The description given by Diodorus was contained in the lost part of his seventeenth book; the table of contents, prefixed thereunto, notes the incident briefly.
All the authors describe in the same general way the commencement, progress, and result, of this impressive scene in the banqueting hall of Marakanda; but they differ materially in the details. In giving what seems to me the most probable account, I have borrowed partly from all, yet following mostly the account given by Arrian from Ptolemy, himself present. For Arrian’s narrative down to sect. 14 of c. 8 (before the words Ἀριστόβουλος δὲ) may fairly be presumed to be derived from Ptolemy.
Both Plutarch and Curtius describe the scene in a manner more dishonorable to Alexander than Arrian; and at the same time (in my judgment) less probable. Plutarch says that the brawl took its rise from a poet named Pierion singing a song which turned into derision those Macedonians who had been recently defeated in Sogdiana; that Alexander and those around him greatly applauded this satire; that Kleitus protested against such an insult to soldiers, who, though unfortunate, had behaved with unimpeachable bravery; that Alexander then turned upon Kleitus saying, that he was seeking an excuse for himself by extenuating cowardice in others; that Kleitus retorted by reminding him of the preservation of his life at the Granikus. Alexander is thus made to provoke the quarrel by aspersing the courage of Kleitus, which I think noway probable; nor would he be likely to encourage a song of that tenor.
Curtius agrees with Arrian in ascribing the origin of the mischief to the extravagant boasts of Alexander and his flatterers, and to their depreciation of Philip. He then tells us that Kleitus, on hearing their unseemly talk, turned round and whispered to his neighbor some lines out of the Andromachê of Euripides (which lines Plutarch also ascribes to him, though at a later moment); that Alexander, not hearing the words, asked what had been said, but no one would tell him; at length Kleitus himself repeated the sentiment in language of his own. This would suit a literary Greek; but an old Macedonian officer half intoxicated, when animated by a vehement sentiment, would hardly express it by whispering a Greek poetical quotation to his neighbor. He would either hold his tongue, or speak what he felt broadly and directly. Nevertheless Curtius has stated two points very material to the case, which do not appear in Arrian. 1. It was Alexander himself, not his flatterers, who vilipended Philip; at least the flatterers only did so after him, and following his example. The topic would be dangerous for them to originate, and might easily be carried too far. 2. Among all the topics touched upon by Kleitus, none was so intolerable as the open expression of sympathy, friendship, and regret for Parmenio. This stung Alexander in the sorest point of his conscience; he must have known that there were many present who sympathized with it; and it was probably the main cause which worked him up to phrenzy. Moreover we may be pretty sure that Kleitus, while expatiating upon Philip, would not forget Philip’s general in chief and his own old friend, Parmenio.
I cannot believe the statement of Aristobulus, that Kleitus was forced by his friends out of the hall, and afterward returned to it of his own accord, to defy Alexander once more. It seems plain from Arrian that Ptolemy said no such thing. The murderous impulse of Alexander was gratified on the spot, and without delay, as soon as he got clear from the gentle restraint of his surrounding friends.
[504] Arrian, iv. 9, 4; Curtius, viii. 2, 2.
[505] Curtius, viii. 2, 12. “Quoque minus cædis puderet, jure interfectum Clitum Macedones decernunt; sepulturâ quoque prohibituri, ni rex humari jussisset.”
In explanation of this monstrous verdict of the soldiers, we must recollect that the safety of the whole army (now at Samarcand, almost beyond the boundary of inhabited regions, ἔξω τῆς οἰκουμένης) was felt to depend on the life of Alexander. Compare Justin, xii. 6, 15.
[506] Arrian, iv. 9, 6. Alexander imagined himself to have incurred the displeasure of Dionysus by having sacked and destroyed the city of Thebes, the supposed birth-place and favorite locality of that god (Plutarch, Alex. 13).
The maddening delusion brought upon men by the wrath of Dionysus is awfully depicted in the Bacchæ of Euripides. Under the influence of that delusion, Agavê, mother of Pentheus, tears her son in pieces and bears away his head in triumph, not knowing what is in her hands. Compare also Eurip. Hippolyt. 440-1412.