The force of the new enemy whom his unsuccessful attack had raised into activity, soon made itself felt. The Ætolian envoys despatched to Sparta and Corinth found it easy to obtain the promise of a considerable force to join them in an expedition against Naupaktus: and about the month of September, a body of three thousand Peloponnesian hoplites, including five hundred from the newly-founded colony of Herakleia, was assembled at Delphi, under the command of Eurylochus, Makarius, and Menedemus. Their road of march to Naupaktus lay through the territory of the Ozolian Lokrians, whom they proposed either to gain over or to subdue. With Amphissa, the largest Lokrian township, and in the immediate neighborhood of Delphi, they had little difficulty,—for the Amphissians were in a state of feud with their neighbors on the other side of Parnassus, and were afraid that the new armament might become the instrument of Phocian antipathy against them. On the very first application they joined the Spartan alliance, and gave hostages for their fidelity to it: moreover, they persuaded many other Lokrian petty villages—among others the Myoneis, who were masters of the most difficult pass on the road—to do the same. Eurylochus received from these various townships reinforcements for his army, as well as hostages for their fidelity, whom he deposited at Kytinium in Doris: and he was thus enabled to march through all the territory of the Ozolian Lokrians without resistance; except from Œneon and Eupalion, both which places he took by force. Having arrived in the territory of Naupaktus, he was there joined by the full force of the Ætolians; and their joint efforts, after laying waste all the neighborhood, captured the Corinthian colony of Molykreion, which had become subject to the Athenian empire.[489]
Naupaktus, with a large circuit of wall and thinly defended, was in the greatest danger, and would certainly have been taken, had it not been saved by the efforts of the Athenian Demosthenês, who had remained there ever since the unfortunate Ætolian expedition. Apprized of the coming march of Eurylochus, he went personally to the Akarnanians, and persuaded them to send a force to aid in the defence of Naupaktus: for a long time they turned a deaf ear to his solicitations, in consequence of the refusal to blockade Leukas, but they were at length induced to consent. At the head of one thousand Akarnanian hoplites, Demosthenês threw himself into Naupaktus; and Eurylochus, seeing that the town had thus been placed out of the reach of attack, abandoned all his designs upon it,—marching farther westward to the neighboring territories of Ætolia, Kalydon, Pleuron, and Proschium, near the Achelôus and the borders of Akarnania. The Ætolians, who had come down to join him for the common purpose of attacking Naupaktus, here abandoned him and retired to their respective homes. But the Ambrakiots, rejoiced to find so considerable a Peloponnesian force in their neighborhood, prevailed upon him to assist them in attacking the Amphilochian Argos as well as Akarnania; assuring him that there was now a fair prospect of bringing the whole of the population of the mainland, between the Ambrakian and Corinthian gulfs, under the supremacy of Lacedæmon. Having persuaded Eurylochus thus to keep his forces together and ready, they themselves with three thousand Ambrakiot hoplites invaded the territory of the Amphilochian Argos, and captured the fortified hill of Olpæ immediately bordering on the Ambrakian gulf, about three miles from Argos itself: this hill had been in former days employed by the Akarnanians as a place for public judicial congress of the whole nation.[490]
This enterprise, communicated forthwith to Eurylochus, was the signal for movement on both sides. The Akarnanians marched with their whole force to the protection of Argos, and occupied a post called Krênæ in the Amphilochian territory, hoping to be able to prevent Eurylochus from effecting his junction with the Ambrakiots at Olpæ. They at the same time sent urgent messages to Demosthenês at Naupaktus, and to the Athenian guard-squadron of twenty triremes under Aristotelês and Hierophon, entreating their aid in the present need, and inviting Demosthenês to act as their commander. They had forgotten their displeasure against him arising out of his recent refusal to blockade at Leukas,—for which they probably thought that he had been sufficiently punished by his disgrace in Ætolia; while they knew and esteemed his military capacity. In fact, the accident whereby he had been detained at Naupaktus, now worked fortunately for them as well as for him: it secured to them a commander whom all of them respected, obviating the jealousies among their own numerous petty townships,—it procured for him the means of retrieving his own reputation at Athens. Demosthenês, not backward in seizing this golden opportunity, came speedily into the Ambrakian gulf with the twenty Athenian triremes, conducting two hundred Messenian hoplites and sixty Athenian bowmen. He found the whole Akarnanian force concentrated at the Amphilochian Argos, and was named general along with the Akarnanian generals, but in reality enjoying the whole direction of the operations.
He found also the whole of the enemy’s force, both the three thousand Ambrakiot hoplites and the Peloponnesian division under Eurylochus, already united and in position at Olpæ, about three miles off. For Eurylochus, as soon as he was apprized that the Ambrakiots had reached Olpæ, broke up forthwith his camp at Proschium in Ætolia, knowing that his best chance of traversing the hostile territory of Akarnania consisted in celerity: the whole Akarnanian force, however, had already gone to Argos, so that his march was unopposed through that country. He crossed the Achelôus, marched westward of Stratus, through the Akarnanian townships of Phytia, Medeon, and Limnæa, then quitting both Akarnania and the direct road from Akarnania to Argos, he struck rather eastward into the mountainous district of Thyamus, in the territory of the Agræans, who were enemies of the Akarnanians. From hence he descended at night into the territory of Argos, and passed unobserved under cover of the darkness between Argos itself, and the Akarnanian force at Krênæ; so as to join in safety the three thousand Ambrakiots at Olpæ; to their great joy,—for they had feared that the enemy at Argos and Krênæ would have arrested his passage; and feeling their force inadequate to contend alone, they had sent pressing messages home to demand large reinforcements for themselves and their own protection.[491]
Demosthenês thus found an united and formidable enemy, superior in number to himself, at Olpæ, and conducted his troops from Argos and Krênæ to attack them. The ground was rugged and mountainous, and between the two armies lay a steep ravine which neither liked to be the first to pass, so that they lay for five days inactive. If Herodotus had been our historian, he would probably have ascribed this delay to unfavorable sacrifices (which may probably have been the case), and would have given us interesting anecdotes respecting the prophets on both sides; but the more positive and practical genius of Thucydidês merely acquaints us, that on the sixth day both armies put themselves in order of battle,—both probably tired of waiting. The ground being favorable for ambuscade, Demosthenês hid in a bushy dell four hundred hoplites and light-armed, so that they might spring up suddenly in the midst of the action upon the Peloponnesian left, which outflanked his right. He was himself on the right with the Messenians and some Athenians, opposed to Eurylochus on the left of the enemy: the Akarnanians, with the Amphilochian akontists, or darters, occupied his left, opposed to the Ambrakiot hoplites: Ambrakiots and Peloponnesians were, however, intermixed in the line of Eurylochus, and it was only the Mantineans who maintained a separate station of their own towards the left centre. The battle accordingly began, and Eurylochus with his superior numbers was proceeding to surround Demosthenês, when on a sudden the men in ambush rose up and set upon his rear. A panic seized his men, and they made no resistance worthy of their Peloponnesian reputation: they broke and fled, while Eurylochus, doubtless exposing himself with peculiar bravery in order to restore the battle, was early slain. Demosthenês, having near him his best troops, pressed them vigorously and their panic communicated itself to the troops in the centre, so that all were put to flight and pursued to Olpæ. On the right of the line of Eurylochus, the Ambrakiots, the most warlike Greeks in the Epirotic regions, completely defeated the Akarnanians opposed to them, and carried their pursuit even as far as Argos. So complete, however, was the victory gained by Demosthenês over the remaining troops, that these Ambrakiots had great difficulty in fighting their way back to Olpæ, which was not accomplished without severe loss, and late in the evening. Among all the beaten troops, the Mantineans were those who best maintained their retreating order.[492] The loss in the army of Demosthenês was about three hundred: that of the opponents much greater, but the number is not specified.
Of the three Spartan commanders, two, Eurylochus and Makarius, had been slain: the third, Menedæus, found himself beleaguered both by sea and land,—the Athenian squadron being on guard along the coast. It would seem, indeed, that he might have fought his way to Ambrakia, especially as he would have met the Ambrakiot reinforcement coming from the city. But whether this were possible or not, the commander, too much dispirited to attempt it, took advantage of the customary truce granted for burying the dead, to open negotiations with Demosthenês and the Akarnanian generals, for the purpose of obtaining an unmolested retreat. This was peremptorily refused: but Demosthenês (with the consent of the Akarnanian leaders) secretly intimated to the Spartan commander and those immediately around him, together with the Mantineans and other Peloponnesian troops,—that if they chose to make a separate and surreptitious retreat, abandoning their comrades, no opposition would be offered: for he designed by this means, not merely to isolate the Ambrakiots, the great enemies of Argos and Akarnania, along with the body of miscellaneous mercenaries who had come under Eurylochus, but also to obtain the more permanent advantage of disgracing the Spartans and Peloponnesians in the eyes of the Epirotic Greeks, as cowards and traitors to military fellowship. The very reason which prompted Demosthenês to grant a separate facility of escape, ought to have been imperative with Menedæus and the Peloponnesians around him, to make them spurn it with indignation: yet such was their anxiety for personal safety, that this disgraceful convention was accepted, ratified, and carried into effect forthwith. It stands alone in Grecian history, as a specimen of separate treason in officers, to purchase safety for themselves by abandoning those under their command. Had the officers been Athenian, it would have been doubtless quoted as an example of the pretended faithlessness of democracy: but as it was the act of a Spartan commander in conjunction with many leading Peloponnesians, we can only remark upon it as a farther manifestation of that intra-Peloponnesian selfishness, and carelessness of obligation towards extra-Peloponnesian Greeks, which we found so lamentably prevalent during the invasion of Xerxes; in this case indeed heightened by the fact that the men deserted were fellow-Dorians and fellow-soldiers, who had just fought in the same ranks.
As soon as the ceremony of burying the dead had been completed, Menedæus, and the Peloponnesians who were protected by this secret convention, stole away slyly and in small bands under pretence of collecting wood and vegetables: on getting to a little distance, they quickened their pace and made off,—much to the dismay of the Ambrakiots, who ran after them and tried to overtake them. The Akarnanians pursued, and their leaders had much difficulty in explaining to them the secret convention just concluded. Nor was it without some suspicions of treachery, and even personal hazard, from their own troops, that they at length caused the fugitive Peloponnesians to be respected; while the Ambrakiots, the most obnoxious of the two to Akarnanian feeling, were pursued without any reserve, and two hundred of them were slain before they could escape into the friendly territory of the Agræans.[493] To distinguish Ambrakiots from Peloponnesians, similar in race and dialect, was, however, no easy task, and much dispute arose in individual cases.
Unfairly as this loss fell upon Ambrakia, a far more severe calamity was yet in store for her. The large reinforcement from the city, which had been urgently invoked by the detachment at Olpæ, started in due course as soon as it could be got ready, and entered the territory of Amphilochia about the time when the battle of Olpæ was fought, but ignorant of that misfortune, and hoping to arrive soon enough to stand by their friends. Their march was made known to Demosthenês, on the day after the battle, by the Amphilochians; who, at the same time, indicated to him the best way of surprising them in the rugged and mountainous road along which they had to march, at the two conspicuous peaks called Idomenê, immediately above a narrow pass leading farther on to Olpæ. It was known beforehand, by the line of march of the Ambrakiots, that they would rest for the night at the lower of these two peaks, ready to march through the pass on the next morning. On that same night, a detachment of Amphilochians, under direction from Demosthenês, seized the higher of the two peaks; while that commander himself, dividing his forces into two divisions, started from his position at Olpæ in the evening after supper. One of these divisions, having the advantage of Amphilochian guides in their own country, marched by an unfrequented mountain road to Idomenê; the other, under Demosthenês himself, went directly through the pass leading from Idomenê to Olpæ. After marching all night, they reached the camp of the Ambrakiots a little before daybreak,—Demosthenês himself with his Messenians in the van. The surprise was complete; the Ambrakiots were found still lying down and asleep, while even the sentinels, uninformed of the recent battle,—hearing themselves accosted in the Doric dialect by the Messenians, whom Demosthenês had placed in front for that express purpose, and not seeing very clearly in the morning twilight, mistook them for some of their own fellow-citizens coming back from the other camp. The Akarnanians and Messenians thus fell among the Ambrakiots sleeping and unarmed, and without any possibility of resistance. Large numbers of them were destroyed on the spot, and the remainder fled in all directions among the neighboring mountains, none knowing the roads and the country; it was the country of the Amphilochians, subjects of Ambrakia, but subjects averse to their condition, and now making use of their perfect local knowledge and light-armed equipment, to inflict a terrible revenge on their masters. Some of the Ambrakiots became entangled in ravines,—others fell into ambuscades laid by the Amphilochians. Others again, dreading most of all to fall into the hands of the Amphilochians, barbaric in race as well as intensely hostile in feeling, and seeing no other possibility of escaping them, swam off to the Athenian ships cruising along the shore. There were but a small proportion of them who survived to return to Ambrakia.[494]
The complete victory of Idomenê, admirably prepared by Demosthenês, was achieved with scarce any loss: and the Akarnanians, after erecting their trophy, despoiled the enemy’s dead and carried off the arms thus taken to Argos.
On the morrow they were visited by a herald, coming from those Ambrakiots who had fled into the Agræan territory, after the battle of Olpæ, and the subsequent pursuit. He came with the customary request from defeated soldiers, for permission to bury their dead who had fallen in that pursuit. Neither he, nor those from whom he came, knew anything of the destruction of their brethren at Idomenê,—just as these latter had been ignorant of the defeat at Olpæ; while, on the other hand, the Akarnanians in the camp, whose minds were full of the more recent and capital advantage at Idomenê, supposed that the message referred to the men slain in that engagement. The numerous panoplies just acquired at Idomenê lay piled up in the camp, and the herald, on seeing them, was struck with amazement at the size of the heap, so much exceeding the number of those who were missing in his own detachment. An Akarnanian present asked the reason of his surprise, and inquired how many of his comrades had been slain,—meaning to refer to the slain at Idomenê. “About two hundred,” the herald replied. “Yet these arms here show, not that number, but more than a thousand men.” “Then they are not the arms of those who fought with us.” “Nay, but they are; if ye were the persons who fought yesterday at Idomenê.” “We fought with no one yesterday: it was the day before yesterday, in the retreat.” “O, then ye have to learn, that we were engaged yesterday with these others, who were on their march as reinforcement from the city of Ambrakia.”