Besieger of Cities by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781788632331
Publisher: Canelo
Published: 2018-07-10T00:00:00+00:00

* * *

During that winter, the twentieth winter of war since the death of Alexander, Demetrius was too busy to think of Lamia. Once or twice he visited Athens, where Stratocles still ruled the Assembly; but he found it more interesting to train his troops than to drink and make love, even with the hetairae of Athens. He was too busy to play the god; though sometimes, on the advice of Stratocles, he issued divine commands, which the Athenians would obey more willingly than the orders of a Macedonian general.

By spring his splendid army was ready to take the field. The League furnished 25,000 citizen spearmen; young Pyrrhus led 8,000 Epirots and Macedonians, paid soldiers but not exactly mercenaries since many of them had followed him into exile; there were 15,000 ordinary mercenaries; those discreditable allies the pirates provided 8,000 light infantry. But he could recruit only 1,500 horse to balance his 56,000 foot; for good cavalry came from Thessaly, which obeyed Cassander.

It was said that Cassander had been able to raise no more than 30,000 men. The Macedonians were tired of the endless war, and discontented under the rule of a king not of the ancient line.

The plan of campaign was simple. Demetrius would invade Macedonia by way of Thessaly. If Cassander should fight he must lose; if he retired before the invasion his own subjects would overthrow him. Meanwhile Antigonus would advance towards the Hellespont with the Hellene mercenaries of Asia and the numerous Asiatic cavalry. He must beat Lysimachus before he crossed into Europe, but that should not be too difficult; unless indeed Lysimachus abandoned his unprofitable alliance with Cassander to make terms with the new rulers of the world.

Surprisingly, Cassander advanced into Thessaly to meet the invasion. Too weak to offer battle in the open field, he fortified a strong position among the Thessalian hills. The news from Macedonia was even more surprising. Cassander was relying on Lysimachus; not only did he send Macedonian silver to pay his ally’s troops, he encouraged him to recruit barbarian mercenaries from the tribes along the Danube. Kings did not usually trust their allies so far.

The Army of United Hellas halted before Cassander’s entrenchments. Demetrius took a close look at the lines and was discouraged by what he saw. Neither citizen-levies nor mercenaries would willingly face a frontal assault on such a position, and with so few horse he dared not manoeuvre among the hills. After a day of indecision Demetrius dug in before the enemy. He had an easy line of supply back to Hellas, and enough money to last the summer. If he waited, hunger might force Cassander to retire from his fortifications. This business of uniting the civilised world always seemed to go more slowly than expected.

Three days later young Pyrrhus strode into headquarters while Demetrius was going over his accounts. Demetrius looked up with an inward groan. The leader of an allied army must waste a great deal of his time being civil to subordinates.

But on active service Pyrrhus never wasted time.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.