From Arrian’s History of the Expedition of Alexander the Great, and conquest of Persia, translated from the Original Greek, by Mr. Rooke, and now corrected and enlarged; with several additions, London: J. Davis, 1812; pp. 93-124.
ARRIAN’S HISTORY OF
A FEW days after came ambassadors to Alexander, from the Scythians, named Abii, (whom Homer in his work commends as the justest nation upon earth; these are inhabitants of Asia, subject to no laws, by reason of their poverty, and their exact distribution of justice) and with them came also ambassadors from the European Scythians; for a great nation of the Scythians inhabits Europe. Alexander sent some of his friends to attend those on their return home, under a pretext indeed of settling a friendship with them, by an embassy, but, in reality, that he might know the situation of their country, the number of their inhabitants, the stature of their bodies, and what kind of arms they use in battle. In the mean time, he resolved to build a city near the banks of the river Tanais, and have it called after his own name; for the place seemed extremely commodious for that purpose, and a fit situation (whenever occasion should offer), for an expedition against the Scythians; and not only so, but it would also serve as a fortress, to secure the country on this side of the river from the incursions of those on the other. He also conjectured that this city would become great, as well by reason of the numbers of its future inhabitants, as by its being dignified with such a name. In the mean time the barbarians inhabiting the country near the river, having seized the Macedonian soldiers, who had been appointed to guard the cities of Scythia, put them to death; and for their greater security fortified their cities. Many of the Sogdians joined with them in this revolt, being stirred up to it by those who had taken Bessus: some of the Bactrians also sided with them, either because they were afraid of Alexander, or as the report then went, because Alexander 94 had fixed the meeting of the presidents of that province to be held at Zariaspa, from which convention they predicted no good to themselves.
WHEN these things were told to Alexander, he ordered all his foot, according to their several cohorts, to furnish themselves with ladders, and he marched with his forces to the city which lay nearest the army, called Gaza (for the barbarians of that country were reported to have seized upon seven cities); he dispatched Craterus to Cyropolis, the greatest of these cities, and into which most of the barbarians had retired, commanding him to encamp near the walls, to draw a ditch and rampart around the city, and plant his engines wherever he thought convenient; so that the citizens there, finding employment enough to defend themselves at home, might not be able to succour other places elsewhere. As soon as he approached Gaza, he ordered the wall, which was but of mud, and low built, to be assaulted, and his scaling ladders every where got ready. Then his slingers and archers, and darters mixed with the foot, beginning the attack, smote the besieged with missive weapons, and at the same time galled them with darts from their engines, insomuch that the walls were deserted by the barbarians, and the ladders being immediately fixed, the Macedonians mounted, and entering the city, killed all the men they met (for so Alexander had commanded); but the women and children, and the riches of the place, were given as spoil to the soldiers. Thence he moved to another of those cities, which was built and fortified like the former, which he assaulted and took the same day, and disposed of the captives in the same manner. Thence, proceeding to the third city on the next day, he took it at the first attack. In the mean time, while he, at the head of his troops of foot, was busied in reducing those places, he dispatched his horse to two other cities, not far off, with orders to take care that the citizens, when they heard of the storming of their neighbouring towns, and his near approach, should not betake themselves to flight, and so render it a difficult task for him to overtake them. And as he thought, so it happened, that the dispatch of these troops thither was necessary; for the barbarians, who held the other cities, not yet taken, seeing the smoke of that over-against them, which was then on fire (and besides, some who had escaped out of the calamity bringing them the news), they fled out of both the cities as fast as they could; but falling in among the horse, posted for that purpose, were most of them slain.
95THESE five cities, thus taken and destroyed in two days, he hastened to Cyropolis, the greatest and most populous of the whole country. It was surrounded with a wall, much higher than any of the rest, and was built by Cyrus; and as many barbarians, both stout and warlike, had fled for shelter thither, it was not to be supposed that the Macedonians should gain it at the first assault. Wherefore, Alexander having planted his engines in places convenient, determined to batter the wall, and wherever he made a breach, to storm the place: but finding the channel of the river, which usually run through the town like a torrent, at that time dry, and the wall disjoined, so as to afford an entrance for his soldiers, he, with his body-guards, his targeteers, his archers, and Agrians, (while the barbarians were employed in guarding themselves from the engines and the assailants) privately entered the city at first with a few men, through that channel, and having burst open the gates near that part, gave an easy admittance to the rest. The barbarians then, notwithstanding they perceived their city taken, falling upon the Macedonians, a sharp battle ensued, wherein Alexander himself received a blow on the head and neck with a stone, and Craterus, and many more of his captains, were wounded with missive weapons. However, the barbarians were at last driven out of the forum. In the mean time, those who battered the wall seeing it void of defendants, took it, and, at their first entrance, slew about eight thousand of the enemy. The rest (for the whole number there gathered together was eighteen thousand) retired into the castle; but these, when Alexander had continued his siege but one day, being destitute of water, surrendered the place. Thence, moving to the seventh city, he took it at the first assault. Ptolemy, indeed, says, it was delivered up without fighting; but Aristobulus, on the contrary, affirms, that it was taken by storm, and all who were found therein slain. Ptolemy tells us, that the captives were dispersed throughout the army, and kept chained till he should depart out of that country, lest any of those who had occasioned the revolt should be left. About this time an army of Asiatic Scythians assembled on the banks of the river Tanais, because they had heard that some barbarians, on the other side, had revolted from Alexander, that if the revolt was any thing considerable, they might also fall off from the Macedonians. Then came news to Alexander, that Spitamenes had besieged those who he had left in garrison in the castle of Maracanda; wherefore, having dispatched Andromachus, Menedemus, and Caranus, with sixty of his auxiliary horse, and eight hundred mercenaries, under the command of Caranus, and about one thousand and five hundred mercenary foot; over those he appointed Pharnuces the interpreter, a Lycian, skilled in the barbarian language, and well qualified to treat with them. He surrounded the city, which he was now building, with a wall, in twenty days space, and gave it 96 for a residence to some Greek mercenaries, and to all such barbarians as had a mind to inhabit there; as also to some Macedonians, who were become unfit for service.
THEN offering sacrifices to the gods, according to the custom of his country, and having exhibited equestrian and gymnic exercises, when he saw that the Scythians retired not from the banks of the Tanais, but threw their darts across the river, which was not broad there, and used reviling speeches, according to their barbarous manner, giving out that Alexander durst not encounter them, or if he did, he should soon find the difference between them and the Asiatite barbarians; he, enraged at this, resolved to pass over to them; and accordingly ordered the skins which covered the tents to be made ready. Then, sacrifices being offered for their safe passage, the omens proved inauspicious. This he took very ill, but bore it with patience, and kept his station. But the Scythians still persisting in their scoffs, he again sacrificed for a safe presage; and notwithstanding Aristander assured him that the omens still portended danger, Alexander replied, that he had rather run the extremest hazard, than, after having subdued almost all Asia, be a sport to the Scythians, as Darius, the father of Xerxes, had formerly been. Aristander protested, that he told him the divine portents truly and faithfully, though Alexander had much rather have heard a different relation. However, having prepared the skins for ferrying over, and his armed troops now ready to enter the river, upon a sign given, he ordered his engineers to gall the Scythians, upon the opposite bank, with darts. This was accordingly done, and some of the enemy were wounded, and one, in particular, losing his shield and breast-plate, fell from his horse. The barbarians, terrified at the strength of their engines, which could cast darts at such a distance, and at the loss of so stout a man, retired a little from the river. Alexander, seeing the effect of his missive weapons, ferried over with trumpets sounding, and his whole army followed. The archers and slingers being the first which arrived on the other side, they begun to gall the enemy with stones and arrows, and kept them from falling upon the phalanx, which was then passing over, and this they continued till all the forces were safe landed. When this was performed, he first of all sent one troop of the auxiliary horse, and four cohorts of spearmen, against the Scythians, whose shock the enemy easily bore, and surrounding them with their horse, being a multitude against a few, readily recovered their ranks. Alexander then dispatched his archers, and Agrians, and other light-armed foot, under the command of Balacrus, and ordered them to mix with three troops of auxiliary horse and all the darters on horseback, and proceed against the enemy; he himself, with the rest of the horse, designing to attack them on the other side. 97 And now they were no longer able to draw up their forces in the same circular manner they did before (for the Macedonian horse pressing them on one hand, and the light-armed foot, mixed among the horse, on the other), hindered them from shewing their dexterity that way. Then their flight was apparent, about a thousand of their number being slain upon the spot, and, among the rest, one of their generals, named Satraces; and one hundred and fifty were taken prisoners. But when he proceeded to pursue the Scythians, his whole army was so overcome with excessive heat, that they were ready to die with thirst; even Alexander himself, having drunk some corrupted water, such as the country afforded, was thereby thrown into a violent flux, which hindered the pursuit; otherwise the whole Scythian army had, in all probability, been either cut off in their flight, or taken captives: but he was brought back to the camp in great danger of his life; and thereby the prophecy of Aristander was accomplished.
SOON after this arrived ambassadors from the king of the Scythians, endeavouring to excuse the fact, as not done by the general consent of the whole Scythians nation, but by a party, who exercised robbery, and lived by spoil; but assuring him that they were willing to receive his commands. Alexander returned them a courteous answer, as neither deeming it prudent to seem to suspect the truth of the excuse they made, nor to revenge his cause, by giving them battle, which it was no ways convenient for him, at that juncture, to attempt. In the mean time, the Macedonians, who were besieged in the castle of Maracanda, when Spitamenes, with his forces, assaulted them, made a sudden excursion, and having killed some of the besiegers, and put the rest to flight, returned safe into the castle; and news afterwards coming to Spitamenes, that the forces designed for the relief of the besieged in the castle of Maracanda were at hand, he raised the siege of that place, and retired towards the capital city of the Sogdian kingdom. Pharnuces and his forces pursued him as far as the confines of Sogdia, but not being able to overtake him, fell accidentally upon a party of Nomidian Scythians, and irritated them to that degree, that about six hundred horse of them hastened and joined Spitamenes, who, receiving such a recruit, was resolved to revenge the late insult of the Macedonians; to which end, drawing up his forces in a plain place, on the edge of the Scythian wilderness, he determined neither to wait for the enemy, nor yet to meet and attack them, but taking a compass with his horse, to gall their phalanx of foot with their arrows. But Pharnuces rushing forwards upon them with his horse, easily frustrated that design, because their horses, at that time, were both swifter and stronger than those of the Scythians: but Aristomachus’s horse, wearied with hard travelling, and 98 wasted for want of food, were hard pressed by the Scythians, both while they stood their ground, and when they retired. Many of them being, therefore, wounded with arrows, and some slain, those who remained drew up in a square battalion, and retreated to the river Polytimetus, because there was a wood adjacent to it, which would cover them, in a great measure, from the barbarian’s arrows, and which might also be useful to their foot. Caranus, captain of one of the troops of horse, without consulting with Andromachus, had already attempted to pass the river, because he thought his horse might be safer on the further side. The foot followed the horse, without any orders, but as their fears urged them forwards; this was the most disorderly passage over a river, with steep banks, that could be imagined. The barbarians, seeing the Macedonians thus at a loss, entered the river, in several places, with their horse, and some of them attacked those who endeavoured to pass over, but returned; some then, placing themselves opposite to those who still went forwards, slew them in the river; others, flanking them, galled them with their arrows; whilst others, again, rushed upon those who had not yet entered the water. The Macedonians, seeing themselves pressed with so many difficulties, retreated into a small island, which the Scythians and Spitamenes entirely surrounding with their horse, slew them all with their arrows, at a distance, except a very few, whom they first seized, and afterwards put to death.
ARISTOBULUS gives us an account of this action somewhat different, namely, that the greatest part of the army was cut off by an ambuscade of the Scythians, who, lying concealed in some adjoining thickets, attacked the Macedonians suddenly and unexpectedly; he also tells us, that Pharnuces was willing to have resigned his post, as general of those forces who were with him, alledging his want of skill in military discipline, and that he was rather sent thither by Alexander to bring the barbarians to reason, by his knowledge in their language, than to reduce them by force of arms, as a general; he also declared, that the Macedonians then committed to his care were the King’s friends as well as the rest. But Andromachus, and Menedemus, and Caranus, refused to act as generals, partly because they would not seem to exceed the commission which they had received from the King, and partly because the forces were then reduced to such streights as rendered it unsafe for them to accept it; for they well considered, that if any disaster happened, they were not, then, each to give an account for their several parts in that loss, but that the ill success of the whole army would be laid to their charge. In this confusion and hurry of affairs, the Scythians rushed suddenly upon them, and cut them almost all off; so that not above forty horse, and about three hundred foot, escaped. When Alexander 99 heard this news, he was enraged at the loss of his soldiers, and therefore determined speedily to march with an army against Spitamenes and the barbarians; and taking with him the half of his auxiliary horse, with all his targeteers, archers, and Agrians, and some of his light-armed phalanx of foot, he hastened to Maracanda, whither, he was informed, Spitamenes had returned, resolving, once more, to raise the siege of the castle there. Wherefore, having marched a thousand five hundred furlongs in three days space, on the fourth, early in the morning, he approached the city: but Spitamenes, hearing of Alexander’s speedy arrival in these parts, and not daring to give him battle, raised the siege, and fled. Alexander pursued them vigorously, and coming to the place where the former battle was fought, buried his soldiers, as well as the time would allow, and continued his pursuit as far as the Scythian deserts. Returning thence, he laid their fields waste, and even slew those who had fled into the towns for refuge, because they were said to have used the Macedonians in that manner. And thus he over-run and depopulated the whole country through which Polytimetus passes; for all beyond the place where that river loses itself is a desert; for though it carries a full stream, it sinks from the sight, and hides its streams in the sand. Nor is it so strange in this; for many other great and constant rivers hide themselves in the same manner; as namely, Epardus, which waters the territories of the Mardi; and Arius, which gives name to the country of the Arii: as also Etymandrus, which flows through the confines of the Euergetæ. These are all vast rivers, none of them inferior to Peneus in Thessaly, which passing through Tempe, discharges itself into the sea; but the river Polytimetus far exceeds it.
AFTER this, Alexander marched to Zariaspa, where he tarried some time, putting his soldiers into winter-quarters. In the mean while arrived Phrataphernes, governor of Parthia, and Stasanor, whom he had dispatched to the country of the Arii, to seize Arsames. Him they brought with them, bound in chains, as also Barzanes, whom Bessus had made governor of the Parthians, and some others, who, at that time, had taken up arms for Bessus. Then arrived from the sea-coast Epocillus and Melamnidas, with Ptolemy, captain of the Thracians, who had conveyed the money, and the recruits sent with Menetes, to the sea. Then also came Asander, and Nearchus, with a fresh band of Greek mercenaries, and Bessus, governor of Syria, and Asclepiodorus, a captain of horse; and these also brought new forces. Here, Alexander calling a council of all the chief men then present, caused Bessus to be brought in, and having accused him of treachery towards Darius, he commanded his nose and ears to be cut off, and then sent him, under a guard, to Ecbatana, there to receive sentence of death, according to the 100 judgment of a full council of the Medes and Persians. This extreme severity, used to the person of Bessus, I deem no ways praise-worthy, and surely the mutilation of his nose and ears was an action little less than barbarous: though I cannot but think Alexander was led to this by his emulating the Median and Persian pomp and ostentation, as also by the cruel customs of some barbarous kings over those in their power. Neither was it any ways commendable in him to lay aside his Macedonian and country habit, seeing he sprung from the race of the Heracledæ, and assume that of the Media: and I cannot but wonder he did not blush, when he exchanged the decent covering of the head, which he had worn in all his conquests, for the Persian turban, and weakly imitated those in habit whom he had so frequently overcome in the field. But surely, if any thing can, Alexander’s high atchievements may be a lesson to mankind, that whether a man excels in strength of body, or in the glory of his ancestors, or though in warlike exploits and happy success he could even out-do Alexander himself; if he could sail round Africa and Asia, as he had designed, and bring them both under subjection; nay, could he join the dominion of Europe to his former acquisitions of Asia and Africa, and thereby become master of the world; all these things would add nothing to the tranquility of his mind, nor would he be one jot the happier, unless he were endued with a suitable moderation of temper, how specious an appearance of tranquility soever he might put on, to deceive the eye of the world.
HERE, therefore, I have thought it not amiss to give an account of the death of Clitus, the son of Dropides, and of Alexander’s extreme grief for that action, though it happened a little while after this, in order of time. The Macedonians had observed a certain yearly festival, in honour of Bacchus, and Alexander had always offered sacrifices to Bacchus on that day; but then Bacchus was neglected, and the Dioscuri introduced: and these sacrifices were ordered for the future, to be performed to them, and a banquet to be made in honour of them. But when the banquet had now continued long, and the guests had drunk deep (for even in his cups Alexander had now begun to imitate the customs of the barbarians), and all were heated with wine, the discourse happened to hinge upon the Dioscuri, after what manner they derived their origin from Jove, seeing Tyndarus, a mortal, was their father: when some of the guests, willing to soothe the king, (for such sycophants have always been destructive of the affairs of princes, and ever will) affirmed, that the actions of Castor and Pollux were no ways comparable to those of Alexander. Others, at the same time, proceeded to compare his atchievements with those of Hercules; and withal added, that envy alone hindered the present race of men from paying him those honours 101 which were so justly his due. But Clitus, who had long since perceived Alexander’s proneness to fall in with the barbarian customs, took these speeches of the flattering courtiers very heinously; and being now heated with wine, declared that he could neither bear to hear these indignities offered to the gods, nor that the actions of ancient heroes should be extenuated to tickle his monarch’s ears. He affirmed, that Alexander’s acts had nothing so great nor surprising in them as they would insinuate; and that they were not performed by him alone, but that his Macedonians ought, at least, to share the glory with him. These words of Clitus enraged Alexander exceedingly; and indeed, howsoever just his reflections might be, I can by no means think they were seasonable at a time of such general drunkenness, but that silence would have been much better. However, when some begun to lessen the actions of his father, Philip, and (that they might please Alexander) to declare that nothing great nor glorious had been done by him, Clitus, in the highest fury imaginable, begun to magnify the exploits of Philip and to depress those of Alexander. He proceeded so far as to upbraid him with saving his life at the battle of Granicus; and arrogantly stretching out his right hand, — “this hand (said he), preserved thee, O Alexander, in that conflict.” Alexander, no longer able to endure Clitus’s rough and unseasonable reproaches, in a great rage leaped upon him, but was held back, and restrained from hurting him, by the guests then present at the banquet. However, Clitus still persisting in his reflections, Alexander called for his targeteers to attend him; but when none came, he cried out, that he was reduced to the same condition with Darius, when he was carried about prisoner by Bessus and his associates; and that he had now no more than an empty title left him. Then his friends, not daring any longer to hold him, he leaped up, and snatching a lance out of the hand of one of his body-guards (say some, or, as others, a sarissa, or Macedonian pike, from one of his ordinary guards), he therewith struck Clitus, and slew him. Aristobulus gives us no account whence this madness proceeded, but lays all the blame upon Clitus, who, when Alexander was in such a fury as to leap upon him with a design to slay him, notwithstanding he was conveyed out of the city, beyond the walls and ditch, and committed to the care of Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, for his preservation, could not tarry there, but must needs return; and then, hearing Alexander call upon him by name, he answered, Clitus is here present; whereupon Alexander thrust him through the body with a pike, and slew him.
AS Clitus deserves the severest censures, for his bitter reproaches to his sovereign, so I cannot chuse but be sorry for Alexander, who then apparently shewed himself obnoxious to two of the greatest vices in life, 102 namely, unbridled wrath and drunkenness; to neither of which the meanest person ought give way: but then he is exceedingly to be praised, because, the moment his wine had left him, he was grieved, and repented himself for what he had done. Some writers of his life affirm, that he was resolved to have dispatched himself with the same weapon wherewith he had before slain Clitus; imagining he was unworthy to enjoy life, who had so rashly put his friend to death; though most authors are silent as to this particular. But when he came fully to himself, and retired to bed, he bewailed his loss, and poured forth the bitterest complaints imaginable, often calling upon the name of Clitus, and of Lanice, the daughter of Dropides, and sister of Clitus, who had been his nurse; complaining what a reward, now he was arrived to man’s estate, he had bestowed on her for nursing him when he was a child; how he had seen her sons slain, fighting for him, and had murdered her brother with his own hands. Thus he, ever and anon, cried out that he was become the executioner of his friends; nay, to such a height of indignation at himself did his deep remorse drive him, that for the space of three days he wholly abstained from food, and became entirely regardless of his former sumptuousness of apparel. Some priests ascribed the cause of all this to the wrath of Bacchus, because Alexander had discontinued his sacrifices. However, being at length induced by his friends to refresh his body with a little meat and drink, he afterwards sacrificed to Bacchus; for it was not unacceptable to him to have that rather imputed to the wrath of a god than to any crime of his own. However, he is certainly to be commended, because he neither made unseemly rejoicings on his committing that fact, nor, what would have been worse, gloried in it afterwards; but acknowledged his crime in the most submissive manner imaginable. Some affirm, that Anaxarchus, the sophist, being sent by his friends to comfort him, when he found him lying upon the bed sighing, said, in raillery, he wondered why the ancient sages always placed Justice so near Jupiter, unless because whatever was decreed by Jupiter should therefore be deemed just; and that all the actions of so great a king as he was ought first to appear just to himself, and afterwards to the rest of mankind. And they added, that Alexander was hereupon much eased of his grief. But, in my opinion, Anaxarchus was guilty of a much greater error than Alexander, if he supposed it to be the sober reflection of a wise man, that a king ought not to be so exceedingly anxious in doing good actions, as that whatever he did should be so accounted by the world. Some authors report, that Alexander would have divine honours paid him, because he had conceived a notion that he was the son of Hammon, and not of Philip. But when he begun to affect the Persian and Median customs, and to imitate them in his attire as well as his manners, he then seemed to stand in need of no flatterer to debauch his mind, nor any sophist, such as Anaxarchus, or Agis the Greek poet, to seduce him.
103CALLISTHENES the Olynthian, a scholar of Aristotle, one of a rough disposition, and inflexible, entirely disapproved these methods of proceeding; for which he is worthy due praise: but what he has wrote relating to that affair, if he really wrote it, is no great argument of his humility, viz. — that Alexander and his military exploits were no ways comparable to him and his writings: — that he did not accompany him for any glory he hoped thereby to acquire himself, but that he might render him the most illustrious and most glorious among mortals: — that he was not to build any hopes of divine honours upon those fabulous stories relating to his mother and his birth, but rather upon those things he should hand down to posterity concerning him. Some also say, that when he was asked by Philotas whom he deemed most honoured by the people of Athens, he answered, Harmodius and Aristogiton, because they had slain one of the tyrants of their state, and dissolved the tyranny. And when Philotas again asked him if any one was now to put a tyrant to death, in which of the Grecian states would he find protection? He replied, if in no other, surely he would in Athens; for they had entered into a war with the sons of Hercules against Eurystheus, who had, at that time, usurped the government of Greece. As to the adoration, which should have been paid to Alexander, there goes a story to this purpose: — it was agreed upon between him and his sophists, and those of the Persian and Median nations, who were of the highest rank about him, that as they were drinking they should fall into a discourse on purpose, which Anaxarchus was to usher in, by asserting that Alexander was more worthy to be esteemed a god than either Bacchus or Hercules; not so much on account of the greatness of his actions, as because Bacchus was no more than a Theban, a race of men, for valour and renown, no ways comparable to the Macedonians; and as for Hercules, he was, indeed, a Grecian, but his chief glory was, that Alexander deduced his origin from him; and that therefore the Macedonians might with much more reason and justice attribute divine honours to their king than either the Thebans to Bacchus or the Grecians to Hercules. And as there was no doubt but he would be worshipped as a god by his people after his death, it would be much better to pay him the same adoration in the time of his life; for after his decease, no fruits of the honours bestowed upon him by mortals would be able to reach him.
THESE, and many other things to the same purpose, were spoken by Anaxarchus; and when he had finished, those who were of his party applauded his oration, and declared themselves ready to begin their adoration immediately; upon which many of the Macedonians, who disliked 104 Anaxarchus’s speech, held their peace. But Callisthenes, breaking the general silence, spoke to Anaxarchus in this manner: — “I cannot, O Anaxarchus, deem Alexander unworthy any honour, which it becomes a mortal man to accept; but divine and human honours are widely different, as well in other things as in the rearing of temples and the erecting of statues. To the gods we consecrate temples, offer sacrifices, and pour out libations; again, hymns are peculiarly attributed to the gods; praises to men, but accompanied with no adoration. Men we usually kiss by way of salutation, but the gods, being placed aloft, it is not lawful so much as to touch them, because they are objects of worship. Dances are also led up, and pæans sung in honour of them, which is no wonder; but one sort of honours is ascribed to the gods, another to heroes; and the honours paid to heroes is vastly different from divine adoration. It is therefore a matter of the utmost importance for us to avoid confounding these things with one another; and neither by extravagant accumulations of honours to pretend to exalt men above mortality, nor to debase the gods, by robbing them of the worship they so justly claim, and reducing them to a level with mankind. Even Alexander himself would be enraged, should any private man usurp a royal title in an unlawful manner; with how much more justice may the gods be enraged, if any mortal dares claim divine honours, or accept them when offered by others. That Alexander is and ought to be esteemed of heroes the most heroic, of men of valour the most valiant, of kings the most king-like, and of emperors the most worthy of imperial dignity, none will deny. It was thy province, O Anaxarchus, if it was any one’s, to have instilled such notions as these into Alexander’s mind, and to have deterred him from those opposite to them, by thy discourse, which he daily delights in, because of thy wisdom and learning. It was highly unbecoming thee to be the author of such a speech, who oughtest to have called to mind that thou wast not then giving counsel to Cambyses or Xerxes, but to the son of Philip, who derives his pedigree from Hercules and Eacus, whose ancestors came to Macedonia from Argos, and obtained the kingdom, not by force, but by law and right. Hercules had no divine honours ascribed to him by the Grecians during his life, nor yet after his death, till they were commanded by the Delphic oracle to worship him as a god. But if there be some few, who, among a nation of barbarians, have degenerated into the barbarian customs and manners, I beseech thee, O Alexander, still to continue mindful of Greece, for whose sake this expedition was undertaken, that thou mightest join Asia to the Grecian empire. Consider now, when thou returnest into thine own country, whether thou wilt force the Greeks, a free people, to pay thee adoration; or, if they are to be exempted, whether the Macedonians alone are to be laden with that disgrace, or whether different honors are to be given thee by different people, the Greeks and Macedonians approaching thee in their ancient manner, with such as belong to mankind, and the barbarians, after theirs, saluting thee with those which none but the gods can admit of. If you object to this, that Cyrus, the 105 son of Cambyses, was the first of all men who had divine worship offered him, and that this had been given to the monarchs of Persia and Media ever since. Consider, I beseech thee, that the Scythians an indigent, but free people, corrected Cyrus for his unexampled insolency. Darius the former received a check from another nation of Scythians; Xerxes from the Athenians and Lacedæmonians; Artaxerxes from Clearchus and Xenophon, with no more than ten thousand soldiers; and this Darius from Alexander before any divine honours had been decreed to him.
THESE, and many other things to the same purpose, Callisthenes uttered at that time, which Alexander took heinously, but they were grateful to the Macedonians; which, when the King understood, he immediately sent to examine whether the Macedonians were mindful of the adoration they owed him. While the King spoke, a profound silence was observed; after which, those Persians who transcended others in age and honours, rose up and begun to worship him, after the Persian manner. But Leonnatus, one of his friends, observing one of them behave undecently, scoffed at his action, as too abject and ridiculous, at which Alexander was much offended; but afterwards received him again into favour. Some write that Alexander took a golden goblet, full of wine, in his hand, and having drunk it off to the person he designed should adore him, he rose from his seat, and having answered his expectations, received a kiss, and departed. And this was performed by all the company, in order; but when the cup came to Callisthenes, he indeed rose up and drunk the wine, and, drawing nearer, would have received his kiss, according to custom, without performing his worship and the King, then engaged in a deep discourse with Hephæstion, did not observe whether he went through with it or not; but Demetrius, the son of Pythonactes, one of his friends, seeing Callisthenes approach nigh to kiss the King, acquainted him that he had not done his duty, for which reason he received a repulse; whereupon he departed, saying, he was only one kiss loser. I am far from approving any of these speeches of Callisthenes, which immediately tended to disgrace his sovereign; neither is his rigid stiffness and sourness of disposition any ways commendable: but this I may affirm, that whoever is resolved to serve a prince, must submit to such things as are deemed requisite to the advancement of that prince’s honour; and therefore I cannot but think that Callisthenes became justly odious to Alexander, for the unseasonable and unwarrantable license he gave to his tongue, as well as for his foolish haughtiness. And this, without doubt, was the reason why such easy credit was given to the information lodged against him, of his being privy to the conspiracy of some young men, to take away Alexander’s 106 life; and this also strengthened the accusation of others, who protested that they were induced, by him alone, to join in that design.
THE story of this conspiracy is thus related: an ordinance had been instituted by Philip, that the sons of those Macedonians, who had arrived to the highest posts of honour, should, as soon as they were grown up, be elected to attend the person of their Sovereign. These were to serve all the offices about the King, to be his guard when he slept, to receive the horse from the groom of the stable, and bring him for the King to mount; to clothe him in a Persian habit, and be his companions when he rode out a-hunting. Among these was Hermolaus, the son of Sopolis, who seemed to be much given to the study of philosophy, and was an admirer of Callisthenes. This Hermolaus, on a certain time, when the King went a-hunting, and a boar made towards him, prevented him, by striking the beast first, which immediately fell down dead. — The King, enraged that this opportunity of smiting the boar was snatched out of his hands, commanded the youth instantly to be whipped in sight of all his companions, and his horse to be taken from him. Hermolaus, deeply resenting this disgrace, communicated his mind to Sostratus, the son of Amyntas, one of equal age with himself, and whom he exceedingly loved; and withal assured him, that his life would be a burthen to him, unless he could revenge this heinous affront upon his Sovereign. Sostratus, by reason of the great love he had for him, easily came into his measures; and he afterwards persuaded Antipater, the son of Asclepiodorus, governor of Syria, to join with them; as also Epimenes, the son of Arseas, and Anticles, the son of Theocritus, and Philotas, the son of Carsis, the Thracian. When therefore it came to Antipater’s turn to watch, they resolved, that night, to kill Alexander in his sleep. But it fell out, that the King, of his own accord (as some say) sat up drinking till day-light. But Aristobulus tells us, that a certain Syrian woman, a prophetess, followed Alexander. She was, at first, looked upon as little less than frantic, both by him and his friends; but when, by her divine fury, she had foretold him the truth of what would happen, by several instances, she was no longer disregarded, but ordered to have free access to the King, either by day or night, even though he was asleep. — The King departing from the banquet late that night, she met him, in one of her divine raptures, and begged that he would return, and drink until morning. He, supposing she was then inspired, returned accordingly, and so rendered the young men’s conspiracy abortive. The next day, Epimenes, the son of Arseas, one of the conspirators, disclosed the whole matter to Chariclus, the son of Menander, his friend, who revealed it to Eurylochus, the brother of Epimenes. Eurylochus, entering the royal tent, declared the whole affair to Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, one 107 of his body-guards. He discovered it to Alexander, who instantly ordered all those whom Eurylochus had named to be apprehended; each of whom, being examined apart, declared his being privy to the conspiracy; and they gave the names of several others.
ARISTOBULUS adds, that the conspirators, when seized, not only confessed their own guilt, but alledged that they were instigated thereto by Callisthenes, and Ptolemy confirms his relation. Some writers give a different account of this matter, namely, that Alexander, bearing a deadly grudge to Callisthenes, and knowing the intimacy which was between him and Hermolaus, easily entertained a notion of his being concerned therein, from their information. Others assure us, that Hermolaus, being brought forth before the Macedonians, openly confessed, that the plot was contrived by himself; for that it was below the soul of free man to bear the injuries he had received from the King; and that he then related all the cruelties committed by Alexander, in order, namely, the unjust murder of Philotas, and the more inhuman one of his father Parmenio, and those who suffered at that time; the rash and barbarous assassination of Clitus; his assuming the Median habit; his edict for having divine honours bestowed upon himself, not yet recalled; as also his drunkenness, sloth, and luxury; all which, when he could no longer bear, he was willing, at once, to set himself, and the rest of the Macedonians, free from such intolerable slavery. They add, that then Hermolaus and his accomplices were stoned to death by those who surrounded them. Aristobulus adds, that Callisthenes was carried round the army in chains, but afterwards died a natural death; though Ptolemy affirms, that he was stretched upon a rack, and then crucified. So little do these two writers, though otherwise of great credit, agree between themselves, about things so manifest, and the circumstances of which could not possibly escape their knowledge, they being both then present: so that ’tis no wonder these things are related by other authors in a manner very different. But enough of these matters, which I have enlarged upon, because they happened not long after the story of Clitus, and are therefore not unfitly mentioned in this place.
ABOUT this time arrived other ambassadors from the European Scythians, and with them those whom he had dispatched thither returned; for the King which reigned in Scythia, when Alexander sent his ambassadors, was dead, and his brother had mounted his throne. The purport of this embassy was, that the Scythians were willing to receive Alexander’s commands. They had also brought presents from their 108 King, which among them were deemed of great value. To bind this league and friendship between them the stronger, the Scythian King proposed to give his daughter to Alexander to wife; but, if he deigned not to accept of that proffer for himself, the princes of the Scythian nation, and those who were in posts of the highest honour about his own person, should bestow their daughters in marriage to those who were his most faithful friends and followers; that he also, if he so thought fit, would attend him in person, to receive his commands. About this time also came Pharaimanes, King of the Chorasmeni, to Alexander, attended by a body of fifteen hundred horse, who affirmed that his territories bordered upon Golchos and the Amazonian nation, and that if Alexander was willing to undertake an expedition against those countries, which border upon the Euxine Sea, he, for his part, would not only conduct him thither with safety, but also provide his whole army with all necessaries. Alexander first dispatched the Scythian ambassadors with a friendly answer, well accommodated to the time, but withal told them, that he was not inclined to accept of a Scythian bride; then, having highly extolled Pharaimanes, and entered into a league and friendship with him, declared that it was not convenient for him, at that time, to think of marching towards the Euxine Sea, but recommended him to Artabazus, the Persian, to whom he had committed the government of the Bactrians, and other bordering nations, and dismissed him. He also professed, that his mind was wholly bent upon an expedition into India; for when the Indians were subdued, all Asia would be in his power; and when Asia was his own, he would return into Greece, and thence, with all his land as well as naval forces, pass through the Hellespont and Propontis, into the Euxine Sea; and Pharaimanes protested, whenever he came, to be ready to fulfil his promise. He then again directed his march to the river Oxus; for he designed to pay the Sogdians another visit, having received intelligence that many of them had betaken themselves to their strong holds, and refused to pay obedience to the governor which he had placed over them. And when he had pitched his tents not far from the banks of that river, two fountains suddenly issued out of the earth, near the royal pavilion, the one pouring forth water, the other pure oil. This prodigy being related to Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, he declared it to the King, who immediately offered sacrifice, according to the direction of his soothsayers, and received an answer from Aristander, that the fountain of oil portended the great toils he was to undergo, but that they would, at last, be crowned with victory.
HE then, with part of his army, marched straight into the country of the Sogdians; for Polysperchon and Attalus, and Gorgias and Meleager, were left in Bactria, to keep that province under subjection, and 109 as well to hinder the barbarians from attempting to revolt, as to reduce those who had revolted already. He divided his forces into five parts, the command over the first of which was given to Hephæstion; the second to Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, one of his body-guards; the third to Perdiccas; the fourth to Cænus and Artabazus: he himself, at the head of the fifth, marched towards Maracanda; the rest, as they could most conveniently, entering the country, reduced some of their strong holds by force, and had others surrendered into their hands. And after they had over-run the greatest part of these territories, they all met together at Maracanda, from whence he dispatched Hephæstion, to draw new colonies into the depopulated cities of the Sogdians. He also sent Cænus and Artabazus against the Scythians, because he was informed that Spitamenes had fled thither; himself and the rest of his forces, marching towards the other cities of that country which had revolted, easily brought them under subjection. In the mean time, Spitamenes, at the head of a band of Sogdian exiles, who had fled into Scythia, and about six hundred Massagetæ horse, attacked a certain castle in Bactria, the governor whereof, imagining no enemy near, was surprised and taken prisoner, and all the soldiers in the garrison slain. Having thus taken this castle, they were mightily elated, and, in a few days, marched to Zariaspe, which city, nevertheless, they durst not besiege, but, ravaging the country round, gathered together much spoil. There were then in that city some of the mercenary horse, who had been left there, by reason of their ill state of health, and with these Pithon, the son of Sosicles, the overseer of the royal houshold of Zariaspe, and Aristonicus the harper. These, having notice of this sudden inroad of the Scythians (for they had now recovered their healths so far as to be able to mount their horses, and bear arms), having gathered together, about eighty of the mercenary horse, which had been left at Zariaspe, and some of the royal youths of the houshold, marched against the enemy, and, attacking the Scythians on a sudden, when they least expected any such treatment, they took from them all the spoil they had gathered together, and slew great umbers of those who guarded it; but, returning in a loose and careless manner, without regard to order, as having no head or captain, they fell into an ambuscade of the Scythians, placed there by Spitamenes, where seven of the auxiliaries, and sixty of the mercenary horse, were slain; and there Aristonicus the harper died, having behaved himself more like a brave soldier than a musician; but Pithon, being wounded, fell alive into the enemy’s hands.
AS soon as the news of this defeat came to Craterus, he immediately marched against the Massagetæ, who, when they heard of his approach, fled towards the desert, but were hotly pursued by him, and they, and 110 others of the same nation, to the number of about a thousand horse, were overtaken, just at the edge thereof, and a sharp contest happening thereupon, the Macedonians were victors. Of the barbarians, about one hundred and fifty were slain; the rest escaped into the desert, Craterus and his solider not being able to pursue them further. In the mean while, Artabazus begging to be discharged from his government of Bactria, by reason of his advanced age, his petition was granted, and Alexander substituted Amyntas*, the son of Nicolaus, to succeed him; and, having left Cænus there, with his own and Meleager’s troops, besides four hundred of the auxiliary horse, all the pikemen on horseback, and the Bactrians and Sogdians under Amyntas, the chief command over all these was given to Cænus, who ordered them to winter in Sogdia, partly for garrisons to defend the country, and partly to encounter Spitamenes, if he should attempt to make an inroad there during the winter. But Spitamenes, understanding that all places were filled with Macedonian garrisons, and that it would be a difficult matter for him to make a retreat, if he had occasion, resolved at once to turn his whole power against Cænus and his forces, imagining that he would penetrate the most easily into the country that way: and when he approached Gabæ, a fortified place belonging to the Sogdians, seated on the borders between them and the Massagetæ Scythians, he drew in four thousand Scythian horse to join his forces, that they might make an irruption into Sogdia. These Scythians being extremely poor, as having neither cities nor fixed and certain habitations, nor possessing any thing which they were afraid to lose, were easily induced to join their forces with any nation. Cænus, having intelligence of Spitamene’s approach, marched forth with his army to meet him, and a sharp battle thereupon ensued, in which the victory fell to the Macedonians. The barbarians lost above eight hundred horse, and Cænus about twenty-five horse, and twelve foot, in this conflict. The Sogdians who survived this day’s action, as also many of the Bactrians, leaving Spitamenes in his flight, came to Cænus, and, having surrendered themselves into his power, swore fidelity to him; but the Massagetæ and other Scythians, after the loss of the battle, having seized upon the baggage of the Bactrians and Sogdians, their allies, accompanied Spitamenes in his flight into the desert: but when they came to understand that Alexander was preparing to scour these places, they slew Spitamenes, and having cut off his head, sent it as a present to Alexander, hoping, by this action, to make him cease his pursuit after them.
NOTES
* Artabazus’s province, according to Curtis, lib. viii. cap. 1. 19. was given to Clitus; but his death happening presently after, it was then bestowed upon Amyntas.
111ABOUT this time Cænus and Craterus returned to Alexander at Nautaca, as also did Phrataphernes, governor of the Parthians, and Stasanor, governor of the Arii, having executed whatsoever had been ordered them. Alexander then, giving his army a little rest (for it was now winter), dispatched Phrataphernes into the country of the Mardii and Topiri, to bring Phradates, the governor of them, before him, in chains, because he had been often sent for, and refused to come. Stasanor was dispatched against the Drangæ, and Atropates against the Medes, because Oxydates, governor of Media, was inclinable to revolt. Stamenes he ordered to Babylon, because Mazæus, the ruler thereof, was said to be dead; and Sopolis, and Epocillus and Menædas, he dispatched into Macedonia, to fetch recruits from thence. Then, at the approach of the spring, he directed his march to a fortress built upon a rock in Sogdia, into which many of the inhabitants of these parts had fled for refuge; among whom were the wife and daughter of Oxyartes the Bactrian; for Oxyartes, when he revolted from Alexander, had taken care to have them conveyed thither, as to an impregnable place; and it appeared plain to him, that if that fort was once taken, the Sogdians would have no place of strength left to invite them to rebellion. As soon as Alexander approached the rock, he found it every way steep, rugged, and difficult of access, and that the barbarians had laid up store of corn for a long siege. The great depth of snow likewise made the ascent up the rock much more difficult to the Macedonians, and, at the same time, supplied the barbarians with plenty of water. However, in spite of all these dangers, Alexander resolved to besiege it; for the proud and insolent answer sent him by the barbarians served only to inflame him with the greater thirst of glory and revenge: for when he sent them a summons to surrender the place, with an offer that every one of them should be suffered freely to return to their habitations, they mocked him rudely and barbarously, and enquired whether he had furnished himself with winged soldiers for the storming that rock? for otherwise they had no cause to be afraid, it being out of the power of all other mortals to ascend it by force. Then Alexander ordered a proclamation to be issued forth, that the first man who gained the top of the rock should have a reward of twelve talents bestowed upon him, and the second and third should be gratified in proportion to the order of their ascent, and even the last of ten should have three hundred darics. The extraordinary hopes they conceived of this gratuity added new vigour to the Macedonians, who, even of themselves, were sufficiently adventurous, upon the bare thirst of glory.
112HAVING therefore chose, out of his whole army, about three hundred of those who had been accustomed to scale walls, and climb up rocks in sieges, they took with them the iron pins which they had used in pitching their tents, and which they designed to fix in the snow, where it was sufficiently hardened by the frost, or in the ground where no snow lay. To these pins they tied strong ropes, and in the dead of the night, made the best of their way to that part of the rock which was most steep and rugged, and where, of consequence, a guard was deemed the least necessary; and then, having fixed their iron pins, sometimes in the snow itself, wherever the frost had hardened it, and sometimes in the ground, where it was bare, they hoisted themselves up, by little and little, some in one place, and some in another. Thirty of those perished in the ascent, and, by falling down headlong from the rocks, were buried so deep in the snow, that their bodies could not be found. The rest, having gained the top by break of day, made a signal to their friends below where they were arrived, by waving their handkerchiefs over their heads; for so Alexander had commanded them. Upon this he immediately dispatched a herald, to give the barbarians a second summons to surrender without delay, for that he had furnished himself with winged soldiers, such as they spoke of, who had already possessed themselves of the utmost summit of the rock: and then the soldiers who had gained that post shewed themselves. The barbarians, terrified with this unexpected sight, supposing them to have been many more, and much better armed than what they really were, immediately surrendered; so great a dread fell upon them at the sight of a few Macedonians. The wives and children of many great men were there taken, and, among the rest, those of Oxyartes. The daughter of Oxyartes was named Roxane, a virgin, but marriageable, and, by the general consent of writers, the most beautiful of all the Asiatic women, Darius’s wife excepted. Alexander was struck with surprise at the sight of her beauty; nevertheless, being fully resolved not to offer violence to a captive, he forbore to gratify his desires till he took her, afterwards, to wife. This act of his undoubtedly deserves the highest honour that can be given him; and, as to the wife of Darius (whose charms surpassed all the Asiatics), he either had no desires towards her, or he took care to curb his desires, notwithstanding he was in the very heat of youth, and at the height of glory, which are commonly great debauchers of the mind, and often cause men to make a bad use of those advantages which fortune has put into their hands. But he, out of a certain awe or reverence, forbore to touch her, and herein shewed himself no less a pattern of true continency, than he had before done of heroic fortitude.
113THERE is a report, that a short while after the battle of Issus, which was fought betwixt Alexander and Darius, a certain eunuch, to whom the custody of Darius’s wife was committed, escaped out of the camp, and fled to Darius; whom, when the King saw, he first asked him whether his children, and wife, and mother, were alive? And being answered that they were not only alive, but were stiled Queens, and received all the honours which they had been accustomed to, he again inquired whether his wife continued chaste? which he affirmed, and added, that the conqueror had not so much as offered any violence to her person, which might tend to his disgrace. All this he confirmed by an oath, and assured the King that his wife continued in the same state in which he left her, and that Alexander was the most temperate and chaste prince upon earth. Whereupon Darius is said to have lifted up his hands to heaven, and poured forth his prayers in this manner: — “O Jupiter, who hast the disposal of all the states and kingdoms of the earth in thy hands, grant to re-state me in the Empire of the Medes and Persians, which I once enjoyed. But if thou hast already decreed otherwise, and I must now cease to be Lord of Asia, I beg and intreat thee to confer my dominions rather on Alexander than on any other.” So much are good and generous acts regarded, even by enemies. Oxyartes, understanding that the rock was won, and his wife and children taken, and besides, that his daughter Roxane was betrothed to the conqueror, he assumed his courage, and came to Alexander, where he received all the honours to which such an affinity could entitle him.
WHEN Alexander had secured his conquests in Sogdia, by his obtaining possession of this rock, he led his army against the Parætacæ, because he had received intelligence that there was another fort erected upon a rock in that country, into which abundance of the inhabitants had retired. This was named the Rock of Chorienes; and Chorienes himself, and other great men in vast numbers,, had chosen that place for their safety. The slant height of this rock was about twenty stadia, and the circuit thereof near sixty, every where steep and craggy. There was only one ascent leading to the summit, hewn out by art, and purposely made so extremely narrow as not to admit of two men to ascend abreast. The foot of this rock was also surrounded with a deep ditch, so that whosoever would lead an army to it must of necessity reduce some part of the ditch to a level before he could bring his forces to a convenient station for an assault. Alexander, however, in spite of all these difficulties, resolved to undertake the task, as deeming no place inaccessible, or impregnable 114 against such an assailer; so great a confidence did he place in the continued course of his successes. Having therefore ordered a vast number of fir-trees, which grew every where near this mountain, to be cut down, he commanded ladders to be made of them, whereby his soldiers might descend to the bottom of the ditch, which they could do by no other contrivance. All day long Alexander employed the half of his army upon this task; and in the night time, Perdiccas, Leonnatus, and Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, having divided the other half into three parts, took care to see the work carried on, which was of so great difficulty, by reason of the extraordinary hardness of the rock, that they finished no more than twenty cubits in a whole day, and in a night much less, through the whole army laboured therein by turns. However, descending into the ditch, and forcing large wooden piles into the bottom, at such a convenient distance from each other as to be able to bear a certain proposed weight; upon the tops of these piles they laid vast hurdles of osiers, or other twigs bound together, and those they covered with earth, that the army might pass over the ditch as upon a bridge. The barbarians at first mocked the Macedonians attempts as dangerous and ill-concerted; but when they found themselves galled with their arrows, and perceived, that, notwithstanding the advantage of their high station, they were unable to drive them from their work, because of the coverings they had contrived to defend themselves with, against darts and other missive weapons from above. Chorienes, amazed at the greatness of the attempt, immediately dispatched an herald to Alexander, desiring that Oxyartes might be sent to him, which was granted, and when he came, he failed not to persuade him to surrender his rock and himself into Alexander’s hands, for that no place was inaccessible to him and his army; and the more to induce him to submit himself, he extolled the King’s goodness and generosity, whereof he was an eminent example. Chorienes, won by these arguments, came with some of his friends and relations to Alexander, who received him with the utmost respect, and ranked him among the number of his friends; and having ordered some of those who came down with him to ascend again, and command those who kept the rock to deliver it up, it was accordingly delivered. Alexander then, accompanied with about five hundred targeteers, mounted the rock, on purpose to view the top thereof; and was so far from doing any thing which might redound to Chorienes’s disgrace, that he committed the rock again into his custody, and not only so, but restored him all his former government. About this time (it being still winter, and the deep snow covering the earth, during this siege) the army was reduced to some streights for want of forage, and other necessaries; but Chorienes, in some measure to requite Alexander’s liberality, proffered to furnish the whole army with provisions for two months, and accordingly, out of the store he had laid up for a siege, he distributed corn, and wine, and salt meat, to the soldiers in every tent; all which, when he had distributed for the full time proposed, he affirmed, that the tenth part of what they had before gathered together 115 was not yet exhausted. Alexander, upon this, esteemed him the more, because he had plainly shewed, that his surrender of the rock was more to be imputed to his own inclination that way, than to any force of an enemy from without.
THESE things thus happily performed, Alexander marched against the Bactrians, and at the same time dispatched Craterus, with six hundred auxiliary horse, and his own, and Polysperchon’s, Attalus’s, and Alcetas’s troops of foot, against Catanes and Austanes, who alone were now remaining of all the revolters in Parætacæ. A sharp battle hereupon ensued, wherein Craterus being victor, Catanes was slain, and Austanes taken alive, and brought in chains to Alexander. About one hundred and twenty of the barbarian horse fell in this battle, and near fifteen hundred foot. This done, Craterus also marched into Bactria where at that time the conspiracy of Callisthenes, and the youths of the royal guard against Alexander’s life was detected. From Bactria, the spring now coming on, he pushed forwards with all his forces for India, (Amyntas being left Governor of Bactria, with one thousand five hundred horse, and ten thousand foot) and in ten days space, passing over Mount Caucasus, he arrived at Alexandria, a city which he had caused to be built among the Parapamisæ, when he made his first expedition into Bactria. He displaced the Governor of that city, because he seemed not to have done his duty; and drawing many inhabitants thither, out of the neighbouring country, and leaving such of the Macedonians there as were rendered unserviceable, he appointed Nicanor their ruler; but Tyriaspes was made Governor of the country of Parapamisæ, and of the whole province, as far as the river Cophenes. Thence passing forwards to Nicæa, he sacrificed to Minerva, and proceeded to the river Cophenes, from whence dispatching a herald before, to Taxiles, and the other princes on this side of the river Indus, to come forth and meet him as he approached their territories, Taxiles and the rest hereupon came and met him, with the most valuable presents which India could furnish; and besides, they made him a promise of twenty-five elephants. There dividing his forces, he dispatched Hephæstion and Perdiccas into the country of Peucelaotis, towards the river Indus, with the troops of Gorgias and Clitus, and Meleager, besides half of his auxiliary horse, and all his mercenary horse. Their orders were to receive the surrender of all the towns through which they passed, or to force them thereto; and when they came to the river Indus, to make things ready for ferrying the army over. Taxiles, and the rest of the princes of that country, accompanied them in that expedition; and when they came to the river, performed whatever Alexander had commanded. But Astes, Prince of Peucelaotis, endeavouring to revolt, 116 lost both the city into which he fled, and his own life; for Hephæstion took it, after thirty days siege, and Astes being slain, the government thereof was delivered to Sangæus, who flying from Astes some time before, had sought protection from Taxiles, which action gained him so much credit with Alexander, that he deputed him ruler over the country.
Alexander then, with a band of targeteers, and those of the auxiliary horse who followed not Hephæstion, as also the troop called the auxiliary foot, and the archers, and Agrians, and equestrian darters, marched against the Aspii, the Thyræi and Arasaci; and passing near the river Choe, through a country rough and mountainous, when he had with some difficulty crossed that river, he ordered his foot to follow him at leisure, while he, with all his horse, and eight hundred heavy armed Macedonian targeteers, which he caused to mount on horseback, marched forwards with all speed, because he had received information that the barbarians of that country had retired to the mountains, or withdrawn themselves to places of the best strength, on purpose to oppose him. When he approached the first of these towns, he found the inhabitants drawn up without the walls; but he beat them back at the first assault, and forced them to retire within their gates: however, a dart pierced his armour, and wounded him in the shoulder, but the wound was slight, by reason of the strength and thickness of his armour. Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, and Leonnatus, were both wounded in that conflict. Then Alexander encamped against the place, on that side where he thought the walls were weakest; and the next day, as soon as it was light, easily made himself master of the outward wall (for the town was surrounded with a double wall), whereupon the besieged retired to the inner one, where they stood for some time; but when the scaling ladders were fixed, and the besieged found themselves every where so galled with their darts, that they could endure it no longer, they issued suddenly out of their gates, and fled to the mountains. But the Macedonians pursuing hard after them, slew many in the pursuit, and took many alive, who, because of the exceeding rage they had conceived against them for the wound given their King, were all put to death: however, great numbers escaped to the neighbouring mountains. When they had laid that city level with the ground, he led his army to another, named Andaca; which yielding upon articles, he there left Craterus, with other captains of foot, to take all such cities by force as refused to submit voluntarily, and to govern the whole province, as it should seem to him most convenient.
117THEN, with his targeteers, archers, and Agrians, as also Cænus’ and Attalus’s troops, the Macedonian Agema, with almost four troops of the auxiliary horse, and half of his equestrian archers, he directed his march towards the river Euaspla, where the general of the Aspii lay, and in two days time, by long journeys, came to the city. The barbarians no sooner perceived his approach than they set it on fire, and fled to the mountains; however, the Macedonians pursued, and made a great slaughter of them, before they could reach these rugged, and almost inaccessible places of retreat. Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, viewing their general posted on a little hill, took with him a party of targeteers, and though their number was far inferior to the enemy, yet he advanced boldly on horseback; but when he could proceed no further on horseback, by reason of the steepness of the hill, he left his horse with one of his soldiers, and went forwards on foot. When the Indian general saw him approach, he rushed forwards, at the head of his men, and threw a spear at Ptolemy, which struck upon his breast-plate, but could not pierce through his armour; whereupon Ptolemy thrust him through the thigh, and having slain him, stripped him of his armour. The barbarians, who were upon the spot, seeing their general fall, betook themselves to flight; but the mountaineers, disdaining that his dead body should be carried off by the enemy, run to the hill, and renewed the conflict, by their endeavours to rescue it. But now Alexander himself approached, with those foot forces, whom he had ordered to alight from horseback, who rushing, all at once, upon the barbarians, with much difficulty drove them back to the mountains, and so carried off the body. Alexander then passed one of these mountains, and coming nigh the city called Arigæus, found it deserted and burnt by the inhabitants. In the mean time, Craterus, having finished whatever was commanded him, returned; and because the situation of this place seemed extremely commodious, he gave orders to Craterus for rebuilding it, an that he should people it with such of the neighbouring inhabitants as would come of their own accord, and with others out of the army, who were become unfit for further service. He, in the mean time, directed his march towards the place where the barbarians had fled, and coming to the foot of a certain mountain, encamped there: whence Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, being sent out to forage, and venturing somewhat further still, with a small party, to view the enemy, at his return acquainted Alexander that many more fires appeared in the camp of the barbarians then in his. Alexander, though he could make no sure guess at the enemy’s numbers, from the multitude of their fires, yet being informed that vast crowds of them had resorted thither, left one party of his army there to defend the camp; and taking with him those whom he deemed fittest for his purpose, he no sooner advanced within sight of the enemy’s fires than he divided his forces into three parts; one of which he ordered 118 should be commanded by Leonnatus, one of his body-guards, and this was composed of the troops of Attalus, and Balacrus; the second by Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, in which were the royal targeteers, and the cohorts of Philip and Philotas, besides two thousand archers and Agrians, and one half of his horse. The third division he led on himself towards that part of the barbarian army where they seemed to stand the thickest.
WHEN they perceived the Macedonians approach towards them (for they were posted upon an eminence), trusting in their multitudes, and despising the small number of their enemies, they descended into the plain country; whereupon a dreadful conflict ensued, wherein Alexander had the victory; but Ptolemy was not to encounter those on the plain, but some who possessed a steep hill; wherefore he moved his army to that part where the ascent seemed the easiest, and purposely forbore to surround the hill, because he would leave a place for the enemy’s flight. There was also a terrible battle on this side, both by reason of the disadvantage of the ground, on the part of the Macedonians, and because the Indians of that province far excelled all the other Indians in military exploits: however, they were at last driven down from the mountain. And in the same manner Leonnatus behaved with his party; for he also beat the enemy, and put them to flight. Ptolemy tells us that forty thousand men were taken, and above two hundred and thirty thousand head of cattle, out of which Alexander chose the best and largest, that he might send them into Macedonia for a breed; for they far excelled the Grecian cattle, both in bulk and beauty. Thence Alexander moved towards the Assaceni, who were said to have an army of twenty thousand horse, and thirty thousand foot, besides thirty elephants, ready to take the field. Craterus, having re-edified the city according to the directions left him, returned, and brought with him the heavy-armed foot, as also such engines as are necessary in sieges; whereupon Alexander, with his auxiliary horse and his equestrian darters, Cænus’s and Polysperchon’s troops, besides a thousand archers and Agrians, proceeded in his march towards the Assaceni, and passing through the territories of the Guræi, crossed the river of that name with much difficulty, not only because of its great depth and the rapidity of the stream, but by reason of the vast numbers of round and slippery stones at the bottom, which neither horse nor man could tread upon with safety. As soon as the barbarians perceived Alexander was at hand, they durst no longer continue in a body, nor think of meeting him in the open field, but dispersing, betook them to their strong holds, where they hoped to defend themselves, and fight with greater advantage.
119Alexander therefore first led his army against Massaga, the capital city of that country, and drawing near it, the inhabitants, led on by a party of about seven thousand mercenaries from the inner parts of India, advanced against the Macedonians, with a design to assault their camp; which Alexander perceiving, and finding that a battle must then be fought just under the walls of their city, strove to draw them farther off, lest if they were forced to fly (as he imagined they would) the small space betwixt them and the city would favour their escape thither. Wherefore, as soon as he saw them pressing forwards, he caused his Macedonians to retreat to a hill, about seven furlongs distant, where he again made a stand. The enemy, encouraged by this retreat of the Macedonians, hastened after them, with much heat, in a disorderly manner: but when they were advanced within the reach of their darts, Alexander, having given the appointed signal for his soldiers to face about, the whole army turned upon them with great rage. The equestrian darters, and Agrians, and archers, were the first which engaged: he, with a choice phalanx, followed in order. The Indians, terrified with this sudden and unexpected blow, no sooner begun to feel their fury than they fled towards the city, leaving two hundred dead behind them: the rest secured themselves within the walls. The King hereupon moved his army forward, to besiege the place, where he received a wound in the heel with an arrow; but planting his engines the next day, and making a breach in the walls, when the Macedonians endeavoured to storm the city, the Indians received them so briskly, that Alexander commanded a retreat to be sounded: however, they attempted to mount the breach again, with fresh vigour, the next day; having drawn a huge wooden tower to the place, out of which the archers poured showers of arrows; besides which, they plied the besieged with a store of darts from their engines. But such was the resistance of the Indians, that all their endeavours were to no purpose. The Macedonians again attempting the same place, the third day, laid a bridge over, from the wooden tower to the top of the breach, and thereby a party of targeteers entered the city, in the same manner as they had, long before that time, entered Tyre; and when, with the greatest joy imaginable, they crowded forwards upon the bridge with too much haste, it broke with their weight, and all who were upon it fell suddenly down with it: which the barbarians perceiving, and being thereby encouraged, they advanced with loud shots, and galled the Macedonians from the walls with stones and darts, and all kinds of missive weapons; whilst others, issuing out from some small posterns between the towers in the wall, attacked those who were already stunned with their fall, and slew them.
120Alexander seeing this, immediately dispatched thither Alcetas, with his troop, to receive those who were wounded, and recal those who had assailed the city, and still made resistance, into the camp; and on the fourth day after, he raised another bridge from other works against the wall. The mercenary Indians, so long as their general survived, always repulsed the Macedonians with the utmost bravery; but he happening to be slain with a dart from an engine, and many of his soldiers being lost in the several skirmishes during a long continued siege, and others rendered useless and unfit for service by their wounds, they sent an herald to Alexander. He, willing to prevent the effusion of blood, and to preserve such stout soldiers, agreed with them (the mercenary Indians) that they should enter into his army, and serve under him. Whereupon, they coming forth from the city in armour, encamped by themselves upon a little hill, opposite to the Macedonians, with a full resolution to steal away by night and return home, because they would not fight against other Indians. Alexander, having intelligence of this, that very night surrounded the hill, on which they lay encamped, with his forces, and cut them all off; and afterwards immediately took the city by force, now void of defendants, and therein the mother and daughter of Assacenus. Only twenty-five of the Macedonians were slain during the whole siege. He then dispatched Cænus to Bazira, imagining that the citizens, hearing of the fate of the Assaceni, would immediately surrender. He also, at the same time, sent Attalus, and Alcetas, and Demetrius, a captain of horse, to Ora, with orders to surround that city with a rampart, and lie before it till he came. The citizens, seeing them approach towards them, made an excursion, but were beat back by the Macedonians, and, in a little time, confined within their walls by a rampart. But the affair of Bazira did not happen according to the opinion of Cænus; for the citizens, trusting to the strength of the place (for it was not only seated on an eminence, but also surrounded with a stout wall), gave him no manner of hopes of a surrender: whereupon Alexander determined to march thither; but receiving news that some neighbouring Indian soldiers had conveyed themselves into the city Ora, being dispatched thither by Abissarus for that purpose, he changed his resolutions, and marched with his army against Ora, sending orders to Cænus to raise a fort over-against Bazira, and place such a garrison therein as should restrain the citizens from making excursions, and bring the rest of his forces to him. The citizens then perceiving that Cænus had drawn off the greatest part of his troops, despising the smallness of the number left to guard the fort, made an excursion into the open country, when a sharp battle ensued, wherein about five hundred of them were slain, above seventy taken prisoners, and the rest, who were beat into the city, durst not attempt to make any more excursions. The siege of Ora proved a business of no great difficulty, after the arrival of Alexander; for at the first assault 121 made against the walls, he carried the place, and seized all the elephants, which he found therein, for the use of his army.
THE Bizareans, hearing that Ora was taken by storm, distrusting their strength, fled out of the city in the dead of night, and betook themselves to a rock, called Aornus, for safety; and many of the neighbouring barbarians followed their example, for they forsook their villages, and escaped thither. This rock, the most stupendous piece of natural strength in all that country, was by the barbarians deemed impregnable; and there was a report, that even Hercules, though he was the son of Jove, was not able to reduce it. But whether any Hercules, either the Theban, the Tyrian, or the Egyptian, ever penetrated so far as Indian, I cannot affirm for truth, but I am rather inclined to believe the contrary, because, whatever is difficult or hard to be accomplished, men, to raise the difficulty still the higher, have reported that Hercules himself attempted it in vain: and indeed it is my opinion that the name of Hercules is only here used, by the Indians, to make the danger seem insurmountable. The circuit of this rock is said to be two hundred furlongs; its height, where it is lowest, eleven; it is only accessible by one dangerous path, cut out by hand, and has a fine spring of pure water on the very summit, which sends a plentiful stream down the sides of this hill, as also a wood, with as much arable and fertile land as to supply a thousand men with provisions. Alexander hearing this, had a more than ordinary ambition to make himself master of the place; and the common tradition of Hercules’s fruitless attempt upon it inflamed him the more; wherefore, having placed garrisons in Ora and Massaga, for the defence of the country, he sent a new colony into Bazira, and Hephæstion and Perdiccas, by his orders, re-peopled another city, named Orobates, and, having furnished it with a garrison, marched forwards to the river Indus, where, when they arrived, they prepared every thing for the laying a bridge over it, as Alexander had commanded them. He then constituted Nicanor, one of his friends, governor of the whole country on this side of the river, and, moving that way himself, had the city Peucelaotis, not far from it, delivered up to him, into which having placed a garrison, under the command of Philip, he proceeded to take many other small towns seated upon that river, the two princes of that province, Cophæus and Assagetes, attending him. He arrived at last at Embolina, a city seated not far from the rock Aornus, where he left Craterus with a part of his army, to gather what stores of corn he could into that city, and to provide himself with all other necessaries for a long continuance there, that, if he was not able to reduce the rock at first, either by assault or stratagem, he might, at least, weary them out with a long siege, and reduce them by famine. Then, with his archers, Agrians, 122 Cænus’s troop, and the choicest, best armed, and most expeditious from out of the whole army, besides two hundred auxiliary horse, and an hundred equestrian archers, he marched towards the rock, and on the first day chose a place convenient for an encampment, but the day after pitched his tents much nearer.
IN the mean while, some of the neighbouring inhabitants came to him, and promised to shew him a way whereby the rock might be stormed, and taken without much trouble. With these he dispatched Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, with the Agrians, and other light-armed soldiers, and choice targeteers, giving them strict orders that, as soon as ever they found they had gained the top of the rock, they should intrench themselves strongly, and shew a signal thereof to those below. Ptolemy long struggled, in a path rugged and dangerous, but, at last (unperceived by the barbarians), gained the summit, and, having surrounded the place with a rampart and ditch, took care to hoist up a burning torch on that part of the hill where it might be the most easily discerned; which being perceived by Alexander, he, the next day, attempted to storm the rock, but, by reason of the vigorous defence of the barbarians, and the disadvantage of his station, he was able to effect nothing. When the Indians saw that his efforts on that side were vain, they turned their whole force against Ptolemy, and a dreadful conflict happened, the Indians being resolved to demolish the rampart they had thrown up for their security, and Ptolemy, with all his might, endeavouring to preserve it; but the barbarians, at last, finding themselves galled by the Macedonian archers, retreated by night to their former station. In the mean while, Alexander dispatched an Indian, whom he knew to be trusty and fit for his purpose, with letters to Ptolemy, wherein he advised him, that, whenever he perceived him to storm the rock below, he should not be satisfied only to maintain his present post, but attack the enemy, at the same time above, that so they, being all in confusion, might not know how to defend themselves; but he, moving his camp, as soon as it was day-light, led on his army to the place where Ptolemy had before ascended, unobserved, being satisfied within himself, that if he could conquer the difficulties of that ascent, and join his forces with Ptolemy, the rock itself would soon be gained, which accordingly happened: for, even till noon, there was a terrible conflict between the Macedonians and Indians, the one party striving to ascend by force, the other to drive them down; but the former still persisted in their resolutions to push forward, and one party always succoured or succeeded another, whilst they drew back and refreshed themselves. They laboured thus till almost night, and at last gained the top, and joined with their friends. Then they made a fresh attack upon the rock, with all their forces; but neither could they yet succeed this way, and so that whole day was spent. The next morning, 123 as soon as day-light appeared, he ordered each of his men to go into the neighbouring wood, and cut down an hundred poles or stakes, which being all brought together, a huge rampart was thereby raised, from the level of that part of the hill where their entrenchment was, against the higher part of the rock, possessed by the enemy, that so they might, from thence, gall them with their darts and arrows; and while the whole army was busied about this work, he was not only a nice observer, but a great encourager of them, praising them who forwarded it with vigour and alacrity, and causing those to be punished who were slothful and inactive in their respective stations.
THE army carried on the rampart the length of a full furlong the first day, and, on the morrow, by posting his slingers and engineers on that part already finished, he repelled the incursions of the Indians upon the labourers; so that the whole aggar was perfected in three days; but on the fourth, when some of the Macedonians had begun to build a mount opposite to the rock, which was designed to be of equal height therewith, Alexander immediately marched thither, and, upon viewing it, determined to prolong the rampart that far. But then the barbarians were so terrified and astonished at the unaccountable boldness of the Macedonians, who had now just finished their mount, and extended the rampart to it, that they no longer trusted to the natural strength of their rock, but, sending an herald to Alexander, promised, if he would grant them certain conditions, they would surrender it into his hands. Their real drift was, to spin out that whole day in agreeing upon articles, and, as soon as night came, to steal down unperceived, and return every one to his own dwelling. This resolution of theirs coming to Alexander’s knowledge, he allowed them a sufficient space to descend, by calling off the guards which surrounded them, and himself tarried there till the barbarians begun to descend. Then, taking with him about seven hundred of his guards and targeteers, he first entered the rock, which the enemy had deserted, and those Macedonians, by helping one another, climbed up after him. Having thus taken possession, the other Macedonians, on a certain signal, fell upon the barbarians, and cut many of them off; and many others, being seized with a panic fear in their flight, fell down headlong from the precipices, and perished. Alexander having thus gained the rock, which had been too hard a task for Hercules, offered sacrifice thereon, and furnished it with a garrison, under the command of Sisicottus, who, long before that time, had fled from India to Bessus, in Bactria, and, when Alexander entered that country, had done him great service in the conquest thereof. He then, descending from the rock, marched into the territories of the Assaceni; for he had heard that the brother of Assacenus, with some elephants, and a vast body of the neighbouring barbarians, had fled into the mountains 124 there, and, when he arrived at the city of Dyrta, found both that and all the country round entirely destitute of inhabitants; but the next day he dispatched Nearchus, with a thousand targeteers, and those Agrians who were light-armed, and Antiochus, with three thousand targeteers more, to search all the country round, and try if they could catch any of the inhabitants, from whom they might learn the customs of the natives, their manner of making war, and the number of their elephants. He himself proceeded on his march towards the river Indus, having sent his army before him to level the road, which would otherwise have been impassable. Having then taken some of the barbarians, he understood that the inhabitants of that country were fled to Barisades for their security, but that they had left their elephants in the pastures near the river Indus; upon which intelligence, he ordered them to be his guides to the places where the elephants were. Some of the Indians of this country are expert at hunting them, and were therefore esteemed by Alexander, who then went in quest of those beasts, two of the number of which, whilst they were endeavouring to seize them, tumbled down from the rocks, and perished; the rest were taken, and being mounted by the Indians, were conveyed safe to the army. He also found a full-ground wood near the river, which he ordered to be cut down by his soldiers, and vessels to be built therewith, which being launched into the river, he and his forces were thereby conveyed to the bridge, which Hephæstion and Perdiccas had already built.
For online additions, corrections, notes & design:
Copyright © 2007
by Elfinspell