Mediterranean Hegemon of Ancient Greece Chapter 1223: The Golden Cicada Sheds Its Shell

When the Thessalian Army departed, Iphicrates had continued leading the Greek expeditionary army—whose morale was already wavering—to keep the pressure on the Daionian camp. That was one reason the very thing he feared most had finally come to pass. But he had no time to worry about that now; his orders remained unchanged and had to be executed.

Of course, orchestrating an immediate retreat was impossible for Iphicrates. Unlike the Daionian Army, the Greek expeditionary army handled logistics piecemeal. By regulation, each city-state's contingent was responsible for its own provisions. Lacking a centralized logistical department, they had instead established a market near Lepreon where merchants from various city-states sold grain and other supplies for the troops to purchase. Some of these merchants had even followed their respective armies all the way from home. Only the Athenian and Thessalian forces operated differently. Thanks to Persian aid for Athens, and Jason's unification of the Thessalian city-states, both possessed the financial and material wealth to form a proper Supply Camp to keep their soldiers fully provisioned. Consequently, on the morning Patroclus led his troops into Central Greece, the outskirts of the small Peloponnesian city of Lepreon were a bustling mess. Soldiers from various city-states were striking their tents, while merchants scrambled to pack their wares and organize their pack animals for departure. The entire scene was a disorganized frenzy.

Fearing a sudden attack, Iphicrates ordered his nearly 20,000 assembled Athenian soldiers into a defensive formation, leaving the task of breaking down their tents and packing their equipment entirely to the Supply Camp.

The Daionian Army never appeared, but the sheer effort of breaking camp consumed a massive amount of time. It was not until the afternoon that the army finally began its march east.

During this delay, the army of Elis and the contingents from the various Arcadia city-states successively departed from the coalition. This whittled the force under Iphicrates's command down to fewer than 30,000 men, infecting the remaining soldiers with a growing sense of unease.

Iphicrates constantly urged the Greek expeditionary army to quicken its pace. Even when dusk fell, he refused to let them halt and rest. Only when night fully descended and they reached the border between Megalopolis and Tegea did he finally order them to make camp.

Conveniently, the Daionian Army had previously constructed a camp here. The Greek expeditionary army had even occupied it briefly during their assault on Laconia, so the troops were able to move in and settle down for the night immediately.

While the exhausted soldiers quickly drifted off to sleep, Iphicrates remained in his command tent, frowning in deep thought. From the moment they began their retreat until now, everything had gone entirely too smoothly. The Daionian Army had not harassed or pursued them once, and his returning scouts reported that the Daionian camp on the northern border of Messenia remained completely quiet.

It was true that the Daionian forces had strictly maintained a defensive posture thus far, but the Greek expeditionary army had made a massive commotion during their retreat today. Did the enemy truly have no desire to seek reprisals? Iphicrates could not shake his suspicions.

Choosing to take a long detour instead of the most convenient path immediately drew the ire of the Argives. Argos bordered the western edge of the Plain of Tegea, and the Argive citizen soldiers had been out fighting for over two months. They had hoped to use this march as an excuse to swing by their homes. Iphicrates's sudden change in route crushed that hope, and the Argives outright refused to comply.

Since Argos was a major power within the Greek League, having dispatched 7,000 troops—second only to Thessaly and Athens—they held significant weight in this new alliance. Iphicrates had no choice but to try and persuade them, citing his fear that the Daionian Army might intercept them in the Tegea region. But the Argives shared the same stubborn, conservative temperament as the Spartans. Once they made a decision, they refused to back down. Had they been easily swayed, they would have submitted to Sparta's hegemony long ago during the last century.

Seeing that the Argives could not be reasoned with, Iphicrates pivoted. He quickly proposed a new plan: the Argive army and the rest of the Greek expeditionary army would march separately and rendezvous at Corinth. The Argives agreed to this.

Iphicrates had an underlying motive. The Greek expeditionary army's overall strength had been severely depleted. If the normally cautious Daionian Army dared to show up in the Tegea region to block them, it meant the enemy was absolutely certain of victory, putting the entire coalition at risk of annihilation. It was better to let the Argives test the waters. If there really was a Daionian ambush waiting in Tegea, the Argives would draw their attention, buying enough time for the rest of the Greek expeditionary army—mostly comprised of Athenians—to escape safely. If the path was clear, the coalition would merely suffer a minor detour, and everyone would end up happy.

Naturally, Iphicrates hoped for the latter outcome. Unfortunately, his instincts were entirely correct.

Back when Patroclus was gathering his army in Thessaly to march south, he had sent warships from the First Fleet to deliver the news to Crotokatax in Messenia. After discussing the matter with Plintors, Crotokatax deduced that the Greek expeditionary army would soon retreat. Consequently, he decided to quietly withdraw his legionaries stationed on Messenia's northern border back to Laconia, leaving the camp's defense to the newly formed Messenian reserves.

Because the Greek expeditionary army had not launched any concerted attacks against the Daionian camp in recent days, Iphicrates never noticed the swap.

Crotokatax had also dispatched mountain scouts to keep a close eye on the Lepreon Camp. The moment the Greek expeditionary army began its retreat, the scouts rushed back to Laconia to report the news. Thus, by the time the coalition settled into the former Daionian camp in Megalopolis, the First Legion and Seventh Legion of Daionia had already quietly slipped into Tegean territory.

The plan Plintors devised was straightforward: wait for the Greek expeditionary army to reach Tegea the next day, then have the First and Seventh Legions, along with the newly formed Laconian cohort, deploy ahead of them to block their path. Once the enemy was forced to halt and prepare for battle, Commander Crotokatax would lead the Fourth Legion, the Sixth Legion, and the First Cavalry Legion—all lying in ambush at Laconia's northern border—to rush the battlefield and catch the enemy in a pincer attack, wiping out the Greek expeditionary army completely.

But to Plintors's surprise, this meticulously woven net only managed to catch the Argive army—a moderately sized fish. To make matters worse, dealing with them delayed the Daionian Army for the better part of the day.

Not only had Iphicrates executed a "golden cicada sheds its shell" stratagem, slipping the main force of the Greek expeditionary army out of the encirclement, but he had also ordered his troops to abandon their accompanying merchants and pack animals to increase their march speed. As a result, they managed to reach the City of Corinth just ahead of the pursuing Daionian Army.

Iphicrates's main force met up with the troops that had previously been besieging Mantineia, bolstering their numbers back up to over 30,000 men. However, he quickly received terrible news: the Thessalian Army had been crushed, and the Daionian forces that landed in the north had already invaded Attica. Refusing to rest in Corinth, he frantically prepared to march his army toward Attica to defend Athens.

But just then, the Greek expeditionary army splintered once again. Corinth refused to let its city-state's citizen soldiers follow him, as their own city was now threatened by the Daionian Army approaching from the south. The citizens of Phocis and Locris, deeply anxious for the safety of their respective city-states, ignored all of Iphicrates's pleas and insisted on risking a march through the Boeotian League—which had already declared war on the Greek League—to return home.

As a result, the entire Greek expeditionary army was reduced to just over 10,000 troops from Athens and its Maritime Alliance. The grand coalition now existed in name only.

...

After Patroclus's forces linked up with the Theban Army, their first target was not an Athenian town, but Oropus, the easternmost city-state in the Boeotia Region.

Although Oropus belonged to the Boeotia Region, it had always aligned itself with Athens and refused to join the Boeotian League. Thebes had long considered the city an eyesore, holding back only out of fear of Athenian intervention. By selecting it as his initial target, Patroclus was expressing Daionia's goodwill toward Thebes.

More than 40,000 troops of the Daunian Allied Forces quickly encircled Oropus, cutting off all avenues of escape. With no sign of Athenian reinforcements anywhere, several thousand Theban soldiers launched a furious assault on the city.

A day of fierce fighting failed to breach the walls, but it inflicted heavy casualties on the defenders. Faced with such overwhelming enemy might and entirely devoid of outside aid, the despairing citizens of Oropus had no choice but to open their gates and surrender early on the fourth morning.

With their morale surging, the Daunian Allied Forces pivoted and advanced toward the Athenian border.

A continuous mountain range served as a natural border between Athens's Attica region and the Boeotia Region. Upon hearing the news of the Thessalian Army's crushing defeat and the Daionian Army's southern advance, Athens initiated an emergency military mobilization. They rapidly mustered an army of 10,000 men, absorbed the nearly 8,000 mercenaries formerly employed by Jason, and rushed them to the border to mount a defense.

In the north, they centered their defensive lines on Mount Parnitha. In the south, they anchored their defenses on Mount Sisaron. Considering that Thebes-controlled Plataea was not far from Mount Sisaron and offered a convenient staging ground for an assault, Athens deployed a greater number of their elite mercenaries to the southern ridges.

Patroclus certainly seemed intent on breaking through the southern mountains, leading more than half his army to garrison at Plataea. In reality, however, the Daunian Allied Forces' true focus was the northern front. The Gallic Reserve Cohort, the Twelfth Legion, and the third legion of Theonia had all been deployed to the north. Led by Lizarus, they were the first to launch an attack on the defensive line.