DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.9184#0455
432
New Chapters in Greek History. [Chap. XV.
But a mere mercenary army is not in itself sufficient
to bind together a civilized State. It is well shown by
Droysen that the main source of Greek power through-
out Asia was in the cities founded everywhere in extra-
ordinary numbers by Alexander and his successors. From
the earliest days of Hellas the city had been a self-com-
plete unit, organized and independent. The Greek cities
of Asia Minor, even when under the sway of the Persian
kings they had paid tribute and admitted a garrison,
yet possessed in many respects their autonomy, appointed
their own magistrates, and regulated their own commerce.
Hence it would appear that the great Alexander conceived
the idea of binding to himself the provinces which he
overran by building a chain of cities across them, cities
with mixed population, but dominated by a Greek faction,
and trained to the enjoyment of Hellenic privilege. With
Alexander, to conceive an idea and to put it into execu-
tion was the same thing. He found the people of several
districts living scattered in villages; he drew them to-
gether into cities, at the head of which he placed a few
of his followers to organize. The result was a complete
change in the manners of such people. From scattered
and ignorant cultivators they became artisans or mer-
chants, and remained for centuries attached to the Greek
rule, which had so enlarged their ideas and improved
their position. At the mouth of the Nile, near the shores
of the Caspian, along the course of the Oxus, at the
foot of the Paropamisus, on the banks of the Indus,
wherever the arms of Alexander were victorious and the
country seemed fertile, the great conqueror halted his
army for a brief period, or detached a body of troops,
and in a few weeks the walls of a city were rising to
dominate the district. To fill those walls he left a few
veterans weary of fighting and marching, and some of
the merchants and artisans who followed his march in
New Chapters in Greek History. [Chap. XV.
But a mere mercenary army is not in itself sufficient
to bind together a civilized State. It is well shown by
Droysen that the main source of Greek power through-
out Asia was in the cities founded everywhere in extra-
ordinary numbers by Alexander and his successors. From
the earliest days of Hellas the city had been a self-com-
plete unit, organized and independent. The Greek cities
of Asia Minor, even when under the sway of the Persian
kings they had paid tribute and admitted a garrison,
yet possessed in many respects their autonomy, appointed
their own magistrates, and regulated their own commerce.
Hence it would appear that the great Alexander conceived
the idea of binding to himself the provinces which he
overran by building a chain of cities across them, cities
with mixed population, but dominated by a Greek faction,
and trained to the enjoyment of Hellenic privilege. With
Alexander, to conceive an idea and to put it into execu-
tion was the same thing. He found the people of several
districts living scattered in villages; he drew them to-
gether into cities, at the head of which he placed a few
of his followers to organize. The result was a complete
change in the manners of such people. From scattered
and ignorant cultivators they became artisans or mer-
chants, and remained for centuries attached to the Greek
rule, which had so enlarged their ideas and improved
their position. At the mouth of the Nile, near the shores
of the Caspian, along the course of the Oxus, at the
foot of the Paropamisus, on the banks of the Indus,
wherever the arms of Alexander were victorious and the
country seemed fertile, the great conqueror halted his
army for a brief period, or detached a body of troops,
and in a few weeks the walls of a city were rising to
dominate the district. To fill those walls he left a few
veterans weary of fighting and marching, and some of
the merchants and artisans who followed his march in