Ghost on the Throne - James S. Romm [82]
Others in Perdiccas’ camp also disliked the strange alignment that put them with Eumenes, a Greek and a former scribe, against two of the greatest Macedonian generals. Alcetas, Perdiccas’ brother, loser to Eumenes in the debate over whom Perdiccas should marry, was one of those who found this repugnant. Neoptolemus, who still nursed his wounded pride after being upstaged by Eumenes in Armenia, was another. Sensing noncooperation, Perdiccas wrote to both men, restating that they must support Eumenes with all their forces. Alcetas refused, claiming that his troops would not fight Antipater and were so fond of Craterus that they would more likely defect than attack. Neoptolemus, for his part, feigned compliance with Perdiccas’ orders but in fact planned to betray Eumenes at the first opportunity. He was in contact with Antipater and Craterus, who had persuaded him to take their side, the side of established Macedonian authority, against an upstart Greek.
Eumenes too had received secret communications from Antipater and Craterus. They offered him complete amnesty, plus rewards and new powers, to join them and abandon Perdiccas. Antipater took a soothing tone in his messages, knowing that Eumenes had always feared him; Craterus, for his part, vowed to help heal this breach. Eumenes replied that friendship between himself and Antipater was no longer possible, but he appealed to Craterus to reconcile with Perdiccas, offering to play peacemaker himself. These probes tested the firmness of alliances on both sides but came to nothing. In the end Craterus and Eumenes both stood by their new masters. There was no hope that those masters, Antipater and Perdiccas, could be reconciled with each other.
Eumenes somehow learned that Neoptolemus, his supposed ally, was conspiring with his enemies. So he put Neoptolemus to the test by summoning him to move his army forward. Neoptolemus responded by forming up troops for battle, rather than bringing them into camp. His target was clearly not Antipater and Craterus but Eumenes.
Abandoned first by Cleitus and then Alcetas, now facing Neoptolemus as an enemy, with Antipater and Craterus not far off, Eumenes could be forgiven had he reconsidered the offer to switch sides. It was a tight spot for a former bookkeeper, surrounded by generals who mistrusted or scorned him and by their powerful infantry phalanxes. Yet he had confidence in his Cappadocian cavalry and his own strengths as a commander, strengths only recently developed but proved in the field. And he believed in the cause he was fighting for, the sovereignty of the Argead house. He would stick by that house, and by Perdiccas, and fight.
The battle at first went in favor of Neoptolemus but slowly turned. His infantry prevailed over that of Eumenes, as it was sure to do given the excellence and experience of these Macedonians. But Eumenes used his cavalry to get around Neoptolemus’ lines and seize the baggage train in their rear. It was a strategy that had been used against Alexander at his greatest battle, Gaugamela, but Alexander ignored the penetration until he had secured victory, thus regaining his troops’ lost gear. Not many leaders could keep their men fighting once their goods had been plundered and their wounded comrades put to death. Loss of baggage usually led quickly to loss of the battle.
The basic unit of the Macedonian phalanx, the syntagma of 256 men (Illustration credit 6.2)
For a while, Eumenes’ coup went unnoticed by Neoptolemus’ infantry. The foot soldiers were