Delphi Complete Works of Quintus Curtius Rufus

by Quintus Curtius Rufus

  [15] Then Alexander marched down into Phoenicia and received the town of Byblos in surrender. From there he came to Sidon, a city renowned for its antiquity and fame of its founders. In it Straton was ruling, supported by the power of Darius; but because he had surrendered rather at the desire of the people than of his own accord, he was deemed unworthy to rule and Hephaestion was allowed to choose as king from among the Sidonians the one whom he thought most worthy of that high station.’

  [17] Hephaestion was the guest of two young men distinguished among their countrymen; when they were offered the privilege of ruling, they said that according to the custom of their country no one was admitted to that eminence unless born of royal stock. Hephaestion, admiring the lofty spirit that declined what others sought by fire and sword, said “Accept my congratulations, since you have been the first to appreciate how much greater it is to disdain royal power than to receive it. But name someone of royal descent, who will remember that he is holding a sovereignty that was conferred by you.” [19] And they, although they were aware that many, eager for so great a prospect, were already courting various friends of Alexander from excessive longing for the throne, decided that no one was preferable to a certain Abdalonymus, a man who had, it is true, a distant connexion with the royal family, but who, because of narrow means, was cultivating a garden in the suburbs at scanty profit. The reason for his poverty, as is true of many men, was his honesty, and intent as he was on his daily toil, he did not hear the din of arms which had shaken all Asia. Unexpectedly then the young men who were mentioned before came with the insignia of the royal dress into the garden, which, as it chanced, Abdalonymus was engaged in clearing up, by plucking out the useless weeds. Then, after hailing him as king, one of them said: “You must change that mean garb of yours for the apparel which you see in my hands; wash yourself, stained as you are by the dirt and filth of the earth; take on the spirit of a king and carry on your self-control into that fortune of which you are worthy. And when you sit upon the royal throne, master of the life and death of all the citizens, do not forget the condition in which — nay, by Heaven! because of which — you are receiving the crown. — It all seemed to Abdalonymus like a dream; from time to time he kept asking whether those who were so saucily making sport of him were altogether sane. But when, as he hesitated, the dirt was washed from his body and a robe adorned with purple and gold was put upon him, and the good faith of the messengers was confirmed by oaths, now a king in earnest, attended by the same youths, he entered the palace.

  [24] Then Rumour, as is her wont, busily ran about through the whole city; the approval of some, the indignation of others, was manifest, all the richest citizens appeared before Alexander’s friends and protested against the new king’s low condition and his [25] poverty. Alexander at once ordered that he be given audience, and after gazing at him for a long time said: “Your bearing does not belie the report of your origin, but I am glad to know of the patience with which you have endured privation.” Then the new king replied: “I only hope that I may be able to endure sovereignty with the same spirit! these hands have been able to satisfy my desires; having nothing, I have lacked nothing.” From these words of Abdalonymus the king gained an impression of his high character. Accordingly he gave orders that not only the regal equipment of Straton should be assigned to him, but also many articles from the Persian booty; he also added to his dominion a territory adjacent to the city.

  Meanwhile Amyntas, who, as I have said, had deserted from Alexander to the Persians, with 4000 Greeks who had followed him in his flight from the field of battle came to Tripolis. From there, having embarked his troops on ships, he crossed over to Cyprus, and since he thought that in the present state of affairs every man would possess as if by an inalienable right whatever he had seized, he decided to go to Egypt, being an enemy to both kings and always ready to take advantage of a critical change [28] of circumstances. And having roused his soldiers to the hope offered by so great an exploit, he told them that Sabaces, the governor of Egypt, had fallen in battle; that the Persian garrison was both leaderless and weak, and that the Egyptians, always at odds with their governors, would regard them as allies, [29] not as enemies. Necessity compelled them to try everything; for when Fortune has stranded our first hopes, the future seems to be preferable to the present. Therefore they all shouted that he might lead them wherever he wished. So, thinking it best to make use of their spirits while they were warm with hope, he made his way to the Pelusian mouth, pretending that he had been sent as governor by [30] Darius. Then, having got possession of Pelusium, he moved his forces on to Memphis. At the report of this the Egyptians, a fickle race and more inclined to start a revolution than to achieve anything great of their own accord rushed thither together, each from his own village or city, to destroy the Persian garrisons.

  The Persians, although terrified, did not nevertheless abandon hope of retaining their hold upon Egypt.

  [31] But Amyntas defeated them in battle, drove them into the city, and after pitching a camp led out his victorious troops to lay waste the fields. As if the property of the enemy was open to all, everything [32] was being carried off; hence Mazaces, although he knew that the minds of his men were terrified by their defeat, yet pointed out that the enemy were straggling and careless through the confidence inspired by victory and induced them not to hesitate to sally forth from the city and recover their lost possessions.

  [33] That plan was equally wise in design and successful in its result. All the Greeks were slain to a man, along with their leader himself. Such was the penalty that Amyntas paid to both kings, having shown himself not a whit more loyal to the one to whom he had deserted than to the one whom he had forsaken.

  [34] The generals of Darius who had survived the battle of Issus, and all the force that had followed them in their flight, with the addition of vigorous young soldiers of the Cappadocians and Paphlagonians, were [35] trying to recover Lydia. The governor of Lydia was Antigonus, one of Alexander’s generals; he, although he had sent very many soldiers from his garrisons to the king, nevertheless scorned the barbarians and led his forces out to battle. There also the fortune of the contending parties was the same; in three battles fought in one region and another the Persians were routed. At the same time a fleet of the Macedonians, which had been ‘summoned from Greece, defeated Aristomenes, who had been sent by Darius to recover the coast of the Hellespont, and captured [37] or sank his ships. Then Pharnabazus, commander of the Persian fleet, having exacted money from the Milesians and put a garrison into the city of Chios, sailed with a hundred ships to Andros and from there to Siphnos. These islands also he occupied with garrisons, besides fining them.

  [38] The great war which was being waged by the most powerful kings of Europe and Asia in the hope of getting control of the whole world had set in motion [39] the arms also of Greece and of Crete. Agis, king of the Lacedaemonians, having assembled the 8000 Greeks who had fled from Cilicia and returned home, was undertaking a war with Antipater, governor of [40] Macedonia. The Cretans, who had sided first with one party and then with the other, had their country occupied by garrisons now of the Spartans, now of the Macedonians. But the crises among these were of slight importance, since Fortune had her eyes fixed upon the one contest on which all the rest depended.

  II. Already all Syria, already Phoenicia also, except Tyre, were in the possession of the Macedonians, and Alexander was encamped on the mainland, from which a narrow strait separates the city.

  [2] Tyre, noteworthy both in size and in fame among all the cities of Syria and Phoenicia, seemed more inclined to accept an alliance with Alexander than to submit to his rule. Therefore envoys were bringing him the gift of a golden crown and the Tyrians had sent him from the city provisions in abundance and in a spirit of hospitality. Alexander gave orders that the gifts should be received as a token of friendship, and addressing the envoys courteously, said that he wished to offer sacrifice to Hercules, whom the [3] Tyrians specially honoured; tha
t the kings of Macedon believed that they derived their descent from that god, and that moreover he had been [4] advised by an oracle to do that thing. The envoys replied that there was a temple of Hercules outside of the city, in the place which they call Old Tyre; that there the king would properly offer sacrifice to [5] the god. Alexander could not restrain his anger, which as a rule he was unable to control. Accordingly he said: “You indeed, relying on your situation, because you live on an island, despise this army of foot-soldiers, but I will soon show you that you are on the mainland. Therefore I want you to know that I will either enter your city or besiege it.” [6] The envoys, dismissed with this response, began to warn their countrymen that a king whom Syria and Phoenicia had received they also should suffer to [7] enter their city. But the Tyrians, having plenty of confidence in their situation, had decided to sustain a siege; for a strait of four stadia separates the city from the mainland and was especially exposed to the Afric wind, which rolls upon the shore wave on wave from the deep. And there was nothing which more than that wind stood in the way of receiving the work by which the Macedonians were preparing to join the island to the mainland. Even with a calm and mild sea foundations can only with difficulty be laid, while the Afric wind, by the blows of the sea as it dashes against them undermines all the first structures, and no mass is so firm that the waters do not eat it away, both by trickling through the joints of the works, and when a more violent wind rises, by pouring over the top of the entire structure. Besides [9] this difficulty there was another equally great. The walls and towers of the city were surrounded by very deep sea; artillery could not be used except when its shots were hurled from ships at a distance, nor could scaling-ladders be applied to the fortifications, since the walls, descending sheer into the surge, had blocked any approach on foot; moreover Alexander had no ships, and if he could have brought them up to the wall, being afloat and unsteady, they could have been kept at bay by missiles.

  [10] Meanwhile a thing slight to mention fired the confidence of the Tyrians. Envoys of the Carthaginians had come at that time to celebrate an annual festival in the manner of their country; for the Tyrians founded Carthage and were always honoured as the forefathers of the Carthaginians. Therefore they began to urge the Tyrians to endure the siege with a courageous spirit; soon help would come from Carthage. For at that time the seas were in great part beset by the Punic fleets. Accordingly, the Tyrians declared war and placed artillery at intervals along the walls and in the towers, distributed arms to the men of military age, and assigned workmen, of whom the city had a great abundance, to the various factories. The whole place resounded with preparation for war; iron hands also (they call them harpagones, “grapplers”), to throw upon the enemies’

  works, ravens, and other devices for the protection of cities were made ready in advance.

  [13] But when the iron which it was necessary to forge had been placed in the furnaces, and the fires were fanned into a blaze by the application of bellows, streams of blood are said to have flowed out in the very midst of the flames, and this the Tyrians interpreted as portending the destruction of the Macedonians. Among the Macedonians also, when some of the soldiers happened to break bread, they noticed drops of blood trickling out, and when the king was alarmed, Aristander, the most skilled of the seers, declared that if the blood had flowed from without, it would be an unfavourable omen for the Macedonians; but on the contrary, since it flowed from an inner part, it foretold destruction for the city which they had determined to besiege. Alexander, both because the fleet which he had was afar off, and because he saw that a long blockade would be a great hindrance to the rest of his plans, sent heralds to urge the Tyrians to make peace; but these, in violation of the law of nations, they killed and threw into the sea. Upon this the king, greatly angered by such outrageous death of his men, resolved to besiege the city.

  But first it was necessary to make a causeway, in order to connect the city with the mainland. Hence the minds of the soldiers were assailed by extreme discouragement, as they looked upon the deep sea, which could hardly be filled even by divine help; what rocks huge enough, they thought, what trees tall enough, can be found? It would be necessary to empty whole regions in order to fill so great a space with material; then too the strait is always in commotion, and the more confined the space in which it is whirled about between the island and the mainland, the more fiercely does it rage. But Alexander, who was by no means inexperienced in working upon the minds of soldiers, announced that an apparition of Hercules had appeared to him in his sleep, offering him his right hand; with that god leading him and opening the way he dreamed that he entered the city. In his speech he also reminded them of the murder of the heralds and the violation of the law of nations; this, he added, was the only city that had ventured [18] to delay the victor’s progress. Then he instructed each of his generals to whip up his own soldiers’ courage, and when all had been sufficiently aroused, he began the work.

  A great amount of rocks was available, supplied by Old Tyre, timber was brought from Mount Libanus for making rafts and towers. And already the work had grown from the bottom of the sea to a moderate height, but nevertheless had not yet reached the surface of the waters, when the Tyrians, bringing up some small boats, mocked them with the taunt that those men famous in arms were carrying loads on their backs like beasts of burden; they also asked whether Alexander was greater than Neptune. These very insults inspired the soldiers to greater eagerness. And now the massive structure was rising a little above the water and at the same time the causeway was increasing in width and moving towards the city, when the Tyrians, seeing the size of the structure, whose increase had hitherto escaped their notice, began to encircle with light craft the work which did not yet form a juncture, and also to assail — with missiles those who stood upon it. Therefore, when many had been wounded without harm to their assailants, since it was easy both to withdraw and to bring up the skiffs, they had diverted them from their work to the care of protecting their own lives. Besides, the farther the causeway was pushed from the shore, the more did the great depth of the sea swallow up whatever was thrown into it.

  [23] Therefore the king gave orders that hides and canvas should be stretched before the workmen, in order that they might be out of reach of the missiles,” and raised two towers on the highest part of the causeway, from which weapons could be showered upon the boats as they came up. To meet this the Tyrians brought the boats to the shore, too far away to be seen by the enemy, and landing soldiers, butchered those who were carrying rocks. On Mount Libanus also the peasants of the Arabians attacked the Macedonians when they were in disorder, killed about thirty, and took a smaller number of prisoners.

  III. This state of affairs compelled Alexander to divide his forces, and lest he should seem slow in besieging one city, he left Perdiccas and Craterus in charge of that work and himself went to Arabia with a light-armed band. Meanwhile the Tyrians so loaded a ship of unusual size, by piling rocks and sand in the stern, that the prow was greatly raised, smeared it with bitumen and sulphur, and drove it ahead by oars; and when its sails also had caught the wind in full force, it quickly reached the causeway. Then, after setting fire to the prow, the rowers leaped into skiffs which were following, designed in advance for that very purpose, but the ship, having caught fire, began to spread far and wide flames, which, before they could be prevented, seized upon the towers and other works that had been [4] placed at the head of the causeway: then those who had leaped into the small boats heaped upon the towers and other works firebrands and whatever else was suitable for feeding the flames. And now, not only the lower parts of the Macedonians’ towers, but also the topmost storeys had caught fire, whereupon those who were in the towers were either consumed by the flames or threw away their arms and leaped [5] into the sea. But the Tyrians, who preferred to take them prisoner rather than kill them, lacerated the hands of the swimmers with stakes and stones, until they were disabled and could be taken into the boats G without danger. N
ot only were the works consumed by the fire, but it chanced that on that day a more furious wind stirred up the sea from its very depths and dashed it against the causeway, and the joints of the structure, lashed by surge after surge, loosened, so that the sea, flowing in between the blocks, broke right through the work. Therefore, when the heaps of stones which supported the earth that had been heaped upon them were demolished, the whole structure sank headlong into the deep, and Alexander, on returning from Arabia, found hardly any traces of so great a causeway.

  Thereupon, as usually happens in disasters, they all put the blame on one another, although all might more reasonably have found fault with the fury of the sea. The king, on beginning to build a new causeway, made its front (instead of its side) face directly into the unfavourable wind. Thus the front protected the rest of the works, which were hidden, as it were, behind it “; he also made the causeway wider, in order that the towers erected on the middle 9 of it might be far out of range of a weapon. Furthermore, they threw whole trees with their great branches into the deep, then loaded them with rocks, again threw other trees upon the pile of rocks, and finally heaped on earth; besides this, by piling up successive masses of rocks and trees they had joined together a continuous causeway, as if by a kind of bond. Nor were the Tyrians inactive in carrying out whatever could be devised to hamper the building of the causeway. A special help in this effort were those who plunged into the sea far out of sight of the enemy, and by gliding under water made their way as far as the causeway, and with hooks pulled towards them the projecting ends of the branches of the trees; and when the trees also were dragged away, they carried with them many parts of the structure into deep water. Then the divers without difficulty heaved away at the logs and tree-trunks, thus deprived of their weight, until finally the entire part of the work which was supported by the tree-trunks, since its foundation was gone, followed and collapsed.