History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides (free ebooks for android .txt) 📕

who on the death of Eurylochus and Macarius had succeeded to the

sole command, being at a loss after so signal a defeat how to stay and

sustain a siege, cut off as he was by land and by the Athenian fleet

by sea, and equally so how to retreat in safety, opened a parley

with Demosthenes and the Acarnanian generals for a truce and

permission to retreat, and at the same time for the recovery of the

dead. The dead they gave back to him, and setting up a trophy took

up their own also to the number of about three hundred. The retreat

demanded they refused publicly to the army; but permission to depart

without delay was secretly granted to the Mantineans and to

Menedaius and the other commanders and principal men of the

Peloponnesians by Demosthenes and his Acarnanian colleagues; who

desired to strip the Ambraciots and the mercenary host of foreigners

of their supporters; and, above all, to discredit the Lacedaemonians

and Peloponnesians with the Hellenes in those parts, as traitors and

self-seekers.

While the enemy was taking up his dead and hastily burying them as

he could, and those who obtained permission were secretly planning

their retreat, word was brought to Demosthenes and the Acarnanians

that the Ambraciots from the city, in compliance with the first

message from Olpae, were on the march with their whole levy through

Amphilochia to join their countrymen at Olpae, knowing nothing of what

had occurred. Demosthenes prepared to march with his army against

them, and meanwhile sent on at once a strong division to beset the

roads and occupy the strong positions. In the meantime the

Mantineans and others included in the agreement went out under the

pretence of gathering herbs and firewood, and stole off by twos and

threes, picking on the way the things which they professed to have

come out for, until they had gone some distance from Olpae, when

they quickened their pace. The Ambraciots and such of the rest as

had accompanied them in larger parties, seeing them going on, pushed

on in their turn, and began running in order to catch them up. The

Acarnanians at first thought that all alike were departing without

permission, and began to pursue the Peloponnesians; and believing that

they were being betrayed, even threw a dart or two at some of their

generals who tried to stop them and told them that leave had been

given. Eventually, however, they let pass the Mantineans and

Peloponnesians, and slew only the Ambraciots, there being much dispute

and difficulty in distinguishing whether a man was an Ambraciot or a

Peloponnesian. The number thus slain was about two hundred; the rest

escaped into the bordering territory of Agraea, and found refuge

with Salynthius, the friendly king of the Agraeans.

Meanwhile the Ambraciots from the city arrived at Idomene. Idomene

consists of two lofty hills, the higher of which the troops sent on by

Demosthenes succeeded in occupying after nightfall, unobserved by

the Ambraciots, who had meanwhile ascended the smaller and

bivouacked under it. After supper Demosthenes set out with the rest of

the army, as soon as it was evening; himself with half his force

making for the pass, and the remainder going by the Amphilochian

hills. At dawn he fell upon the Ambraciots while they were still abed,

ignorant of what had passed, and fully thinking that it was their

own countrymen—Demosthenes having purposely put the Messenians in

front with orders to address them in the Doric dialect, and thus to

inspire confidence in the sentinels, who would not be able to see them

as it was still night. In this way he routed their army as soon as

he attacked it, slaying most of them where they were, the rest

breaking away in flight over the hills. The roads, however, were

already occupied, and while the Amphilochians knew their own

country, the Ambraciots were ignorant of it and could not tell which

way to turn, and had also heavy armour as against a light-armed enemy,

and so fell into ravines and into the ambushes which had been set

for them, and perished there. In their manifold efforts to escape some

even turned to the sea, which was not far off, and seeing the Athenian

ships coasting alongshore just while the action was going on, swam off

to them, thinking it better in the panic they were in, to perish, if

perish they must, by the hands of the Athenians, than by those of

the barbarous and detested Amphilochians. Of the large Ambraciot force

destroyed in this manner, a few only reached the city in safety; while

the Acarnanians, after stripping the dead and setting up a trophy,

returned to Argos.

The next day arrived a herald from the Ambraciots who had fled

from Olpae to the Agraeans, to ask leave to take up the dead that

had fallen after the first engagement, when they left the camp with

the Mantineans and their companions, without, like them, having had

permission to do so. At the sight of the arms of the Ambraciots from

the city, the herald was astonished at their number, knowing nothing

of the disaster and fancying that they were those of their own

party. Some one asked him what he was so astonished at, and how many

of them had been killed, fancying in his turn that this was the herald

from the troops at Idomene. He replied: “About two hundred”; upon

which his interrogator took him up, saying: “Why, the arms you see

here are of more than a thousand.” The herald replied: “Then they

are not the arms of those who fought with us?” The other answered:

“Yes, they are, if at least you fought at Idomene yesterday.” “But

we fought with no one yesterday; but the day before in the retreat.”

“However that may be, we fought yesterday with those who came to

reinforce you from the city of the Ambraciots.” When the herald

heard this and knew that the reinforcement from the city had been

destroyed, he broke into wailing and, stunned at the magnitude of

the present evils, went away at once without having performed his

errand, or again asking for the dead bodies. Indeed, this was by far

the greatest disaster that befell any one Hellenic city in an equal

number of days during this war; and I have not set down the number

of the dead, because the amount stated seems so out of proportion to

the size of the city as to be incredible. In any case I know that if

the Acarnanians and Amphilochians had wished to take Ambracia as the

Athenians and Demosthenes advised, they would have done so without a

blow; as it was, they feared that if the Athenians had it they would

be worse neighbours to them than the present.

After this the Acarnanians allotted a third of the spoils to the

Athenians, and divided the rest among their own different towns. The

share of the Athenians was captured on the voyage home; the arms now

deposited in the Attic temples are three hundred panoplies, which

the Acarnanians set apart for Demosthenes, and which he brought to

Athens in person, his return to his country after the Aetolian

disaster being rendered less hazardous by this exploit. The

Athenians in the twenty ships also went off to Naupactus. The

Acarnanians and Amphilochians, after the departure of Demosthenes

and the Athenians, granted the Ambraciots and Peloponnesians who had

taken refuge with Salynthius and the Agraeans a free retreat from

Oeniadae, to which place they had removed from the country of

Salynthius, and for the future concluded with the Ambraciots a

treaty and alliance for one hundred years, upon the terms following.

It was to be a defensive, not an offensive alliance; the Ambraciots

could not be required to march with the Acarnanians against the

Peloponnesians, nor the Acarnanians with the Ambraciots against the

Athenians; for the rest the Ambraciots were to give up the places

and hostages that they held of the Amphilochians, and not to give help

to Anactorium, which was at enmity with the Acarnanians. With this

arrangement they put an end to the war. After this the Corinthians

sent a garrison of their own citizens to Ambracia, composed of three

hundred heavy infantry, under the command of Xenocleides, son of

Euthycles, who reached their destination after a difficult journey

across the continent. Such was the history of the affair of Ambracia.

The same winter the Athenians in Sicily made a descent from their

ships upon the territory of Himera, in concert with the Sicels, who

had invaded its borders from the interior, and also sailed to the

islands of Aeolus. Upon their return to Rhegium they found the

Athenian general, Pythodorus, son of Isolochus, come to supersede

Laches in the command of the fleet. The allies in Sicily had sailed to

Athens and induced the Athenians to send out more vessels to their

assistance, pointing out that the Syracusans who already commanded

their land were making efforts to get together a navy, to avoid

being any longer excluded from the sea by a few vessels. The Athenians

proceeded to man forty ships to send to them, thinking that the war in

Sicily would thus be the sooner ended, and also wishing to exercise

their navy. One of the generals, Pythodorus, was accordingly sent

out with a few ships; Sophocles, son of Sostratides, and Eurymedon,

son of Thucles, being destined to follow with the main body. Meanwhile

Pythodorus had taken the command of Laches’ ships, and towards the end

of winter sailed against the Locrian fort, which Laches had formerly

taken, and returned after being defeated in battle by the Locrians.

In the first days of this spring, the stream of fire issued from

Etna, as on former occasions, and destroyed some land of the

Catanians, who live upon Mount Etna, which is the largest mountain

in Sicily. Fifty years, it is said, had elapsed since the last

eruption, there having been three in all since the Hellenes have

inhabited Sicily. Such were the events of this winter; and with it

ended the sixth year of this war, of which Thucydides was the

historian.