march into the desert, they cut off the head of Spitamenes and sent it to him, with the hope by this deed of diverting him from pursuing them.[1]
CHAPTER XVIII.
Oxyartes Besieged in the Sogdian Rock.
Meantime Coenus returned to Alexander at Nautaca, as also did Craterus, Phrataphernes the viceroy of the Parthians, and Stasanor the viceroy of the Areians, after executing all the orders which Alexander had given them. The king then caused his army to rest around Nautaca, because it was now mid-winter; but he despatched Phrataphernes into the land of the Mardiaus and Tapurians to fetch Autophradates the viceroy, because, though he had often been sent for, he did not obey the summons. He also sent Stasanor into the land of the Drangians, and Atropates into Media,[2] with the appointment of viceroy over the Medes, because Oxodates seemed disaffected to him. Stamenes also he despatched to Babylon, because news came to him that Mazaeus the Babylonian governor was dead. Sopolis, Epocillus, and Menidas he sent away to Macedonia, to bring him the army up from that country. At the first appearance of spring,[3] he advanced towards the rock in Sogdiana, to which he was informed many of the Sogdianians had fled for refuge; among whom were said to be the wife and daughters of Oxyartes the Bactrian, who had deposited them for safety in that place, as if forsooth it
- ↑ Curtius (viii. 11 and 12) says that the wife of Spitamenes murdered him and carried his head to Alexander.
- ↑ The Hebrew name for Media is Madai, which means middle-land. The Greeks called the country Media, according to Polybius (v. 44), because it lies near the middle of Asia.
- ↑ Of the year 327 B.C.
