Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 15.djvu/158

Rh 140 MACEDONIAN EMPIRE of Lake Lyclmitis, on the western side of the range of Scardus or Pindus, when the news reached him that the exiles had roused Thebes to arms, and were besieging his garrison in the Cadmeia or citadel. Striking through a cleft in the main range of mountains, through which the Devol flows, and marching south along the Haliacmon and over the Cambunian ridge, which joins Pindus to Olympus, he reached Bceotia in less than a fortnight, stormed Thebes, sold the citizens as slaves, and destroyed the place. The citadel alone remained as a Macedonian fortress, until Cassander rebuilt the city. Amidst the general terror, Alexander thought it wisest to follow his father s policy here also, and be content with his election as captain- general by the congress of Corinth. He left Antipater as regent, and at once crossed the Hellespont to Sestus in the spring of 334, before the Persian fleet was ready to intercept him, or the main Persian army had been embodied. What information had he as to the regions beyond the Taurus and beyond the Tigris, and still more as to the great table-land of Asia extending from Persia to the Indus 1 He had the Anabasis of Xenophon, and perhaps the Persian history of Ctesias, but he must have relied mainly on information derived from Greeks who had been in the Persian service, or who had traded in the interior. But he knew one thing for certain, that no force in Asia could resist Philip s veteran army. Philip had formed the local battalions of militia into the phalanx, arrayed sixteen deep, and armed with Jong two-handed pikes (sarissx); and this steady body of pikemen, with the veterans in the front ranks, had borne down on the open plain of Chaeronea the resistance of the Greek hoplites, who were only armed with a much shorter epear. The phalanx was supported on the flanks by the light infantry of the guard (hypaspists), by targeteers (pcltasts) trained after the plan of Iphicrates, by light lancers, and by a strong body of heavy cavalry, headed by the king s companions, and fighting with the short thrust ing pike. It was the charge of the cavalry led by Alexander in person, at the head of the &quot; agema &quot; or royal squadron, that decided all his battles. It seems strange, however, to us to hear that the men had neither saddles nor stirrups, nor were the horses shod. The fine native army was largely reinforced by barbarian archers, darters, and slingers, and by regiments of Greek mercenaries ; and this systematic combination of different arms and kinds of troops was supported by field and siege artillery of an improved type. Later on, when the main Persian army was broken up, Alexander added to the number of light troops, and made the regiments smaller and more flexible. Philip had moulded his country into a military monarchy, and turned the nobles into a caste of officers. All its strength was devoted to the one object of war, and it became for the time an overmateh for all its neighbours. On the other hand, Persia had deprived the subject peoples of national life and spirit ; the retreat of the Ten Thousand had shown how useless her native levies were, and now her defence rested almost entirely on a force of Greek troops under the able Rhodian general Memnon. The Orientals fought mainly with missiles, and were little suited for close combat hand to hand. The Persian satraps, however, had around them some choice horsemen, armed with missile javelins and with scimitars; and they insisted, against Memnon s advice, on fighting at the Granicus, which flows northward from Ida into the Propontis, but is every where fordable. A sharp cavalry action at the passage of the river (334 B.C.) gave Alexander all Asia Minor, and the completeness of his victory might seem to justify Livy s saying that he &quot; did but dare to despise an empty show,&quot; and the words attributed to his uncle, Alexander of Epirus, that he himself had found the men s chamber in Italy while his nephew had found the women s in Asia. The Greeks had. long been conscious of their superiority. &quot; They might,&quot; said Aristotle, &quot;govern the world, could they but combine in one political society.&quot; Agesilaus of Sparta and Jason of Pherae had already planned the attack on Persia, and the liberation of the Asiatic Greeks; and Alexander acted in the full consciousness that he was extending Greek rule and civilization over the East. At the news of the battle on the Granicus, Sardis surrendered. It was the centre to which all the routes converged, but Alexander did not (like Cyrus the younger) at once push on into the heart of the empire along the great road that led from Sardis to Susa. His object was to secure a firm base of operations, by occupying the line of coast round the ^Egean, and forcing the Phoenician fleet in the Persian service to retire. The Greek colonization of Asia Minor had prepared the way for him ; the Greek cities along the western and southern coast threw open their gates, and Alexander restored their popular constitutions. He even recognized the Lycian con federation. Memnon was only able to organize a resist ance at Miletus and Halicarnassus. But his real plan was to put troops on board his ships and raise Greece against the Macedonian yoke, especially as the Athenian fleet was still more than a match for that of Alexander. But when; Memnon died there was no one left to carry out this able plan, and Darius threw away his best chance by recalling, the troops. Then Alexander marched up northwards from Lycia through Pisidia and Phrygia to Gordion on the Sangarius, whence the main road led east across the Halys and through Cappadocia to Cilicia, between the passes of Mount Taurus and those of Mount Amanus. Here Darius tried to throw his army across the Greek line of communi cation with their supplies, but his host, crowded together in the narrow ground on the river Pinarus near Issus, was hopelessly defeated. The modern name of the Gulf of Issus, &quot; Iskenderun,&quot; still preserves the memory of Alexander. Then Farmenio, Alexander s second in com mand, pushed on and took Darius s treasures and stores at Damascus. Again, however, Alexander deferred his march inland till he had mastered Phoenicia and Egypt, and so gained the command of the sea in the eastern basin of the Mediterranean. Only the brave freemen of two fortified cities, Tyre and Gaza, held out ; and when the Phoenician and Cyprian fleet transferred its allegiance to the invader their only effective weapon was wrested from the hands of the Persians. The occupation of Cyprus and Egypt had been one of the boldest conceptions of the age of Pericles and Cimon, and its success would have secured the supremacy of Greek commerce. As the Persians had persecuted the Egyptians for their worship of animals, Egypt welcomed the deliverer, and recognized him as the son of Ammon ; while the Greek colonies of Gyrene and its Pentapolis sent to tender submission. Alexandria was founded on the seaboard as a new centre of commerce,, from which it was easy to communicate with the Govern ment and with all parts of the empire. The protecting island of Pharos gave the means of forming two good harbours on a. coast elsewhere harbourless ; while Lake Mareotis, communicating by canals with the Nile, enabled produce to be easily brought down from the interior. At last the time was come for delivering the final blow to Persia. Alexander passed the Euphrates at Thapsacus (&quot;the passage&quot;), and then marched north-east through the hilly country by Nisibis, to avoid the hot desert of Mesopotamia. He crossed the Tigris unopposed, and defeated Darius s hosts at Gaugamela. The long struggle of two hundred years between Greece and Persia was at an end. The victory converted Alexander into the great king, and Darius into a fugitive pretender; and Babylon and Susa submitted. At Babylon Alexander sacrificed