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their island. So they decided to counterattack by sailing up in light boats to
the edges of the mole and firing missiles at the builders, thus injuring
many. In response Alexander had two towers raised at the end of the mole
with war engines to ward off such attackers. The Tyrians also conducted a
successful land raid, inflicting heavy casualties among the Macedonians
employed in the gathering of stones. It was at about this time that
highlanders from the Antilebanon Mountains also launched an attack and
killed thirty Macedonians. Worse still, the Tyrians managed to sail a fire
ship to the end of the mole, which set ablaze the towers and war engines,
while missiles from nearby Tyrian triremes prevented Alexander’s soldiers
from putting the flames out. It is possible that this fire not only destroyed
the towers but also the parts of the mole structure, which allowed the
waves to wash many of the stones away.119
By then it had probably become obvious that the city could not be
captured without the aid of a fleet. That was why Alexander set out with a
detachment of hypaspists and Agrianians to Sidon, which he designated to
be the gathering point for his navy. This was the time when
Autophradates’s Persian fleet was already dispersing with its Phoenician
and Greeks contingents successively departing. It was also no later than
then that the Tyrian squadron commanded by King Azemilcus must have
119 Arr., An. , 2.18.3-19.5; Curt., 4.2.7-3.7; Diod., 17.42-43; Str., 16.2.23; Plin., Nat. , 5.76; Polyaen., 4.3.3. Bosworth 1980, pp. 239-241. On the tombolo: Marriner 2009,
pp. 49-101.
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returned home as soon afterwards it was taking part in the conflict and,
although he had not been there when Alexander first arrived, this king was
captured in Tyre when the city finally fell. The ships of the other
Phoenician kings, Gerostratus of Aradus and Ainel of Byblus, now sailed
to Sidon; together with the Sidonian squadron they formed a force of 80
vessels. Next they were joined by ten ships from Lycia, three from Mallus,
three from Soli and probably ten from Rhodes – though some sources
claim that island went over to Alexander’s side only after the capture of
Tyre. At least some of the nine kingdoms of Cyprus also decided to
contribute to the victor’s side. The sources mention that among those
present at the siege were Androcles of Amathus, Pasicrates of Curium as
well as Pnytagoras of Salamis; as a reward for his services the last of these
was granted part of the Phoenician kingdom of Citium in Cyprus.
However, it is probable that even more kingdoms from that island
supported the Macedonian king for his fleet included as many as 120
vessels. The deflection of Phoenician and Cypriot squadrons effectively
marked the end of Persian dominance at sea and the ultimate vindication
of the strategy announced by Alexander at Miletus. The Cypriot rulers,
who had for a long time supported Persia, now wished to ingratiate
themselves to Alexander, buy his favour and thus maintain the status quo
on the island. That is why we later hear of the gifts offered to Alexander
by Pymiathon of Citium. The last element of the Macedonian king’s
armada was a single Macedonian warship. Cleander also joined
Alexander’s forces at Sidon with a unit of 4,000 Greek mercenaries that
had been hired in the Peloponnese.120
In the spring of 332, while allied sea states gathered their forces at
Sidon, Alexander set out from that city on campaign against the Itureans,
who inhabited Mount Lebanon and were hampering his soldiers who were
collecting logs in this area. Some historians reckon that Alexander’s
expedition reached as far as the Bekaa Valley, but the sources only
mention an episode high up in the mountains, whose nights at that time of
year were bitterly cold. Curtius’s inaccurate claim that this expedition
occurred before the burning down of the towers and war engines on the
mole at Tyre is perhaps motivated by a desire to absolve Alexander for
this Macedonian failure. During his absence Alexander entrusted
command of the Tyre siege to Perdiccas and Craterus. For his expedition
he selected the best and fastest moving units – several ilai of cavalry,
hypaspists, Agrianians and archers – which suggest that he was expecting
120 Arr., An. , 2.19.6-20.3; Duris, FGrH, 76 F12; Curt., 4.2.11; Plu., Alex. , 24.4-5, 29.2-6, 32.10; Plu., mor. , 334d-e; It. Alex. , 42. Bosworth 1980, pp. 241-244;
Seibert 1985, pp. 80-82; Heckel 2006, pp. 224, 239.
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189
stiff resistance. No doubt his caution was well justified for, despite
numerous pacifications, the region was still plagued by bandits in Roman
times. There was an incident during this expedition that yet again
demonstrated Alexander’s courage and bravado. His main units had
dispersed into this dangerous territory but the king decided to stay behind
with a small unit of soldiers and accompany Lysimachus, for his now aged
teacher’s strength had failed him. Dusk fell and his small detachment
faced the prospect of spending a bitterly cold night without a fire.
Alexander therefore decided to creep up on the enemy, who had fires
burning. He stabbed two of the barbarians to death and returned to his men
with a lighted brand from the enemy’s fire. In this way the Macedonians
were able to light a huge fire, which terrified some of the Itureans and
caused them to flee. The rest of the enemy were defeated in a nigh-time
skirmish. The sources provide no further information regarding the results
of this ten-day military campaign.121
In response to the Tyrian counterattack and the damage caused by
waves Alexander ordered the mole to be widened and new towers to be
constructed nearer its centre, so that they would be beyond the reach of
missiles fired from Tyrian ships. These works were carried out while
Alexander was away in Sidon and later on his expedition in Mount
Lebanon. A breakwater of tree trunks was constructed around the mole,
which was particularly important in the winter season, when sea storms
could easily destroy a construction raised with such difficulty. The greater
width of the mole offered the Macedonian soldiers better protection
against surprise attacks. Trees dragged down from the hills were used as
building material in their entirety and thrown into the sea whole, their
roots weighted down with stones. Unfortunately, the defenders soon found
a new method of counterattacking: they sent divers to release the stones
from the roots of these trees so that the timber floated up to the surface and
thus broke up the mole’s building structure. Curtius writes that in face of
these mounting problems Alexander considered giving up on the siege, but
eventually he resolved to continue it with the aid of his fleet. Besides,
despite everything, the engineering work was making progress. After some
time the walls of Tyre found themselves within the firing range of
Macedonian siege engines on wooden towers now constructed at the end
of the farther extended mole.122
1
21 Plu., Alex. , 24.10-14 (after Chares, FGrH, 125 F7); Curt., 4.3.1; Arr., An. , 2.20.4; Polyaen., 4.3.4. Bosworth 1980, p. 244; Seibert 1985, p. 82; Eph’al 1988, p.
148.
122 Diod., 17.42.6-7; Curt., 4.3.8-11.
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Some time after his return from the expedition against the Itureans
Alexander ordered the fleet gathered at Sidon to sail for Tyre. These ships
were instructed to sail in battle formation with hypaspists on board.
Therefore clearly Alexander’s intention was to fight a sea battle against
the weaker Tyrian fleet. He personally commanded the right wing and
entrusted the left wing to Craterus and Pnytagoras of Salamis. The Tyrians
did initially wish to engage Alexander’s fleet in battle, but when they
realised that this fleet included the mighty Phoenician and Cypriot
squadrons, they sensibly decided to stay in harbour blocking the entrance
with several rows of triremes. Alexander tried a feint attack to lure the
ships out to sea, but to no avail. The most Alexander’s fleet could do was
to sink three of the most protruding Tyrian triremes. Moreover, the
Macedonian side also suffered losses; on top of the city fortifications the
Tyrians cruelly murdered some Macedonian hostages as their compatriots
helplessly looked on from the sea. However, although the sea operation
against Tyre was not spectacularly successful, it did at least stop the
Tyrian ships from hampering the work of the besiegers.123
However, the Tyrian defenders remained active. Soon they repaired the
parts of the city wall that had incurred damage and raised their own
wooden towers to fire missiles at the Macedonians on the mole. The
defenders used a number of ingenious machines and discovered ever
newer ways of weakening the enemy’s power to attack. They fired rope-
fastened metal tridents into the besiegers’ shields which were next
violently pulled away to leave the enemy exposed or catapulted them
together with the shield to a certain death. Tyrians captured other
Macedonians on the mole with hooks or simple nets fired from a war
engine called the crow. They lessened the impact of battering rams by
literally lowering cushions in the place where they struck the wall and
cutting the ropes from which the battering log was suspended with sickles
attached to long poles. Metal tipped spears fired from Tyrian war engines
also damaged the rigging of the enemy’s ships and wounded those on
board. A simpler but awfully effective weapon in this cruel war was to
pour blistering hot sand on the Macedonian soldiers below, which once it
got beneath their armour caused unbearable pain. Large stones had been
hurled into the sea to prevent the Macedonian ships from getting too close
to the city, and it was with the greatest of effort, under fire from the city
wall, that that these stones had to be removed by Macedonian divers so as
to clear the waterway. Tyrian divers, on the other hand, caused chaos in
the Macedonian fleet by cutting the anchor cables, which consequently
123 Arr., An. , 2.20.6-10, 2.24.3; Diod., 17.43.3; Curt., 4.3.11-12. Bosworth 1980, pp.
244-246.
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191
had to be replaced with chains. All such measures further prolonged the
siege, forcing Alexander to once again consider whether there was any
sense in continuing it. The stiff resistance of the Tyrians as well as that
awkwardness of the topography meant that the siege lasted until the
summer and the final storming of the city did not occur until the end of
July or even early August.124
The Tyrians tried their luck once more in the open sea with a surprise
attack on the Cypriot ships that lay anchored blocking their northern (so-
called Sidon) harbour. They chose to attack at midday, when the enemy
was less watchful and there was practically no one on deck. Earlier they
had also screened off the harbour mouth with canvas and now their ships
sailed out silently without the steersmen calling the oarsmen to keep in
time. The Tyrian squadron, which included modern quad- and
quinqueremes, were initially very successful against the moored Cypriot
vessels, sinking many including the flagships of Pnytagoras of Salamis
and Androcles of Amathus. Their luck turned, however, when an alerted
Alexander, who had been stationed on the southern side of the mole, sailed
with some hastily gathered quinqueremes and several smaller ships to
counterattack the enemy while they were still engaged in sinking the
Cypriot vessels. The Tyrians now had to save themselves by returning into
the harbour. Although the Tyrians lost only two ships and had inflicted
much heavier losses on the enemy, their strategic situation must have now
radically deteriorated. The sources make no further mention of the
defenders being able to challenge Macedonian dominance at sea.125
Once the Tyrian fleet was confined to port and no longer was able to
hamper Macedonian actions, Alexander gave the order to attack. Under the
cover of fire from Macedonian catapults, the mole was extended right up
to the island. Meanwhile Macedonian, Cypriot and Phoenician engineers
constructed yet more siege engines, some of which were mounted on
transport ships and triremes, the intention being to attack from both land
and sea. This first attack ended in failure: on the mole’s side the city’s
mighty wall proved too strong for Macedonian battering rams. Nor did the
seaborne attack from north bring any success. From the southern side
seaborne siege engines on ships did manage to destroy part of the wall and
the Macedonians did lower draw bridges in an attempt to get in through
124 Arr., An. , 2.21.1-7; Diod., 17.43.5-45.7; Curt., 4.3.13-4.1; Fragmentum
Sabbaiticum, FGrH, 151 F1.7.
125 There are two accounts differing in details: Arr., An. , 2.21.8-22.5 and Curt.,
4.4.6-9; better being that of Arrian, Atkinson 1980, pp. 309-310. A hypothesis was
formulated about two sea battles, both won by Alexander: Abramenko 1992.
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the breach, but this attack was also repelled. Moreover, a storm next
damaged some of the siege engine bearing vessels.126
The final assault commenced after a two-day respite when the sea had
calmed down. With no winds the siege engines mounted on ships could be
effectively used against the city wall, which was considerably weaker
from the side facing the sea. This was the 29th day of a Macedonian month
that is not named in the sources, but according the Athenian calendar it
would have been Hekatombaion, i.e. July/August. Therefore the assault
would have most probably occurred in the early August of 332. The
Macedonians attacked from all sides and their battering rams managed to
destroy a considerable section of the wall. Bridges were thrown over to
this breach and elite detachments of hypaspists and phalangites
commanded by Coenus landed. The remaining ships sailed round the
island with archers on board firing at the defenders to distract them from
the main thrust of attack. Alexander himself together with some hypaspists
scaled the city’s
wall from a tower on one of the ships and thence, via the
royal palace, reached the city. At the same time Phoenician ships broke
into the southern harbour while Cypriot ships entered the northern harbour
and their respective crews started occupying the city from both sides.
Paradoxically the only side where the sources record no breach was from
the mole which had been built with such great effort. Realising that the
enemy had entered the city from several directions, the Tyrians rallied to a
part of the city called Agenorion. But even there they were unable to
withstand the onslaught of Alexander and his hypaspists. Enraged by the
difficulties they had had to endure in the long siege, the Macedonians now
set about massacring the stubborn city’s inhabitants. The number of
Tyrians killed has been estimated from 6,000 (Curtius) to 8,000 (Arrian),
with another 2,000 said to have been crucified on the mainland coast.
Probably rather 13,000 (Diodorus) than 30,000 (Arrian) inhabitants were
allegedly taken into slavery. The Sidonians, however, took pity on their
compatriots and saved 15,000 Tyrians by taking them on board their ships.
The victor’s mercy was only shown to King Azemilcus, some Tyrian
dignitaries and envoys from Carthage, who had all sought refuge in the
Temple of Melqart. The only available information regarding the size of
Macedonian losses for the entire siege and the two major assaults on the
city is 400 soldiers killed: it comes from Arrian and therefore probably has
126 Arr., An. , 2.22.6-7; Curt., 4.3.13-18; Diod., 17.43.6-44.5. Bosworth 1980, pp.
250-251.
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as much to do with reality as all the other figures provided by this
author.127
Military historians give Alexander high notes for the siege of the
seemingly impregnable fortress defended by skilful and determined
citizens. The capture of mighty Tyre was an earthshaking event in this part
of the world, even recorded in the Bible as a prophesy in the second part of