The History of the Peloponnesian War, Volume I (37 page)

96.
Having lain the night with his whole army in the temple of Jupiter Nemeius, (wherein the poet Hesiodus is reported by them that dwell thereabout to have died, foretold by an oracle, that he should die in Nemea), in the morning betimes he dislodged, and marched into Ætolia. The first day he took Potidania; the second day, Crocyleium; the third, Teichium. There he stayed, and sent the booty he had gotten to Eupalium in Locris. For he purposed, when he had subdued the rest, to invade the Ophionians afterwards (if they submitted not) in his return to Naupactus. But the Ætolians knew of this preparation when it was first resolved on. And afterwards, when the army was entered, they were
1
united into a mighty army to make head: insomuch as that the farthest off of the Ophionians, that reach out to the Melian Gulf, the Bomians and Callians, came in with their aids.

97.
The Messenians gave the same advice to Demosthenes that they had done before; and alleging that the conquest of the Ætolians would be but easy, willed him to march with all speed against them, village after village, and not to stay till they were all united and in order of battle against him, but to attempt always the place which was next to hand. He, persuaded by them and confident of his fortune, because nothing had crossed him hitherto, without tarrying for the Locrians that should have come in with their aids, (for his greatest want was of darters light–armed), marched to Ægitium: which approaching
1
he won by force, the men having fled secretly out, and encamped themselves on the hills above it: for it stood in a mountainous place, and about eighty furlongs from the sea. But the Ætolians (for by this time they were come with their forces to Ægitium) charged the Athenians and their confederates; and running down upon them, some one way and some another, from the hills, plied them with their darts. And when the army of the Athenians assaulted them, they retired; and when it retired, they assaulted. So that the fight, for a good while, was nothing but alternate chase and retreat; and the Athenians had the worst in both.

98.
Nevertheless, as long as their archers had arrows, and were able to use them, (for the Ætolians, by reason they were not armed
2
, were put back still with the shot), they held out. But when upon the death of their captain the archers were dispersed, and the
3
rest were also wearied, having a long time continued the said labour of pursuing and retiring, and the Ætolians continually afflicting them with their darts, they were forced at length to fly; and lighting into hollows without issue, and into places they were not acquainted withal, were destroyed. For Chromon a Messenian, who was their guide for the ways, was slain. And the Ætolians pursuing them still with darts, slew many of them quickly whilst they fled, being swift of foot and without armour. But the most of them missing their way and entering into a wood which had no passage through, the Ætolians set it on fire and burnt it about them. All kinds of shifts to fly, and all kinds of destruction were that day in the army of the Athenians. Such as remained, with much ado got to the sea and to Œneon, a city of Locris, from whence they first set forth. There died very many of the confederates, and a hundred and twenty men of arms of the Athenians; that was their number, and all of them able men
1
: these men of the very best died in this war. Procles also was there slain, one of the generals. When they had received the bodies of their dead from the Ætolians under truce, and were gotten again to Naupactus, they returned with the fleet to Athens. But they left Demosthenes about Naupactus and those parts; because he was afraid of the Athenian people for the loss that had happened.

99.
About the same time, the Athenians that were on the coast of Sicily, sailed unto Locris, and landing overcame such as made head; and took in Peripolium
2
, situate on the river Halex.

100.
The same summer, the Ætolians having
3
sent their ambassadors, Tolophus an Ophionian, Boryades an Eurytanian, and Tisander an Apodotian, to Corinth and Lacedæmon, persuaded them to send an army against Naupactus: for that it harboured the Athenians against them. And the Lacedæmonians, towards the end of autumn, sent them three thousand men of arms of their confederates; of which five hundred were of Heracleia, the new–built city of Trachinia. The general of the army was Eurylochus a Spartan; with whom Macarius and Menedæus went also along, Spartans likewise. 101. When the army was assembled at Delphi, Eurylochus sent a herald to the Locrians of Ozolæ, both because their way lay through them to Naupactus, and also because he desired to make them revolt from the Athenians. Of all the Locrians, the Amphissians co–operated with him most, as standing most in fear for the enmity of the Phoceans. And they first giving hostages, induced others who likewise were afraid of the coming in of the army, to do the like: the Myoneans first, being their neighbours; for this way is Locris of most difficult access: then the Ipneans, Messapians, Tritæans, Chalæans, Tolophonians, Hessians, and the Œantheans. All these went with them to the war. The Olpæans gave them hostages, but followed not the army. But the Hyæans would give them no hostages, till they had taken a village of theirs called Polis.

102.
When every thing was ready, and he had sent the hostages away to Cytinium in Doris, he marched with his army towards Naupactus, through the territory of the Locrians. And as he marched, he took Œneon, a town of theirs, and Eupalium; because they refused to yield unto him. When they were come into the territory of Naupactus, the Ætolians being there already to join with them, they wasted the fields about; and took the suburbs of the city, being unfortified. Then they went to Molycreium, a colony of the Corinthians, but subject to the people of Athens, and took that. Now Demosthenes the Athenian, (for ever since the Ætolian business he abode about Naupactus), having been pre–advertised of this army and being afraid to lose the city, went amongst the Acarnanians, and with much ado, because of his departure from before Leucas, persuaded them to relieve Naupactus; and they sent along with him in his galleys a thousand men of arms. Which entering, were the preservation of the city; for there was danger, the walls being of a great compass and the defendants few, that else they should not have been able to make them good
1
. Eurylochus and those that were with him, when they perceived that those forces were entered and that it was impossible to take the city by assault, departed thence, not into Peloponnesus, but to Æolis, now called Calydon, and to Pleuron
2
and other places thereabouts, and also to Proschion in Ætolia. For the Ambraciotes coming to them, persuaded them to undertake, together with themselves, the enterprise against Argos and the rest of Amphilochia, and Acarnania; saying withal, that if they could overcome these, the rest of that continent would enter into the league of the Lacedæmonians. Whereunto Eurylochus assented; and dismissing the Ætolians lay quiet in those parts with his army, till such time as the Ambraciotes being come with their forces before Argos he should have need to aid them. And so this summer ended.

103.
The Athenians that were in Sicily, in the beginning of winter, together with the Grecians of their league, and as many of the Siculi, as having obeyed the Syracusans by force, or
1
being their confederates before, had now revolted, warred jointly against Nessa, a town of Sicily, the citadel whereof was in the hands of the Syracusans. And they assaulted the same; but when they could not win it, they retired. In the retreat, the Syracusans that were in the citadel, sallied out upon the confederates that retired later than the Athenians; and charging, put a part of the army to flight, and killed not a few. After this, Laches and the Athenians landed
2
some time at Locris; and overcame in battle by the river Caicinus about three hundred Locrians, who with Proxenus the son of Capaton came out to make resistance; and when they had stripped them of their arms, departed.

104.
The same winter also the Athenians hallowed the isle of Delos, by the admonition indeed of a certain oracle. For Pisistratus also, the tyrant, hallowed the same before; not all, but only so much as was within the prospect of the temple. But now they hallowed it all over in this manner. They took away all sepulchres whatsoever of such as had died there before; and for the future, made an edict that none should be suffered to die, nor any woman to bring forth child in the island; but [when they were near the time, either of the one or the other] they should be carried over into Rheneia. This Rheneia is so little a way distant from Delos, that Polycrates, the tyrant of Samos, who was once of great power by sea and had the dominion of the other islands, when he won Rheneia dedicated the same to Apollo of Delos, tying it unto Delos with a chain
1
. And now after the hallowing of it, the Athenians instituted the keeping, every fifth year, of the Delian games.

There had also in old time been great concourse in Delos, both of Ionians and of the islanders round about
2
. For they then came to see the games, with their wives and children, as the Ionians do now the games at Ephesus. There were likewise matches set of bodily exercise and of music; and the cities did severally set forth dances. Which things to have been so, is principally declared by Homer in these verses of his hymn to Apollo:

• But thou, Apollo, takest most delight
  
• In Delos. There assemble in thy sight
  
• The long–coat Ions, with their children dear
  
• And venerable bedfellows; and there
  
• In matches set of buffets, song, and dance,
  
• Both show thee pastime and thy name advance
  3
  .
  

That there were also matches of music, and that men resorted thither to contend therein, he again maketh manifest in these verses of the same hymn. For after he hath spoken of the Delian dance of the women, he endeth their praise with these verses, wherein also he maketh mention of himself:

• But well: let Phœbus and Diana be
  
• Propitious; and farewell you, each one.
  
• But yet remember me when I am gone:
  
• And if of earthly men you chance to see
  
• Any toil’d pilgrim, that shall ask you, Who,
  
• O damsels, is the man that living here
  
• Was sweet’st in song, and that most had your ear?
  
• Then all, with a joint murmur, thereunto
  
• Make answer thus: A man deprived of seeing;
  
• In the isle of sandy Chios is his being
  1
  .
  

So much hath Homer witnessed touching the great meeting and solemnity celebrated of old in the isle of Delos. And the islanders and the Athenians, since that time, have continued still to send dancers along with their sacrificers
2
; but the games and things of that kind were worn out, as is likely, by adversity: till now that the Athenians restored the games, and added the horse race, which was not before.

105.
The same winter the Ambraciotes, according to their promise made to Eurylochus when they retained his army, made war upon Argos in Amphilochia with three thousand men of arms: and invading Argeia they took Olpæ, a strong fort on a hill by the sea–side, which the Acarnanians had fortified and used for the place of their common meetings for matters of justice, and is distant from the city of Argos, which stands also on the sea–side, about twenty–five furlongs. The Acarnanians, with part of their forces, came to relieve Argos; and with the rest they encamped in that part of Amphilochia which is called Crenæ, to watch the Peloponnesians that were with Eurylochus, that they might not pass through to the Ambraciotes without their knowledge; and sent to Demosthenes, who had been leader of the Athenians in the expedition against the Ætolians, to come to them and be their general. They sent also to the twenty Athenian galleys, that chanced to be then on the coast of Peloponnesus, under the conduct of Aristoteles the son of Timocrates, and Hierophon the son of Antimnestus. In like manner the Ambraciotes that were at Olpæ sent a messenger to the city of Ambracia, willing them to come to their aid with their whole power; as fearing that those with Eurylochus would not be able to pass by the Acarnanians, and so they should be either forced to fight alone, or else have an unsafe retreat. 106. But the Peloponnesians that were with Eurylochus, as soon as they understood that the Ambraciotes were come to Olpæ, dislodging from Proschion went with all speed to assist them: and passing over the river Achelöus, marched through Acarnania, which, by reason of the aids sent to Argos, was now disfurnished. On their right hand they had the city of Stratus, and that garrison; on the left, the rest of Acarnania. Having passed the territory of the Stratians, they marched through Phytia, and again by the utmost limits of Medeon; then through Limnæa; then they went into the territory of the Agræans, which are out of Acarnania, and their friends: and getting to the hill Thiamus, which is a desert hill, they marched over it, and came down into Argeia when it was now night; and passing between the city of the Argives and the Arcarnanians that kept watch at [the]
Wells,
came unseen and joined with the Ambraciotes at Olpæ. 107. When they were altogether, they sat down about break of day at a place called Metropolis, and there encamped. And the Athenians not long after with their twenty galleys arrived in the Ambracian gulf, to the aid of the Argives: to whom also came Demosthenes, with two hundred Messenian men of arms and threescore Athenian archers. The galleys lay at sea, before the hill upon which the fort of Olpæ standeth. But the Acarnanians, and those few Amphilochians (for the greatest part of them the Ambraciotes kept back by force) that were come already together at Argos
1
, prepared themselves to give the enemy battle; and chose Demosthenes, with their own commanders, for general of the whole league. He, when he had brought them up near unto Olpæ, there encamped. There was between them a great hollow. And for five days together they stirred not; but the sixth day both sides put themselves into array for the battle. The army of the Peloponnesians reached a great way beyond the other, for indeed it was much greater
2
; but Demosthenes, fearing to be encompassed, placed an ambush in a certain hollow way and
3
fit for such a purpose, of armed and unarmed soldiers, in all to the number of four hundred; which, in that part where the number of the enemies overreached, should in the heat of the battle rise out of ambush and charge them on their backs. When the battles were in order on either side, they came to blows. Demosthenes, with the Messenians and those few Athenians that were there, stood in the right wing; and the Acarnanians (as they could one after another be put in order) and those Amphilochian darters which were present, made up the other
1
. The Peloponnesians and Ambraciotes were ranged promiscuously, except only the Mantineans, who stood together most of them
2
in the left wing, but not in the utmost part of it; for Eurylochus and those that were with him made the extremity of the left wing, against Demosthenes and the Messenians. 108. When they were in fight, and that the Peloponnesians with that wing overreached and had encircled the right wing of their enemies, those Acarnanians that lay in ambush coming in at their backs, charged them and put them to flight: in such sort as they endured not the first brunt; and besides, caused the greatest part of the army through affright to run away
3
. For when they saw that part of it defeated which was with Eurylochus, which was the best of their army, they were a great deal the more afraid. And the Messenians that were in that part of the army with Demosthenes, pursuing them, dispatched the greatest part of the execution. But the Ambraciotes
4
that were in the right wing, on that part had the victory, and chased the enemy unto the city of Argos. But in their retreat, when they saw that the greatest part of the army was vanquished, the rest of the Acarnanians setting upon them, they had much ado to recover Olpæ in safety. And many of them were slain, whilst they ran into it out of array and in disorder; save only the Mantineans: for these made a more orderly retreat than any part of the army. And so this battle ended, having lasted till the evening.