Alexander the Great

by Philip Freeman

  MORTAL MAN, I AM CYRUS, SON OF CAMBYSES,

  FOUNDER OF THE PERSIAN EMPIRE AND KING OF ASIA.

  DO NOT BEGRUDGE ME THIS SMALL MONUMENT.

  Alexander was deeply moved by his visit to the tomb of Cyrus and commanded that the wishes of the first Great King be forever honored. The priests were to continue in perpetuity the royal ceremonies due to Cyrus and the tomb was to remain inviolate.

  It may have been the stench of the burned city or shame at having allowed his soldiers to rampage through Persepolis that soon moved Alexander to leave the city for a trip to the Persian countryside. He knew Darius and the remnants of the Persian army were in Media waiting to see what he would do next, but he was in no hurry to chase them across Asia just yet. After four years of campaigning, he felt his men needed a rest. The winter snows still covered the mountains to the north and the king knew there would be many difficult marches ahead, even if many of the soldiers thought the campaign was over and they were soon returning home. It seemed best to let his army regain their strength in Persepolis and perhaps their appetite for battle before beginning the campaign once again in the spring.

  But the restless nature of Alexander did not abide remaining long in any one place. There were reports of primitive tribes in the hills that refused to acknowledge his sovereignty, but this was little more than an excuse to explore more of Persia on his own. Leaving his army behind, he took with him his closest companions and a small force of only a thousand cavalry and light-armed infantry into the rugged mountains. The weather was horrible and the paths were covered with snow and ice. As they climbed into the highlands, the men began to feel as if they had reached the end of the world. There were no farms or houses, no people or animals, only endless sky and fading light. There was something strange and disturbing about these mountains even for men who had been raised in the highlands of Macedonia. At last a group of soldiers dared to approach Alexander and begged him to turn back.

  Instead of berating his frightened men, the king jumped down from his horse and pressed ahead up the trail by himself over snow and slippery patches of ice. He took a pick and broke up the ice covering the path as he made his way forward. All his men watched and were filled with shame. First his friends joined him in blazing the trail, then his officers, and finally the rest of the soldiers. They slowly made their way through the forest and over the mountains until at last they saw traces of human civilization once again. The bands of herdsmen who lived in these inaccessible hills did not expect to see outsiders in the middle of winter and certainly were unprepared for a small army to descend upon their valley. Many of the tribesmen killed their own people to spare them from the invaders, and fled themselves higher into the mountains.

  The Macedonians then moved even deeper into the highlands to the isolated land of a people known as the Mardi, a tribe left over from another age. They lived in caves in the mountains and fed their families on sheep and wild animals. Their women were as tough as the men, wearing tunics that barely covered their thighs and binding their bushy hair with slings. When the need arose, the women would pull off the slings and fight alongside the men with devastating effect. To Alexander, it was as if the trek from Persepolis had become a grand hunting expedition with humans as prey instead of beasts. There were few spoils aside from a handful of scrawny sheep, but nonetheless the hapless Mardi were tracked down and killed for the amusement of the king and his men. On their return to the city after thirty days in the wild, Alexander celebrated the excursion by giving each of those who had accompanied him gifts to remember their month traversing the mountains of Persia.

  It was a fine Greek tradition to blame women for the foolish deeds of men. Helen was the face that launched a thousand ships full of warriors to fight and die before the walls of Troy. Pandora allowed evil into the world when she opened her forbidden jar (box is a mistranslation). Likewise at Persepolis that spring, it was an Athenian prostitute who would enter history as the woman who led Alexander to destroy the palace of the Great King.

  As the story is told by Plutarch and other ancient authors, there was a drunken party one night not long after Alexander returned from his expedition into the mountains. Wine flowed freely as always at Macedonian banquets, so that soon all the king’s friends and guests were roaring drunk. Alexander’s old friend Ptolemy was there along with his mistress, Thaïs, whom he would later marry and father three children with. She was not a common harlot and camp follower but a woman known to the Athenians as a hetaira—a beautiful, educated, and charming female who shared the bed of her sponsor but also served as his confidante and advisor. Such women did well in Greek society and often ended up as lifetime partners of their lovers. Thaïs, as an Athenian, knew the history of the Persian conflict better than most of the Macedonian soldiers around her and took this moment of revelry to make an impassioned speech to Alexander and his friends. It was a fine reward, she proclaimed, after wandering over Asia, to dine in luxury in the splendid palace of Xerxes. But it would be a so much sweeter pleasure to set fire to the house of the man who had burned down her own city. Thaïs was a moving speaker, so that applause and cheers erupted from the whole crowd and echoed through the hall. Everyone began to urge the king to lead the way in starting a blaze. Alexander eagerly agreed and grabbed the nearest torch. He himself first set afire the cedar columns and rafters of the building, then all the others ran through the halls with firebrands. Soon the whole complex was a raging inferno that lit up the plain of Persepolis. But even as the king watched the great palace of Xerxes burn, he began to regret his hasty action. He tried to put the fire out, but it was much too late. By morning, there was nothing left but scorched pillars and ashes.

  This is one tradition handed down through ancient documents, but there is a darker and more sinister tale found in the historian Arrian, often our best source for the life of Alexander. What makes Arrian so believable in this instance is that he normally has a quite positive view of the Macedonian king, but he passes over the events of this night as rapidly as possible with outright condemnation of Alexander’s actions. He states that the king planned all along to burn the palace and that even Parmenion tried to discourage him from such a drastic deed. The old general argued that it was foolish to destroy his own property and that the people of Asia would see him as just a rampaging conqueror with no real interest in building an empire. But in Arrian’s version, Alexander counters that he wants revenge for all the evils the Persians had done to the Greek world.

  Discovering the truth about what happened that night is next to impossible when the ancient sources disagree. What can be said with certainty is that the palace burned to the ground before Alexander left the city. Archaeologists found a thick layer of ash throughout the remains, but no precious gold or treasures, indicating the valuables had been deliberately removed beforehand—again suggesting premeditation. If Arrian is right and Alexander burned down the palace on purpose, was revenge a sufficient reason? Perhaps, if it were an act of propaganda designed to bolster his support in Greece, especially Athens. But the king had shown surprisingly little interest in what the Greeks thought of his war since he left the Aegean coast. It may be instead that the primary audience was the Persians in an effort to show them that the old days were finished and that Alexander was now Great King. In this scenario, the burning was meant to discourage further resistance before he resumed his campaign against Darius. And yet, after slaughtering the population of Persepolis, did the Persians really harbor any doubts that opposing Alexander was dangerous and ultimately futile? In the end, we simply cannot know whether or not the king deliberately burned down the palace of Xerxes. But we can be sure that most of the ancient historians who wrote of the episode were deeply uncomfortable with Alexander’s actions and preferred to blame the events of that night on too much wine and the silken tongue of a woman.

  The game now was to capture the king. Darius had spent the winter at the Median capital of Ecbatana, almost four hundred miles north of Persepolis, waiting
to see what Alexander would do next. The Persian ruler had gathered an impressive army of perhaps ten thousand soldiers, including his loyal Greek mercenaries. He knew he did not have enough men to face the Macedonians in open battle, but he planned to withdraw east across the mountains into Bactria, burning the fields as he went. Since the area had few reliable crops to begin with, this devastation would make it difficult for Alexander to feed his army while pursuing him. Once in Bactria, he would lead a rear-guard effort to retake the empire. Given the sheer size and rugged terrain of the lands from the Caspian Sea to the Indus River, it was a reasonable plan. Darius could hold off the Macedonians for years in the mountains and valleys of the Hindu Kush, all the while wearing down Alexander and diverting his attention and resources from potential problems elsewhere in his new realm.

  Alexander understood the strategy of Darius quite well and appreciated the threat it posed to his rule. He also knew that in a very real sense he could not be Great King in the eyes of Asia until Darius had abdicated or was dead. It was therefore essential that he overtake Darius before he could escape into Bactria. As he explained to his officers and men, the war against Persia could not be finished until the shah, as the Persians called their king, was mat, or finished. The endgame had to be shah mat, a Persian phrase that would evolve in time into checkmate.

  As soon as most of the snow had melted between Persepolis and Ecbatana, Alexander readied his army for a lightning march up the eastern side of the Zagros Mountains. He once again appointed a Persian as local satrap, this time a noble named Phrasaortes, but also left behind a strong Macedonian garrison at Persepolis under the command of a trusted officer. Alexander then set out with his men across the edge of the great desert of the central Persian highlands toward Ecbatana. He pushed his men over twenty miles a day past parched hills and scattered oases in an attempt to reach the doorstep of Darius before the Persian king could flee. After almost two weeks at this blistering pace, Alexander heard that Darius had decided to make a stand at Ecbatana as the Persian had been joined by reinforcements from Scythia and tribesmen from near the Caspian Sea. This was just what Alexander was hoping for. He separated the supply train to follow at a slower pace while he and the army moved even faster toward the north. But just a few days later he received an updated report that the Persian reinforcements had not in fact arrived, prompting Darius to change his plan from fight to flight. The Persian leader had sent ahead his harem and supply wagons to a pass called the Caspian Gates in the mountains east of Rhagae (Tehran) leading to Bactria. Three days out of Ecbatana, a Persian noble named Bisthanes arrived at the camp of Alexander. This man was the only son of the previous Great King, Artaxerxes III, who had escaped the bloody purge engineered by the scheming eunuch Bagoas that had led to the ascension of Darius. He had no love for the Persian king and had decided, along with many others, to take his chances with Alexander. Bisthanes reported that Darius had now fled the Median capital and was on his way to the Caspian Gates. He also had in his wagons enough gold to pay his men and hire local warriors for years to come.

  Alexander was now becoming seriously worried. If Darius made it over the mountains with his soldiers and treasure he could carry on the war indefinitely. It was therefore essential that Alexander move even faster with a rapid force. But in spite of the hurry and indeed using it as an excuse, he seized the moment to make a radical change in his command staff. First he announced that he was sending the cavalry units from Thessaly back home to Greece. These men had served bravely as the contribution of their nation to the war effort against Persia. They would all depart in honor with a large bonus and would be escorted back to the Mediterranean to be carried by ship to the Aegean. Once home they could rejoin their families and live out their lives in peace and prosperity. On the other hand, if any of them wished to sign on to his army as paid volunteers rather than subject soldiers, he would welcome them with an even larger bonus. Most of the Thessalians jumped at the chance to remain and were transferred to a new commanding officer.

  It is no mere coincidence that the reassigned Thessalian cavalry were the backbone of Parmenion’s support in the army. They had fought with him for years and were stubbornly loyal to the old general. In removing them from Parmenion’s command, Alexander was cutting off his father’s oldest friend from his power base among the soldiers. The king then called Parmenion to his tent and informed him that he was sending him to Ecbatana to guard the treasury and keep an eye on Harpalus, who would now be running Alexander’s finances from the Median capital. It was an important position, Alexander assured Parmenion, and besides, at over seventy years of age, the heroic general deserved a rest from chasing fugitive Persians across the mountains. In time, he would certainly call on the general to join him in the east.

  Parmenion realized exactly what Alexander was doing. The king had slowly whittled away his supporters and family members from positions of power during the campaign, leaving one here as satrap and another there as garrison chief. Now the only significant players left from his faction were himself and his two sons. Finally, in one quick stroke with no time to debate the issue, the king had severed Parmenion from his soldiers and cashiered the old man to guard duty away from the army. Parmenion had served his purpose and was to be set aside like an aged horse put out to pasture. There was no point in arguing as Alexander was leaving immediately to pursue Darius. The son of Philip had yearned for years to be his own man and silence forever the voice of his father whispering in his ear through the lips of Parmenion. In the last few years the king had gained confidence in his own innate leadership skills and grown in experience leading an army. Now, he hoped, the great battles were over and much of the empire conquered; Alexander didn’t need Parmenion anymore.

  Alexander set out from Ecbatana after Darius with a strong but fast-moving force of cavalry and infantry. He was so eager to overtake the Persians that many of his men fell behind as he rushed across the arid highlands on the way to the Caspian Gates. The horses were pushed so hard that they began to die. They reached Rhagae in only eleven days and at last saw the towering Elburz Mountains rising before them. But there was no time to stop as they raced eastward, only to find that Darius had passed through the Caspian Gates several days ahead of them. Alexander camped at the pass that night, sending a battalion forward to prepare supply caches as he had heard the lands beyond were even more desolate.

  While he was still in camp, a Babylonian named Bagisthanes came to him along with Antibelus, one of the sons of Mazaeus, his own satrap at Babylon. They had just left Darius and brought valuable information to Alexander. Bessus, the satrap of Bactria and kinsmen of Darius, had arrested the Persian king with the support of another eastern satrap named Barsaentes and were fleeing with him, unharmed at present, as a captive in a wagon. Alexander had been fearing something like this might happen. A coup in the Persian ranks only complicated his goal of capturing the king and ending the war. If Bessus killed Darius and took the throne, that would drag out the fight, especially as the satrap was a skilled warrior and general who had the loyalty of the Bactrians and other eastern provinces.

  Alexander’s response was to strip down his troops even more and pursue Bessus with a smaller, faster force of horsemen and picked infantry. He didn’t even wait for the supply caches to be readied, but set off from the Caspian Gates with orders that the remainder of his soldiers were to follow as fast as they could. He traveled all night and stopped only at noon when his men and horses were exhausted. He had reached the camp where Darius had been arrested. Then he discovered from Persians remaining behind that Bessus had assumed the title of Great King with the support of the Bactrian cavalry. Some Persian troops remained loyal to Darius and refused to follow Bessus, including the Greek mercenaries who had set off into the mountains to try to make their way home. The plan of Bessus was that if the Macedonians ceased their pursuit, to strike a deal with Alexander and surrender Darius to him in exchange for favorable terms. But if the Macedonians continued to pursue them,
they would retreat into the mountains and stage a guerrilla campaign against Alexander, forming a Persian government in exile in the highlands of Bactria.

  The Macedonians were some of the toughest soldiers in the world, but by this point in the chase they were spent. Still, Alexander pushed them on through the night and into the next day. He reached the camp where the Persians had stayed just the previous day, but they were still well ahead of him. He asked the local inhabitants if there was any shortcut through the desert by which he could overtake Bessus. There was, but it was a waterless route traveled only rarely by camel caravans. Alexander then dismounted five hundred weary cavalry and put his most fit infantry on their horses, setting off into the night at full speed. With this small force he covered almost fifty miles in the darkness and at last saw the Persians in the distance at dawn.

  Most of the Persians fled in panic when they saw the Macedonians closing in, though they must have far outnumbered Alexander’s men. A few attempted to delay the approaching enemy by turning back and fighting, but they were swept aside. For a short time, Bessus continued to haul Darius in the wagon behind him, but he soon realized that he would never be able to stay ahead of his pursuers. With Alexander practically on top of him, the satrap rushed to the wagon and stabbed Darius with a spear, leaving him for dead. He also killed two loyal slaves accompanying the king and wounded the horses pulling him. Then with his Bactrian cavalry, Bessus fled east into the mountains.

  The scene was a confusion of men, horses, and carts racing in all directions with the Macedonians close behind. The cart bearing Darius no longer had a driver, so the injured horses wandered off the road in pain and confusion, finding their way to a small oasis in a nearby valley. Alexander immediately sent search parties into the hills to find Darius. And so it was that a weary young Macedonian soldier named Polystratus came upon the cart as he stopped to collect water in his helmet. He saw the wounded horses and wondered why anyone would be so cruel to helpless animals. Then he heard groans from inside and pushed aside the curtains to find the two dead slaves and the bloody form of Darius, barely alive.