Page:History of Greece Vol XII.djvu/98

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66 HISTORY OF GREECE. the heavier masses. Lastly, Philip had completed his military arrangements by organizing what may be called an effective siege-train for sieges as ttell as for battles ; a stock of projectile and battering machines, superior to anything at that time ex- tant. We find this artillery used by Alexander in the very first year of his reign, in his campaign against the Illyrians.^ Even in his most distant Indian marches, he either carried it with him, or had the means of constructing new engines for the occa- sion. There was no part of his military equipment more essen- tial to his conquests. The victorious sieges of Alexander are among his most memorable exploits. To all this large, multifarious, and systematized array of actual force, are to be added the civil establishments, the depots, maga- zines of arms, provision for remounts, drill officers and adjutants, etc., indispensable for maintaining it in constant training and efficiency. At the time of Philip's accession, Pella was an un- important place ; 2 at his death, it was not only strong as a forti- fication and place of deposit for regal treasure, but also the per- manent centre, war-office, and training quarters, of the greatest military force then known. The military registers as well as the traditions of Macedonian discipline were preserved there until the fall of the monarchy.* Philip had employed his life in orga- nizing this powerful instrument of dominion. His revenues, large as they were, both from mines and from tributary con- quests, had been exhausted in the work, so that he had left at his decease a debt of 500 talents. But his son Alexander found the instrument ready made, with excellent officers, and trained veterans for the front ranks of his phalanx.* This scientific organization of military force, on a lai-ge scale and with all the varieties of arming and equipment made to co^ ' Arrian, i. 6, 17. ' Demosthenes, De CoronA, p. 247. ' Liv}', xiii. 51 : xlir. 46, also the comparison in Strabo, xvi. p. 752, be- tTreen the military establishments of Seleukus Nikator at Apameia in Syria, and those of Philip at Pella in Macedonia.

  • Justin, xi. 6. About the debt of 500 talents left by Philip, see the

words of Alexander, Arrian, vii. 9, 10. Diodorus affirms (xvi. 8) that Philip's annual return from the gold mines was 1000 talents : a total not much to be trusted.