kings temporarily may have given up on bringing the Greeks into obedience, over the course of the
next century the Greeks themselves provided Xerxes’ successors with plenty of opportunities to
influence Greek affairs, as the city-states exhausted themselves fighting inconclusively for supremacy
in Greece.
Thus, when the Peloponnesians (led by the Spartans) finally triumphed over the Athenians at the
end of the so-called Peloponnesian War of 431–404, it was largely as a result of the financial
subsidies provided to them by Cyrus, the son of the Persian king Darius II. In that war’s aftermath,
pro-Spartan oligarchies were set up to control the former members of the Athenian alliance. While
many Greek cities were left to govern themselves, rule over the Ionians of Asia Minor reverted to the
Persians. After 387, this situation was formally recognized in the so-called King’s Peace of the
Persian ruler Artaxerxes II (405–359).
During the early fourth century, even the autonomy of the major Greek cities thus was authorized by
the Persian king. That guarantee, however, turned out to be a license for Spartan intervention into the
affairs of other Greek city-states, particularly the great old city-state of Thebes.
The Spartan seizure of Thebes, and then the attempted seizure of Athens’ port of Piraeus by a
Spartan governor, led to the formation of an Athenian-Theban alliance against Sparta. The Athenians
then organized another naval league, called the Second Athenian Confederacy. Hostilities continued
after a peace conference held in 371 failed to satisfy the Thebans.
In that year, a Theban army of 6,000 heavily armed hoplite infantry and 1,000 cavalrymen, led by
Epaminondas and Pelopidas, defeated a Spartan army of about 9,000 hoplites, plus cavalry, at
Leuctra. The keys to the Theban victory were the massing of their hoplites on the left side of their
battle formation to a depth of fifty shields, their advance at an oblique angle of attack, and the shock
provided by the so-called Sacred Band, an elite unit of 150 pairs of select hoplites, who camped out,
lived together as lovers, and fought together as a unit to the point of death. In the battle, a thousand
Spartan citizens were killed, including 400 of the officer class.
It was a devastating defeat, and Sparta’s Peloponnesian allies—or subjects—sought their freedom.
In 362, on the plain of Mantinea, Epaminondas met another anti-Theban army, led by the Spartans but
including soldiers from Achaea, Elis, and Athens. Using the same tactics he had deployed at Leuctra,
Epaminondas once again defeated the Spartans, but he was killed in the battle. Although his victories
had broken Sparta forever as a military power, his death left a leadership vacuum in Thebes, and in
Greece generally.
Unrest also arose within the second Athenian naval alliance. The strategically vital city of
Byzantium had been detached from the alliance by Epaminondas before he died; and the important
islands of Rhodes, Cos, and Chios revolted in 357.
By 355 or early in 354, with the new Persian king, Artaxerxes III Ochus (359–338), threatening
Athens, the Athenians made peace, with the independence of Byzantium, Chios, Rhodes, and Cos
recognized. Soon Lesbos and other important member states broke away from the alliance as well.
THE THREAT FROM THE NORTH
By the middle of the fourth century, the most important city-states of Greece—Sparta, Thebes, and
Athens—were all crippled by their attempts to gain the upper hand against one another, and Persia
remained the arbiter of Greek affairs, particularly with respect to the Greek cities of Asia Minor.
There was no need for the Persian king to put down the Greeks; they had managed that for themselves.
In 346 Persia’s imperial prospects in the West were brighter than they had been at any time since
before the battle of Salamis.
A single threat to Ahuramazda’s divine plan for human happiness loomed. After decades of
political instability, the kingdom of Macedon, on Greece’s northern border, was showing ominous
signs of vitality and aggressiveness under the leadership of its charismatic king, Philip II. Should he
manage somehow to unite his own divided kingdom, while dividing the Greeks, a very great
disturbance to the perfect order might arise. For Macedon was a land like no other.
CHAPTER 3
The Emergence of a Superpower
LOWER AND UPPER MACEDONIA
For most of its early history, Macedonia was a fitfully slumbering superpower. All it required to
wake up and take the leading role in the Greek world was the strong and dexterous hand of the right
king, one who could master its land’s fiercely independent tribes and harness its rich resources.
Philip II, the father of Alexander the Great, was that king.
The sheer size of the Macedonian kingdom, far larger than the territory of any single Greek city-
state, potentially made it the dominant power in the Greek world. For ancient Macedonia consisted of
two distinct geographical regions. Lower Macedonia was, essentially, formed from the alluvial plain
created by the Haliacmon and Axius Rivers, which flowed into the Thermaic Gulf. Upper Macedonia
consisted of the uplands and mountains that stretched northwest toward Illyria and Epirus.
The climate of Lower Macedonia was basically Mediterranean, with short, rainy winters and long,
dry summers suitable for the production of cereal grains and olive trees, at least along the coast. The
grapevine also flourished in Lower Macedonia, and the Macedonians were enthusiastic wine
drinkers. Well watered by the Axius and Haliacmon, the fertile plains of Lower Macedon could
sustain a large population. Here also were found Pella, Macedon’s largest city and its fourth-century
capital, and Aegae (modern Vergina), the burial place of the Temenid kings.
The Haliacmon River in Lower Macedon, one of the few year-round rivers in Greece. Author’s collection
The Temenid kings supposedly were descended from the legendary Temenus of Argos, and through
him from Herakles. A descendant of Temenus, either Perdiccas or his son Archelaus, founded the
royal house of Macedonia.
The mountainous hinterlands of Upper Macedon bore deep forests of deciduous and evergreen
trees, and rich mineral deposits. Pine was used for shipbuilding and construction. Oak was forested
for ships’ keels.
Eastern Macedonia was rich in mineral wealth, including large quantities of silver and especially
gold, mined during the reign of Philip II from the region of Mount Pangaion. The mountains were
ideal, too, for the transhumance of flocks. Here the climate was essentially continental—that is,
marked by cold winters and warm summers. In these hinterlands lived tribes who had been resisting
the political control of the Argead kings of Lower Macedon for nearly 200 years.
Macedon’s kings were faced with two rings of external rivals and potential enemies as well. In the
first and closer ring, there was Thessaly to the south, Thrace and the Chalcidian League to the east,
Paeonia to the north, and Illyria and Epirus to the west. To the outer ring belonged the Greek city-
states to the south and in central Greece, and the mighty Persian empire to the east. Until the
Macedonian kings were able to control rival dynasts within Lower and Upper Macedonia and to fend
off aggressive neighbors, they would not be able to entertain broader ambit
ions. Unleashing the
potential of Macedon would require two centuries of warfare and the development of what looked to
many fourth-century Greeks like a very different society from their own.
THE MACEDONIAN STATE
In fact, many Greeks did not think the Macedonians were Greeks. Although the Argead kings, such as
Alexander, could speak and read Greek, Greeks could not understand the Macedonian dialect; indeed,
modern scholars still debate whether it really was a form of Greek or not.
In other ways, too, fourth-century Macedon differed dramatically from the Greek city-states.
Although kings still ruled in some of the latter, in most, assemblies, or councils of citizens, elected
their political leaders, usually for limited terms. The exercise of power by elected officials was
limited by law.
In Macedon, the Argead kings essentially were the state, with no constitutional limitations on their
powers. While the army might acclaim a new king and had the right to judge the guilt of nobles
prosecuted for treason, the king designated his own successor, served as the prosecutor in treason
trials, appointed all officers in the army, made all grants of land, and responded in his own name to
all petitions. The powerful position of the Argead kings will help us to understand certain actions of
Alexander that otherwise might seem arbitrary or despotic.
Nor was there any bureaucracy in Macedon. Rather, the kings lived among their picked noble
companions—fighting enemies, both domestic and external, usually in person on the battlefield;
hunting; drinking heavily; and marrying as many women as they wished (often to cement political
alliances with their neighbors). Their wild, licentious parties were famous. Few Macedonian kings
before Philip II died in their sleep. Many died in battle. Others fell victim to conspiracies. Ancient
Macedonia really was an autocracy tempered by assassination. Its atmosphere was that of a tribally
based frontier society.
For all the tumult, though, in the two centuries before Philip’s reign, the Argead kings gradually had
managed to consolidate their power, sometimes at the expense of their Greek neighbors. During the
Persian invasion of Greece in 480, for instance, Alexander I of Macedon (c. 498/7–454) personally
led the Macedonian contingent, allied to the Persians, against the Greeks. After the Persians’
expulsion from Greece in the 470s, the Macedonian kings incorporated the highlands of Upper
Macedon into their kingdom and also seized control of the silver-mining region between the Axius
and Strymon Rivers. The successors of Alexander I, particularly Archelaus (413–399), used some of
the resulting wealth to open up the Macedonian court to wider artistic influences. Greek craftsmen
were brought in to help build Archelaus’ new capital at Pella, and Greek artists and writers also
came to Macedon; the Athenian tragedian Euripides wrote his last and most disturbing play, the
Bacchae, there between 408 and 406. In spite of what Athenian orators claimed, Pella was no
intellectual or cultural backwater by the late fifth century. Alexander the Great would grow up there at
a royal court that had been attracting leading Greek writers, musicians, and artists for decades.
Despite Macedon’s growing strength and the Hellenization of its court, the threat of political
instability remained. Between 400 and 360, nine kings ruled Macedon. In 360/59, one of those kings,
Perdiccas III, was killed fighting the Illyrians, along with 4,000 soldiers and many Macedonian
nobles. After this disaster, the Illyrians and Paeonians prepared to invade, while the Athenians and
Thracians supported rival claimants to the throne. Perdiccas’ infant son Amyntas IV was too young to
walk, let alone face such a crisis. That left Perdiccas’ brother, Philip II, as the sole surviving Argead
adult male able to lead the kingdom—or to watch it fall apart. The latter was the more likely outcome,
given the situation.
Philip II of Macedon, born perhaps in 382, met this crisis vigorously and eventually became the
master of the sneering Greeks. After stabilizing his kingdom by defeating the Athenians in what
amounted to no more than a skirmish, and then buying off threatening Paeonians and Thracians, Philip
embarked upon military reforms that resulted in the creation of the first truly professional army in
Greek history. In short order, he introduced improved torsion catapults for siege warfare, and he
reorganized the Macedonian infantry and cavalry.
PHILIP’S NEW INFANTRY
Greek infantry hoplites took their name from the protective armor they wore in battle, particularly the
characteristic Argive-style shield ( hoplon). Traditionally, in the citizen armies of the Greek city-
states, hoplites fought shoulder to shoulder in lines, holding their shields with one arm and their
seven-foot-long spears with the other. Depending upon how many hoplites were available, they were
organized in lines or rows, one behind another, usually eight to ten men deep. The entire unit of
infantrymen fighting in close order with thrusting spears constituted a phalanx.
In Macedon, the heavily armed infantry of the phalanx were known as the Foot Companions
( pezhetairoi), as a kind of counterpoise to the title of the aristocratic cavalrymen, who were called
the Companions ( hetairoi). By such honorific titles group solidarity, always an important element in
the creation of a successful fighting force, was affirmed.
The Macedonian Companion infantrymen ( pezhetairoi) formed the nucleus of the army with which Alexander conquered the Persian
empire. The infantryman depicted here wears a Thracian-style helmet, a cuirass, and greaves. Although Macedonian infantrymen carried
swords for close-quarter combat, their primary offensive weapon was the famous sarissa, a sixteen-foot-long pike.
During the fourth century, the infantrymen in the front ranks of the Macedonian phalanx usually
were equipped with some kind of metal helmet, either of the pilos (conical) or of the Thracian type;
the rear ranks wore the kausia, a broad-brimmed hat made of straw.
The cuirasses (breastplates) of the hoplites were made of layers of linen. Attached to the linen
cuirass was a kind of pleated skirt, which protected the lower abdomen and groin. Sheathed in a
waistband attached to the cuirass or the skirt, Macedonian infantrymen carried a short, cutting sword
for close combat.
Each infantryman was equipped with a slightly concave, circular bronze shield, the aspis, with a
diameter of about two feet; it was held by an elbow grip, combined with a baldric (strap) slung over
the left shoulder. The shield was rimless, to allow the frontline troops to grip the new weapon Philip
provided for them, the sarissa.
The sarissa was a long, heavy pike that required two hands to wield. At a length of sixteen feet or
longer, it was at least twice as long as the seven-foot spear that traditional Greek hoplites held with
one hand. A pike of such length weighed around fourteen pounds; wielding it effectively with two
hands, in formation, required training and a high level of physical fitness. The infantry sarissa could
not be used effectively by amateur, citizen soldiers; its introduction presumed a high degree of
professionalization.
The sarissa also had implications for the organization of the tactical unit of the Macedonian
phalanx; it was so long that those carried by the
first five ranks or rows of infantrymen projected out
in front of the infantry line, as the second century B.C.E. Greek historian Polybius observed.
It was the job of the infantrymen in the ranks behind the fifth row to hold their pikes either at an
angle over the men in front of them or directly up in the air. The hoplites in these back ranks used their
pikes to deflect missiles shot at them and applied their weight to the forward charge of the men in
front.
Philip not only equipped the Macedonian hoplite infantrymen with what proved to be a
devastatingly effective new weapon but also, and most importantly, reorganized the Macedonian
infantry as a unit.
In 334 B.C.E., there were around 24,000 Macedonian Foot Companions, brigaded into tactical units
of at least 1,500 men, each called a taxis. At least three (and probably all) of the six Macedonian
infantry brigades that went with Alexander to Asia were recruited on a regional basis within
Macedonia. Brigading the infantrymen on the basis of local recruitment must also have contributed to
unit loyalty, as it was later to do in the locally mustered units of the Scottish regiments of the British
army.
In addition to the brigades of the Foot Companions, Philip (and Alexander subsequently) also made
use of another corps of heavy infantry, known as the hypaspistai, or Shield Bearers. The hypaspistai
developed out of the old infantry bodyguard of the Macedonian kings; its elite unit, the agema,
protected the kings when they fought on foot. Under Philip, the hypaspistai were organized into three
chiliarchies, in principle, groups of 1,000 infantrymen. They were used in coordination with the Foot
Companions against hoplite phalanxes and also against lightly armed enemies. The hypaspistai were
highly skilled and flexible infantry warriors. Philip used not only the two types of Macedonian heavy
infantry but also large contingents of allied Greek infantry, and of Thracians, Triballians, and
Illyrians.
Philip (and then Alexander) also made frequent and effective use of light infantry. One group of
javelin men known from Alexander’s reign was commanded by an officer named Balacrus and may
have consisted of Macedonians. There were lightly armed Thracian and Agrianian taxeis of javelin
Alexander Page 5
