Delphi Complete Works of Quintus Curtius Rufus

by Quintus Curtius Rufus

  Such was the end of the greatest king of his time. He had made the kingdom of Macedonia powerful; he had subdued the barbarians by which it was surrounded; he had imposed his yoke upon Greece; the leaders whom he had sent in advance had already crossed into Asia. Olympias, on hearing of the king’s death, compelled Cleopatra to hang herself (Justin ix. 7.10). She burned to death the child born of Cleopatra a few days before the death of its father, and vented her rage upon all her rival’s relatives and dependants.

  Alexander, in whose absence his mother had done these things, appeared in time for quieting such tempests, like a helpful star; for the Greeks whom Philip had subjected were aroused to the hope of liberty, the barbarians in the neighbourhood of Macedonia were rioting, and not even the affairs of Macedonia itself were tranquil. Alexander put Attalus to death through Hecataeus and Parmenion (Diod xvii. 5. 2), and got rid of other aspirants to the throne except Alexander Lyncestes, whom he spared for the time because he had been the first to salute him as king, and kept in prison for three years (Curt vii. 1. 8). The frequent quarrels which Alexander had had with Philip led to the suspicion that he had by a verse from the tragedy of Medea “inspired Pausanias to murder Philip (Plut. Alex x. 4); but Alexander threw the blame upon the Persians in a letter to Darius, in which he accused him of hiring assassins to slay his father (Arr ii. 14. 5; Curt, iv. 1. 12). To efface this suspicion, Alexander planned, shortly before his death, to build a magnificent temple in honour of Philip (Diod xviii. 4. 5), but his successors neglected his order, although they found it in his Memoirs among many other directions.

  In order to carry out his plans, Alexander thought it most important to retain the leadership of Greece which Philip had held. Hastily leading out his army, he unexpectedly burst into Thessaly. Some of the Thessalians had taken courage and by seising the narrow pass at Tempi had blocked the approach from Macedonia. For Olympus and Ossa separate those regions, and between their slopes flows the river Peneus, which because of its charm merits the annual sacrifices of the race. A narrow pass extends for about five miles (Plin. N.H. iv. 8 (31,32); Livy xliv. 6. 8), hardly allowing passage for a single loaded mule, and capable of being defended by ten men against any number of the enemy. This pass Alexander penetrated by cutting steps in the side of Mount Ossa, and by his rapidity so terrified all the Thessalians that without opposition they gave him the rule of the entire race along with all their rights and revenues under the same conditions that Philip had enjoyed (Diod xvii. 4. 1 ff.; Justin xi. 3). He gave immunity to Phthia because it was the birthplace of Achilles, the founder of his family, and he said that he chose that hero as his ally and fellow-soldier on his expedition against the Persians.

  From Thessaly he went to Thermopylae, the meeting-place of the general assembly of Greece — they call it Pylaic (Livy xxxi. 35. 8, ci. Pylaïcus conventus, xxxi. 32. 3, 5), where he was appointed chief commander of the Greeks. He ordered ratification of the freedom of the Ambraciots (Diod l c.). which they had recovered, by driving out a garrison of Macedonians, saying that he would have restored it of his own accord if they had not anticipated him by a few days. Then he led his army to Thebes, and having broken the obstinacy of the Boeotians and Athenians, who especially had opposed his plans, he ordered the envoys of the Greeks to meet him at Corinth (Diod l c.; Justin xi. 2. 4). There the decree of the Amphictyons was confirmed, by a unanimous vote he was appointed Commander of the Greeks in place of his father Philip, and help was voted for the Persian war. In the Craneion, a suburb of Corinth, where there is a cypress grove, the philosopher Diogenes, of Sinopê, was sunning himself. When Alexander gave him the privilege of asking for anything he wished, Diogenes asked that the king and his followers should move a little and not shut out his sunlight (Plut. Alex xiv. 3; Arr vii. 2. 1)

  Whereupon Alexander is reported to have said: “I should wish to be Diogenes, if I were not Alexander.”

  From the Peloponnesus Alexander went to Delphi, to consult Apollo about the result of the war which he had in mind, but the prophetic maid said that it was not lawful to approach the god at that time. Thereupon Alexander seized her and tried to drag her to the temple, and when she said: “Thou art invincible, my son,” he said that he accepted the omen and asked for no other oracle (Plut. Alex’, xiv. 4). After quickly accomplishing these things and returning to his kingdom, he devoted himself with great seal to avenging the insult to the prestige of the Macedonians. Having prepared everything, in the early spring he set out from Amphipolis against the free nations of Thrace and came to Mount Haemus. A great band of Thracians had taken possession of the height, in order to block the king’s passage. They had surrounded their camp with wagons in the manner of a rampart, intending to launch them upon the Macedonians, if they attacked them (Arr i. 1. 6). Alexander, seeing their plan (Arr i. 1. 8; Polyaen. Strat iv. 2. 11), directed his soldiers, when the wagons rushed upon them, to part the phalanx and let them pass through without doing harm; or if any of them should be caught, to lie flat on the ground under a covering of shields held close together. Hence the enemy’s plan failed, and all that tempest passed with only thunder. Then the Macedonians, freed from fear, charged up the hill and scattered the enemy. Some 1500 were killed and great booty was taken.

  Then Alexander advanced into the interior of Thrace, where there is a grove consecrated to Father Liber (Macr. Saturn, i. 18). There and at Mount Libethrus, in the country of the Odrysae, omens foretold the greatness of Alexander (cf. Suet. Aug. 94. 5). He next attacked the Triballi, whose king Syrmus had taken refuge in Peucê, an island in the Danube (Arr i. 2. 2). Alexander was unable to reach him for want of ships, but attacked and defeated another army of the Triballi, killing 3000 men with a loss of only 50. He also attacked the Getae (Arr i. 3. 5) and defeated them. Then he erected altars to Jupiter, Hercules, and the Ister. Here envoys came to him from the neighbouring peoples and from King Syrrmus, bringing gifts of the things which they regard as most valuable. The Germans, too, who occupy the lands extending from the sources of the Ister to the Adriatic, had sent gifts; for the Ister rises in Germany and they call it by the native name Danube. Alexander, admiring their great size and active bodies, asked them what they feared most of all, thinking that his power was formidable to them and that he would force them to confess it. But they replied that they feared nothing greatly, except that the heavens might fall on them, but that they valued highly the friendship of brave men.

  Struck by the unexpected answer, he was silent for a moment, then merely saying: “Arrogant fellows, these Germans!” (Arr i. 4. 8), he made an alliance with them because they asked it. To Syrmus and the rest he gave peace. Then, thinking that he had acquired enough glory in that expedition, he turned all his thoughts to the war in Persia, where he hoped with less toil to gain a far greater reward for his labours. It is well known that his uncle Alexander (Molossus) thus taunted him, when he was tired a little later of making war in Italy; he said that it had been his lot to fight with men, the Macedonians’, with women (Gell xvii. 21. 33; some attribute this saying to Pyrrhus). The princes of Thrace, and others who seemed strong enough to revolt, Alexander led away, under guise of honour, as if he were enrolling them as fellow-soldiers against the Persians (Front. Strat ii. 11. 3), and in this manner he removed the chiefs of the factions, which could do nothing without their leaders (Justin xi. 5. 3). As he was returning to Macedonia, fresh disturbances broke out among the Autariates and Taulantii, which were put down after a hard struggle (Arr i. 5-6).

  Meanwhile the rumour spread over all Greece that Alexander had been slain in the country of the Triballi (Arr i. 7.2; Justin xi. 2. 8), and the report was confirmed by an alleged eye-witness of his death. Encouraged by this rumour, some Thebans who had been exiled by Philip, led by Phoenix and Prothytes, slew the commanders of the Macedonian garrison which was holding the Cadmea, who had gone outside of the citadel because they had no suspicion of treachery (Arr i. 7) The citizens, hastily embracing the apparent opportunity of freeing their country, laid siege to the garr
ison (Diod xvii. 8. 3) and surrounded the Cadmea with a double wall and trench, in order that neither supplies nor aid could be furnished. Then, sending envoys in the garb of suppliants to the Greek cities, they begged them not to think of failing those who were seeking the liberty which had been shamefully snatched from them. And Demosthenes induced the Athenians because of their old-time hatred of the Macedonians promptly to vote aid. Yet this was not sent, because, alarmed by the sudden arrival of Alexander, they thought it best to wait for the decision of Fortune. Demosthenes, however, aided the Thebans with his private means and supplied without cost a great amount of arms (Plut. Dem xx. 4f; xxiii. T). With these those from whom Philip had taken their arms were thoroughly equipped and, vigorously attacked the garrison of the Cadmea.

  A strong force of Peloponnesians had gathered at the Isthmus, and although Antipater, to whom the king had given charge of Macedonia during his absence, had sent to ask them not, contrary to the general decree of Greece, to join with the professed enemies of Alexander, they nevertheless admitted the envoys of the Thebans. And although the common soldiers were moved by pity, their leader, Astylus, an Arcadian by race, caused delay, not so much because he was alarmed by the difficulty of the undertaking, as through avarice, in order that he might receive a greater bribe from the haste and anxiety of the Thebans. Ten talents were demanded, and when the Thebans did not pay this, that sum was offered by the men of the Macedonian party as the price of remaining quiet. Hence the hope of the Thebans of aid from the Arcadians came to nothing. Nevertheless Demosthenes by bribery prevented other forces from the Peloponnesus from fighting against the Thebans; few he was said to have received 300 talents from the Persians with which to make trouble for Alexander (Plut. Demos, xx. 4 f.; Justin xi. 2. 7).

  When these things were announced, Alexander made haste with his army, and on the seventh day after leaving Pelium came to Pelleni, a town of Thessaly, and six days later into Boeotia; presently he came to Onchestus, about six miles from Thebes. Meanwhile the Thebans, managing affairs with greater courage than prudence, were unaware of all this; for while they believed that the Macedonian forces were within Pylae, they considered it so incredible that the king was coming, that they said that another Alexander, son of Aëropus, was commanding the army (Arr i. 7. 6). The king encamped at the shrine of Iolaiis, which is before the gate called Proetis, and had decided to give the Thebans time for repentance; whereupon they made a sally and attacked the pickets of the Macedonians, killing some and putting the rest to flight. They even penetrated the camp, but were repulsed by a light-armed band sent by order of the king. On the following day the king moved his army to the gate facing Attica, in order to be at hand for his countrymen shut up in the citadel, but he still delayed and offered pardon if the Thebans would repent.

  But those who wished peace were overcome by the power of the exiles and of those by whom they had been recalled; having no hope of life if the Macedonians got possession of the city, they preferred that their fatherland should be ruined rather than purchase its safety with their death; and they brought some of the Boeotarchs to side with them. How great their madness was can be seen from this, that when Alexander demanded that they give up the ringleaders of the revolt, and by two lives expiate all the wrongdoing of their city, they had the assurance to demand in turn Philotas and Antipater, the king’s principal friends (Plut. Alex. 11), and to proclaim through a herald that if any, in company with the great king and the Thebans, wished to maintain the freedom of the Greeks against the tyrant, they would find a refuge in Thebes.

  Nevertheless the city was not attacked by Alexander’s order, but as Ptolemy has reported (Arr i. 8. l) — for some tell a different story — Perdiccas, who was in command at the part of the camp opposite the stockade of the enemy by which the Cadmea was enclosed, attacked them without waiting for the signal, and Amyntas, who was stationed next to him, followed his example. Then Alexander, fearing for his men, appeared with the whole mass of his troops, and having ordered the light-armed soldiers to break through and aid their comrades, halted with the rest before the stockade. A fierce conflict followed; Perdiccas, while attacking the inner wall, was carried off the field, badly wounded (Arr i. 8. 3) and many of the Cretan archers fell, along with their leader Eurybotas. The Thebans pressed after them and followed them in their flight to Alexander. There, when the king with the phalanx drawn up charged the scattered and disordered ranks of the Thebans, the fortune of the battle changed, and such was the confusion of the Thebans that they did not even close the gates of the city, and at the same time those who were holding the Cadmea rushed out into the streets below the citadel. Thus the most famous city of Greece was attacked and taken in the same day. No example of cruelty was omitted; men and women were slaughtered indiscriminately; not even children were spared. This inhumanity was due to the people of Phoeis, Plataea, Orchomenus, and Thespiae, to whom the might of the neighbouring city, in the days of its power, had been destructive; the Macedonians did nothing in violation of the laws of war (Arr i. 8. 8; Diod xvii. 13. 5).

  At length, when already 6000 had perished, the order to cease from carnage was given. The entire booty amounted to 440 talents, according to Clearchus; others say that that was the sum made from the sale of the prisoners. Alexander took the 100 talents which the Thessalians owed the Thebans. A few who had opposed war escaped slavery; so also priests (Plut. Alex xi. 6), and those whose hospitality Alexander or his father had enjoyed. Of the rest, Timoclea (Plut. Alex xii.; Polyaen. Strat viii. 40) gained the reward of liberty for a famous deed, as well as renown among future generations. A general of cavalry, serving with Alexander, having violated her, asked her where she hid her most precious treasures. She showed him a well, and when the man looked into it, she pushed him in and threw rocks upon him. When she was taken before Alexander to be punished, he, on hearing the case, pardoned her and gave her freedom along with all her relatives. He also spared the descendants of Pindar, because that poet had praised his ancestor Alexander in his Odes, and he forbade the destruction of Pindar’s house (Arr i. 9. 10; Plut. Alex xi. 6).

  The destruction of Thebes was foretold by many portents (Diod xvii. 10. 2 ff.); but having in mind the glory of their ancestors, the Thebans nevertheless opposed Alexander with an inferior force. Having taken the city, Alexander referred to the council of the allies what its fate should be (Justin xi. 3. 8). Through the influence of the Phocians and of many Boeotians who had suffered from the Thebans, the walls and buildings of the city mere destroyed, and its territory was divided among the victors. Thus a single day took from the midst of Greece the birthplace, not only of famous men, but also of gods (Justin xi.4. 4), nearly 800 years after the oracle of the crows (Diod xix. 53. 8) which led to its foundation. The city was razed to the ground to the music of the flute, as Lysander had razed the long walls of Athens sixty years before (Plut. Lys xv. 4). Thebes was rebuilt by Cassander, son of Antipater, twenty years later through hatred of Alexander (Diod xix. 54. T). Alexander himself repented of having destroyed the city (Plut. Alex xiii. 2) and attributed to the anger of Bacchus the murder of Clitus and the mutiny of the Macedonians in India; some even believed that his death was caused by excessive wine and hence was due to the vengeance of Bacchus.

  After this, Alexander sent envoys to the Athenians, demanding that they should surrender the orators who had so often roused them to revolt against the Macedonians (Arr i. 10. 4; Plut. Phocion xvii. 2). Phocion urged them to consent, but Demosthenes opposed such action (Plut. Dem xxiii. 4). Demosthenes had offended the Macedonians in many ways, and Athens had committed many sins, especially by her friendship for Thebes. Yet Alexander spared them at the appeal of Demades (Plut. Dem xxiii. 5), insisting only on the banishment of Charidemus (Arr i. 10. (1); he went to the Persians, and was of great use to them until he was killed by order of Darius because of too great freedom of speech (Curt iii. 2.10-19). Other Athenians through hatred of Alexander left the city [Curt iii. 13. 15). After this and after the taking of Leucadia (Front.
Strat iii. 4. 5), none dared to resist him. Ambassadors came from the Peloponnesus to congratulate him on his victories over the barbarians and also on having punished the insolence of some Greeks. The Aetolians also sent excuses, because when there had been such great disturbances in Greece, their own people had not wholly abstained from new plans. The Megarians made Alexander a citizen, at first to the amusement of himself and his friends (Sen. De Benef i. 13. 1); but when he learned that they had conferred that honour previously only upon Hercules, he accepted it with joy. He pardoned the rest of the Greeks, but since he especially distrusted the Spartans, he restored the children of Psilias to Messenê, from which they had been banished; he gave Pellene, a town of Achaia, to Chaeron, and placed in Sicyon and in several other cities of the Peloponnesus creatures of his, to keep watch on the Spartans. All these things were quickly accomplished. On being once asked how he had been able to subdue Greece, he replied: “By putting off nothing to to-morrow” (Schol ad Hom. Iliad. B).

  BOOK II

  At that time Darius was king of the Persians, raised to that eminence shortly before the death of Philip by a eunuch named Bagoas, who, after destroying King Ochus and then his son Arses with their whole house, made a gift of the rule which he could not claim for himself, imagining that he would have lasting favour with one whom he had put under obligation by so great a service (Diod xvii. 5- 3 ff.; Arr ii. 14. 5). And Darius was not regarded among his people as unworthy of that fortune; for he was related to the royal family. In fact, Ostanes, the uncle of Ochus, had begotten Arsanes, and Arsanes Codomannus, which was the name of Darius before he became king. But when he had been placed upon the throne of Cyrus, in accordance with a custom of the Persians (Hdt vi. 98; Justin x. 3. 5) he gave up his former name and wished to be called Darius. Also distinguished in war (Diod l c.), he had challenged and slain an enemy when Ochus was waging war with the Cadusii, and thus gained a reputation for valour. He was the tenth ruler of Persia after Cyrus, the founder of the kingdom; for Ochus had succeeded his father Artaxerxes (Mnemon), Artaxerxes succeeded Darius, to whom Artaxerxes (Macrochir), son of Xerxes, had left the throne, and Xerxes had received it from his father Darius. As for this Darius, he was the son of Hystaspes, and after the house of Cyrus had come to an end in the person of Cambyses, he wrested the rule from the Magi by a conspiracy formed by seven distinguished Persians (Hdt in. 60; Amm xxiii. 6. 36, note; on the names of the kings see Nepos xxi. 1. 2 ff.).