Only Ptolemy remained to be dealt with. Learning of Antigonus’ departure from Palestine, and encouraged by the eager Seleucus, Ptolemy prepared a large army and at the end of 312 invaded Palestine to try his chances in war against the young Demetrius. A great battle was fought near Gaza, in which the experience of Ptolemy and Seleucus told over Demetrius’ youth: Demetrius’ forces were disastrously defeated with heavy losses, and Ptolemy was able to re-occupy Palestine and Phoenicia. Undismayed, however, Demetrius retreated with strong cavalry forces (having lost most of his infantry) to north Syria and there summoned reinforcements from the garrisons of Syria and Mesopotamia, quickly rebuilding his army and securing Syria against Ptolemy. A large raiding column sent by Ptolemy was ambushed and captured by Demetrius, showing that he knew how to recover from a great setback. Having waited to see how his son would do, Antigonus now, in spring 311, crossed the Taurus mountains into Syria with a large army to redress the situation in Palestine. As before, when he heard of Antigonus’ advance against him Ptolemy did not wait to fight, but retreated at once back to Egypt leaving Antigonus to recover control of Phoenicia and Palestine with barely a fight.
In four years of fighting, Antigonus had seriously weakened Cassander in Greece, kept Lysimachus busy in his own province, secured naval dominance with a huge fleet-building program, and shown that Ptolemy simply could not hold Palestine against him. The demands of the dynasts allied together against Antigonus in 314 had proved unenforceable, and Antigonus had fought them to a standstill. In mid-311 Cassander and Lysimachus sued for peace, and when he heard of it Ptolemy quickly joined in. The Peace of the Dynasts concluded in summer 311 effectively acknowledged Antigonus as ruler of Asia and owner of the former Persian treasures. Antigonus in return acknowledged Cassander as ruler of Macedonia, Lysimachus as ruler of Thrace, and Ptolemy as ruler of Egypt. The principle that all Greek cities should be autonomous, as pronounced by Antigonus at Tyre, was accepted by all the dynasts; and this division of powers was to be in effect until the king himself, young Alexander IV, could take power. The peace was a clear triumph for Antigonus, who emerged from it as de facto successor to the Persian kings. But there were some troubling issues which were to undermine it from the beginning.
In the first place, the treaty reminded the world of the existence of a king who formally reigned over the conquests of his father Alexander and grandfather Philip, and who—now aged around thirteen—could be expected to come forward to begin to rule over his empire before too many more years had passed. This was an embarrassment to the great dynasts, who had not struggled and fought and bled for thirteen years just to hand over their power to a youth whose only claim to attention was his parentage. It was in particular an embarrassment to Cassander, under whose protection and guard young Alexander was living and, putatively, being trained to rule. Cassander had, in 315, taken in marriage a daughter of the great Philip named Thessalonice, and had by her three sons, the eldest of whom was named Philip after his maternal grandfather, to remind all Macedonians that he was a grandson of the great king. As a direct descendant of the Argead royal line through his mother, Cassander’s son might himself be seen as a candidate for the kingship … if only the inconvenient youth Alexander IV would just die. Well, such things could be arranged. As calls began to arise for Alexander to be brought out of his seclusion at Amphipolis and introduced to the Macedonian people over whom he would soon be ruling, Cassander announced in 310 that, sadly, the boy and his mother had unexpectedly fallen ill and died. People were not fooled by this: immediately the rumor spread, almost certainly a well founded one, that Cassander had simply had the wretched young Alexander and his mother assassinated. Once again, the Macedonian realm was left with no king, but there was no power vacuum this time: the question was merely under what formal guise or title the great dynasts would govern their lands in the long term.
A far more significant threat to the peace treaty of 311 was an action undertaken by Ptolemy and Seleucus in the winter of 312/11, immediately after the victorious battle of Gaza. Seleucus had been living for four years as a protégé of Ptolemy, giving valuable assistance and advice, but lacking all power and status of his own. He was not content with this role. Intent on weakening Antigonus, Ptolemy gave Seleucus around fifteen hundred soldiers with whom to launch an attempt to recover control of his former satrapy of Babylonia. Setting out in the dead of winter, Seleucus rode at speed with his small force north-west through the Syrian desert, aiming to cross the Euphrates well upstream where it would be easily fordable. He had some luck: the land of Mesopotamia was largely denuded of troops thanks to Demetrius’ ingathering of the garrisons to rebuild his army after his defeat at Gaza, enabling Seleucus to ride without significant opposition through Mesopotamia and down the Tigris valley into Babylonia, where he arrived towards the end of winter in early 311. He had been a popular governor of Babylonia before being ousted in 315, whereas Antigonus remained largely unknown there. Besides, Seleucus was an active and highly effective general, who deserved the epithet he later acquired: Nicator (the Victor). Within a few months Seleucus had not only recovered control over Babylonia, but set about completely undermining Antigonus’ arrangements in the eastern or “upper” satrapies, and reorganizing the east under his own control.
17. Portrait bust of Seleucus Nicator from Herculaneum, now in Archaeological Museum, Naples
(Wikimedia Commons public domain image
through Creative Commons; photo by Massimo Finizio)
This rapid and unexpected success on Seleucus’ part was unknown at the time the Peace of the Dynasts was concluded in mid-311, but it immediately undermined a key provision of that peace, the notion that Antigonus ruled all of the Macedonian lands in Asia. Within a few months it became clear that he did not: the eastern provinces were falling under the control of Seleucus instead, introducing a new power dynamic into the equation of the struggle over the succession to Alexander. Key to the rise of Seleucus in the east was a great victory he won on the eastern bank of the Tigris in late 311. Antigonus had left a trusted officer named Nicanor as governor of Media and overseer of the eastern provinces back in 315, and it fell to this Nicanor to respond to Seleucus’ invasion of Babylonia. He gathered a large force near seventeen thousand strong and set out to crush the uprising. But Seleucus, though having fewer than four thousand soldiers with which to oppose this force, managed to take Nicanor’s army completely by surprise and win an overwhelming victory. That left the eastern provinces wide open to his attack, and within a few years he had organized for himself an empire stretching from Babylonia (southern Iraq) to Bactria (Afghanistan). In truth, Antigonus did little to prevent this, perhaps in the belief that Greek domination so far east could not last. He had only entered the “upper” satrapies in pursuit of Eumenes, and had left as soon as he could, never to return. When Nicanor failed to deal with Seleucus, Antigonus sent his son Demetrius with a flying column of troops to pillage and loot in Babylonia, and around 308 apparently entered Mesopotamia with an army for a showdown with Seleucus. No longer as quick and energetic as he had been (he was now in his mid-seventies), Antigonus suffered a reverse, and seems to have patched up a truce of sorts ceding control of the east to Seleucus, keeping only northern Mesopotamia east of the Euphrates: his interest was in Palestine, Syria, Asia Minor, and the Greek lands and seas.
In 310, no doubt encouraged by Seleucus’ growing power in the east, Ptolemy had broken the peace and begun again to harass Antigonus’ lands and forces in the eastern Mediterranean. An expeditionary force sailed to Cilicia and harried the coastal settlements, but more importantly than mere coastal raiding, Ptolemy was making his own play for greater power. He got in touch with Alexander’s full sister Cleopatra, who since the failure of her proposed marriage to Perdiccas in 320 had been living a retired life under Antigonus’ protection at Sardis. With Cleopatra as his wife, Ptolemy hoped to be able to appeal to Macedonians as a possible new king, it seems. But Antigonus’ spies in Cleopatra’s circle alerte
d him to what was happening, and he had Cleopatra killed before she could escape to join Ptolemy. The old Argead royal family was now nearly exhausted even in the female line. Ptolemy’s attempts to win favor and power in the Aegean and Greece failed, and he had to sail back to Egypt having done little but stir up Antigonus to anger against him. Antigonus, seeing that Cassander and Ptolemy would not respect the terms of the peace deal they had agreed to, prepared great blows against them. He struck at Cassander first.
Equipping a great fleet of warships and transport vessels, he sent a large army commanded by Demetrius across the Aegean to strip Cassander of all influence in southern Greece once and for all. Demetrius landed at the Piraeus, the great harbor of Athens, early in the summer of 307 and announced that he had come to overthrow Macedonian garrisons and pro-Macedonian tyrants and oligarchies once and for all. In particular, the Athenian democracy, disbanded by Antipater in October 321, was to be restored. In a surge of public rejoicing, the Athenians went over to Demetrius and Cassander’s forces and allies at Athens found themselves powerless to resist. The restored democracy hailed Antigonus and Demetrius as saviors and loaded them with honors, even going so far as to address them as kings, though for the time being Antigonus did not take up this title. Demetrius quickly extended his operations into the Peloponnese and central Greece, everywhere driving out Cassander’s forces and allies and “liberating” the Greek cities, that is allowing them to set up their own preferred governing systems (usually democracies) which then at once allied with Antigonus and Demetrius. Cassander was unable to match the level of forces Demetrius had at his disposal, and saw his position in southern Greece crumbling without being able to do much about it. But in 306 Antigonus recalled Demetrius from this campaign, leaving it unfinished: it was time to strike at Ptolemy.
For some fifteen years, since 320, Ptolemy’s main base for operations against Antigonus and into the Aegean, and the secure mainstay of his naval power, had been the island of Cyprus. Antigonus had frequently sought to undermine the loyalty to Ptolemy of the Cypriot city-kings, with mixed success. But in 311 Ptolemy had put a stop to this by deposing the city-kings once and for all and placing his reliable younger brother Menelaus in charge of Cyprus as the island’s governor. Antigonus now ordered Demetrius to lead a great fleet and army to the island of Cyprus to conquer it and bring it under Antigonid power. Demetrius landed successfully, defeated Menelaus, and besieged him in Salamis. In response Ptolemy gathered the largest fleet he could, together with a large relieving military force on a fleet of transports, and sailed for Cyprus, landing at Paphus on the south-west coast. This led to a confrontation between the fleets of Demetrius and Ptolemy, the battle of Salamis, one of the great naval battles of the ancient world. As Ptolemy’s fleet approached Salamis along the south coast of the island, pausing at Cition before making the final push to Salamis itself, Demetrius deployed his fleet outside the harbor of Salamis. He decided to use only ten warships, chosen for their size and power, to blockade the harbor of Salamis and keep Menelaos’ fleet (sixty warships) inside. He himself confronted Ptolemy with 170 ships to 140, counting on this advantage to defeat Ptolemy before Menelaus could break out and intervene. The main interest of the battle, besides the scale of forces deployed and the outsize personalities of the two commanders, lay in the fact that it was the first known battle in which a new type of ship and naval tactics were deployed.
The standard ancient warships of the late fourth century BCE were oared galleys called triremes, quadriremes, and quinqueremes, so named for the fact that at each oar station they deployed the motive power of three, four, or five oarsmen respectively. The largest of these standard warships, the quinquereme, had two banks of oars, one below the other, with each oar on the lower bank being pulled by two rowers, and each oar on the upper bank by three. Ptolemy’s fleet was made up of ships of this type. But Antigonus’ naval building program had begun to develop larger, super massive galleys which became a feature of Hellenistic navies. Demetrius’ fleet contained “sixes” (hexereis) and “sevens” (heptereis). The extra wide decks of these massive ships were used as fighting platforms, not just for soldiers who might try to board an enemy vessel, but for artillery: catapults firing bolts and stone-throwers. Demetrius had concentrated his large ships on his right wing, and he went into battle with them, subjecting the ships opposite his squadron to a withering hail of catapult bolts and massive stones which damaged many ships and demoralized the rest. This was the first battle in recorded history in which ship-borne artillery played the decisive role: Demetrius won a crushing victory. Ptolemy was forced to flee having lost more than half of his fleet and transports; Menelaus had to surrender to Demetrius with all his forces, and Cyprus belonged to Antigonus.
The significance of this victory went beyond Demetrius’ proof that he could compete with the great generals who had learned under Philip and fought under Alexander, and Antigonus’ rounding-off of complete naval domination of the eastern Mediterranean region: it was used by Antigonus as the occasion to elevate himself and his family to royal status. The scene is described in detail by Plutarch in his biography of Demetrius. The official messenger sent by Demetrius to announce news of his victory to his father was Antigonus’ old and close friend Aristodemus of Miletus. Antigonus was, at the time of Demetrius’ victory, not far away: a few miles inland from the adjacent coast of Syria, Antigonus was supervising the construction of his new capital city of Antigoneia on the River Orontes. Aristodemus sailed across from Cyprus to Syria and up the mouth of the River Orontes to land close to Antigonus’ new city. Walking silently and grim-faced from his landing point into the city and to the main town square, where Antigonus was awaiting him surrounded by an anxious crowd, Aristodemus ignored all questions until he stood in front of Antigonus himself, where he suddenly changed his expression from grim to joyful and cried out in a loud voice “Hail king Antigonus, we have won a glorious victory!” That this was all a pre-calculated show is made evident by the fact that Antigonus’ entourage, far from being surprised by Aristodemus’ news and use of the royal title, immediately produced a royal diadem, tied it around Antigonus’ head, and likewise hailed him as king. The title was then taken up amidst rejoicing by the surrounding crowd of soldiers and new citizens of Antigoneia. The effect produced, obviously deliberately, was that Antigonus was having the title of king thrust upon him by his entourage of officers and aides, soldiers, and citizens. He could thus gracefully accept the royal title as something bestowed on him by his people, in acknowledgement of his great successes, rather than seeming to usurp the title himself.
After five years of official power vacuum, the Macedonians finally had a king again: Antigonus the One-Eyed, who immediately emphasized the dynastic importance of his new status by sending a letter accompanied by a royal diadem to his son Demetrius, officially elevating him to the status of co-king as well as successor. In the letter too, Antigonus sent instructions for Demetrius to prepare his fleet for a grand new operation: Antigonus wanted to follow up the crushing defeat inflicted on Ptolemy by attempting to finish off Ptolemy once and for all. He prepared a massive land expedition, totaling up to eighty-eight thousand men we are told, to march for the invasion of Egypt, while Demetrius was to sail along the coast with the army with a grand supporting fleet. Late in the year, the army concentrated at Gaza in southern Palestine and marched from there for Egypt. Demetrius and the fleet sailed a day later, and despite some difficulties with the weather, arrived at the border of Egypt to link up there with Antigonus’ army, which encamped about a quarter of a mile from the Pelousiac (easternmost) branch of the Nile. Ptolemy, severely outnumbered by Antigonus’ forces, had prepared strong defensive positions on the western banks of the Pelousiac Nile, and challenged Antigonus to attack across the broad and deep stream.
About fifteen years earlier, in 320, the regent Perdiccas had attempted such an attack across the Pelousiac Nile in the face of Ptolemy’s strong defenses, and had failed disastrously. Antigonus was n
ot inclined to try the same thing: that is why he had brought the fleet. He ordered Demetrius to sail along the Egyptian coast and land troops well to the rear of Ptolemy’s defenses. Attacked by Antigonus’ forces from in front and behind, Ptolemy would have been very hard put to it to hold out. But Demetrius failed: two separate attempts to land troops were defeated by determined efforts of Ptolemy’s local defense forces, and Demetrius brought the fleet back to Antigonus’ camp with nothing accomplished. It must be said that Demetrius seems to have shown a lack of determination and perseverance in this absolutely vital operation. Demetrius was at times quite brilliant; but this sort of inconsistency and lack of perseverance were to prove characteristic of him in subsequent years. In the present circumstances, Demetrius’ failure caused Antigonus to call off the whole expedition: he would not risk a frontal assault across the well defended Nile, and his supply situation prevented staying where he was for a prolonged operation. He retreated back to Palestine with nothing accomplished. Ptolemy was hailed as victor by his troops, and used the occasion to have himself proclaimed king just as Antigonus had been. From having no king, the Macedonians now had three. And within a year or two, Seleucus in inner Asia, Lysimachus in Thrace, and Cassander in Macedonia followed suit, making six kings in all including Demetrius, ruling five separate kingdoms carved out of Alexander’s realm (see map 4).
Before and After Alexander Page 27
