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Did Alexander intend Babylon to become the Imperial Capital?

I have seen three pieces of ‘evidence adduced for this proposition, towhit :

1) Curtius X 2 xii

‘Now when it was discovered that some were being sent home and others detained, the men assumed that Alexander was going to fix the seat permanently in Asia...’

2) Strabo XV 3 viii-x

8 Onesicritus records also the following inscription on the tomb of Dareius: "I was friend to my friends; as horseman and bowman I proved myself superior to all others; as hunter I prevailed; I could do everything." Aristus of Salamis is indeed a much later writer than these, but he says that the tower has only two stories and is large; that it was built at the time of the succession of the Persians, and that the tomb was kept under guard; and that there was one inscription written in Greek, that quoted above, and another written in the Persian language with the same meaning. Cyrus held Pasargadae in honour, because he there conquered Astyages the Mede in his last battle, transferred to himself the empire of Asia, founded a city, and constructed a palace as a memorial of his victory.
9 Alexander carried off with him all the wealth in Persis to Susa, which was also full of treasures and equipment; and neither did he regard Susa as the royal residence, but rather Babylon, which he intend to build up still further; and there too treasures lay stored. They say that, apart from the treasures in Babylon and in the camp, which were not included in the total, the value of those in Susa and Persis alone was reckoned at forty thousand talents, though some say fifty; and others have reported that all treasures from all sources were brought together at Ecbatana and that they were valued at one hundred and eighty thousand talents; and the treasures which were carried along with Dareius in his flight from Media, eight thousand talents in value, were taken as booty by those who slew him.
10 At all events, Alexander preferred Babylon, since he saw that it far surpassed the others, not only in its size, but also in all other respects. Although Susis is fertile, it has a hot and scorching atmosphere, and particularly in the neighbourhood of the city, according to that writer. At any rate, he says that when the sun is hottest, at noon, the lizards and the snakes could not cross the streets in the city quickly enough to prevent their being burnt to death in the middle of the streets. He says that this is the case nowhere in Persis, although Persis lies more to the south; and that cold water for baths is put out in the sun and immediately heated, and that barley spread out in the sun bounces like parched barley in ovens; and that on this account earth is put on the roofs of the houses to the depth of two cubits, and that by reason of this weight the inhabitants are forced to build their houses both narrow and long; and that, although they are in want of long beams, yet they need large houses on account of the suffocating heat; and that the palm-tree beam has a peculiar property, for, although it is rigid, it does not, when aged, give way downwards, but curves upwards because of the weight and better supports the roof. It is said that the cause of the heat is the fact that lofty mountains lie above the country on the north and that these mountains intercept all the northern winds. Accordingly, these winds, blowing aloft from the tops of the mountains and high above the plains, do not touch the plains, although they blow on the more southerly parts of Susis. But calm prevails here, particularly at the time when the Etesian winds cool the rest of the land that is scorched by heat.

3) The existence of ‘Alexander’ tetradrachms from Babylon with the monogram Mu-Tau-Rho


To this might be added the story in Plutarch of the Indians and the hide shield

Alex 65 viff
It was Calanus, as we are told, who laid before Alexander the famous illustration of government. It was this. He threw down upon the ground a dry and shrivelled hide, and set his foot upon the outer edge of it; the hide was pressed down in one place, but rose up in others. 7 He went all round the hide and showed that this was the result wherever he pressed the edge down, and then at last he stood in the middle of it, and lo! it was all held down firm and still. The similitude was designed to show that Alexander ought to put most constraint upon the middle of his empire and not wander far away from it.

The quote from Curtius can hardly be considered evidence, what we have is an authors suggestion as to the motivation of the mutineers at Opis (Susa in Curtius). Arrian’s list of grievances does not include a shift of capital, but the matters concern the increasing Persianisation of the army, it is possible that Curtius or his source is merely extrapolating from this, in any case Babylon is not specified.

The reference in Strabo is no firmer evidence of Alexander’s intentions, it may come from Onesikritos but just how close was he to Alexander? Not as close as he liked to pretend, for sure. It is also possible that the material actually comes from Aristos and is therefore late and of low value. The remark about lizards being unable to cross the street without being shrivelled by a laser-beam sun, shows the type of source we are dealing with.

But the tetradrachms, they must be a clincher, contemporary or near concrete evidence. Unfortunately, whilst in the 19th Century m-t-r was interpreted as Metropolis subsequent study has demonstrated, by die-linkages that several of the m-t-r issues are to be reassigned to Susa and that some of the monograms are in fact m-t-th. Besides which, this particular monogram appears only on posthumous issues. Lifetime issues generally have phi mu either as a monogram with the mu inverted or as distinct letters (cf M J Price ‘The Coinage in the Name of Alexander and Philip Arrhidaeus’ 1991). The letters of the monogram refer to a mint official. It would be strange, indeed, that Alexander’s intention to make Babylon the metropolis should only be declared on the coinage after his death and the abandonment of any such putative policy; Perdikkas was clearly not intending to stay in the East, his sending Alexander’s corpse to Aigai demonstrates that.

Indeed, the burial arrangements supposedly left by Alexander would imply that he intended his seat of power to be in Egypt as that is where he wished to be interred. Having conquered the West this would also be more central than Babylon, two months from the Mediterranean. The Seleucids, who would have good reason to make Babylon their capital instead established Seleucia-on-the-Tigris. Babylon’s malarial swamps cannot have been an asset.

There is no real evidence for the assertion then, what we have is a constructwhich owes more to the fact that it was at Babylon that Alexander died, his plans incomplete, the reported ‘hypomnemata’ have no provision for Babylon, either in Diodoros or LDM, Susa seems to have been a more important mint, it was there that the Greeks were dismissed and paid off, and later the army’s debts were settled. Babylon was to be developed, witness the new harbour plans, but the city was never intended as an Imperial Capital.

Hello.

All good points. The only thing that makes me possibly disagree is the pyre/proposed monument to Hephaistion. If Alexander didn't plan on Babylon being the capital, why would he have carted Hephaistion's corpse/ashes from Ecbatana down there? If he wanted to build a monument in a city he didn't plan on hanging around in...why not Ecbatana? Or elsewhere..back home on Macedonia or Egypt? Eumenes carted Craterus's cremated remains around for years, till they could sent "home". Would ATG been any different with Hephaistion?

agesilaos wrote:But the tetradrachms, they must be a clincher, contemporary or near concrete evidence. Unfortunately, whilst in the 19th Century m-t-r was interpreted as Metropolis subsequent study has demonstrated, by die-linkages that several of the m-t-r issues are to be reassigned to Susa and that some of the monograms are in fact m-t-th. Besides which, this particular monogram appears only on posthumous issues. Lifetime issues generally have phi mu either as a monogram with the mu inverted or as distinct letters (cf M J Price ‘The Coinage in the Name of Alexander and Philip Arrhidaeus’ 1991). The letters of the monogram refer to a mint official. It would be strange, indeed, that Alexander’s intention to make Babylon the metropolis should only be declared on the coinage after his death and the abandonment of any such putative policy; Perdikkas was clearly not intending to stay in the East, his sending Alexander’s corpse to Aigai demonstrates that.

This site http://alexanderthegreatcoins.reidgold.com/tets.html says:

Babylon, the world's most populous city at the time, was likely the site of Alexander's most prolific mint outside Macedonia and the single most prolific during his lifetime. This coin falls into the second group of coins that Price tentatively attributed to Babylon, but with this second group, he believes there's a possibility that they may be issues of Susa, further east, because of stylistic similarities. For this and similar coins to be Babylon issues, Price believes that die engravers must have moved from Babylon to Susa a year or two before Alexander's death. Along with Susa, Price believes that another city that could have been site of Alexander's principal eastern mint was Ekbatana. Price may have been overcautious here. Babylon was the city Alexander chose as the capital of his new empire, and it was the city where he died in 323 BC.

It is therefore a strong possibility that die engravers moved from the Babylon mint to the Susa mint. The hypothesis is that this happened just before Alexander's death, but it could have been after or there could have been further migrations to the Susa mint after Alexander's death. If so, they would have taken their dies with them, because these dies represented a huge amount of effort and investment. They would have carried on using these dies at the Susa mint until they were exhausted (level of damage at which they were retired from service - cracks, chips, general wear) and these would have overlapped with new dies created at the Susa mint used for the opposite side of the flan, thus creating the die-linkages that you mention. For this reason, finding the Mu-Tau-Rho monogram on Susa mint coins is not an argument against the monogram indicating that Babylon was the metropolis (mother-city).

Regarding the Mu-Tau-Theta version of the monogram that you mention, I have never seen one. Can you post an image, please? (If the monogram represented a mint official, why would he have subtly changed it?)

As for why somebody in charge of the Babylon mint after Alexander's death (initially Archon of Pella, subsequently Seleucus) might wish to represent Babylon as Alexander's intended "mother city" for his empire, it would obviously be in the interests of the local satrap to assert the importance of his satrapy in the context of the rivalry among the Successors. It would have been uncontroversial to put a Metropolis monogram on the coins if everyone knew that Alexander

did not regard Susa as the royal residence, but rather Babylon, which he intended to build up still further

Best wishes,
Andrew

The problem with the travelling die scenario is that those dies bear the mu (usually inverted) phi monogram not mu-tau-rho, this is Price's second group which has strong stylistic affinities with the variety struck at Susa by Aspeisias; there may have been movement or the whole group may belong at Susa, where its large production; 77 obverse dies give at least 2,310,000 tetradrachms along with issues of gold staters and dekadrachms; may represent the discharge of the veterans, coins of this group being found empire-wide.

There intervenes a third group which seems related to the first mu/phi not monogrammed issues, then there comes the fourth group stylistically close to the second and carrying the same symbols these it is that bear the mu-tau-rho but if the second group is reassigned then it is probable that these ought to be too.
The variation reflects different individual officials, or a different trio or even differing batches of metal.

That a modern site says Babylon was Alexander's intended capital is worthless as evidence and how you extrapolate 'everyone knew' that alexander intended Baylon to be the Imperial seat from one reference in Strabo to a sensational author who may be as late as Aristos Consider the fact too that these monograms appear while Antigonos was in control of the region, and that was no time to bruit one's own ambitions; ask Peithon, Peucestas, Eumenes and Seleukos for a start!

Sorry, Athena's Owl failed to answer your point; the tradition about Hephaistion's funeral is not at all clear, nor do the Greeks seem to have possessed a Catholic love of relics it is entirely possible that Hephaistion was burned and interred at Ecbatana, a lion that may represent a monument to him was found some time ago, and the monumental pyre described by Diodoros may be a projected monument/shrine to him at Babylon. Babylon being chosen for the easier collection of material and a more pleasant milieu than the mountain town of Ecbatana, perhaps also as a brek with the Achaemenid Royal cities. The shrine built at Alexandria seems to have been the most important judging from the letter to Kleomenes.

In any case Alexander was not planning to stay in Babylon, he ought to have left three days (I think) after the onset of his illness, to conquer Arabia, thence to Cilicia and Phoenicia where his naval forces were being assembled for the push West. It is the burial place of kings that determine the capital, rather than favouites, and that seems to have been Egypt.

agesilaos wrote:The variation [in the monogram] reflects different individual officials, or a different trio or even differing batches of metal.

Above is a selection of the Mu-Tau-Rho monograms, which occur on both the silver tetradrachms and the gold staters minted at Babylon in the two decades after Alexander’s death. As well as the occurrence of a dot in the head of the letter Rho in some samples, other samples have even larger deviations from the archetypal form. An example is the stater with the horizontal bar of the Tau missing amongst the examples in my image. I do not believe that these variations represent distinct designs. Instead they are normal deviations from the archetype as die engravers copied the design from one die to another, sometimes introducing mistakes or flaws. The dot in the head of the Rho in some samples is probably a mistake or die flaw that got perpetuated through die copying. If it were intended to mean Theta instead of Rho, then the ring should have been moved to the centre of the vertical bar of the Mu, so that the letter could not be confused with Rho (ring with a dot at the centre of a bar is how I have seen Theta represented in some other coin monograms – example image below)

agesilaos wrote: …the tradition about Hephaistion's funeral is not at all clear, nor do the Greeks seem to have possessed a Catholic love of relics. It is entirely possible that Hephaistion was burned and interred at Ecbatana, a lion that may represent a monument to him was found some time ago, and the monumental pyre described by Diodoros may be a projected monument/shrine to him at Babylon.

That Hephaistion’s funeral took place at Babylon is asserted by Arrian, Anabasis 7.14.8, as well as Diodorus 17.110.8. A burial at Babylon is also implied by Polyaenus, Stratagems 4.3.31. No source locates Hephaistion’s funeral at Ecbatana. It was normal Greek practice to build a monument/tomb on the site of the funeral pyre. There is an excavated example at Salamis on the coast of Cyprus, which may have been built after the naval battle between Ptolemy and Demetrius in 306BC.

Best wishes,

Andrew

None of this addresses the likelihood that the coin series should be assigned to Susa rather than Babylon, but let’s consider your position. Essentially everyone knows that the monogram stands for ‘metropolis’ but the Greek celators (die-cutters) at certain mints who blindly copy flaws on the flan and, these are passed by the Greek mint-supervisors. There are no set rules for the positioning of letters in monograms which is why there are variants of the same groups; in the second group assigned to Babylon mu-phi occurs with the mu inverted and upright, for instance. If there were die-linkage between those with the dot, ie theta then there may be a case for the continuance of an error, I have not the material to make such a study, but Price, who did sees them as variants not transmitted errors.

If they were errors they would be more explicable if the mark referred to officials rather than a recognisable word.

The case of Hephaistion is QI but a separate issue so I am going to start it in a new thread, to save it getting lost in this one.

Price’s book sans plates is available at Scribd.com for (possibly illegal) download..

On his return west Alexander, like the Achaemenid kings before him, rotated his court between the "Persian capitals" of empire. Aside from the well attested climatic reasons, the increasingly onerous burden of furnishing this court with its by now expected largesse will have taken its toll on any one city. Alexander eventually found himself back in Babylon where, of course, he died. The time spent there, the funeral arrangements of Hephaestion and the armament works lead not a few to claim this city as Alexander's capital of empire. That is certainly possible, though possibility is not certainty. Certainly it does not mean that "everyone knew that Alexander did not regard Susa as the royal residence, but rather Babylon" (a rather ridiculous forcing of the source).

Plut. Alex. 68.1-2
Here (Carmania) Nearchus came up to meet him, and Alexander was so delighted to hear of his voyage that he eagerly desired to sail down the Euphrates himself with a large fleet, and then, after circumnavigating Arabia and Africa, to enter the Mediterranean by way of the pillars of Heracles. And vessels of every sort were built for him at Thapsacus, and sailors and pilots were assembled from all parts.

Curt. 10.1.19
Accordingly, Alexander instructed his governors in Mesopotamia to cut timber on Mt Libanus, transport it down to the Syrian city of Thapsacus, and there lay down keels for 700 ships. These were to be all septemremes, which were to be transported to Babylon. The kings of Cyprus were instructed to furnish bronze, hemp and sails.

This order, given in Carmania following Nearchus' report, is not recorded by Arrian. That it was given, unless the tradition is entirely to be rejected, is certain because when Alexander arrived in Babylon Aristobulos says that Alexander

... found at Babylon the fleet with Nearchus, which had sailed from the Persian Sea up the river Euphrates; and another which had been conveyed from Phoenicia, consisting of two Phoenician quinqueremes, three quadriremes, twelve triremes, and thirty triacontors. These had been taken to pieces and conveyed to the river Euphrates from Phoenicia to the city of Thapsacus. There they were joined together again and sailed down to Babylon. The same writer says that he cut down the cypresses in Babylonia and with them built another fleet; for in the land of the Assyrians these trees alone are abundant, but of the other things necessary for ship-building this country affords no supply. A multitude of purple-fishers and other seafaring men came to him from Phoenicia and the rest of the sea-board to serve as crews for the ships and perform the other services on board. Near Babylon he made a harbour by excavation large enough to afford anchorage to 1,000 ships of war; and adjoining the harbour he made dockyards. Miccalus the Clazomenian was despatched to Phoenicia and Syria with 500 talents to enlist some men and to purchase others who were experienced in nautical affairs. For Alexander designed to colonize the sea-board near the Persian Gulf, as well as the islands in that sea. (Arr. 7.19.3-5)

The plan to incorporate Arabia into the empire, conceived in Carmania, necessitated an armada. Such an expedition was clearly to be made from Babylon and thus the armament had to be assembled in that city. Because of this, if for no other reason, Alexander was intent upon reaching Babylon. Here he would (as he did) oversee the assembly of and training given to this armada as well as the final planning of the expedition. Alexander would spend some time in Babylon and, from the time the orders were given, it would be his destination.

The death of Hephaestion - unfortunately for the Cossaeans who, according to Plutarch (72.4), provided a far better restorative hunt than your average Persian "paradise" - interrupted matters. His remains, entrusted to his successor as chiliarch Perdiccas, were sent on to Babylon (Diod 17.110.8). That this was because Alexander had made Babylon his capital of empire is, again, possible. Far more practically it will have been because Babylon - the assembly point for his invasion armada - was where Alexander had to be. Therefore his "boon companion" would have his funerary extravaganza where the king could oversee it as well as his military preparations.

Strabo is little help. There is no certainty as to which writer he is "quoting". If the amount of "treasures" a city possessed were indicative then one has to wonder at the amount deposited in Cilicia (Cyinda) which financed the massive armament to be raised against the west. In the event this treasury financed the fleets of the first Diadoch war, Eumenes in the second of those wars (along with Susa) and Antigonus still stripped 10,000 talents from it in November 316 (along with 25,000 from Susa and Ecbatana). Babylon seems never to be mentioned in such reports.

Further, the passage is distinctly summary and very compressed chronologically. Having regaled us with the fact that Alexander stripped Persis of its treasures and betook them to Susa he says that Alexander intended to "build up" Babylon and so laid up treasure there as well. The removal of moneys and treasure from Persis happened in 330. This was to Ecbatana, intended to be the treasury (Arr. 3.19.7), where Harpalus was to have custody of it. When Harpalus moved to Babylon is not known; whether the entire treasure ofPersis went with him is also uncertain (the moneys still residing in Susa and Ecbatana after Alexander's death might indicate not). In any case, any "building up" of Babylon will have only been decided upon after the Indian excursus. This build up is, to my mind (aside from Arr. 3.16.4-5: Alexander in "Cyrus mode"), that involved with the military build up, harbour construction and canal works of his final year. This all - inevitably - for another invasion.

In the end Alexander died just short of leaving Babylon for more conquest; a death, whilst holding extravagant court, amidst a large concentration of manpower, arms and the money to supply it. Had the conqueror lived (having succeeded with Arabia) and embarked upon his planned western conquest he will have moved to the Levant or - more probably - Alexandria. Had he then died there in the midst of massive preparations for a campaign how many might then claim Alexandria as the capital?