3. Hills between Kopais and Euripus.
4. Mount Dirphys in Eubœa.
5. Valley of Stream A 4.
6. Temenos of Demeter.
7. Valley of Stream A 5.
8. The Plateau.
[To face page [502].
It is not difficult at the present day to follow the course of this struggle.[219] After their commander’s fall the Persians gave way, and were pushed down the gradual slope towards the stream valleys which ran on either side of the precinct of Demeter,[220] affording them direct lines of retreat to their camp. The stream of fugitives would divide where the rise of the ground towards the precinct begins, and would naturally take the easier and quicker routes afforded by these valleys. H. ix. 65. They fled in disorder to their camp and stockade. Herodotus notes with pious emphasis the fact that, though the fight had raged near the temple, none of the sacrilegious destroyers of her temple at Eleusis fell within the consecrated ground about this shrine of Demeter. On more materialistic grounds it would be extremely unlikely that men flying for their lives in panic flight should ascend the hill whereon the sanctuary and its precinct stood, when easier avenues of retreat were ready for them on either side of it.[221]
Such were the fortunes of what had been the Greek right wing. It is now necessary to follow the movements of the Athenians who had been stationed on the left of the second position.
It is clear that the two days’ cavalry attack had driven back the Greek left from the Asopos; and, in the final phase of its tenure of the second position, the army must have been massed on the summit of the Asopos ridge; so that the left would be at no great distance from the right.