Causes, conditions and pretexts

[jona]

Dear compagnions,I have a very simple question - but the answer is probably more complex. Why did the Macedonians and Persians go to war?The pretext from the Macedonian side was, as we all know, revenge for the expedition of 480. This was already discarded in Antiquity and I believe that we don't have to consider it anymore.Polybius says that Philip needed the pretext to hide the real cause, his own greed. This, I think, is possible, but perhaps a bit too easy. It explains why the war started, but not why it was continued after the capture of the Persian treasures.German scholars have argued that Philip wanted to unite Greece by creating a common enemy, Persia. This has been presented as a benefaction on Greece. This looks like retroprojection of Bismarck's policies, which makes me hesitate, especially since the opposite has been claimed as well: Philip was not a benefactor of Greece, but simply needed an excuse to take a lot of Greeks as hostages. This seems to be a bit too simple too.Recently, Maria Brosius has argued that Philip launched the war to punish the main ally of Athens. I am not convinced and have a completely different idea, but before I post it, I would like to hear your opinions. (Clue: maybe it wasn't Macedonia that started the war.)Jona

[marcus]

Hi Jona,Brief reply for now (partly because I'm using my mother's spanking new PC with has a weird keyboard and I can't type on it very fast ... it's also gone midnight).I've always been inclined to go with the Realpolitik angle. Having subdued Greece (for no altruistic reason) Philip needed a raison d'etre for doing so, and the easiest way to secure himself against revolt by the recently conquered Greeks was to introduce the 'crusade' justification (using 'crusade' purely as a term for a religiously-inspired/justified war, of course).All the bestMarcus

[susan]

I've got a different take on it: Philip went to war to get rewards for his followers. I think that Macedonia in Philip's time was still similar in many ways to a Homeric society ( as shown by the excavations at Arkhontiko); in such a society one of the roles of the king was to reward his followers with gold and land. As Philip took over more and more of Macedonia and the lands around, he had an increasing number of followers to reward and so the enormous riches of Persia were a great temptation. To some extent this carried on in Alexander's reign; the sources tell of the ostentatious luxury of Alexander's court and the extravagance of his generals; this conspicuous consumption was what was expected of a Heroic-age king, in order to be taken seriously by his followers. And in the end, the ones who survived the Diadochi killings were enormously rich and powerful. There was a similar cause for the Norman invasion of Britain in 1066 - William the Conqueror needed to provide land for his nobles to keep up his position. Immediately after the invasion, his nobles became immensely rich : William de Warenne was given lands & property worth -ú57 billion; Richard Fitzalan had -ú48 billion, Robert of Mortain - -ú46 billion and Odo of Bayeux - -ú43 billion (in prices of about 2001). A similar thing happened with Henry VIII; he started off as ruler of a minor European power - but the conspicuous consumption of his court - particularly the Field of the Cloth of Gold - raised him, and England, up the power stakes.Susan

[L7]

And wasn't that the thrust of Alexander's famous speech to his disaffected troops- "You were goatherds, and look at you now? I delivered..now you honour your part of the bargain."

[yiannis]

In my mind, Persia was conquered simply because it was ripe for the taking. Numerous people in the past had pressed towards this direction: a Panhellenic campaign towards the East. This would act as a relief from continuous civil wars between city-states and a channel to divert over flooding population. It was inevitable since previous expeditions (Xenophon, Agesilaus) had shown that the only way the Persians could defeat a Greek army was to either bribe it or create turmoil at home.
Philip and Alexander addressed that by dominating at home. That was what he needed the Corinthian League for. To legitimize his authority and make anyone who revolted a "common enemy" of the League. The Southern Greek troops(almost half of the total army in the beginning of the campaign) were much needed not only to secure the allegiance of the home cities of the troops but also valuable manpower for battles, serving as reserve and moreover as occupation force and garrison in occupied cities. These troops allowed Alexander to keep his core Macedonian Phalanx intact for frontline duty instead of garrisoning (that and his policy of appearing as liberator in Asia Minor and Egypt and achieving relative peace in Persia by appointing local governors as Satraps-although he later executed most of them).
When it comes to the pretext, of course "to avenge the sacking of Athens" was a pretty lame one, but then again pretexts don't have to be anything more!

[jona]

You're spoiling all my fun, Susan This was exactly what I was aiming at. Macedonia was what anthropoligists call a "pristine" or "early state": a recent invention, and unstable. People were loyal to the king and not to an abstract state. Philip's Macedonia was of the same type as Cyrus' Persia and Charlemagne's Franconia: the ruler could only overcome opposition by continuous conquest, and the sharing of booty.The frontier of Philip's growing kingdom was always expanding, and sooner or later there would be a moment on which this expansion would interfere with the vital interests of the Persian empire. As it turned out, this moment was the Perinthus incident, including a full-blown military invasion of Europe by Persian forces. The letter of Alexander to Darius does in fact mention this as a casus belli.Macedonians could, therefore, plausibly see Persia as the aggressor. And, what is more important, the story of Alexander's war does not start in 334, when he crossed the Hellespont, or 336, when Parmenio crossed the Hellespont, but in 340, during the Perinthus incident.The fact that Macedonia had to expand or implode also explains why Alexander could not stop his conquests.What I am writing here seems all very obvious, but I have never read about it anywhere; on the contrary, a recent discussion of the outbreak of war (Maria Brosius in Achaemenid History 12) seems to confuse causes, conditions, and pretexts.Susan: did we just have the same idea, or did I miss some literature?Seen in this light, Philip's famous compliment to Parmenion ("I have found only one general") may in fact be more than a compliment. It also describes the difference between a pristine and a full-blown state. Athenians could indeed find ten loyal generals, because they would remain loyal to the state; in Macedonia, this would be impossible.Jona

[Jolanda]

Just a quick note about the pretext: it needs to be convincing, because a general can not demand from his men to die for a wrong cause.After the killing of Darius, Alexander encountered serious problems with his men, which he could only overcome because Bessus continued the war. Bessus was the best enemy Alexander could have.Jona

[jona]

Just a note to explain: no, I have not had a transgender operation, but had to write the preceding message from a friends' computer. Jolanda = Jona.Jona

[susan]

JonaThanks for your message. I've not really read this idea anywhere except in such books as Beowulf and other epic poetry. I think that at the time of Philip, the Macedonians ( and Olympias' race too) were at the end of the Heroic Age - and the king's way of life reflected this. The King's palace in Beowulf is adorned with gold, and is the resort of heroes; and the king, Heorot, gives out rings and arm-bands at the feasts to his war-band. Alexander's romantic spirit encouraged him to continue this ideal; the groundwork of his father's development of the army allowed him the resources to continue. At some level, Alexander lived in a realm where he walked with demi-gods ; and the possibility of copmpeting with Heracles was real to him. This is why his character has such appeal - recent postings on this forum remind me of the Arthur of legend, who was quite different from the Arthur of history (who was regarded closer to the time as an effective warlord but possibly rather dubious character; it was only later when the Anglo-Norman Kings wished to legitimise themselves that the Arthurian legends developed into the ideal of chivalry).I also think that the change in Alexander's character towards the end was due to a growing realisation that there was a mismatch between his ideals for himself and reality; he never was going to become a god in the same way that Heracles was; or else he just got tired of the whole idea and re-running it through his head
Susan

[xxx]

This is certainly not the first time I've read this.The ancient Macedonians could be well characterized as Pirates with much the same aims.But fame was what it was all about for the Kings. And to gain fame, one had to go to war. in order to go to war one needed troops and allies. And to do that you needed to pay them booty as it were. Philip needed to keep filling his war chest - a standing army is very expensive and a great drain on the economy, more than taxes could ever pay. And Alexander's had to be vastly superior to satisfy his aims.As for reasons to go to war with Persia - has nothing to do with the political climate so much as they were the richest state Macedonian knew about. It was easy to come up with a reason - in politics it's always easy. The ancient Greeks knew well about how to come up with a reason to 'justify' wars to make it look good. PR is hardly a new invention. And protection of the home state surrounded by an old enemy is an easy one to put forth.

[alejandro]

Hi JonaI do remember having read an article where AlexanderGÇÖs pothos was rationalized as a consequence of having to prove himself as a worthy King time after time before his fellow noblemen. The idea stems from the premise that 300BC Macedonia was a land with Homeric institutions; in particular, the King was not an absolute ruler but just primus-inter-pares (sp?).I donGÇÖt remember the author (Errington comes to my mind, though IGÇÖm not sure), but if you have access to JSTOR, do a search with GÇ£Alexander the GreatGÇ¥ as keyword, as that is the way I got the article.Best wishes,Alejandro

[yiannis]

That was a relief Jona, you had us thinking :-)Back to the pretext-cause discussion. I was thinking that each one has a different meaning. An Athenian rower at Salamis did not need a pretext to row his heart out. He knew he's doing it "for his mother, sister, family and the tombs of his ancestors" as the battle-cry called, and he's doing it on his own free will (to a great extend). His Persian adversary on the other hand, did it for neither cause or pretext. He rowed because otherwise he knew that he would become fish-food by his officers. Xerxes did not need a pretext, still he had to have one and it was the "punishment of the Athenians" for their involvement Ionian revolt. He used this to conquer the whole of Greece.
Here I'm trying to make the distinction between Persian and Macedonian motives for aggression. Philip's cause was simply the "conquest" of the Persian empire, because simply he saw that he was in a position to do so. He devised a pretext "to avenge the burning of the temples" etc... in order to give his campaign some legitimacy and to give to his Corinthian League a goal that Greeks could buy-in. If one would ask what was the pretext that his Macedonian subjects would buy-in, I'd say that it had to be the greatness of their kingdom plus the promise of vast booty (I'm sure that worked for all soldiers under his command). You decide which one was more important But in the end each one fights for different reasons and people fight better if they feel they fight for a "cause" not a "pretext".Uhmmm, I think I'm ranting...I'll stop now!

[jona]

"That was a relief Jona, you had us thinking "Maybe it's an improvement. Who knows?"Back to the pretext-cause discussion. I was thinking that each one has a different meaning."Yes, you're right. Compare World War I: the Austrians fought to defend their interests in the Balkans, the Germans to prevent their power from being weakened (or to seize world power, whatever one's perspective). On the other side, the Russians did not want to be humiliated, the French wanted revenge, and the British fought to keep the world in balance.Jona