had guarded Alexander with his shield in the Mallian city, was made Alexander’s eighth bodyguard
and was appointed as the future satrap of Persia.
During the general festival, Alexander reportedly attended some contests in dancing and singing
where his “favorite,” Bagoas, won the prize. This Bagoas was the handsome young Persian eunuch
who had been brought to Alexander by Nabarzanes in Hyrcania as a kind of gift, and whose pleas had
induced Alexander to pardon Nabarzanes for his part in the betrayal and murder of Darius.
After winning his prize, Bagoas, still in his performer’s costume and wearing his victor’s crown,
came across the theater and seated himself beside the king. At the sight the Macedonians applauded
loudly and shouted for Alexander to kiss the winner. At last the king put his arms around Bagoas and
kissed him.
Some historians have denied that this episode even took place. But there seems no good reason to
question its historicity. Alexander did kiss the eunuch Bagoas in a theater filled with Macedonians
and Greeks in the capital of Carmania. What that kiss signified about their relationship is less clear.
The Greek word Plutarch uses to describe Bagoas in the relevant passage of his biography of
Alexander ( eromenon in the accusative case) previously had been used by Athenian writers of the
fifth and fourth centuries to describe a younger man who was involved in a relationship with an older
man ( erastes). Such a relationship was partly educational and cultural, but also frequently included a
sexual or erotic component. These kinds of relationships seem to have been popular and fashionable
especially among the well-to-do. In classical Athens the expectation also seems to have been that the
erotic dimension of the relationship would end by the time the younger man reached his early
twenties, at the latest. Otherwise, both men might become subjects of gossip or criticism. Such a
relationship conformed to only one pattern and set of protocols among a variety of same-gender
attractions and relationships described in ancient texts and also represented pictorially during the
classical and Hellenistic periods.
If Plutarch used the term eromenon to describe Bagoas in the way that the term was sometimes
employed by earlier classical authors to describe a beloved younger partner in an intimate
relationship, the conclusion must be that Plutarch believed that Alexander and Bagoas had some kind
of intimate relationship. The relationship may have included an erotic element. The historian Curtius
Rufus certainly believed that there was a sexual relationship between the two men.
Whatever Alexander’s relationship to Bagoas was, however, it apparently caused the Macedonians
no alarm; rather, we are told that when Alexander kissed Bagoas, the spectators cheered. This should
not surprise us. Whatever conventions applied to relationships between younger and older men in
Athens, they did not apply in Macedon. It will be recalled that Alexander’s father, Philip, while in
middle age and after marrying a number of women and siring a number of children, also had at least
two erotic relationships with men, the most significant of which was with the guard Pausanias. The
death of Philip’s second lover led directly to Philip’s assassination by the first. Before that,
according to one fourth-century historian, at Philip’s court were gathered “companions” who shaved
themselves and made themselves smooth, mounted each other, although they had beards, and caroused
with two or three companions. That Alexander had kissed a handsome young Persian boy in a theater
in Salmus after that young man had won a prize at a festival was hardly likely to shock men who had
seen Philip stabbed to death in another theater by his former lover.
ALEXANDER’S SEXUALITY
Based upon Plutarch’s account of the incident in Salmus, and the scattered and ambiguous evidence
for Alexander’s relationship to Hephaestion, many scholars have concluded that Alexander the Great
was a homosexual. Other scholars, pointing out that Alexander married three times, sired at least two
children, and also maintained a harem of 365 women, have argued that Alexander essentially was a
heterosexual.
But modern sexual categories such as “homosexual” and “heterosexual” cannot be usefully applied
to describe the sexuality of Alexander. He belonged to a culture in which the erotic impulse ( eros)
was not necessarily assumed to be confined to feelings or acts directed to either men or women that,
if they were consummated, thereby placed individuals exclusively in one sexual category or another.
Rather than striving to fix Alexander within one modern sexual camp or another, it is far more
illuminating to examine the evidence for the trajectory of the erotic impulses he acted upon.
If we look at Alexander’s sexuality historically, it is striking that the farther he got from Macedon,
the stronger and more varied his impulse toward erotic expression became. At the same time, a
consistent thread can be discerned. Alexander was drawn to physical beauty without regard either to
modern sexual categories or ancient prejudices about ethnic origins.
To begin at the beginning: whatever the truth is about the report of Athenaeus that because
Alexander seemed to have little appetite for sex of any kind when he was young, Olympias and Philip
conspired to have the beautiful prostitute ( hetaira) Kallixena go to bed with Alexander to make sure
that he was not effeminate, or whether we can credit Aelian’s statement that a certain Pancaste was
the first woman with whom Alexander had sexual relations, Alexander’s first intimate relationship
seems to have been with the tall and handsome Hephaestion. That said, the unambiguous evidence that
sex was central to the relationship is conspicuously absent.
After his victory at Issos Alexander took as his mistress Barsine, the beautiful ex-wife of Memnon
of Rhodes. They subsequently had a son named Herakles. Following the battle of Gaugamela
Alexander acquired Darius’ harem of concubines. These concubines had been selected for their
beauty. In Bactria Alexander immediately fell in love with Roxane, the daughter of a Bactrian
nobleman, who, after Darius’ wife, was said to be the most beautiful woman in Asia. Bagoas
apparently had been a court favorite first of Darius, then of Artabazus, and finally of Alexander
himself—and not because of his martial prowess. Finally, after he returned from India, at Susa,
Alexander married both Darius’ eldest daughter, another Barsine, and Parysatis, the youngest daughter
of Artaxerxes III Ochus. As we shall see, he fully expected these marriages to produce heirs.
Unlike the last Ottoman sultans, whose harems grew larger as the number of their provinces
diminished, for Alexander sex apparently was not a form of compensation for military incompetence.
Rather, the more Alexander conquered, the more he was conquered, by men, women, and a Persian
youth, all of whom had been gifted by the gods with physical beauty. Indeed, casting his eyes over the
Persian women captured after the battle of Issos, Alexander is said to have remarked jestingly that
Persian women were a torment for the eyes. The plain did not excite Alexander’s erotic impulse. If
sex, along with sleep, made Alexander aware that he was mortal, as we are told, then his sense of his
own mortality increased dramatically as he made
his way from the Haliacmon to the Indus River.
THE RETURN OF NEARCHUS
When Alexander was celebrating at Salmus he also received the joyous news that Nearchus and the
fleet at long last had arrived at Harmozeia, the main port of Carmania. Nearchus was able to give
Alexander the good news in person, although Alexander apparently barely recognized him because of
his briny, fatigued state. Nearchus’ account of the difficult voyage, which Arrian used extensively in
his short work entitled the Indike, emphasized the difficulties of the voyage and helped to explain to
Alexander what at first glance had looked like irresponsibility or disobedience on the part of some of
his generals or governors.
From Nearchus Alexander learned the following: as soon as Alexander had left Pattala, its
inhabitants and the people around it had turned on the troops left behind. It is very likely that they
destroyed the harbor installation Alexander left at the lake on the eastern stream of the Indus.
Nearchus therefore was compelled to sail down the western stream, but he left earlier than
anticipated, probably in early October, well before the southern wind had died down in early
November.
Sailing down the western stream of the Indus to reach the Outer Ocean, Nearchus was forced to
make a cut through the coastal sandbar. After this, the winds compelled him to land on an offshore
island, where he remained for twenty-four days, until they finally died down.
By the time Nearchus had reached the territory of the Oreitae, Leonnatus and his troops had killed
6,000 of the Oreitae in battle, but Apollophanes, the satrap of Gedrosia, had fallen during the
engagement. This was the reason why Apollophanes had not carried out Alexander’s orders—not due
to any negligence on the satrap’s part. Apollophanes’ reputation was saved for posterity by Nearchus’
account. Despite the victory, which made the coastal region safe for the fleet, Nearchus did not begin
his voyage off the south coast until late October or early November 325 at the earliest.
As we have seen, Alexander himself had left the territory of the Oreitans in early October, perhaps
as much as a month before Nearchus and the fleet got there. Marching westward in early October,
Alexander certainly would have been much too far ahead of Nearchus for the fleet to catch up to him
at the pre-arranged wells and food drops along the coast. Nor could Alexander have stopped to wait
once he realized what the conditions were really like. If Alexander stopped, he risked starving the
army.
Thus Alexander was forced to accept Nearchus’ account of his voyage, replete as it was with
fantastic stories of encounters with the Fish Eaters and a school of whales that spouted water up into
the air to great heights, terrifying the Macedonians. To scare the whales away, Alexander was told,
the sailors had shouted with all their might, blown trumpets, and beaten the water with their oars.
Despite all of the adventures, the fleet lost only one vessel, an Egyptian galley and crew that
strayed too close to the island called Nosala. By legend anyone who touched this island, which was
sacred to the Sun, instantly disappeared. Nearchus himself landed on Nosala to search for the galley’s
crew, but found no one.
It was also said of this island that a Nereid lived there, luring any sailor who approached. But if he
were foolish enough to respond to her advances, she would turn him into a fish and throw him into the
sea. The Sun eventually grew annoyed at these shenanigans and forced the Nereid to vacate the island;
pitying the sailors she had piscified, he turned them into the Fish Eaters Alexander had encountered
along the south coast.
Whatever Alexander thought of these sailors’ yarns, he must have been genuinely relieved to see
Nearchus and the fleet. They had been at sea for sixty days and had traveled nearly a thousand miles
through uncharted waters since leaving the Indus. Now Alexander sent them onward: he ordered
Nearchus to continue his voyage from Harmozeia to Susia, and then from there on to the mouths of the
Tigris, where he would rendezvous with the army.
THE TOMB OF CYRUS
As for the land army, from Carmania in December 325 Alexander now ordered Hephaestion to
proceed to Persia by the coastal route, with the elephants, the baggage train, and the greatest part of
the army. Accompanied by the most mobile infantry units, the Companion cavalry, and a part of the
archers, he himself took the direct road to Pasargadae.
When he reached the Persian frontier, Alexander discovered that the governor Phrasaortes had died
and that the satrap’s position had been undertaken or usurped by Orxines, a descendant of Cyrus the
Great. Orxines’ wealth was partly inherited and also had been augmented during the long period when
he had served as a satrap.
Tomb of Cyrus the Great, at Pasargadae in Persia. Slides collection of the Joint Library of the Hellenic and Roman Societies
Apparently recognizing the precariousness of his position, Orxines greeted Alexander with herds of
horses, chariots trimmed with silver and gold, costly furniture, jewels, gold vessels, purple garments,
and 3,000 talents of silver coins. Alexander already had designated his new bodyguard Peucestas
governor of Persia, but Orxines’ lavish gifts kept him alive, for the moment. Others were not as
fortunate.
In the district of Pasargadae Alexander also found Atropates, governor of Media, who brought with
him a Mede named Baryaxes. Baryaxes had been put under arrest for wearing his cap upright and
calling himself king of the Medes and Persians. He and all of his associates were promptly put to
death, as was one Phradates (or Autophradates), suspected of having designs on the throne.
At the city of Pasargadae itself, Alexander also found that the gabled tomb of Cyrus the Great had
been robbed, its famous inscription having failed to protect it. The inscription read:
“O man! I am Cyrus son of Cambyses, who founded the Persian empire and ruled Asia. Grudge me
not my monument.”
Of all the treasures in the tomb, only the coffin of Cyrus and a divan remained. The robbers even
had opened up the sarcophagus and thrown out the body of Cyrus.
Alexander had the Persian priests (Magi) who served as tomb guards arrested and tortured to find
out the names of the culprits. But even under torture, the Magi neither confessed nor implicated others.
At length, none the wiser, Alexander let the Magi go without discovering who had been responsible
for the sacrilegious treatment of the tomb.
Aristobulus, however, was personally instructed to put the tomb in a state of thorough repair, to
restore Cyrus’ body to its sarcophagus, and to replace with exact replicas every stolen object. As
Cyrus’ putative successor, Alexander had good political reasons for repairing Cyrus’ tomb. At the
same time, Alexander, the conqueror of a great empire himself, must have been distressed by the ill
treatment of the remains of another great king.
Finally, however, it was Orxines who was hanged for the crime, after Bagoas implied to Alexander
that the satrap was the guilty party. As Orxines was led away to be executed, we are told, the satrap
looked at Bagoas and was said to have remarked that he had heard “that women once were rulers of
Asia,” but that this was something new, a eunuch as king.
&nbs
p; But many other Persians also brought accusations against Orxines, and Orxines was convicted not
only of robbing temples and royal tombs but of putting many Persians to death illegally.
With Orxines dead, Peucestas now took up his appointment as satrap of the Persians. As soon as
Peucestas entered the office he adopted Median dress and learned Persian. The Persians, we are told,
were delighted that at least one Macedonian preferred the customs of their country to his own. The
problem for Alexander was that Peucestas was the exception rather than the rule.
CHAPTER 26
Marriage: Persian Style
THE SUICIDE OF CALANUS
Either in Pasargadae or on the borders of Persia and Susiana, after living for seventy-three years in
perfect health, Alexander’s Indian friend Calanus developed an intestinal disorder of some kind and
decided to end his own life. Alexander tried to talk the philosopher out of his decision, but to no
avail. Ptolemy therefore was ordered to build a funeral pyre.
By the time the pyre was built, Calanus was too ill to walk to it. A horse was provided, but
Calanus could not mount it. He had to be borne on a litter lying down. A procession of horses,
soldiers in armor, and people carrying incense to throw on the flames escorted the sage.
The horse Calanus was to have ridden was of the royal breed of Nysaia; before he mounted the
pyre, he gave it as a gift to Lysimachus, one of his students in philosophy. To his other pupils and
friends Calanus distributed the draperies and cups Alexander had ordered to be burned on the pyre in
his honor. Calanus’ head was wreathed with garlands in the Indian fashion, and on his way to his
death he sang hymns of praise to his country’s gods.
When the fire was kindled Alexander ordered the trumpets to be sounded. The troops raised their
battle cry, and even the elephants bellowed out their war cry in Calanus’ honor. Calanus slowly
climbed up on the pyre as the whole army watched. Alexander himself felt that the spectacle was
unseemly, especially in the case of a man who was dear to him. But the rest were simply astonished to
see Calanus give no sign of flinching from the flames. Some thought he was mad, others that his ability
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