Alexander the Great

CHAPTER 11 TREASON!

Alexander did not have a moment to lose.

In two battles he had tried his hardest to kill or capture Darius, but each time the man had slipped through his fingers. It was obvious that the war was won, and should be over and done with. Instead, he was obliged to chase after the Great King wherever he was. The Macedonian army needed to move fast if it was to catch him. If too much time passed, Darius might be able to raise a third army from the eastern satrapies, which so far had made only a minor contribution in the field.

Why, then, did Alexander linger so long in Persepolis? He had arrived in January and did not leave until late May or June.

—

THE ANSWER TO THE PUZZLE lies in the terrain the Macedonians would have to cross before reaching their next destination. That was Ecbatana (today’s Hamadan), capital of the northern province of Media and the empire’s fourth great city, where the imperial family spent their summers. The route lay through a high pass in the Zagros range, snowbound and all but impassable in winter months.

Obtaining supplies in this desolate landscape, much of which was uninhabited in ancient times, was another challenge. In March 330, Alexander led a small exploratory force of a thousand cavalry and a few light infantry to face down a hostile tribe, the Mardi, and almost certainly to arrange food depots.

They had a terrible time of it. The rank-and-file soldiers clamored to go back to the comforts of Persepolis. Curtius, always well informed on geographical matters, writes that the king, leading from the front as usual,

jumped from his horse and proceeded to make his way on foot through the snow and hard-packed ice. His friends were ashamed not to follow him and the feeling spread to his officers, and, finally, the men. The king was the first to clear a way for himself, using an axe to break the ice, and then the others followed his example.

Once they had defeated the Mardi, the Macedonians returned to base after a month’s absence. The five-hundred-mile journey to Ecbatana lay across a rocky solitude of ice and snow, in many places three or four feet deep. Alexander accepted that he would be stuck at Persepolis until spring or the early summer. The only consolation was that Darius, reported to be at Ecbatana, would also be immobilized by winter.

—

DURING THE EMPTY MONTHS at Persepolis, Alexander had time to catch up on his correspondence. In the ancient western world, letters were scratched onto soft metal, such as lead, or onto wax-coated wooden boards. Papyrus was also available in quantity, presumably manufactured in Egypt and expensive. Trusted messengers would travel along the well-maintained highway that ran from the Persian capitals to the provinces of the west.

According to Plutarch, “It is astonishing that Alexander could find time to write so many letters to his friends.” Everyone of any importance in Greece and the former Persian empire will have had reason to communicate with the world conqueror, and he was snowed under by official inquiries, to which he would be obliged to reply when decisions were required. A secretary, an intelligent young Greek called Eumenes, managed the king’s correspondence. He had worked for Philip and had the rare virtue of being popular with Olympias.

The complicated issues Alexander had to adjudicate by long distance are well exemplified by the crisis at Eresos, a hill town by the sea on the island of Lesbos. It was a place of no importance, but its politics were savage. Alexander never went there, but found himself having to intervene by letter in its affairs more than once. During the 350s, three brothers seized power as joint tyrants (the word signified an authoritarian ruler but did not have pejorative connotations). At some point the brothers were expelled, and early in Alexander’s reign two new tyrants emerged who were pro-Persian.

After Granicus, Alexander had these men removed from office and (presumably) a democracy installed, but during Memnon’s brief but effective maritime campaign they were reinstated. Then the town was liberated again and the ci-devant tyrants were sent to Alexander, then in Egypt, for judgment. He sent them back, accompanied by a letter telling the people of Eresos to set up a court to decide themselves what should be done with them. This was arranged, the men were condemned to death and, it would appear, executed.

The family of the tyrant brothers now sent a delegation to ask the king to reinstate them. So Alexander wrote to Eresos about this. According to fragments of a marble inscription, the king ruled that

the people should decide whether or not they should be allowed to return; the people hearing the edict set up a court for them, in accordance with the law and the edict of king Alexander, and when speeches had been made on both sides decided that the law against the tyrants should be valid and that they should be exiled from the city.

Plutarch reports an instructive comment of the Roman emperor Augustus, who expressed his surprise that Alexander did not regard it as a greater task to set in order the empire he had won than to win it. The criticism does not appear to be well-founded. Although our sources pay scant attention to matters of governance, inscriptions found at the site of ancient cities, such as those from Eresos, suggest that the king took an active interest in administration. Either he personally, or his staff, kept a close eye on the political activity and legislation of local communities.

What is more, the attention the king gave to the logistics of a military campaign and his careful management of his soldiers’ welfare are evidence that he was a human-resources manager of the first order. We know too little of that aspect of his leadership skills to say much more.

—

ALEXANDER OFTEN CORRESPONDED WITH his mother, usually to fend off her many complaints. But she did also interest herself in his creature comforts: we are told that she urged her son to buy a slave of hers who was highly skilled at ritual cooking.

Like many of the king’s inner circle, Olympias could not stand Hephaestion, rival as he was for her son’s undivided love and attention. However, Hephaestion gave as good as he got. When she sent him threatening letters, he responded in high dudgeon: “Stop quarrelling with us and do not be angry or menacing. If you keep on, we won’t pay much attention. You know that Alexander means more to us than anything.” We can imagine the fury he aroused in Olympias by his use of the royal “we” with reference to himself. He surely meant to tease. He was certain of his place in his lover’s heart and could risk goading his impossible “mother-in-law.”

But the king did not allow him a completely free hand, for as a rule he kept Olympias’s letters to himself. Otherwise, they regularly went through the post together. On one occasion, though, Hephaestion’s eye fell on a missive from Olympias that had already been opened. Alexander let him read it, but took off his ring and pressed the seal to Hephaestion’s lips, “so much as to tell him not to say a word.”

Alexander liked to keep in touch with his friends and share the ups and downs of everyday life. He wrote to them fondly when they were away. They were all keen hunters, for whom any animal with legs was a fair target. He wrote to a Companion who had been bitten by a bear, complaining that everyone else had heard of the incident except for himself. “Now,” he went on, “you must write to tell me how you are, and whether you were let down by any of your fellow-huntsmen, so that I can punish them.” The sting in the tail was meant as a joke rather than a serious threat. The king had a heavy-handed sense of humor.

Another day he was out hunting a mongoose when Craterus accidentally wounded another general, Perdiccas, in the thigh. Alexander wrote to inform Hephaestion, who happened to be absent on a mission. Hephaestion was not well liked by his colleagues, but he and Perdiccas got on and the news must have worried him. The injured man survived.

Slavery was endemic in Mediterranean societies and domestic slaves were numberless. To be useful, they had to be allowed freedom of movement and, understandably, some took the opportunity to run away. The king somehow found time to help retrieve friends’ slaves. He ordered a search to be made for one runaway and sent a letter of congratulation on the discovery and arrest of another. In the case of a third, who had sought sanctuary in a temple, the king advised caution. The man should be lured out and not taken by force from a sacred precinct. The son of Zeus always respected the gods.

—

THE GREAT KING, WHILING AWAY the winter in Ecbatana, had no intention of giving up the struggle.

He had with him a substantial force (if much reduced from the usual multitude) of thirty thousand infantry. They included a fiercely loyal regiment of mercenary Greeks under the command of Patron, a man from the home of the Delphic oracle, Phocis. Alexander saw them as traitors, for they had fought against his Hellenic crusade. They would never be allowed home, and if captured they faced a bleak fate. They had no choice but to be steadfast.

Bessus, the able and energetic satrap of Bactria, led a formidable troop of 3,300 horse. Four thousand slingers and archers completed the complement.

This was not a large enough army to defeat the Macedonians in a third trial of arms, and the Great King sent round to the eastern satrapies calling for soldiers. He was awaiting the requested reinforcements.

But spring had arrived and with it reports that his nemesis was closing in. There was no alternative but to hurry off to the increasingly remote provinces of Hyrcania, Parthia, Bactriana, and Sogdiana. Space would buy time, and time would buy soldiers. But time would lose him soldiers, too, for withdrawal from Ecbatana opened important allies, the Cadusii and the Scythians, to Macedonian attack

At one point Darius ordered his army to veer off the military road a little, telling the camp followers and the men guarding the baggage to go on ahead. He then called a meeting of his council. Among its members were his chief executive officer or chiliarch, Nabarzanes, and Artabazus, who was the father of Alexander’s mistress Barsine but nevertheless a faithful servant of the Great King. Satraps from the east were also present.

The mood must have been gloomy, but everyone protested their loyalty. Below the surface, though, these high officials of empire were weighing their options. Darius’s withdrawal after Gaugamela had depressed morale, and Alexander’s obvious desire for continuity meant that jobs, position, life could be maintained under the new regime. Treason could be presented as being in the public interest.

Artabazus gave a rousing speech: “We shall follow our king into battle,” he said, “dressed in our richest robes and equipped with our finest armor.” But with no troops forthcoming from the east, the satraps saw little advantage in throwing away good men after bad. They sat on their hands.

Behind the scenes, Nabarzanes and Bessus made common cause. They decided to arrest the Great King. Curtius writes:

They reasoned that if Alexander overtook them they could ingratiate themselves with the victor by handing over their king alive—he was sure to set great store by the capture of Darius—whereas, if they managed to get away from him, they would kill Darius, seize his kingdom themselves and restart hostilities.

These were ruthless and ambitious grandees, but they genuinely believed that Darius’s cause was lost. They would be patriots if possible. Otherwise they would look out for themselves.

Nabarzanes laid the ground for their plan, turning to Darius and addressing him directly: “Temporarily transfer your authority and your command to another, who can carry the title of king only until the enemy quits Asia. When victorious, he can then return your kingdom to you.”

His intention was to raise the notion of regime change without risking a charge of betrayal, but seldom has advice been less convincing. The Great King lost his temper. He drew his sword and threatened to cut down the speaker. Bessus and some Bactrians crowded around him. Ostensibly, they were upset; they begged the Great King to stay his hand. He did so, but if he had persisted they would have arrested and chained him.

The gathering began to break up. Nabarzanes slipped away and was soon joined by Bessus. They decided to move the men under their command away from the main body of the army. Meanwhile, Artabazus did his best to placate the Great King, telling him that he could not afford to estrange any of his supporters. Darius agreed, but, depressed and despairing, withdrew into his tent.

No one seemed to be in charge. Patron was worried by the turn of events. He told his Greeks to get their weapons from the baggage train, where they were stored during a long march, and await his orders. The Persian troops remained loyal, believing that “it was impious to desert a king.” Artabazus assumed the role of commander-in-chief and worked hard to build their morale.

The conspirators decided it was time for action. They knew that the Greek mercenaries and the Persians were still loyal and dared not arrest Darius openly. When Artabazus told them that he had mollified the Great King, they put on a show of weeping and begging for forgiveness. A night passed; with dawn, they moved their men back into the camp and presented themselves at the door of the royal tent. They prostrated themselves in front of Darius.

Having accepted their apologies, the apparently unsuspecting Darius gave the order to march on and climbed onto his chariot in the usual way.

—

PATRON SUSPECTED THAT BESSUS and Nabarzanes meant the Great King harm. He walked as near as was permissible to Darius’s carriage (Darius had left the uncomfortable chariot) and looked out for a chance to talk to him. But Bessus, fearing that the Greek was planning to betray his plot, would not step away from the Great King; he behaved more like a guard than a traveling companion.

Patron hesitated and sometimes fell back, not daring to speak. At last Darius noticed him and told an official to ask Patron whether he had anything to tell him. Patron replied that he did, but only in the absence of others. He was told to step forward without an interpreter. Alone in his entourage, Darius spoke some Greek, so the two men were able to converse in plain sight with nobody else able to understand what they were saying.

Patron asked him to pitch his tent in the Greek area of the camp, where he would be properly guarded. Darius asked why, and Patron told him that Bessus and Nabarzanes were plotting against him. The monarch replied that he was well aware of the mercenaries’ loyalty but that it would be very difficult for him to leave his compatriots. He made a good point, for his Persian soldiers were doubtless considering their position and any sign that the Great King no longer had confidence in them could loosen theirs in him.

—

BESSUS WAS ON TENTERHOOKS; he knew no Greek but the setting aside of the interpreters made him certain that Patron was giving him away. He once more loudly protested his loyalty and warned that a mercenary like Patron would do anything for hire. Darius gave him a look that signified acceptance. In fact, he had accepted the truth of Patron’s accusations: he later said as much to Artabazus. The old nobleman advised him to move across to the Greeks, but he again refused.

Night gathered and silence fell throughout the camp. Men in the bodyguard began to make themselves scarce. A few eunuchs stood around in the royal tent, not knowing what to do. Darius told them to leave and look after themselves. They began wailing and others joined in.

Misinterpreting the noise, soldiers reported to Bessus and Nabarzanes that Darius had committed suicide. They mounted their horses and, with a picked group of supporters, rushed to the royal tent, where they found that Darius was alive. They ordered him to be arrested and bound (in gold fetters, it was said).

The conspirators and their forces rejoined the highway and began marching east toward Bactriana, Bessus’s province on the edge of India.

Darius was brought with them, still wearing his official robes. He was transported in an old wagon, which was covered in dirty animal skins so that its occupant should not be recognized. He must have told himself that his future would be bleak and short.

—

IN MAY OR EARLY June 330, Alexander was at last able to leave Persepolis. The snows had shrunk if not altogether vanished and the approaching harvest would help to provide supplies of food and fodder.

He was to march north to Ecbatana at the head of seventeen thousand men. He decided to take with him some of the money surrendered to him; with this, he would pay his army. The remainder of the money he ordered to be stored under guard at Ecbatana’s citadel. To carry it all there, a vast number of mules, as well as three thousand camels, were recruited from Susa and Babylonia. Parmenion was placed in charge of the operation and ordered to hand over the treasure to the repentant and reinstated Harpalus. After that he launched a punitive expedition against the aforementioned Cadusii, a hostile tribe of mountaineers by the Caspian Sea.

Along the way, the king kept picking up contradictory rumors. Were the Macedonians to advance, he was told, Darius would abandon Ecbatana, fleeing eastward and ravaging the land as he went. Later it was said that the Great King meant to offer battle. Then, when Alexander was three days’ march from the city, he was met by a renegade Achaemenid, who was an illegitimate son of the previous Great King, Artaxerxes Ochus. He reported that Darius had been expecting reinforcements, but when they failed to arrive had left Ecbatana four days previously, taking with him seven thousand talents from the exchequer.

Ecbatana was a remarkable sight, if we are to believe Herodotus, writing in the fifth century:

Its walls are of great size and strength, rising in circles one within the other. The plan of the place is that each of the walls out-tops the battlements of the one beyond it….There are seven circles, the royal palace and the treasuries standing within the last.

Apparently, the battlements were each painted in different colors—to start from the outside, white, followed by black, scarlet, blue, and orange. The inner two battlements were coated with silver and gold.

Alexander’s priority was to catch Darius and once he had arrived at the city he spent as little time as possible admiring it before moving on. However, he chose this moment to introduce an important military reform. He demobilized all the League of Corinth troops, including the Thessalian cavalry. It was his final signal, after the burning of Persepolis, that the crusade was over. He treated the men with typical generosity: as well as all his back pay, each cavalryman received an enormous bonus of one talent; foot soldiers were awarded the smaller but still lavish sum of one thousand drachmas.

Many of these men had spent years in foreign service and will not have welcomed the prospect of a long march home to their small native city-states, where jobs were scarce. The king had something to offer them. They were invited to reenlist, and those who did so were given a handsome “golden hello” of three talents (eighteen thousand drachmas).

But from now onward they would exchange their Hellenic allegiance for loyalty to Alexander alone. He had in mind an army of professional soldiers, disciplined and well-trained according to his rule book. They would be ready and willing to go wherever he chose to lead them. They would fight alongside other recruits from the empire he had just vanquished, barbarians and Greeks marching together.

—

ALEXANDER WAS NOT INTERESTED in money, but now he had it in almost uncountable quantities. He was a masculine version of the nymph Danaë on whom Zeus—his father—had showered gold. His wealth allowed him to display munificence. This was a quality expected of a king which he will have learned from his famously openhanded father.

Plutarch discusses the topic in his biography: “Alexander was by nature exceptionally generous and became even more so as his wealth increased. His gifts were always bestowed with grace and courtesy, and it is this alone which truly makes a giver’s generosity welcome.”

However, he had no compunction in using prodigality as a weapon of control, and his gifts often had a bullying undertone. They were delivered to the recipient with the force of a blunt instrument. On one occasion the king saw a Macedonian soldier who was driving a mule laden with Persian gold. The animal was exhausted and the man took the load onto his own shoulders and tried to carry it. He was obviously in difficulty and Alexander called out to him: “Hold on, keep going, and you can take what you are carrying to your own tent.”

When a Companion asked for help with dowries for his girls, Alexander presented him with the enormous sum of fifty talents. The Companion replied that ten would be more than enough, upon which the king remarked dryly: “Enough for you to accept, but not enough for me to give.”

People close to the king registered their anxiety about what they saw as his excessive liberality. Olympias for one gave him a piece of her mind. She wrote: “I wish you would find other ways of rewarding those you love and respect: as it is, you are making them all the equals of kings and enabling them to make plenty of friends, but leaving yourself without any.”

(Olympias knew nothing of today’s dismal science of economics. If she had, she would also have been able to point out to her son that in time, the release of so much money into the classical marketplace was highly inflationary.)

Alexander himself noticed that some of those around him had developed a taste for vulgar and extravagant lifestyles. Hagnon survived his faux pas of offering the king a beautiful boy and remained an influential courtier; as a mark of conspicuous waste, he wore silver nails in his boots. Leonnatus was one of Alexander’s closest friends from their schooldays and had been with him on the day of Philip’s assassination. He was brave, hardworking, and true, but he was also very fond of Persian luxury. He enjoyed wrestling as a pastime and had special dust sent from Egypt to sprinkle on his body before a bout. His armor was ornately decorated and his horses’ bridles gilded. Senior Macedonians cossetted themselves, hiring masseurs and personal servants.

The king noticed such things, but expressed no more than gentle disapproval. He asked: “How can a man look after his horse, or keep his spear and his helmet clean and bright, if he has lost the habit of using his hands to look after his own adorable body?” Plutarch, ever the moralist, believed that inordinate wealth sapped the fighting spirit of the Macedonians. He claimed that “[the king’s] friends, because of the wealth and pomp with which they were surrounded, wished only to lead a life of luxury and idleness. They found his expeditions and campaigns an intolerable burden, and little by little went so far as to abuse and find fault with the king.”

The evidence points in the opposite direction. Alexander’s long run of victories, forced marches, and exposure to climatic extremes is proof enough that there was nothing degenerate about the Macedonian army. The king did not countenance poor performance when his men were on duty, and self-indulgence was unthinkable. When at leisure, though, they could let their hair down. As we have seen, Philip’s court was notoriously filled with warriors who delighted in bling and excess. Alexander had no quarrel with that. Like father, like son.

—

AT ECBATANA THE MACEDONIAN army came back together again as an integrated whole. Word came that Darius was in full retreat and was heading for the satrapies of Parthia, Hyrcania, and, at the farthest edge of empire, the rich and powerful province of Bactriana. He was believed to be in danger of assassination, but at this point he still seemed to be in full command of his forces. His followers were losing heart, though, and many deserted, traveling back to their home regions. Quite a few voluntarily surrendered to Alexander, who as a result was kept well-informed about Darius’s progress.

He set off in hot pursuit. He took with him only the Companion cavalry; the scouts or light cavalry and the mercenary horse; some of the phalanx; the archers; and the Agrianians—in sum, the fastest troops at his disposal. The rest of the army was to follow at its own pace.

The king set a course for Rhagae, a town with Zoroastrian associations (near today’s Teheran). About 240 miles from Ecbatana, it stood on an ancient highway south of the Caspian Sea and the Elburz mountain range, brown and bone-dry below snowcapped peaks. It was only a day’s march to the Caspian Gates, a mountain pass that opened the way to the eastern parts of the empire. Alexander wanted to get there before Darius.

The Macedonians proceeded at a punishing pace, with men falling behind and horses dying. They arrived at their destination after eleven days of forced marches only to find that Darius had already passed through the Gates. It was clear that he could not be easily overtaken. So Alexander gave his men five days’ rest to recover from their exertions. He took the opportunity to appoint a Persian called Oxydates as satrap of Media; he had been imprisoned by Darius at Susa and condemned to death (for what offense we do not know), which, Arrian writes, “inclined Alexander to trust him.”

The Macedonians resumed their march via the Caspian Gates and into cultivated territory. The next stage of their journey was to be across desert; the king sent Coenus, Parmenion’s reliable son-in-law and one of his most trusted lieutenants, with a small party to forage for supplies. Soon afterward, one of Mazaeus’s sons and a Babylonian nobleman, both escapees from the Great King’s disconsolate army, presented themselves to Alexander and gave him the startling news of Darius’s arrest by Nabarzanes and Bessus.

This galvanized Alexander. He had to reach and rescue the Great King before, as seemed very likely, his captors killed him. That way lay disaster, for some other Achaemenid would surely lay claim to the vacant throne and the struggle would resume. But with a living and breathing Darius in his possession, Alexander would be able to command events and find some way of persuading his prisoner to give up his crown in his own favor.

He pressed on without waiting for Coenus to return, taking with him only the Companions, the light cavalry, and some infantry chosen for their stamina and speed on the march. They had nothing with them apart from their weapons and two days’ worth of food. The rest of the army was told to come after him at their ordinary speed.

The party traveled all through the night and till noon the following day. After a short rest, they resumed their journey and marched through the next night. At first light they arrived at the camp from which the renegade Achaemenid had set out to find Alexander. Darius’s interpreter, ill and unable to keep up with the Persian force, was caught and was debriefed on the latest developments, the most important of which was that the Bactrian cavalry had acclaimed Bessus as supreme commander. He had declared himself Great King, giving himself the regnal name of Artaxerxes V and wearing the upright tiara of office. Artabazus and his troops, together with the Greek mercenaries, were furious. However, there was nothing they could do to reverse the coup, so they left. They turned off the main road and made for the hills. The Persians soon drifted back, for “they had no one else to follow.”

Having heard all this, the king saw there was not a moment to be lost. He had to carry on: men and horses were exhausted, but he insisted. After another night and morning march, the Macedonians arrived at the place where Bessus and Darius had camped the day before. From the locals Alexander learned that the Persians were traveling by night. When he asked whether there was a shortcut to catch up with them, he was told that there was, but it was waterless.

That did not discourage Alexander. He selected five hundred of his toughest infantrymen and mounted them on the best of the surviving horses. He instructed Parmenion’s son Nicanor, commander of the hypaspists, and the Agrianian chief to lead the rest of the attack force along the road taken by Bessus. He himself and his elite troop, assisted by a guide, rode from dusk for forty-five miles through the desert. It was an extraordinary feat. At dawn they came across the Persian rear. The soldiers were straggling and few of them had weapons. They offered no resistance and fled.

The scene was obscured by clouds of dust. Bessus did not see that his Bactrian cavalry heavily outnumbered the Macedonians and could have annihilated them. As ever with Alexander, audacity made luck.

—

THE CRISIS HAD ARRIVED. Darius had become a liability, chained as he was in his dilapidated wagon. He would soon be overtaken, and Bessus and some colleagues tried to persuade him to avoid capture by mounting a horse and galloping off with them. Darius refused. He would take his chances with Alexander.

With the commotion of the enemy’s unexpected arrival audible, time was short. The conspirators’ priority was to prevent their distinguished captive from falling into Macedonian hands. If they could not take him with them, they would have to leave him behind, dead.

This a couple of dissident satraps swiftly accomplished, hurling their spears at the king and running him through many times. Also, they tried to maim the wagon’s draft animals, and they put to death the two slaves who were accompanying Darius (presumably the last of the eunuchs).

Then Nabarzanes and Bessus panicked. They were sure that Alexander would not thank them for killing Darius. In fact, he was more likely to punish them and, if he learned of the existence of the new Great King Artaxerxes, definitely with extreme prejudice. Most of their troops refused to fight. They decided to abandon the scene of the crime, riding off immediately to their different satrapies, Hyrcania and distant Bactriana.

Much of Darius’s last army probably melted away. Patron and his Greek mercenaries surrendered unconditionally to Alexander. But the Bactrian cavalry remained fiercely loyal to their satrap Bessus and some of the infantry transferred their allegiance to him. At the empire’s farthest frontier, they would make a last stand against the invader.

Meanwhile, maddened by their wounds, the draft animals pulled the wagon off the road and came to a halt some distance away. There was a spring nearby. Local people pointed it out to a Macedonian soldier who was tormented by thirst; he went over to drink the water and found Darius, not dead yet but at his last gasp. The king asked for a drink and when he had swallowed some cold water he is said to have sent a message of goodwill to Alexander. “Through you, I give him my hand.” As he spoke, he took the soldier’s hand and died holding it. He was about fifty years old.

Alexander soon came up and stood around respectfully for a short time, with a tear in his eye. He laid his cloak on the body, which he sent to Persepolis for a full-dress state funeral. As the self-proclaimed king of Asia, he knew he should stand for continuity and act as Darius’s grieving heir. He vowed to punish the Great King’s murderers.

A few miles away stood the city later known as Hecatompylos (Greek for City of One Hundred Gates). Built in the flat, dust-blown desert, it was fed and watered by the fertile strip that lies along the foot of the Elburz Mountains. Here Alexander made a fortified camp or base. His army was given a few days’ well-earned rest.

—

DARIUS HAS BEEN PORTRAYED as weak and “effeminate.” According to Arrian, he was “a consummate coward and incompetent.” In fact, he was an effective ruler who possessed charm and attracted loyalty from those around him. His doom was to face a military commander of genius.

As Darius was only a distant member of the royal family, Artaxerxes Ochus, well-known butcher of close male relatives, saw him as no threat to his throne. He was appointed satrap of Armenia and later promoted to a senior position in the postal service. He can never have counted on becoming the Great King.

His victorious duel with a tribal rebel was evidence of physical courage. Plucked from the imperial bureaucracy, he soon consolidated his rule and showed that he knew how to make and implement swift decisions, as when he removed the venomous kingmaker Bagoas from the stage.

With Philip’s murder, he judged, quite reasonably, that the Macedonian threat was just an irritant and could be dealt with by local forces. In any case, the inexperienced boy king might very well abandon his father’s invasion plan. Darius’s only error was not to appoint a commander-in-chief, but he did not trust the best qualified candidate, Memnon.

The battle at the Granicus sounded the alarm; the Great King had no choice but to go to war in person. He was obviously a fine organizer—he assembled a vast host with speed and efficiency—but he suffered from two material disadvantages: he had never had experience as a battlefield commander, and he was isolated from the world in a court of flatterers and fools, who underestimated the opposition.

Darius was adaptable enough to learn from failure. Seeing that the Macedonians at the Granicus had longer swords and light but tough cornel-wood spears, he re-equipped Persian soldiers with similar weapons. However, no experienced general would have fought at Issus along the narrow ribbon of land that constrained his greatest strength, cavalry. Darius learned that lesson, too, and made sure that his next battle would be fought on a broad plain. And this time his battle plan made the most of his cavalry. He nearly won.

For the second time he had to flee the field. The day was going well elsewhere, but that would mean little if he was struck down. It was the right, the brave decision.

Not only was Darius good at his job, but also the institutions over which he presided and the governing system were working satisfactorily in most parts of the empire (Egypt being a notable exception). The provinces were acquiescent and the Great King took care not to interfere in local affairs.

The Achaemenids did not fall through structural decay or misrule, but from straightforward military defeat. The victor had no plans for reform and saw himself as the heir to a going concern. He behaved as if he were an Achaemenid, and the slogan of continuity calmed the traditional ruling elite.

—

THE YOUNG MACEDONIAN MONARCH was changing. He began to wear exotic clothes that combined features of Persian as well as Greek costume. He dressed himself in a white robe with a sash around his waist, though not in the trousers and the typically Persian long-sleeved upper garment. He gave his Companions cloaks with purple borders and dressed the horses in Persian harness. He took to wearing the blue-and-white diadem, although not the upright tiara.

When sealing letters to European destinations he used his old Macedonian ring, but when writing to Asians he adopted Darius’s royal signet (which he had presumably removed from the dead man’s body).

Apparently, he maintained a Great King’s costly perquisite of a harem containing 365 concubines, one for every night of the year. From what we know of his sexual interests it is most unlikely that he went to the trouble of recruiting hundreds of young women himself or that he brought them with him on campaign. We can assume that he inherited Darius’s harem and simply took on the responsibility to pay for its upkeep.

Alexander continued to protect and promote distinguished Persians. He asked Hephaestion to parade outside the royal quarters the many prisoners of war who had accumulated over time, and to separate nobles from commoners. A granddaughter of Darius’s predecessor, Artaxerxes Ochus, was identified; her possessions were returned to her and a search instituted for her husband, who was missing. The most important personage who came to light was Oxyathres, a younger brother of Darius, to whom Oxyathres had been devoted. At Issus, he had defended his Great King bravely from Alexander’s decisive cavalry charge.

Oxyathres transferred his loyalty to Alexander, who took to him and enrolled him among his inner circle of friends. Evidently the Persian had been unimpressed by Bessus and, whatever his personal feelings, accepted that the Macedonian king was the new power in the land. He could see that Alexander wanted to govern the empire with the assistance of the Persian political elite. By joining his court, he publicized his endorsement.

The king was aware that his philo-Persian policy of retaining local administrators divided his generals. According to Plutarch,

It was Hephaestion who approved of these plans and joined him in changing his habits, while Craterus clung to Macedonian customs. He therefore made use of the first in his dealings with the barbarians, and of the second with the Greeks and Macedonians. In general, he showed most affection for Hephaestion and most respect for Craterus, for he had formed the opinion and always said: “Hephaestion is a friend of Alexander, while Craterus is a friend of the king.”

Unsurprisingly, the two men’s mutual hostility grew and festered over time. On occasion they quarreled openly and Alexander was forced to mediate between them.

—

THE DEMOBILIZATION OF THE Greeks at Ecbatana some weeks earlier had upset the rank and file more than had immediately appeared. During the brief furlough at Hecatompylos, a sudden irrational rumor swept through the army that the king was satisfied with what he had achieved thus far and had decided on an immediate return to Macedonia. Curtius writes: “The soldiers scattered to their tents like madmen and prepared their baggage for the journey. One might have thought a signal had been given for the general packing-up of the camp. The bustle of men looking for their tent-mates or loading wagons came to the king’s ears.”

Alexander was rattled, for Bessus had yet to be defeated. Also, he had already privately decided on an exploratory expedition to India, thought to be at the final rim of land before the encircling ocean. He convened an emergency meeting of his senior officers. With tears in his eyes, he told them that his men were not cowards, but that they were threatening to bring his career to a premature end with this sudden pining for home. It was not possible to reverse the march of events. Having conquered Persia, they could hardly walk away now. Whatever their true feelings, each of the generals offered his support and volunteered for the most difficult tasks. They would calm their men down, they promised, provided that the king reassured them with kind words.

A general assembly was called and the king addressed it. He reminded his audience of the long list of victories they had won, but warned that those gains could be easily lost. Bessus and his friends would catch at any sign of weakness. He said, “The moment our backs are turned, they will be after us” and would fall upon the Macedonians “as if they were so many women.” But one last push and the war would be over. The men cheered him to the echo, as he wrote in a dispatch to Antipater, and promised to follow him wherever he chose. The crisis was over. Two days later, in August 330, the army set off to the province of Hyrcania, where Persian refugees were hiding out.

But had there been a crisis at all? The episode leaves an impression of hysteria, of a lovers’ quarrel, fierce to the outside gaze but playful for participants. Alexander’s leadership style—risking his life at the drop of a hat; never ordering something to be done he would not, indeed did not, do himself; providing reliable supplies; arranging frequent rest breaks and quality entertainment; above all, winning—meant that his men had complete confidence in him. Their relationship had an undertone of infatuation.

Alexander had always paid great attention to his soldiers’ morale, but from about this time he went a step further and began regularly providing lavish feasts overflowing with food and alcohol. They would be opportunities for bonding, for backslapping, for camaraderie. Also, as the military campaign stretched into the indefinite future, the king sought to deflect a natural homesickness and foster a desire to settle down. So, farsightedly, he encouraged his soldiers to marry and start families. Life in the camp was to become increasingly civilian and domestic.

Importantly, he backed this policy with a basic welfare system for soldiers’ sons (nothing is known of provision, if any, for daughters). According to the Roman historian Justin, writing in the second century A.D.,

maintenance was provided for the boys, and arms and horses were given them when they grew up; and rewards were assigned to the fathers in proportion to the number of their children. If the fathers of any of them were killed, the orphans notwithstanding received their father’s pay; and their childhood was a sort of military service in various expeditions. Inured from their earliest years to toils and dangers, they formed an invincible army; they looked upon their camp as their country, and upon a battle as a prelude to victory.

In late August 330, a real crisis emerged which showed that Macedonian traditionalists were not to be bought off; it exposed the depth of disaffection in some quarters and, indeed, threatened the king’s life.

—

DIMNUS WAS INFATUATED WITH a rent boy called Nicomachus, whom he had taken off the game and whose favors he now monopolized. A member of the Companion cavalry, Dimnus was a young man of no importance except for the fact that he was keeper of an enormous secret, which he was bursting to reveal to his boyfriend.

Almost beside himself, he took his beloved to a temple when nobody else was present. He asked him, in the name of their love and the pledges they had exchanged, to swear a solemn oath never to divulge what he was about to tell him. Nicomachus took the oath, not supposing that this would involve him in any illegality.

Dimnus then announced that he had joined a conspiracy to assassinate Alexander. The attempt was to be made in two days. He named eight plotters, apparently including a certain Demetrius, one of the king’s seven personal bodyguards. The literary sources do not discuss their motives, but the timing suggests that Alexander’s reconciliation policy and his refusal to end the war were powerful motives, and as we have seen, killing their kings was something of a Macedonian tradition.

Nicomachus was horrified by what he had heard. He made it clear that his oath did not justify treason nor free him from his duty to report a crime; self-interest will have reminded him that secret schemes of this sort often fail. Demented by passion and fear, Dimnus tried to persuade his lover to join the conspiracy and, failing that, at least to keep quiet about it. He drew his sword, pressing it to each of their throats, one after the other.

Eventually Nicomachus pretended that, out of affection, he would do what he was asked. He was a boy of a practical cast of mind and understood that he was in very real danger. Somehow he had to extricate himself, even if that meant betraying Dimnus.

He decided to confide in his brother Cebalinus, who was also endowed with common sense. They recognized that the sooner a message could be got to the king the safer they would be. Nicomachus should stay where he was. Other conspirators might realize that they were betrayed if he was seen near the royal tent. So Cebalinus went instead. He hung about at the entrance, waiting to ask someone entering to take in an urgent message.

This was a rare day when no visitors arrived. At last one of Alexander’s leading commanders, Philotas, son of Parmenion, commander of the Companion cavalry, arrived on business with the king. Cebalinus, upset and anxious, stopped him and poured out his story. The general commended him and said he would report the matter to Alexander. He had a long conversation with the king, but in the event did not mention the conspiracy.

Cebalinus waited until Philotas came out toward evening and asked if he had done as he promised. He replied that Alexander had had no time to talk to him and then went on his way. Cebalinus refused to be put off and the next day he was back outside the royal tent. Philotas, on his way in again to see the king, said he was seeing to the matter, although in fact he did not inform Alexander.

The young man’s suspicions were aroused. Rather than continuing to press Philotas, he gave his information to a young nobleman called Metron. He was one of the Royal Pages, who was responsible for the royal weapons and armor and had routine access to the king. He acted without delay, discreetly slipping Cebalinus into the armory and breaking in on the king, who happened to be taking a bath.

Events now speeded up. Alexander sent guards to arrest Dimnus and questioned Cebalinus. When he learned that it had taken two days for the boy to report the conspiracy, he doubted his loyalty and ordered his arrest. Cebalinus cried out that he had gone at once to Philotas, who had done nothing. He was obviously telling the truth and Alexander saw a huge political crisis bearing down on him. What was one of his senior generals and son of his deputy thinking of when he refused to pass on Cebalinus’s warning? Had treason penetrated the heart of his regime?

He burst into tears.

—

DIMNUS SAW THE GUARDS approaching and guessed that the game was up. He stabbed himself with a sword he was wearing and collapsed. He was carried to the royal quarters for interrogation, but had lost the power of speech. He groaned, turned his face away from the king’s gaze, and died.

Alexander invited Philotas to meet him and asked him, as though there must have been some misunderstanding, to clear up the issue of the two-day delay. The general was not at all taken aback. Yes, he admitted, Cebalinus had mentioned the plot to him; but (according to Curtius) he said he was afraid that reporting “a quarrel between a male prostitute and his lover would make him a laughingstock.” Now, he admitted, he could see he had made a bad mistake, and he begged Alexander to forgive him.

To buy himself time, the king offered Philotas his right hand as a token of reconciliation. He commented that in his opinion this was a case of information not being taken seriously rather than being deliberately suppressed.

The trouble was that Philotas had form. He was brave, hardy, and almost as openhanded as Alexander. However, according to Plutarch, he

also displayed an arrogance, an ostentation of wealth and a degree of luxury in his personal habits and his way of living which could only cause offense in his position as a private subject. At this time, in particular, his efforts to imitate a lofty and majestic presence carried no conviction, appeared clumsy and uncouth, and succeeded only in provoking envy and mistrust.

Olympias, no slouch when it came to complaining, wrote to warn Alexander against him. And Philotas was heartily disliked by his colleagues. His father was worried enough by the poor impression he was making to remark: “Son, don’t make so much of yourself.”

Philotas had a mistress called Antigone. A beautiful young woman, she came from Pydna, a Greek port on the Thermaic Gulf. Sailing to Samothrace for the Mysteries, she was captured by the Persian fleet. After Issus she found herself in the Great King’s baggage train at Damascus. There she fell into the hands of Parmenion, who passed her on to Philotas. She may or may not have been a slave, but appears to have been of low birth. She had little choice but to make her living as a high-class prostitute or hetaira.

By the time of the Egyptian campaign, Philotas and Antigone had become a settled couple. When he was drunk, he enjoyed engaging in indiscreet pillow talk. He complained of Alexander’s claim to be the son of Zeus-Ammon. In his opinion, the king was a mere boy and his successes in the field were thanks to Philotas and to Philip. Antigone gossiped about these remarks, which eventually reached the ears of Craterus, Philotas’s political enemy and rival. He brought her privately to Alexander, who told her to maintain the relationship with her patron and send in regular reports. He tended to discount carping among his subordinates and took no further action.

Alexander may never have been very close to Philotas, who appears to have taken Philip’s part during the Pixodarus marriage fiasco. That was a long time ago, but Alexander saved up his resentments. However, he drew a line between inactive boastfulness and active disloyalty. He valued his cavalry commander highly for his military skills and had no wish needlessly to offend Parmenion. Best let sleeping, if tactless, dogs lie.

—

FACED WITH THE POTENTIALLY damning evidence of Nicomachus and Cebalinus, the king knew that, according to Macedonian custom, he would be expected to act consultatively and democratically. He called a meeting of his senior officers, except for Philotas, and arranged for Nicomachus to repeat his account. He then asked for advice.

Craterus twisted the knife: “The enemies we are about to pursue are still numerous enough. Protect yourself against the enemies within. Eliminate them and I have nothing to fear from foreigners.”

The commanders could find no plausible explanation for Philotas’s failure to warn the king. The pretense that Alexander had had no time to talk with him was a direct lie. If he had not believed Cebalinus, he should have rejected his charges and sent him away. Instead he had let the affair drag on, with the implication that the claims were credible.

The meeting agreed unanimously that there was enough evidence to justify interrogation under torture. We do not know enough about the Macedonian legal system to judge whether torture was regularly used when investigating serious crime, but in ancient Greece its use was usually restricted to slaves; by contrast, the honor of a citizen compelled him to speak the truth. However, because no one objected to the decision, it seems probable that the king in his judicial capacity was entitled to authorize torture.

Great care was taken with the arrest of Philotas. He was invited to dinner with the king and other guests and, to give an impression of normality, a route march was announced for the following day. Cavalry units were posted at all entrances to the camp with orders to block the roads. This was to make sure that no hint of what was about to happen reached the ears of Parmenion. He may have been innocent of any crime, but whether he was or not was immaterial. The old general would be furious at the news of his son’s downfall. He was popular with the men and could be counted on to make trouble on Philotas’s behalf.

In the middle of the night, when all lights were out, some of Alexander’s most trusted officers—Hephaestion, Craterus, Coenus, and Erigyius, along with Perdiccas and Leonnatus from the bodyguard— gathered secretly in the royal tent. Small military detachments arrested all those who had been named, and a force of three hundred men surrounded Philotas’s tent. The commander was in a deep slumber and was only half awake when he was arrested and shackled. A cloak was placed over his head so that he would not be recognized by any insomniac soldier.

The following morning Alexander ordered a general assembly in arms. About six thousand soldiers as well as assorted camp followers gathered outside the royal tent. Philotas was concealed from view by a column of soldiers, but Dimnus’s corpse was placed on open display.

According to Macedonian law, the king acted as prosecutor in a capital trial, and Macedonian soldiers (or citizens if at home) were the jury. They stood on their rights and would not necessarily come to the desired decision. A sensitive case such as this needed careful handling.

Alexander marched out with his entourage to the assembly, looking gloomy and upset. He stood staring at the ground for a while, then pulled himself together and spoke. He announced the discovery of an extensive criminal conspiracy headed by (of all people, his listeners must have thought) his aged deputy Parmenion. He named Philotas and others as among the plotters and pointed to the dead Dimnus.

Nicomachus, Cebalinus, and Metron were then summoned and repeated their accounts. Although there was evidence of a conspiracy, it did not implicate Philotas and Parmenion as among its members. After an initial outburst, what the three young men said was received in silence.

Alexander resumed his address. He quoted from an intercepted letter sent by Parmenion to his two sons. The text read: “First of all take care of yourselves, and then of your people—that is how we shall accomplish our purpose.” The king explained that anyone in the know would understand the passage, but it would be meaningless to other readers if they came across it.

Some people in the audience criticized the accused man, including Coenus (despite the family connection). He picked up a stone to throw at Philotas, but the king stayed his hand. At this point Alexander left the meeting, without explanation. So far, Philotas appears not to have been tortured, but he was in poor shape. Dazed and fainting, he wept. However, after wiping his eyes he spoke strongly in his defense.

He made two main points: first, neither he nor his father had been named by Dimnus and there was no evidence of their involvement in a plot. Secondly, his inaction after listening to Cebalinus was justifiable. He explained: “Unfortunately for me, I thought that what was coming to my ears was a tiff between lover and boyfriend. I doubted Nicomachus’ reliability because he did not bring the information in person but induced his brother to bring it.” He would have looked a fool, he thought, if he had taken the matter any further.

Philotas was then led away. Perhaps he had displayed some of his old arrogant manner, for a veteran officer who had risen from the ranks infuriated the assembly with tales of Philotas’s extravagance and boastfulness. The general mood hardened against him. However, the prosecution case was thin. It had not established the existence of a large conspiracy involving the two generals.

With uncanny timing, Alexander returned and promptly adjourned the session to the following day. He convened another meeting of his advisers, who agreed that Philotas should be executed by stoning, the traditional Macedonian form of capital punishment. However, first of all there had to be a conviction.

Clearly what was needed was a confession. Hephaestion, Craterus, and Coenus volunteered to question Philotas under torture. The king withdrew into the inner section of his quarters and waited on events (although some say he listened in behind a tapestry).

—

PHILOTAS WAS SHOWN THE instruments used to inflict pain. He immediately confessed to everything. “Why hurt me? I planned the crime and I wanted it to succeed.” However, Craterus insisted that any admissions had to be given under torture. We are told that Philotas was subjected to “fire and beatings.” Bloody and broken, he agreed to give a detailed confession, provided that the torture was halted and the instruments removed.

The story began with a certain Hegelochus, a relative of Attalus, whose niece and ward was King Philip’s last wife. He was close to Parmenion and while the army was in Egypt complained bitterly about the visit to the Siwah oasis. Like many other Macedonians, he was furious that Alexander now claimed he was the son of Zeus Ammon, thus casting doubt over Philip’s paternity. He asked the old general to join a plot to kill the king.

Parmenion had no objection to the project in principle, he said, but believed that the timing was wrong. According to Philotas,

with Darius still alive, Parmenion thought the plan premature, since killing Alexander would benefit the enemy, not themselves, whereas with Darius removed the reward of killing the king that would fall to his assassins would be Asia and all of the East. The plan was approved and pledges given and accepted on it.

Philotas pleaded guilty to this grand conspiracy. Its implementation was now an urgent task, for Parmenion was old and likely to be retired soon from active service. However, he insisted that he had no knowledge at all of Dimnus’s activities. His onetime comrades showed him the instruments again and he conceded on that point too.

Alexander now had a complete case to offer his Macedonian jurors, whom he reconvened on the following day. Philotas was carried to the assembly on a chair, for he was unable to walk. His confession was read out aloud. A mysterious incident followed, when he unexpectedly inculpated a high-ranking individual who was present and had not been previously named. Then Philotas and all the other conspirators were stoned to death. (Demetrius, the bodyguard, loudly protested his innocence and may have been spared for the time being, in which case he was done away with later when the fuss had died down.)

Far away in Ecbatana, Parmenion knew nothing of the catastrophe that had overtaken his one remaining son. The king realized that “it would be too dangerous to let him survive.” He suborned Polydamas, a trusted and long-standing associate of the general, and dispatched him to the Median capital. Polydamas rode for eleven days on a racing camel through desert lands. Arriving secretly at night, he delivered instructions for the assassination. Parmenion’s second-in-command, Cleander, orchestrated the murder on the following day. Delighted to greet the new arrival, the old man was unsuspectingly struck down in his walled Persian garden while reading a forged letter from his son.

It was an ungenerous reward for a lifetime’s service to the Macedonian crown, but Parmenion knew that he played in a rough game. He would not have registered surprise at his fate, had he been given time to do so.

Alexander decided the moment was propitious to settle some unfinished business. Once the guilty men had been put to death, he brought forward before the assembly the hapless Alexander of Lyncestis, imprisoned since before Issus for treasonable correspondence with the Great King and possible involvement in Philip’s assassination. He was suddenly brought forward in front of the assembly and required to defend himself. Three years of imprisonment in the baggage train had taken its toll. Curtius writes: “Although he had had all of three years to rehearse his defense, he was faltering and nervous, deploying few of the arguments which he had stored up in his mind, until finally his very thought processes, not just his memory, failed him.” Without more ado, the Lyncestian was put to death.

After the body had been removed, Alexander had the four sons of Andromenes put on trial. The eldest, Amyntas, had the calamitous misfortune to have been a close friend of Philotas. Also, as a boy he had been educated alongside Amyntas, son of King Perdiccas, whom Alexander executed in 336 as a potential rival to the throne. However, the brothers had a proven record of loyalty and were liked by the troops. The youngest, Polemon, was in his teens. He was panicked by the Philotas affair and ran away from the camp.

The other siblings stayed to face prosecution. Amyntas convinced a truculent assembly of his innocence and the trio was acquitted. Amyntas promised to bring back Polemon and, when he had done so, the boy too was exonerated. The outcome showed that Macedonian justice could be fair-handed and generous. A suspicious mind, though, may wonder whether it was the king’s intention to calm the feverish atmosphere and bring a melancholy sequence of trials and deaths to a happy conclusion.

—

THE ACCOUNT GIVEN ABOVE is a great lie, or at least dust thrown in the face. So say modern scholars who propose that, ever since inheriting the throne, Alexander had wanted to discredit Parmenion and his sons and rid himself of them. They were a constant reminder that his army was not truly his, but was the creation of his father. A helpful fate had disposed of Nicanor and Hector, and now at last after years of waiting the opportunity had arrived to put an end to this talented but independent-minded family. A scheme was hatched by a malevolent monarch and his cynical courtiers.

Is there any truth in this theory? And, more generally, how much of the narrative that has come down to us can be trusted?

To be clear, we are speaking of two conspiracies. The first was the amateurish group Dimnus joined. Curtius’s account is the fullest: it is internally coherent and there is every reason to regard it as broadly historical. Apart from Demetrius the bodyguard, none of the named plotters were people of note; rather, they were probably discontented young men. We may speculate that their motives were in some way a reaction to Alexander’s pro-Persian policy and his intention to continue the war.

The only point of interest was Philotas’s opportunistic refusal to let its intended victim know what was planned, despite the fact that an attempt was said to be imminent. His explanation was weak. Even if he did not believe Cebalinus, the least he should have done was to investigate his claims. It is hard to resist the conclusion that his silence was malicious.

It is clear that Parmenion had no connection with Dimnus and his friends (pace his son’s forced admission after two bouts of torture). If Philotas had been involved, it beggars belief that Cebalinus would have asked him to warn the king.

So far as the second, grander conspiracy is concerned, there is hardly a case to answer. At the beginning of his agony Philotas appealed to Craterus: “Just tell me what you want me to say.” The detailed confession, in which a broken man asserted a long-standing plan to kill the king and tarred his father with premeditated treason, is most likely to have been devised by his tormentors. No doubt Alexander had already decided to eliminate Parmenion and needed some justification for his extrajudicial murder.

The only concrete piece of evidence that Parmenion conspired against Alexander is the dim tale Philotas told about Hegelochus, but that allegation could not be tested. Parmenion was absent and Hegelochus had conveniently died at Gaugamela.

Apart from this whisper, the slate is clean. Ancient histories cite the king as often rejecting Parmenion’s advice. From this scholars deduce a propaganda campaign against him, which reflected the king’s desire to remove him (and his sons). As we have seen, the charge is weakened by the fact that on a number of other occasions Alexander accepted his deputy’s recommendations.

Parmenion had been Philip’s man and married his daughter to Attalus, Alexander’s great enemy. However, after the king’s assassination, he quickly lined up behind Alexander and, as we have seen, put his son-in-law to death when asked to do so.

A great deal is known about Parmenion’s activities during the Persian campaign as well as those of Philotas and Nicanor. They took leading roles in all Alexander’s battles and made a major contribution to his victories. Why should the king seek to discard his best and most reliable commanders? And had he wanted to do so, Alexander’s purge at the beginning of the reign showed that he was ruthless enough to have demoted or dismissed them at any stage. With his unbroken record of military victories, he could have ridden out a storm of protest. However, he kept Parmenion and his sons on in their posts. By the time of his death Parmenion was on the verge of retirement and two of his three sons were dead. Why bother to get rid of Philotas?

If there is a scintilla of truth in the charges, it may be attributed to the culture at the Macedonian court. Although an intelligent monarch could usually get his way, his noblemen insisted on treating him merely as a first among equals. They drank deep, led adventurous private lives, and spoke their minds. Philip was not literal-minded and had no objection to their candor, always providing they fought hard on the battlefield. Alexander had inherited that attitude. Only when talk turned into treason was he ready to intervene.

—

WE ARE NOW READY to sum up what we know or can reasonably guess of the facts.

Alexander was a hugely successful war leader, admired both by his officers and the rank and file. He had inherited his best generals from his father. He demanded a great deal from them, both under his direct command and as independent generals when he divided up his army into smaller units. And do their best they did. They fought well and served their master without stint.

As the distinguished Greek historian Polybius observed: “While we should perhaps give Alexander, as commander-in-chief, the credit for much, despite his extreme youth, we should assign no less to his co-operators and friends, who defeated the enemy in many marvelous battles, [and] exposed themselves often to extraordinary toil, danger, and hardship.”

However, many were out of sympathy with his newfangled and un-Macedonian policies. They objected to his downgrading of King Philip, to his eccentric decision to claim Zeus Ammon as his father, to his promotion of Persians, to the growing luxury of his court, and to the continuance of the war. They did not keep their thoughts to themselves.

Mostly talk remained talk, but Dimnus and his friends were determined to act. Philotas felt much the same way as they did about the king and, when he was told what was afoot, he decided to keep his mouth shut. This can only have been because he was content for the plot to proceed undisturbed.

Once they understood the unpalatable truth, Alexander and his circle of intimates faced a difficulty. They were certain that Philotas had behaved treasonably and deserved execution. However, the fact that he had done nothing weakened the case against him. Furthermore, Alexander surmised that Parmenion would seek revenge in some way for his son’s death, but that the army would accept a preemptive strike against him only if there were tangible evidence of his guilt.

Hence the need to fabricate a second conspiracy that smeared father and son. There was no evidence for what did not exist, so Philotas had to be tormented into a complete confession.

With the death of the conspirators, both genuine and alleged, the immediate crisis was over. Alexander had gotten away with it—just—at some cost to his reputation. He was not a prime mover in the scandal, but a responder. He had behaved promptly, rationally—and cruelly. If ever there was a case of raison d’état, this was it.

Alexander surely realized that the affair was not over. His policies were no more popular than before, and an undertow of fear now tugged at the loving relationship between him and his men. Of one thing he was certain: if loyalties were as slippery as now appeared, he could never again place the Companion cavalry under a single general who might turn them against him. He divided the command between Hephaestion and Cleitus, commander of the Royal Squadron. Hephaestion was dear to Alexander, but he possessed only a middling talent. He was no Philotas. The king usually advanced careers on merit; his lover’s promotion suggests that he was running out of talent he could trust.

So far as Cleitus was concerned, his appointment was certainly deserved, but it also reflected a desire on the king’s part to promote someone who reflected traditional Macedonian values and was popular with the army, as Parmenion had been. He was anxious about the men’s mood. Letters sent home to family and friends were secretly read for disaffection and those who had criticized the king were reassigned to a special unit as a mark of disgrace (apparently their courage in the field turned out to be equal to any other’s).

The Macedonian soldiery still loved their king; whatever they thought of Philotas, they were prepared to play their part in his destruction. But the atmosphere was becoming chilly. Alexander was increasingly remote, and the army was plunging to the edge of nowhere when all the men wanted was to go home.

When Antipater heard of the scandal, he commented: “If Parmenion plotted against Alexander, who is to be trusted? And if he did not, what is to be done?” And, he might have silently added, who would be next?