The story of how Alexander set off on his career of conquest has attracted authors and historians ever since that impetuous young man chopped his way through the Gordion knot. According to the usual accounts, Alexander set out in 334 BC at the head of his army of Macedonian veterans. The first check was at the Hellespont, nowdays known as the Dardanelles. One hundred and fifty years before the Persian king Xerxes had demonstrated his power by building a bridge of boats across the narrow strait (when an unseasonable storm swept away the first bridge, Xerxes had the engineers beheaded, the sea whipped and a set of fetters thrown into it as a symbol that it was his slave.)
Alexander had neither the manpower nor the time for such grandiose gestures. He left his general Parmenion with the bulk of the army to cross using 160 ships, probably embarking from somewhere near the modern Gallipoli. Meanwhile Alexander himself with an escort of 6,000 men set off for the tip of the Gallipoli peninsula where he sacrificed to the shade of Protosilaus: according to legend, Protosilaus was the first Greek ashore at the siege of Troy and was promptly killed. Alexander, who intended to be first ashore in his turn, hoped for better fortune and saw a prayer at the hero's tomb as one way of ensuring it.
By the time Alexander and his men had marched the long way down the peninsula, the crossing was sufficiently advanced that Parmenion was able to detach 60 ships and send them down to ferry his king across. With a fair wind behind them, the little fleet sailed up the strait and Alexander was so thrilled by the blue water and green shores on either side that he insisted on taking the helm of the ship in which he sailed.
In mid-voyage there was a short pause while a bull was sacrificed to Poseidon, the god of the sea, and libations were poured out to the Nereids to ensure that the wind continued. True to his ambition, Alexander was the first ashore, though his satisfaction must have been diminished somewhat by the sight of the rest of his army already in peaceful occupation of the Asian shore.
That, at least, is the story as told by Arrian, Plutarch, Polybius and Diodorus, the earliest historians to record the epic life of Alexander. A much later historian, Justin, who wrote in the 2nd or 3rd century AD and abridged the history of Trogus "Historia Philippicae", adds an interesting detail. According to this late work, Alexander finally relinquished the wheel - or more precisely, the steering oar - as his ship neared land. He hurried forward and donned his full ceremonial armour and then, as the keel grated on the pebbles of the beach, hurled a spear into the ground as a sign that he claimed Asia from the gods as a "spear-won prize".
Now normally a story which only appears in one source, particularly when that source is late and the earlier authors appear ignorant of the tale, is rejected. This is one reason why so many people have rejected the Bible as a reliable source: believing that it was written at a late date, they dismiss it as "late", "unreliable" and "more myth than history".
We have before commented on the way in which legends can preserve a kernel of historical truth. Often late sources can preserve details which have been ignored by early authors as trivial or irrelevant, but passed down by word of mouth to be recorded by the later writer. It would seem that something of the sort may have happened with regard to the story of Alexander and the spear.
Septimius Severus, the Roman emperor, minted a coin sometime between 193 and 211 AD. One side of the coin shows a bust of the bearded emperor in profile and bears the inscription, "Emperor Caesar L. Septimius Severus Pertinax". The other side shows a galley with a ramming prow at the front and a castle at the rear in which a soldier is sitting. A helmeted figure, probably representing the goddess Athena, is seated in the stern of the ship holding a round shield. On the galley - and dwarfing it - are two other figures: the central one is another soldier, holding a torch and a shield. The one in the front is also in armour, but he is standing in the prow of the ship holding a spear in his hand.
It is not possible to identify any of these figures apart from the goddess, whose attributes are well known. However this side of the coin bears an inscription, "Magistrate Fabius A. Proclo, Abydos". Abydos was a fairly unimportant ferry port on the Asian side of the Dardanelles. Its only claim to fame was that Xerxes built his bridge from there, and Alexander landed at Abydos - probably as a deliberate reversal of Xerxes invasion. Obviously the picture does not represent Xerxes, for the Persian king did not sail in a boat and there is nothing suggesting a bridge on the coin. The alternative is that the picture represents Alexander's crossing.
If this is so, then we can conclude that the figure in the prow of the ship, whose importance is shown by the fact that it is the only one of the four figures not to be obscured in some way, is Alexander - and if so, we may ask ourselves what he is doing with a spear. No doubt Alexander was proficient in the use of all weapons, but for a man on horseback a spear was a most awkward weapon. Even the bold knights of the Middle Ages only used their lance for the initial onset, in which it was likely to be shattered; after that they threw it away and drew their swords. Pictures of Alexander in places such as the Alexander Sarcophagus in the Istanbul museum or the famous mosaic of Pompeii, show him wielding a sword: indeed, cavalrymen commonly had swords that were longer and heavier than those of the infantry.
Italo Vecchi, Managing Director fo Europe of the Classical Numismatic Group, has no doubts on the matter. This coin is confirmation of the spear story and represents Alexander sailing into the port of Abydos, spear in hand, ready to hurl it into the ground as soon as he is near enough.
From Abydos Alexander headed eastwards, only to find his way blocked by the Persian army lined up on the opposite bank of the river Granicus. In the ensuing battle, Alexander had two factors in his favour. The first was that the Persian army was, by and large, a conscript force, untrained and lacking in motivation, whereas his own army consisted of well-trained and experienced volunteers. The second factor was his revolutionary tactics. Whereas the Persian host just rolled forward, heedless of losses, until it had flattened all opposition, Alexander's men were carefully arranged with a definite end in view.
The main part of the Greek army consisted of the phalanx, a body of men armed with long spears. Whereas those in the front row held spears eight feet in length, those in subsequent rows held even longer spears until you got to the rear rank which held an unwieldly thirty-two foot shaft! This forest of spear-points moved forward inexorably and as no one could get closer to the soldiers than eight feet, those opposed to it had the choice of being skewered where they stood or moving out of the way! Archers, who alone could reach the Greek soldiers, were ridden down by cavalry.
Alexander's innovation was to greatly strengthen his left; while the battle raged elsewhere on the field, the body of men on the left would force their way through the enemy opposed to them and once they were disposed of, the Greeks on the left would turn ninety degrees to the right and just walk down the battlefield, taking all the other enemy forces in the flank. Caught between two advancing walls of spearpoints the enemy either fled or died.
This is what happened at the Granicus. Once the phalanx was able to assemble on the far side of the stream - thanks to a heroic charge by Alexander and his cavalry - they simply swept the Persian army aside. The story of that battle is told in a film on NWTV.
Reproduced with permission from Diggings magazine.