ancient greece mediterranean ruler

Chapter 452 Siege of Crotone ([-])
Those slaves staggered to the front of Luzhai, and the soldiers on the city began to fire arrows, and suddenly there were screams from below...

Just as Colbus and the others bent their bows and nocked arrows again and drew out their javelins, the slaves below the city shouted loudly: "Don't let go of the arrows. I am Siphonus, son of Hipparchus!"

"I am Palarus! Neighbor of Askamas!"

……

The Crotone soldiers were stunned: the people under the city were not slaves, but their compatriots who had been captured after the failure of the previous battle!

"Damn the people of Syracuse! Dionysius deserves to go to Hades!" Askamas punched the battlements angrily, and blood immediately stained his fists. He did not expect that Dionysius They actually ignored Greek tradition and allowed Greek prisoners to serve as human shields that were consumed during the siege.

At this time, Dionysius, who had followed the archers to the earthen ramparts, looked down at the situation below the city with a sneer on his face.You must know that after the last battle, Syracuse captured nearly 2000 prisoners. After intimidation, beatings, fasting... and other torture, they forced more than 2000 people to be willing to pull out the deer stockade under the city and fill it up for Syracuse. Moat in exchange for the promise not to be tortured or sold into slavery.Among these [-] people, there are not only Crotones, but also a few Siliting and Trina people, but no Dionians.On the one hand, the Dionysian soldiers were the least captured, and more than half of them have been replaced by Dionysius. The remaining Bruti captives, Dionysius has other uses, and the pure Greeks Most of the Lucanians have a stubborn temper...

Dionysius did not think about this annoying little problem. He was now proud of the strategy he used and wanted to see how the Crotones would respond. For this reason, he ordered the archers not to shoot arrows and save their strength and arrows. Arrow, wait until the whole army attacks, and then clear the obstacles on the city wall for the army.

On the top of the city, the adjutant asked eagerly: "General, what should we do?!"

Askamas did not answer immediately. While he asked the guards to bandage his left hand, he watched sadly as the Crotone prisoners below the city were forced by the Syracuseans to walk to the moat and put the earth bags on their backs. Throw it into the moat, and then turn around to destroy the deer stronghold carefully laid out by the defenders.

Askamas secretly cursed these traitors, but he did not dare to order an attack on them because he thought of the fact that Crotone's former mortal enemy Thurii and their chief general Kunogorata ordered the city gates to be closed. , although he saved the whole city, it caused the death of some citizen soldiers. The people were unyielding and not only drove away Kunogorata, but also harmed his family. Now he directly ordered the killing of Croto below. Even if the enemy's attack is repelled, how can the family members of these thousands of deceased people not hate themselves in the future? I am afraid that my fate will be even worse than that of Kunogolata!
Askamas is not a general who only knows how to fight. He has been elected as a general many times in Crotone, a large Greek state with tens of thousands of citizens. His political quality is not low.After quickly weighing the pros and cons, he said to his adjutant: "Go to the city hall immediately and tell the council what is going on here and let them make a decision."

After the adjutant left, Askamas saw that a small section of the moat was about to be cut off, he couldn't help sighing, and ordered the left and right: "You guys quickly find some ropes and hang them down below the city, so that they can climb up. "

He did not dare to open the city gate, fearing that the people of Syracuse would take advantage of the opportunity and swarm in.

The soldiers hurriedly found a rope and hung it down to the bottom of the city, and then shouted to their compatriots: "Come here quickly!! Grab the rope and climb up!!"

After hearing this, some prisoners staggered across the filled moat, but Syracuse's light infantry immediately shot arrows at them, making these weak prisoners who had never had enough to eat easily shot down.

The soldiers at the top of the city fired back angrily, but most of them were unable to hit the Syracuseans hiding behind the arrow-blocking carts, and instead accidentally injured their own compatriots.

The prisoners no longer dared to act rashly.

Seeing this, Askamas reluctantly gave up on rescuing his compatriots.

The Crotone Council was obviously not mentally prepared for Syracuse's use of prisoners to attack the city. They argued fiercely, but they were never able to make a decision. This gave the Syracuseans ample time to let the prisoners fill up the gap for several long days. The moat was sectioned and the deer villages on both sides of the moat were cleaned up.

Askamas looked at all this depressedly, but he quickly forced himself to cheer up: In this case, let us fight face to face!

As if hearing Askamas' inner cry, the prisoners were driven back and never appeared again.

Seeing that everything was ready, Dionysius confidently issued the order from the high platform: "Attack!"

As soon as he finished speaking, he suddenly felt a chill on his face. He stretched out his hand and touched it, and it turned out to be water.

It's raining?Dionysius looked up at the sky. The previously clear sky became a little gloomy at some point. Although it was just a small raindrop, Dionysius was a little worried because the weight of the siege tower would cause the ground to become soft after being soaked by the rain. As a result, the wheels got stuck in the mud and could not be pushed.

"Speed ​​up the attack!" He ordered again.

The bugle sounded.

Stone bullets kept whizzing over the city of Crotone, and the dark enemy below the city slowly came in like a tide...

The sound of bugles, war drums, shouts, footsteps... were mixed together, hitting the eardrums of the soldiers guarding the city, making their breathing quicken.

"It's begun." Askamas whispered, picked up the javelin, and walked to the battlement.

At this time, a black spot suddenly passed over the sky behind his head, followed closely by another...

His eyes suddenly widened and he looked up, and heard the soldiers next to him shouting excitedly: "Our ballistae! Our ballistae finally started to show off its power!!..."

That's not Crotone's ballista...Askamas thought to himself, but seeing the soldiers' morale rising, he didn't mind it, but felt lucky in his heart: Fortunately, Dionia and Crotone Stand together!
The Crotone soldiers were excited, and the people of Syracuse were anxious, especially Dionysius. He saw with his own eyes that almost all the stone bullets flying out of the city hit the siege tower not far from the fort. .

He heard Fasipesas say, 'Dionia also has ballistae. 'Since Crotone has not been used in the past two days, he thought that Dionia did not lend Crotone this weapon with a complicated production process, expensive materials and powerful power, but It was used to defend Asprostum. Unexpectedly, Crotone remained hidden until Syracuse attacked the city with all its might.

"Cunning Crotones!" Dionysius yelled. He knew that the target of the enemy's ballista was the siege tower, but he could only act in a hurry: "Notify our ballista players that they may place crossbows in the enemy's city." Attack the cannon area!"

Although Dionysius gave the order, he also knew that the accuracy of the ballista was not high. It would be too difficult to hit the enemy's ballista without being able to see its position. However, after the siege troops had already Approaching the city wall, and the ballistae can no longer bombard the city wall to avoid accidentally injuring one's own people, it is also good to make some attempts to disrupt the city of Crotone.

In front of the huge tidal force of the siege team, the enemy only had a dozen or so ballistae, and they couldn't make much of a splash. The key was to capture the city head first!Dionysius made a quick decision. Under his instructions, hundreds of archers on the earthen ramparts began to throw arrows at the city head directly in front, suppressing the enemy's attack on the soldiers below the city.

The Crotone light infantry on the top of the city also began to rain arrows on the enemies approaching the moat.

The people of Syracuse crossed the filled moat, braved the javelins thrown by the Crotones, and put up the ladders they carried on the city wall.The Crotone people specially made the ladder after many experiences in siege. There are two curved iron hooks at the head end, which can be hooked on the battlements so that the ladder will not slip off or be pushed down easily.

The Crotone soldiers could not push down the ladder quickly, so they had to throw javelins and stones downwards, attack the enemies climbing the city, pour tung oil, and burn the ladder with fire...

The Syracuse light infantry also came out from behind the arrow-blocking carts, rushed to the city, and shot arrows at the top of the city to reduce the defenders' attack on the siege soldiers...

Syracuse's siege machinery advanced the slowest.The ones running at the front were those wooden wheeled vehicles with a roof. Pushed by the people in the vehicles, they finally arrived on the filled moat. Under the protection of the roof, the people in the vehicles picked up their tools and began to compact the ground again without any distractions. The gaps were filled with soil and wooden planks were laid to ensure that the heavy siege tower could pass through the moat.

Dionia's ballistae are concentrated not far behind the west city wall, with a wide distance between them, and are blocked by houses around them, making them relatively safe.However, due to the wide spread of the ballistae, it is impossible to use the same data after calculating the attack target to adjust the trajectory. There are not so many gunners from the mathematics academy, so Kuldorod made a suggestion: ten ballistae bombarded at the same time An area or a target can improve the accuracy of the hit.After the ballista under his personal command fires the first shot, other ballistas can adjust their firing data according to the height and speed of the stone projectiles.

This suggestion was approved by the ballista team, and now their primary target is the approaching siege tower directly ahead.

Kurdorod kept looking at the observer holding the colorful flag on the city wall. The position he was standing was exactly the direction of the siege tower, and the number he drew in the air with the colorful flag was the distance between the siege tower and the city wall. Then he observed He pointed the colorful flag to the left with his hand. After repeating this action twice, the numbers he drew next were the direction and distance of the stone bullets fired by Coldorod.

The first two launches failed to hit. Coldorod felt the pressure. He wiped the rain from his face to make his vision clearer. He knew that he had to hit the target as soon as possible, otherwise the rain would keep falling. When the spring set of the gun gets wet, the elastic force will change, making it even more difficult to judge the accurate ballistic trajectory.

　Happy May Day! !

　　
　
(End of this chapter)