Translation:Lives of the Eminent Commanders/Eumenes

by Cornelius Nepos

I. Eumenes the Cardian. If he had been given fortune equal to his virtue, he would not have been a greater man, although far more illustrious and even more honoured, because we measure men's greatness by their virtue, not their fortune. For in the times when his life began, the Macedonians were prospering, and he was deprived of a lot as a result of living among them, because he was from a foreign community and he lacked nothing other than a noble lineage. Even though he was from the highest local family, the Macedonians were indignant whenever he was preferred to one of them and they would not submit to him, although he defeated them all in care, vigliance, patience, cunning, and speed of genius. When he was a very young man he entered into the friendship of Philip, Amyntas' son,^[1] and for a short time was on intimate terms with him, since he glowed in his youth from his innate virtue. Thus, he kept him at hand in the role of scribe, which is a far more honourable role among the Greeks than among the Romans. For, among us, in actual fact, scribes are considered mere hirelings, but among them on the contrary no one is admitted to this office if they are not of honourable rank, with recognised faithfulness and industry, because he must participate in every council. Eumenes held this position of friendship under Philip for seven years.^[2] After he died, Eumenes remained at the same rank under Alexander for thirteen years.^[3] At a very late point [in the reign], he even commanded a wing of the cavalry, which were called Hetaerice.^[4] He was alway present in the councils of both kings and was accustomed to take part in all affairs.

II. After Alexander died, kingdoms were distributed to individual friends of his and the highest oversight of affairs was handed to the one to whom Alxander had given his ring when he was dying: Perdiccas (from whom everyone sought to be installed in a kingdom, for as long as Alexander's children remained under his guardianship), since Crateros^[5] and Antipater,^[6] who seemed to outrank him, were not present, while Hephaestio,^[7] whom it could clearly be seen that Alexander had made the foremost of the multitude. At this time, Cappadocia was given to Eumenes, or so it was said, for it was then under enemy control. Perdiccas linked him to himself with great effort, because he saw the great faithfulness and industry in the man, not doubting that, if he seduced him, he would be very useful in the things which he was planning. For he planned, as nearly everyone in great power desires, to snatch and seize everyone's portions. In fact, he was not alone in this, but all the others who had been friends of Alexander [had the same plan]. First, Leonnatus planned to take Macedonia befoure anyone else. With many great promises he tried to persuade Eumenes to desert Perdiccas and make an alliance with him. When he was not able to prevail, he attempted to kill him and would have done it, if Eumenes had not fled his camp secretly in the night.

III. Meanwhile, the war flared up, which had been brought to general destruction after Alexander's death, and everyone joined together to attack Perdiccas. Although he seemed to be weak, because he alone was forced to resist everyone, Eumenes did not desert his friend and did not value his safety over faithfulness. Perdiccas established him in his part of Asia, which stretched from the Taurus mountains to the Hellespont and left him alone to face his European enemies. He himself marched to besiege Egypt, in opposition to Ptolemy. Eumenes' forces were neither big nor firm, because they were untrained and had been enlisted only a short time earlier, but it was said that Antipater and Crateros were approaching and had crossed the Hellespont with a large army of Macedonians, men who were foremost with brilliance in the practice of war at that time (In fact Macedonian soldiers were then as famous as Roman ones are now: since those who acquire the greatest power are always held to be the bravest men). Eumenes understood that if his forces found out whom they were being led to fight, not only would they refuse to go, they would slip away as soon as it was announced. Accordingly, this was his very wise move: he led the soldiers by isolated routes where they could not hear the truth and convinced them that they were marching against some barbarians. And he kept to this cover story and led the army into the breach and began the battle before the soldiers worked out whom they were attacking. He even succeeded in occupying the field first, so that he contended with cavalry - in which he was stronger - rather than with infantry - of which he had less.

IV. When the battle had been going on with bitter fighting for much of the day, Crateros the General fell and Neoptolemus, his second in command. Eumenes himself encountered the latter. They grabbed onto each other and fell from their horses onto the ground, so that they could clear be seen to have clashed with vicious intent and to have fought with their souls more than their bodies, and they were not separated until life left one of them. In the process, Eumenes was struck with many wounds, yet he did not retreat from battle, but pursued the enemy sharply. With the horsemen in flight, General Crateros dead, and especially many of the noblemen captured, the infantry force, which had been brought to a point where it could not escape from Eumenes against his will, sought peace from him. When they had received this, they did not rely on the promise for long, but returned to Antipater as soon as they could. Crateros had been pulled from the battle half dead and Eumenes tried to revive him; when he could not, he held a splendid funeral because of the man's dignity and because of their former friendship (for he had been on friendly terms with him when Alexander was alive), and sent his bones to his wife and children in Macedonia.

V. While this was happening near the Hellespont, Perdiccas was killed near the Nile by Seleucus and Antigenes, and supreme power passed to Antipater. Those who served him condemned those who were absent to death, including Eumenes, by a vote of the army. Struck by this blow, he did not surrendur and carried on the war even so. But although the dire straits did not break his spirits, they did diminish them. Since Antigonus, who was persuing him had a lot of every kind of force, he often harried him on the march and never allowed him to fight a battle except in those places where a few men could resist many. But eventually, when he could not be won over by negotiation, he was surrounded by the multitude. From this he escaped with many of his friends and fled to a castle in Phrygia which is called Nora. When he was beseiged on all sides and feared that while staying there he would lose the army's horses because there was no space to exercise them, this was the clever means by which he was able to fire the horses up and exercise them so that they were happy and fed and the movement of their bodies did not become strange to them. He tied them up so high that they could not properly touch the round with the front legs, then from behind he used whips to force them to jump and pull up their feet. Through this movement they shook out as much sweat as if they had been running in a space. By this act, which seemed bizarre to everyone, he was able to bring the animals out of the castle after they had been under siege for several months, as healthy as if he had been keeping them in training grounds. During this siege, he burnt and destroyed the equipment and supplies of Antigonus whenever he wanted, but he remained there all through winter, because he would not have been able to maintain a camp in the open air. Spring approached: He pretended to surrender and while he was discussing the terms, he tricked Antigonus' commanders and extracted himself and his men with everyone unharmed.

VI. When Olympias, who had been Alexander's mother, sent letters and envoys to him in Asia to advise whether she should go into Macedonia to regain her property (for she was residing in Epirus at the time) and take control of those things, he encouraged her not to make a move and to wait until Alexander's son achieved the kingship, but if by some chance she was brought to Macedonia, to forget every injury and not inflict excessively harsh authority on anyone. She did neither of these things: for she went into Macedonia and there she behaved cruelly. However she sought from the absent Eumenes that he not allow the greatest enemies of Philip's house and family to kill even his descendents and that he bring prosperity to the children of Alexander. She asked if he would do her the favour of raising an army and bringing it to help her, and she said that, in order that he might achieve this more easily, she had sent letters to all the commanders who remained in office instructing them to obey him and follow his decisions. Eumenes was persuaded by these things, considering that it was better to die (if fate brought it to that) while repaying his debts to those who deserved it than to live indebted.

VII. So he gathered forces, he prepared for war against Antigonus. Because there were many noble Macedonians in the one location, such as Peucestes, who had been a bodyguard of Alexander and then received Persis, and Antigenes, who had command of a phalanx of Macedonians, Eumenes was afraid of their envy (which he could not escape), since he - a foreigner - held the highest command rather than one of the multitude of Macedonians who were there, so he set up a tent for Alexander among the leaders and he ordered a golden chair with a sceptre and a diadem to be placed in it and for everyone to gather there everyday to take counsel about important matters, believing that he would decrease the envy if it seemed that the war was being administered by a form of the command of Alexander and a pretence of his name. That is what happened. For when they gathered not at the general's tent of Eumenes but at the royal tent and discussed matters there, he was concealed in a way, but everything was accomplished by him alone.

VIII. Eumenes clashed with Antigonus in Paraetacae,^[8] not drawn up in battle-array, but while on the march, and since he did poorly he was forced to retire to Media to spend the winter there. He split up his forces for the winter in the border region with Persis, not as he wished, but as he was forced to by the soldiers' wishes. For the phalanx of Alexander the Great, which had traversed Asia and conquered the Persians, had grown old with glory but also with such independence that it did not obey its leaders, but wished to command, just as our veterans do now. Thus there was a risk that they would do what they actually ended up doing, as a result of their intemperence and excessive independence: destroy everything, including those who fought alongside them, rather than those whom they fought against. If one of these veterans were to look at their deeds, they would recognise that they were equal to their own and judge that nothing except time separated them. But I shall return to them. They had spent the winter not on matters of war, but on their own relaxation, and had been split up for a long time. When Antigonus had learnt this and understood that he was not the equal of his prepared enemies, he decided that some new plan had to be adopted by him. There were two roads by which he could travel from Media (where he was spending the winter) to his enemies' winter quarters. The shorter of these passed through a deserted area which no one inhabited because of the lack of water, but it took barely ten days; meanwhile, the road which everyone used had a circuitous route and was much longer than the other one, but was fertile and had plenty of everything. If he took this route, he knew that his enemies would know about his approach, before he had completed a third of the journey, but if he marched through the deserted area, he expected that he would take the enemy by surprise. In order to achieve this thing, he ordered his troops to prepare many bags and water-skins, then fodder and cooked rations for ten days, so that there would be as little fire in the camp as possible. In this way, he would hide everyone. Prepared in this way, as he had ordered, he sets out.

IX. He had almost made it halfway across the distance, when the smoke from his camp caused Eumenes to suspect that an enemy was approaching. The leaders convened: it was asked, what ought to be done. Everyone understood that their forces ould not be gathered as quickly as it seemed Antigonus was approaching. While everyone was faltering and despairing about important matters, Eumenes said that if they were willing to employ speed and do what they were commanded, as they had not done before, he would resolve the matter. For he said that although the enemy could cross the distance in five days, he would make it so that the period was delayed by no less than that many days. Thus, they would be able to go around, each gathering his forces. To rein in Antigonus' attack, then, he employed this plan. He sent some men to low mountains which were along the enemy's route and he instructed them that when night first came (over the widest area they could) they should make fires, as big as they could, and they should reduce these at the second watch, and let them almost go out at the third watch. By simulating the appearance of a camp in this way, he intended that they would create suspicion among the enemies, that there was a camp in this location and that their approach had been revealed in advance. They were to do the same thing on the next night. The men who were commanded to do this, followed his instructions diligently. When it got dark, Antigonus noticed the fires. He believed that his enemies had heard about his approach and had gathered their forces there. He changed his plan and since he could not attack them unawares, he bends his route and takes the longer route of the well-supplied road. There he delayed one day for relaxation, to molify the troops and restore the pack-animals, so that he might decide the issue with a fresher army.

X. Thus Eumenes defeated a shrewd commander with his plan and impeded his speed, but he did not accomplish much. For by the envy of the leaders with him and the treachery of the Macedonian veterans, he was betrayed to Antigonus, after he had been victorious in battle, although the army had sworn to him previously on three separate occasions that it would defend him and never desert him. For asmall group's disparagement of his virtue was so great that they preferred to break their oath than for him to survive. And Antigonus would have kept him safe, even though he had been his most dangerous enemy, if his forces had allowed it, for he knew that he could be supported better by no one in those matters, which appeared to everyone to be impending at that moment. For Seleucus, Lysimachus, and Ptolemy were becoming threatening, now that they were rich, and he would have to fight with them for power. But the men who were around him did not allow it, because they saw that, if Eumenes was brought into Antigonus' service, everyone would be subservient to him. Antigonus himself was so angry that he could not have been calmed, except by a great prospect of the greatest successes.

XI. Therefore, when he had put Eumenes under guard and the chief of the guards had asked how he should be kept, Antigonus said, "like the fiercest lion or the most ferocious elephant:" for he had not yet decided whether he would preserve him or not. But both sorts of person went to Eumenes: those who out of hatred intended to take joy from seeing his state and those who out of former friendships wanted to speak with him and console him. Many more were eager to know what he looked like, what sort of man he was, whom they had feared so much for so long, in whose destruction they had placed hope of victory. But Eumenes, when he had been in chains for a long time, said to Onomarchus, who held the highest command over the guard, that he was amazed that ti was now the third day that he had been held in this way: for it was not in accordance with Antigonus' prudence to abuse a defeated enemy in this way, when he should order him to be killed or to be released. Since he seemed to Onomarchus to have spoken fiercely, he said, "What? If you had this intention, why didn't you fall in battle rather than coming into the power of your enemy?" Eumenes responded, "If only it had turned out that way! But it did not happen, because I never met anyone strong enough: For I did not bring my weapons against anyone who did not succumb to me. For it was not by the courage of my enemies, but my friends' treachery that I fell." And this was not a lie < * * * > For he had a noble dignity and firm power for doing work, and not so much a large body as a pleasant figure.

1. Philip II of Macedon (r. 359-336), father of Alexander the great.
2. Roughly from 343-336 BC
3. Alexander the Great, who reigned from 336-323 BC; Eumenes thus remained in the same role for his entire reign
4. i.e. ἑταιρική (hetairike), "companion cavalry" - the elite cavalry unit of the Macedonian army.
5. Commander of Alexander's army from 330-323 BC, he was leading some of Alexander's troops back to Macedonia at the time of Alexander's death.
6. An aged general who had been left in command of Macedonia for Alexander's entire reign.
7. Alexander's closest friend
8. Usually referred to as Paraetacene