| Alexander's Indian campaign | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of theWars of Alexander the Great | |||||||
 Routes taken by theMacedonian army into theIndus Valley | |||||||
| |||||||
| Belligerents | |||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
| ||
|---|---|---|
Early rule Conquest of the Persian Empire Expedition into India Death and legacy Cultural impact | ||
TheIndian campaign of Alexander the Great began in 327 BC and lasted until 325 BC. After conquering theAchaemenid Persian Empire, theMacedonian army undertook an expedition into theIndus Valley of NorthwesternIndian subcontinent. Within two years,Alexander expanded theMacedonian Empire, a kingdom closely linked to the broader Greek world, to include Gandhara and the Indus Valley ofPunjab andSindh (now inIndia andPakistan), surpassing the earlier frontiers established by thePersian Achaemenid conquest.
Following Macedon's absorption ofGandhara (a formerPersian satrapy), including the city ofTaxila, Alexander and his troops advanced into Punjab, where they were confronted byPorus, the regional Indian king. In 326 BC, Alexander defeated Porus and thePauravas during theBattle of the Hydaspes,[1][2] but that engagement was possibly the Macedonians' most costly battle.[3]
Alexander's continued eastward march was leading his army into a confrontation with theNanda Empire, based inMagadha. According to Greek sources, the Nanda army was five times the size of the Macedonian army;[4] Alexander's troops—increasingly exhausted, homesick, and anxious by the prospects of having to further face large Indian armies throughout theIndo-Gangetic Plain—mutinied at theHyphasis River, refusing to advance his push to the east. After a meeting with his army generalCoenus, during which he was informed of his soldiers' laments, Alexander relented under the conviction that it was better to return. He subsequently turned southward, advancing through southern Punjab as well as Sindh, where he conquered more tribes along the lower areas of theIndus River, before finally turning westward to reach Macedon.[5]
Of those who accompanied Alexander to India,Aristobulus,Onesicritus, andNearchus wrote about the Indian campaign.[6] The only surviving contemporary account of Alexander's Indian campaign is a report of the voyage of thenaval commander Nearchus,[7] who was tasked with exploring the coast between the Indus River and thePersian Gulf.[6] This report is preserved inArrian'sAnabasis (c. 150 AD). Arrian provides a detailed account of Alexander's campaigns, based on the writings of Alexander's companions and courtiers.[7]
Arrian's account is supplemented by the writings of other authors, whose works are also based on the accounts of Alexander's companions: these authors includeDiodorus (c. 21 BC),Strabo (c. 23 AD), andPlutarch (c. 119 AD).[8]
Alexander's incursion into India took place primarily in theIndus River basin area, which was divided among several small states. These states appear to have been based on dominance of particular tribes, as the Greek writers mention tribes such as theMalloi as well as kings whose names seem to be tribal designations. TheAchaemenid Empire of Persiahad held suzerainty over the Indus valley in the previous decades, but there was no trace of Achaemenid rule beyond the Indus river when Alexander's army arrived in the region.[9]Strabo, sourcing his information from the earlier writerEratosthenes, states that the Achaemenid king controlled the area to the west of the Indus.[10] This area (including theKapisa-Gandhara region) was probably the territory of the Indians, who according to the Greek accounts, fought alongside their overlordDarius III at theBattle of Gaugamela.[11]
Greek writings as well as archaeological excavations indicate the existence of an urban economy dependent on agriculture and trade in the Indus basin. The Greeks mention the existence of cities and fortified towns such asTaxila. Arrian mentions that after defeating Porus, Alexander marched eastwards towards theChenab River, and captured 37 towns: the smallest of these towns had 5,000 or more inhabitants.[12] In theSwat valley, Alexander is said to have seized 230,000 oxen (possiblyZebu), intending to send them to Macedonia forploughing land.[7] Aristobulus saw rice being grown inpaddy fields, Onesicritus reported the existence of a crop called bosmoran (possibly thepearl millet), and Nearchus wrote of "honey-yielding reeds" (presumably thesugarcane).[8] Nearchus also mentions that Indians wore clothes made ofcotton.Rock salt was extracted from theSalt Range, and supplied to other parts of India.[12] Some primitive communities existed in the forest, desert, and coastal regions of the subcontinent. For example, Nearchus mentions that people around the Tomeros river (Hingol) subsisted on fishing, and used stone tools instead of iron ones.[12]
The Greek writers mention the priestly class ofBrahmanas (as "Brachmanes"), who are described as teachers of Indian philosophy.[13] They do not refer to the existence of any religious temples or idols in India, although such references commonly occur in their descriptions of Alexander's campaigns in Egypt, Mesopotamia and Iran. Greek accounts mention naked ascetics calledgymnosophists. A philosopher named Calanus (probably a Greek transcription of the Indian name "Kalyana") accompanied Alexander toPersepolis, where he committed suicide on a public funeral pyre: he was probably a Jain or anAjivika monk. There is no reference toBuddhism in the Greek accounts.[14]
Other than their mention of the Brahmanas, the Greek narratives about Alexander's invasion do not directly mention thecaste system. Some Brahmanas acted as advisors to local princes: Alexander had groups of Brahmanas hanged in present-daySindh for instigating the rulers Musicanus and Sambus to revolt against him. The Greek writings attest the existence of slavery in at least two places: Onesicritus describes slavery in the territory ruled by Musicanus, and Aristobulus mentions poor people selling their daughters publicly in Taxila. Aristobulus also observedSati, the practice of widows immolating themselves on their husbands' pyre, at Taxila. The practice of exposing dead bodies to vultures, similar to theMagian practice ofTower of Silence, was also prevalent in Taxila.[13]
Nearchus mentions that Indians wrote letters on closely woven cloth; it is possible that this is a reference to a precursor of theKharoshthi script, which may have developed from theAramaic alphabet during the Achaemenid rule.[13] While describing a tribe on the coast of present-dayBalochistan, Nearchus mentions that they were different from Indians in "their language and customs", which implies that he associated a particular language with the Indians.[15] This does not mean that the Indians spoke a single language: the language that Nearchus associated with India might have been alingua franca used for official and commercial purposes. This lingua franca was most probably theGandhari Prakrit, as the Greek names (e.g. "Taxila" and "Sandrokottus") for Indian people and places seem to be derived from this language (e.g. "Takhasila" and "Chandagutta") rather thanSanskrit (e.g. "Takshashila" and "Chandragupta").[14]
Nearchus attests the existence ofmedical science in India: he mentions that when the Greek physicians failed to provide remedies for snake-bites toAlexander, the king gathered Indian healers who were also able to cure other diseases and painful conditions. The Greek accounts do not mention any other sciences of contemporary India.[14]
_circa_480_BCE_in_the_Naqsh-e_Roastam_reliefs_of_Xerxes_I.jpg)
After the death ofSpitamenes and his marriage toRoxana (Raoxshna inOld Iranian) in 326 BC to cement his relations with his new Central Asian satrapies, Alexander was finally free to turn his attention toIndia. For Alexander, the invasion of India was a natural consequence of his subjugation of theAchaemenid Empire, as the areas of theIndus valley had long been under Achaemenid control, since theAchaemenid conquest of the Indus Valleyc. 515 BC.[16] Alexander was only taking possession of territories which he had obtained from the Achaemenids, and now considered rightfully his own.[16]
Alexander invited all the chieftains of the former satrapy ofGandhara, to come to him and submit to his authority.Ambhi (Greek: Omphis), ruler ofTaxila, whose kingdom extended from theIndus to theJhelum (Greek: Hydaspes), complied. At the end of the spring of 327 BC, Alexander started on his Indian expedition leaving Amyntas behind with 3,500 horse and 10,000 foot soldiers to hold the land of theBactrians.[17]
Alexander personally took command of the shield-bearing guards, foot-companions, archers, Agrianians, and horse-javelin-men and led them against theclans – theAspasioi ofKunarvalleys, the Guraeans of the Guraeus (Panjkora) valley, and theAssakenoi of theSwat andBuner valleys.[citation needed]
Alexander faced resistance from Hastin (or Astes), chief of the Ilastinayana (called the Astakenoi or Astanenoi) tribe, whose capital was Pushkalavati or Peukelaotis.[18] He later defeated Asvayanas and Asvakayanas and captured their 40,000 men and 230,000 oxen. Asvakayanas of Massaga fought him under the command of their queen,Cleophis, with an army of 30,000 cavalry, 38,000 infantry, 30 elephants, and 7,000 mercenaries. Other regions that fought Alexander were Abhisara,Aornos,Bazira, and Ora or Dyrta.[19][20][21]
A fierce contest ensued with the Aspasioi, in the course of which Alexander himself was wounded in the shoulder by a dart, but eventually the Aspasioi lost the fight; 40,000 of them were enslaved. The Assakenoi faced Alexander with an army of 30,000 cavalry, 38,000 infantry, and 30elephants.[22] They had fought bravely and offered stubborn resistance to the invader in many of their strongholds such as the cities of Ora,Bazira, and Massaga. The fort of Massaga could only be reduced after several days of bloody fighting in which Alexander himself was wounded seriously in the ankle. When theChieftain of Massaga fell in the battle, the supreme command of the army went to his old mother,Cleophis, who also stood determined to defend her motherland to the last extremity. The example of Cleophis assuming the supreme command of the military also brought the entire population of women of the locality into the fighting.[23][24] Alexander was only able to reduce Massaga by resorting to political stratagem and actions of betrayal. According toCurtius: "Not only did Alexander slaughter the entire population of Massaga, but also did he reduce its buildings to rubbles".[25] A similar slaughter then followed at Ora, another stronghold of the Assakenoi.
In the aftermath of generalslaughter andarson committed by Alexander at Massaga and Ora, numerousAssakenians fled to a high fortress calledAornos (not definitely identified but somewhere between Shangla, inSwat, and theKohistan region, both innorthern Pakistan). Alexander followed close behind their heels and besieged the strategic hill-fort. The Siege of Aornos was Alexander's last siege, "the climax to Alexander's career as the greatest besieger in history", according to Robin Lane Fox.[26] The siege took place in April 326 BC.[27] It presented the last threat to Alexander's supply line, which stretched, dangerously vulnerable, over theHindu Kush back toBalkh, thoughArrian credits Alexander's heroic desire to outdo his kinsmanHeracles, who allegedly had proved unable to take the place Pir-Sar, which the Greeks called Aornis. The site lies north ofAttock in what is nowPakistani Punjab, on a strongly reinforced mountain spur above the narrow gorges in a bend of the upperIndus. Neighboring tribesmen who surrendered to Alexander offered to lead him to the best point of access.[citation needed]
At the vulnerable north side leading to the fort, Alexander and his catapults were stopped by a deep ravine. To bring the siege engines within reach, an earthwork mound was constructed to bridge the ravine. A low hill connected to the nearest tip of Pir-Sar was soon within reach and taken. Alexander's troops were at first repelled by boulders rolled down from above. Three days of drumbeats marked the defenders' celebration of the initial repulse, followed by a surprise retreat. Hauling himself up the last rockface on a rope, Alexander cleared the summit, slaying some fugitives – inflated by Arrian to a massacre[28] – and erected altars toAthena Nike, Athena of Victory, traces of which were identified by Stein.Sisikottos, orSaśigupta, who had helped Alexander in this campaign, was made the governor of Aornos.[citation needed]
 | This sectionneeds additional citations forverification. Please helpimprove this article byadding citations to reliable sources in this section. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.(August 2024) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
After reducing Aornos, Alexander crossed the Indus to begin campaigning in thePunjab region.[29]
TheBattle of the Hydaspes River was fought by Alexander in July 326 BC against kingPorus (possibly,Paurava) on theHydaspes River (Jhelum River) in thePunjab, nearBhera. The Hydaspes was the last major battle fought by Alexander.[30] The main train went into what is now modern-day Pakistan through theKhyber Pass, but a smaller force under the personal command of Alexander went via the northern route, resulting in the Siege of Aornos along the way. In early spring of the next year, he combined his forces and allied withTaxiles (also Ambhi), the King ofTaxila, against his neighbor, the King ofHydaspes.
Porus was a regional King in India. Arrian writes about Porus, in his own words:
One of the Indian Kings called Porus, a man remarkable alike for his personal strength and noble courage, on hearing the report about Alexander, began to prepare for the inevitable. Accordingly, when hostilities broke out, he ordered his army to attack Macedonians from whom he demanded their king, as if he was his private enemy. Alexander lost no time in joining battle, but his horse being wounded in the first charge, he fell headlong to the ground, and was saved by his attendants who hastened up to his assistance.
Porus drew up on the south bank of the Jhelum River, and was set to repel any crossings. The Jhelum River was deep and fast enough that any opposed crossing would probably doom the entire attacking force. Alexander knew that a direct crossing would fail, so he found a suitable crossing, about 27 km (17 mi) upstream of his camp. The name of the place is "Kadee". Alexander left his general Craterus behind with most of the army while he crossed the river upstream with a strong contingent. Porus sent a small cavalry and chariot force under his son to the crossing.
According to sources[citation needed], Alexander had already encountered Porus's son, so the two men were not strangers. Porus's son killed Alexander's horse with one blow, and Alexander fell to the ground. Also writing about this encounter, Arrian adds,
Other writers state that there was a fight at the actual landing between Alexander's cavalry and a force of Indians commanded by Porus's son, who was there ready to oppose them with superior numbers, and that in the course of fighting he (Porus's son) wounded Alexander with his own hand and struck the blow which killed his (Alexander's) beloved horse Buccaphalus.
The force was easily routed, and according to Arrian, Porus' son was killed. Porus now saw that the crossing force was larger than he had expected, and decided to face it with the bulk of his army. Porus's army were poised with cavalry on both flanks, thewar elephants in front, and infantry behind the elephants. These war elephants presented an especially difficult situation for Alexander, as they scared the Macedonian horses.
Alexander started the battle by sending horse archers to shower the Porus's left cavalry wing, and then used his cavalry to destroy Porus's cavalry. Meanwhile, theMacedonian phalanxes had crossed the river to engage the charge of the war elephants. The Macedonians eventually surrounded Porus's force.
Diodorus wrote about the battle tactics of war elephants:
Upon this the elephants, applying to good use their prodigious size and strength, killed some of the enemy by trampling under their feet, and crushing their armour and their bones, while upon other they inflicted a terrible death, for they first lifted them aloft with their trunks, which they twisted round their bodies and then dashed them down with great violence to the ground. Many others they deprived in a moment of life by goring them through and through with their tusks.
The fighting style of Porus' soldiers was described in detail by Arrian:
The foot soldiers carry a bow made of equal length with the man who bears it. This they rest upon the ground, and pressing against it with their left foot thus discharges the arrow, having drawn the string far backwards for the shaft they use is little short for three yards long, and there is nothing can resist an Indian archer's shot, neither shield nor breast plate, nor any stronger defence if such there be.[28]
According to Curtius Quintus, Alexander towards the end of the day sent a few ambassadors to Porus:
Alexander, anxious to save the life of this great and gallant soldier, sent Texile the Indian to him (to Porus). Texile rode up as near as he dared and requested him to stop his elephant and hear what message Alexander sent him, escape was no longer possible. But Texiles was an old enemy of the Indian King, and Porus turned his elephant and drove at him, to kill him with his lance; and he might indeed have killed him, if he had not spurred his horse out of the way in the nick of the time. Alexander, however, far from resenting this treatment of his messenger, sent a number of others, last of whom was Indian named Meroes, a man he had been told had long been Porus' friend.[28]
According to Plutarch this was one of Alexander's hardest battles:
The combat then was of a more mixed kind; but maintained with such obstinacy, that it was not decided till the eighth hour of the day.
Plutarch also wrote that the bitter fighting of the Hydaspes made Alexander's men hesitant to continue the conquest of India, considering that they would potentially face far larger armies than those of Porus if they were to cross the Ganges River.[31]
Porus was one of many local kings who impressed Alexander. Wounded in his shoulder, standing over 2 m (6 ft 7 in) tall, but still on his feet, he was asked by Alexander how he wished to be treated. "Treat me, Alexander, the way a King treats another King", Porus responded. Other historians question the accuracy of this entire event, arguing that Porus would never have said those words.[32][dubious –discuss]Philostratus the Elder in theLife of Apollonius of Tyana writes that in the army of Porus there was an elephant who had fought bravely against Alexander's army and Alexander dedicated it toHelios (Sun) and named it Ajax, because he thought that a so great animal deserved a great name. The elephant had gold rings around its tusks and an inscription was on them written in Greek: "Alexander the son of Zeus dedicates Ajax to Helios" (ΑΛΕΞΑΝΔΡΟΣ Ο ΔΙΟΣ ΤΟΝ ΑΙΑΝΤΑ ΤΩΙ ΗΛΙΩΙ).[33]
Alexander did not continue, thus leaving all the headwaters of the Indus River unconquered. He later founded Alexandria Nikaia (Victory), located at the battle site, to commemorate his triumph. He also foundedAlexandria Bucephalus on the opposite bank of the river in memory of his much-cherished horse,Bucephalus, who had carried Alexander through the campaign on the Indian subcontinent and had died heroically during that battle at Hydaspes.[28]
After crossing theRiver Chenab, Alexander joined byPorus with elephants and 5,000 local troops,laid siege toSagala, where theCathaeans (related toKāṭhī[34])[35][need quotation to verify] had entrenched themselves. The city was razed to the ground, and many of its inhabitants killed:
Musicanus (Ancient Greek:Μουσικανὸς,[36] Indian: Mûshika[citation needed]) was an Indian king at the head of theIndus, who raised a rebellion againstAlexander the Greatc. 323 BC.Peithon, one of Alexander's generals, managed to put down the revolt:
The King ofPatala, Porticanus came to Alexander and surrendered. Alexander let him keep possession of his own dominions, with instructions to provide whatever was needed for the reception of the army.[36]
Sambus was yet another ruler in lower Indus valley. According toDiodorus Siculus, Alexander invaded his kingdom, killing eighty thousand people and destroying cities. Most of population was taken into slavery, and Sambus himself ‘fled with thirty elephants into the country beyond the Indus’.
East of Porus's kingdom, near theGanges River (the Hellenic version of the Indian nameGanga), was the powerfulNanda Empire ofMagadha and theGangaridai Empire ofBengal. Fearing the prospects of facing other powerful Indian armies and exhausted by years of campaigning, his army mutinied at theHyphasis River (the modernBeas River), refusing to march further east.[38]
As for the Macedonians, however, their struggle with Porus blunted their courage and stayed their further advance into India. For having had all they could do to repulse an enemy who mustered only twenty thousand infantry and two thousand horse, they violently opposed Alexander when he insisted on crossing the river Ganges also, the width of which, as they learned, was thirty-two furlongs, its depth a hundred fathoms, while its banks on the further side were covered with multitudes of men-at-arms and horsemen and elephants. For they were told that the kings of the Ganderites and Praesii were awaiting them with eighty thousand horsemen, two hundred thousand footmen, eight thousand chariots, and six thousand fighting elephants.
Gangaridai, a nation which possesses a vast force of the largest-sized elephants. Owing to this, their country has never been conquered by any foreign king: for all other nations dread the overwhelming number and strength of these animals. Thus Alexander the Macedonian, after conquering all Asia, did not make war upon the Gangaridai, as he did on all others; for when he had arrived with all his troops at the river Ganges, he abandoned as hopeless an invasion of the Gangaridai when he learned that they possessed four thousand elephants well trained and equipped for war.
Alexander, using the incorrect maps of the Greeks, thought that the world ended a mere 1,000 kilometres (620 mi) away, at the edge of India. He therefore spoke to his army and tried to persuade them to march further into India, butCoenus pleaded with him to change his mind and return, saying the men "longed to again see their parents, their wives and children, their homeland". Alexander, seeing the unwillingness of his men, agreed and turned back.
Alexander raised twelve altars to mark the eastern extent of his conquests.[42][43] The exact location and fate of these altars is unknown, although one historian has suggested that they were later reused to create some of thePillars of Ashoka.[44]
Along the way, his army conquered the Malli clans (in modern-dayMultan). During a siege, Alexander jumped into the fortified city with only two of his bodyguards and was wounded seriously by a Mallian arrow.[31] His forces, believing their king dead, took the citadel and unleashed their fury on the Malli who had taken refuge within it, perpetrating a massacre, sparing no man, woman or child.[45] However, due to the efforts of his surgeon, Kritodemos of Kos, Alexander survived the injury.[46] Following this, the surviving Malli surrendered to Alexander's forces, thereby his beleaguered army moved on and conquered more Indian tribes along the way.
.jpg)
Alexander sent much of his army toCarmania (modern southernIran) with his generalCraterus, and commissioned a fleet to explore thePersian Gulf shore under his admiralNearchus while he led the rest of his forces back to Persia by the southern route through theGedrosian Desert (now part of southernIran) andMakran (now part ofPakistan). In crossing the desert, Alexander's army took enormous casualties from hunger and thirst, but fought no human enemy. They encountered the "Fish Eaters", orIchthyophagi, primitive people who lived on theMakran coast of theArabian Sea, who had matted hair, no fire, no metal, no clothes, lived in huts made of whale bones, and ate raw seafood obtained bybeachcombing.[47] During the crossing, Alexander refused as much water as possible, to share the sufferings of his men and to boost the morale of the army.[48]
In the territory of theIndus, Alexander nominated his officerPeithon as asatrap, a position he would hold for the next ten years until 316 BC, and in thePunjab he leftEudemus in charge of the army, at the side of the satrapPorus andTaxiles. Eudemus became ruler of a part of the Punjab after their death. Both rulers returned to the West in 316 BC with their armies. Inc. 322 BC BC,Chandragupta Maurya ofMagadha founded theMaurya Empire in India and conquered the Macedonian satrapies during theSeleucid–Mauryan war (305–303 BC).[49]
While the battle raged, Craterus forced his way over the Haranpur ford. When he saw that Alexander was winning a brilliant victory he pressed on and, as his men were fresh, took over the pursuit.
