Aornos

The Aornos is located to the north of Taxila

One of the Ever First Coloured Photoraph of the Rock of Aornos (Shot on 17 July 1986 CE) by Asst. Prof. Dr. Taskeen Ahmad Khan and then Uploaded by him for the Ever First Time at the various Websites over the Internet/World Wide Web on 09.09.2009 CE and later on. It is loctated in the Shangla District, Khyber Pakhtun Khwa (KPK) (previously the North-West Frontier Province), Pakistan. There is mention of the Rock of Aornos in the book entitled Anabasis Alexandri (Expedition of Alexander) written by Lucius Flavius Arrianus (Arrian) (A Greek who was a Prefect or Legate (Governor) of Cappadocia under the Caesar Publius Aelius Traianus Hardianus Augustus of the Roman Empire) who lived to circa 160 CE. This, and the fixing of the Site of Aornos, is the theme of some fascinating expolorations undertaken by Marc Aurel Stein (Ethnic Hungarian British Archaeologist) - includings its Ever First Black and White Photographs by him (Later on Knightened as Sir Marc Aurel Stein). The stir and the thrill comes, one thinks, from a sudden discovery that, while no local record or memory remains of those far-off events, it is still possible from the tactical accounts rendered by Arrian and the others to recognise on the ground today some of the actual strongholds which fell to the arms of the Alexander the Great. In so doing one can see again the heavy-armed hoplites of the Macedonian's phalanx and almost hear the headlong rush of his cavalry carrying his standard up the broad and beautiful valley of Swat, KPK, Pakistan.

Aornos (Ancient Greek: Ἄορνος) was the Ancient Greek name for the site of Alexander the Great's last siege: "the climax to Alexander's career as the greatest besieger in history" according to Robin Lane Fox, a biographer of Alexander.^[1] The siege took place in April 326 BC,^[2] at a mountain site located in modern Pakistan. Aornos offered the last threat to Alexander's supply line, which stretched, dangerously vulnerable, over the Hindu Kush back to Balkh, though Arrian credits Alexander's heroic desire to outdo his kinsman Heracles, who allegedly had proved unable to take a fort that the Macedonians called Ἄορνος Aornos (according to Arrian and Diodorus; Aornis according to Curtius; elsewhere Aornus): meaning "birdless" in Greek. According to one theory, the name is a corruption of an Indo-Iranian word, such as *awarana "fortified place". According to Arrian, the rock had a flat summit well supplied with natural springs and wide enough to grow crops: it could not be starved to submission. Neighboring tribesmen who surrendered to Alexander offered to lead him to the best point of access.

The geographer Aurel Stein suggested that Aornos was located on Pir Sar – a mountain spur above narrow gorges in a bend of the upper Indus River, north of Attock in the Pakistani Punjab. However, the Indologist Giuseppe Tucci has instead proposed a site at the summit of Elum Ghar (Mount Ilam), a site significant in Hinduism, in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (the former North-West Frontier Province).

Ptolemy and Alexander's secretary Myllinas (rather than the famous Eumenes), reconnoitered and reinforced a neighboring spur to the west with a stockade and ditch. His signal fire to Alexander also alerted the defenders of Pir-Sar, and it took two days of skirmishing in the narrow ravines for Alexander to regroup. At the vulnerable north side leading to the fort, Alexander and his catapults were stopped by a deep ravine. To bring the siege engines within reach, an earthwork mound was constructed to bridge the ravine with carpentry, brush and earth. The first day's work brought the siege mound 50 metres (55 yd) closer, but as the sides of the ravine fell away steeply below, progress rapidly slowed; nevertheless, at the end of the third day, a low hill connected to the nearest tip of Pir-Sar was within reach and was taken, after Alexander in the vanguard and his first force were repelled by boulders rolled down from above. Three days of drumbeats marked the defenders' celebration of the initial repulse, followed by a surprise retreat. Alexander hauled himself up the last rockface on a rope. Alexander cleared the summit, slaying some fugitives (Lane Fox), inflated by Arrian to a massacre, and erected altars to Athena Nike, Athena of Victory, traces of which were identified by Stein.^[3]

Alexander was now free to pursue his journey into Punjab, and his reputation for invincibility seemed to be established in India. The Battle of the Hydaspes River lay in the future.

Notes

References

• Lane Fox, Robin. Alexander the Great. Penguin, 1973, ISBN 0-14-008878-4
• Sastri, K. A. Nilakanta, ed. (1988) [1967], Age of the Nandas and Mauryas (Second ed.), Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, ISBN 81-208-0465-1 
• Arrian, Anabasis IV chapters 28.1–30.4 (in French)