IN ALEXANDER’S OWN WORDS
Alexander’s letter from Tyre, to Darius III (Anabasis II.14.4–8):
“Your ancestors invaded Makedon and Greece and caused havoc in our country, though we had done nothing to provoke them. As supreme commander of all Greece I invaded Asia because I wished to punish Persia for this act - an act which must be laid wholly to your charge. You sent aid to the people of Perinthos in their rebellion against my father; Ochus sent an army into Thrace, which was a part of our dominions; my father was killed by assassins whom, as you openly boasted in your letters, you yourself hired to commit the crime; <…> then I took the field against you; but it was you who began the quarrel. First I defeated in battle your generals and satraps; now I have defeated yourself and the army you led.
By the Gods’ help, I am master of your country, and I have made myself responsible for the survivors of your army who fled to me for refuge: far from being detained by force, they are serving of their own free will under my command. Come to me, therefore, as you would come to the Lord of the continent of Asia. Should you fear to suffer any indignity at my hands, then send some of your friends and I will give them the proper guarantees. Come then, and ask me for your mother, your wife, and your children and anything else you please; for you shall have them, and whatever besides you can persuade me to give you.”
Alexander at the mutiny in Opis (Anabasis VII.9–10):
“In August 324, on arriving at Opis, Alexander called together the Makedonians and declared that he was discharging from the campaign and sending back to their country all those who were unfit for service because of age or wounds suffered. The presents he would give would make them an object of even greater envy at home and would encourage the other Makedonians to take part in the same dangers and hardships.
Alexander spoke these words with the clear intention of pleasing the Makedonians, but they felt Alexander now despised them. It was not unreasonable for them to take exception to Alexander’s words, and they had had many grievances throughout the expedition. There was the recurring annoyance of Alexander’s Persian dress which pointed in the same direction, and the training of the barbarian ‘Successors’ in the Makedonian style of warfare, and the introduction of foreign cavalry into the squadrons of the Companions.
They could not keep quiet any longer, but all shouted to Alexander to discharge them from service and “take his father on the expedition”; by this insult, they meant Ammon. When Alexander heard this, he spoke as follows:
“Makedonians, my speech will not be aimed at stopping your urge to return home; as far as I am concerned you may go where you like. But I want you to realize on departing what I have done for you, and what you have done for me. <...>
I inherited a handful of golden and silver cups, coin in the treasury worth less than sixty talents, and over eight times that amount of debts; yet to add to this burden I borrowed a further sum of 800 talents. And marching out from a country too poor to maintain you decently, I laid open for you at a blow the gates of the Hellespont, although at that time the Persians controlled the sea.
My cavalry attacks crushed the satraps of Darius, and I added all Ionia and Aiolia, the two Frygias and Lydia to your empire. Miletos I reduced by siege; the other towns all yielded of their own free will – I took them and gave them to you for your profit and enjoyment.
All the wealth of Egypt and Cyrene, which I shed no blood to win, now flows into your hands; Palestine and the plains of Syria and the Land between the Rivers are now your property; Babylon and Baktria and Susa are yours, you are the masters of the gold of Lydia, the treasures of Persia, the riches of India – yes, and of the sea beyond India, too.
You are my captains, my generals, my governors of provinces. As for me, what do I have left from all these labours? Merely this purple cloak and a diadem. I kept nothing for my own; no one can point to treasure of mine alone, kept apart from which you yourself either possess, or have in safe keeping for your future use. Indeed, what reason have I to keep anything, as I eat the same food and take the same sleep as you do?”
<...>
“Over every land and sea, across river, mountain and plain I led you to the world’s end, a victorious army. I have married as you married, and many of you will have children related by blood to my own.”
<…>
“And now it was in my mind to dismiss any man no longer fit for active service – all such should return home to be envied and admired. But you all wish to leave me.
Go then! And when you reach home, tell them that Alexander your King, who vanquished the Persians and Medes and Baktrians and Sacae; who crushed the Uxians, the Arachosians, and the Drangae, and added to the empire Parthia, the Chorasmian desert, and Hyrcania to the Caspian Sea; who crossed the Caucasus beyond the Caspian Gates, and the Oxus and the Tanais and the Indus, which none but Dionysios had crossed before, and the Hydaspes and the Acines and the Hydraotes – yes, and the Hyfasis too, had you not feared to follow; who by both mouths of the Indus burst into the Great Sea beyond, and traversed the desert of Gadrosia, untrodden before by any army; who made Carmania his own, as his troops swept by, and the country of the Oreitians; who was brought back by you to Susa, when our ships sailed the ocean from India to Persia – tell them, I say, that you deserted him and left him to the mercy of barbarian men, whom you yourselves had conquered. Such news will indeed assure you praise upon earth and reward in heaven. Out of my sight!”
When he had finished, Alexander leaped down from the platform, retired to the royal tent and neglected his bodily needs. For that day and the day after he would not let any of his Companions see him.
On the third day he invited inside the elite of the Persians, appointed them to the command of all the squadrons, and only allowed those who received the title of ‘kinsmen’ from him to kiss him.
As for the Makedonians, they were at first struck dumb by his speech and waited for him near the platform. No one followed the departing king, apart from the Companions around him and the bodyguards, but the majority was unable to decide what to do or say or to make up their minds to go away. When they were told what was happening with the Persians and Medes, that the command was being given to Persians and the oriental army was being divided into companies, that Makedonian names were being given to them, and there was a Persian squadron and Persian footcompanions and other infantry and a Persian regiment of Silver Shields, and a Companion cavalry together with another royal squadron, they could not endure it any longer.
They ran in a body to the royal tent, cast their weapons down in front of the doors as a sign of supplication to the king, and standing before the doors shouted to the king to come out. They were prepared to hand over those responsible for the present disturbance and those who had raised the outcry. They would not move from the doors by day or night until Alexander took pity on them.
He celebrated the occasion by sacrificing to the gods he normally sacrificed to, and offering a public banquet. He sat down and so did everyone else, the Makedonians around him, the Persians next to them, then any of the other peoples who enjoyed precedence for their reputation or some other quality. Then he and those around him drew wine from the same bowl and poured the same libations, beginning with the Greek seers and the Magians. He prayed for the blessings and for harmony and partnership in rule between Makedonians and Persians. It is said that there were 9,000 guests at the banquet, who all poured the same libation and then sang the song of victory.”
THE CLASSICAL SOURCES ON ALEXANDER’S ERA:
Lost works appear in cursive red
1) EYE-WITNESSES, BY ORDER OF PUBLISHING DATE:
—Aristoteles of Stágira, 384-322 BC, the great philosopher/biologist, son of Philip’s physician. Though he wrote numerous works, only two so far are known to relate to Alexander: the volumes called Politics (as it mentions, without background explanation, the murder of Philip); and About the Cosmos (as it is dedicated to “to the best of all Hegemons”, that is,
to Alexander in 335 BC).
—Kallisthenes of Olynthos, 370-327 BC, a snobbish intellectual married to a niece of Aristoteles; on the campaign trail he composed Alexander’s Deeds, published in installments from 334 to 327 in Greece for evident propaganda purposes.
—Antipater of Palioura, 397-319 BC; Regent of Makedon; friend of Philip and Aristoteles. He wrote about the wars against Illyria, and left behind two volumes of Correspondence.
—Eumenes of Kardia 362-316 BC; Royal Secretary, later turned general; published –but also falsified in part, for propaganda reasons– Efemerides (Diaries) on the campaigns, and left some volumes of Correspondence.
—Onesikritos of Astypalaia, 380-305 BC, a helmsman with philosophical pretenses; he published his Memoirs soon after 319 BC.
—Chares of Mytilene, 367-313 BC, protocol chief; published a (Stories) About Alexander containing court anecdotes.
—Nearchos of Kreta, c. 360-300 BC; as a close (youth) friend and later admiral of Alexander’s, he always accompanied him; around 310 BC (and in part, to decry Onesikritos) he published his own Memoirs.
—Aristoboulos of Kassandreia, 380-295 BC, chief engineer for Alexander, published his Memoirs around 300 BC.
—Ptolemy I Soter of Makedon, 367-283 BC; a close friend, maybe even half-brother of Alexander’s, he became one of his marshals with the title of Bodyguard (‘Somatofylax’). Ruler of Egypt from 323 and Pharaoh from 305, he published his Memoirs about 285 BC.
—Hieronymos of Kardia, c. 355-250 BC, an educated gentleman, worked for Alexander’s secretariat and, later, at the service of Antigonos One-Eye and his dynasty. About 265 BC he published his History of the Successor Wars.
2) HISTORIANS WHOSE WORKS DERIVE FROM THESE EYE-WITNESSES:
A: in a literary style called vulgar, or ‘Vulgate’:
—Kleitarchos of Alexandria, c. 330-280 BC, son of the historian Deinon who had written about Persia; moving in intellectual circles of Ptolemy’s court, Kleitarchos published his About Alexander between 310 and 301 BC. His main sources were Kallisthenes, Onesikritos, Nearchos, and the veterans of the campaigns he found in Alexandria. Possibly he also read some volumes of Eumenes, but these would be rather contaminated copies. He could not use the memoirs of Ptolemy that appeared later. Afterwards, Kleitarchos was used in the original version by Diodoros, and in a second-hand mode (plagiarised by Timagenes of Alexandria, source of Trogus) by Curtius. The text of Kleitarchos on Alexander is the starting point of the literary style called “Vulgate”.
—Duris, tyrant of Samos, c. 350-270 BC; his Makedonika covered the period 370-281 BC until the triumph of Seleukos over Lysimachos at the battle of Corrupedion/Sardès.
B: in the first ‘professional’ style history/biography:
—Mestrios Ploutarchos, Plutarch of Chaironea, c 45-120 AD; author of the Parallel Lives that include a biography of Alexander, and of the Moralia and other works, that contribute further data. Among his sources, Plutarch mentions a Correspondence that must have been authentic at least in part (from Antipater and/or Eumenes?); and he gives the names of 24 historians that had already published works on Alexander.
—Arrianus, Lucius Flavius, of Nikomedia in Asia Minor, 85-162 AD; a Romanised Greek student of philosophy under Epiktetos, together with Hadrian who (as emperor) made him a general, and consul in 129; imperial governor of Cappadocia in 131-137, when he beat back an invasion by the Alan tribes, descendants of the Scythians that Alexander had warred with. In 145/46, Arrian was mayor of Athens. He describes his fight against the Alans in Ektaxis kata Alanoon. His main work is the history of Alexander’s life and campaigns, Anabasis Alexandrou, using as sources the eyewitness accounts of Ptolemy, Aristoboulos and Nearchos. He also published a report on India called Indikè.
3) WORKS BASED ON ‘VULGATE’ SOURCES:
—Diodoros, c. 100-20 BC, a historian from Agyrium on Sicily who had travelled extensively through Europe, Egypt and Asia, from 40 BC onwards published a Historical Library. For its volume on Alexander, his main source was Kleitarchos, with additional data taken from Hieronymos and Duris.
—Trogus Pompeius, a Romanised Gaul, around 10 BC published his Historiae Philippicae; two of its 44 volumes concerned Alexander, and were based on a second-hand version of Kleitarchos. Trogus was used in turn by Curtius, and later ineptly abridged by Justin. Some fragments of the original text are preserved in Valerius Maximus and in the Metz Epitome.
—Curtius, Quintus C. Rufus, 10 BC - 53 AD, a prominent Roman author, in the days of emperor Claudius published a Historiae Alexandri Magni: an indirect heir to Kleitarchos through Diodoros, with some parts of Trogus mixed in.
—Justinus, Marcus Julianus, a Roman writer, around 300 AD published his ‘Epitome’ of Trogus, a badly edited digest; its only merit was to preserve a part of the contents.
—the Metz Epitome: Epitoma Rerum Gestarum Alexandri et Liber de Morte Eius, a manuscript in late Latin (found back at Metz) written in the 4th or 5th century AD as a digest of several earlier texts. Some parts derive from Duris and Diodoros, but most of its material is similar to Trogus and Curtius. However, it also preserves a few details that cannot be found in any other source on Alexander.
4) THE ALEXANDER ROMANCE, A ‘VULGATE’ FRENZY:
—the so called ‘pseudo-Kallisthenes’, an anonymous Greek scribe in Alexandria, published around 220 AD his bestseller Life and Deeds of Alexander, with many a phantasy mixed in.
—Julius Valerius, Roman consul in 338 AD, translated this text into Latin under the title Res Gestae Alexandri Macedonis, which became the origin of over 70 ‘remakes’ in Occidental and Oriental literature, generally known as the Alexander Romances.
5) PROFESSIONAL HISTORIANS ON THE ALEXANDER ERA:
—Berossos (in Chaldean: Bel-re’ushunu) of Babylon, emigrated to Asia Minor, where he wrote in Greek; of his 3-volume Babyloniaka, published c. 285 BC, only a few fragments survive, referring to events of the period 600-300 BC.
—Memnon, of Herakleia Pontos in Asia Minor, limited himself to local history of his region in the period 365-70 BC; a few fragments survive.
—Fylarchos, of Athens, published a Historia covering 272-220 BC.
—Polybios, of Megalopolis, 203-118; his Historia covers 230-145 BC.
6) OTHER REFERENCE WORKS BY PROFESSIONAL WRITERS:
—Strabo of Amasya, c. 64 BC - 24 AD: Geography
—Pliny ‘the Elder’, Gaius Plinius, 23-79 AD: Natural History
—Appianus of Alexandria, 95-165 AD: The Mithridatic Wars
—Polyainos of Bithynia, born c.100 AD: Strategy
—Pausanias ‘the Traveller’, 115-180 AD: Description of Greece
—Cassius Dio, 164-235 AD, consul in 229 AD: Historiae Romanae
—Filostratos of Athens, 170-247 AD: Life of Apolonius (with a reference to Parthia)
7) ABRIDGERS WHO PRESERVE INTERESTING FRAGMENTS:
—Valerius Maximus quotes from Trogus in his Factorum et Dictorum Memorabilium, c. 25 AD.
—Athenaios, of Naukratis in Egypt, c.140-200 AD, quotes from many other authors in his Deipnosofistai (“Gastromy and table-talk”).
—Aelianus, Claudius, c.175-235 AD quotes from many now-lost works in his Varia Historia.
—Photius, 820-897 AD, patriarch of Constantinople; his Myriobiblion also contains digests of 280 classical writers, and so preserves important fragments of historians like Ktesias, Diodoros, Arrian, or Memnon of Herakleia.
—The historical encyclopedia known as the Suda (10th cent. AD) has over 32.000 entries and can be read in English translation at www.stoa.org/sol.
WHERE ALEXANDER’S WOMEN APPEAR IN THE CLASSICAL SOURCES:
Ada I, queen
-Plut. Al. 21.4/22.4; Plut. Mor. 6.5.22; Arr.I.23.8
Ada II, princess
-Plut.Al.10.1; Arr.I.23.8
Adea, queen
-Diod. XIX.11.1-7; Arr.Succ.I.22/23/30/33
Amastris, queen
-Diod. XX.109.7; Arr.VII.4.5; Memnon FGrH 434 f1-4
Apame (Seleukos’ bride)
see below: brides in Susa
Artakama (Ptolemy’s bride)
see below: brides in Susa
Artonis (Eumenes’ bride)
see below: brides in Susa
Atropates’daughter (Perdikkas’ bride)
see below: brides in Susa
Atropates’ ‘Amazons’
-Arr. VII, 13
‘Auspicious Amazon’;
-Sikandar-Nama 64-67; Darab-Nama
Barsine, princess & concubine
-Diod. XVI 52.3-4 and XX.20
Barsine/Stateira, queen
-Aristoboulos FGrH 139 f52; Plut.Al.77.3-6; Arr. VII.4.4; see also below: brides in Susa
Barsine? (Nearchos’ bride)
see below: brides in Susa
Brides in Susa
-Plut. Eum. 1.3/1.6-7; Arr.III.22.6 and VII.4.4-8
Cynnane, princess
-Arr.I.5.4-5; Arr.Succ.I.22; Polyainos 8.60
Drypetis, princess
-Aristob. FGrH 139 f52; Arr. VII.4.4; see: Brides in Susa
Eurydike, queen-mother
-Diod. XVI.2.4; Plut. Mor. 14c; Strab. 326c; Aeschines 2.26-29; contra Just. 7.4.5-8
Hystaspes’ wife, a grandchild of Ochus
-Curtius VI.2.6-9
Kallixeina, callgirl
-Athenaios X 434.a
(=Hieronymos Ep. F10)
Kampaspe/Pancaspe, concubine
-Plinius NH 35.86/7; Aelianus VH 12.34
All Alexander's Women Page 17
