capital. From Susa, in an act of generosity to the Athenians, he returned the bronze
statues of Harmodius and Aristogeiton, seized by Xerxes in his sack of the Acropolis,
one of a series of sacrilegious acts which it was the ostensible object of his expedition
to avenge. He was then involved in what the Persians would certainly have regarded
as an act of sacrilege when after a night of drunken partying Persepolis was burnt
down. Whether this was accidental or planned is a matter of dispute. Alexander is
said to have expressed regret the morning after. Darius was murdered by Bessus, the
satrap of Bactria to whom he had fled after his defeat. Alexander recovered the body
of Darius and returned it to the King’s mother. Bassus who had called himself King,
was hunted down and killed.
Thereafter he was proclaimed King of Asia and literally began to clothe himself
in the trappings of Persian power, wearing a diadem and tunic in the Persian style.
Healso departed from Greek ways in taking over the proskynesis, or obeisance,
traditionally reserved for the Persian kings. This practice and the tendency, whether
of Alexander himself or those around him, to equate his actions with those of the gods
were a cause of tension reflected in Alexander’s treatment of two close subordinates.
At a festival of Dionysus in Samarkand in 328, when the participants were the worse
for wear Cleitus the Black, who had saved Alexander’s life at Granicus, got into an
argument with Alexander over comparisons made between the king’s achievements
and those of other heroes such as Heracles. The drunken Alexander in a fury ran him
through with a spear, an action he deeply regretted subsequently. On a more sober
occasion, Alexander is reported to have allowed a debate on the practice of
proskynesisinthe presence of Persians and Macedonians with speakers for and
against. Speakers for argued his achievements were even greater than those of
Heracles and Dionysus. One of the speakers against was Callisthenes, a nephew of
Aristotle, who was writing a eulogistic account of Alexander’s campaigns, which is
believed to be one of the historian Arrian’s main contemporary sources. Making a
clear distinction between mortals and immortals, he argued that proskynesis, apractice
alien to the Greeks, dishonoured them and the Macedonians. On this occasion,
Alexander let the matter drop. Soon after at a banquet when Alexander passed round
a cup, Callisthenes alone of those who drank from it failed to make proskynesis,and
Alexander omitted to kiss him afterwards as he had kissed the others. Not much later
Callisthenes was implicated in the Royal Pages’ conspiracy against the king on the
grounds that he had encouraged them to see themselves as defenders of the
Macedonian tradition. He endured a painful death. Whatever the exact truth of these
stories, they not only suggest something about Alexander’s temperament but are
indicative of the strains in the Macedonian camp caused by Alexander’s adoption of
Persian ways.
Soon after in 328, Alexander continued eastward beyond the Persian borders as
far as north-west India and the Punjab, meeting and marrying on the way in 327
HISTORY 83