Note 530 — Chapter XCIV · MILITARY OPERATIONS AND CONQUESTS OF ALEXANDER, AFTER HIS WINTER-QUARTERS IN PERSIS, DOWN TO HIS DEATH AT BABYLON.
Reading edition
Plutarch, Alex. 55. Καίτοι τῶν περὶ Ἑρμόλαον οὐδεὶς οὐδὲ διὰ τῆς ἐσχάτης ἀνάγκης Καλλισθένους κατεῖπεν. Ἀλλὰ καὶ Ἀλέξανδρος αὐτὸς εὐθὺς γράφων Κρατερῷ καὶ Ἀττάλῳ καὶ Ἀλκέτᾳ φησὶ τοὺς παῖδας βασανιζομένους ὁμολογεῖν, ὡς αὐτοὶ ταῦτα πράξειαν, ἄλλος δὲ οὐδεὶς συνειδείη. Ὕστερον δὲ γράφων πρὸς Ἀντίπατρον, καὶ τὸν Καλλισθένην συνεπαιτιασάμενος, Οἱ μὲν παῖδές, φησιν, ὑπὸ τῶν Μακεδόνων κατελεύσθησαν, τὸν δὲ σοφιστὴν ἐγὼ κολάσω, καὶ τοὺς ἐκπέμψαντας αὐτὸν, καὶ τοὺς ὑποδεχομένους ταῖς πόλεσι τοὺς ἐμοὶ ἐπιβουλεύοντας ... ἄντικρυς ἔν γε τούτοις ἀποκαλυπτόμενος πρὸς Ἀριστοτέλην, etc.
About the hostile dispositions of Alexander towards Aristotle, see Dio Chrysostom, Orat. 64. de Fortunâ, p. 598.
Kraterus was at this time absent in Sogdiana, engaged in finishing the suppression of the resistance (Arrian, iv. 22, 1). To him, therefore, Alexander would naturally write.
This statement, from the pen of Alexander himself, distinctly contradicts and refutes (as I have before observed) the affirmation of Ptolemy and Aristobulus as given by Arrian (iv. 14, 1)—that the pages deposed against Kallisthenes.