Had he taken Antipater’s advice, he might have been survived by a successor eleven years old; had he taken his parents’, one of perhaps fourteen; and the whole course of Hellenistic history would have been altered. It is said that when asked how he had contrived to subdue Greece so swiftly, he answered, “By never putting off anything till tomorrow.” This one thing he put off; and set in train a generation of wars.
At least it saved him expense. A much more pressing problem just then was money. It was said of Philip that at his accession his most valuable asset was a cup of thin gold, which he kept at night in the bed box under his pillow. Later he amassed much wealth, but he had also spent it: on his army, on buying support in Greece, on civilizing Macedon, and on preparing for the war. Alexander was to say later, “I inherited from my father a few gold and silver cups, less than sixty talents in the treasury; and debts of five hundred that he owed. When I had borrowed another eight hundred, I set out.” In spite of this, or because of it, he realized all his personal estate, and gave it away to friends and loyal supporters. Some would take nothing, like Perdiccas; whose inclusion suggests, in spite of Ptolemy, that he did the right thing at Thebes. “What are you keeping for yourself?” he asked. “Hope,” said Alexander, to which Perdiccas’ prophetic answer was, “That I’ll share.”
In early spring, Alexander marched east with 30,000 infantry, partly light-armed skirmishers and archers, and about 5,000 cavalry: scarcely more than the Macedonian numbers at Chaeronea, to invade an empire which, if marshalled by an enemy of a calibre anywhere near his own, could have put a million in the field. Tarn has well said that he embarked upon the war at first because “he never thought of not doing it; it was his inheritance.” It was in what the war engendered that his unique genius appeared.
He marched to the Hellespont alongside his fleet; but the far superior Persian navy did not attack. At the crossing of the straits he took the helm of his own flagship; probably as a boy he had sailed on the now-vanished Pella lagoon. Having sacrificed in midstream to Poseidon, on the further shore he cast his spear before him as an omen, and was the first to wade to land. He had no backward look for Europe, which he was never to see again.
Typically, before doing anything else he made straight for Troy—ruined, but traceable on its site of natural rock—made offerings to its patroness Athene, and dedicated at her shrine his whole panoply of arms; taking for himself, as of right, his choice of her ancient, allegedly Homeric trophies, including a shield which would later save his life. Here he and Hephaestion paid their tribute to the immortal friends; Plutarch says also that Alexander and his comrades stripped and ran a ceremonial race round Achilles’ gravemound. All sources agree that he sacrificed to the hero. Some enterprising tourist tout offered him the authentic lyre of Paris (whose other name was Alexandros); he crisply rejected this relic of an effete hedonist, saying he would prefer the instrument to which Achilles sang about the deeds of heroes. The truth is perhaps that lyres and singing were still a sore subject, even after eight or ten years.
After this romantic dedication of his adventure, he marshalled his forces for the conquest of transpontine Greece, his only present objective. He marched north, then east along the coast of the Dardanelles, where the Persian force awaited him.
It was not yet led by Darius, who put nothing off till tomorrow if next week or next month would do. Its most expert commander was the mercenary general Memnon, leading 15,000 of his Greeks. He was, however, outranked by half a dozen aristocratic Persians. When he advised scorching the countryside and starving out the Macedonians, who could not live very long on what they brought, the local satrap indignantly refused and carried the others with him. They then decided to hold the eastern bank of the River Granicus, just inshore from its mouth; a reasonable alternative in view of their (much-disputed) numbers, which seem to have been inferior to the invaders’. Alexander would have to tackle them before he advanced inland, and the high river banks gave them a needed advantage.
As Alexander neared the river, his scouts reported the Persians’ position. Since his landing he had been joined by Parmenion, who had replaced his son Philotas as second-in-command. If Parmenion did advise Alexander against pitched battle and propose a dawn surprise—another disputed matter in view of later events—it was probably on the assumption that the enemy would adopt the obviously sensible tactic of posting their firm-stanced infantry on the top of the bank, to prod back with their spears the insecure and slithering horsemen as they scrambled up. Instead it was held by cavalry. General Fuller is surely right in seeing here another example of aristocratic noblesse oblige and racial pride. The mere infantry were foreign hirelings—no gentleman should shelter himself behind them.
Medieval knights, on big horses, anchored by stirrups into their massive saddles and holding their huge spears in rests, would have offered an impregnable defense line. But the Persians, with the insecure seat of the ancient horseman, were also handicapped by having not even small spears as combat hand weapons, but missile javelins, of which each man is unlikely to have carried more than two. The Macedonians had strong battle lances of cornel wood. Depending though they did on the rider’s arm movements, since using his horse’s forward impetus would have pushed him off, they were still superior armament. The armies were near enough for Alexander to be aware of this.
Drawing up his forces to front the river, he gave the left wing to Parmenion, himself taking up the time-honoured royal station on the right; his brigade commander here was Philotas. Arrian gives the name of all section leaders; and it is interesting to see the great future generals, Craterus and Perdiccas, still only phalanx commanders. Ptolemy and Hephaestion had as yet no commands at all. A true professional, Alexander had no favourites in the field.
The fact that he himself was so resplendently armed as to be recognizable as far as he could be seen, deplorable by modern standards, was professional too throughout all ages of war but ours. That practical soldier Xenophon relates approvingly of Cyrus that his arms shone like a mirror and his helmet had a white plume. Alexander put up two of them, one each side.
Having launched his first shock-troops into the river, he returned to the right wing, gave his war yell, and, riding in front, drove straight into the massive formation drawn up on purpose to receive him. He directed his thrust towards the Persian high command, traditionally in the centre, rescuing some of his own centre assault troops who were hard pressed. The scrimmage on the steep churned-up bank was for some time indecisive, the Macedonians being faced with hand-to-hand combat whenever they reached the top; the Persians, their javelins expended, now using side arms. In this hacking and shoving Alexander’s spear was broken; he got another from one of his squires, a Demaratus of Corinth, probably the grandson of the Demaratus who had negotiated his return from exile. With this he dashed at a conspicuous Persian general, killed him, and was at once involved in a mêlée, getting a blow on the helmet which removed one of its plumes. While he was accounting for this assailant, another raised his scimitar to bring it down on him; the brother of his childhood nurse Hellanice, Cleitus “the Black,” was in time to cut through the second attacker’s arm.
Resolution, discipline, and the strong cornel-wood lances carried the day. The Persians fell into confusion, then into flight. Alexander let them go; he concentrated his assault upon the mercenaries, whom he regarded as traitors to Greece. Here there was a savage slaughter. Some must have escaped, but he only took about 2,000 prisoners, whom he did not re-employ but sent to hard labour in Macedon. Memnon himself got away to fight again. The Persian satrap Arsames, who had overruled his advice before the battle, also escaped, but killed himself.