Quintus Curtius Rufus, History of Alexander 9.7.6

9.7.6

Itaque Graeci milites arma capiunt occisuri Bitonem, si daretur occasio: ceterum principes eorum iram multitudinis mitigaverunt.

While these things were doing in India, the Greek soldiers who had been recently drafted by the king into settlements around Bactra disagreed among themselves and revolted, for the stronger faction, having killed some of their countrymen who remained loyal, had recourse to arms, and making themselves masters of the citadel of Bactra, which happened to be carelessly guarded, forced even the barbarians to join their party. Their leader was Athenodorus, who had also assumed the title of king, not so much from an ambition to reign as from a wish to return to his native country along with those who acknowledged his authority. Against his life one Biton, a citizen of the same Greek state as himself, but who hated him from envy, laid a plot, and having invited him to a banquet, had him assassinated during the festivities by the hands of a native of Margiana called Boxus. The day following Biton, in a general meeting which had been convoked, persuaded the majority that Athenodorus had without any provocation formed a plot to take away his life. Others, however, suspected there had been foul play on Biton's part, and by degrees this suspicion spread itself about among the rest. The Greek soldiers, therefore, took up arms to put Biton to death should an opportunity present itself.

But the leading men appeased the anger of the multitude, and Biton being thus freed from his imminent danger, contrary to what he had anticipated, soon afterwards conspired against the very man to whom he owed his safety. But when his treachery came to their knowledge they seized both Biton himself and Boxus. The latter they ordered to be at once put to death, but Biton not till after he had undergone torture. The instruments for this purpose were already being applied to his limbs when the soldiers, it is not known why, ran to their arms like so many madmen. On hearing the uproar they made, the men who had orders to torture Biton desisted from their office, thinking that the object of the rioters, whom they had heard shouting, was to prevent them going on with their work. Biton, stripped as he was, ran for protection to the Greeks, and the sight of the wretched man sentenced to death caused such a revulsion of their feelings that they ordered him to be set at liberty. Having twice escaped punishment, he returned to his native country with the rest of those who left the colonies which the king had assigned to them. These things were done about Bactra and the borders of Scythia. In the meantime a hundred ambassadors came to the king from the two nations we have before mentioned. They all rode in chariots and were men of uncommon stature and of a very dignified bearing. Their robes were of linen and embroidered with inwrought gold and purple.