This step was probably determined by news of the movements of Magon, who was in the field anew with a mercenary force reckoned at eighty thousand men—Libyan, Sardinian, and Italian—obtained from Carthage, where hope of Sicilian success was again reviving. Magon directed his march through the Sikel population in the centre of the island, receiving the adhesion of many of their various townships. Agyrium, however, the largest and most important of all, resisted him as an enemy. Agyris, the despot of the place, who had conquered much of the neighboring territory, and had enriched himself by the murder of several opulent proprietors, maintained strict alliance with Dionysius. The latter speedily came to his aid, with a force stated at twenty thousand men, Syracusans and mercenaries. Admitted into the city, and co-operating with Agyris, who furnished abundant supplies, he soon reduced the Carthaginians to great straits. Magon was encamped near the river Chrysas, between Agyrium and Morgantinê; in an enemy’s country, harassed by natives who perfectly knew the ground, and who cut off in detail all his parties sent out to obtain provisions. The Syracusans, indeed, disliking or mistrusting such tardy methods, impatiently demanded leave to make a vigorous attack; and when Dionysius refused, affirming that with a little patience the enemy must be speedily starved out, they left the camp and returned home. Alarmed at their desertion, he forthwith issued a requisition for a large number of slaves to supply their places. But at this very juncture, there arrived a proposition from the Carthaginians to be allowed to make peace and retire; which Dionysius granted, on condition that they should abandon to him the Sikels and their territory—especially Tauromenium. Upon these terms peace was accordingly concluded, and Magon again returned to Carthage.[14]
Relieved from these enemies, Dionysius was enabled to restore those slaves, whom he had levied under the recent requisition, to their masters. Having established his dominion fully among the Sikels, he again marched against Tauromenium, which on this occasion was unable to resist him. The Sikels, who had so valiantly defended it, were driven out, to make room for new inhabitants, chosen from among the mercenaries of Dionysius.[15]
Thus master both of Messênê and Tauromenium, the two most important maritime posts on the Italian side of Sicily, Dionysius prepared to execute his ulterior schemes against the Greeks in the south of Italy. These still powerful, though once far more powerful, cities, were now suffering under a cause of decline common to all the Hellenic colonies on the coast of the continent. The indigenous population of the interior had been reinforced, or enslaved, by more warlike emigrants from behind, who now pressed upon the maritime Grecian cities with encroachment difficult to resist.
It was the Samnites, a branch of the hardy Sabellian race, mountaineers from the central portion of the Apennine range, who had been recently spreading themselves abroad as formidable assailants. About 420 B. C., they had established themselves in Capua and the fertile plains of Campania, expelling or dispossessing the previous Tuscan proprietors. From thence, about 416 B. C., they reduced the neighboring city of Cumæ, the most ancient western colony of the Hellenic race.[16] The neighboring Grecian establishments of Neapolis and Dikæarchia seem also to have come, like Cumæ, under tribute and dominion to the Campanian Samnites, and thus became partially dis-hellenised.[17] These Campanians, of Samnite race, have been frequently mentioned in the two preceding chapters, as employed on mercenary service both in the armies of the Carthaginians, and in those of Dionysius.[18] But the great migration of this warlike race was farther to the south-east, down the line of the Apennines towards the Tarentine Gulf and the Sicilian strait. Under the name of Lucanians, they established a formidable power in these regions, subjugating the Œnotrian population there settled.[19] The Lucanian power seems to have begun and to have gradually increased from about 430 B. C. At its maximum (about 380-360 B. C.), it comprehended most part of the inland territory, and considerable portions of the coast, especially the southern coast,—bounded by an imaginary line drawn from Metapontum on the Tarentine Gulf, across the breadth of Italy to Poseidonia or Pæstum, near the mouth of the river Silaris, on the Tyrrhenian or Lower sea. It was about 356 B. C., that the rural serfs, called Bruttians,[20] rebelled against the Lucanians, and robbed them of the southern part of this territory; establishing an independent dominion in the inland portion of what is now called the Farther Calabria—extending from a boundary line drawn across Italy between Thurii and Läus, down to near the Sicilian strait. About 332 B. C., commenced the occasional intervention of the Epirotic kings from the one side, and the persevering efforts of Rome from the other, which, after long and valiant struggles, left Samnites, Lucanians, Bruttians, all Roman subjects.
At the period which we have now reached, these Lucanians, having conquered the Greek cities of Poseidonia (or Pæstum) and Läus, with much of the territory lying between the Gulfs of Poseidonia and Tarentum, severely harassed the inhabitants of Thurii, and alarmed all the neighboring Greek cities down to Rhegium. So serious was the alarm of these cities, that several of them contracted an intimate defensive alliance, strengthening for the occasion that feeble synodical band, and sense of Italiot communion,[21] the form and trace of which seems to have subsisted without the reality, even under marked enmity between particular cities. The conditions of the newly-contracted alliance were most stringent; not only binding each city to assist at the first summons any other city invaded by the Lucanians, but also pronouncing, that if this obligation were neglected, the generals of the disobedient city should be condemned to death.[22] However, at this time the Italiot Greeks were not less afraid of Dionysius and his aggressive enterprises from the south, than of the Lucanians from the north; and their defensive alliance was intended against both. To Dionysius, on the contrary, the invasion of the Lucanians from landward was a fortunate incident for the success of his own schemes. Their concurrent designs against the same enemies, speedily led to the formation of a distinct alliance between the two.[23] Among the allies of Dionysius, too, we must number the Epizephyrian Lokrians; who not only did not join the Italiot confederacy, but espoused his cause against it with ardor. The enmity of the Lokrians against their neighbors, the Rhegines, was ancient and bitter; exceeded only by that of Dionysius, who never forgave the refusal of the Rhegines to permit him to marry a wife out of their city, and was always grateful to the Lokrians for having granted to him the privilege which their neighbors had refused.
Wishing as yet, if possible, to avoid provoking the other members of the Italiot confederacy, Dionysius still professed to be revenging himself exclusively upon Rhegium; against which he conducted a powerful force from Syracuse. Twenty thousand foot, one thousand horse, and one hundred and twenty ships of war, are mentioned as the total of his armament. Disembarking near Lokri, he marched across the lower part of the peninsula in a westerly direction, ravaged with fire and sword the Rhegian territory, and then encamped near the strait on the northern side of Rhegium. His fleet followed coastwise round Cape Zephyrium to the same point. While he was pressing the siege, the members of the Italiot synod despatched from Kroton a fleet of sixty sail, to assist in the defence. Their ships, having rounded Cape Zephyrium, were nearing Rhegium from the south, when Dionysius himself approached to attack them, with fifty ships detached from his force. Though inferior in number, his fleet was probably superior in respect to size and equipment; so that the Krotoniate captains, not daring to hazard a battle, ran their ships ashore. Dionysius here attacked them, and would have towed off all the ships (without their crews) as prizes, had not the scene of action lain so near to Rhegium, that the whole force of the city could come forth in reinforcement, while his own army was on the opposite side of the town. The numbers and courage of the Rhegines baffled his efforts, rescued the ships, and hauled them all up upon the shore in safety. Obliged to retire without success, Dionysius was farther overtaken by a terrific storm, which exposed his fleet to the utmost danger. Seven of his ships were driven ashore; their crews, fifteen hundred in number, being either drowned, or falling into the hands of the Rhegines. The rest, after great danger and difficulty, either rejoined the main fleet or got into the harbor of Messênê; where Dionysius himself in his quinquereme also found refuge, but only at midnight, and after imminent risk for several hours. Disheartened by this misfortune as well as by the approach of winter, he withdrew his forces for the present, and returned to Syracuse.[24]
A part of his fleet, however, under Leptines, was despatched northward along the south-western coast of Italy to the Gulf of Elea, to coöperate with the Lucanians; who from that coast and from inland were invading the inhabitants of Thurii on the Tarentine Gulf. Thurii was the successor, though with far inferior power, of the ancient Sybaris; whose dominion had once stretched across from sea to sea, comprehending the town of Läus, now a Lucanian possession.[25] Immediately on the appearance of the Lucanians, the Thurians had despatched an urgent message to their allies, who were making all haste to arrive, pursuant to covenant. But before such junction could possibly take place, the Thurians, confiding in their own native force of fourteen thousand foot, and one thousand horse, marched against the enemy single-handed. The Lucanian invaders retreated, pursued by the Thurians, who followed them even into that mountainous region of the Appenines which stretches between the two seas, and which presents the most formidable danger and difficulty for all military operations.[26] They assailed successfully a fortified post or village of the Lucanians, which fell into their hands with a rich plunder. By such partial advantage they were so elated, that they ventured to cross over all the mountain passes even to the neighborhood of the southern sea, with the intention of attacking the flourishing town of Läus[27]—once the dependency of their Sybaritan predecessors. But the Lucanians, having allured them into these impracticable paths, closed upon them behind with greatly increased numbers, forbade all retreat, and shut them up in a plain surrounded with high and precipitous cliffs. Attacked in this plain by numbers double their own, the unfortunate Thurians underwent one of the most bloody defeats recorded in Grecian history. Out of their fourteen thousand men, ten thousand were slain, under merciless order from the Lucanians to give no quarter. The remainder contrived to flee to a hill near the sea-shore, from whence they saw a fleet of ships of war coasting along at no great distance. Distracted with terror, they were led to fancy, or to hope, that these were the ships expected from Rhegium to their aid; though the Rhegines would naturally send their ships, when demanded, to Thurii, on the Tarentine Gulf, not to the Lower sea near Läus. Under this impression, one thousand of them swam off from the shore to seek protection on shipboard. But they found themselves, unfortunately, on board the fleet of Leptines, brother and admiral of Dionysius, come for the express purpose of aiding the Lucanians. With a generosity not less unexpected than honorable, this officer saved their lives, and also, as it would appear, the lives of all the other defenceless survivors; persuading or constraining the Lucanians to release them, on receiving one mina of silver per man.[28]
This act of Hellenic sympathy restored three or four thousand citizens on ransom to Thurii, instead of leaving them to be massacred or sold by the barbarous Lucanians, and procured the warmest esteem for Leptines personally among the Thurians and other Italiot Greeks. But it incurred the strong displeasure of Dionysius, who now proclaimed openly his project of subjugating these Greeks, and was anxious to encourage the Lucanians as indispensable allies. Accordingly he dismissed Leptines, and named as admiral his other brother Thearides. He then proceeded to conduct a fresh expedition; no longer intended against Rhegium alone, but against all the Italiot Greeks. He departed from Syracuse with a powerful force—twenty thousand foot and three thousand horse, with which, he marched by land in five days to Messênê; his fleet under Thearides accompanying him—forty ships of war, and three hundred transports with provisions. Having first successfully surprised and captured near the Lipari isles a Rhegian squadron of ten ships, the crews of which he constituted prisoners at Messênê, he transported his army across the strait into Italy, and laid siege to Kaulonia—on the eastern coast of the peninsula, and conterminous with the northern border of his allies the Lokrians. He attacked this place vigorously, with the best siege machines which his arsenal furnished.
The Italiot Greeks, on the other hand, mustered their united force to relieve it. Their chief centre of action was Kroton where most of the Syracusan exiles, the most forward of all champions in the cause, were now assembled. One of these exiles, Helôris (who had before been named general by the Rhegines), was intrusted with the command of the collective army; an arrangement neutralizing all local jealousies. Under the cordial sentiment prevailing, an army was mustered at Kroton, estimated at twenty-five thousand foot and two thousand horse; by what cities furnished, or in what proportion, we are unable to say.[29] At the head of these troops, Helôris marched southward from Kroton to the river Elleporus not far from Kaulonia; where Dionysius, raising the siege, met him.[30] He was about four miles and a half from the Krotoniate army, when he learnt from his scouts that Helôris with a chosen regiment of five hundred men (perhaps Syracusan exiles like himself), was considerably in advance of the main body. Moving rapidly forward in the night, Dionysius surprised this advanced guard at break of day, completely isolated from the rest. Helôris, while he despatched instant messages to accelerate the coming up of the main body, defended himself with his small band against overwhelming superiority of numbers. But the odds were too great. After an heroic resistance, he was slain, and his companions nearly all cut to pieces, before the main body, though they came up at full speed, could arrive.
The hurried pace of the Italiot army, however, though it did not suffice to save the general, was of fatal efficacy in deranging their own soldierlike army. Confused and disheartened by finding that Helôris was slain, which left them without a general to direct the battle or restore order, the Italiots fought for some time against Dionysius, but were at length defeated with severe loss. They effected their retreat from the field of battle to a neighboring eminence, very difficult to attack, yet destitute of water and provisions. Here Dionysius blocked them up, without attempting an attack, but keeping the strictest guard round the hill during the whole remaining day and the ensuing night. The heat of the next day, with total want of water, so subdued their courage, that they sent to Dionysius a herald with propositions, entreating to be allowed to depart on a stipulated ransom. But the terms were peremptorily refused; they were ordered to lay down their arms, and surrender at discretion. Against this terrible requisition they stood out yet awhile, until the increasing pressure of physical exhaustion and suffering drove them to surrender, about the eighth hour of the day.[31]