Delphi Complete Works of Quintus Curtius Rufus

by Quintus Curtius Rufus

  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.

  Ea res Alexandrum dividere copias coegit et, ne segniter adsidere uni urbi videretur, operi Perdiccan Crateronque praefecit, ipse cum expedita manu Arabiam petiit. [2] Inter haec Tyrii navem magnitudine eximia saxis harenaque a puppi oneratam, ita ut multum prora emineret, bitumine ac sulphure inlitam remis concitaverunt, et, cum magnam vim venti vela quoque concepissent, celeriter ad molem successit. [3] Tum prora eius accensa remiges desiluere in scaphas, quae ad hoc ipsum praeparatae sequebantur, navis autem igne concepto latius fundere incendium coepit, quod, priusquam posset occurri, turres et cetera opera in capite molis posita conprehendit. [4] At qui desiluerant in parva navigia, faces et, quidquid alendo igni aptum erat, in eadem opera ingerunt. Iamque non imae modo Macedonum turres, sed etiam summa tabulata conceperant [p. 50] ignem, cum ii, qui in turribus erant, partim haurirentur incendio, partim armis omissis in mare semet ipsi inmitterent. [5] At Tyrii, qui capere eos quam interficere mallent, natantium manus stipitibus saxisque lacerabant, [6] donec debilitati inpune navigiis excipi possent. Nec incendio solum opera consumpta, sed forte eodeni die vehementior ventus motum ex profundo mare inlisit in molem, crebrisque fluctibus conpages operis verberatae laxavere se, saxaque interfluens unda medium opus rupit. [7] Prorutis igitur lapidum cumulis, quibus iniecta terra sustinebatur, praeceps in profundum ruit, tantaeque molis vix ulla vestigia invenit Arabia rediens Alexander. Hic, quod in adversis rebus solet fieri, alius in alium culpam referebant, cum omnes verius de saevitia maris queri possent. [8] Rex novi operis molem orsus in adversum ventum non latere, sed recta fronte direxit: ea cetera opera velut sub ipsa latentia tuebatur: latitudinem quoque aggeri adiecit, ut turres in medio excitatae procul teli iactu abessent. [9] Totas autem arbores cum ingentibus ramis in altum iaciebant, deinde saxis onerabant rursusque cumulo eorum alias arbores iniciebant, tum humus aggerebatur: superque alia strue saxorum arborumque cumulate velut quodam nexu continens opus iunxerant. Nee Tyrii, [10] quidquid ad inpediendam molem excogitari poterat, segniter exequebantur. Praecipuum auxilium erat, qui procul hostium conspectu subibant aquam occultoque lapsu ad molem usque penetrabant, falcibus palmites arborum eminentium ad se trahentes. Quae ubi secutae erant, pleraque secum in profundum [p. 51] dabant: tum levatos onere stipites truncosque arborum haud aegre moliebantur, deinde totum opus, quod stipitibus fuerat innixum, fundamento lapso sequebatur. [11] Aegro animi Alexandro nec, perseveraret an abiret, satis certo classis Cypro advenit eodemque tempore Cleander cum Graecis militibus in Asiam nuper advectis. e et XC navigia in duo dividit cornua: laevum Pnytagoras, rex Cypriorum, cum Cratero tuebatur, Alexandrum in dextro quinqueremis regia vehebat. [12] Nee Tyrii, quamquam classem habebant, ausi navale inire certamen: tris omnino ante ipsa moenia opposuerunt, quibus rex invectus ipse eas demersit. [13] Postera die classe ad moenia admota undique tormentis et maxime arietum pulsu muros quatit: quos Tyrii raptim obstructis saxis refecerunt, interiorem quoque murum, ut, si prior fefellisset, illo se tuerentur, munire orsi. [14] Sed undique vis mali urguebat: mole intra teli iactum erant, classis moenia circumibat, terrestri simul navalique clade obruebantur. Quippe binas quadriremes Macedones inter se ita iunxerant, ut prorae cohaererent, puppes intervallo, quantum capere poterant, distarent: [15] hoc puppium intervallum antemnis asseribusque validis deligatis superque eos pontibus stratis, qui militem sustinerent, inpleverant. Sic instructas quadriremes ad urbem agebant: inde missilia in propugnantes ingerebantur tuto, quia proris miles tegebatur. [16] Media nox erat, cum classem sic, uti [p. 52] dictum est, paratam circumire muros iubet. Iamque naves urbi undique admovebantur, et Tyrii desperatione torpebant, cum subito spissae nubes intendere se caelo et, quidquid lucis internitebat, offusa caligine extinctum est. [17] Tum inhorrescens mare paulatim levari, deinde acriore vento concitatum fluctus ciere et inter se navigia conlidere. Iamque scindi coeperunt vincula, quibus conexae quadriremes erant, ruere tabulata et cum ingenti fragore in profundum secum milites trahere. [18] Neque enim conserta navigia ulla ope in turbido regi poterant: miles ministeria nautarum, remex militis officia turbabat, et, quod in eiusmodi casu accidit, periti ignaris parebant. Quippe gubernatores alias imperare soliti tum metu mortis iussa exequebantur. Tandem remis pertinacius everberatum mare veluti eripientibus navigia classicis cessit, adpulsaque sunt litori lacerata pleraque. [19] Isdem forte diebus Carthaginiensium legati XXX superveniunt, magis obsessis solacium quam auxilium. [20] Quippe domestico bello Poenos inpediri nec de imperio, sed pro salute dimicare nuntiabant. Syracusani tum Africam urebant et haud procul Carthaginis muris locaverant castra. Non tamen defecere animis Tyrii, quamquam ab ingenti spe destituti erant, sed coniuges liberosque devehendos Carthaginem tradiderunt, fortius, quidquid accideret, laturi, si carissimam sui partem extra sortem communis periculi habuissent. [21] Cumque unus e civibus in contione indicasset, oblatam esse per somnum sibi speciem Apollinis, quem eximia religione colerent, urbem deserentis molemque a Mace- [p. 53] donibus in salo iactam in silvestrem saltum esse mutatam, [22] quamquam auctor levis erat, tamen ad deteriora credenda proni metu aurea catena devinxere simulacrum araeque Herculis, cuius numini urbem dicaverant, inseruere vinculum quasi illo deo Apollinem retenturo. Syracusis id simulacrum devexerant Poeni et in maiore locaverant patria mu
ltisque aliis spoliis urbium a semet captarum non Carthaginem magis quam Tyrum ornaverant. [23] Sacrum quoque, quod equidem dis minime cordi esse crediderim, multis saeculis intermissum repetendi auctores quidam erant, ut ingenuus puer Saturno immolaretur — quod sacrilegium verius quam sacrum Carthaginienses a conditoribus traditum usque ad excidium urbis suae fecisse dicuntur — , ac nisi seniores obstitissent, quorum consilio cuncta agebantur, humanitatem dira superstitio vicisset. [24] Ceterum efficacior omni arte necessitas non usitata modo praesidia, sed quaedam etiam nova admovit. Namque ad inplicanda navigia, quae muros subibant, validos asseres funibus inligaverant, ut, cum tormento asseres promovissent, subito laxatis funibus inicerent. [25] Unci quoque et falces ex isdem asseribus dependentes aut propugnatores aut ipsa navigia lacerabant. Clipeos vero aereos multo igne torrebant, quos repletos fervida harena caenoque decocto e muris subito devolvebant. [26] Nec ulla pestis magis timebatur: quippe ubi inter loricam corpusque fervens harena penetraverat, nec ulla vi excuti poterat [p. 54] et, quidquid attigerat, perurebat, iacientesque arma laceratis omnibus, quis protegi poterant, vulneribus inulti patebant. Corvi vero et ferreae manus tormento remissae plerosque rapiebant.

  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. Not 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.

  Just when Alexander was feeling discouraged, and was not quite certain whether to continue the siege or to withdraw, a fleet arrived from Cyprus, and at the same time Cleander came with the Greek soldiers which had recently been transported to Asia. These 120 ships Alexander divided into two wings; of the left Pnytagoras, king of the Cypriotes, and Craterus had command, on the right the royal five-banker carried Alexander. The Tyrians, although they had a fleet, did not dare to risk a sea-fight; to oppose the enemy, they placed in position only three ships, directly before the walls, and these the king himself rammed and sank.

  [13] On the following day, Alexander, bringing his fleet up to the city’s defences, shattered the walls on every side with artillery, and in particular by the battering of rams. The Tyrians hastily repaired the breaches by blocking them with rocks, and began also to build an inner wall, in order to protect themselves with this, if the first wall failed them. But the power of misfortune was pressing them on every side; the causeway was advanced within spear-range of the walls, which were also surrounded by the fleet; they were being overwhelmed by disaster on sea and on land. For the Macedonians had joined four-bankers together in pairs, in such a way that while their prows were united, the sterns were as far apart as it was possible to have them; this space between the sterns they had filled with yards of ships and strong beams bound together, and upon them had built platforms, as a standing-place for soldiers. These four-bankers, thus equipped, they rowed up to the city; from them missiles were showered upon the defenders with safety, since the soldiers were protected by the prows.

  It was in the middle of the night when Alexander gave orders for the fleet, prepared as described, to encircle the walls. And already the ships were moving towards the city from every side, and the Tyrians were paralysed with despair, when suddenly thick clouds spread over the heavens, and whatever light penetrated them was shut out by a widespread mist. Then a rough sea began to rise by degrees, and soon, urged on by a more violent wind, stirred up billows, and the craft dashed against one another. And already the bonds by which the four-bankers were fastened together began to be torn apart, the platforms to break up and with a mighty roar to drag the soldiers with them into the deep. For the ships, when joined together, could not in any way be managed in such a time of disorder; the soldiers disturbed the work of the sailors, the oarsmen the duties of the soldiers, and, as usually happens in such a crisis, the skilful obeyed the ignorant. For the helmsmen, who at other times were wont to take command, then through fear of death did what they were ordered. At last the sea, lashed with greater vigour by the oars, yielded to the sailors, who were rescuing the ships as if by main force, and the vessels were brought to the shore, for the most part badly damaged.

  It chanced that in those same days thirty Carthaginian envoys arrived, rather a consolation to the besieged than a help. For they announced that the Carthaginians were involved in a war at home and were fighting, not for dominion, but for their lives.

  At that time the Syracusans were devastating Africa and had pitched their camp not far from the walls of Carthage. Nevertheless the Tyrians did not lose courage, in spite of being abandoned by this great hope, but entrusted to the envoys their wives and children to be taken to Carthage, being ready to bear more bravely whatever might befall them if they could keep their dearest treasures without share in the common peril. And when one of their citizens declared in a public assembly that a vision of Apollo, whom they worshipped with special veneration, had appeared to him in his sleep as deserting the city, and that, the causeway which the Macedonians had constructed in the sea had changed into a forest tract, [22]
although the author of the tale was a man of slight importance, yet, inclined through fear to believe the worst, they bound the statue of Apollo with a chain of gold to its base, and attached the chain to the altar of Hercules, to whose divine power they had dedicated their city, supposing that that god would hold Apollo back. The Carthaginians had carried off that statue from Syracuse and had placed it in their ancestral fatherland, and with many other spoils of the cities which they had captured they had adorned lyre rather than Carthage.

  [23] Some even proposed renewing a sacrifice which had been discontinued for many years, and which I for my part should believe to be by no means pleasing to the gods, of offering a freeborn boy to Saturn — this sacrilege rather than sacrifice, handed down from their founders, the Carthaginians are said to have Performed until the destruction of their city — and unless the elders, in accordance with whose counsel everything was done, had opposed it, the awful only the usual means of defence, but also some novel ones. For in order to catch in their toils the ships which came up close under the walls, they had bound stout beams to ropes, so that when they had thrown forward these beams with a hurling-engine, they might suddenly, while the ropes ran slack, drop the beams upon the ships. Hooks also and scythes hanging from those same beams lacerated either the attackers or the ships themselves. Moreover, the Tyrians heated brazen shields in a great fire, and after filling them with hot sand and boiling filth hurled [26] them down from the walls. And no plague was more feared than this; for when the burning-hot sand had made its way between the coat-of-mail and the body, it could not be shaken out by any effort and burned through whatever it had touched; and the soldiers, throwing away their arms and tearing to bits everything by which they could be protected, were exposed to wounds without being able to retaliate. Besides this, ravens and iron claws, released by hurling-engines, carried off many.