Chapter 18

Antiquities.—Macedonia, like the neighbouring Balkan countries, still awaited exploration at the beginning of the 20th century, andlittle had been learned of the earlier development of civilization in these regions. The ancient indigenous population has left many traces of its presence in the tumuli which occur on the plains, and more especially along the valley of the Vardar. The unquiet state of the country went far to prevent any systematic investigation of these remains; excavations, however, were made by Körte and Franke at Niausta and near Salonica (see Kretschner,Einleitung in die Geschichte der griechischen Sprache, pp. 176, 421), and fragments of primitive pottery, with peculiar characteristics, were found by Perdrizet at Tchepelje, on the left bank of Lake Tachino. The oldest archaeological monuments of Macedonia are its coins, for which the mines of Crenides (the later Philippi), at the foot of Mt Pangaeus, of Chalcidice, of the island of Thasos, and of the mountains between Lake Prasias and the ancient Macedonian kingdom (Herod. v. 17), furnished abundance of metal. From the reign of Alexander I., in the epoch of the Persian wars (502-479B.C.), the Macedonian dynasty issued silver coins of a purely Greek style. The Thracian communities around Mt Pangaeus also produced a variety of coins, especially at the beginning of the 5th century. The great octodrachms of this period were perhaps struck for the purpose of paying tribute to the Persians when the country between the Strymon and the Nestos was in their possession; most of the specimens have been found in Asia Minor. These large pieces present many characteristics of the Ionian style; it is evident that the Thracians derived the arts of minting and engraving from the neighbouring Thasos, itself a colony from the Ionian Paros. The monarchs of Pella were enthusiastic admirers of Hellenic culture, and their court was doubtless frequented by Greek sculptors as well as men of letters, such as Herodotus and Euripides. At Pella has been found a funerarysteleof the late 5th or early 4th century representing a Macedonianhetaerus—a beautiful specimen of the best Greek art, now preserved in the Imperial Ottoman Museum at Constantinople. To the Hellenic period belong the vaulted tombs under tumuli discovered at Pella, Pydna, Palatitza, and other places; the dead were laid in marble couches ornamented with sculptures, like those of the so-called sarcophagus of Alexander at Constantinople. These tombs doubtless received the remains of the Macedonian nobles andhetaeri: in one of them a fresco representing a conflict between a horseman and a warrior on foot has been brought to light by Kinch. Similarly constructed places of sepulture have been found at Eretria and elsewhere in Greece. At Palatitza the ruins of a remarkable structure, perhaps a palace, have been laid bare by Heuzey and Daumet. Unlike Greece, where each independent city had its acropolis, Macedonia offers few remnants of ancient fortification; most of the country towns appear to have been nothing more than open market-centres. The most interesting ruins in the country are those of the Roman and Byzantine epochs, especially those at Salonica (q.v.). The Byzantine fortifications and aqueduct of Kavala are also remarkable. At Verria (Beroea) may be seen some Christian remains, at Melnik a palace of the age of the Comneni, at Serres a fortress built by the Servian tsar Stephen Dushan (1336-1356). The remains at Filibejik (Philippi) are principally of the Roman and Byzantine periods; the numerousex votorock-tablets of the acropolis are especially interesting. The Roman inscriptions found in Macedonia are mainly funerary, but include several ephebic lists. The funerary tablets afford convincing proof of the persistence of the Thracian element, notwithstanding hellenization and latinization; many of them, for instance, represent the well-known Thracian horseman hunting the wild boar. The monastic communities on the promontory of Athos (q.v.), with their treasures of Byzantine art and their rich collections of manuscripts, are of the highest antiquarian interest.

History.—For the history of ancient Macedonia seeMacedonian Empire.1After its subjugation by the Romans the country was divided into four districts separated by rigid political and social limitations. Before long it was constituted a province, which in the time of Augustus was assigned to the senate. Thenceforward it followed the fortunes of the Roman empire, and, after the partition of that dominion, of its eastern branch. Its Thraco-Illyrian inhabitants had already been largely latinized when Constantine the Great made Byzantium the imperial residence inA.D.330; they called themselves Romans and spoke Latin. Towards the close of the 4th century the country was devastated by the Goths and Avars, whose incursions possessed no lasting significance. It was otherwise with the great Slavonic immigration, which took place at intervals from the 3rd to the 7th century. An important ethnographic change was brought about, and the greater part of Macedonia was colonized by the invaders (seeBalkan Peninsula).

The Slavs were in their turn conquered by the Bulgarians (seeBulgaria:History) whose chief Krum (802-815) included central Macedonia in his dominions. The Byzantines retained the southern regions and Salonica, which temporarily fell intoByzantine and Bulgarian Domination.the hands of the Saracens in 904. With the exception of the maritime districts, the whole of Macedonia formed a portion of the empire of the Bulgarian tsar Simeon (893-927); the Bulgarian power declined after his death, but was revived in western Macedonia under the Shishman dynasty at Ochrida; Tsar Samuel (976-1014), the third ruler of that family, included in his dominions Usküb, Veles, Vodena and Melnik. After his defeat by the emperor Basil II. in 1014 Greek domination was established for a century and a half. The Byzantine emperors endeavoured to confirm their positions by Asiatic colonization; Turkish immigrants, afterwards known as Vardariotes, the first of their race who appeared in Macedonia, were settled in the neighbourhood of Salonica in the 9th century; colonies of Uzes, Petchenegs and Kumans were introduced at various periods from the 11th to the 13th century. While Greeks and Bulgarians disputed the mastery of Macedonia the Vlachs, in the 10th century, established an independent state in the Pindus region, which, afterwards known as Great Walachia, continued to exist till the beginning of the 14th century. In 1185 southern Macedonia was exposed to a raid of the Normans under William of Sicily, who captured Salonica and massacred its inhabitants. After the taking of Constantinople in 1204 by the Franks of the fourth crusade, the Latin empire of Romania was formed and the feudal kingdom of Thessalonica was bestowed on Boniface, marquis of Montferrat; this was overthrown in 1222 by Theodore, despot of Epirus, a descendant of the imperial house of the Comneni, who styled himself emperor of Thessalonica and for some years ruled over all Macedonia. He was defeated and captured by the Bulgarians in 1230 and the remnant of his possessions, to which his son John succeeded, was absorbed in the empire of Nicaea in 1234. Bulgarian rule was now once more established in Macedonia under the powerful monarch Ivan Asen II. (1218-1241) whose dynasty, of Vlach origin, had been founded at Trnovo in 1186 after a revolt of the Vlachs and Bulgars against the Greeks. A period of decadence followed the extinction of the Asen dynasty in 1257; the Bulgarian power was overthrown by the Servians at Velbuzhd (1330), and Macedonia was included in the realm of the great Servian tsar Dushan (1331-1355) who fixed his capital at Usküb. Dushan’s empire fell to pieces after his death, and the anarchy which followed prepared the way for the advance of the Turks, to whom not only contending factions at Constantinople but Servian and Bulgarian princes alike made overtures.

Macedonia and Thrace were soon desolated by Turkish raids; when it was too late the Slavonic states combined against the invaders, but their forces, under the Servian tsar Lazar, were routed at Kossovo in 1389 by the sultanTurkish Rule.Murad I. Salonica and Larissa were captured in 1395 by Murad’s son Bayezid, whose victory over Sigismund of Hungary at Nicopolis in 1396 sealed the fate of the peninsula. The towns in the Struma valley were yielded to the Turks by John VII. Palaeologus in 1424; Salonica was taken for the last time in 1428 by Murad II. and its inhabitants were massacred. Large tracts of land were distributed among the Ottoman chiefs; a system of feudal tenure was developed by Mahommed II. (1451-1481), each fief furnishing a certain number of armed warriors. The Christian peasant owners remained on the lands assigned to the Moslem feudal lords, to whom they paid a tithe. The condition of the subject population was deplorable from the first, and became worse during the period of anarchy which coincided with the decadence of the central power in the 17th and 18th centuries; in the latter half of the 17th century efforts to improve it were made by the grand viziers Mehemet and Mustafa of the eminent house of Koprülü. The country was policed by the janissaries (q.v.). Numbers of the peasant proprietors were ultimately reduced to serfdom, working as labourers on the farms ortchifliksof the Moslem beys. Towards the end of the 18th century many of the local governors became practically independent; western Macedonia fell under the sway of Ali Pasha of Iannina; at Serres Ismail Bey maintained an army of 10,000 men and exercised a beneficent despotism. For more than two centuries Albanianincursions, often resulting in permanent settlements, added to the troubles of the Christian population. The reforms embodied in the Hatt-i-Sherif of Gulhané (1839) and in the Hatt-i-humayun (1856), in both of which the perfect equality of races and religions was proclaimed, remained a dead letter; the first “Law of the Vilayets” (1864), reforming the local administration, brought no relief, while depriving the Christian communities of certain rights which they had hitherto possessed.

In 1876 a conference of the powers at Constantinople proposed the reorganization of the Bulgarian provinces of Turkey in two vilayets under Christian governors-general aided by popular assemblies. The “western” vilayet, ofEuropean Intervention.Treaties of San Stefano and Berlin.which Sofia was to be the capital, included northern, central and western Macedonia, extending south as far as Castoria. Theprojet de règlementelaborated by the conference was rejected by the Turkish parliament convoked under the constitution proclaimed on the 23rd of December 1876; the constitution, which was little more than a device for eluding European intervention, was shortly afterwards suspended. Under the treaty of San Stefano (March 3, 1878) the whole of Macedonia, except Salonica and the Chalcidic peninsula, was included in the newly formed principality of Bulgaria; this arrangement was reversed by the Treaty of Berlin (July 13) which left Macedonia under Turkish administration but provided (Art. xxiii.) for the introduction of reforms analogous to those of the Cretan Organic Statute of 1868. These reforms were to be drawn up by special commissions, on which the native element should be largely represented, and the opinion of the European commission for eastern Rumelia was to be taken before their promulgation. The Porte, however, prepared a project of its own, and the commission, taking this as a basis, drew up the elaborate “Law of the Vilayets” (Aug. 23, 1880). The law never received the sultan’s sanction, and European diplomacy proved unequal to the task of securing its adoption.

The Berlin Treaty, by its artificial division of the Bulgarian race, created the difficult and perplexing “Macedonian Question.” The population handed back to Turkish rule never acquiesced in its fate; its discontent was aggravatedThe Macedonian Question.by the deplorable misgovernment which characterized the reign of Abdul Hamid II., and its efforts to assert itself, stimulated by the sympathy of the enfranchised portion of the race, provoked rival movements on the part of the other Christian nationalities, each receiving encouragement and material aid from the adjacent and kindred states. Some insignificant risings took place in Macedonia after the signature of the Berlin Treaty, but in the interval between 1878 and 1893 the population remained comparatively tranquil, awaiting the fulfilment of the promised reforms.

In 1893, however, a number of secret revolutionary societies (druzhestva) were set on foot in Macedonia, and in 1894 similar bodies were organized as legal corporations in Bulgaria. The fall of Stamboloff in that year and theBulgarian Conspiracies.reconciliation of Bulgaria with Russia encouraged the revolutionaries in the mistaken belief that Russia would take steps to revive the provisions of the San Stefano treaty. In 1895 the “Supreme Macedo-Adrianopolitan Committee” (Vrkhoven Makedoni-Odrinski Komitet) was formed at Sofia and forthwith despatched armed bands into northern Macedonia; the town of Melnik was occupied for a short time by the revolutionaries under Boris Sarafoff, but the enterprise ended in failure. Dispirited by this result, the “Vrkhovists,” as the revolutionaries in Bulgaria were generally styled, refrained from any serious effort for the next five years; the movement was paralysed by dissensions among the chiefs, and rival parties were formed under Sarafoff and General Tzoncheff. Meanwhile the “Centralist” or local Macedonian societies were welded by two remarkable men, Damian Grueff and Gotzé Delcheff, into a formidable power known as the “Internal Organization,” founded in 1893, which maintained its own police, held its own tribunals, assessed and collected contributions, and otherwise exercised animperium in imperiothroughout the country, which was divided into rayons or districts, and subdivided into departments and communes, each with its special staff of functionaries. The Internal Organization, as a rule, avoided co-operation with the revolutionaries in Bulgaria; it aimed at the attainment of Macedonian autonomy, and at first endeavoured, but unsuccessfully, to enlist the sympathies of the Greeks and Servians for the programme of “Macedonia for the Macedonians.”

The principle of autonomy was suspected at Athens and Belgrade as calculated to ensure Bulgarian predominance and to delay or preclude the ultimate partition of the country. At Athens, especially, the progress of theGreek Action.Bulgarian movement was viewed with much alarm; it was feared that Macedonia would be lost to Hellenism, and in 1896 theEthniké Hetaerea(seeGreeceandCrete) sent numerous bands into the southern districts of the country. The Hetaerea aimed at bringing about a war between Greece and Turkey, and the outbreak of trouble in Crete enabled it to accomplish its purpose. During the Greco-Turkish War (q.v.) Macedonia remained quiet, Bulgaria and Servia refraining from interference under pressure from Austria, Russia and the other great powers. The reverses of the Greeks were to the advantage of the Bulgarian movement, which continued to gain strength, but after the discovery of a hidden dépôt of arms at Vinitza in 1897 the Turkish authorities changed their attitude towards the Bulgarian element; extreme and often barbarous methods of repression were adopted, and arms were distributed among the Moslem population. The capture of an American missionary, Miss Stone, by a Bulgarian band under Sandansky in the autumn of 1901 proved a windfall to the revolutionaries, who expended her ransom of £T16,000 in the purchase of arms and ammunition.

In 1902 the Servians, after a prolonged conflict with the Greeks, succeeded with Russian aid in obtaining the nomination of Mgr. Firmilian, a Servian, to the archbishopric of Usküb. Contemporaneously with a series of Russo-BulgarianTroubles in 1902: Intervention of the Powers.celebrations in the Shipka pass in September of that year, an effort was made to provoke a rising in the Monastir district by Colonel Yankoff, the lieutenant of General Tzoncheff; in November a number of bands entered the Razlog district under the general’s personal direction. These movements, which were not supported by the Internal Organization, ended in failure, and merciless repression followed. The state of the country now became such as to necessitate the intervention of the powers, and the Austrian and Russian governments, which had acted in concert since April 1897, drew up an elaborate scheme of reforms. The Porte, as usual, endeavoured to forestall foreign interference by producing a project of its own, which was promulgated in November 1902, and Hilmi Pasha was appointed Inspector General of the Rumelian vilayets and charged with its application. The two powers, however, persevered in their intention and on the 21st of February 1903 presented to the Porte an identic memorandum proposing a series of reforms in the administration, police and finance, including the employment of “foreign specialists” for the reorganization of the gendarmerie.

At the same time the Bulgarian government, under pressure from Russia, arrested the revolutionary leaders in the principality, suppressed the committees, and confiscated their funds. The Internal Organization, however, was beyondBulgarian Insurrection in 1903.reach, and preparations for an insurrection went rapidly forward. In March a serious Albanian revolt complicated the situation. At the end of April a number of dynamite outrages took place at Salonica; public opinion in Europe turned against the revolutionaries and the Turks seized the opportunity to wreak a terrible vengeance on the Bulgarian population. On the 2nd of August, the feast of St Elias, a general insurrection broke out in the Monastir vilayet, followed by sporadic revolts in other districts. The insurgents achieved some temporary successes and occupied the towns of Krushevo, Klisura and Neveska, but by the end of September their resistance was overcome; more than 100 villages were burned by the troops and bashi-bazouks, 8400 houses were destroyed and 60,000 peasants remained homeless in the mountains at the approach of winter.

The Austrian and Russian governments then drew up a further series of reforms known as the “Mürzsteg programme” (Oct. 9, 1903) to which the Porte assented in principle, though many difficulties were raised overThe “Mürzsteg Programme.”details. Two officials, an Austrian and a Russian, styled “civil agents” and charged with the supervision of the local authorities in the application of reforms, were placed by the side of the inspector-general while the reorganization of the gendarmerie was entrusted to a foreign general in the Turkish service aided by a certain number of officers from the armies of the great powers. The latter task was entrusted to the Italian General de Giorgis (April 1904), the country being divided into sections under the supervision of the officers of each power. The reforms proved a failure, mainly owing to the tacit opposition of the Turkish authorities, the insufficient powers attributed to the European officials, the racial feuds and the deplorable financial situation. In 1905 the powers agreed on the establishment of a financial commission on which the representatives of Great Britain, France, Germany and Italy would sit as colleagues of the civil agents. The Porte offered an obstinate resistance to the project and only yielded (Dec. 5) when the fleets of the powers appeared near the Dardanelles. Some improvement was now effected in the financial administration, but the general state of the country continued to grow worse; large funds were collected abroad by the committees at Athens, which despatched numerous bands largely composed of Cretans into the southern districts, the Servians displayed renewed activity in the north, while the Bulgarians offered a dogged resistance to all their foes.

The Austro-Russianententecame to an end in the beginning of 1908 owing to the Austrian project of connecting the Bosnian and Macedonian railway systems, and Great Britain and Russia now took the foremost place in theThe “Reval Programme.”demand for reforms. After a meeting between King Edward VII. and the emperor Nicholas II. at Reval in the early summer of 1908 an Anglo-Russian scheme, known as the “Reval programme,” was announced; the project aimed at more effective European supervision and dealt especially with the administration of justice. Its appearance was almost immediately followed by the military revolt of the Young Turk or constitutional party, which began in the Monastir district under two junior officers, Enver Bey and Niazi Bey, in July. The restoration of the constitution of 1876 was proclaimed (July 24,1908), and the powers, anticipating the spontaneous adoption of reforms on the part of regenerated Turkey, decided to suspend the Reval programme and to withdraw their military officers from Macedonia.

See Lejean,Ethnographie de la Turquie d’Europe(Gotha, 1861); Hahn,Reise von Belgrad nach Salonik(Vienna, 1868); Yastreboff,Obichai i pesni turetskikh Serbov(St Petersburg, 1886); “Ofeicoff” (Shopoff),La Macédoine au point de vue ethnographique, historique et philologique(Philippopolis, 1888); Gopchevitch,Makedonien und Alt-Serbien(Vienna, 1889); Verkovitch,Topografichesko-ethnographicheskii ocherk Makedonii(St Petersburg, 1889); Burada,Cercetari despre scoalele Romanesci din Turcia(Bucharest, 1890); Tomaschek,Die heutigen Bewohner Macedoniens(Sonderabdruck aus den Verhandlungen des IX. D. Geographen-Tages in Wien, 1891) (Berlin, 1891);Die alten Thräker(Vienna, 1893); Berard,La Turquie et l’Hellénisme contemporain, (Paris, 1893);La Macédoine(Paris, 1900); Shopoff,Iz zhivota i polozhenieto na Bulgarite v vilayetite(Philippopolis, 1894); Weigand,Die Aromunen(Leipzig, 1895);Die nationalen Bestrebungen der Balkanvölker(Leipzig, 1898); Nikolaides,La Macédoine(Berlin, 1899); “Odysseus,”Turkey in Europe(London, 1900); Kunchoff,Makedonia: etnografia i statistika(Sofia, 1900);La Macédoine et la Vilayet d’Andrinople(Sofia, 1904), anonymous; L. Villari,The Balkan Question(London, 1905); H. N. Brailsford,Macedonia: its Races and their Future(London, 1906); J. Cvijić,Grundlinien der Geographie und Geologie von Mazedonien und Altserbien(Gotha, 1908). For the antiquities, see Texier and Pullan,Byzantine Architecture(London, 1864); Heuzey and Daumet,Mission archéologique en Macédoine(Paris, 1865); Duchesne and Bayet,Mémoire sur une mission en Macédoine et au Mont Athos(Paris, 1876); Barclay V. Head,Catalogue of Greek Coins; Macedonia (London, 1879); Kinch,L’Arc de triomphe de Salonique(Paris, 1890);Beretnung om en archaeologisk Reise i Makedonien(Copenhagen, 1893); Mommsen, Suppl. to vol. iii.Corpus inscript., latinarum(Berlin, 1893); Perdrizet, Articles on Macedonian archaeology and epigraphy inBulletin de correspondance hellénique, since 1894.

(J. D. B.)

1Also Alexander, Perdiccas, Philip, &c.

MACEDONIAN EMPIRE,the name generally given to the empire founded by Alexander the Great of Macedon in the countries now represented by Greece and European Turkey, Asia Minor, Egypt, Syria, Persia and eastwards as far as northern India.1The present article contains a general account of the empire in its various aspects. It falls naturally into two main divisions:—I. The reign of Alexander. II. The period of his successors, the “Diadochi” and their dynasties.

I.The Reign of Alexander.—At the beginning of the 4th centuryB.C.two types of political association confronted each other in the lands of the Eastern Mediterranean,—the Persian monarchy with its huge agglomeration1. Greeks and Persians.of subject peoples, and the Greek city-state. Each had a different principle of strength. The Persian monarchy was strong in its size, in the mere amount of men and treasure it could dispose of under a single hand; the Greek state was strong in itsmorale, in the energy and discipline of its soldiery. But the smallness of the single city-states and their unwillingness to combine prevented this superiority in quality from telling destructively upon the bulk of the Persian empire. The future belonged to any power that could combine the advantages of both systems, could make a state larger than the Greekpolis, and animated by a spirit equal to that of the Greek soldier. This was achieved by the kings of Macedonia. The work, begun by his predecessors, of consolidating the kingdom internally and making its army a fighting-machine of high power was completed by the genius of Philip II. (359-336B.C.), who at the same time by war and diplomacy brought the Greek states of the Balkan peninsula generally to recognize his single predominance. At the synod of Corinth (338) Philip was solemnly declared the captain-general (στρατηγὸς αὐτοκράτωρ) of the Hellenes against the Great King. The attack on Persia was delayed by the assassination of Philip in 336, and it needed some fighting before the young Alexander had made his position secure in Macedonia and Greece. The recognition as captain-general he had obtained at another synod in Corinth, by an imposing military demonstration in Greece immediately upon his accession. Then came the invasion of the Persian empire by Alexander in 334 at the head of an army composed both of Macedonians and contingents from the allied Greek states. Before this force the Persian monarchy went down, and when Alexander died eleven years later (323) a Macedonian empire which covered all the territory of the old Persian empire, and even more, was a realized fact.

The empire outside of Macedonia itself consisted of 22 provinces.In Europe, (1) Thrace;in Asia Minor, (2) Phrygia on the Hellespont, (3) Lydia, (4) Caria, (5) Lycia and Pamphylia, (6) Great Phrygia, (7) Paphlagonia and Cappadocia;2. Extent of the Empire.between the Taurus and Iran, (8) Cilicia, (9) Syria, (10) Mesopotamia, (11) Babylonia, (12) Susiana;in Africa, (13) Egypt;in Iran, (14) Persis, (15) Media, (16) Parthia and Hyrcania, (17) Bactria and Sogdiana, (18) Areia and Drangiana, (19) Carmania, (20) Arachosia and Gedrosia; lastlythe Indian provinces, (21) the Paropanisidae (the Kabul valley), and (22) the province assigned to Pithon, the son of Agenor, upon the Indus (J. Beloch,Griech. Gesch.III. [ii.], p. 236 seq.; for the Indian provinces cf. B. Niese,Gesch. der griech. und maked. Staaten, I. p. 500 seq.). Hardly provinces proper, but rather client principalities, were the two native kingdoms to which Alexander had left the conquered land beyond the Indus—the kingdoms of Taxiles and Porus.

The conquered empire presented Alexander with a system of government ready-made, which it was natural for the new masters to take over. For the Asiatic provinces and Egypt, the old Persian name ofsatrapy(seeSatrap) was still retained,3. System of Government.but the governor seems to have been styled officially in Greekstrategos, although the termsatrapcertainly continued current in common parlance. The governors appointed by Alexander were, in the west of the empire, exclusively Macedonians; in the east, members of the Old Persian nobility were still among the satraps at Alexander’s death, Atropates in Media, Phrataphernes in Parthia and Hyrcania,and Alexander’s father-in-law Oxyartes in the Paropanisidae. Alexander had at first trusted Persian grandees more freely in this capacity; in Babylonia, Bactria, Carmania, Susiana he had set Persian governors, till the ingrained Oriental tradition of misgovernment so declared itself that to the three latter provinces certainly Macedonians had been appointed before his death. Otherwise the only eastern satrapy whose governor was not a Macedonian, was Areia, under Stasanor, a Cypriote Greek. In the case of certain provinces, possibly in the empire generally, Alexander established a double control. The financial administration was entrusted to separate officials; we hear of such in Lydia (Arr. i. 17, 7), Babylonia (id. iii. 16, 4), and notably in Egypt (id. iii. 5, 4). Higher financial controllers seem to have been over groups of provinces (Philoxenus over Asia Minor, Arr. i. 17, 7; see Beloch,Gr. Gesch.III. [i] p. 14), and Harpalus over the whole finances of the empire, with his seat in Babylon. Again the garrisons in the chief cities, such as Sardis, Babylon, Memphis Pelusium and Susa, were under commands distinct from those of the provinces. The old Greek cities of the motherland were not formally subjects of the empire, but sovereign states, which assembled at Corinth as members of a great alliance, in which the Macedonian king was included as a member and held the office of captain-general. The Greek cities of Asia Minor stood to him in a similar relation, though not included in the Corinthian alliance, but in federations of their own (Kaerst,Gesch. d. hellenist. Zeitalt.i. 261 seq.). Their territory was not part of the king’s country (Inscr. in the Brit. Mus.No. 400). Of course, in fact, the power of the king was so vastly superior that the Greek cities were in reality subject to his dictation, even in so intimate a matter as the readmission of their exiles, and might be obliged to receive his garrisons. Within the empire itself, the various communities were allowed, subject to the interference of the king or his officials, to manage their own affairs. Alexander is said to have granted the Lydians to be “free” and “to use the laws of the ancient Lydians,” whatever exactly these expressions may mean (Arr. i. 17, 4). So too in Egypt, the native monarchs were left as the local authorities (Arr. iii. 5, 4). Especially to the gods of the conquered people Alexander showed respect. In Egypt and in Babylon he appeared as the restorer of the native religions to honour after the unsympathetic rule of the Persians. The temple of Marduk in Babylon which had fallen began to rise again at his command. It is possible that he offered sacrifice to Yahweh in Jerusalem. In Persia, the native aristocracy retained their power, and the Macedonian governor adopted Persian dress and manners (Diod. xix. 48, 5; Arr. vi. 30). A new factor introduced by Alexander was the foundation of Greek cities at all critical points of intercourse in the conquered lands. These, no doubt, possessed municipal autonomy with the ordinary organization of the Greek state; to what extent they were formally and regularly controlled by the provincial authorities we do not know; Pithon, the satrap of the Indian province is specially described as sent “in colonias in Indis conditas” (Just. xiii. 4, 21). The empire included large tracts of mountain or desert, inhabited by tribes, which the Persian government had never subdued. The subjugation of such districts could only be by a system of effective military occupation and would be a work of time; but Alexander made a beginning by punitive expeditions, as occasion offered, calculated to reduce the free tribes to temporary quiet; we hear of such expeditions in the case of the Pisidians, the tribes of the Lebanon, the Uxii (in Khuzistan), the Tapyri (in the Elburz), the hill-peoples of Bajaor and Swat, the Cossaei (in Kurdistan); an expedition against the Arabs was in preparation when Alexander died.

See A. Köhler,Reichsverwaltung u. Politik Alexanders des Grossen in Klio, v. 303 seq. (1905).

Alexander, who set out as king of the Macedonians and captain-general of the Hellenes, assumed after the death of Darius the character of the Oriental great king. He adopted the Persian garb (Plutarch,de fort. Al.i. 8) including4. Court.a head-dress, thediadema, which was suggested by that of the Achaemenian king (Just.xii. 3, 8). We hear also of a sceptre as part of his insignia (Diod.xviii. 27, 1). The pomps and ceremonies which were traditional in the East were to be continued. To the Greeks and Macedonians such a régime was abhorrent, and the opposition roused by Alexander’s attempt to introduce among them the practice ofproskynesis(prostration before the royal presence), was bitter and effectual. The title ofchiliarch, by which the Greeks had described the great king’s chief minister, in accordance with the Persian title which described him as “commander of a thousand,”i.e.of the royal body-guard, was conferred by Alexander upon his friend Hephaestion. The Greek Chares held the position of chief usher (εἰσαγγελεύς). Another Greek, Eumenes of Cardia, was chief secretary (ἀρχιγραμματεύς). The figure of the eunuch, so long characteristic of the Oriental court, was as prominent as ever (e.g.Bagoas, Plut.Alex.67, &c.; cf. Arr. vii. 24).

Alexander, however, who impressed his contemporaries by his sexual continence, kept no harem of the old sort. The number of his wives did not go beyond two, and the second, the daughter of Darius, he did not take till a year before his death. In closest contact with the king’s person were the seven, or latterly eight, body-guards,σωματοφύλακες, Macedonians of high rank, including Ptolemy and Lysimachus, the future kings of Egypt, and Thrace (Arr. vi. 28, 4). The institution, which the Macedonian court before Alexander had borrowed from Persia, of a corps of pages composed of the young sons of the nobility (παῖδες βασίλειοιorβασιλικοί) continued to hold an important place in the system of the court and in Alexander’s campaigns (see Arr. iv. 13, 1; Curt. viii. 6, 6; Suid.βασίλειοι παῖδες; cf. theπαῖδεςof Eumenes, Diod. xix. 28, 3).

See Spiecker,Der Hof und die Hofordnung Alex. d. Grossen(1904).The army of Alexander was an instrument which he inherited from his father Philip. Its core was composed of the Macedonian peasantry who served on foot in heavy armour (“the Foot-companions”πεζεταῖροι). They formed the phalanx,5. Army.and were divided into 6 brigades (τάξεις), probably on the territorial system. Their distinctive arm was the great Macedonian pike (sarissa), some 14 ft. long, of further reach than the ordinary Greek spear. They were normally drawn up in more open order than the heavy Greek phalanx, and possessed thereby a mobility and elasticity in which the latter was fatally deficient. Reckoning 1,500 to each brigade, we got a total for the phalanx of 9,000 men. Of higher rank than thepezetaeriwere the royal foot-guards (βασιλικοὶ ὐπασπίσται), some 3,000 in number, more lightly armed, and distinguished (at any rate at the time of Alexander’s death) by silver shields. Of these 1,000 constituted the royal corps (τὸ ἄγημα τὸ βασιλικόν). The Macedonian cavalry was recruited from a higher grade of society than the infantry, thepetite noblesseof the nation. They bore by old custom the name of the king’s Companions (ἑταῖροι), and were distributed into 8 territorial squadrons (ἴλαι) of probably some 250 men each, making a normal total of 2,000. In the cavalry also the most privileged squadron bore the name of theagema. The ruder peoples which were neighbors to the Macedonians (Paeonians, Agrianes, Thracians) furnished contingents of light cavalry and javelineers (ἀκοντισταί). From the Thessalians the Macedonian king, as overlord, drew some thousand excellent troopers. The rest of Alexander’s army was composed of Greeks, not formally his subjects. These served partly as mercenaries, partly in contingents contributed by the states in virtue of their alliance. According to Diodorus (xvii. 17, 3) at the time of Alexander’s passage into Asia, the mercenaries numbered 5,000, and the troops of the alliance 7,000 foot and 600 horse. All these numbers take no account of the troops left behind in Macedonia, 12,000 foot and 1,500 horse, according to Diodorus. When Alexander was lord of Asia, innovations followed in the army. Already in 330 at Persepolis, the command went forth that 30,000 young Asiatics were to be trained as Macedonian soldiers (theepigoni, Arr. vii., 6, 1). Contingents of the fine Bactrian cavalry followed Alexander into India. Persian nobles were admitted into theagemaof the Macedonian cavalry. A far more radical remodelling of the army was undertaken at Babylon in 323, by which the old phalanx system was to be given up for one in which the unit was to be composed of Macedonians with pikes and Asiatics with missile arms in combination—a change calculated to be momentous both from a military point of view in the coming wars, and from a political, in the close fusion of Europeans and Asiatics. The death of Alexander interrupted the scheme, and his successors reverted to the older system. In the wars of Alexander the phalanx was never the most active arm; Alexander delivered his telling attacks with his cavalry, whereas the slow-moving phalanx held rather the position of a reserve, and was brought up to complete a victory when the cavalry charges had already taken effect. Apart from the pitched battles, the warfare of Alexander was largely hill-fighting, in which thehypaspistaetook the principal part, and the contingents of light-armed hillmen from the Balkan region did excellent service.For Alexander’s army and tactics, beside the regular histories (Droysen, Niese, Beloch, Kaerst), see D. G. Hogarth,Journal of Philol., xvii. 1 seq. (corrected at some points in hisPhilip and Alexander).

See Spiecker,Der Hof und die Hofordnung Alex. d. Grossen(1904).

The army of Alexander was an instrument which he inherited from his father Philip. Its core was composed of the Macedonian peasantry who served on foot in heavy armour (“the Foot-companions”πεζεταῖροι). They formed the phalanx,5. Army.and were divided into 6 brigades (τάξεις), probably on the territorial system. Their distinctive arm was the great Macedonian pike (sarissa), some 14 ft. long, of further reach than the ordinary Greek spear. They were normally drawn up in more open order than the heavy Greek phalanx, and possessed thereby a mobility and elasticity in which the latter was fatally deficient. Reckoning 1,500 to each brigade, we got a total for the phalanx of 9,000 men. Of higher rank than thepezetaeriwere the royal foot-guards (βασιλικοὶ ὐπασπίσται), some 3,000 in number, more lightly armed, and distinguished (at any rate at the time of Alexander’s death) by silver shields. Of these 1,000 constituted the royal corps (τὸ ἄγημα τὸ βασιλικόν). The Macedonian cavalry was recruited from a higher grade of society than the infantry, thepetite noblesseof the nation. They bore by old custom the name of the king’s Companions (ἑταῖροι), and were distributed into 8 territorial squadrons (ἴλαι) of probably some 250 men each, making a normal total of 2,000. In the cavalry also the most privileged squadron bore the name of theagema. The ruder peoples which were neighbors to the Macedonians (Paeonians, Agrianes, Thracians) furnished contingents of light cavalry and javelineers (ἀκοντισταί). From the Thessalians the Macedonian king, as overlord, drew some thousand excellent troopers. The rest of Alexander’s army was composed of Greeks, not formally his subjects. These served partly as mercenaries, partly in contingents contributed by the states in virtue of their alliance. According to Diodorus (xvii. 17, 3) at the time of Alexander’s passage into Asia, the mercenaries numbered 5,000, and the troops of the alliance 7,000 foot and 600 horse. All these numbers take no account of the troops left behind in Macedonia, 12,000 foot and 1,500 horse, according to Diodorus. When Alexander was lord of Asia, innovations followed in the army. Already in 330 at Persepolis, the command went forth that 30,000 young Asiatics were to be trained as Macedonian soldiers (theepigoni, Arr. vii., 6, 1). Contingents of the fine Bactrian cavalry followed Alexander into India. Persian nobles were admitted into theagemaof the Macedonian cavalry. A far more radical remodelling of the army was undertaken at Babylon in 323, by which the old phalanx system was to be given up for one in which the unit was to be composed of Macedonians with pikes and Asiatics with missile arms in combination—a change calculated to be momentous both from a military point of view in the coming wars, and from a political, in the close fusion of Europeans and Asiatics. The death of Alexander interrupted the scheme, and his successors reverted to the older system. In the wars of Alexander the phalanx was never the most active arm; Alexander delivered his telling attacks with his cavalry, whereas the slow-moving phalanx held rather the position of a reserve, and was brought up to complete a victory when the cavalry charges had already taken effect. Apart from the pitched battles, the warfare of Alexander was largely hill-fighting, in which thehypaspistaetook the principal part, and the contingents of light-armed hillmen from the Balkan region did excellent service.

For Alexander’s army and tactics, beside the regular histories (Droysen, Niese, Beloch, Kaerst), see D. G. Hogarth,Journal of Philol., xvii. 1 seq. (corrected at some points in hisPhilip and Alexander).

The modifications in the army system were closely connected with Alexander’s general policy, in which the fusion of Greeks and Asiatics held so prominent a place. He had himself, as we have seen, assumed to some extent6. Fusion of Greeks and Asiatics.the guise of a Persian king. The Macedonian Peucestas received special marks of his favour for adopting the Persian dress. The most striking declaration of his ideals was the marriage feast at Susa in 324, when a large number of the Macedonian nobles were induced to marry Persian princesses, and the rank and file were encouraged by special rewards to take Eastern wives. We are told that among the schemes registered in the state papers and disclosed after Alexander’s death was one for transplanting large bodies of Asiatics into Europe and Europeans into Asia, for blending the peoples of the empire by intermarriage into a single whole (Diod. xviii. 4, 4). How far did Alexander intend that in such a fusion Hellenic culture should retain its pre-eminence? How far could it have done so, had the scheme been realized? It is not impossible that the question may yet be raised again whether the Eurasian after all is the heir of the ages.

High above all the medley of kindreds and tongues, untrammelled by national traditions, for he had outgrown the compass of any one nation, invested with the glory of achievements in which the old bounds of7. Divine Honours.the possible seemed to fall away, stood in 324 the man Alexander. Was he a man? The question was explicitly suggested by the report that the Egyptian priest in the Oasis had hailed him in the god’s name as the son of Ammon. The Egyptians had, of course, ascribed deity by old custom to their kings, and were ready enough to add Alexander to the list. The Persians, on the other hand, had a different conception of the godhead, and we have no proof that from them Alexander either required or received divine honours. From the Greeks he certainly received such honours; the ambassadors from the Greek states came in 323 with the character oftheori, as if approaching a deity (Arr. vii. 23, 2). It has been supposed that in offering such worship the Greeks showed the effect of “Oriental” influence, but indeed we have not to look outside the Greek circle of ideas to explain it. As early as Aeschylus (Supp.991) the proffering of divine honours was a form of expression for intense feelings of reverence or gratitude towards men which naturally suggested itself—as a figure of speech in Aeschylus, but the figure had been translated into action before Alexander not in the well-known case of Lysander only (cf. the case of Dion, Plut.Dio, 29). Among the educated Greeks rationalistic views of the old mythology had become so current that they could assimilate Alexander to Dionysus without supposing him to be supernatural, and to this temper the divine honours were a mere form, an elaborate sort of flattery. Did Alexander merely receive such honours? Or did he claim them himself? It would seem that he did. Many of the assertions as to his action in this line do not stand the light of criticism (see Hogarth,Eng. Hist. Rev.ii., 1887, p. 317 seq.; Niese,Historische Zeitschrift, lxxix., 1897, p. 1, seq.); even the explicit Statement in Arrian as to Alexander and the Arabians is given as a mere report; but we have well-authenticated utterances of Attic orators when the question of the cult of Alexander came up for debate, which seem to prove that an intimation of the king’s pleasure had been conveyed to Athens.

A new life entered the lands conquered by Alexander. Human intercourse was increased and quickened to a degree not before known. Commercial enterprise now found open roads between the Aegean and India; the new8. Intercourse and Discovery.Greek cities made stations in what had been for the earlier Greek traders unknown lands; an immense quantity of precious metal had been put into circulation which the Persian kings had kept locked up in their treasuries (cf. Athen, vi. 231 e). At the same time Alexander himself made it a principal concern to win fresh geographical knowledge, to open new ways. The voyage of Nearchus from the Indus to the Euphrates was intended to link India by a waterway with the Mediterranean lands. So too Heraclides was sent to explore the Caspian; the survey, and possible circumnavigation, of the Arabian coasts was the last enterprise which occupied Alexander. The improvement of waterways in the interior of the empire was not neglected, the Babylonian canal system was repaired, the obstructions in the Tigris removed. A canal was attempted across the Mimas promontory (Plin.N.H.v. 116). The reports of theβηματισταί, Baeton and Diognetus, who accompanied the march of Alexander’s army, gave an exacter knowledge of the geographical conformation of the empire, and were accessible for later investigators (Susemihl,Gesch. d. griech. Litt., I. p. 544). Greek natural science was enriched with a mass of new material from the observations of the philosophers who went with Alexander through the strange lands (H. Bretzl,Botanische Forschungen d. Alexanderzuges, 1903); whilst on the other hand attempts were made to acclimatize the plants of the motherland in the foreign soil (Theophr.,Hist. Plant.iv. 4, 1).

The accession of Alexander brought about a change in the monetary system of the kingdom. Philip’s bimetallic system, which had attempted artificially to fix the value of silver in spite of the great depreciation of gold consequent upon the9. Coinage.working of the Pangaean mines, was abandoned. Alexander’s gold coinage, indeed (possibly not struck till after the invasion of Asia), follows in weight that of Philip’s staters; but he seems at once to have adopted for his silver coins (of a smaller denomination than the tetradrachm) the Euboic-Attic standard, instead of the Phoenician, which had been Philip’s. With the conquest of Asia, Alexander conceived the plan of issuing a uniform coinage for the empire. Gold had fallen still further from the diffusion of the Persian treasure, and Alexander struck in both metals on the Attic standard, leaving their relation to adjust itself by the state of the market. This imperial coinage was designed to break down the monetary predominance of Athens (Beloch,Gr. Gesch.iii. [i.], 42). None of the coins with Alexander’s own image can be shown to have been issued during his reign; the traditional gods of the Greeks still admitted no living man to share their prerogative in this sphere. Athena and Nike alone figured upon Alexander’s gold; Heracles and Zeus upon his silver.See L. Müller,Numismatique d’Alexandre le Grand(1855); alsoNumismatics: § I. “Greek Coins, Macedonian.”

See L. Müller,Numismatique d’Alexandre le Grand(1855); alsoNumismatics: § I. “Greek Coins, Macedonian.”

II.After Alexander.—The external fortunes of the Macedonian Empire after Alexander’s death must be briefly traced before its inner developments be touched upon.2There was, at first, when Alexander suddenly died in 323, no overt1. History of the “Successors.”disruption of the empire. The dispute between the Macedonian infantry and the cavalry (i.e.the commonalty and the nobles) was as to the person who should be chosen to be the king, although it is true that either candidate, the half-witted son of Philip II., Philip Arrhidaeus, or the posthumous son of Alexander by Roxana, opened the prospect of a long regency exercised by one or more of the Macedonian lords. The compromise, by which both the candidates should be kings together, was, of course, succeeded by a struggle for power among those who wished to rule in their name. The resettlement of dignities made in Babylon in 323, while it left the eastern commands practically undisturbed as well as that of Antipater in Europe, placed Perdiccas (whether as regent or as chiliarch) in possession of the kings’ persons, and this was a position which the other Macedonian lords could not suffer. Hence the first intestine war among the Macedonians, in which Antipater, Antigonus, the satrap of Phrygia, and Ptolemy, the satrap of Egypt, were allied against Perdiccas, who was ultimately murdered in 321 on the Egyptian frontier (seePerdiccas[4],Eumenes). A second settlement, made at Triparadisus in Syria in 321, constituted Antipater regent and increased the power of Antigonus in Asia. When Antipater died, in 319, a second war broke out, the wrecks of the party of Perdiccas, led by Eumenes, combining with Polyperchon, the new regent, and later on (318) with the eastern satraps who were in arms against Pithon, the satrap of Media. Cassander, the son of Antipater, disappointed of the regency, had joined the party of Antigonus. In 316 Antigonus had defeated and killed Eumenes and made himself supreme from the Aegean to Iran, and Cassander hadousted Polyperchon from Macedonia. But now a third war began, the old associates of Antigonus, alarmed by his overgrown power, combining against him—Cassander, Ptolemy, Lysimachus, the governor of Thrace, and Seleucus, who had fled before Antigonus from his satrapy of Babylonia. From 315 to 301 the war of Antigonus against these four went on, with one short truce in 311. Antigonus never succeeded in reaching Macedonia, although his son Demetrius won Athens and Megara in 307 and again (304-302) wrested almost all Greece from Cassander; nor did Antigonus succeed in expelling Ptolemy from Egypt, although he led an army to its frontier in 306; and after the battle of Gaza in 312, in which Ptolemy and Seleucus defeated Demetrius, he had to see Seleucus not only recover Babylonia but bring all the eastern provinces under his authority as far as India. Meanwhile the struggle changed its character in an important respect. King Philip had been murdered by Olympias in 317; the young Alexander by Cassander in 310; Heracles, the illegitimate son of Alexander the Great, by Polyperchon in 309. Thus the old royal house became extinct in the male line, and in 306 Antigonus assumed the title of king. His four adversaries answered this challenge by immediately doing the same. Even in appearance the empire was no longer a unity. In 301 the coalition triumphed over Antigonus in the battle of Ipsus (in Phrygia) and he himself was slain. Of the four kings who now divided the Macedonian Empire amongst them, two were not destined to found durable dynasties, while the house of Antigonus, represented by Demetrius, was after all to do so. The house of Antipater came to an end in the male line in 294, when Demetrius killed the son of Cassander and established himself on the throne of Macedonia. He was however expelled by Lysimachus and Pyrrhus in 288; and in 285 Lysimachus took possession of all the European part of the Macedonian Empire. Except indeed for Egypt and Palestine under Ptolemy, Lysimachus and Seleucus now divided the empire between them, with the Taurus in Asia Minor for their frontier. These two survivors of the forty years’ conflict soon entered upon the crowning fight, and in 281 Lysimachus fell in the battle of Corupedion (in Lydia), leaving Seleucus virtually master of the empire. Seleucus’ assassination by Ptolemy Ceraunus in the same year brought back confusion.

Ptolemy Ceraunus (the son of the first Ptolemy, and half-brother of the reigning king of Egypt) seized the Macedonian throne, whilst Antiochus, the son of Seleucus, succeeded in holding together the Asiatic dominions of his father. The confusion was aggravated by the incursion of the Gauls into the Balkan Peninsula in 279; Ptolemy Ceraunus perished, and a period of complete anarchy succeeded in Macedonia. In 276 Antigonus Gonatas, the son of Demetrius, after inflicting a crushing defeat on the Gauls near Lysimachia, at last won Macedonia definitively for his house. Three solid kingdoms had thus emerged from all the fighting since Alexander’s death: the kingdom of the Antigonids in the original land of the race, the kingdom of the Ptolemies in Egypt, and that of the Seleucids, extending from the Aegean to India. For the next 100 years these are the three great powers of the eastern Mediterranean. But already parts of the empire of Alexander had passed from Macedonian rule altogether. In Asia Minor, Philetaerus a Greek of Tios (Tieium) in Paphlagonia, had established himself in a position of practical independence at Pergamum, and his nephew, Attalus, was the father of the line of kings who reigned in Pergamum till 133—antagonistic to the Seleucid house, till in 189 they took over the Seleucid possessions west of the Taurus. In Bithynia a native dynasty assumed the style of kings in 297. In Cappadocia two Persian houses, relics of the old aristocracy of Achaemenian days had carved out principalities, one of which became the kingdom of Pontus and the other the kingdom of Cappadocia (in the narrower sense); the former regarding Mithradates (281-266) as its founder, the latter being the creation of the second Ariarathes (?302-?281). Armenia, never effectively conquered by the Macedonians, was left in the hands of native princes, tributary only when the Seleucid court was strong enough to compel. In India, Seleucus had in 302 ceded large districts on the west of the Indus to Chandragupta, who had arisen to found a native empire which annexed the Macedonian provinces in the Panjab.

Whilst the Antigonid kingdom remained practically whole till the Roman conquest ended it in 168B.C., and the house of Ptolemy ruled in Egypt till the death of Cleopatra in 30B.C., the Seleucid Empire perished by a slow process of disruption. The eastern provinces of Iran went in 240 or thereabouts, when the Greek Diodotus made himself an independent king in Bactria (q.v.) and Sogdiana, and Tiridates, brother of Arsaces, a “Scythian” chieftain, conquered Parthia (so Arrian, but seeParthia). Armenia was finally lost in 190, when Artaxias founded a new native dynasty there. Native princes probably ruled in Persis before 166, though the district was at least nominally subject to Antiochus IV. Epiphanes till his death in 164 (seePersis). In southern Syria, which had been won by the house of Seleucus from the house of Ptolemy in 198, the independent Jewish principality was set up in 143. About the same time Media was totally relinquished to the Parthians. Babylonia was Parthian from 129. Before 88 the Parthians had conquered Mesopotamia. Commagene was independent under a king, Mithradates Callinicus, in the earlier part of the last centuryB.C.Syria itself in the last days of the Seleucid dynasty is seen to be breaking up into petty principalities, Greek or native. From 83 to 69 is the transient episode of Armenian conquest, and in 64 the last shadow of Seleucid rule vanished, when Syria was made a Roman province by Pompey. From this time Rome formally entered upon the heritage of Alexander as far as the Euphrates, but many of the dynasties which had arisen in the days of Macedonian supremacy were allowed to go on for a time as client states. One of them, the royal house of Commagene, not deposed by the Romans tillA.D.72, had Seleucid blood in its veins through the marriage of a Seleucid princess with Mithradates Callinicus, and regarded itself as being a continuation of the Seleucid dynasty. Its kings bore the name of Antiochus, and were as proud of their Macedonian, as of their Persian, descent (see the Inscription of Nimrud Dagh, Michel, No. 735).

The Macedonians of Alexander were not mistaken in seeing an essential transformation of their national monarchy when Alexander adopted the guise of an Oriental great king. Transplanted into this foreign soil, the2. Constitution of the Macedonian Kingdom.monarchy became an absolute despotism, unchecked by a proud territorial nobility and a hardy peasantry on familiar terms with their king. The principle which Seleucus is reported to have enunciated, that the king’s command was the supreme law (App.Syr.61), was literally the principle of the new Hellenistic monarchies in the East. But the rights belonging to the Macedonian army as Alexander inherited it did not altogether disappear. Like the old Roman people, the Macedonian people under arms had acted especially in the transference of the royal authority, conferring or confirming the right of the new chief, and in cases of the capital trials of Macedonians. In the latter respect the army came regularly into function under Alexander, and in the wars which followed his death (Diod. xviii. 4, 3; 36, 7; 37, 2, 39, 2; xix. 61, 3), and in Macedonia; although the power of life and death camede factointo the hands of the Antigonid king, the old right of the army to act as judge was not legally abrogated, and friction was sometimes caused by its assertion (Polyb. v. 27, 5). The right of the army to confer the royal power was still symbolized in the popular acclamation required on the accession of a new king, and at Alexandria in troubled times we hear of “the people” making its will effective in filling the throne, although it is here hard to distinguish mob-rule from the exercise of a legitimate function. Thus the people put Euergetes II. on the throne when Philometor was captured (Polyb. xxix. 23, 4); the people compelled Cleopatra III. to choose Soter II. as her associate (Just. xxxiv. 3, 2). In Syria, the usurper Tryphon bases his right upon an election by the “people” (Just. xxxvi. 1, 7) or “the army” (Jos.Ant.xiii. § 219). Where it is a case of delegating some part of the supreme authority, as when Seleucus I. made his son Antiochus king for the eastern provinces, we find the army convoked to ratify the appointment (App.Syr.61). So too the people is spoken of asappointing the guardians of a king during his minority (Just. xxxiv. 3, 6). Nor was the power of the army a fiction. The Hellenistic monarchies rested, as all government in the last resort must, upon the loyalty of those who wielded the brute force of the state, and however unlimited the powers of the king might be in theory, he could not alienate the goodwill of the army with impunity. The right of primogeniture in succession was recognized as a general principle; a woman, however, might succeed only so long as there were no male agnates. Illegitimate children had no rights of succession. In disturbed times, of course, right yielded to might or to practical necessities.

The practice by which the king associated a son with himself, as secondary king, dates from the very beginning of the kingdoms of the Successors; Antigonus on assuming the diadem in 306 caused Demetrius also to bear the title of king. Some ten years later Seleucus appointed Antiochus as king for the eastern provinces. Thenceforth the practice is a common one. But the cases of it fall into two classes. Sometimes the subordinate or joint kingship implies real functions. In the Seleucid kingdom the territorial expanse of the realm made the creation of a distinct subordinate government for part of it a measure of practical convenience. Sometimes the joint-king is merely titular, an infant of tender years, as for instance Antiochus Eupator, the son of Antiochus Epiphanes, or Ptolemy Eupator, the son of Ptolemy Philometor. The object here is to secure the succession in the event of the supreme king’s dying whilst his heir is an infant. The king’s government was carried on by officials appointed by him and responsible to him alone. Government at the same time, as an Oriental despotism understands it, often has little in view but the gathering in of the tribute and compulsion of the subjects to personal service in the army or in royal works, and if satisfied in these respects will leave much independence to the local authorities. In the loosely-knit Seleucid realm it is plain that a great deal more independence was left to the various communities,—cities or native tribes,—than in Egypt, where the conditions made a bureaucratic system so easy to carry through. In their outlying possessions the Ptolemies may have suffered as much local independence as the Seleucids; the internal government of Jerusalem, for instance, was left to the high priests. In so far as the older Greek cities fell within their sphere of power, the successors of Alexander were forced to the same ambiguous policy as Alexander had been, between recognizing the cities’ unabated claim to sovereign independence and the necessity of attaching them securely. In Asia Minor, the “enslavement” and liberation of cities alternated with the circumstances of the hour, while the kings all through professed themselves the champions of Hellenic freedom, and were ready on occasion to display munificence toward the city temples or in public works, such as might reconcile republicans to a position of dependence. Antiochus III. went so far as to write on one occasion to the subject Greek cities that if any royal mandate clashed with the civic laws it was to be disregarded (Plut.Imp. et duc. apophth.). But it was the old cry of the “autonomy of the Hellenes,” raised by Smyrna and Lampsacus, which ultimately brought Antiochus III. into collision with Rome. How anxious the Pergamene kings, with their ardent Hellenism, were to avoid offence is shown by the elaborate forms by which, in their own capital, they sought to give their real control the appearance of popular freedom (Cardinali, Regno diPergamo, p. 281 seq.). A similar problem confronted the Antigonid dynasty in the cities of Greece itself, for to maintain a predominant influence in Greece was a ground-principle of their policy. Demetrius had presented himself in 307 as the liberator, and driven the Macedonian garrison from the Peiraeus; but his own garrisons held Athens thirteen years later, when he was king of Macedonia, and the Antigonid dynasty clung to the points of vantage in Greece, especially Chalcis and Corinth, till their garrisons were finally expelled by the Romans in the name of Hellenic liberty.

The new movement of commerce initiated by the conquest of Alexander continued under his successors, though the break-up of the Macedonian Empire in Asia in the 3rd century and the distractions of the Seleucid court must have withheld many3. Commerce.advantages from the Greek merchants which a strong central government might have afforded them. It was along the great trade-routes between India and the West that the main stream of riches flowed then as in later centuries. One of these routes was by sea to south-west Arabia (Yemen), and thence up the Red Sea to Alexandria. This was the route controlled and developed by the Ptolemaïc kings. Between Yemen and India the traffic till Roman times was mainly in the hands of Arabians or Indians; between Alexandria and Yemen it was carried by Greeks (Strabo ii. 118). The west coast of the Red Sea was dotted with commercial stations of royal foundation from Arsinoë north of Suez to Arsinoë in the south near the straits of Bab-el-Mandeb. From Berenice on the Red Sea a land-route struck across to the Nile at Coptos; this route the kings furnished with watering stations. That there might also be a waterway between Alexandria and the Red Sea, they cut a canal between the Delta and the northern Arsinoë. It was Alexandria into which this stream of traffic poured and made it the commercial metropolis of the world. We hear of direct diplomatic intercourse between the courts of Alexandria and Pataliputra,i.e.Patna (Plin. vi. § 58). An alternative route went from the Indian ports to the Persian Gulf, and thence found the Mediterranean by caravan across Arabia from the country of Gerrha to Gaza; and to control it was no doubt a motive in the long struggle of the Ptolemaic and Seleucid houses for Palestine, as well as in the attempt of Antiochus III. to subjugate the Gerrhaeans. Or from the Persian Gulf wares might be taken up the Euphrates and carried across to Antioch; this route lay altogether in the Seleucid sphere. With Iran Antioch was connected most directly by the road which crossed the Euphrates at the Zeugma and went through Edessa and Antioch-Nisibis to the Tigris. The trade from India which went down the Oxus and then to the Caspian does not seem to have been considerable (Tarn,Journ. of Hell. Stud.xxi. 10 seq.). From Antioch to the Aegean the land high-road went across Asia Minor by the Cilician Gates and the Phrygian Apamea.

Of the financial organization of the Macedonian kingdoms we know practically nothing, except in the case of Egypt. Here the papyri and ostraca have put a large material at our disposal, but the circumstances in Egypt34. Finance.were too peculiar for us to generalize upon these data as to the Seleucid and Antigonid realms. That the Seleucid kings drew in a principal part of their revenues from tribute levied upon the various native races, distributed in their village communities as tillers of the soil goes without saying.4In districts left in the hands of native chiefs these chiefs would themselves exploit their villages and pay the Seleucid court and tribute. To exact tribute from Greek cities was invidious, but both Antigonid and Seleucid kings often did so (Antigonid, Diog. Laërt. II., 140; Plut.Dem.27; Seleucid, Michel, No. 37; Polyb. xxi. 43, 2). Sometimes, no doubt, this tribute was demanded under a fairer name, as the contribution of any ally (σύνταξις, notφόρος), like theΓαλατικάlevied by Antiochus I. (Michel, No. 37; cf. Polyb. xxii. 27, 2). The royal domains, again, and royal monopolies, such as salt-mines, were a source of revenue.5As to indirect taxes, like customs and harbour dues, while their existence is a matter of course (cf. Polyb. v. 89, 8), their scale, nature and amount is quite unknown to us. Whatever the financial systemof the Antigonid and Seleucid kingdoms may have been, it is clear that they were far from enjoying the affluence of the Ptolemaic. During the first Seleucid reigns indeed the revenues of Asia may have filled its treasuries (see Just. xvii. 2, 13), but Antiochus III. already at his accession found them depleted (Polyb. v. 50, 1), and from his reign financial embarrassment, coupled with extravagant expenditure, was here the usual condition of things. Perseus, the last of the Antigonid house, amassed a substantial treasure for the expenses of the supreme struggle with Rome (Polyb. xviii. 35, 4; Liv. xlv, 40), but it was by means of almost miserly economies.

Special officials were naturally attached to the service of the finances. Over the whole department in the Seleucid realm there presided a single chief (ὁ ἐπὶ τῶν προσόδων, App.Syr. 45). How far the financial administration was removed from the competence of the provincial governors, as it seems to have been in Alexander’s system, we cannot say. Seleucus at any rate, as satrap of Babylonia, controlled the finances of the province (Diod. xix. 55, 3), and so, in the Ptolemaic system, did the governor of Cyprus (Polyb. xxvii. 13). The fact that provincial officialsἐπὶ πῶν προσόδων(in Eriza,Bull. corr. hell.xv. 556) are found does not prove anything, since it leaves open the question of their being subordinate to the governor.

With the exception of Ptolemaic Egypt, the Macedonian kingdoms followed in their coinage that of Alexander. Money was for a long while largely struck with Alexander’s own image and superscription; the gold and silver5. Coinage.coined in the names of Antigonid and Seleucid kings and by the minor principalities of Asia, kept to the Attic standard which Alexander had established. Only in Egypt Ptolemy I. adopted, at first the Rhodian, and afterwards the Phoenician, standard, and on this latter standard the Ptolemaic money was struck during the subsequent centuries. Money was also struck in their own name by the cities in the several dynasties’ spheres of power, but in most cases only bronze or small silver for local use. Corinth, however, was allowed to go on striking staters under Antigonus Gonatas; Ephesus, Cos and the greater cities of Phoenicia retained their right of coinage under Seleucid or Ptolemaic supremacy.

In language and manners the courts of Alexander’s successors were Greek. Even the Macedonian dialect, which it was considered proper for the kings to use on occasion, was often forgotten (Plut.Ant.27). The Oriental features which6. The Court.Alexander had introduced were not copied. There was noproskynesis(or certainly not in the case of Greeks and Macedonians), and the king did not wear an Oriental dress. The symbol of royalty, it is true, thediadem, was suggested by the head-band of the old Persian kings (Just. xii. 3, 8); but, whereas, that had been an imposing erection, the Hellenistic diadem was a simple riband. The king’s state dress was the same in principle as that worn by the Macedonian or Thessalian horsemen, as the uniform of his own cavalry officers. Its features were the broad-brimmed hat (kausia), the cloak (chlamys) and the high-laced boots (krepīdes) (Plut.Ant.54; Frontinus, iii. 2, 11). These, in the case of the king, would be of richer material, colour and adornment. The diadem could be worn round the kausia; the chlamys offered scope for gorgeous embroidery; and the boots might be crimson felt (see the description of Demetrius’ chlamys and boots, Plut.Dem. 41). There were other traces in the Hellenistic courts of the old Macedonian tradition besides in dress. One was the honour given to prowess in the chase (Polyb. xxii. 3, 8; Diod. xxxiv. 34). Another was the fashion for the king to hold wassail with his courtiers, in which he unbent to an extent scandalous to the Greeks, dancing or indulging in routs and practical jokes.6

The prominent part taken by the women of the royal house was a Macedonian characteristic. The history of these kingdoms furnishes a long list of queens and princesses who were ambitious and masterful politicians, of which the great Cleopatra is the last and the most famous. The kings after Alexander, with the exception of Demetrius Poliorcetes and Pyrrhus, are not found to have more than one legitimate wife at a time, although they show unstinted freedom in divorce and the number of their mistresses. The custom of marriages between brothers and sisters, agreeable to old Persian as to old Egyptian ethics, was instituted in Egypt by the second Ptolemy when he married his full sister Arsinoë Philadelphus. It was henceforth common, though not invariable, among the Ptolemies. At the Seleucid court there seems to be an instance of it in 195, when the heir-apparent, Antiochus, married his sister Laodice. The style of “sister” was given in both courts to the queen, even when she was not the king’s sister in reality (Strack,Dynastie, Nos. 38, 40, 43;Archiv. f. Papyr, i. 205). The “Friends” of the king are often mentioned. It is usual for him to confer with a council (συνέδριον) of his “Friends” before important decisions, administrative, military or judicial (e.g.Polyb. v. 16, 5; 22, 8). They form a definite body about the king’s person (φίλων σύνταγμα, Polyb. xxxi. 3, 7); cf.οἱ φίλοιin contrast withαἱ δυνάμεις, id. v. 50, 9), admission into which depends upon his favour alone, and is accorded, not only to his subjects, but to aliens, such as the Greek refugee politicians (e.g.Hegesianax, Athen. iv. 155b; Hannibal and the Aetolian Thoas take part in the councils of Antiochus III. A similar body, with a title corresponding toφίλοι, is found in ancient Egypt (Erman,Ancient Egypt, Eng. trans., p. 72) and in Persia (Spiegel.Eran. Alt.iii. 626); but some such support is so obviously required by the necessities of a despot’s position that we need not suppose it derived from any particular precedent. The Friends (at any rate under the later Seleucid and Ptolemaïc reigns) were distinguished by a special dress and badge of gold analogous to the stars and crosses of modern orders. The dress was of crimson (πορφύρα); this and the badges were the king’s gift, and except by royal grant neither crimson nor gold might, apparently, be worn at court (1 Macc. 10, 20; 62; 89; 11, 58; Athen. v. 211b). The order of Friends was organized in a hierarchy of ranks, which were multiplied as time went on. In Egypt we find them classified asσυγγενεῖς, ὁμότιμοι τοῖς συγγενέσιν, ἀρχισωματοφύλακες, πρῶτοι φίλοι, φίλοι(in the narrower sense),διάδοχοι. For the Seleucid kingdomσυγγενεῖς, πρῶτοι φίλοιandφίλοιare mentioned. These classes do not appear in Egypt before the 2nd century; Strack conjectures that they were created in imitation of the Seleucid court. We have no direct evidence as to the institutions of the Seleucid court in the 3rd century. Certainσωματοφύλακεςof Antiochus I. are mentioned, but we do not know whether the name was not then used in its natural sense (Strack,Rhein. Mus.LV., 1900, p. 161 seq.; Wilamowitz,Archiv f. Pap.I., p. 225; Beloch,Gr. Gesch.iii (i), p. 391). As to Macedonia, whatever may have been the constitution of the court, it is implied that it offered in its externals a sober plainness in comparison with the vain display and ceremonious frivolities of Antioch and Alexandria (Polyb. xvi, 22, 5; Plut.Cleom.31;Arat, 15). The position of a Friend did not carry with it necessarily any functions; it was in itself purely honorary. The ministers and high officials were, on the other hand, regularly invested with one or other of the ranks specified. The chief of these ministers is denotedὁ ἐπὶ τῶν πραγμάτων, and he corresponds to thevizierof the later East. All departments of government are under his supervision, and he regularly holds the highest rank of a kinsman. When the king is a minor, he acts as guardian or regent (ἐπίτροπος). Over different departments of state we find a state secretary (ἐπιστολογράφοςorὑπομνηματογράφος: Seleucid, Polyb. xxxi, 3, 16; Ptolemaic, Strack,Inschriften103) and a minister of finance (ὁ ἐπὶ τῶν προσόδωνin the Seleucid kingdom; App.Syr.45;διοικήτηςin Egypt, Lumbroso,Econ. Pol.p. 339). Under each of these great heads of departments was a host of lower officials, those, for instance, who held to the province a relation analogous to that of the head of the department of the realm. Such a provincial authority is described asἐπὶ τῶν προσόδωνin the inscription of Eriza (Bull. corr. hell.xv. 556). Beside the officials concerned with the work of government we have those of the royal household: (1) the chief-physician,ἀρχιατρός(for the Seleucid see App.Syr.59; Polyb. v. 56, 1; Michel, No. 1158; for the Pontic,Bull. corr. hell.vii. 354 seq.); (2) the chief-huntsman,ἀρχικυνηγός(Dittenb.Orient. Graec.99); (3) the maître-d’hôtelἀρχεδέατρος(Dittenb.Orient. Graec.169) (4) the lord of the queen’s bedchamber,ὁ επὶ τοῦ κοιτῶνος τὴς βασιλίσσης(Dittenb.Orient. Graec.256). As in the older Oriental courts, the high positions were often filled by eunuchs (e.g.Craterus, in last mentioned inscription).

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