The Invasion of India by Alexander the Great as described by Arrian, Q. Curtius, Diodoros, Plutarch and Justin: Being Translations of such portions of the Works of these and other Classical Authors as describe Alexander's Campaigns in Afghanistan, the Panjâb, Sindh, Gedrosia and Karmania

by John Watson McCrindle

Polyainos, a Macedonian, who flourished about the middle of the second century of our aera, and was the author of a work on the stratagems of war, which is still extant.

Polykleitos was a native of Larissa, who wrote a history of Alexander. Most of the extracts preserved from this work refer to the geography of the countries which Alexander conquered.

Polysperchon, or Polyperchon, was one of the oldest officers of a high rank in Alexander’s service. After the battle of Issos he was promoted to the command of a division of the phalanx in succession to Ptolemy, the son of Seleukos, who fell in that battle. In Baktria he offended Alexander by casting ridicule on the ceremony of prostration, and was thus for a time in disgrace. He was present at the passage of the Hydaspês, and also in the descent of the Indus, and was then sent with Krateros to conduct the veterans from India to Karmania by way of the Bolan Pass. He was not in Babylon at the time of Alexander’s death, and hence was passed over in the allotment of the provinces made after that event. When war, however, broke out between Antipater and Perdikkas, the former committed to his hands the chief command in Macedonia and Greece during his absence in Asia. The veteran general showed himself worthy of the trust reposed in him, and received the reward of his services at Antipater’s death, who appointed him, in preference to his own son, Kassander, to be his successor in the regency. After many vicissitudes of fortune, and disgracing his name by his treachery towards Phôkiôn, and his causing Heraklês, the son of Alexander, whose cause he had espoused, to be murdered, he disappears from history after the year 303 B.C.

Pôros was the most powerful king in the Panjâb at the time of Alexander’s invasion. He was then at enmity with Omphis, the king of Taxila, but in alliance with Abisarês, the king of Kâśmîr. After his defeat and submission to the conqueror, he was confirmed in his kingdom, the limits of which were afterwards considerably extended. All that is known of his history will be found in the translations, if read along with the notice below, of Sandrokottos, except that after Alexander’s death he made himself master of Sindh, from which he ousted Peithôn. The name of Pôros, which is formed from Paura or Paurava, with the Greek termination os added, shows that he belonged to a family of the Lunar race. Bohlen, however, takes the name to be a corruption of the Sanskrit Paurusha, which means “heroic.”

Portikanos.—See [Oxykanos].

Ptolemy, called the son of Lagos, is supposed to have been in reality the son of Philip, as his mother Arsinoê was the concubine of that king, and was pregnant when married to Lagos. Of all Alexander’s generals Ptolemy was the one who approached him nearest in a capacity both for war and government, while he did not fall short of him in magnanimity of disposition. He was banished from Macedonia by Philip, who discovered that he was promoting with others a marriage between Alexander and the daughter of Pixodaros, the king of Karia. He rendered important services in the war against Darius; and when Dêmêtrios, a member of the select bodyguard, was arrested on suspicion of being concerned in the conspiracy of Philôtas, Ptolemy was promoted to fill his place. It was he who obtained information of the plot of Hermolaos, and by revealing it was probably the means of saving the king’s life. In the battle with the Aspasians, Ptolemy slew their leader with his own hand, and in the campaigns in India he was on several occasions entrusted with separate commands of great importance. The story of Alexander’s dream, which led to the discovery of a plant by which Ptolemy was cured of a dangerous wound inflicted by a poisoned arrow, must be apocryphal, since Arrian, who had Ptolemy’s own memoirs of the expedition constantly before him, is silent on the subject. At Sousa he received in marriage a daughter of Artabazos. After Alexander’s death he obtained Egypt as his share of the empire, and raised that country to a high pitch of prosperity. He reigned for no less than forty years. The dynasty which he founded, after subsisting for nearly two hundred years, ended with the death of Kleopatra.

Fig. 25.—Ptolemy III.

Ptolemy III. ascended the throne of Egypt in 247 B.C. in succession to his father Ptolemy Philadelphos. In the early part of his reign he overran Syria, and having thence turned his arms eastward, advanced as far as Babylon and Sousa, and received the submission of all the upper provinces of Asia as far as the borders of Baktria and India. On returning to his kingdom he carried back with him the statues of the Egyptian deities which Kambyses had removed to the East, and restored them to their proper temples, an act which won for him the gratitude of the Egyptians and the title by which he is generally known, Euergetês, i.e. Benefactor. Like his father he distinguished himself by his munificent patronage of literature and science. He was one of the kings to whom Buddhist missionaries were sent by the Indian king Aśôka. He died in the year 222 B.C.