The Sieges of Alexander the Great

by Stephen English

  Alexander was now in possession of the most powerful fleet in the Aegean; this is exactly what his strategy of conquering the Persian navy on land was intended to achieve, and it had worked brilliantly. It must be said, however, that if Memnon had lived longer and carried through his plan of taking the war to Greece by using the Persian fleet to land troops there, the history of Alexander’s career could have been completely different. From the moment of Alexander’s acquisition of the former Persian fleet, the fate of Tyre was sealed.

  The newly formed fleet would have taken time to both arrive and to organize once their allegiances had been assured. Whilst this was happening, presumably under the watchful eye of several senior Macedonian officers, Alexander took the opportunity for some light relief from the siege. He took a detachment of cavalry, the hypaspists, Agrianians and archers on an expedition into the Lebanese mountains. The cavalry were presumably light cavalry, as the Companions are not mentioned as being present on the expedition north to Sidon, and they surely would have been worthy of note.120 These were invariably the troops that Alexander used for these sorts of rapid expeditions, where lightning fast movement and flexibility of arms were required. For ten days he conducted operations in mountainous terrain. The reasons are twofold. Alexander wanted to establish a supply of timber and other raw materials for the siege works (massive amounts of wood were no doubt being consumed by the mole and the siege engines, particularly given the recently-increased size of the project, as well as the wood that was required for cooking fires and heating). Alexander also wanted to relieve his own frustrations and those of his men after being unable to engage the Tyrians properly.121 There is also a revenge motif of course, as these were the same Arabs that had killed thirty of his men while out foraging a month or two previously. This expedition against the Arabs almost certainly took place during the visit to Sidon, and not just prior to the attack of the fire ship as in Curtius.122 Placing the expedition just before the destruction of the mole is an obvious device on the part of Curtius to remove any blame from Alexander for the disaster by having him away on expedition in the Lebanese mountains at the time.123 Once Alexander returned to Sidon, his thirst for conquest sated for the time being, he found Cleander waiting with 4,000 much-needed Greek mercenary reinforcements from the Peloponnese.

  The second and decisive phase of the siege began as Alexander embarked his men onboard ship. In order to make the grandest re-entrance possible to Tyre, he embarked as many foot soldiers as could be crammed into his new ships and set off south. The remainder of the troops were sent back to Tyre on foot. The delay in their arrival would not matter as the bulk of the army was already at Tyre. Within the new fleet, Alexander was in command of the right wing and Pyntagoras, king of Cyprus in command of the left. Pyntagoras was given such a prestigious position because his was the largest contingent of the new fleet. Command of such a large force showed a considerable degree of faith and trust in Alexander’s new allies and was something of a risk, although if a national naval contingent was to revolt, it would make little difference where they were stationed or who was in command. Alexander’s position on the right wing is indicative of his upbringing; it was always the case in land warfare that the place of honour in a land battle was on the right, such as the Spartans at Plataea, and we know that Alexander always fought on the right with the Companion Cavalry during his great set-piece battles. This organization probably again indicates Alexander’s lack of naval experience. As noted at Halicarnassus, if Alexander was to have fought a naval battle (there or here), he likely would have tried to turn it into effectively a land battle fought at sea. This is not really surprising as there is nothing in Alexander’s career or upbringing that would have prepared him for naval actions. Philip was no admiral either, and his Athenian allies did not provide any experienced crews at all. Alexander also would have been unsure of the advice he was receiving from his new allies. He also likely would have been keen to assert his dominant position over these new allies by giving them instructions, rather than acting on their advice, if indeed they offered any.

  As the newly-constituted fleet sailed south, the Tyrians became aware of their approach, presumably by means of scouting vessels patrolling the region, a precaution no doubt started when it became apparent that the former Persian fleet had disbanded. As soon as they realized that enemy vessels approached, they sailed out to meet them on open water. The Tyrians evidently expected this to be only the Sidonian fleet after having seen Alexander head north in that direction perhaps a week or two previously. This is an indication of the strength of the Tyrian fleet, that they felt they could successfully engage the Sidonians. As soon as they realized that Alexander’s new fleet was around 200 strong, and considerably outnumbered their own, they immediately turned around and made all speed for the safety of Tyre. What followed was a desperate race to see who could reach the harbours first. The Tyrian vessels were heavily laden and running low in the water because of the numbers of marines that were on board each vessel. This excess weight meant that they were cumbersome and slow to turn, as well as being far slower in a straight line than the lighter ships of Alexander’s fleet. If Alexander’s ships arrived at Tyre first, they could disembark their troops and capture the city while the bulk of the city’s fighting men were on board ship.

  Three of the Tyrian vessels were overtaken by Alexander’s triremes; it is not clear if they deliberately turned to engage the Macedonians as a delaying tactic to allow the remainder to gain the ports safely, or if they were still running and were engaged by faster moving vessels; either way, all three Tyrian vessels were sunk after a brief naval skirmish. This did, however, buy enough time for the remainder of the Tyrian fleet to achieve the safety of the two ports. Once the Tyrians had reached the safety of the fortress, both ports were blockaded to prevent the possibility of Alexander gaining access.124 This defensive tactic of the Tyrians is interesting; they were outnumbered, of this there is little doubt, but they undoubtedly would have operated with naval tactics superior to those of Alexander, given that he would have been reluctant to accept advice from his new allies/recent enemies (especially when we consider that he was so reluctant to even accept advice from the likes of Parmenio). It is likely that they simply felt the risk of an engagement was too great; if a naval battle was fought and lost, the defenders would not only have lost their fleet, but the majority of their fighting troops too, given that they were stationed with the fleet at the time.

  It should be realized that the nature of the Tyrian tactics during the siege to this point can be described as cautiously ambitious. They had operated low-risk high-reward strategies; they were not gambling with the lives of everyone in the city. If the naval attacks against the mole had failed, few if any Tyrians would have died. Similarly with the incident of the fire ship; it was possible that some marines would be killed while trying to burn the siege engines and palisades, but the fleet was on hand to rescue anyone who dived into the sea to escape the inevitable Macedonian counter-offensive. The conservative stance in relation to a naval battle is not surprising, therefore. The Tyrians would also have realized that refusing to offer a fight on even terms would frustrate Alexander, perhaps to the point of acting rashly, something that they could exploit to their own advantage.

  Once the Tyrian vessels were safely in the harbour, they turned their prows out towards the sea and lined themselves up along the mouth of their harbours so that no Macedonian vessel could gain access. Each ship was also still fully laden with defenders; Alexander saw this arrangement and decided not to attempt to force an entry; the risk of defeat, and the potential losses in ships and men was too high. Instead, Alexander moved the fleet to station on either side of the mole, and the following day a naval blockade of the island began. The Cypriot fleet took up a station opposite the northern Sidonian harbour, whilst the Phoenician contingent blockaded the Egyptian harbour to the south. The remainder of the fleet, specifically the Rhodian vessels, and what existed of the Macedonian fleet, wer
e held in reserve and stationed alongside the mole to act as protection for the construction crews and as a reserve force in the event of a successful break out by the ships of Tyre. The ability to prevent food, water and reinforcements from reaching the city immediately gave Alexander the upper hand. The blockade also made it a far more risky proposition for the defenders to launch a sortie against the mole or the new siege towers and catapults as it drew ever closer to the city walls.

  Construction now continued with renewed vigour; the construction teams no longer had to worry about attack, and the presence of a fleet presumably made logistics considerably easier. The mole was quickly widened as per Alexander’s instructions; this evidently took far less time than the construction of the original mole because of their experience in building the first mole, and because it could be used as a foundation once it had been repaired. Not only was the mole widened, but the pace of progress towards Tyre also increased. During this phase of construction, another storm hit the mole, probably less severe than the first, but it certainly had the potential to set the project back again. Alexander had seen the destruction caused by the first storm and this time set in place measures to mitigate the damage. He had a number of whole trees cut down and floated in the sea to either side of the mole. The intention being that the branches would break up the force of the waves to such an extent that the damage would be limited. The felled trees must have been secured in some way; else the force of the waves would simply have sent them crashing against the mole, probably causing more damage than the waves would have alone. Either way, the device was successful and only minor damage was sustained. This was quickly repaired and progress was soon underway again.125 The lack of damage is also suggestive of the improved quality and stability of the extended mole over the earlier one. Lessons must have been learned during the early construction that was being applied to the latter.

  It is of this second phase of construction that our sources provide us with almost no information. Arrian presents a picture of the arrival of the new fleet and in the next paragraph the mole was virtually at the walls of Tyre, within missile range at least.126 There must have been a gap of at least a couple of months to allow for the repairs and extensions to the mole that had been ordered after the destruction of the first set of siege towers by the fire ship. This time was used wisely by Alexander; the mole occupied the attentions of a major part of his workforce, especially the newly-drafted men from Cyprus and Phoenicia. Many of his engineers were engaged in building the massive siege towers and building large numbers of catapults and other siege engines. These engineers were not only working on mundane engines, but were also constructing catapults that were mounted on triremes to be used at sea. These catapults were evidently of both arrow-throwing and stone-throwing varieties. Alexander apparently also had triremes lashed together and siege towers built on their decks; Curtius tells us that they were lashed at their prows to form a delta shape with planks connecting the two, upon which stood the siege tower.127 This remarkably precarious situation could not have supported a particularly tall tower, but missiles launched from a greater height were more likely to have had an impact upon the defenders than arrows launched from sea level. These ship-borne artillery pieces and towers were intended to act in coordination with marines on troop transport vessels. These would have been equipped with scaling ladders that were raised from a turret, not unlike the larger naval siege towers, the intention being that the artillery would lay down a suppressing fire against the defenders and allow the marines to climb the walls unhindered.

  Once the mole was within range, Alexander ordered the siege proper to begin both from the mole and from ships at every point around the circumference of the fortress. The Tyrians had not sat upon their laurels while the mole was being constructed, however; they had themselves built defensive equivalents of Alexander’s siege towers on the battlements. The intention of these towers was to be higher than Alexander’s siege towers so that they could reign down arrows and artillery fire upon the attackers, and essentially to attempt to prevent them from doing the same. The Tyrians also stationed their own artillery and missile troops at every point around the circuit of the city where they were under attack and answered with missile fire of their own.128 Fire arrows were used against anything potentially flammable, particularly against Alexander’s navy when a vessel strayed too close (a necessity if they were to use their own projectile weapons). These fire arrows were so successful that the crews of some ships were afraid to approach too close to the fortress.

  The defenders again showed their inventiveness in a couple of other creations; firstly they set up what would have looked like windmills along some stretches of the walls; these continuously rotating devices would act as anti-catapult weapons. Arrows, both from bowmen and catapults would hit the sails of the windmills as they rotated and would be deflected before reaching the defenders. This was an extremely clever device and was in some ways more effective than a simple screen as it would allow the defenders to fire when the gaps between the blades was in front of them. The defenders also used large shields placed over fires and filled with sand. This boiling hot sand was then dropped upon the attackers as they attempted to scale ladders. If the attackers had been wearing any armour at all, even a leather tunic, it would have been impossible to prevent red hot sand from being trapped against the skin; one can only imagine how agonizing this must have been, especially when halfway up a ladder and with no means of quenching the tortuous heat.129

  The walls closest to the mainland were by far the tallest and strongest; when the fortress was constructed the builders could not have conceived of an attacker building a mole in order to besiege the island. What they no doubt intended was for the fortress to look impregnable, and therefore presented the strongest side to those viewing it from the mainland. This, of course, did have the corollary effect of making it almost impossible to carry the siege from the mole. To this end the naval vessels were becoming increasingly important as the mechanism through which victory would be achieved.

  The defenders realized this too, and as an added layer of defence they had dropped large boulders into the sea all around the island. One can only imagine that sections of the city had been dismantled and destroyed in order to provide the stone that was used (and for the wood of the defensive siege towers). The situation with regards supplies and stockpiles of everything must have been desperate by this stage of operations. Alexander’s troops made use of some of the boulders closest to the mole, slinging ropes around them and dragging them from the sea. They were then presumably incorporated into the ever-growing mole, despite Arrian’s claim that they were then lifted by cranes and dropped into deeper water. What would be the point, if stones of these dimensions were being dragged from the mainland for the construction?130 The stones in deeper water that could not be reached from the mole were more problematic.

  Alexander’s naval commanders who were attempting to clear away the boulders in deeper water in order to make a close approach of the walls became entangled in a game of cat and mouse with the defenders. In order to raise the rocks out of the ocean, the triremes had to be stationary to provide a stable working platform. In order to achieve any kind of stability, the ships had to be anchored; these anchor ropes were initially made of rope. Arrian goes on to tell us:131

  The Tyrians in certain specially-armoured vessels kept driving athwart the bows of the Macedonian triremes and cutting the anchor cables, so that it was impossible for them to remain in their station.

  These Tyrian vessels are of unknown type, but they must have been smaller and more manoeuvrable than triremes. They probably had some form of bladed weapon protruding from the sides of the vessel, or perhaps crewmen simply slashed through the ropes as they passed close by the moored ships. Either way, as long as the Macedonians were not securely moored in place, they could not raise the rocks from the ocean, and therefore could not approach the walls as they had been ordered. Alexander’s response to this is telling of his tac
tical thinking at this time: he fitted out a number of vessels and used them as a defensive screen against the Tyrian ships. This is exactly the tactic that he used to protect the workers on the mole, essentially the creation of a solid barrier. The Tyrians’ response was to send a number of divers to cut the cables; these men would then swim back to the relative safety of the fortress. Alexander then substituted chain for the rope, against which the divers were ineffective.132

  In this incident, as with earlier ones on the mole, we see Alexander reacting to actions of the defenders. This is certainly not the proactive innovator that we would expect. What we may have here is something we see elsewhere: when Alexander is confronted with an entirely-new situation for the first time, the outcome is usually less successful than in subsequent encounters in similar circumstances. We can see, for example, the struggles initially in the Balkans, at Halicarnassus and the island of Tyre juxtaposed with the later stunning successes at Gaza and during the eastern sieges. Alexander shows himself to be a commander who does not always instantly make the correct decisions when faced with a situation he has never seen, but quickly learns and adapts.