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The Glory that was Macedon

Previously, in “Philip the Great, Emperor of Great Macedonia”, I postulated an ATL in which Philip II of Macedon was not assassinated at his daughter’s wedding, but went on to found a Macedonian Empire in western Asia. His son, Alexander “the Restless”, then expanded into the Arabian Peninsula, the Black Sea coasts, southern Gaul, and southern Italy. In this last, he met his fate in the form of a stray pilum during the First Roman War.

We are warned, in writing alternative history against the illusion of the “eternal empire”, the notion that our pet polity will overcome all obstacles to reign triumphant throughout space and time. I shall try to avoid this illusion.

Alexander’s son and heir presumptive, Archelaus, may or may not be with the Macedonian army at the battle of Myskelion, where his father undergoes sudden apotheosis. For the sake of discussion, I shall assume that wherever he was, he had no problem in being recognized as the next Great King of Macedonia. He really doesn’t need that problem, as the Macedonian army has retreated, considerably demoralized by the death of Alexander. Whether the next day or the next year, however, he rallies the army and leads it into the field again.

In OTL, the effectiveness of the Philippian military system was due to its use of combined arms, most particularly of cavalry and infantry together. Philip’s cavalry, although their seats must have been much more precarious without the use of the stirrup, was the striking arm of his force, the “hammer”; his phalangists, with their long sarissae, were the holding force, the “anvil”, against which the cavalry would (ideally) crush the enemy. In OTL, during the Diadochi Wars, the use of cavalry lapsed, from a combination of impoverishment and lack of understanding by lesser commanders than Philip and Alexander. Only the phalanx was left, to be decisively defeated at Cynoscephalae.

This deterioration of the military art can hardly happen in Alexander’s lifetime; the OTL record shows that he appreciated the use of cavalry as the striking force in a combined arms battle. OTOH, south-central Italy, where I postulate him spending his last years, is peculiarly unsuited to a cavalry/phalanx army; the Romans, who in the 5^th century BCE used a pseudo-Greek phalanx originated by the Etruscans, found this organization unsuited for their wars against their south Italian opponents, the Samnites. Probably late in the 4^th century, they reorganized into the archaic manipular formation, gradually giving up the long thrusting spear (hasta) in favor of the short throwing spear (pilum) and thrusting sword (gladius, although the sword of this pattern appears to be Iberian in origin, and was probably not adopted until the Punic Wars).

After the Lucanian Wars, Alexander can hardly be unaware of the inferiority of his phalanx/cavalry army; in this theatre, at least, he will have built up the hypaspist (light infantry) component of his force. Still, whilst I’ve postulated that Macedon will be the victor in the First Roman War, it will hardly be a decisive defeat for the Romans; they will undertake (by treaty) to keep the south Italian tribes under control and out of the Macedonian satrapy of Great Greece (southern Italy).

The First Roman War will be complicated by three events other than Alexander’s death. The first is the eruption of the Danubian Celts into the Balkans. In OTL, they killed the king of Macedon, Ptolemy Ceraunus (who had himself seized the throne after murdering his benefactor, Seleucus I Nicator) and set up kingdoms in Thrace and Asia Minor (the last, Hellenized as Galatia, would last until Roman Imperial times). Against a united Macedonian Empire, they can hardly do so well; still, it can certainly be supposed that they will wreak devastation in Thrace and Macedon proper.

The second, I choose to make a military revolt in Sicily. Philip and Alexander recruited most of their army through what may be called feudal obligations. Philip’s infantry, however, had a significant mercenary element (the 4^th century was the great age of the mercenary in Greece), which was maintained if not increased by Alexander. In TTL, his tenure as sub-king of the Persian March will have certainly increased this (how else will he get troops, after all?), and he will almost certainly maintain this after becoming Great King of Macedon. Mercenaries, however, are not always loyal to their paymaster; I postulate that a dissatisfied group of mercenaries will seize the Sicilian city of Messene, and rule it as a pseudo-Spartan military oligarchy for nearly a quarter of a century. This will have the effect of weakening communications with Sicily and, importantly, Carthage, a subject ally of Great Macedonia, but a restive one, particularly since Alexander’s high-handedness in seizing Corsica from it.

The third is the character of Archelaus himself. He could be anything; I choose to make him a man of intellectual and esthetic tastes, not an unworthy man, but hardly up to the standards of Philip and Alexander as either king or general.

So, as Archelaus prepares to lead his army out against the Romans again, a messenger comes hotfoot from Pella, telling him of the invasion of the core of his realm by red-haired barbarians who fear the sky falling, but nothing else – certainly not the Macedonian garrisons on the border. Archelaus must not only defend the Macedonian heartland, he must be seen to be doing so, not frittering away his time and his men’s lives in Italy. He hurries home with part of the Macedonian field force, therefore, leaving a portion under his brother Ion to face the Romans.

Alexander might well have decisively defeated the Romans in time, were it not for his death. Archelaus might not have done so, even with a veteran field army. Ion, with only a portion of that army, cannot do so. Although he defeats the Romans in three major battles, they are expensive, hard-fought victories, and the Romans do not seem to be running out of either men or determination. Moreover, after five years, disaster strikes: Ion is taken captive by the Romans. A peace is made, which does little more than bind Romans to keep their allies out of Macedonian territories. Ion is kept by the Romans to insure against an attack by Archelaus; he is transferred from place to place in the Roman confederacy, and dies, in suspicious circumstances, at Neapolis in 261 BCE. Not entirely coincidentally (although the Roman seizure of Messene certainly has much to do with it), the Second Roman War breaks out that same year.

After driving out the Celts, Archelaus will be occupied by a revolt of the Isaurians in southeastern Anatolia (in OTL, the Byzantines found them excellent soldiers and a perennial bandit problem). There will also be a revolt of the Phoenician cities in Cyprus. In OTL, Herodotus claims that Cambyses II of Persia was prevented from attempting to conquer Carthage by the refusal of his Phoenician navy to proceed against their kinsmen; in TTL, Carthage will return the favor. This is just short of open revolt by the Carthaginians, but Archelaus will back down to keep the peace, and maintain his increasingly shaky hold on the city. Cyprus will not return fully to Macedonian control until the time of Archelaus’ great-grandson.

Archelaus is a fairly nice guy. However, we all know where nice guys finish. In 249, a civil war breaks out over the succession between Archelaus’ sons. The victor, Dionysius, determines that the succession will happen now; he forces Archelaus to abdicate.

Dionysius is everything that his father was not: bigoted instead of tolerant, philistine instead of cultured...and a brilliant and determined general instead of an ineffectual and irresolute commander. In particular, Dionysius is angry with his cousin, the Persian shah Xerxes III (Archelaus’ mother was Xerxes’ aunt). Xerxes, who came to the Persian throne in 266, spent the first few years of his reign stabilizing his Central Asia frontier. In the past few years, he has been intriguing to get back the western territories that his grandfather Darius ceded to Philip the Great, and he backed Dionysius’ brother Euergetes to succeed Archelaus.

Dionysius begins the war by massacring 40,000 Persians, mostly harmless small farmers, within the borders of the Macedonian Empire. He then marches east, crosses the Euphrates, and defeats Xerxes at the battle of Khaldiron in 247. He sacks Tauria, but is forced to retreat by his mutinous troops (Alexander’s men followed him past the Indus, but Dionysius lacks his grandfather’s charisma). He spents the next year consolidating his position in Cappadocia and conquering Carduchia. In 246, he is determined to smash Xerxes, but is diverted by the revolt of Cansyagauris in Egypt. Cansyagauris marches to Askelon, but is completely defeated (and, incidentally, killed) by Dionysius at Maridabicus, north of the city. His lieutenant, Tymanarchus, picks up the standard of revolt.

Dionysius is not completely unreasonable; he sees (probably correctly) a strong Persia as a greater threat to Macedonia than an autonomous Egypt would be, and offers to recognize Tymanarchus as satrap. Tymanarchus, however, wishes to be Pharaoh, not satrap, and forces the issue. Dionysius must march into Egypt in 245, where he definitely reconquers the country, and captures and executes Tymanarchus. This puts paid to Egyptian dreams of autonomy for nearly three centuries.

Dionysius is never able to launch the decisive campaign against Persia that he wished. Soon, he grows ill with we now would recognize as throat cancer; he dies at a relatively young age in 242, and his succeeded by his only son Eleutherius.

Timeline

280-249: Archelaus II, “the Savior”.

280: Archelaus continues the war against the Romans, but is soon distracted by

279: The invasion of the Celts. Eastern Celtic tribes migrate down the Ister valley and into the Balkan peninsula. The westernmost invades Macedonia and Greece, killing Archelaus’ viceroy of Macedonia, Caranus (his cousin) and sacking Delphi. Archelaus is forced to withdraw from Italy to deal with the invasions; his brother, Ion, continues the war but with little success.

275: Romans capture Ion at Rhegium; peace is made

277-270: Isaurian rebellion. Archelaus conducts six inconclusive campaigns against them.

272: Rebellion of the Phoenicians in Cyprus. The Carthaginian fleet refuses to sail against them. The Cypriot League is effectively independent until 191.

266-262: Rebellion in Greece; Athens and Sparta lead rebellion against Macedon. Areus I of Sparta is defeated and killed at Megalopolis; Athens is besieged and starved into submission. End of Athenian democracy; Archelaus imposes an oligarchy and garrison on Athens.

266: Death of Artaxerxes IV of Persia; accession of his son Xerxes III (r. 266-244).

261-257: SECOND ROMAN WAR. The Romans took the city of Messene, after its mercenary rulers had been driven out by the Carthaginian governor of Sicily, Hanno. In 260, Rome allies itself with Sicily (see below) and the Celtic kingdom of Pannonia (organized by the Celts driven out of Macedonia in 276). Although the Greek-Arab admiral Camelus defeats the hastily-organized Roman fleet at Corinth, and Macedonian troops enter the Po Valley to support the Cisalpine Gauls against the Romans, the war ends in a second stalemate for Macedonia.

260: Rebellion of Hanno, who declares himself king of Sicily (to 248), and allies with the Romans. Syracuse, Agrigentum, and other cities come under Roman control, either directly or through Hanno.

257: Xerxes incites another Isaurian rebellion, hoping to reverse the Macedonian ascendancy.

252: Hanno, with Roman aid, seizes Panormus. Carthage ceases to pay tribute to Macedon.

249: Archelaus is forced to abdicate by his son Dionysius.

249-242: Dionysius I “the Ghastly”

248: Death of Archelaus.

Dionysius defeats and executes his brother Euergetes.

Death of Hanno; accession of his son Hasdrubal.

242-196: Eleutherius I “the Glorious”

Excursus: the Middle of the World

What of the other kingdoms and republics, from the Pillars of Hercules to the Land of the Five Rivers, that existed in the Hellenistic world? What do I view as in store for them in the “Philip the Great” timeline?

First, let me speak of Persia. When Darius Codomannus made his abject offer to Philip, he actually saved himself and the Persian heartland; whilst Philip is organizing Great Macedonia, he can retire to Persepolis and live out his years in slightly tarnished luxury. His son, Artaxerxes IV (Darius did have at least one son, although I don’t know his name; he was born about 336 BCE, and his thus around twenty at the time that he succeeds his father), is a proud, ambitious man who would like nothing so much as to reverse, forcibly or otherwise, the loss of the western half of the Achaemenid Empire to Macedonia. I don’t give him the chance, however; the rise of Chandragupta Maurya (delayed for a few years in TTL) means that he must rush to the Indian border to defend his eastern provinces. A peace is made in 305 that cedes the Indus valley to Chandragupta in return for an annual tribute of elephants (in OTL, Seleucus I got a one-time indemnity of 500 of the beasts). Artaxerxes then spends the rest of his days in battling centrifugal forces in Persia; he is successful, but the struggle absorbs his energies; even though Alexander is off in the fringes of the Macedonian Empire, he cannot spare the time, the troops, or the treasure to invade Syria.

His son Xerxes III is a different man, facing different opponents. After the reunion of the realm by his father, he is now ready to expand outwards again. He definitively defeats the Scythians, but in turning his attention to his western frontier, he finds that, whilst he has some success against Archelaus II, Archelaus’ son, Dionysius I, and his grandson, Eleutherius I, are not so easily spooked. Xerxes’ attempts to foment rebellion against Dionysius result in a long conflict between Macedonia and Persia, resulting the loss of Mesopotamia to the latter, and ultimately Persia’s exhaustion and the final downfall of the Achaemenidae.

ATL Achaemenid shahs

Darius III 336-316

Artaxerxes IV 316-266 son

Xerxes III 266-244 son

Tachamaspos I 244-192 son

Xerxes IV 192-190 son

Chydabandas 190-181 brother

Asarapus I 181-139 son

Huais 139-126 grandson

Asarapus II 126-101 son

Arses II 101-77 son

Teispes II 77-49 son

Tachamaspos II 49-40 son (most of this time, however, Persia was actually ruled by Bactrian conquerors)

Asarapus III 40-39 son (a mere puppet of the Scythian Culis)

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The End