“Something about doing no harm, yes, yes, I remember” grumbled the wounded soldier.
Klemes paused, swallowed hard, and breathed deep, holding it overlong until finally expelling the air in a great bubbling sigh. Placing his hands on Aristophanes’ shoulders, the physician gave him the speech – the same speech that has been spoken a hundred thousand times and more by physicians from the Pillars of Hercules to the deserts of Bactria – and beyond, to whatever lies inside the great river that encircles the world.
“Your days as a soldier are over, Ari. You will never stand in the ranks again. With time, and prayer, and good fortune, you will walk and walk unaided – but haltingly, at least at first, and with a noticeable limp.”
“But didn't Melon, the hero who killed the Spartan king at Leuctra and saved our city years ago, didn't he have a limp? That did not stop him!”
“Well, Ari, I am not quite that old as to have known Melon, let alone to have been his physician. I do not know how serious a limp he had, if he truly had one at all, but I know what I see here.”
“So what now?” shouted Ari, angry and frustrated. “Do I shave half of my head and beard like some trembler, some half-man who won't do his duty? Who won't do his duty as a man or a citizen and stand shoulder to shoulder with his brothers, feet firmly apart, gritting his teeth, and shouting defiance to our enemies?”
The physician shook his head gently, sighed, and looked the young man squarely in the eyes.
“Ari. You may ride a mule or perhaps even a horse again someday, and you will be able to walk, but with difficulty and always with pain. You did stand, and stand with honor, and you shed blood for our city, but,” he added with conviction and sympathy, “this war is no longer yours to fight.”
7
Alexander's Camp
Outside the Elektrian Gate of Thebes
“You offer them mercy and they insult you this way!” shouted Perdiccas angrily. “Did I not tell you they are nothing more than Persian-loving scum! These Thebans are not worthy of your forgiveness, my King,” the Macedonian general shouted, gesticulating wildly for effect. “How much more proof of their treachery do you need! Unleash the army, Alexander; let us tear down this city and cleanse the world of this stain upon the honor of Greece!”
Perdiccas took a moment to compose himself, then, like a teacher berating a student, proceeded to lecture the young king.
“I caution you against showing clemency, Alexander. Show these Thebans mercy, let them get away with killing our men, and you will lose the support of the army. You know what your father's answer to such rebellion would have been.”
Alexander listened in earnest to his father’s old general, a valiant, much-scared, and well-respected officer. Perdiccas was the son of a minor noble from the lake district around the Orontes, a commander who rose through the ranks because he led quite literally from the front rank of the phalanx, pike in hand.
“I understand, good Perdiccas,” smiled Alexander slyly, “but I believe these insults to my good offices are but the mewling of a few hot heads. Their leaders are men who took Persian coin not just from the old Great King, but most certainly from his successor. Darius is as new to his throne as I am to mine, but he is already playing the old game, to keep us fighting each other at home so we cannot go east.”
“Besides, my teacher Aristotle long ago advised me to treat the Greeks as a leader, not as a master. They are family, he told me – contentious, stubborn, and difficult – but family. You've spent too much time fighting barbarians,” added the king. “Now those, those we can treat as if they were no better than animals – but not the Greeks. I have other plans for them, as you will see when we go to face the Great King.”
Alexander paused and motioned for a slave to bring him a cup of wine, then walked over to a map of Greece splayed out on a camp table. “But Darius is not the only one behind this uprising. The Thebans most certainly were also swayed by the seductive promises offered by Demosthenes…”
“That Athenian rabble-rousing pederast!” spat the older Macedonian general. “He prances and prattles before the mob, like, like some, some…actor on a stage!”
“Now, now, Perdiccas,” teased Alexander. “Some of my best friends are actors – you've seen how entertaining Thessalos and Athenodoros can be, especially when they do one of those plays by Euripedes. Damn, how I love his stuff.”
“Well, well...” grumbled the general. “Demosthenes is a worse actor. Worthless windbag! I say once we finish here, we march on Athens and hang him upside down, naked, swinging from the Parthenon itself!”
Murmurs of agreement, sprinkled with muttered jibes and muted laughter filled the command tent as Perdiccas, his face reddening with every word, continued his diatribe on the perfidies, despicable personal habits, and dubious parentage of the noted Athenian orator. Alexander allowed this to continue until Perdiccas, his spleen sufficiently vented, appeared to run out of insults to hurl at what some in Greece believed to be the very embodiment of Athens and its democracy.
“One chastisement at a time, good Perdiccas, one chastisement at a time. That vile Athenian who spins lies like a spider spins a web, will be dealt with in turn,” said the king with a smile like that of a cat contemplating a mouse for his dinner. “He is one of those few Greeks over whom indeed I must be the master, rather than the leader. Besides, the rest of the army has not yet come up. There are seven gates leading in and out of this city, and most we have covered by no more than a few companies of light troops and some hasty trenches. We need more men if we are to threaten Thebes with siege and sack, and show them how fruitless their rebellion is.”
“My battalion is here!” replied Perdiccas proudly. “My men alone are enough to beat these soft-living city dwellers, just as they did at Chaeronea three years ago!”
“And mine are ready, too, majesty” piped up another battalion commander, Amyntas, son of Andromenes. “The Plateans are ready as well my King. For 150 years they have longed to avenge the wrongs done by their neighbors from Thebes, when those traitors sided with Xerxes the Persian and burned Plateai to the ground!”
“If they have waited that long, then what is a few more days?” replied Alexander calmly. “Believe me, good friends, my anger at Thebes is no less than your own. My wrath will be like that of Zeus himself should the Thebans not come to realize that they have been duped into this act of rebellion. General Parmenion is already across the Hellespont with the advance guard, and I long to join him and begin our own war of vengeance on Persia.”
“Besides,” added Alexander with a smirk, “Theban gold and Theban men would be valuable additions to our forces, and I would not waste what men we have with us in fighting fellow Greeks, not even Thebans. They can pay for their treachery with the blood of their soldiers when we invade Persia. I can trust you to put them in the very front, right, Perdiccas,” he added with a knowing titter.
“So, for now, return to your post and maintain the guard. Take no action on your own, not unless you hear from me directly.”
“Aye, young lord,” grumbled Perdiccas unhappily. “If that is your command, but if those Theban bastards keep up their taunting from the walls and towers...”
“I understand, General. But you have your orders, so…”
Before the Macedonian King could finish, his words were drowned out by the sound of trumpets, one after the other, followed by the shouting of hundreds of voices.
“What is going on out there? Ptolemy,” said the king, addressing one of his close companions, “go find out what the noise is all about.”
Within minutes Ptolemy, son of Lagos, boyhood friend and trusted staff officer of the boy king, was back inside the command tent, nearly breathless.
“They’re attacking, my King!”
“The Thebans? Are they coming out of the city?” asked a startled Alexander, reaching for his armor and helmet.
“No, my King,” replied his aide and friend, “it’s not the Thebans.”
“Th
en who is attacking?” asked Alexander.
“It seems we are!”
8
The Palisade
Thebes
Perdiccas was not alone in his eagerness to get at the Thebans. His men shared that desire. Without his commanding presence to hold them back when the Thebans hurled yet another set of insults at them, there was nothing for it but for the Macedonians to attack. Grabbing ropes, ladders, and a tree trunk to use as a battering ram, the men of Perdiccas’ battalion rushed to the southeastern gate of the city, just north of where the Ismenion bastion jutted out into the plain. Few made it up the walls, let alone to the gate, as the defenders rained javelins, arrows, and stones down upon them in a crossfire from the tall circular towers to either side. Thebans in the Ismenion fired into the left flank of the charge, causing further casualties – casualties that only seemed to inflame the angry Macedonians to further exertions. Yet still the gate held – but even the torrent of rocks, and arrows, and javelins could not dissuade the Macedonians from coming on again, and again, and again.
As water naturally flows toward the path of least resistance, so did the Macedonian attack. Large groups of men sloughed off to the left, around the corner bastion toward the city’s southern side – and attacked the palisade of stakes the Thebans had erected there to seal off the Elektrian Gates beneath the citadel.
“Here they come, lads!” roared Captain Dimitrios, for it was his company – or what remained of it – that had been sent down from the walls to thicken the line at the palisade. “Lock...shields!” He commanded his men, as did other company commanders to his left and right.
“I know some of you are afraid,” he shouted honestly, “but your fear is forgiven as long as you hold the line!”
The Macedonians came on in a wild, savage rush, the battle madness bringing their barbarian heritage to the fore, erasing the discipline that the old king had drilled into them. Many in the Theban line were visibly afraid, as were those in the small squadron of horse who stood behind them, between the hoplites and the gate.
“Present...Spears!” Dimitrios ordered, as his men and all of those along the line of stakes lowered their eight-foot long weapons, their front bristling with a hundred razor sharp, broad, flat leaf-shaped tips. The Macedonians obligingly came on, only to become entangled and disorganized amidst the maze of sharp stakes. As they struggled to cross the barrier, gaps opened in their ranks, and into these openings Captain Dimitros and his men thrust their spears, sticking them hard to the Macedonians and inflicting great, bloody wounds.
“Hold the line!” shouted the captain. “Hold the line!” And hold they did, these hard men of Thebes, their spears jabbing out through the scalloped openings on the sides of their shields, which resembled an infinity sign turned sideways. These protected them in the attack far better than the standard, round hoplon, the original shield from which these traditional soldiers of Greece got their name.
“Eleleleu! Eleleleu! Eleleleu!” shouted the Thebans, roaring out the battle cry that had led them to victory over Sparta nigh on three-score years past. As much to taunt their foe as to boost their own spirits, the companies to either side of Dimitrios' took up the cry, until, like a wave, it rolled across the length of the battlefield and along the ramparts of Thebes.
Still the Macedonians came on. Their first and second ranks, gutted and slashed by the Thebans, were barely down before the third rank broke upon the shields, bashing and battering them in an effort to tear out the living hearts of the dragon-born men of Thebes.
It was here, at a point not far from Alexander’s tent, that Perdiccas rejoined his command. Had he any intention of obeying Alexander’s order to restrain the troops, however, Perdiccas quickly threw aside that notion. Seeing his men falter after their initial repulse, the old scrapper did what he did best. Grabbing a pike from a surprised soldier, Perdiccas roared his own battle cry and exhorted the men to form ranks like proper soldiers and then follow him.
And follow him they did, through a storm of arrows and javelins at, into and over the palisade. Fired up with righteous anger, the Macedonians tore at the barrier. Cutting at the stakes with swords and daggers, pulling down the palisade with their bare hands, they ripped a breach in the barricade through which first Perdiccas' own battalion, and then that of Amyntas poured. Amyntas had heard Alexander’s orders, but upon seeing Perdiccas breaking through the barricade, he too was driven to follow.
The two battalions of Macedonians tore into the Thebans at the palisade as lions into a pride of lesser cats. Captain Dimitrios and his Thebans fought hard and bravely, but were sorely pressed to withstand the sheer madness of the Macedonian onslaught.
At first the Thebans merely recoiled, falling back slowly, a half step at a time, back among the scattering of tombstones in the cemetery of Kastellion, in the area behind the now shattered barricade. As with all Greek cities, there was no room inside the walls to bury the dead, so families interred the remains of their loved ones outside the walls. Many of those ancient tombs and monuments dated from before the time of legends, back before Oedipus and his sons Eteocles and Polyneices reigned, their inscriptions long worn down to be beyond reading.
Many of the ancient tombs were waist high or higher. Several dozen Theban soldiers climbed up on them. These elevated stones provided a platform for the light troops, the peltastes, to stand on to hurl javelins, and fire slings, and arrows over the heads of their own hoplites at the advancing Macedonians. Others from the rear ranks of the hoplites line climbed up all the better to spear down into the Macedonians. The Macedonians followed their example, and the two groups began firing and jabbing at one another from rival tombs, while the spearmen battled in the mud below.
Captain Dimitrios and his men had never trained for this kind of fighting. Hoplites battles were strict, formal affairs where two blocks of iron and bronze collided head on in an open field. The battle among the tombs was not the typical scrum of two shield walls grinding against each other with which the heavy infantry in each army were familiar. Instead of solid lines a hundred meters wide and four to eight ranks deep, the Thebans were forced to form into small bands between the larger stones. At least the tombs gave some protection to their flanks, as the struggle devolved into something akin to a score of fierce street fights.
At first the Thebans had the better fortune, with the peltastes on the stones pelting the Macedonians from above while the hoplites held fast in the alleys below. What had been a slow retreat, face to the enemy, became an unflinching defense. As spears broke and shields shattered, men began swinging about the broken spears, using the hard iron butts as clubs. Others drew their short swords and daggers, and dove in and under the shields to slash at calves, and thighs, and ankles. Faced with such determined resistance, the Macedonians started to recoil.
“Who are the men of iron now!” shouted a Theban soldier.
“That's it, run, run back to your mountains and to your goats,” yelled another. All along the line, Theban soldiers, exhilarated at seeing the Macedonians falling back, shouted insults and taunts...but all to the opposite of the intended effect.
Amyntas brought up more missile troops to provide covering fire, but as their heavy, accurate fire cut down more and more of the exposed Thebans, other Macedonians took heart. As the Theban archers, slingers and javelinmen were swatted from their perch on the tombs, the Macedonians became encouraged, and now it was the Theban hoplites themselves who began to give ground. Exhausted, they looked for a second line to come forward as in a relay, to give them a breather – but no second line came out of the city. Weary beyond imagining, these citizen-soldiers, these farmers and shopkeepers, masons and blacksmiths, could take no more. They broke, with dozens fleeing in panic back toward the city. Captain Dimitrios tried to rally some of his men, but with their friends running in fear on all sides, even the captain's best men threw down their spears, unstrapped their shields and ran for their lives, sweeping the captain back in the flood.
As the
Theban cavalry came forward to try to stem the Macedonian tide before it reached the still open gates, Captain Dimitrios again tried to rally his men – and any men whom he could grab. A small band gathered hesitatingly around the brave captain, but as they turned about and steeled themselves against the wave of Macedonians to their front, they heard screams from behind. Screams of “save yourselves! Run for your lives!” caused even the captain to turn around, and what he and others saw broke whatever courage they had left.
Heartened by the charge of Perdiccas, which they could see from atop the acropolis upon which the Cadmea stood, the garrison in the citadel opened their own gates and exploded forth. They swept aside the few Thebans who were stationed there to pen them in, and swarmed out to attack the gate from the rear. In moments, they had joined up with the advancing battalions – and in so doing trapped hundreds of Theban soldiers in a killing zone just outside of the city wall.
Few Theban soldiers kept any semblance of order, and that small band that had coalesced around Captain Dimitrios was not one of them. The captain sorely missed having his friend and fellow hoplites, Aristophanes, beside him, to protect his right side with his shield. Yet though alone now in a stream of panicked soldiers, he kept his head, searching for some island of resistance to break the Macedonian tide.
One company of old men – white-haired grandfathers considered too long in their years to stand in the front line of battle – had been kept in reserve. To them fell the task of holding the Heracleion – the temple of Heracles situated outside the southern gates, in the ground between the city gate and the palisades, both of which were now in Macedonian hands. A sunken road running parallel to those walls of stakes provided this company to which Dimitrios gravitated with some advantage of ground – and a concealed area, out of view from most of the advancing Macedonians. There the old men stood, the battle swirling around them.
A Captain of Thebes Page 5