Arrian's History of Alexander's Expedition. Translated from the Greek. With notes, historical, geographical, and critical by Mr. Rooke ... To which is prefix'd, Mr. Le Clerc's Criticism upon Quintus Curtius. And some remarks upon Mr. Perizonius's Vindication of that author. (Arrian's Indian...

Preface

. HAD there been ever a tolerable history of Alexander's acts in the English tongue, I had hardly undertaken this ; and had this been ever translated into English before, I had scarce attempted it again ; but as most of the histories of him, in our language, are full of errors, inconsistencies, incredibilities, and romance, I thought it might be no unacceptable piece of service to present the public with the truest, justest, and most accurate account thereof now extant ; and to put thi> matter beyond dispute, I have taken the pains to compare several of the most material passages in this history, with the accounts given us of them by other authors ; and as I have no particular bias of prejudice, prepossession. nor interest, that I am sensible of, to incline me one way or another, I presume 1 have stated the case, all along, fairly and impartially, on each side.

The greatest part of the knowledge we arrive at is acquired by comparing things and ideas with each other; and if so, the nearest way to it is by laying them fairly together, and making apt and useful comparisons. Before we can justly determine the difference between two bodies, in quantity, we must know the exact dimensionsof both ; and before we can be satisfied of the difference of two ideas, in quality, we must form a true judgment of each. When a considerable number of authors treat upon one subject, unless they have all copied each other, which seldom happens, wherever one seems to run mad, we find another in his senses ; where one sleeps, another keeps awake ; where one curtails a story too much, another gives it fully ; and where one delivers it in dark and unintelligible terms, another serves to clear up his meaning, and render him plain and easy.

In short, wherever one errs in any particular, he is either corrected by some other, or may be, by a judicious commentator. This is the method I have taken, with the writers of the ensuing history ; and by this means my readers will reap the advantage of consulting many authors by looking into one, and have the substance of several volumes contracted into the compass of a few pages. Of almost an hundred and fifty authors who have handled this subject, scarce half a score have come down tn our times, and even the better part of these have only touched it casually. The chief of the remaining ones are Diodorus, Strabo, Plutarch, Arrian, Curtius, Justin, and Orosius. Of these, Diodorus, Justin, and Orosius, wrote his acts only transiently in their larger works, and having so many things upon their hands at once, it is no great wonder if they be found accurate in nothing.

Diodorus took much upon trust, without ever examining into the truth or credit bility of the facts which he related ; he swallowed every thing, without digesting anything ; and Curtius either copied from the same authors, or, which is much more likely, translated a great part of his work from him. Trogus was either a sad historian, or Justin a vile abridger ; but as we have the testimony of many famous men of antiquity in favour of Trogus, Justin will stand condemned as an injudicious author, and the world would have been highly satisfied, if an hundred such as lie had perished, so Trogus had come safe to our hands. Orosius consulted Justin as his grand oracle, and copied much from him ; and when the fountain is muddy, it is no wonder if the stream partake of the same qualities. Strabo has intermixed sundry excellent passages of Alex-

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. IV ansler's life with his geography, which makes us regret the loss of the treatise which he wrote upon that subject . he has also given us ajust character of many of Alexander's followers, who, to satisfy their monarch's vanity during his life, or to gratify" their own inclinations after his death, published strange aud unaccountable stories of his exploits. Even Pto lemy aud Aristobulus, whom our author chiefly copied, are not always free from this ; but as Arrian was a man of a sound judgment, he took care to choose only what was most probable, and left the rest as husks aud chaff, to be gleaned up by such as were ambitious of swelling their work, to a huge size, by heaps of all gatherings : — ■ Quicquid Græcia mendax Aud-t in Historia— — Juv. Sat. 10. But thanks to kind time, the greatest part of these romancing gentry are now gone to rest, and their works have followed them.

What Calis thenes wrote of Alexander is long since lost ; besides, he was put to death before tlittt monarch had half finished his expedition. Eratosthenes was the first, so far as I can find, who undertook to de tect the Macedonian forgeries, and did it to so good purpose, that Strabo, Plutarch, and Arrian, have steered after his light, and thereby reduced their accounts to reason and probability, whilst Diodorus, Curtius, Jus tin, and some others of inferior rank, have followed blind credulous guides, and are perpetually groping and stumbling about in mists of error and uncertainty. Few would, perhaps, have drawn up a better narrative of Alexander's acts than Plutarch, had he designed his work as pure history ; but he himself acquaints us, at his first setting out, that he rather endeavours to declare the springs or causes of actions, than the actions themselves.

Besides, with regard to prodigies, omens, &c. he was extremely credulous, and even his accounts of facts are not always carefully given. Many other authors have presented us with single stories relating to this affair, particularly Pliny, Atheuæus, Philostratus, Seneca, Lucian, Polyænns, Frontinus, Æliad, and others, to whom I have occasionally referred in the comment upon the ensuing work ; but as they are all well known, I shall forbear characterising them here. Thus far, I think, I have truth and justice on my side ; aud I believe I may safely affirm, that no ancient author, who ever wrote a particular his tory of Alexander, now remains, except Curtius and Arrian ; and if I have made it evident that Arrian is the best, the truest, and the most accurate historian of the two, by setting the truth and credibility of the several facts, as related by each, in a clear light, I shall s,o a great way in convincing the unprejudiced part, at least, that my chief design was their instruction : besides, this may, perhaps, be a means of gaining Arrian an esteem among English renders, to whom he has hitherto lain wholly unknown.

The chief benefit we can receive from history, is by comparing effects with the causes which produced them ; and, as like effects will always flow from like causes, we may form a pretty good judgment of future contingencies, by looking carefully into past events, and learn to regulate our affairs accordingly. This renders history really useful to the world, and this sets the grave, judicious, and exact historian, above the airy, vain, and empty romancer ; for, if either our accounts of causes, or their effects, be erroneously given, we shall form a wrong judgment concerning them, and instead of making ourselves wiser by them, we shall be immersed in greater folly and stupidity that} before. As to the translation of Arrian, I have done it justly, to the best of my knowledge, without endeavouring so much at eloquence in diction as thereby to destroy the plainness and simplicity of his manner of re-

PREFACE.

. V latiug facts. And whenever I have had occasion to introduce other au thors, iu my comment, I hope I have seldom misunderstood, misquoted, misinterpreted, or misrepresented thetg, to serve any sinister purpose of my own. I have generally directed my readers to the book, chapter, dr page, whence I borrowed my materials ; and I neither desire nor expect further credit than the vouchers I produce, and the arguments I use, naturally demand. Historical facts are not reducible to mathematical certainty ; the most we can hope for is, that the historian be a man of judgment, who will not be imposed upon by fiction himself, and a man of veracity, who will not impose it upon us; and then we may safely rely upon him, unless some other gives us a more probable account of some particulars ; for as demonstration cannot be had, every story will gain credit with us according to the degree of probability it bears.

I have been no more partial to Arrian, in my remarks, than to any other author ; he has been sometimes overseen through haste or inadvertency ; and if I add that he is not exempt from human frailty, it will be no great dimunition to his credit. He has been much abused by ignorant transcribers ; and though three or four have published observations, and critical notes with their editions, I still suspect several passages to be corrupt ; however, I have pointed them out, and earnestly recom mend them to his next editor to correct, by the assistance of manuscript copies. Curtius has had a multitude of editions, aud a numerous herd of com mentators have exercised their faculties upon him, and been lavish in his praise, among whom the celebrated Erasmus, of Rotterdam, appears as one ; but Mr. Le Clerc has justly observed, that these have either com mended the whole work, without any regard to the parts which compose it, or some of the parts, without considering what relation they bore to the whole.

They were, indeed, so blinded with the glare of his oratory, that they seem never to have presumed to look further. The first who attempted to call his veracity in question, was Henry Glareanus: he wrote very sharp and severe notes upon him, and taxed him with abundance of errors, some say, more than were true ; however, Snakenburgh commends his industry, and excuses him, by telling us, it often happens that the first reinurkers upon other men's failings fall into errors them selves. Modius attempted to vindicate Curtius from the reflections of Glareanus, and made himself excessively merry with him ; but he was served the sainesauce by Acidalius, and used in the same sarcastic manner. His next commentators were Popma, Loccenius, Radarus, and Freiu shemius, which last took immense pains in comparing him with Arrian, and other authors ; and to his labours I am not ashamed to own myself much indebted.

Tellier, with some others, succeeded him, 'and every one found new faults in their author, Curtius, which had escaped the search of the rest. As for my part, I have used each of them, as far as I deemed them agreeable to truth, and have sometimes taken the same liberty of departing from all of them, which they have occasionally taken with each other, namely, when I had stronger reasons to induce me to a contrary opinion : however, if any other commentator upon Curtius arises in my days, who will be so kind as to shew me one of my errors, for I am no more than a man, and pretend not to infallibility, and bring sufficient proofs along with him, I shall freely aud readily sub scribe to his opinion. I desire no better, nor more candid usage from posterity, than what I have given my predecessors in this province, and have set aside all authority of great names, whenever they endeavoured to make me swerve from truth.

Truth is, and always will be, what it ever was, and what was false two thousand years ago, is the same ut this present writing ; for antiquity can give no sanction to error. There was a time when all the ancient, were moderns, and there may come a time VI

PREFACE.

. when some, who are now moderns, may be stiled ancients. We moderns _tre men, the ancients were no more : they were subject to the same frailties, passions, and prejudices, with ourselves : some of them wrote as smartly against their predecessors, as we can write against ours, and laid as many accusations of partiality and error to their charge, as we ever pretended to lay to ours. Had I transcribed or translated all I could have raked up, relating to this subject, neither two, nor half a dozen such volumes as these, would have contained them ; but my intended brevity debarred me from making long quotations. However, where I have only abridged others, I hope I have seldom failed to carry the strength of their reasons along with me, and to take whatever suited my purpose. The works of a Dutch commentator would, I fancy, be grate ful to few English readers ; for which reason, 1 have given my observa tions such a turn, as to take off that dullness and dryness so common to most of my fraternity, and endeavoured to render them agreeable, at the same time that they are instructive.

No remarks of this kind, that I know of, have ever yet been published to an English translation of any ancient historian, and of what vast use they are, may be perceived at first sight. We have, indeed, had a faint attempt towards some, in Brown's Justin ; but the commentator has not thought fit to take notice of a tenth part of his author's errors, as they had been published, before his time, in the Variorum, and other editions. We have also now some remarks of Mr. Dacier, upon an English version of Plutarch's Lives ; but those relating to Alexander especially are so mean and trifling, that I could find no more than about five lines, which I thought worth transcribing, from him. I have purposely avoided taking notice of the controversy relating toCurtis's antiquity ; for whether he be an ancient ora modern, concerns neither me nor the world, half so much to know, as whether the work bearing his name be bad or good.

That has, indeed, been the subject of some part of my enquiry ; and, if I may be allowed to declare my sentiments freehy, I think it a pit)' that a particular brand of infamy cannot be stamped upon every author, without distinction, who dares presume to impose romance upon us, under the specious title of true histor)'. But some of his admirers may be apt to say, in his defence, that, as his two first books are lost, we know not what title he gave his work ; perhaps that which now goes for history, was only designed for romance ; and what we call the Acts of Alexander, he might only stile the Adventures of Alexander. — Perhaps it might be so. However, as it now is, so grave a title before so loose a work looks like a bar-gown upon a buffoon's back, otr a cardinal's hat upon the head of a monkey.

I shall neither take up my own time, nor tire out my reader's patience with much more concerning an author, whom I have censured so freely elsewhere, but refer hini to the observations upon the ensuing work. Had Mr. Le Clerk illustrated his criticisms with more examples, there had been less necessity for my comment ; and the morel have said there, the less I have occasion to say here. Allow me only to add the character of Curtius from Tellier, who was appointed to write note* upon him in Usurp Delphi.}!. " His periods," says he, " are generally round, aud well turned, and his cadences sweet and harmonious ; his wit is terse, and his sense strong ; his language pure and elegant, and his thoughts refined. But, among so many shining qualities, (which, by the bye, are fitter for a dcclaimer than "an historian) he has many blemishes ; for he ofteu runs counter to true history, and his geography is frequently false : he has shewn himself unskilled "in describing battles, (vyhich was the better half of his task), and frequently confounds truth with fiction: he seems to have had but an ordinary judgment, and •trives more to tickle the ear, than inform the understanding: he

PREFACE.

. VII describes things rather as they might have been, than as they really were acted, and affects the artful turn, and harmonious cadence of his periods too much: in his descriptions,, he is too poetical, and, in his speeches, too pedantic and affected." Thus far Tellier; to which, I hope, 1 may add, that nigh one half of his work is made up of speeches which were never spoken, letters which were never sent, and descriptions of mountains, rivers, towns and countries, whereof many are false, and the few that are true, nothing to his purpose, as an historian ; for they only serve to distract his readers, and divert them from the main story. I shall conclude this discourse with some particulars of Arrian's life, from Photius, Vossius, Boileau, Fabricius, and others. Under that learned Prince, (says Vossius, speaking of the Emperor Hadrian) flourished Arrian of Nicomedia, the celebrated scholar of Epictetus.

(Dio calls him, Flavius Arrianus Nicomedieusis), a philosopher, an his torian, and, if some may be credited, an eminent civilian. Suidas acquaints us, from Heliconius, that he attained even to the consular dig nity, and that, for the sweetness of his stile, he was termed another Xenophon. Photius agrees with him, and adds, that he was priest to Ceres and Proserpine. Lucian, in his Pseudomantes, assures us, that Arrian, the scholar of Epictetus, a man of the first rank in Rome, em ployed his whole life in the study of polite literature, for which he was so particularly famous, (says Dio), that he was complimented with his freedom, both of Rome and Athens. Arnobius mentions him towards the close of his second book, and so does Aulus Gellius, lib. xvii. 19. & lib. xix. 1. Dio informs us, that he was advanced to be prefect of Cappadocia, and that he reduced the Alauni, and Fvlassagetæ.

Pliny, the younger, who was then proconsul of Pontus, and Bithynia, ad dressed seven of his epistles to him ; and this is the more probable, be cause Arrian was not only a native of Nicomedia, a city of Bithynia, but wrote the Bithynian and Alaunian history, an abridgement of the first of which may be seen in Photius, and a fragment of the last in the second volume of Blancard's edition of his works. He wrote the Par thian history, in seventeen books, an extract whereof Photius has pre served. We have four books of his Dissertations on Epictetus, as also a paraplus, or lustration of coasts of the Euxine and Red Seas,' in scribed to the Emperor Hadrian, if that inscription be genuine; (for Salatnasius imagines these to have been the works of another of the same name, who flourished from the time of Nero to Vespasian.)

He wrote the life of Dio the Syracusian ; an account of Timoleon's acts in Sicily, a book of tactics, and a treatise on hunting, as a supplement to Xeiiophou's work upon the same subject. His Indian history we have entire, notwithstanding the assertion of the learned Stuchius to the contrary ; and Tzetzes, in chil. iii. hist. xcv. takes notice of his history «f Alexander. But time has deprived us of all the ten books which he wrote of the transactions after Alexander's death, except a short ab stract preserved by Photius. Allow me here to add the character which Mr. Boileau has given us of our author, in his life of Epictetus, translated by Dean Stanhope, p. xxii, xxiii. Of all the scholars of Epicte tus, says he, Arrian is the only one whose name has been transmitted with reputation to posterity ; but lie is such a one, as sufficiently de monstrates the excellency of his master, though we should suppose that he alone had been of his forming : for this is the very person who was afterwards advanced to be the preceptor to Antonine, surnamed the Pious, aud distinguished by the title of Xenophon, because, like that philosopher, he committed to writing the dictates delivered by his master, in his life time, and published them in one volume, under the name of Epictetus, his discourses, or dissertations, which, at present,

PREFACE.

. we have in four books. After this he composed a little treatise, called his Enchiridion, which is a short compendium of all Epictetus's philo sophical principles, and hath ever been acknowledged for one of the most valuable aud beautiful pieces of ancient morality. He likewise wrote a large book of the life and death of Epictetus, which is now un fortunately lost. And to shew how much he was of opinion our author had obliged mankind, he assures us, p. vi, that Epictetus leit nothing of his own composition behind him, and if Arrian had not transmitted to posterity the maxims taken from his master's mouth,- we have some reason to doubt, whether the very name of Epictetus had not been lost to the world. This history of Alexander's Expedition was translated into Italian by Leo of Modena, and printed at Venice, anno 1554.

Claudius Vitart bestowed a French version upon it, which was published at Paris, ailno 15S1, and Ablaucourt another, which has been reprinted three times, aud is accounted the best of his performances. It has had four Latin translations; the first by Nicolaus Saguntinus ; the second by Petrius Paulus Vergerius ; the third by Bartholomæus Facius ; and the fourth by Bonaventnre Vulcanius. Mr. Fabricius imagines the two first never appeared in public, because he could not find them in any library, nor even so much as mentioned in a catalogue of books. Fa cins's translation is generally condemned, for his numerous omissions, interpolations, mistakes, and wilful deviations from his original; besides which, he is often guilty of slightly skimming over whatever he did not fully understand. That of Vulcanius is the most esteemed, and, for that reason, annexed to all the best editions of our author.

How many editions Arrian has had, I never had curiosity enough to enquire; all I could procure I made use of, particularly those of Henry Stephens, Blancard, and Gronovius ; and have not only taken what was fit for my purpose, from the annotations annexed to each, but also from those of the best editions of Curtius. I am as far from pretending that all these observations are my own, as that they would be ever a whit the better if thejr were so; I acknowledge my obligations to all my assistants, and whoever has a mind to distinguish mine from their's, may easily satisfy himself, by consulting the several editions of Curtius and Arrian, al ready mentioned. As to the remarks upon prodigies, predictions, omens, auguries, answers cf oracles, __c. they are my own. Whether Mr. Van Dale has taken notice of those particular stories, in his history of oracles, 1 know not ; however, I had not that treatise by me ; and, in deed, I found no manner of difficulty in giving a plain and natural so lution of each of tfiem, as fast as they came in my nay.

What additions, alterations, and amendments 1 have made to Alex ander's genealogy, the catalogue of author's upon this history, the ac count of the division of the empire after Alexander's death, and Ra derus's tables, will be easily perceived by such of my readers as are skilled in the Latin language, if they compare mine with those in Snakenburgt's edition of Curtius. The chronological table, which I have added at the end of the second volume, contains an abstract of all the most memorable facts mentioned in the history, in their due order of time, drawn chiefly from Arrian. Such of the names of the Athenian Archons as he had passed by, I have supplied from Meursius's Treatise De Archontibus Atheniensium ; the Roman Consuls from Diodorus, and the last edition of Petavius's Kationarium Temporum; and for the agreement between the Greek Calender and ours, I consulted Scaliger, Petavius, Potter, aud especially the learned Usher, who has handled that matter more fully and clearly than all others. .-■-

PREFACE.

. Whoever mentions this history, bestow high encomiums on its author's veracity, beyond any other upon the subject ; but as a long detail of them would be tedious, I shall refer my readers, for full satisfaction, to Fabricius's Bibilothec. Græc. torn. iii. «The consideration of his vera city alone induced me to undertake this version, and to make the following remarks, whereby I have been enabled to contradict many strange stories, which have hitherto passed for truths, and to bring some truths to light, which had lain long buried in oblivion. I have taken upon me, as all commentators do, to judge of the probability of facts, as related by the several authors 1 have cjuoted, and shall now leave my work to the judgment of the wide world, without further apology. IL. TT^. C. . £ ARRIAN'S

PREFACE.

. I HAVE chose to make use of the toritings of Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, and of Aristobulus, the son of Aristobulus, concerning Alex ander, the son of Philip, as the most authentic accounts of those actions, so far as they are consistent with themselves, or with each otlter, and in those points where they differ, ichichsoever appeared to me the most con sonant to truth, and fittest to be recorded, I have followed. Others in deed have set Alexander s acts in a different light, and there is no hero, on whose life so many pens have been employed, or where they disagree so much among themselves. But Aristobulus and Ptolemy are preferable to all the rest, and most worthy of credit ; for, as the first was one of Alexander's companions in that expedition, and the latter not only bore a command there, but teas also a king himself afterwards, a deviation from truth would be more unpardonable in them than others.

And sure their veracity is the less to be doubted, because they compiled their his tories osier Alexander's death, ivhen neither fear nor favour could in duce them to relate facts, otherwise than they really happened. Some things touched upon by others I have thought not altogether unworthi/ the rehearsal, as falling within the compass of probability ; but those are only delivered as reports. And if any note wonder why, after so many writers of Alexander's acts, I also attempt the task, and endeavour to elucidate the same, after he has perused the rest, let him proceed to the, reading of mine, and he tvillfind less cause of wonder than before. ALEXANDER'S EXPEDITION. BOOK THE FIRST. CHAP. I. PHILIP* died when Pythodemus was Arclion at Athens, and hi* son Alexander, then about twenty years of age, ascended his throne, and marched into Peloponnesus, where, in a grand council of all the Greeks of those parts, he requested to be made General of the intended expe dition against the Persians, an honour which had been before conferred on his father Philip.

This was granted by all, except the Lacedæmo nians, who alledged, that by ancient custom of theirs, deduced from their ancestors, the Lacedæmonians ought not to obey the orders of a foreign General, but themselves to have the command of any army raised for a foreign expedition. The Athenians were also busy in con triving to bring some innovation about, but were so terrified at Alexan der's approach, that they decreed him more honours than they had be fore promised his father. He then returned into Macedonia, to raise forces for his expedition into Asia. However, the spring following, he determined to march through Thrace, and so to pe netrate into the countries of the Triballi.f and Illyrians, % who, he heard, were also plotting mischief; and as they almost bordered upon his kingdom, he deemed it inconsistent with true policy to neglect humbling them, before he attempted to march with his army against places so remote ; wherefore, setting out from Amphipolis,)! he marched first against those Thracians, % who were governed by their own laws, and tenacious of their own customs, and leaving the city Philippi, and the * Pausanias, a young nobleman of Macedonia, having been forcibly abused by Attalus, made his complaints to King Philip ; but Attalus's interest prevailing, and finding no redress, turned his rage upon the king ; whereupon, as he was to see some shows between the two Alexanders, his son, aud nephew, without his ordinary guards, he was suddenly assaulted and slain.

See Diodor. lib. xvi. pag. 482. Edi tionis Hannoviæ,& Justin, lib. ix. eap. 6 & 7. t Tbe TribalU were a nation inhabiting the lower part of Mcesia, between mount Hæm us and the river Istcr. Their country is now called Bulgaria. J The country of Illyria bordered on the Adriatic sea ou one side, and ou Pan nonia on the other. It is now called Sclavonia. || Amphipolis was a city seated on both sides of the river Styrmon, partly in the borders of Thrace, and partly in those of Macedonia. The Thracians were a valiant people. Their country, which was bounded by the Euxine and Ægæan seas, and mount Hæuius, is now called Romania. B mountain Orbelus on the left, and having passed the river Nesus, after ten days journey, he arrived at Mount Hæmus. Here a mighty num ber of the neighbouring inhabitants appeared in armour, as also multitudes of the free Thracians abovementioned, being fully determined, by seizing the tops of the mountains, and securing the streights, or pass, to hinder him and his army from any further progress.