Free The Campaigns of Alexander (Classics) by Arrian Page A

trickle of water like this’ (a very derogatory way of referring to the Granicus!) ‘were too much for us to cross without further preparation, when I had no difficulty whatever in crossing the Hellespont. Such hesitancy would be unworthy of the fighting fame of our people and of my own promptitude in the face of danger. Without doubt it would give the Persians added confidence; nothing has yet happened tothem to cause them alarm, and they would begin to think they were as good soldiers as we are.’ 48
    Without further delay he sent Parmenio to take command of the left wing, and himself moved over to the right. Command of the right had already been given to Philotas, Parmenio’s son, with the Companion cavalry, the archers, and the Agriane spearmen; Amyntas, son of Arrabaeus, was attached to him with the lancers, the Paeonians, and Socrates’ squadron. On the left of these divisions were the Guards’ battalions, commanded by Parmenio’s son, Nicanor; next came the infantry battalions of Perdiccas, son of Orontes, of Coenus, son of Polemocrates, of Amyntas, son of Andromenes, in that order: finally the troops under Amyntas’ son, Philip. The advance position of the left wing was held by the Thessalian cavalry under Calas, son of Harpalus, and these were supported – in the following order – by the allied cavalry under Philip, son of Menelaus, and the Thracians under Agathon. Immediately on their right was infantry – the battalions of Craterus, Meleager, and Philip, extending to the centre of the army as a whole.
    The Persians had about 20,000 cavalry and nearly the same number of foreign mercenaries fighting on foot. Back from the river the ground rose steeply, and they had taken up a position with their mounted troops along the bank on a very broad front and with the infantry in therear. 49 At one point on the river-bank they had massed their squadrons in strength – for here it was that, threatening their left, they could see Alexander himself, an unmistakable figure in magnificent armour, attended by his suite with an almost ecstatic reverence.
    There was a profound hush as both armies stood for a while motionless on the brink of the river, as if in awe of what was to come. Then Alexander, while the Persians still waited for the crossing to begin, that they might fall upon his men as they were struggling up the further bank, leapt upon his horse and called upon his bodyguard to follow and to play the man. His orders were that Amyntas, son of Arrabaeus, should lead off into the water with the advanced scouts, the Paeonians, and one infantry company, preceded by Ptolemy, son of Philip, with Socrates’ squadron, which was the leading cavalry squadron for that day; then he himself, at the head of the right wing of the army, with trumpets blaring and the shout going up to the God of Battle, moved forward into the river. He kept his line oblique to the pull of the current as the troops went over, to prevent a flank attack as they emerged from the water, and to enable him to engage the enemy with a front as solid as he could make it.
    The leading files under Amyntas and Socrates were met as they gained the river bank by volleys of missiles from the Persians, who kept up a continuous fire into the river both from their commanding position on the high ground above, and also from the comparatively flat strip right down by the water’s edge. A hand-to-hand struggle developed, the Macedonian mounted troops trying to force their way out of the water, the Persians doing their utmostto prevent them. Persian lances flew thick and fast, the long Macedonian spears thrust and stabbed. In this first onslaught Alexander’s men, heavily outnumbered, suffered severely; their foothold was insecure, and down there in the water they had to contend with an enemy in a strong position on the bank above them – not to mention the fact that they met there the fine flower of the Persian horse, with Memnon and his sons braving the fortune