The Anabasis of Alexander or, The history of the wars and conquests of Alexander the Great
his alliance. He had not even sent him the gifts which were suitable
for a great king, or asked any favour from him. He accelerated his
voyage down the river to such a degree that he succeeded in reaching
the confines of the land of Musicanus before he had even heard that
Alexander had started against him. Musicanus was so greatly alarmed
that he went as fast as he could to meet him, bringing with him
the gifts valued most highly among the Indians, and taking all his
elephants. He offered to surrender both his nation and himself, at
the same time acknowledging his error, which was the most effectual
way with Alexander for any one to get what he requested. Accordingly
for these considerations Alexander granted him an indemnity for his
offences. He also granted him the privilege of ruling the city and
country, both of which Alexander admired. Craterus was directed to
fortify the citadel in the capital; which was done while Alexander was
still present. A garrison was also placed in it, because he thought the
place suitable for keeping the circumjacent tribes in subjection.
CHAPTER XVI.
CAMPAIGN AGAINST OXYCANUS AND SAMBUS.
Then he took the archers, Agrianians, and cavalry sailing with him,
and marched against the governor of that country, whose name was
Oxycanus,[765] because he neither came himself nor did envoys come
from him, to offer the surrender of himself and his land. At the very
first assault he took by storm the two largest cities under the rule
of Oxycanus; in the second of which that prince himself was captured.
The booty he gave to his army, but the elephants he led with himself.
The other cities in the same land surrendered to him as he advanced,
nor did any one turn to resist him; so cowed in spirit[766] had all
the Indians now become at the thought of Alexander and his fortune.
He then marched back against Sambus, whom he had appointed viceroy of
the mountaineer Indians and who was reported to have fled, because
he learned that Musicanus had been pardoned by Alexander and was
ruling over his own land. For he was at war with Musicanus. But when
Alexander approached the city which the country of Sambus held as its
metropolis, the name of which was Sindimana, the gates were thrown
open to him at his approach, and the relations of Sambus reckoned up
his money and went out to meet him, taking with them the elephants
also. They assured him that Sambus had fled, not from any hostile
feeling towards Alexander, but fearing on account of the pardon of
Musicanus.[767] He also captured another city which had revolted
at this time, and slew as many of the Brachmans[768] as had been
instigators of this revolt. These men are the philosophers of the
Indians, of whose philosophy, if such it may be called, I shall give an
account in my book descriptive of India.[769]
CHAPTER XVII.
MUSICANUS EXECUTED.—CAPTURE OF PATALA.
Meantime he was informed that Musicanus had revolted. He despatched the
viceroy, Peithon, son of Agenor, with a sufficient army against him,
while he himself marched against the cities which had been put under
the rule of Musicanus. Some of these he razed to the ground, reducing
the inhabitants to slavery; and into others he introduced garrisons and
fortified the citadels. After accomplishing this, he returned to the
camp and fleet. By this time Musicanus had been captured by Peithon,
who was bringing him to Alexander. The king ordered him to be hanged
in his own country, and with him as many of the Brachmans as had
instigated him to the revolt. Then came to him the ruler of the land of
the Patalians,[770] who said that the Delta formed by the river Indus
was still larger than the Egyptian Delta.[771] This man surrendered
to him the whole of his own land and entrusted both himself and his
property to him. Alexander sent him away again in possession of his own
dominions, with instructions to provide whatever was needful for the
reception of the army. He then sent Craterus into Carmania with the
brigades of Attalus, Meleager, and Antigenes, some of the archers, and
as many of the Companions and other Macedonians as, being now unfit
for military service, he was despatching to Macedonia by the route
through the lands of the Arachotians and Zarangians. To Craterus he
also gave the duty of leading the elephants; but the rest of the army,
except the part of it which was sailing with himself down to the sea,
he put under the command of Hephaestion. He transported Peithon with
the cavalry-lancers and Agrianians to the opposite bank of the Indus,
not the one along which Hephaestion was about to lead the army. Peithon
was ordered to collect men to colonize the cities which had just been
fortified, and to form a junction with the king at Patala, after having
settled the affairs of the Indians of that region, if they attempted
any revolutionary proceedings. On the third day of his voyage,
Alexander was informed that the governor of the Patalians[772] had
collected most of his subjects and was going away by stealth, having
left his land deserted. For this reason Alexander sailed down the river
with greater speed than before[773]; and when he arrived at Patala, he
found both the country and the city deserted by the inhabitants and
tillers of the soil. He however despatched the lightest troops in his
army in pursuit of the fugitives; and when some of them were captured,
he sent them away to the rest, bidding them be of good courage and
return, for they might inhabit the city and till the country as before.
Most of them accordingly returned.
CHAPTER XVIII.
VOYAGE DOWN THE INDUS.
After instructing Hephaestion to fortify the citadel in Patala, he sent
men into the adjacent country, which was waterless, to dig wells and to
render the land fit for habitation. Certain of the native barbarians
attacked these men, and falling upon them unawares slew some of them;
but having lost many of their own men, they fled into the desert.
The work was therefore accomplished by those who had been sent out,
another army having joined them, which Alexander had despatched to take
part in the work, when he heard of the attack of the barbarians. Near
Patala the water of the Indus is divided into two large rivers, both
of which retain the name of Indus as far as the sea. Here Alexander
constructed a harbour and dockyard; and when his works had advanced
towards completion he resolved to sail down as far as the mouth of the
right branch of the river.[774] He gave Leonnatus the command of 1,000
cavalry and 8,000 heavy and light-armed infantry, and sent him to march
through the island of Patala opposite the naval expedition; while he
himself took the fastest sailing vessels, having one and a half bank of
oars, all the thirty-oared galleys, and some of the boats, and began
to sail down the right branch of the river. The Indians of that region
had fled, and consequently he could get no pilot for the voyage, and
the navigation of the river was very difficult. On the day after the
start a storm arose, and the wind blowing right against the stream made
the river hollow[775] and shattered the hulls of the vessels violently,
so that most of his ships were injured, and some of the thirty-oared
galleys were entirely broken up. But they succeeded in running them
aground before they quite fell to pieces in the water; and others were
therefore constructed. He then sent the quickest of the light-armed
troops into the land beyond the river’s bank and captured some Indians,
who from this time piloted him down the channel. But when they arrived
at the place where the river expands, so that where it was widest it
extended 200 stades, a strong wind blew from the outer sea, and the
oars could hardly be raised in the swell; they therefore took refuge
again in a canal into which his pilots conducted them.
CHAPTER XIX.
VOYAGE DOWN THE INDUS INTO THE SEA.
While their vessels were moored here, the phenomenon of the ebb and
flow of the tide in the great sea occurred, so that their ships were
left upon dry ground. This caused Alexander and his companions no small
alarm, inasmuch as they were previously quite unacquainted with it.
But they were much more alarmed when, the time coming round again, the
water approached and the hulls of the vessels were raised aloft.[776]
The ships which it caught settled in the mud were raised aloft without
any damage, and floated again without receiving any injury; but those
that had been left on the drier land and had not a firm settlement,
when an immense compact wave advanced, either fell foul of each other
or were dashed against the land and thus shattered to pieces. When
Alexander had repaired these vessels as well as his circumstances
permitted, he sent some men on in advance down the river in two boats
to explore the island at which the natives said he must moor his
vessels in his voyage to the sea. They told him that the name of the
island was Cilluta.[777] As he was informed that there were harbours
in this island, that it was a large one and had plenty of water in it,
he made the rest of his fleet put in there; but he himself with the
best sailing ships advanced beyond, to see if the mouth of the river
afforded an easy voyage out into the open sea. After advancing about
200 stades from the first island, they descried another which was quite
out in the sea. Then indeed they returned to the island in the river;
and having moored his vessels near the extremity of it, Alexander
offered sacrifice to those gods to whom he said he had been directed by
Ammon to sacrifice. On the following day he sailed down to the other
island which was in the deep sea; and having come to shore here also,
he offered other sacrifices to other gods and in another manner. These
sacrifices he also offered according to the oracular instructions
of Ammon. Then having gone beyond the mouths of the river Indus, he
sailed out into the open sea, as he said, to discover if any land lay
anywhere near in the sea; but in my opinion, chiefly that he might be
able to say that he had navigated the great outer sea of India. There
he sacrificed some bulls to Poseidon and cast them into the sea; and
having poured out a libation after the sacrifice, he threw the goblet
and bowls, which were golden, into the deep as thank-offerings,
praying the god to escort safely for him the fleet, which he intended
to despatch to the Persian Gulf and the mouths of the Euphrates and
Tigres.[778]
CHAPTER XX.
EXPLORATION OF THE MOUTHS OF THE INDUS.
Returning to Patala, he found that the citadel had been fortified and
that Peithon had arrived with his army, having accomplished everything
for which he was despatched. He ordered Hephaestion to prepare what was
needful for the fortification of a naval station and the construction
of dockyards; for he resolved to leave behind here a fleet of many
ships near the city of Patala, where the river Indus divides itself
into two streams. He himself sailed down again into the Great Sea by
the other mouth of the Indus, to ascertain which branch of the river is
easier to navigate. The mouths of the river Indus are about 1800 stades
distant from each other.[779] In the voyage down he arrived at a large
lake in the mouth of the river, which the river makes by spreading
itself out; or perhaps the waters of the surrounding district draining
into it make it large, so that it very much resembles a gulf of the
sea.[780] For in it were seen fish like those in the sea, larger indeed
than those in our sea. Having moored his ships then in this lake, where
the pilots directed, he left there most of the soldiers and all the
boats with Leonnatus; but he himself with the thirty-oared galleys and
the vessels with one and a half row of oars passed beyond the mouth of