See CARTHAGE: THE FOUNDING OF. TYRE: B. C. 598-585. Siege by Nebuchadnezzar. See PHŒNICIANS: B. C. 850-538. {3160} TYRE: B. C. 332. Siege and capture by Alexander the Great. After defeating the Persians at Issus (see MACEDONIA: B. C. 334-330), Alexander turned his attention to the tributary Phœnician cities, whose fleets gave to the Great King a naval power more formidable than the hosts of the nations which marched at his command. Sidon, Byblus, and other towns submitted promptly to the conqueror. Tyre offered a qualified surrender, which did not satisfy the haughty Macedonian, and he instantly laid siege to the city. Having no adequate fleet with which to reach the island-town, he resolved to carry a causeway across the channel which separated the island from Old Tyre, on the mainland, and he demolished the buildings of the latter to provide materials for the work. It was an undertaking of immense magnitude and difficulty, and the ingenious Tyrians found many modes of interfering with it. They succeeded in destroying the mole when half of it had been built; but Alexander, with obstinate perseverance, began his work anew, on a larger scale than before. He also collected a strong fleet of war-galleys, from Cyprus and from the Phœnicians who had submitted to him, with which the opposition of the enemy was checked and his own operations advanced. After seven months of prodigious labor and incessant battle, the strong walls of Tyre were beaten down and the city taken. "It soon became a scene of unresisted carnage and plunder. The Macedonians, exasperated by the length and labours of the siege, which had lasted seven months, and by the execution of their comrades [Greek prisoners, whom the Tyrians had put to death on the walls, before the eyes of the besiegers, and cast into the sea], spared none that fell into their hands. The king—whom the Greeks call Azelmicus—with the principal inhabitants, and some Carthaginian envoys who had been sent with the usual offerings to Melkart, took refuge in his sanctuary: and these alone, according to Arrian, were exempted from the common lot of death or slavery. It was an act of clemency, by which the conqueror at the same time displayed his piety to the god. Of the rest, 8,000 perished in the first slaughter, and 30,000, including a number of foreign residents, were sold as slaves. But if we may believe Curtius, 15,000 were rescued by the Sidonians [of Alexander's navy], who first hid them in their galleys, and afterwards transported them to Sidon—not, it must be presumed, without Alexander's connivance or consent. It sounds incredible, that he should have ordered 2,000 of the prisoners to be crucified. … Tyre was still occupied as a fortress, and soon recovered some measure of her ancient prosperity."