Sanjay Chopra is 40-years-old and an airline pilot, working with Air India.
He is also currently doing a course with The London School of Journalism. He is a history buff
and fascinated by ancient cultures and civilizations. He is currently working on a novel on terrorism
in Kashmir, and a film script with his actress wife. Sanjay lives in Mumbai, India.
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“He’s coming…..HE’S COMING!”
The messenger’s wail outside startled him. He felt his bladder constrict.
The need to relieve himself was overpowering, although he had just been. It had been embarrassingly so
since the beginning of this campaign.“Quiet!” Darius thundered.
The messenger fell trembling to the ground. Darius dragged himself back
from the boundary of stark blind rage, uneasy at his loss of control, It's a trap for a king, his father used to say.
“How far away is he?”
“A few miles, Majesty.”
So the Greek comes…at last.
Let him see this place called Guagamela where the villagers had worked for
days, leveling the fields for his chariots. Let him see what he must face tomorrow.
He’d gone along with the advice of his courtiers to have this face to face.
His thoughts jerked back to the meeting of the war council. Each and every one of them had bayed for war.
Then the faces of the council had looked back at him, watching, waiting for his reaction. They knew every
line, fold and crease on his face. But then, they’d had a lifetime of training to be able to cue into his
every expression, he thought.
It was tough but he managed to declare war with a smile.
The tension released audibly in a cry from the head priest. “Lord of the
celestial flame, Ahura Mazda …has guaranteed our victory, O great Darius!”
| "He was following the traditional, tried and tested concept of ‘ideal war.’ Assemble
a large army, march out and confront the enemy, stun them with pomp and show. And then start negotiations, that was
the secret device of the Persians, he thought." |
Darius, his royal alias meant literally ‘holding on to the good’.
The Persian Empire, stretching from the Indus to the Ister had been good and much more for three
centuries. ‘ Never relinquish your hold on the Empire, son.’ His father’s words.
He looked at the high priest. He had dressed carelessly today; the sides
of his turban were crinkled.
There wasn’t a court more stylish or elegant than his in all the lands.
Pleated turbans of scarlet, saffron and purple vied with robes of blue, emerald green and violet.
But today, his highly fashion conscious courtiers were slipping. Was there worry beneath the silks and the make up?
And all because of the vague threat of this little known raider, this upstart from the west.
“These Macedonian and Greek ruffians are no match for the splendor of our Persian
knights, my lord” His commanders had said. Yes, his armies were splendid and on this great limitless plain they
would smash the woefully outnumbered Greeks in minutes.
‘Bedazzle him first sire, invite him for talks and let him see the power and
majesty of a real emperor’ they’d said.
But now as the moment drew close, he could feel the first throb in his temples.
Headaches were his childhood reaction to tension. It’s a womanly ailment son, never let your men see it.
And for years now he’d followed his father’s words and hidden it. But the heat and din of thousands of human
bodies living in camp was worsening his condition. His retainers worked in chain gangs to cool the royal
enclosure by soaking reed mats placed on the sides.
Should he have the giant silver altars that housed the sacred fire removed?
Maybe that would bring down the heat in the tent.
No, that would be a bad omen and they certainly added to the grandeur of the scene.
He was following the traditional, tried and tested concept of ‘ideal war.’ Assemble
a large army, march out and confront the enemy, stun them with pomp and show. And then start negotiations, that was
the secret device of the Persians, he thought. This was something that other lesser civilizations had no idea about.
That riches and wealth when used this way were deadlier than swords or spears.
Bah! Maybe it was all overkill; maybe he didn’t need any of it, even this meeting.
This Greek, this nobody, was probably already regretting having challenged the Persian Empire.
* * *
How he wished he could be back in Persepolis,
in civilization with what he loved best, his musical orchestras and his gardens. They were firdu…his paradise.
Designed and built by his forefathers the city and the palace were beacons of culture. That was where he came from,
a long line of great kings. What were the credentials of this brat? Just ignorance and youth!
What did the young know about tradition, culture, the running of an Empire? All
they had was hunger and they thought the world owed it to them to satiate it.
Well this was one youngster who would find reality on that field tomorrow, unless of
course, he came to his senses after the meeting today. Then, he would forgive the Greek. Generosity and especially
its very public demonstration are great qualities for a king. He remembered his father’s words.
“He is here, Majesty!” someone cried from outside.
Darius rose from his traveling cedar wood throne, baffled.
He is here?
But he hadn’t heard any sounds of trumpets or cymbals or even vocal announcements,
the traditional way of ushering aristocracy. No fanfare? Does he not know any protocol?
The flap of the outer tent that formed a reception area flipped open and he caught
a glimpse through the dust of men and horses, leather and bronze.
As he went there, the group of men came in walking fast like common soldiers. Very
unlike the dignified measured steps he was taking.
The entire assembly in the tent rose and bowed low to Darius and then turned to face
the visitors. His interpreter moved up to his side. The band of men stopped a few feet away. They were all dressed
alike in bronze and iron armor and helmets. There wasn’t a piece of silk or gold on them.
The one leading the company had ostrich feathers on his helmet which he swept off
to reveal wild golden curls.
His empire spanned twelve races but never before had Darius seen such a group of men.
Their clothing and un-coiffed hair were crude and they smelt….of horses! These people, this man, had come to challenge
Persia? His face framed by his long unkempt locks seemed like a boy’s. Darius felt his head begin a manic drumbeat.
The irritation he thought he had subdued earlier left him short of breath.
The Persian interpreter began the ritual chant to introduce an emperor.
But Darius felt compelled to intervene. The first words must be his, to show this
boy what he thought of his feeble attempt at being a king. He swept the interpreter aside. His words should carry
the essence of his superiority, he thought, his introduction as it was meant to be, an emperor, the light of the universe.
He spoke in Persian, the only language fit for a royal. He didn’t know why or where
the words came from but when they did come out they sounded like a high pitched cry.
“ Pidram Sultan boot!” [My forefathers were great kings]
It was to be a challenge, a battle cry, a claim of lineage and heritage thrown in the face
of the Greek.
Then Darius saw the face of the boy. It was calm. Utterly, irritatingly calm. The
Greek interpreter started to translate but the boy silenced him. The boy nodded first. Darius couldn’t make out
if he was acknowledging his claim of greatness or he was amused by the boast.
The Greek then spoke, just two words.
It was a question asked in the same language Darius had used…Persian!
“Turache? Turache’? [Who are you?]
The entire gathering stood still, sound it seemed had been sucked out of the enclosure.
No one had ever spoken to the Emperor this way.
Darius was stunned. This Greek spoke Persian? ‘Just how much did he know about us?’
“ Who are you?” Darius realized in that instant that it was a question that he had
shied away from his entire life. Who was he? What was his own identity? All this glory was just inherited. Even his
name was taken from an ancestor’s.
The Greek’s words seemed to leave him feeling naked, his core exposed. The moment was
slipping from his hands, he must find a suitable repartee, he must have the last word.
A king must have the last word, his father’s words.
| "He wished he was far away from what lay on the plains of Guagamela the next day. He
knew suddenly that no matter what his generals said or how enormous the odds in his favour, the battle was lost
today to that one question. Who are you?" |
‘ Oh! Let me be now Pader…let me have some original thoughts, not just second hand
words of a long dead ancestor.’ He almost shouted his thoughts aloud. For the first time Darius felt his ancestry
a burden, an encumbrance.
But nothing came out of him. His life force seemed drained. The need to relieve his
bladder had become a burning agony now.
The Persian interpreter confused by this unorthodox exchange decided to finish the
introduction.
“There stands before you, O lord Darius……Alexander the prince of Macedonia.”
Darius looked into the boy’s eyes. He stepped back as if physically struck. They
blazed with a power he had never seen in a human. Like a dark deep force of nature, a high wind that blows across the
earth sweeping all before it, uncompromising. It was folly to think he could have negotiated with this man. For how
do you negotiate with a hurricane?
When he had heard stories of a force coming from the west, he had imagined an army,
troops and cavalry. Now he knew that the force was what lay in the eyes of just one man and it was…..indefatigable.
He wished he was far away from what lay on the plains of Guagamela the next day. He
knew suddenly that no matter what his generals said or how enormous the odds in his favour, the battle was lost
today to that one question. Who are you?
His father had often compared life to a poem. If so, would his contributing verse be failure?
Yah Mazda! Even now he couldn’t get his father’s words out of his head.
Later he sat alone for hours, shunning the company of his court and harem. When it
was dark he went out into the open to be away from the camp. His numb senses carried him faster and faster. He
could hear jackals yipping in the distance. Then suddenly a lone one far away howled a long plaintive cry. Pidram
Sultan boot, Pidram Sultan boot it seemed to go. And the westerly wind sweeping the plains , as if in reply
mocked again and again……. Turache`? Turache`?
Darius stopped unable to find an answer.
Note: In October 331 BC , on the plains of Guagamela, Darius with an army of 250,000 faced Alexander’s modest
force of 45,000 . The battle ended with Darius fleeing the field. The Persian empire collapsed and Alexander’s entry
into Asia was secured. Guagamela changed the map of the existing world.
* * *
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