cavalry organisation

[Paralus]

Also we should say 'A fifth hipparchy', the Macedonians seem to have named their units for their commander's rather than assigning them numbers. That makes it more likely that we are talking about an establishment of only five hipparchies.

Yes, the literary evidence points in the direction of hipparchies named for their hipparchs. This is eminently logical as the phalanx taxeis are clearly named for their taxiarchs - even (and especially) when field commanded by another Macedonian. Another look at the Hydaspes passage (using Arrian's terminology rather than a dated translation of same):

Alexander selected the agema of the hetairoi, the hipparchies of Hephaestion, Perdikkas and Demetrious, and the hippies (cavalry) from Bactria and Sogdia and Scythia and the Daan hippotoxotas (mounted archers)...

So the Macedonian hipparchies of the Companion cavalry are clearly named for their hipparchs (as are the phalanx taxeis for their taxiarchs) . The barbarian cavalry are then clearly named as separate units not brigaded with or attached to those hipparchies. And so I'd agree with you that such makes it far more likely that Arrian speaks of the establishment of five hipparchies. Where I'd disagree is that he means five hipparchies: four totally barbarian and made up of Bactrian, Sogdian, Arachosian, Zarangian, Areian, Parthian and Persian (including the so called Euakai) cavalry and a fifth which comprised both barbarians and Macedonians. If the insult of barbarian hipparchies is not enough, the king also wanted Macedonians to endure serving within the same hipparchy as these barbarians! At least the other Macedonian cavalry were still in "Hephaestion's hipparchy" or "Perdikkas' hipparchy". These outraged individuals, there not being enough for a "full" hipparchy, had to serve in some 'bastardised" mixed hipparchy. This happened at a time when the entire cavalry had been enlarged. That time is, almost certainly, after Gedrosia.

The scant evidence indicates that there were eight hipparchies plus the agema. Perhaps, after Gedrosia, there were enough Macedonians for three and a little more than half hipparchies plus the agema (this latter, if the Successors sedulously followed, being 300 strong) . Thus four and and some are added at this time "when the cavalry was expanded"; that four and some comprising barbarians, as noted by Arrian, resulting in one where these barbarians did not dominate.

In any case, what the whole process shows is that Macedonians and Barbarians had not, until after the return west, been forced into any "army of fusion" and that such was a matter of military necessity rather than notions of fostering brotherhood. The only possible exception being that the complete lack of mention of the Bactrians and Sogdians after Hydaspes might indicate that they had become separate hipparchies of the Companions.

[agesilaos]

Contra Bosworth, I cannot see evidence for these wholly barbarian hipparchies, the whole burden of καταλοχισθέντες is that in the first four hipparchies the barbarians were incorporated into the lochoi but formed less than half of the unit but in the fifth they were in the majority. Since, as you have pointed out, they seem to retain their native weapons there is a good possibility that they were formed in discreet units; and, probably, in their traditional formation.

If there were two lochoi to every ile and there were two wedges to each lochos, then we might posit three Macedonian wedges of 64 or possibly 49 and one barbarian unit of, maybe 100 for the first four and two of each in the fifth or three barbarian units to one Macedonian.

Allowing for the almost completely Macedonian Agema we get 300 +(12 X 64 or 49) + (49 or 64 or 98 or 128) a range of 937 to 1196, representing losses between 48% and 34% . However, none of the totals would exceed the 1800 at the Hellespont so the ‘increase in the cavalry’ must refer to an increase on the strength after Gedrosia rather than on the original cavalry strength. It would also mean that the Macedonian element remained in the majority, a fact that the power of the cavalry faction at Babylon would also suggest. The importation of the barbarian cavalry may parallel the so-called mixed phalanx where the Macedonian element was in the minority; there may have only been 2-3,000 after Krateros left with the veterans, and like that, a short-term stop-gap rather than a reflection of any ‘policy’. That would help explain the retention of their native weapons; no need to re-train if their service within the hipparchies was to last only until reinforcements from Macedonia arrived.

[Paralus]

I rather suspect that any clear evidence is long gone. Two lochoi per Ile is about as clear as it gets (Arr.3.16.11 and 6.21.3). Interestingly, Arrian reports Ptolemy as asserting that Alexander's cavalry attacked "ile by ile" at the crossing of the Hydaspes. This can only really mean in column (of wedges I'd assume - a la Gaza). Perhaps, as it comes from Ptolemy writing at a later Hellenistic time, it reflects the tactical terminology of his time rather than Alexander's. Each time we hear of numbers and ile after Alexander's death those numbers are fifty.

Contra Bosworth, I cannot see evidence for these wholly barbarian hipparchies, the whole burden of καταλοχισθέντες is that in the first four hipparchies the barbarians were incorporated into the lochoi but formed less than half of the unit but in the fifth they were in the majority.

Yes: it means the forming into lochoi in the Companion Cavalry (like Peucestas' Persians being formed into files of a mixed - and so new - phalanx). That Arrian goes onto to parenthetically write "and a fifth hipparhcy which was not all barbarian" (a little more literally) means that the forgoing was totally barbarian. All that remains is whether, as he is clearly talking of a hipparchy in this phrase, Arrian takes as read that the previous four were made of of barbarian lochoi. He certainly means that a fifth hipparchy was not wholly barbarian. That seems an odd distinction to draw unless he was referring to wholly barbarian hipparchies which were formed when Asians were καταλοχισθέντες into them (for want of a better way of saying it).

Allowing for the almost completely Macedonian Agema we get 300 +(12 X 64 or 49) + (49 or 64 or 98 or 128) a range of 937 to 1196, It would also mean that the Macedonian element remained in the majority, a fact that the power of the cavalry faction at Babylon would also suggest.

I don't necessarily disagree with the figures. The other thing to remember is that Alexander had discharged 10,000 phalanx infantry at Opis. Although Curtius leads to muddied water in claiming some 13,000 remained, his figure clearly contains other troops for Alexander clearly states that he sent more home than he kept. A total of about 8-9,000 may have remained giving a survival total of say 18-19,000 infantry of somewhere between 28-30,000. 3,100 Macedonian cavalry went east if we include the unarguable reinforcement numbers. If your guesstimation is correct, there is no need to posit away four hipparchies of barbarians in the standoff at Babylon. The Diadochoi weren't all as accommodating of Persians as Alexander. It is highly unlikely that they had any voice in the succession squabble; the Macedonians doing all the aggravating and agitating. That Perdiccas may have used them in the "embargo" of Babylon is quite possible. The cavalry faction's influence was strong seems only a matter of proportion. In 323 some 1,100 cavalry forced its will onto some 8-9,000 phalanx infantry. That is not so far from 1,800 to 12,000 (or possibly 15,000)

[agesilaos]

Arrian III 18 v ἀναλαμβάνει τοὺς ὑπασπιστὰς καὶ τὴν Περδίκκου τάξιν καὶ τῶν τοξοτῶν τοὺς κουφοτάτους καὶ τοὺς Ἀγριᾶνας καὶ τῶν ἑταίρων τὴν ἴλην τὴν βασιλικὴν καὶ τετραρχίαν πρὸς ταύτῃ μίαν ἱππικήν,


This passage stands unique in its use of tetrarchy, for a unit of cavalry yet emending the text to read ‘hipparchy’ would make Ptolemy commit an anachronism he avoids elsewhere.

De Selincourt translates ‘double squadron’ (presumably on the basis of two ilai containing four lochoi), Brunt does not translate but notes that it was ‘evidently more than one squadron’.

The only other instance of tetrarchy possibly meaning a group of four is in Euripides’ Alcestis line 1154 where Admetus describes his realm as having four cities and calls it a tetrachy, but the meaning could equally well be that it is a tetrachy by virtue of being divided into four. This is certainly the meaning in Demosthenes’ Third Philippic section 26, referring to the Thessallian tetrarchies, in Strabo et al referring to the Galatian tetrarchy and in Josephus to the division of Iudaea.

In Aelian ‘Taktike Theoria’ there is scope for confusion as in chapter 9.2 he states that four files make a tetrarchy (two dilochoi in fact) and this makes the translator of the copy on Googlebooks, derive the name tetrarchy from this fact rather than from the fact, stated at 10.4, that a tetrachy is one quarter of a syntagma, the smallest unit with supernumary officers.

If this is not a unique usage then Arrian’s tetrarchy ought to be the fourth part of something too and that something is surely an ile, this would explain why Arrian does not follow his usual practice and name the ilarch or territory of recruitment, such a minor appointment might not be noted.

The obvious objection is that sixty-four extra men seems somewhat paltry an addition to Alexander’s force; but Krateros is said to have been left with only 500 horse and Alexander to have only taken the Royal Squadron and a tetrarchy, so 364 on my thinking or 826 on others’; the tactical situation did not demand more cavalry in Alexander’s force, which are making a difficult mountain crossing, in Curtius, V 4 xx, he even leaves the cavalry he took to follow on more slowly, by a separate route. A split 7:10 seems more likely than 33:20.

A closing thought on Paralus’ 50 man ile; Aelian 16.1 mentions a unit of 64 men (psiloi) called a pentekontarchy. I wonder if Diodorus did not find in his source a remark such as ‘...ile which some call a pentekontarchy...’ and chose to understand from this that the ilai were fifty strong.