(Arrian, Anabasis 2.10.4–5)
It would seem that the hypaspists and the two right-sided battalions of the phalanx had quickly followed Alexander and the Companion Cavalry against the Cardaces on the Persian left. However, the remaining four battalions of the phalanx had to contend with a more difficult part of the river bank and with Darius’ Greek mercenaries, who were first-class, battle-hardened soldiers. As a result, the Macedonian line came apart and the Greek mercenaries were skilfully exploiting this, by pushing the Macedonians back into the river and inflicting heavy casualties on them – the battalion commander, Ptolemy, and 120 of the phalanx perished (A.A. 2.10.6–7).
The situation in the centre was saved by the hypaspists and the two right-sided battalions who, having swiftly completed the rout of the Cardaces on the Persian left, turned half-left and attacked the Greek mercenaries in the flank with great success (A.A. 2.11.1). According to Arrian and the ‘official tradition’, Darius fled as soon as his left wing broke (A.A. 2.11.2), whereas the ‘vulgate’ sources of Diodorus (17.34.2–7) and Quintus Curtius (3.11.7–12) describe hard and bloody fighting around Darius, who fled only when his death or capture was imminent. These two traditions cannot be reconciled. However, the ‘vulgate’ tradition seems more convincing: first, because Callisthenes, the ultimate source of the ‘official tradition’, habitually portrays Darius as a coward and thus influenced Arrian (A.A. 2.10.1, 11.4; 3.14.3, 22.4); and second, because the casualties among the Royal Cavalry Guard, Darius’ bodyguard, would have been sustained only while Darius was still there to be defended (A.A. 2.11.8). If Darius had fled so soon into the battle, they also would have made an immediate escape to safety.
Meanwhile, on the Macedonian left wing, a desperate cavalry fight was taking place. The squadrons of heavy Persian cavalry, with man and horse protected by rows of armour-plating, had already overcome one squadron of Thessalian cavalry which, having retreated and regrouped, had launched a ferocious counter-attack (Quintus Curtius 3.11.13–15). When the news of Darius’ flight reached the Persian cavalry, already suffering at the hands of the Thessalians, they also turned and fled (A.A. 2.11.2). There is no mention of the Cardaces, who were posted next to the Persian cavalry, but they also presumably fled at the same time as their cavalry. Alexander pursued the Persians until nightfall, adding to their casualties; having stormed Darius’ camp, he captured the Persian king’s mother, wife and son, and other Persian noble ladies (A.A. 2.11.9).
This was a much greater victory than the one that Alexander had achieved at the Granicus River. Apart from the same qualities of generalship that he had displayed at the Granicus, Alexander also showed coolness under pressure, when he discovered that his enemy was to his rear and had cut off his line of retreat. More deserving of praise was his tactical ability to assess almost instantaneously the enemy’s strengths and weaknesses, and to rearrange his own battle-formation to take advantage of this assessment, even as he was advancing into battle. Finally, although obviously flushed with victory but still in pain from a sword wound in his thigh, he nevertheless found time to visit the Macedonian wounded (A.A. 2.12.1) – such was the close bond between general and his soldiers.
The battle of Gaugamela (331)
Darius had paid the penalty at Issus for fighting a battle in a confined space, where he could not make use of his superior numbers. In his final encounter with Alexander in the autumn of 331, Darius had chosen the wide plain of Gaugamela (in Mesopotamia, near the river Tigris) in order to make full use of his numerical superiority and to provide the most suitable terrain for his cavalry, on whom he placed his best hopes of victory. The sources give widely divergent numbers for Darius’ infantry: 1,000,000 (A.A. 3.8.6), 800,000 (D.S. 17.53.3), 400,000 (Justin 11.12.5) and 200,000 (Quintus Curtius 4.12.13). These numbers have clearly been greatly exaggerated to increase the glory of Alexander’s victory. It is impossible to give an accurate estimate, which in any case would be a fruitless exercise, since all the sources agree that the Persian infantry played a negligible part in the battle. There is a similar problem with the figures for Darius’ cavalry; but, whereas the 200,000 of Diodorus (17.53.3) and 100,000 of Justin (11.12.5) can be readily discounted, the 40,000 of Arrian (3.8.6) and the 45,000 of Curtius (4.12.13) are sufficiently close and reasonable enough to be accepted with caution. What can be said with certainty is that they greatly outnumbered Alexander’s cavalry. The newest addiction to Darius’ army was the 200 scythed-chariots, each drawn by two or four horses (D.S. 17.53.1–2).
Deployment of the armies
Darius’ battle-formation comes from a Persian document which, according to Aristobulus, was captured after the battle (A.A. 3.11.3). The Persian army was drawn up in a straight line of varying depth. Darius commanded the centre and was protected by 50 chariots in the very front, followed by a mixture of cavalry and infantry divisions, including archers and about 6,000 Greek mercenaries. Behind Darius’ centre was stationed the reserve infantry force in formation. The main fighting strength – the cavalry – was placed on the wings, where Bessus commanded the Persian left wing with the best cavalry (Persians, Bactrians and Scythians) and Mazaeus the Persian right. In addition, 100 chariots were posted on the left, facing Alexander’s stronger right wing, and 50 on the right. This arrangement of Persian forces gives an insight into Darius’ battle-plan (see Map 13). The chariots were intended to disrupt the formations of the Macedonian phalanx and cavalry squadrons by launching full speed attacks. However, the key to success lay with the cavalry, which was to outflank and envelop the two Macedonian wings, and, after crushing them, to attack the Macedonian centre in the flanks and the rear.
Alexander’s army consisted of 40,000 infantry and 7,000 cavalry (A.A. 3.12.5). He drew up his front line of battle in his favoured attacking formation: the Companion Cavalry were stationed on the right wing; next to them, from right to left, came the three battalions of hypaspists with the Royal Footguard on the immediate left of the Companion Cavalry; the six battalions of the phalanx occupied the centre; and on the left wing came the Greek allied cavalry, stationed next to the phalanx, with the Thessalian cavalry on the extreme left (A.A. 3.11.8–10). However, it was his assignment of the other troops that reveal Alexander’s quality as a field commander. He arranged the rest of his troops to offset the dangers posed by Darius’ battle-plan. In the first place:
He also drew up a second line so that the phalanx could face both ways. He gave orders to the commanders of this force to turn about-face and receive the enemy’s attack, if they saw themselves being encircled by the Persian army.
(Arrian, Anabasis 3.12.1)
Having ensured the safety of the front line in its rear, he needed now to protect its flanks. To achieve this, he placed flank-guards at both ends of the front line, but stationed roughly at an angle of 45 degrees to the front line:
in case it became necessary to extend the front line or to close up the phalanx.
(Arrian, Anabasis 11.12.2)
Map 13 The battle of Gaugamela
Thus, the flank-guards had an in-built flexibility, being ready either to swing forward in order to join the Companion Cavalry in an offensive capacity or to swing back to close up the sides of the front and rear lines, and thereby create a defensive ‘square’.
These flank-guards were arranged by Alexander into two roughly triangular-shaped wedges (see Map 13), each unit at first facing the Persian front line, but ready to face away from the Macedonian centre so that they could attack the Persian cavalry in their exposed flank, whenever they tried to envelop the Macedonian wings (A.A. 3.12.4). Each wedge consisted of a combination of infantry and cavalry units, drawn up into three rows. On the right wing, the bottom row consisted of three units – half of the Agrianians (next to the Companion Cavalry), the Macedonian archers and the veteran mercenaries; the middle row consisted of two units – the Prodromoi and the Paeonians; and the mercenary cavalry under Menidas formed the point of the wedge. On the left, the bottom row contained the
Thracian javelin-men (next to the Thessalian cavalry), the Cretan archers, and the Achaean mercenary infantry; the allied Greek cavalry and the Odrysian cavalry comprised the middle row; and the Greek mercenary cavalry under Coeranus were the point (A.A. 3.12.4–5; Diodorus 17.57.4). Finally, Alexander stationed the other two halves of the Agrianians and the Macedonian archers, together with a force of javelin-men under Balacrus, in front of the Companion Cavalry to act as their shield and to tackle the scythed-chariots.
The sources
The sources vary considerably on the details of this battle, but it is possible to give a reasonably accurate description by combining their accounts, since they concentrate on different parts of the battle. Arrian concentrates entirely on the action of Alexander’s right wing, and thus provides no record of the fighting on the Macedonian left wing, which was under the command of Parmenion. Diodorus, however, gives a detailed description of the combined attack of the Persian cavalry and scythed-chariots, under the command of Mazaeus, on the Macedonian left wing (17.58.2–5); and of the Persians’ attack on the Macedonian camp, after they had successfully outflanked the Macedonians (17.59.5–8). Curtius’ detailed account is careless and muddled, and, since he is apparently using the same sources as both Arrian and Diodorus, it is a safer course to follow their accounts of the battle.
The battle
When Alexander’s army took the field, his right wing was in line with the Persian centre. Therefore he ordered his army to advance to the right in an oblique or slanting battle-line to reduce the considerable overlap of the Persian left wing (A.A. 3.13.1; D.S. 17.57.6). It was this rightwards movement that provoked the battle because Darius, fearing that Alexander would pass beyond the specially levelled ground for the scythed-chariots, ordered some of his cavalry squadrons in front of the Persian left wing to ride around the Macedonian right wing to stop its rightward advance. Alexander’s response was to send the mercenary cavalry under Menidas (the point of the flankguards’ wedge on the right – see Map 13) against them. However, Menidas’ force, being greatly out-numbered by the Scythian and Bactrian cavalry squadrons, was driven back by their counter-charge (A.A. 3.13.2–3). At this point Alexander launched the Paeonians, the mercenary infantry under Cleanor, and most probably the Prodromoi (their later ‘second’ charge at A.A. 3.14.1 marks the resumption of Arrian’s account of the fighting on the Macedonian right wing, after he had described the attack of the scythedchariots). So successful were these Macedonian reinforcements that Bessus, Darius’ commander of the Persian left, was forced to send in the rest of the Bactrian cavalry, possibly as many as 8,000 (Quintus Curtius 4.12.6). The fighting in this area of the battle was long and hard, culminating eventually in success for the Macedonian right flank-guards (A.A. 3.13.4).
Very soon after Bessus had engaged Alexander’s right wing, Darius ordered the rest of the Persian front-line to engage the enemy (A.A. 3.14.1). The scythed-chariots proved to be very ineffectual: the force of Agrianians and Balacrus’ javelin-men, stationed in front of the Companion Cavalry on the Macedonian right, drove them back with heavy casualties; those that did manage to reach the Macedonian phalanx were allowed to pass harmlessly through the opened ranks, and were overpowered in the rear (A.A. 3.13.5–6). Mazaeus, Darius’ commander on the Persian right wing, launched his cavalry squadrons and scythed-chariots against the ‘refused’ Macedonian left wing, commanded by Parmenion, and the left flank-guards. He may also have sent 2,000 Cardusii and 1,000 Scythians around the Macedonian left flank to attack the Macedonian camp itself (D.S. 17.59.5–8). However, there are doubts whether this attack ever took place, since it is linked with the entertaining, but certainly fictitious, story of the refusal of Darius’ mother to be rescued from the camp, and because these Persian units were known to have been stationed on the Persian left wing (see below).
Darius’ main hope of defeating Alexander lay with his cavalry on both wings, whose role was to surround and envelop the Macedonian wings. However, by sending reinforcements to help Bessus against the Macedonian right wing, Darius made a fatal mistake:
But when the [Persian] cavalry, which was sent to bring aid to those who were encircling the right wing, had to some extent broken their own front line of battle, Alexander, having turned towards the gap and having made, as it were, a wedge of the Companion Cavalry and the phalanx that was drawn up on this side, led them at full speed and with a loud battle-cry against Darius himself.
(Arrian, Anabasis 3.14.2)
Alexander had learned from the battle of Issus that he had to deliver the knock-out blow against Darius himself, as this would lead to the collapse of Persian resistance. By committing his right wing flank-guards to attack in stages, he had drawn the Persian left wing and then, far more importantly, the Persian centre-left into a concentrated attack on his right, thus creating the gap which offered direct access to Darius. In addition, he had kept the Companion Cavalry removed and protected from the initial fighting in order to preserve their attacking strength. Then, at this key moment, he and the Companion Cavalry wheeled to the left, forming the point and the right-hand side of an inverted ‘v’-shape wedge, while the hypaspists and the four nearest battalions of the phalanx formed the left-hand side, and together they charged into the opening in the Persian line. After some fierce hand-to-hand fighting, first Darius and then the Persian centre broke into flight (A.A. 3.14.3; D.S. 17.60.2–4). At this point Bessus and the Persian right wing, seeing the collapse of the centre, presumably also withdrew from the battle (A.A. 3.14.3).
Most scholars have been in general agreement, although expressing differences of opinion about some of the details, about the action on the Macedonian right wing and Alexander’s thrust against Darius in the Persian centre-left. However, the events on the Macedonian left wing and the last stages of the battle are a major source of disagreement, because of the divergent narratives of the official tradition and the ‘vulgate’. The first point of disagreement concerns a Persian attack that was launched through a gap in the Macedonian front line:
But the battalion [of the Macedonian phalanx] under Simmias was no longer able to join with Alexander in his pursuit, but had brought its phalanx to a halt and was fighting where it had stopped, because it was reported that the Macedonian left wing was under severe pressure. At this point where the Macedonian line of battle had split, some Indians and Persian cavalry burst through the gap right up to where the Macedonian baggage animals were.
(Arrian, Anabasis 3.14.4–5)
According to Arrian, Alexander’s ‘v’–shaped wedge consisted only of the four nearest battalions of the phalanx, for the remaining two had to check their advance in order to help the Macedonian left, thus creating a gap between the fourth and fifth battalions. Arrian then states that the Persians, who raced into this gap, attacked the baggage animals and the Macedonians guarding them, but were defeated by the Macedonian second line of battle which turned about-face and attacked them in the rear (A.A. 3.14.6).
In the ‘vulgate’ version of Diodorus and Quintus Curtius there is no mention of a gap appearing in the Macedonian phalanx and no breakthrough by Indians and Persians. However, they both describe an attack on Alexander’s camp. Diodorus records Mazaeus’ dispatch of a force of Cardusii and Scythians, who rode around the Macedonian left wing without contact and successfully attacked the camp, although they failed to persuade Darius’ mother to gain her freedom from Alexander (17.59.5–8). Quintus Curtius also describes a large-scale attack on the Macedonian camp (Quintus Curtius 4.15.5–10). Clearly the ‘official tradition’ and the ‘vulgate’ are recording two separate traditions. Furthermore, the sources disagree upon the identity and the nature of the camps, which also affects the interpretation of events in the battle.
Alexander’s four-day fortified camp (A.A. 3.9.1), which was about 16 miles from the battlefield, can be excluded from consideration, although it is precisely this camp where Darius’ mother was most likely to have been based. But Arrian mentions a make-shift night-ca
mp, 3–4 miles from the battlefield (A.A. 3.9.3–4); whereas Curtius mentions two camps of which the second was the main fortified camp, which was the object of the Mazaeus’ planned attack (Quintus Curtius 4.12.17, 12.24). In Arrian’s account, there is even doubt whether the Indians and Persian cavalry actually attacked the Macedonian make-shift night-camp: first, since it was an unlikely thing for a fleeing force to do; and second, because it would have taken the Macedonian second battle-line one to two hours to cover the 3–4 miles, and this time-scale is not in keeping with Arrian’s narrative. It seems more likely that Arrian was referring to the baggage-park, which contained the baggage animals and their handlers and which was situated close to the battlefield. On the basis of the above evidence, it is impossible to reconcile these two conflicting traditions.
The second major area of disagreement concerns Parmenion’s appeal for help to Alexander, which is mentioned by all the sources, although they disagree about Alexander’s response. According to Arrian, Alexander, having received Parmenion’s message, turned back from his pursuit of Darius, but upon his arrival discovered that Parmenion and the Macedonian left wing had triumphed (A.A. 3.15.1, 15.3). Plutarch’s account is in substantial agreement with Arrian, although he records Alexander’s irritation with Parmenion (Plutarch, Alexander 33.9–11). Quintus Curtius also appears at first sight to agree with Arrian’sand Plutarch’s version, when he states that Alexander received Parmenion’s message at some distance from the battlefield (Quintus Curtius 4.16.3); but later he says that Alexander halted his pursuit at the river Lycus, partly because it was late in the day, and partly because he believed that his left wing was in danger (Quintus Curtius 4.16.16–19). This strongly suggests that Alexander never received Parmenion’s message, and this accords with Diodorus:
Aspects of Greek History (750–323BC) Page 71
