-0521148443. In any case, the ancient sources were certain that Alexander was sexually active with women. When Barsine, the daughter of a prominent Persian and a Greek woman, and the widow of Memnon of Rhodes, was captured in 333 and brought to Alexander, he was reportedly so entranced by her beauty – and her high level knowledge of Greek literature – that he became her lover. Plutarch asserted that Barsine was the only woman with whom Alexander had sex before his (first) marriage several years later, but other sources report that he had learned about sex from Pancaste, a woman from Thessaly in Greece so beautiful that Apelles the painter became famous for his nude portrait of her. Our sources also recount that Alexander, like the Persian kings he replaces, regularly took his pick of the many concubines kept at the court as temporary sex partners. Most colourfully of all they also report that Alexander spent thirteen days having sex with the female leader of the tribe of women warriors ('Amazons'), who came to him from the Caucasus region, asking that he impregnate her so she could have his child. The ancient sources do not report, however, what modern scholars have asserted: that Alexander and his very close friend Hephaestion were lovers. Achilles and his equally close friend Patroclus provided the legendary model for this friendship, but Homer in the Iliad never suggested that they had sex with each other. (That came from later authors.) If Alexander and Hephaestion did have a sexual relationship, it would have been transgressive by majority Greek standards ...
^Skinner, Marilyn B. Alexander and Ancient Greek Sexuality: Some Theoretical Considerations. Cartledge, Paul; Greenland, Fiona Rose (编). Responses to Oliver Stone's Alexander: Film, History, and Cultural Studies. Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press. 2010: 129. ISBN 9780299232832. [...] none of Alexander's extant biographers, Greek or Roman, ever refers to Hephaestion as anything but Alexander's 'friend' (Greek philos, Latin amicus), conforming to Alexander's own epithet for him, philalexandros
^e.g. Victoria Wohl (2002). Love Among the Ruins: the Erotics of Democracy in Classical Athens. Princeton University Press, pp. 6–7. ISBN0-691-09522-1.
^Cantarella, Eva. Secondo natura. La bisessualità nel mondo antico. Biblioteca Universale Rizzoli. 2001: 7. ISBN 88-17-11654-8. I greci e i romani, infatti, al di là delle profonde differenze tra le due culture, vivevano i rapporti tra uomini in modo molto diverso da quello in cui li vivono (ovviamente, salvo eccezioni) coloro che fanno oggi una scelta di tipo omosessuale: per i greci e i romani, infatti (sempre salvo eccezioni), l'omosessualità non era una scelta esclusiva. Amare un altro uomo non era un'opzione fuori della norma, diversa, in qualche modo deviante. Era solo una parte dell'esperienza di vita: era la manifestazione di una pulsione vuoi sentimentale vuoi sessuale che nell'arco dell'esistenza si alternava e si affiancava (talvolta nello stesso momento) all'amore per una donna (English edition translated by Cormac O' Cuilleanain: Bisexuality in the Ancient World (2nd edition), Yale University Press, New Haven, 2002, ISBN978-0300093025).
^Aelian, Varia Historia 12.7. According to Plato, it was Achilles that should be regarded as the eromenos as he was "much younger" (Symposium, 179e–180a).
^Falk, Avner. A Psychoanalytic History of the Jews. Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press. 1996: 211. ISBN 9780838636602. Alexander married 'Barsine' (Stateira), daughter of the dead Darius III; his best friend, Hephaestion, married her sister 'Drypetis', whose Persian name recalls Draupadi, the Indian heroine of the Mahabharata.
^Worthington, Ian. Alexander the Great: Man and God. Routledge. 2014: cxxvi. ISBN 9781317866442. Then Hephaestion was cremated and the ashes were taken to Babylon. There, an enormous funerary monument was to be built of brick and decorated with five friezes. It would stand over 200 feet high and cost 10,000 talents（英语：Attic talent）. Alexander himself would supervise its building when he got back to Babylon. In the aftermath of the king’s death, it was abandoned.
^Chandler, Joyce Helen. Alexander The Man: King Alexander. AuthorHouse. 2006: 23. ISBN 9781467806343. Eumenes suggested giving divine honors to Hephaestion, as so it was done, Hephaestion was then cremated when they got back to Babylon.
^Copy of votive relief. Greek and Roman Art (greek-art.livejournal.com). 13 November 2011 [2021-09-20]. （原始内容存档于2012-12-01）. Διογένης Ἡφαιστίωνι ἥρωι (Diogénēs Hephaistíoni hḗroi)
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