The depth of this single phalanx is not given, nor do we know the exact width of the ground which it occupied. Assuming a depth of sixteen, and one pace in breadth to each soldier, 4000 men would stand in the breadth of a stadium of 250 paces; and therefore 80,000 men in a breadth of twenty stadia (see the calculation of Rüstow and Köchly, p. 280, about the Macedonian line). Assuming a depth of twenty-six, 6500 men would stand in the stadium, and therefore 90,000 in a total breadth of 14 stadia, which is that given by Kallisthenes. But there must have been intervals left, greater or less, we know not how many; the covering detachments, which had been thrown out before the river Pinarus, must have found some means of passing through to the rear, when recalled.
Mr. Kinneir states that the breadth between Mount Amanus and the sea varies between one mile and a half (English) and three miles. The fourteen stadia of Kallisthenes are equivalent to nearly one English mile and three-quarters.
Neither in ancient nor in modern times have Oriental armies ever been trained, by native officers, to regularity of march or array—see Malcolm, Hist. of Persia, ch. xxiii. vol. ii. p. 498; Volney, Travels in Egypt and Syria, vol. i. p. 124.
[276] Arrian, ii. 10, 2. Kallisthenes appears to have reckoned the mercenaries composing the Persian phalanx at 30,000—and the cavalry at 30,000. He does not seem to have taken account of the Kardakes. Yet Polybius in his criticism tries to make out that there was not room for an array of even 60,000; while Arrian enumerates 90,000 hoplites, not including cavalry (Polyb. xii. 18).
[277] Arrian, ii. 9; Kallisthenes ap. Polyb. xii. 17. The slackness of this Persian corps on the flank, and the ease with which Alexander drove them back—a material point in reference to the battle—are noticed by Curtius, iii. 9, 11.
[278] Arrian, ii. 11, 6. εὐθὺς, ὡς εἶχεν ἐπὶ τοῦ ἅρματος, ξὺν τοῖς πρώτοις ἔφευγε, etc.
This simple statement of Arrian is far more credible than the highly wrought details given by Diodorus (xvii. 34) and Curtius (iii. 11, 9) about a direct charge of Alexander upon the chariot of Darius, and a murderous combat immediately round that chariot, in which the horses became wounded and unmanageable, so as to be on the point of overturning it. Chares even went so far as to affirm that Alexander had come into personal conflict with Darius, from whom he had received his wound in the thigh (Plutarch, Alex. 20). Plutarch had seen the letter addressed by Alexander to Antipater, simply intimating that he had received a slight wound in the thigh.
In respect to this point, as to so many others, Diodorus and Curtius have copied the same authority.
Kallisthenes (ap. Polyb. xii. 22) stated that Alexander had laid his plan of attack with a view to bear upon the person of Darius, which is not improbable (compare Xenoph. Anab. i. 8, 22), and was in fact realized, since the first successful charge of the Macedonians came so near to Darius as to alarm him for the safety of his own person. To the question put by Polybius—How did Alexander know in what part of the army Darius was?—we may reply, that the chariot and person of Darius would doubtless be conspicuous: moreover the Persian kings were habitually in the centre—and Cyrus the younger, at the battle of Kunaxa, directed the attack to be made exactly against the person of his brother Artaxerxes.
After the battle of Kunaxa, Artaxerxes assumed to himself the honor of having slain Cyrus with his own hand, and put to death those who had really done the deed, because they boasted of it (Plutarch, Artax. 16).