Part 3

In the meantime, however, Memnon had not been inactive, and he was putting to good use his superiority in naval strength. Several islands had either been occupied or were making preparations to join the Persian general, and even in continental Greece the anti-Macedonian influence was being felt. There was no question that Memnon’s arrival on the shores of European Greece would be the signal for a general abandonment of the Macedonian cause. Athens even sent an embassy to Darius, although the city did not dare to join the Persians openly. In the midst of these successes, Memnon was taken ill and died. Those who succeeded him in the command showed none of his capacity. The fleet was kept in inactivity, and though on land some small successes could be put to the credit of the Persian arms in Asia Minor, the soldiers operating there were soon directed to join the main army of Darius in Syria, now being collected to meet the advancing Greeks. When the news of Alexander’s victory at the Granicus reached the interior of the Persian Empire, Darius began to draw together a large army, and leaving Babylon in January, reached northern Syria in autumn. Alexander was still in Cilicia, detained in Tarsus by a severe illness, and on his recovery busied himself with the conquest of some of the coast cities. But when he heard of the advance of Darius, he marched trough the narrow pass near the coast which connects Cilicia and Syria, and commenced the siege of Myriandros, the first Phœnician city on the road. He evidently reckoned on Darius meeting him in the level places of northern Persia, where the latter’s cavalry could be used to its best advantage, but Darius showed a keener strategical instinct than is usually associated with Persian generalship. While Alexander was taking the coast road south, Darius’ army made a northerly movement, passing over a difficult mountain region, and so appeared in the rear of the Macedonian army on the level plain near Issus. The Persians had a strong position; on their right was the sea, and on their left a chain of mountains. On the front they were protected by the deeply worn bed of the river Pinarus. They had also constructed a line of earthworks.

The preliminary operations of the Persians were conducted with great intelligence. By them Alexander was cut off from his base and his position was desperate, unless he could restore his line of communications by a successful engagement. This was no easy matter, for the mountain defile, the Assyrian Gate, had to be passed through, a place where the mountains and the sea are so close that there is room only for a road. Darius had an excellent position but failed to make any use of it. Without attempting to interfere he allowed Alexander to march through the narrow strip of land between the mountains and the sea and to change from a column formation into regular battle array.

It took the Greek commander the whole night to make the journey from Myriandros, a place south of the defile, to the level country on the banks of the Pinarus. As Alexander’s army debouched on the plain, the cavalry and the light-armed troops sent against them by Darius failed to arrest their progress. The Persians were outmanœuvered from the start, for on the plain, which had very narrow limits--a little more than two miles wide--Darius could make no use of his superior numbers, nor was there opportunity for bringing to bear to any purpose the Persian advantage in cavalry. It was possible for Alexander to extend his own line of battle just as far as the enemy could, and the nature of the ground protected him against any enveloping manœuver. Thus the disposable forces, on either side, were equalized, and on account of the superior training and skill of the Macedonians, there was little doubt from the first as to the issue of the fight.

On the Greek side the left wing was commanded by Alexander in person, and it was made up of the Macedonian cavalry, the hypaspists, and a part of the ordinary infantry. The vigor of their onslaught was irresistible, and the Asiatics opposed to them gave way after a short struggle and fled. The whole Persian center was disorganized, even Darius avoiding capture with difficulty. His chariots, his royal robes, and his arms fell into the hands of the victorious Greeks. In another part of the field Parmenio, who was in command of the left wing of the Greek army, had no easy time in withstanding the charges of the Asiatic cavalry, and also when the Macedonian phalanx undertook to storm the heights which were occupied by Greek mercenary troops on the other side, they were repulsed with considerable loss. Fortunately, Alexander, after defeating the division opposed to him, was able to use his infantry to attack the mercenaries on their rear, and they were forced to withdraw from the field. They retired in good order, but the Persian cavalry proved inefficient, and were repulsed with great loss. In their flight they demoralized the reserves which had been placed by the Persians immediately behind the line of battle. The Persian army ceased to exist as a military entity and the fugitives were saved from further pursuit only by the early nightfall of the autumn season. Darius was able to bring together on the other side of the Syrian mountains 4000 men, most of whom were Greek mercenaries, and with a small force he recrossed the Euphrates. The main body of the Greeks, attached to the army of Darius, made their way to Tripolis in Phœnicia and from there sailed to Cyprus. (October, 333 B.C.)

After the battle the Persian camp was occupied by the Greeks, and among the captives were the mother of Darius and his wife, Stateira, and her children. These members of the royal household were treated considerately. Their presence with the Greek army was a most valuable asset, and a few days after his defeat Darius began to open negotiations for the purpose of having the captives restored to him. Alexander showed no unfriendly spirit, and received an embassy with formal proposals of peace from Darius. The conditions were, that all of the country west of the Euphrates should be ceded and the large sum of 10,000 talents given for the return of the royal captives. In addition to this, as a pledge of good faith, it was proposed that Alexander should receive one of the king’s daughters in marriage. The offer was a proof that Darius realized how deep was his humiliation and how small the chance of successful resistance to the conqueror.

Liberal as the terms were, it must have been plain to Alexander that to make peace now was to leave his work half finished, especially as the first half was the more difficult. In it he had defeated the best soldiers under the command of Darius, and there was nothing more to fear from the Persian fleet, its most important units being withdrawn to protect Syria, nor was a rising in Greece likely to be attempted. The news of the battle of Issus had made the anti-Macedonian faction in the Greek cities see the purposelessness of counting on the co-operation of Persia. At the Isthmian games the representatives of the Hellenic confederation voted Alexander a golden crown as a defender of the liberties of Greece.

Alexander answered the proposition of the Persian king in a stern mood, fully conscious of his strength. His letter to Darius, which has been preserved, is a document that speaks in no uncertain tone. “Your ancestors invaded Macedonia and the rest of Greece, and without provocation inflicted wrongs upon us. I was appointed leader of the Greeks and crossed over into Asia for the purpose of avenging those wrongs; for ye were the first aggressors. In the next place ye assisted the people of Perinthus, who were offenders against my father, and Ochus sent a force into Thrace, which was part of our empire. Further, the conspirators who slew my father were suborned by you, as ye yourselves boasted in your letters. Thou with the help of Bagoas didst murder Arses (son of Ochus) and seize the throne unjustly and contrary to the law of the Persians, and then thou didst write improper letters regarding me to the Greeks, to incite them to war against me, and didst send to the Lacedæmonians and other of the Greeks, for the same purpose, sums of money (whereof none of the other cities partook but only the Lacedæmonians); and these emissaries corrupted my friends and tried to dissolve the peace which I had brought about in Greece. Wherefore I marched forth against thee who wert the aggressor in general. I have overcome in battle first thy generals and satraps, and now thyself and thine host, and possess thy land through the grace of the gods. Those who fought on thy side and were not slain but took refuge with me, are under my protection and are glad to be with me and will fight with me henceforward. I am lord of all Asia, and therefore do thou come to me. If thou art afraid of being evilly entreated, send some of thy friends to receive sufficient guaranties. Thou hast only to come to me to ask and receive thy mother and children, and whatsoever else thou mayest desire. And for the future whenever thou sendest, send to me as to the Great King of Asia, and do not write as to an equal, but tell me whatever thy need be, as to one who is lord of all that is thine. Otherwise I shall deal with thee as an offender. But if thou disputest the kingdom, then wait and fight for it again and do not flee; for I will march against thee, wherever thou mayest be.”

Darius now set about collecting another army and made no more peace proposals. He gathered the fragments of the force that had been beaten at Issus, and to this were added contingents drawn from all the furthermost parts of his empire still in his hands. The army so formed was almost exclusively Asiatic, for of Greek mercenaries there were only the soldiers, a few thousand all told, who had followed him in his flight. No others could now be secured. Darius’ new plan was to await the approach of Alexander on the plains of Assyria, where the Persian cavalry could be used with most effect.

On Alexander’s part there was no haste in turning to the interior. Instead of following Darius, he remained on the sea coast, while Parmenio was sent to Damascus with half the Greek army, to seize the treasure left there by Darius before the battle of Issus. Alexander with the rest of the army turned south to the conquest of the great island city of Phœnicia, which unlike its smaller neighbors had refused to surrender and had declared its neutrality to Alexander. Tyre was the center of Persian sea power, and so long as it remained independent its fleet could be used against the Greek king, either on the sea itself or as an instrument for creating disturbances in continental Greece.

The siege of Tyre involved special difficulties; not only were its walls high and strong, but it was situated on an island separated from the mainland by a shallow body of water. As Alexander had no fleet adequate to conduct aggressive operations from the open sea against the city, he planned to bring up his siege engines against the walls from the land side, by building a causeway over the shallow body of water. The defenders of the town tried repeatedly and with great bravery to prevent such an approach from being made. Tyre’s own commercial competitors, Cyprus and the less important Phœnician cities, including Sidon, placed their navies at Alexander’s disposition, and with their ships he began to operate from the sea. The situation of the town was desperate, but its people made a defense as desperate and as resourceful as their daughter city Carthage in later days against the Romans.

When the causeway was finally constructed, the walls on this side, being 150 feet high and enormously thick, were not damaged by the siege engines. Accordingly Alexander changed his plans quickly; the engines were mounted in vessels and a breach was effected in one of the battlements extending along the harbor. While the Macedonians were now able to penetrate the city, they met with heavy resistance from the besieged townsmen, and the occupation of Tyre was only effected by the protection of Alexander’s naval allies, who forced an entrance into the two harbors, and so drew off a portion of the defenders from the side where the Greeks were making their attack. The stubborn defense cost the Tyrians 8000 men, and of the prisoners 3000 were sold as slaves. On the Macedonian side the loss was small, only amounting to 400 men, but no mention is made of the losses of the allied fleets. The siege of Tyre lasted seven months, the city falling in July, 332. The long delay was worth while, for the successful issue showed how invincible was the generalship of the Greek leader. By the possession of the city he held the key to the control of the eastern Mediterranean.

On the way south he met with no resistance except from the strong citadel at Gaza, which withstood him for two months and was finally taken by storm. The march to Egypt could now be safely undertaken, as the whole sea coast from the Hellespont south was in the hands of the Greeks. Egypt itself had no love for its Persian masters. It had not long before been autonomous for fifty years, and it had been brought back under the régime of the Great King under circumstances of repression that made its inhabitants greet Alexander as a liberator. The Persian governor, seeing the folly of resistance, gave up the strong places, and Alexander passed the winter in the country. During his stay he founded the only good harbor on the coast, the city which still bears his name. This undertaking was not the boastful action of a conqueror, solicitous of the praise of posterity; it was a keen-sighted scheme to divert from the Phœnician towns of Syria the control of the Mediterranean trade. Within half a century Alexandria had become a great commercial emporium, the center of Greek science and learning, and for three hundred years it continued to be the richest and largest city in the world.

As the members of the old Egyptian monarchy had proclaimed themselves sons of Ammon, Alexander, in order to regularize his position in the newly conquered province, made a visit to the temple of Zeus Ammon, traveling across the desert with a small company of troops. He was greeted by the priests of the temple as the divinely accredited ruler of Egypt, but the exact words of the response of the oracle were not communicated. They were kept as a mystery, but the divine honors claimed afterwards by Alexander were always connected with this mysterious attestation of his claim that his father was no earthly parent, but Zeus himself.

Darius, meanwhile, was in no position to interrupt this series of successes in Syria and in Egypt. He had no army there prepared to take the field, but he did try to interfere with the Greek lines of communication in regions more remote from the present scene of operations. Antigonus, left in Phrygia as its governor, was attacked by a force composed of some of the soldiers who had fought on the Persian side at Issus, as well as of contingents from Cappadocia and Paphlagonia. But the attempt was unsuccessful. Antigonus showed remarkable military ability, for with his small force he defeated the Persians and added to the region under him the country of Lycaonia, which had never submitted to Persian rule. In the spring of 331 Alexander left Egypt for his march to the interior of the Persian Empire, and by the middle of the summer he crossed the Euphrates near Thapsacus, and from there, taking a northerly direction through Mesopotamia, he passed the Tigris on the 20th of September.

The advance of the Greek army was continuous, little resistance being offered to its progress. It seemed to be the aim of Darius to do nothing to prevent Alexander from penetrating into the interior. If the Greeks were defeated there, they would be cut off from retreat, and in case the Persians again failed, there would be a chance for the vanquished to withdraw in security to the mountainous country to the north. Alexander has been criticised for delaying so long in his occupation of Syria and Egypt; indeed Parmenio had urged him to accept the terms offered by Darius after the battle of Issus, a suggestion which called forth from Alexander the reply “that he would do it if he were Parmenio.” But the small number of soldiers under his command showed the strategy he followed to be as cautious as his conduct of the expedition was daring. If he had gone straight on after the battle of Issus, he would have been obliged to detach enough men from his main army to act as a corps of observation in Syria and Egypt, and this would have left him hardly more than 20,000 men.

In the meantime he had received accessions of numbers, so that when he came to confront Darius for the second time he had under his command about 47,000 men. The engagement took place at Gaugamela (October, 331 B.C.), not far from the ruins of Nineveh. Darius had made some attempt to give an improved armament to his foot soldiers, supplying them with longer spears and swords so that they might fight the Macedonian phalanx on more equal terms. Besides this, he had provided chariots armed with scythes and a small number of elephants, which could be effectively used only in a level country. But his chief hope lay in his cavalry, of which he probably had 12,000, while Alexander had but 7000.

The Greeks had had four days’ rest in a fortified camp before they were drawn up in battle array, and besides this the ground between them and the Persians had been carefully reconnoitered, in order to discern if the enemy had constructed concealed pits to confuse the cavalry charge. There was no way of protecting the flanks of the army, so Alexander placed a reserve force behind with orders to move towards the right or the left, according as the expected turning movement from the Persians might develop. The Greeks moved forward on the 30th of September, with Alexander leading the Macedonian heavy cavalry and the bulk of the phalanx. He directed his attack against the enemy’s left wing, but as he did so he was charged on the flank by the Scythian and Bactrian horse. He sent against them the reserves previously mentioned, and himself engaged the Persian infantry, who had lost heart when they were attacked by the Macedonian cavalry. The manœuvers with the scythe-bearing chariots did no damage, for the Greeks made way for them to pass through their ranks, and re-formed again as soon as they had rattled past. The onslaught of the phalanx proved irresistible; the Asiatic foot could not withstand its superior armament and discipline. The Persian center was broken and again Darius had the ignominious experience of a headlong flight. The Persian cavalry, left to battle alone, was soon demoralized and could not hold its ground.

Parmenio’s experience with the left wing of the Greeks was different, for he had difficulty in keeping his position against the Persian horse. He could not follow Alexander’s advance, and hence there came to be a great gap between the two positions of the army. In this open space the Persians precipitated themselves; the Greek lines in battle array were forced farther apart and their camp occupied. It was a most dangerous position, but the barbarians, instead of using their advantage, busied themselves in plundering the Greek camp. Alexander turned from pursuing the Persian center to help the hard-pressed left wing, and on his way met the enemy’s cavalry, now on their way back with the booty of the Macedonian camp. He tried to cut them off from their main body, but they fought with desperation and succeeded in breaking through. In the hand-to-hand fights one of Alexander’s closest friends, Hephæstion, was wounded.

The danger to the left wing was now over, for the Persian commander Mazæus, on hearing of his king’s flight, had ceased the attack on Parmenio, who now occupied the Persian camp, while Alexander resumed the pursuit of the main body, anxious to get Darius into his hands. He marched with great rapidity, reaching on the day after the battle Arbela, at which place the supplies and treasures of the flying Persians were discovered. But the Great King had made good his escape to Media, where, owing to the mountainous character of the country, it was useless to pursue him farther. The results of the battle were impressive materially and emotionally. The Persians had no heart to continue the war. Their army was destroyed, 10,000 prisoners were in the hands of their enemy, and the road to their capitals, Babylon and Susa, lay open. All this had been won by Alexander at a small cost, only 100 Macedonians having fallen, and the whole loss of the Greek army did not exceed 500 men.

Alexander marched to Babylon, which was surrendered without resistance by its inhabitants, who welcomed him as a liberator. Religious differences had made the citizens regard the Persians as oppressors, and Alexander won over the Babylonians by acting as the protector of their national religion. He rebuilt the Babylonian temples and also showed a placable temper by keeping the Persian Mazæus as satrap of the province of Babylonia. Without delaying at Babylon longer than was necessary to conciliate the inhabitants, Alexander passed to Susa. Its citadel offered no resistance, and with its surrender the town and its treasury, amounting to 50,000 talents ($60,000,000), became the property of the conqueror. (December, 331 B.C.)

The next stage of the conquest of the interior of Asia was the occupation of the country called Persis, the homeland of the Persians. To reach it a difficult country held by Uxian hillmen had to be passed. These were proud of their independence, for they had never paid tribute to the Persians, and they now occupied their mountain defile, prepared to dispute the passage of the Greeks. They were easily circumvented by Alexander’s strategy, and brought to reason. Farther on, the access to Persepolis was strongly defended by the Persians, but Alexander forced his way through devious mountain roads and took the capital without trouble. The national treasure, equivalent to 120,000 talents, fell into his hands.