ALEXANDER MURDERS HIS FRIEND
[327 B.C.]
During this halt at Maracanda (Samarcand), 328-327 B.C., the memorable banquet occurred wherein Alexander murdered Clitus. Clitus had saved his life at the battle of the Granicus, by cutting off the sword arm of the Persian Spithridates, when already uplifted to strike him from behind. Since the death of Philotas, the important function of general of the companion cavalry had been divided between Hephæstion and Clitus. Moreover, the family of Clitus had been attached to Philip, by ties so ancient, that his sister, Lanice, had been selected as the nurse of Alexander himself when a child. Two of her sons had already perished in the Asiatic battles. If, therefore, there were any man who stood high in the service, or was privileged to speak his mind freely to Alexander, it was Clitus.
In this banquet at Maracanda, when wine, according to the Macedonian habit, had been abundantly drunk, and when Alexander, Clitus, and most of the other guests were already nearly intoxicated, enthusiasts or flatterers heaped immoderate eulogies upon the king’s previous achievements. They exalted him above all the most venerated legendary heroes; they proclaimed that his superhuman deeds proved his divine paternity, and that he had earned an apotheosis like Hercules, which nothing but envy could withhold from him even during his life. Alexander himself joined in these boasts, and even took credit for the later victories of the reign of his father, whose abilities and glory he depreciated. To the old Macedonian officers, such an insult cast on the memory of Philip was deeply offensive. But among them all, none had been more indignant than Clitus, with the growing insolence of Alexander—his assumed filiation from Zeus Ammon, which put aside Philip as unworthy—his preference for Persian attendants, who granted or refused admittance to his person—his extending to Macedonian soldiers the contemptuous treatment habitually endured by Asiatics, and even allowing them to be scourged by Persian hands and Persian rods. The pride of a Macedonian general in the stupendous successes of the last five years, was effaced by his mortification, when he saw that they tended only to merge his countrymen amidst a crowd of servile Asiatics, and to inflame the prince with high-flown aspirations transmitted from Xerxes or Ochus. But whatever might be the internal thoughts of Macedonian officers, they held their peace before Alexander, whose formidable character and exorbitant self-estimation would tolerate no criticism.
At the banquet of Maracanda, this long-suppressed repugnance found an issue, accidental, indeed, and unpremeditated, but for that very reason all the more violent and unmeasured. The wine, which made Alexander more boastful, and his flatterers fulsome to excess, overpowered altogether the reserve of Clitus. He rebuked the impiety of those who degraded the ancient heroes in order to make a pedestal for Alexander. He protested against the injustice of disparaging the exalted and legitimate fame of Philip, whose achievements he loudly extolled, pronouncing them to be equal, and even superior, to those of his son. For the exploits of Alexander, splendid as they were, had been accomplished, not by himself alone, but by that unconquerable Macedonian force which he had found ready made to his hands; whereas those of Philip had been his own—since he had found Macedonia prostrate and disorganised, and had to create for himself both soldiers and a military system. The great instruments of Alexander’s victories had been Philip’s old soldiers, whom he now despised, and among them Parmenion, whom he had put to death.
Remarks such as these, poured forth in the coarse language of a half-intoxicated Macedonian veteran, provoked loud contradiction from many, and gave poignant offence to Alexander; who now for the first time heard the open outburst of disapprobation, before concealed and known to him only by surmise. But wrath and contradiction, both from him and from others, only made Clitus more reckless in the outpouring of his own feelings, now discharged with delight after having been so long pent up. He passed from the old Macedonian soldiers to himself individually. Stretching forth his right hand towards Alexander, he exclaimed, “Recollect that you owe your life to me; this hand preserved you at the Granicus. Listen to the outspoken language of truth, or else abstain from asking freemen to supper, and confine yourself to the society of barbaric slaves.” All these reproaches stung Alexander to the quick. But nothing was so intolerable to him as the respectful sympathy for Parmenion, which brought to his memory one of the blackest deeds of his life—and the reminiscence of his preservation at the Granicus, which lowered him into the position of a debtor towards the very censor under whose reproof he was now smarting.
At length wrath and intoxication together drove him into uncontrollable fury. He started from his couch, and felt for his dagger to spring at Clitus; but the dagger had been put out of reach by one of his attendants. In a loud voice and with the Macedonian word of command, he summoned the bodyguards and ordered the trumpeter to sound an alarm. But no one obeyed so grave an order, given in his condition of drunkenness. His principal officers, Ptolemy, Perdiccas, and others, clung round him, held his arms and body, and besought him to abstain from violence; others at the same time tried to silence Clitus and hurry him out of the hall, which had now become a scene of tumult and consternation. But Clitus was not in a humour to confess himself in the wrong by retiring; while Alexander, furious at the opposition now, for the first time, offered to his will, exclaimed that his officers held him in chains as Bessus had held Darius, and left him nothing but the name of a king. Though anxious to restrain his movements, they doubtless did not dare to employ much physical force; so that his great personal strength, and continued efforts, presently set him free. He then snatched a pike from one of the soldiers, rushed upon Clitus, and thrust him through on the spot, exclaiming, “Go now to Philip and Parmenion.”