ASIATIC CAMPAIGNS OF ALEXANDER.
A year and some months had sufficed for Alexander to make a first
display of his energy and military skill, destined for achievements
yet greater; and to crush the growing aspirations for freedom
among Greeks on the south, as well as among Thracians on the north,
of Macedonia. The ensuing winter was employed in completing his
preparations; so that early in the spring of 334 B. C., his army
destined for the conquest of Asia was mustered between Pella and
Amphipolis, while his fleet was at hand to lend support.
The whole of Alexander’s remaining life—from his crossing the
Hellespont in March or April 334 B. C., to his death at Babylon in
June 323 B. C., eleven years and two or three months—was passed in
Asia, amidst unceasing military operations, and ever-multiplied
conquests. He never lived to revisit Macedonia; but his achievements
were on so transcendent a scale, his acquisitions of territory so
unmeasured, and his thirst for farther aggrandizement still so
insatiate, that Macedonia sinks into insignificance in the list
of his possessions. Much more do the Grecian cities dwindle into
outlying appendages of a newly-grown Oriental empire. During all
these eleven years, the history of Greece is almost a blank, except
here and there a few scattered events. It is only at the death of
Alexander that the Grecian cities again awaken into active movement.
The Asiatic conquests of Alexander do not belong directly and
literally to the province of an historian of Greece. They were
achieved by armies of which the general, the principal officers,
and most part of the soldiers, were Macedonian. The Greeks who
served with him were only auxiliaries, along with the Thracians
and Pæonians. Though more numerous than all the other auxiliaries,
they did not constitute, like the Ten Thousand Greeks in the army
of the younger Cyrus, the force on which he mainly relied for
victory. His chief-secretary, Eumenes of Kardia, was a Greek, and
probably most of the civil and intellectual functions connected
with the service were also performed by Greeks. Many Greeks also
served in the army of Persia against him, and composed indeed a
larger proportion of the real force (disregarding mere numbers) in
the army of Darius than in that of Alexander. Hence the expedition
becomes indirectly incorporated with the stream of Grecian history
by the powerful auxiliary agency of Greeks on both sides—and still
more, by its connection with previous projects, dreams, and legends,
long antecedent to the aggrandizement of Macedon—as well as by the
character which Alexander thought fit to assume. To take revenge on
Persia for the invasion of Greece by Xerxes, and to liberate the
Asiatic Greeks, had been the scheme of the Spartan Agesilaus, and of
the Pheræan Jason; with hopes grounded on the memorable expedition
and safe return of the Ten Thousand. It had been recommended by the
rhetor Isokrates, first to the combined force of Greece, while yet
Grecian cities were free, under the joint headship of Athens and
Sparta—next, to Philip of Macedon as the chief of united Greece, when
his victorious arms had extorted a recognition of headship, setting
aside both Athens and Sparta. The enterprising ambition of Philip was
well pleased to be nominated chief of Greece for the execution of
this project. From him it passed to his yet more ambitious son.
Though really a scheme of Macedonian appetite and for Macedonian
aggrandizement, the expedition against Asia thus becomes thrust
into the series of Grecian events, under the Pan-hellenic pretence
of retaliation for the long past insults of Xerxes. I call it a
_pretence_, because it had ceased to be a real Hellenic feeling, and
served now two different purposes; first, to ennoble the undertaking
in the eyes of Alexander himself, whose mind was very accessible
to religious and legendary sentiment, and who willingly identified
himself with Agamemnon or Achilles, immortalized as executors of the
collective vengeance of Greece for Asiatic insult—next, to assist in
keeping the Greeks quiet during his absence. He was himself aware
that the real sympathies of the Greeks were rather adverse than
favorable to his success.
Apart from this body of extinct sentiment, ostentatiously rekindled
for Alexander’s purposes, the position of the Greeks in reference to
his Asiatic conquests was very much the same as that of the German
contingents, especially those of the Confederation of the Rhine, who
served in the grand army with which the Emperor Napoleon invaded
Russia in 1812. They had no public interest in the victory of the
invader, which could end only by reducing them to still greater
prostration. They were likely to adhere to their leader as long as
his power continued unimpaired, but no longer. Yet Napoleon thought
himself entitled to reckon upon them as if they had been Frenchmen,
and to denounce the Germans in the service of Russia as traitors
who had forfeited the allegiance which they owed to him. We find him
drawing the same pointed distinction between the Russian and the
German prisoners taken, as Alexander made between Asiatic and Grecian
prisoners. These Grecian prisoners the Macedonian prince reproached
as guilty of treason against the proclaimed statute of collective
Hellas, whereby he had been declared general, and the Persian king a
public enemy.[113]
[113] Arrian, i. 16, 10; i. 29, 9, about the Grecian prisoners
taken at the victory of the Granikus—ὅσους δὲ αὐτῶν αἰχμαλώτους
ἔλαβε, τούτους δὲ δήσας ἐν πέδαις, εἰς Μακεδονίαν ἀπέπεμψεν
ἐργάζεσθαι, ὅτι παρὰ τὰ κοινῇ δόξαντα τοῖς Ἕλλησιν, Ἕλληνες
ὄντες, ἐναντία τῇ Ἑλλάδι ὑπὲρ τῶν βαρβάρων ἐμάχοντο. Also iii.
23, 15, about the Grecian soldiers serving with the Persians, and
made prisoners in Hyrkania—Ἀδικεῖν γὰρ μεγάλα (said Alexander)
τοὺς στρατευομένους ἐναντία τῇ Ἑλλάδι παρὰ τοῖς βαρβάροις παρὰ τὰ
δόγματα τῶν Ἑλλήνων.
Toward the end of October 1812, near Moscow, General
Winzingerode, a German officer in the Russian service,—with his
aide-de-camp a native Russian, Narishkin,—became prisoner of the
French. He was brought to Napoleon—“At the sight of that German
general, all the secret resentments of Napoleon took fire. ‘Who
are you (he exclaimed)? a man without a country! When I was at
war with the Austrians, I found you in their ranks. Austria has
become my ally, and you have entered into the Russian service.
You have been one of the warmest instigators of the present
war. Nevertheless, you are a native of the Confederation of the
Rhine: _you are my subject_. You are not an ordinary enemy:
you are a rebel: I have a right to bring you to trial. _Gens
d’armes_, seize this man!’ Then addressing the aide-de-camp of
Winzingerode, Napoleon said, ‘As for you, Count Narishkin, I have
nothing to reproach you with: you are a Russian, you are doing
your duty.’” (Ségur’s account of the Campaign in Russia, book ix.
ch. vi. p. 132.)
Napoleon did not realize these threats against Winzingerode;
but his language expresses just the same sentiment as that of
Alexander towards the captive Greeks.
Hellas, as a political aggregate, has now ceased to exist, except
in so far as Alexander employs the name for his own purposes.
Its component members are annexed as appendages, doubtless of
considerable value, to the Macedonian kingdom. Fourteen years
before Alexander’s accession, Demosthenes, while instigating the
Athenians to uphold Olynthus against Philip, had told them[114]—“The
Macedonian power, considered as an appendage, is of no mean value;
but by itself, it is weak and full of embarrassments.” Inverting the
position of the parties, these words represent exactly what Greece
herself had become, in reference to Macedonia and Persia, at the time
of Alexander’s accession. Had the Persians played their game with
tolerable prudence and vigor, his success would have been measured by
the degree to which he could appropriate Grecian force to himself,
and withhold it from his enemy.
[114] Demosth. Olynth. ii. p. 14 Ὅλως μὲν γὰρ ἡ Μακεδονικὴ
δύναμις καὶ ἀρχὴ ~ἐν μὲν προσθήκῃ μερίς~ ἐστὶ τις οὐ σμικρὰ, οἷον
ὑπῆρξέ ποθ᾽ ὑμῖν ἐπὶ Τιμοθέου πρὸς Ὀλυνθίους ... αὐτὴ δὲ καθ᾽
αὑτὴν ἀσθενὴς καὶ πολλῶν κακῶν ἐστὶ μεστὴ.
Alexander’s memorable and illustrious manifestations, on which we
are now entering, are those, not of the ruler or politician, but
of the general and the soldier. In this character his appearance
forms a sort of historical epoch. It is not merely in soldier-like
qualities—in the most forward and even adventurous bravery—in
indefatigable personal activity, and in endurance as to hardship
and fatigue,—that he stands pre-eminent; though these qualities
alone, when found in a king, act so powerfully on those under his
command, that they suffice to produce great achievements, even
when combined with generalship not surpassing the average of his
age. But in generalship, Alexander was yet more above the level of
his contemporaries. His strategic combinations, his employment of
different descriptions of force conspiring towards one end, his
long-sighted plans for the prosecution of campaigns, his constant
foresight and resource against new difficulties, together with
rapidity of movement even in the worst country—all on a scale of
prodigious magnitude—are without parallel in ancient history. They
carry the art of systematic and scientific welfare to a degree of
efficiency, such as even successors trained in his school were unable
to keep up unimpaired.
We must recollect however that Alexander found the Macedonian
military system built up by Philip, and had only to apply and enlarge
it. As transmitted to him, it embodied the accumulated result and
matured fruit of a series of successive improvements, applied by
Grecian tacticians to the primitive Hellenic arrangements. During
the sixty years before the accession of Alexander, the art of war
had been conspicuously progressive—to the sad detriment of Grecian
political freedom. “Everything around us (says Demosthenes addressing
the people of Athens in 342 B. C.), has been in advance for
some years past—nothing is like what it was formerly—but nowhere is
the alteration and enlargement more conspicuous than in the affairs
of war. Formerly, the Lacedæmonians as well as other Greeks did
nothing more than invade each other’s territory, during the four or
five summer months, with their native force of citizen hoplites: in
winter they stayed at home. But now we see Philip in constant action,
winter as well as summer, attacking all around him, not merely with
Macedonian hoplites, but with cavalry, light infantry, bowmen,
foreigners of all descriptions, and siege-batteries.”[115]
[115] Demosth. Philipp. iii. p. 123, 124: compare Olynth. ii. p.
22. I give here the substance of what is said by the orator, not
strictly adhering to his words.
I have in my last two volumes dwelt upon this progressive change in
the character of Grecian soldiership. At Athens, and in most other
parts of Greece, the burghers had become averse to hard and active
military service. The use of arms had passed mainly to professional
soldiers, who, without any feeling of citizenship, served wherever
good pay was offered, and became immensely multiplied, to the
detriment and danger of Grecian society.[116] Many of these
mercenaries were lightly armed—peltasts served in combination
with the hoplites.[117] Iphikrates greatly improved and partly
re-armed the peltasts; whom he employed conjointly with hoplites so
effectively as to astonish his contemporaries.[118] His innovation
was farther developed by the great military genius of Epaminondas;
who not only made infantry and cavalry, light-armed and heavy-armed,
conspire to one scheme of operations, but also completely altered
the received principles of battle-manœuvring, by concentrating an
irresistible force of attack on one point of the enemy’s line, and
keeping the rest of his own line more on the defensive. Besides these
important improvements, realized by generals in actual practice,
intelligent officers like Xenophon embodied the results of their
military experience in valuable published criticisms.[119] Such were
the lessons which the Macedonian Philip learnt and applied to the
enslavement of those Greeks, especially of the Thebans, from whom
they were derived. In his youth, as a hostage at Thebes, he had
probably conversed with Epaminondas, and must certainly have become
familiar with the Theban military arrangements. He had every motive,
not merely from ambition, of conquest, but even from the necessities
of defence, to turn them to account: and he brought to the task
military genius and aptitude of the highest order. In arms, in
evolutions, in engines, in regimenting, in war-office arrangements,
he introduced important novelties; bequeathing to his successors the
Macedonian military system, which, with improvements by his son,
lasted until the conquest of the country by Rome, near two centuries
afterwards.
[116] Isokrates, in several of his discourses, notes the gradual
increase of these mercenaries—men without regular means of
subsistence, or fixed residence, or civic obligations. Or. iv.
(Panegyr.) s. 195; Or. v. (Philippus), s. 112-142; Or. viii. (De
Pace), s. 31-56.
[117] Xenoph. Magist. Equit. ix. 4. Οἶδα δ᾽ ἐγὼ καὶ
Λακεδαιμονίοις τὸ ἱππικὸν ἀρξάμενον εὐδοκιμεῖν, ἐπεὶ ξένους
ἱππέας προσέλαβον· καὶ ἐν ταῖς ἄλλαις πόλεσι πανταχοῦ τὰ ξενικὰ
ὁρῶ εὐδοκιμοῦντα.
Compare Demosth. Philippic. i. p. 46; Xenoph. Hellenic. iv. 4,
14; Isokrates, Orat. vii. (Areopagit.), s. 93.
[118] For an explanation of the improved arming of peltasts
introduced by Iphikrates, see Vol. IX. Ch. lxxv. p. 335 of this
History. Respecting these improvements, the statements both
of Diodorus (xv. 44) and of Nepos are obscure. MM. Rüstow and
Köchly (in their valuable work, Geschichte des Griechischen
Kriegswesens, Aarau, 1852, B. ii. p. 164) have interpreted the
statements in a sense to which I cannot subscribe. They think
that Iphikrates altered not only the arming of peltasts, but also
that of hoplites; a supposition, which I see nothing to justify.
[119] Besides the many scattered remarks in the Anabasis, the
Cyropædia is full of discussion and criticism on military
phænomena. It is remarkable to what an extent Xenophon had
present to his mind all the exigencies of war, and the different
ways of meeting them. See as an example, Cyropæd. vi. 2; ii. 1.
The work on sieges, by Æneas (Poliorketica), is certainly
anterior to the military improvements of Philip of Macedon:
probably about the beginning of his reign. See the preface
to it by Rüstow and Köchly, p. 8, in their edition of Die
Griechischen Kriegs-schriftsteller, Leips. 1853. In this work,
allusion is made to several others, now lost, by the same
author—Παρασκευαστικὴ βίβλος, Ποριστικὴ Βίβλος, Στρατοπεδευτικὴ,
etc.
The military force of Macedonia, in the times anterior to Philip,
appears to have consisted, like that of Thessaly, in a well-armed
and well-mounted cavalry, formed from the substantial proprietors
of the country—and in a numerous assemblage of peltasts or light
infantry (somewhat analogous to the Thessalian Penestæ): these latter
were the rural population, shepherds or cultivators, who tended
sheep and cattle, or tilled the earth, among the spacious mountains
and valleys of Upper Macedonia. The Grecian towns near the coast,
and the few Macedonian towns in the interior, had citizen-hoplites
better armed; but foot-service was not in honor among the natives,
and the Macedonian infantry in their general character were hardly
more than a rabble. At the period of Philip’s accession, they were
armed with nothing better than rusty swords and wicker shields, noway
sufficient to make head against the inroads of their Thracian and
Illyrian neighbors; before whom they were constantly compelled to
flee for refuge up into the mountains.[120] Their condition was that
of a poor herdsman, half-naked or covered only with hides, and eating
from wooden platters: not much different from that of the population
of Upper Macedonia three centuries before, when first visited by
Perdikkas the ancestor of the Macedonian kings, and when the wife
of the native prince baked bread with her own hands.[121] On the
other hand, though the Macedonian infantry was thus indifferent, the
cavalry of the country was excellent, both in the Peloponnesian war,
and in the war carried on by Sparta against Olynthus more than twenty
years afterwards.[122] These horsemen, like the Thessalians, charged
in compact order, carrying as their principal weapon of offence, not
javelins to be hurled, but the short thrusting-pike for close combat.
[120] See the striking speech addressed by Alexander to the
discontented Macedonian soldiers, a few months before his death,
at Opis or Susa (Arrian, vii).
... Φίλιππος γὰρ παραλαβὼν ὑμᾶς πλανήτας καὶ ἀπόρους, ἐν
διφθέραις τοὺς πολλοὺς νέμοντας ἀνὰ τὰ ὄρη πρόβατα κατὰ ὄλιγα,
καὶ ὑπὲρ τούτων κακῶς μαχομένους Ἰλλυριοῖς τε καὶ Τριβαλλοῖς καὶ
τοῖς ὁμόροις Θρᾳξὶ, χλαμύδας μὲν ὑμῖν ἀντὶ τῶν διφθερῶν φορεῖν
ἔδωκε, κατήγαγε δὲ ἐκ τῶν ὀρῶν ἐς τὰ πεδία, ἀξιομάχους καταστήσας
τοῖς προσχώροις τῶν βαρβάρων, ὡς μὴ χωρίων ἔτι ὀχυρότητι
πιστεύοντας μᾶλλον ἢ τῇ οἰκείᾳ ἀρετῇ σώζεσθαι....
In the version of the same speech given by Curtius (x. 10,
23), we find, “Modo sub Philippo seminudis, amicula ex purpurâ
sordent, aurum et argentum oculi ferre non possunt: lignea enim
vasa desiderant, et ex cratibus scuta rubiginemque gladiorum”,
etc.
Compare the description given by Thucydides, iv. 124, of the
army of Brasidas and Perdikkas, where the Macedonian foot are
described as ἄλλος ὅμιλος τῶν βαρβάρων πολύς.
[121] Herodot. viii. 137.
[122] Thucyd. ii. 100; Xenoph. Hellen. v. 2, 40-42.
Thus defective was the military organization which Philip found.
Under his auspices it was cast altogether anew. The poor and hardy
Landwehr of Macedonia, constantly on the defensive against predatory
neighbors, formed an excellent material for soldiers, and proved
not intractable to the innovations of a warlike prince. They were
placed under constant training in the regular rank and file of heavy
infantry: they were moreover brought to adopt a new description
of arm, not only in itself very difficult to manage, but also
comparatively useless to the soldier when fighting single-handed,
and only available by a body of men in close order, trained to
move or stand together. The new weapon, of which we first hear the
name in the army of Philip, was the sarissa—the Macedonian pike or
lance. The sarissa was used both by the infantry of his phalanx,
and by particular regiments of his cavalry; in both cases it was
long, though that of the phalanx was much the longer of the two.
The regiments of cavalry called Sarissophori or Lancers were a sort
of light-horse, carrying a long lance, and distinguished from the
heavier cavalry intended for the shock of hand combat, who carried
the xyston or short pike. The sarissa of this cavalry may have been
fourteen feet in length, as long as the Cossack pike now is; that of
the infantry in phalanx was not less than twenty-one feet long. This
dimension is so prodigious and so unwieldy, that we should hardly
believe it, if it did not come attested by the distinct assertion of
an historian like Polybius.
The extraordinary reach of the sarissa or pike constituted the
prominent attribute and force of the Macedonian phalanx. The
phalangites were drawn up in files generally sixteen deep, each
called a Lochus; with an interval of three feet between each two
soldiers from front to rear. In front stood the lochage, a man of
superior strength, and of tried military experience. The second and
third men in the file, as well as the rearmost man who brought up the
whole, were also picked soldiers, receiving larger pay than the rest.
Now the sarissa, when in horizontal position, was held with both
hands (distinguished in this respect from the pike of the Grecian
hoplite, which occupied only one hand, the other being required
for the shield), and so held that it projected fifteen feet before
the body of the pikeman; while the hinder portion of six feet so
weighted as to make the pressure convenient in such division. Hence,
the sarissa of the man standing second in the file, projected twelve
feet beyond the front rank; that of the third man, nine feet; these
of the fourth and fifth ranks, respectively six feet and three feet.
There was thus presented a quintuple series of pikes by each file,
to meet an advancing enemy. Of these five, the three first would be
decidedly of greater projection, and even the fourth of not less
projection, than the pikes of Grecian hoplites coming up as enemies
to the charge. The ranks behind the fifth, while serving to sustain
and press onward the front, did not carry the sarissa in a horizontal
position, but slanted it over the shoulders of those before them, so
as to break the force of any darts or arrows which might be shot over
head from the rear ranks of the enemy.[123]
[123] Respecting the length of the pike of the Macedonian
phalanx, see Appendix to this Chapter.
The phalangite (soldier of the phalanx) was farther provided
with a short sword, a circular shield of rather more than two
feet in diameter, a breast-piece, leggings, and a kausia or
broad-brimmed-hat—the head-covering common in the Macedonian army.
But the long pikes were in truth the main weapons of defence as well
as of offence. They were destined to contend against the charge
of Grecian hoplites with the one-handed pike and heavy shield;
especially against the most formidable manifestation of that force,
the deep Theban column organized by Epaminondas. This was what Philip
had to deal with, at his accession, as the irresistible infantry
of Greece, bearing down everything before it by thrust of pike and
propulsion of shield. He provided the means of vanquishing it, by
training his poor Macedonian infantry to the systematic use of the
long two-handed pike. The Theban column, charging a phalanx so
armed, found themselves unable to break into the array of protended
pikes, or to come to push of shield. We are told that at the battle
of Chæroneia, the front rank Theban soldiers, the chosen men of the
city, all perished on the ground; and this is not wonderful, when
we conceive them as rushing, by their own courage as well as by the
pressure upon them from behind, upon a wall of Pikes double the
length of their own. We must look at Philip’s phalanx with reference
to the enemies before him, not with reference to the later Roman
organization, which Polybius brings into comparison. It answered
perfectly the purposes of Philip, who wanted mainly to stand the
shock in front, thus overpowering Grecian hoplites in their own mode
of attack. Now Polybius informs us, that the phalanx was never once
beaten, in front and on ground suitable for it; and wherever the
ground was fit for hoplites, it was also fit for the phalanx. The
inconveniences of Philip’s array, and of the long pikes, arose from
the incapacity of the phalanx to change its front or keep its order
on unequal ground; but such inconveniences were hardly less felt by
Grecian hoplites.[124]
[124] The impression of admiration, and even terror, with which
the Roman general Paulus Emilius was seized, on first seeing the
Macedonian phalanx in battle array at Pydna—has been recorded by
Polybius (Polybius, Fragm. xxix. 6, 11; Livy, xliv. 40).
The Macedonian phalanx, denominated the Pezetæri[125] or Foot
Companions of the King, comprised the general body of native
infantry, as distinguished from special _corps d’armée_. The largest
division of it which we find mentioned under Alexander, and which
appears under the command of a general of division, is called a
Taxis. How many of these Taxeis there were in all, we do not know;
the original Asiatic army of Alexander (apart from what he left at
home) included six of them, coinciding apparently with the provincial
allotments of the country: Orestæ, Lynkestæ, Elimiotæ, Tymphæi,
etc.[126] The writers on tactics give us a systematic scale of
distribution (ascending from the lowest unit, the Lochus of sixteen
men, by successive multiples of two, up to the quadruple phalanx of
16,384 men) as pervading the Macedonian army. Among these divisions,
that which stands out as most fundamental and constant, is the
Syntagma, which contained sixteen Lochi. Forming thus a square of
sixteen men in front and depth, or 256 men, it was at the same time
a distinct aggregate or permanent battalion, having attached to it
five supernumeraries, an ensign, a rear-man, a trumpeter, a herald,
and an attendant or orderly.[127] Two of these Syntagmas composed
a body of 512 men, called a Pentakosiarchy, which in Philip’s time
is said to have been the ordinary regiment, acting together under a
separate command; but several of these were doubled by Alexander when
he reorganized his army at Susa,[128] so as to form regiments of 1024
men, each under its Chiliarch, and each comprising four Syntagmas.
All this systematic distribution of the Macedonian military force
when at home, appears to have been arranged by the genius of Philip.
On actual foreign service, no numerical precision could be observed;
a regiment or a division could not always contain the same fixed
number of men. But as to the array, a depth of sixteen, for the
files of the phalangites, appears to have been regarded as important
and characteristic,[129] perhaps essential to impart a feeling of
confidence to the troops. It was a depth much greater than was common
with Grecian hoplites, and never surpassed by any Greeks except the
Thebans.
[125] Harpokration and Photius, v. Πεζέταιροι, Demosth. Olynth.
ii. p. 23; Arrian, iv. 23, 1. τῶν πεζεταίρων καλουμένων τὰς
Τάξεις, and ii. 23, 2, etc.
Since we know from Demosthenes that the pezetæri date from the
time of Philip, it is probable that the passage of Anaximenes
(as cited by Harpokration and Photius) which refers them to
Alexander, has ascribed to the son what really belongs to the
father. The term ἑταῖροι, in reference to the kings of Macedonia,
first appears in Plutarch, Pelopidas, 27, in reference to
Ptolemy, before the time of Philip; see Otto Abel, Makedonien
vor König Philip, p. 129 (the passage of Ælian referred to by
him seems of little moment). The term Companions or Comrades had
under Philip a meaning purely military, designating foreigners as
well as Macedonians serving in his army: see Theopompus, Frag.
249. The term, originally applied only to a select few, was by
degrees extended to the corps generally.
[126] Arrian, i. 14, 3; iii. 16, 19; Diodor. xvii. 57. Compare
the note of Schmieder on the above passage of Arrian; also
Droysen, Geschichte Alexanders des Grossen, p. 95, 96, and the
elaborate note of Mützel on Curtius, v. 2, 3. p. 400.
The passage of Arrian (his description of Alexander’s army
arrayed at the Granikus) is confused, and seems erroneous in some
words of the text; yet it may be held to justify the supposition
of six Taxeis of pezetæri in Alexander’s phalanx on that day.
There seem also to be six Taxeis at Arbêla (iii. 11, 16).
[127] Arrian. Tactic. c. 10; Ælian. Tactic. c. 9.
[128] Curtius, v. 2, 3.
[129] This is to be seen in the arrangement made by Alexander
a short time before his death, when he incorporated Macedonian
and Persian soldiers in the same lochus; the normal depth of
sixteen was retained; all the front ranks or privileged men being
Macedonians. The Macedonians were much hurt at seeing their
native regimental array shared with Asiatics (Arrian, vii. 11, 5;
vii. 23, 4-8).
But the phalanx, though an essential item, was yet only one among
many, in the varied military organization introduced by Philip.
It was neither intended, nor fit, to act alone; being clumsy in
changing front to protect itself either in flank or rear, and unable
to adapt itself to uneven ground. There was another description of
infantry organized by Philip called the Hypaspists—shield-bearers
or Guards;[130] originally few in number, and employed for personal
defence of the prince—but afterwards enlarged into several distinct
_corps d’armée_. These Hypaspists or Guards were light infantry
of the line;[131] they were hoplites, keeping regular array and
intended for close combat, but more lightly armed, and more fit for
diversities of circumstance and position, than the phalanx. They seem
to have fought with the one-handed pike and shield, like the Greeks;
and not to have carried the two-handed phalangite pike or sarissa.
They occupied a sort of intermediate place between the heavy infantry
of the phalanx properly so called—and the peltasts and light troops
generally. Alexander in his later campaigns had them distributed into
Chiliarchies (how the distribution stood earlier, we have no distinct
information), at least three in number, and probably more.[132] We
find them employed by him in forward and aggressive movements; first
his light troops and cavalry begin the attack; next, the hypaspists
come to follow it up; lastly, the phalanx is brought up to support
them. The hypaspists are used also for assault of walled places, and
for rapid night marches.[133] What was the total number of them, we
do not know.[134]
[130] The proper meaning of ὑπασπισταὶ, as guards or personal
attendants on the prince, appears in Arrian, i. 5, 3; vii. 8, 6.
Neoptolemus, as ἀρχιυπασπιστὴς to Alexander, carried the shield
and lance of the latter, on formal occasions (Plutarch, Eumenes,
1).
[131] Arrian, ii. 4, 3, 4; ii. 20, 5.
[132] Arrian, iv. 30, 11; v. 23, 11.
[133] Arrian, ii. 20, 5; ii. 23, 6; iii. 18, 8.
[134] Droysen and Schmieder give the number of hypaspists in
Alexander’s army at Issus, as 6000. That this opinion rests on no
sufficient evidence, has been shown by Mützel (ad Curtium, v. 2,
3. p. 399). But that the number of hypaspists left by Philip at
his death was 6000 seems not improbable.
Besides the phalanx, and the hypaspists or Guards, the Macedonian
army as employed by Philip and Alexander included a numerous
assemblage of desultory or irregular troops, partly native
Macedonians, partly foreigners, Thracians, Pæonians, etc. They were
of different descriptions; peltasts, darters, and bowmen. The best
of them appear to have been the Agriânes, a Pæonian tribe expert in
the use of the javelin. All of them were kept in vigorous movement
by Alexander, on the flanks and in front of his heavy infantry, or
intermingled with his cavalry,—as well as for pursuit after the enemy
was defeated.
Lastly, the cavalry in Alexander’s army was also admirable—at
least equal, and seemingly even superior in efficiency, to his
best infantry.[135] I have already mentioned that cavalry was the
choice native force of Macedonia, long before the reign of Philip;
by whom it had been extended and improved.[136] The heavy cavalry,
wholly or chiefly composed of native Macedonians, was known by the
denomination of the Companions. There was besides a new and lighter
variety of cavalry, apparently introduced by Philip, and called the
Sarissophori, or Lancers, used like Cossacks for advanced posts or
scouring the country. The sarissa which they carried was probably
much shorter than that of the phalanx; but it was long, if compared
with the xyston or thrusting pike used by the heavy cavalry for the
shock of close combat. Arrian, in describing the army of Alexander at
Arbêla, enumerates eight distinct squadrons of this heavy cavalry—or
cavalry of the Companions; but the total number included in the
Macedonian army at Alexander’s accession, is not known. Among the
squadrons, several at least (if not all) were named after particular
towns or districts of the country—Bottiæa, Amphipolis, Apollonia,
Anthemus, etc.;[137] there was one or more, distinguished as the
Royal Squadron—the Agêma or leading body of cavalry—at the head of
which Alexander generally charged, himself among the foremost of the
actual combatants.[138]
[135] See Arrian, v. 14, 1; v. 16, 4; Curtius, vi. 9, 22.
“Equitatui, optimæ exercitûs parti”, etc.
[136] We are told that Philip, after his expedition against the
Scythians about three years before his death, exacted and sent
into Macedonia 20,000 chosen mares, in order to improve the breed
of Macedonian horses. The regal haras were in the neighborhood of
Pella (Justin, ix. 2; Strabo, xvi. p. 752, in which passage of
Strabo, _the details_ apply to the _haras_ of Seleukus Nikator at
Apameia, not to that of Philip at Pella).
[137] Arrian, i. 2, 8, 9 (where we also find mentioned τοὺς ἐκ
τῆς ἄνωθεν Μακεδονίας ἱππέας), i. 12, 12; ii. 9, 6; iii. 11, 12.
About the ἱππεῖς σαρισσόφοροι, see i. 13, 1.
It is possible that there may have been sixteen squadrons of
heavy cavalry, and eight squadrons of the Sarissophori,—each
squadron from 180 to 250 men—as Rüstow and Köchly conceive (p.
243). But there is no sufficient evidence to prove it; nor can I
think it safe to assume, as they do, that Alexander carried over
with him to Asia _just half_ of the Macedonian entire force.
[138] Arrian, iii. 11, 11; iii. 13, 1; iii. 18, 8. In the first
of these passages, we have ἴλαι βασιλικαὶ in the plural (iii. 11,
12). It seems too that the different ἴλαι alternated with each
other in the foremost position, or ἡγεμονία for particular days
(Arrian, i. 14, 9).
The distribution of the cavalry into squadrons was that which
Alexander found at his accession; but he altered it, when he
remodelled the arrangements of his army (in 330 B. C.), at Susa, so
as to subdivide the squadron into two Lochi, and to establish the
Lochus for the elementary division of cavalry, as it had always been
of infantry.[139] His reforms went thus to cut down the primary body
of cavalry from the squadron to the half-squadron or Lochus, while
they tended to bring the infantry together into larger bodies—from
cohorts of 500 each to cohorts of 1000 men each.
[139] Arrian, iii. 16, 19.
Among the Hypaspists or Guards, also, we find an Agêma or chosen
cohort, which was called upon oftener than the rest to begin the
fight. A still more select corps were, the Body-Guards; a small
company of tried and confidential men, individually known to
Alexander, always attached to his person, and acting as adjutants
or as commanders for special service. These Body-Guards appear
to have been chosen persons promoted out of the Royal Youths or
Pages; an institution first established by Philip, and evincing the
pains taken by him to bring the leading Macedonians into military
organization as well as into dependence on his own person. The Royal
Youths, sons of the chief persons throughout Macedonia, were taken by
Philip into service, and kept in permanent residence around him for
purposes of domestic attendance and companionship. They maintained
perpetual guard of his palace, alternating among themselves the
hours of daily and nightly watch; they received his horse from the
grooms, assisted him to mount, and accompanied him if he went to
the chase: they introduced persons who came to solicit interviews,
and admitted his mistresses by night through a special door. They
enjoyed the privilege of sitting down to dinner with him, as well
as that of never being flogged except by his special order.[140]
The precise number of the company we do not know; but it must have
been not small, since fifty of these youths were brought out from
Macedonia at once by Amyntas to join Alexander and to be added to the
company at Babylon.[141] At the same time the mortality among them
was probably considerable; since, in accompanying Alexander, they
endured even more than the prodigious fatigues which he imposed upon
himself.[142] The training in this corps was a preparation first for
becoming Body-guards of Alexander,—next, for appointment to the great
and important military commands. Accordingly, it had been the first
stage of advancement to most of the Diadochi, or great officers of
Alexander, who after his death carved kingdoms for themselves out of
his conquests.
[140] Arrian, iv. 13, 1. Ἐκ Φιλίππου ἦν ἤδη καθεστηκὸς, τῶν ἐν
τέλει Μακεδόνων τοὺς παῖδας, ὅσοι ἐς ἡλικίαν ἐμειρακίσαντο,
καταλέγεσθαι ἐς θεραπείαν τοῦ βασιλέως. Τὰ δὲ περὶ τὴν ἄλλην
δίαιταν τοῦ σώματος διακονεῖσθαι βασιλεῖ, καὶ κοιμώμενον
φυλάσσειν, τούτοις ἐπετέτραπτο· καὶ ὁπότε ἐξελαύνοι βασιλεὺς,
τοὺς ἵππους παρὰ τῶν ἱπποκόμων δεχόμενοι ἐκεῖνοι προσῆγον, καὶ
ἀνέβαλον οὗτοι βασιλέα τὸν Περσικὸν τρόπον, καὶ τῆς ἐπὶ θήρᾳ
φιλοτιμίας βασιλεῖ κοινωνοὶ ἦσαν, etc.
Curtius, viii. 6. 1. “Mos erat principibus Macedonum adultos
liberos regibus tradere, ad munia haud multum servilibus
ministeriis abhorrentia. Excubabant servatis noctium vicibus
proximi foribus ejus ædis, in quâ rex aquiescebat. Per hos
pellices introducebantur, alio aditu quam quem armati obsidebant.
Iidem acceptos ab agasonibus equos, quum rex ascensurus esset,
admovebant; comitabanturque et venantem, et in præliis,
omnibus artibus studiorum liberalium exculti. Præcipuus honor
habebatur, quod licebat sedentibus vesci cum rege. Castigandi eos
verberibus nullius potestas præter ipsum erat. Hæc cohors velut
seminarium ducum præfectorumque apud Macedonas fuit: hinc habuere
posteri reges, quorum stirpibus post multas ætates Romani opes
ademerunt.” Compare Curtius, v. 6, 42; and Ælian, V. H. xiv. 49.
This information is interesting, as an illustration of Macedonian
manners and customs, which are very little known to us. In the
last hours of the Macedonian monarchy, after the defeat at Pydna
(168 B. C.), the _pueri regii_ followed the defeated
king Perseus to the sanctuary at Samothrace, and never quitted
him until the moment when he surrendered himself to the Romans
(Livy, xlv. 5).
As an illustration of the scourging, applied as a punishment to
these young Macedonians of rank, see the case of Dekamnichus,
handed over by king Archelaus to Euripides, to be flogged
(Aristotle, Polit. v. 8, 13).
[141] Curtius, v. 6, 42; Diodor. xvii. 65.
[142] We read this about the youthful Philippus, brother of
Lysimachus (Curtius, viii. 2, 36).
It was thus that the native Macedonian force was enlarged and
diversified by Philip, including at his death—1. The phalanx,
Foot-companions, or general mass of heavy infantry, drilled to
the use of the long two-handed pike or sarissa—2. The Hypaspists,
or lighter-armed corps of foot-guards—3. The Companions, or heavy
cavalry, the ancient indigenous force consisting of the more opulent
or substantial Macedonians—4. The lighter cavalry, lancers, or
Sarissophori.—With these were joined foreign auxiliaries of great
value. The Thessalians, whom Philip had partly subjugated and partly
gained over, furnished him with a body of heavy cavalry not inferior
to the native Macedonian. From various parts of Greece he derived
hoplites, volunteers taken into his pay, armed with the full-sized
shield and one-handed pike. From the warlike tribes of Thracians,
Pæonians, Illyrians, etc., whom he had subdued around him, he levied
contingents of light troops of various descriptions, peltasts,
bowmen, darters, etc., all excellent in their way, and eminently
serviceable to his combinations, in conjunction with the heavier
masses. Lastly, Philip had completed his military arrangements by
organizing what may be called an effective siege-train for sieges as
well as for battles; a stock of projectile and battering machines,
superior to anything at that time extant. We find this artillery used
by Alexander in the very first year of his reign, in his campaign
against the Illyrians.[143] Even in his most distant Indian marches,
he either carried it with him, or had the means of constructing new
engines for the occasion. There was no part of his military equipment
more essential to his conquests. The victorious sieges of Alexander
are among his most memorable exploits.
[143] Arrian, i. 6, 17.
To all this large, multifarious, and systematized array of actual
force, are to be added the civil establishments, the depôts,
magazines of arms, provision for remounts, drill officers and
adjutants, etc., indispensable for maintaining it in constant
training and efficiency. At the time of Philip’s accession, Pella
was an unimportant place;[144] at his death, it was not only strong
as a fortification and place of deposit for regal treasure, but
also the permanent centre, war-office, and training quarters, of
the greatest military force then known. The military registers as
well as the traditions of Macedonian discipline were preserved there
until the fall of the monarchy.[145] Philip had employed his life in
organizing this powerful instrument of dominion. His revenues, large
as they were, both from mines and from tributary conquests, had been
exhausted in the work, so that he had left at his decease a debt of
500 talents. But his son Alexander found the instrument ready made,
with excellent officers, and trained veterans for the front ranks of
his phalanx.[146]
[144] Demosthenes, De Coronâ, p. 247.
[145] Livy. xlii. 51; xliv. 46, also the comparison in Strabo,
xvi. p. 752, between the military establishments of Seleukus
Nikator at Apameia in Syria, and those of Philip at Pella in
Macedonia.
[146] Justin, xi. 6. About the debt of 500 talents left by
Philip, see the words of Alexander, Arrian, vii. 9, 10. Diodorus
affirms (xvi. 8) that Philip’s annual return from the gold mines
was 1000 talents; a total not much to be trusted.
This scientific organization of military force, on a large scale and
with all the varieties of arming and equipment made to co-operate
for one end, is the great fact of Macedonian history. Nothing of the
same kind and magnitude had ever before been seen. The Macedonians,
like Epirots and Ætolians, had no other aptitude or marking quality
except those of soldiership. Their rude and scattered tribes manifest
no definite political institutions and little sentiment of national
brotherhood; their union was mainly that of occasional fellowship
in arms under the king as chief. Philip the son of Amyntas was the
first to organize this military union into a system permanently and
efficaciously operative, achieving by means of it conquests such as
to create in the Macedonians a common pride of superiority in arms,
which served as substitute for political institutions or nationality.
Such pride was still farther exalted by the really superhuman career
of Alexander. The Macedonian kingdom was nothing but a well-combined
military machine, illustrating the irresistible superiority of the
rudest men, trained in arms and conducted by an able general, not
merely over undisciplined multitudes, but also over free, courageous,
and disciplined, citizenship with highly gifted intelligence.
During the winter of 335-334 B. C., after the destruction of
Thebes and the return of Alexander from Greece to Pella, his final
preparations were made for the Asiatic expedition. The Macedonian
army with the auxiliary contingents destined for this enterprise were
brought together early in the spring. Antipater, one of the oldest
and ablest officers of Philip, was appointed to act as viceroy of
Macedonia during the king’s absence. A military force, stated at
12,000 infantry and 1500 cavalry,[147] was left with him to keep
down the cities of Greece, to resist aggressions from the Persian
fleet, and to repress discontents at home. Such discontents were
likely to be instigated by leading Macedonians or pretenders to the
throne, especially as Alexander had no direct heir: and we are told
that Antipater and Parmenio advised postponement of the expedition
until the young king could leave behind him an heir of his own
lineage.[148] Alexander overruled these representations; yet he did
not disdain to lessen the perils at home by putting to death such men
as he principally feared or mistrusted, especially the kinsmen of
Philip’s last wife Kleopatra.[149] Of the dependent tribes around,
the most energetic chiefs accompanied his army into Asia, either by
their own preference or at his requisition. After these precautions,
the tranquillity of Macedonia was entrusted to the prudence and
fidelity of Antipater, which were still farther ensured by the fact
that three of his sons accompanied the king’s army and person.[150]
Though unpopular in his deportment,[151] Antipater discharged the
duties of his very responsible position with zeal and ability;
notwithstanding the dangerous enmity of Olympias, against whom he
sent many complaints to Alexander when in Asia, whilst she on her
side wrote frequent but unavailing letters with a view to ruin him in
the esteem of her son. After a long period of unabated confidence,
Alexander began during the last years of his life to dislike and
mistrust Antipater. He always treated Olympias with the greatest
respect; trying however to restrain her from meddling with political
affairs, and complaining sometimes of her imperious exigencies and
violence.[152]
[147] Diodor. xvii. 17.
[148] Diodor. xvii. 16.
[149] Justin, xi. 5. “Proficiscens ad Persicum bellum, omnes
novercæ suæ cognatos, quos Philippus in excelsiorem dignitatis
locum provehens imperiis præfecerat, interfecit. Sed nec suis,
qui apti regno videbantur, pepercit; ne qua materia seditionis
procul se agente in Macedoniâ remaneret.” Compare also xii. 6,
where the Pausanias mentioned as having been put to death by
Alexander is not the assassin of Philip. Pausanias was a common
Macedonian name (see Diodor. xvi. 93).
I see no reason for distrusting the general fact here asserted by
Justin. We know from Arrian (who mentioned the fact incidentally
in his work τὰ μετὰ Ἀλέξανδρον, though he says nothing about it
in his account of the expedition of Alexander—see Photius, Cod.
92. p. 220) that Alexander put to death, in the early period of
his reign, his first cousin and brother-in-law Amyntas. Much less
would he scruple to kill the friends or relatives of Kleopatra.
Neither Alexander nor Antipater would account such proceeding
anything else than a reasonable measure of prudential policy.
By the Macedonian common law, when a man was found guilty of
treason, all his relatives were condemned to die along with him
(Curtius, vi. 11, 20).
Plutarch (De Fortunâ Alex. Magn. p. 342) has a general allusion
to these precautionary executions ordered by Alexander. Fortune
(he says) imposed upon Alexander δεινὴν πρὸς ἄνδρας ὁμοφύλους
καὶ συγγενεῖς διὰ φόνου καὶ σιδήρου καὶ πυρὸς ἀνάγκην ἀμύνης,
ἀτερπέστατον τέλος ἔχουσαν.
[150] Kassander commanded a corps of Thracians and Pæonians:
Iollas and Philippus were attached to the king’s person (Arrian,
vii. 27, 2; Justin, xii. 14; Diodor. xvii. 17).
[151] Justin, xvi. 1, 14. “Antipatrum—amariorem semper ministrum
regni, quam ipsos reges, fuisse”, etc.
[152] Plutarch, Alexand. 25-39; Arrian, vii. 12, 12. He was wont
to say, that his mother exacted from him a heavy house-rent for
his domicile of ten months.
Kleopatra also (sister of Alexander and daughter of Olympias)
exercised considerable influence in the government. Dionysius,
despot of the Pontic Herakleia, maintained himself against
opposition in his government, during Alexander’s life, mainly by
paying assiduous court to her (Memnon. Heracl. c. 4. ap. Photium,
Cod. 224).
The army intended for Asia, having been assembled at Pella, was
conducted by Alexander himself first to Amphipolis, where it crossed
the Strymon; next along the road near the coast to the river Nestus
and to the towns of Abdêra and Maroneia; then through Thrace
across the rivers Hebrus and Melas; lastly, through the Thracian
Chersonese to Sestos. Here it was met by his fleet, consisting of 160
triremes, with a number of trading vessels besides;[153] made up in
large proportions from contingents furnished by Athens and Grecian
cities.[154] The passage of the whole army, infantry, cavalry, and
machines, on ships, across the strait from Sestos in Europe to Abydos
in Asia,—was superintended by Parmenio, and accomplished without
either difficulty or resistance. But Alexander himself, separating
from the army at Sestos, went down to Elæus at the southern extremity
of the Chersonese. Here stood the chapel and sacred precinct of the
hero Protesilaus, who was slain by Hektor; having been the first
Greek (according to the legend of the Trojan war) who touched the
shore of Troy. Alexander, whose imagination was then full of Homeric
reminiscences, offered sacrifice to the hero, praying that his own
disembarkation might terminate more auspiciously.
[153] Arrian, i. 11, 9.
[154] The Athenians furnished twenty ships of war. Diodor. xvii.
22.
He then sailed across in the admiral’s trireme, steering with his
own hand, to the landing place near Ilium called the Harbor of the
Achæans. At mid-channel of the strait, he sacrificed a bull, with
libations out of a golden goblet, to Poseidon and the Nereids.
Himself too in full armor, he was the first (like Protesilaus)
to tread the Asiatic shore; but he found no enemy like Hektor to
meet him. From hence, mounting the hill on which Ilium was placed,
he sacrificed to the patron-goddess Athênê; and deposited in her
temple his own panoply, taking in exchange some of the arms said
to have been worn by the heroes in the Trojan war, which he caused
to be carried by guards along with him in his subsequent battles.
Among other real or supposed monuments of this interesting legend,
the Ilians showed to him the residence of Priam with its altar of
Zeus Herkeios, where that unhappy old king was alleged to have been
slain by Neoptolemus. Numbering Neoptolemus among his ancestors,
Alexander felt himself to be the object of Priam’s yet unappeased
wrath; and accordingly offered sacrifice to him at the same altar,
for the purpose of expiation and reconciliation. On the tomb and
monumental column of Achilles, father of Neoptolemus, he not only
placed a decorative garland, but also went through the customary
ceremony of anointing himself with oil and running naked round it:
exclaiming how much he envied the lot of Achilles, who had been blest
during life with a faithful friend, and after death, with a great
poet to celebrate his exploits. Lastly, to commemorate his crossing,
Alexander erected permanent altars, in honor of Zeus, Athênê, and
Hêraklês; both on the point of Europe which his army had quitted, and
on that of Asia where it had landed.[155]
[155] Arrian, i. 11; Plutarch, Alexand. 15; Justin, xi. 5. The
ceremony of running round the column of Achilles still subsisted
in the time of Plutarch—ἀλειψάμενος λίπα καὶ μετὰ τῶν ἑταίρων
συναναδραμὼν γυμνὸς, ~ὥσπερ ἔθος ἔστιν~, etc. Philostratus,
five centuries after Alexander, conveys a vivid picture of the
numerous legendary and religious associations connected with the
plain of Troy and with the tomb of Protesilaus at Elæus, and of
the many rites and ceremonies performed there even in his time
(Philostrat. Heroica, xix. 14, 15. p. 742, ed. Olearius—δρόμοις
δ᾽ ἐῤῥυθμισμένοις συνηλάλαζον, ἀνακαλοῦντες τὸν Ἀχιλλέα, etc.,
and the pages preceding and following).
Dikæarchus (Fragm. 19, ed. Didot. ap. Athenæum, xiii. p. 603)
had treated in a special work about the sacrifices offered to
Athênê at Ilium (Περὶ τῆς ἐν Ἰλίῳ θυσίας) by Alexander, and
by many others before him; by Xerxes (Herodot. vii. 43), who
offered up 1000 oxen—by Mindarus (Xenoph. Hellen. i. 1, 4), etc.
In describing the proceedings of Alexander at Ilium, Dikæarchus
appears he have dwelt much on the warm sympathy which that prince
exhibited for the affection between Achilles and Patroklus: which
sympathy Dikæarchus illustrated by characterizing Alexander as
φιλόπαις ἐκμανῶς, and by recounting his public admiration for the
eunuch Bagôas: compare Curtius, x. i. 25—about Bagôas.
The proceedings of Alexander, on the ever-memorable site of Ilium,
are interesting as they reveal one side of his imposing character—the
vein of legendary sympathy and religious sentiment wherein alone
consisted his analogy with the Greeks. The young Macedonian prince
had nothing of that sense of correlative right and obligation,
which characterized the free Greeks of the city-community. But he
was in many points a reproduction of the heroic Greeks,[156] his
warlike ancestors in legend, Achilles and Neoptolemus, and others
of that Æakid race, unparalleled in the attributes of force—a man
of violent impulse in all directions, sometimes generous, often
vindictive—ardent in his individual affections both of love and
hatred, but devoured especially by an inextinguishable pugnacity,
appetite for conquest, and thirst for establishing at all cost his
superiority of force over others—“Jura negat sibi nata, nihil non
arrogat armis”—taking pride, not simply in victorious generalship
and direction of the arms of soldiers, but also in the personal
forwardness of an Homeric chief, the foremost to encounter both
danger and hardship. To dispositions resembling those of Achilles,
Alexander indeed added one attribute of a far higher order. As a
general, he surpassed his age in provident and even long-sighted
combinations. With all his exuberant courage and sanguine temper,
nothing was ever omitted in the way of systematic military
precaution. Thus much be borrowed, though with many improvements of
his own, from Grecian intelligence as applied to soldiership. But the
character and dispositions, which he took with him to Asia, had the
features, both striking and repulsive, of Achilles, rather than those
of Agesilaus or Epaminondas.
[156] Plutarch, Fort. Al. M. ii. p. 334. Βριθὺς ὁπλιτοπάλας,
δαΐος ἀντιπάλοις—ταύτην ἔχων τέχνην προγονικὴν ἀπ᾽ Αἰακιδῶν, etc.
Ἄλκην μὲν γὰρ ἔδωκεν Ὀλύμπιος Αἰακίδησι,
Νοῦν δ᾽ Ἀμυθαονίδαις, πλοῦτον δ᾽ ἔπορ᾽ Ἀτρεΐδῃσιν.
(Hesiod. Fragment. 223, ed. Marktscheffel.)
Like Achilles, Alexander was distinguished for swiftness of foot
(Plutarch, Fort. Al. M. i. p. 331).
The army, when reviewed on the Asiatic shore after its crossing,
presented a total of 30,000 infantry, and 4500 cavalry, thus
distributed:—
INFANTRY.
Macedonian phalanx and hypaspists 12,000
Allies 7,000
Mercenaries 5,000
------
Under the command of Parmenio 24,000
Odryssians, Triballi (both Thracians), and Illyrians 5,000
Agriânes and archers 1,000
------
Total Infantry 30,000
CAVALRY.
Macedonian heavy—under Philotas son of Parmenio 1,500
Thessalian (also heavy)—under Kallas 1,500
Miscellaneous Grecian—under Erigyius 600
Thracian and Pæonian (light)—under Kassander 900
------
Total Cavalry 4,500
Such seems the most trustworthy enumeration of Alexander’s first
invading army. There were however other accounts, the highest of
which stated as much as 43,000 infantry with 4000 cavalry.[157]
Besides these troops, also, there must have been an effective train
of projectile machines and engines, for battles and sieges, which
we shall soon find in operation. As to money, the military chest of
Alexander, exhausted in part by profuse donatives to his Macedonian
officers,[158] was as poorly furnished as that of Napoleon Buonaparte
on first entering Italy for his brilliant campaign of 1796. According
to Aristobulus, he had with him only seventy talents; according to
another authority, no more than the means of maintaining his army
for thirty days. Nor had he even been able to bring together his
auxiliaries, or complete the outfit of his army, without incurring a
debt of 800 talents, in addition to that of 500 talents contracted by
his father Philip.[159] Though Plutarch[160] wonders at the smallness
of the force with which Alexander contemplated the execution of such
great projects, yet the fact is, that in infantry he was far above
any force which the Persians had to oppose him;[161] not to speak
of comparative discipline and organization, surpassing even that of
the Grecian mercenaries, who formed the only good infantry in the
Persian service; while his cavalry, though inferior as to number, was
superior in quality and in the shock of close combat.
[157] Diodor. xvii. 17. Plutarch (Alexand. 15) says that the
highest numbers which he had read of, were,—43,000 infantry with
5000 cavalry: the lowest numbers, 30,000 infantry with 4000
cavalry (assuming the correction of Sintenis, τετρακισχιλίους
in place of πεντακισχιλίους, to be well founded, as it probably
is—compare Plutarch, Fort. Alex. M. i. p. 327).
According to Plutarch (Fort. Al. M. p. 327), both Ptolemy and
Aristobulus stated the number of infantry to be 30,000; but
Ptolemy gave the cavalry as 5000, Aristobulus, as only 4000.
Nevertheless, Arrian—who professes to follow mainly Ptolemy and
Aristobulus, whenever they agree—states the number of infantry
as “not much more than 30,000; the cavalry as more than 5000”
(Exp. Al. i. 11, 4). Anaximenes alleged 43,000 infantry, with
5500 cavalry. Kallisthenes (ap. Polybium. xii. 19) stated
40,000 infantry, with 4500 cavalry. Justin (xi. 6) gives 32,000
infantry, with 4500 cavalry.
My statement in the text follows Diodorus, who stands
distinguished, by recounting not merely the total, but the
component items besides. In regard to the total of infantry, he
agrees with Ptolemy and Aristobulus: as to cavalry, his statement
is a mean between the two.
[158] Plutarch, Alexand. 15.
[159] Arrian, vii. 9, 10—the speech which he puts in the mouth of
Alexander himself—and Curtius, x. 2, 24.
Onesikritus stated that Alexander owed at this time a debt of 200
talents (Plutarch, Alex. 15).
[160] Plutarch, Fort. Alex. M. i. p. 327; Justin, xi. 6.
[161] Arrian, i. 13, 4.
Most of the officers exercising important command in Alexander’s army
were native Macedonians. His intimate personal friend Hephæstion,
as well as his body-guards Leonnatus and Lysimachus, were natives
of Pella: Ptolemy the son of Lagus, and Pithon, were Eordians from
Upper Macedonia; Kraterus and Perdikkas, from the district of Upper
Macedonia called Orestis;[162] Antipater with his son Kassander,
Kleitus son of Drôpides, Parmenio with his two sons Philôtas and
Nikanor, Seleukus, Kœnus, Amyntas, Philippus (these two last names
were borne by more than one person), Antigonus, Neoptolemus,[163]
Meleager, Peukestes, etc., all these seem to have been native
Macedonians. All or most of them had been trained to war under
Philip, in whose service Parmenio and Antipater, especially, had
occupied a high rank.
[162] Arrian, vi. 28, 6; Arrian, Indica, 18; Justin, xv. 3-4.
Porphyry (Fragm. ap. Syncellum, Frag. Histor. Græc. vol. iii. p.
695-698) speaks of Lysimachus as a Thessalian from Kranon; but
this must be a mistake: compare Justin, xv. 3.
[163] Neoptolemus belonged, like Alexander himself, to the Æakid
gens (Arrian, ii. 27, 9).
Of the many Greeks in Alexander’s service, we hear of few in
important station. Medius, a Thessalian from Larissa, was among his
familiar companions; but the ablest and most distinguished of all
was Eumenes, a native of Kardia in the Thracian Chersonese. Eumenes,
combining an excellent Grecian education with bodily activity and
enterprise, had attracted when a young man the notice of Philip
and had been appointed as his secretary. After discharging these
duties for seven years until the death of Philip, he was continued
by Alexander in the post of chief secretary during the whole of that
king’s life.[164] He conducted most of Alexander’s correspondence,
and the daily record of his proceedings, which was kept under the
name of the Royal Ephemerides. But though his special duties were
thus of a civil character, he was not less eminent as an officer in
the field. Occasionally entrusted with high military command, he
received from Alexander signal recompenses and tokens of esteem. In
spite of these great qualities—or perhaps in consequence of them—he
was the object of marked jealousy and dislike[165] on the part of the
Macedonians,—from Hephæstion the friend, and Neoptolemus the chief
armor-bearer, of Alexander, down to the principal soldiers of the
phalanx. Neoptolemus despised Eumenes as an unwarlike penman. The
contemptuous pride with which Macedonians had now come to look down
on Greeks, is a notable characteristic of the victorious army of
Alexander, as well as a new feature in history; retorting the ancient
Hellenic sentiment in which Demosthenes, a few years before, had
indulged towards the Macedonians.[166]
[164] Plutarch, Eumenes, c. 1; Cornelius Nepos, Eumen. c. 1.
[165] Arrian, vii. 13, 1; Plutarch, Eum. 2, 3, 8, 10.
[166] Demosth. Philipp. iii. p. 19, respecting Philip—οὐ μόνον
οὐχ Ἕλληνος ὄντος, οὐδὲ προσήκοντος οὐδὲν τοῖς Ἕλλησιν, ἀλλ᾽ οὐδὲ
βαρβάρου ἐντεῦθεν ὅθεν καλὸν εἰπεῖν, ~ἀλλ᾽ ὀλέθρου Μακεδόνος~,
ὅθεν οὐδ᾽ ἀνδράποδον σπουδαῖον οὐδὲν ἦν πρότερον πρίασθαι.
Compare this with the exclamations of the Macedonian soldiers
(called Argyraspides) against their distinguished chief Eumenes,
calling him Χεῤῥονησίτης ὄλεθρος (Plutarch, Eumenes, 18).
Though Alexander has been allowed to land in Asia unopposed, an army
was already assembled under the Persian satraps within a few days’
march of Abydos. Since the reconquest of Egypt and Phenicia, about
eight or nine years before, by the Persian king Ochus, the power of
that empire had been restored to a point equal to any anterior epoch
since the repulse of Xerxes from Greece. The Persian successes in
Egypt had been achieved mainly by the arms of Greek mercenaries,
under the conduct and through the craft of the Rhodian general
Mentor; who, being seconded by the preponderant influence of the
eunuch Bagôas, confidential minister of Ochus, obtained not only
ample presents, but also the appointment of military commander on the
Hellespont and the Asiatic seaboard.[167] He procured the recall of
his brother Memnon, who with his brother-in-law Artabazus had been
obliged to leave Asia from unsuccessful revolt against the Persians,
and had found shelter with Philip.[168] He farther subdued, by force
or by fraud, various Greek and Asiatic chieftains on the Asiatic
coast; among them, the distinguished Hermeias, friend of Aristotle,
and master of the strong post of Atarneus.[169] These successes of
Mentor seem to have occurred about 343 B. C. He, and his brother
Memnon after him, upheld vigorously the authority of the Persian king
in the regions near the Hellespont. It was probably by them that
troops were sent across the strait both to rescue the besieged town
of Perinthus from Philip, and to act against that prince in other
parts of Thrace;[170] that an Asiatic chief, who was intriguing
to facilitate Philip’s intended invasion of Asia, was seized and
sent prisoner to the Persian court; and that envoys from Athens,
soliciting aid against Philip, were forwarded to the same place.[171]
[167] See, in reference to these incidents, my last preceding
volume, Vol. XI. Ch. xc. p. 441 _seq._
[168] Diodor. xvi. 52; Curtius, vi. 4, 25; vi. 5, 2. Curtius
mentions also Manapis, another Persian exile, who had fled from
Ochus to Philip.
[169] Diodor. xvi. 52. About the strength of the fortress of
Athens, see Xenoph. Hellen. iii. 2, 11; Diodor. xiii. 64. It had
been held in defiance of the Persians, even before the time of
Hermeias—Isokrates. Compare also Isokrates, Or. iv. (Panegyr.) s.
167.
[170] Letter of Alexander, addressed to Darius after the battle
of Issus, apud Arrian, ii. 14, 7. Other troops sent by the
Persians into Thrace (besides those despatched to the relief of
Perinthus), are here alluded to.
[171] Demosthenes, Philippic. iv. p. 139, 140; Epistola Philippi
apud Demosthen. p. 160.