Jump to content

Page:The Anabasis of Alexander.djvu/217

From Wikisource
This page needs to be proofread.
Treatment of Amyntas.
195

Grecian auxiliaries, whom lie often used to command according to Alexander's order, both in his own turn and out of his turn, with his sovereign's approbation and satisfaction.[1]


CHAPTER XXVII.

Treatment of Amyntas.—The Ariaspians.

They also say that about the same time Amyntas, son of Andromenes, was brought to trial, together with his brothers Polemo, Attains, and Simmias, on the charge of being accessory to the conspiracy against Alexander, on account of their trust in Philotas and their intimate friendship with him. The belief in their participation in the plot was strengthened among the mass of men by the fact that when Philotas was arrested, Polemo, one of the brothers of Amyntas, fled to the enemy. But Amyntas with his other two brothers stayed to await the trial, and defended himself so vigorously among the Macedonians that he was declared innocent of the charge. As soon as he was acquitted in the assembly, he demanded that permission should be given him to go to his brother and bring him back to Alexander. To this the Macedonians acceded; so he went away and on the same day brought Polemo back. On this account he now seemed free from guilt much more than ' before. But soon after, as he was besieging a certain village, he was shot with an arrow and died of the wound; so that he derived no other advantage from his acquittal except that of dying with an unsullied reputation.[2]

Alexander appointed two commanders over the Companion cavalry, Hephaestion, son of Amyntor, and Clitus,


  1. Full particulars of the murder of Parmenio are given by Curtius (vii. 7-9).
  2. For the trial of Amyntas, cf. Curtius, vii. 2-6.