ancient greece mediterranean ruler

Chapter 832 Disaster in Campania

This caused the soldiers to speed up again and again. Zantiparis, who was almost 60 years old, felt a little overwhelmed even when riding a horse.

After entering the mountain road, no matter how urgent it was, Zantiparis had to slow down the troops to prevent being ambushed by the enemy.

At this moment, the soldiers saw flames shooting into the sky in the distance.

The scouts sent out hurried back to report that the Kautini had retreated and burned the entire town of Papania.

When Zantiparis led the army to arrive, the bustling town established in the valley was already shrouded in raging flames, and three headless corpses were placed in the open space to the south of the town, and a A wooden sign with a line of Greek written in human blood: I have 134 Dionians in my hand, exchange them with captured Samnite warriors, otherwise these corpses will be their end!

When the soldiers saw this tragic scene, they were all angry and demanded to pursue the enemy and rescue the captured people.

Of course, the old Zantiparis would not be as impulsive as the soldiers. He just asked the soldiers to collect the three corpses and line up in place, waiting for the scout's return.

Soon, the news returned confirmed his guess: there seemed to be an ambush in the mountains on both sides of the mountain road ahead, and there were Kautini warriors waiting in formation at the exit of the road.

Zantiparis led his army back without hesitation. He knew that the long-term peace between Naconia and Dionysia had been broken, and the war had hit the northwest border of the kingdom. Not only did he have to assemble the reserve army as soon as possible, , defend Enona, and also notify the Ministry of Military Affairs as soon as possible to ask it to send more troops or give itself greater leadership power. Otherwise, it may be difficult to cope with the next war with more than 4000 new soldiers. Heavy.

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Pompeii was originally a small Greek city with a small population, and now most of the residents were prisoners. Even the old men and women of Pompeii took up arms and went to the top of the city, but it was difficult to resist Segovani's premeditated onslaught.

The battle ended in the afternoon and the city was broken.

The cheers of the soldiers made Segovani feel relieved, but he was still not satisfied. He still needed more victories to wash away the shame he had suffered before.

So, he left some soldiers to garrison and continued to lead his army northward along the coast. At dusk, he arrived at Herculaneum, which was only 15 miles away from Pompeii.

Herculaneum is located at the foot of Mount Vesuvius. It is also a Greek seaside town, but it is wealthier than Pompeii because it is close to the Gulf of Naples, thus becoming a subsidiary trading port of Naples' prosperous maritime trade.

But the Herculaneum people have their own pride. They believe that the history of their town is older than Naples, because this is the town founded by Hercules (as can be seen from his name).

As the fleeing Pompeians informed them of the enemy's attack in advance, the Herculaneum people were already prepared for defense.

Seeing this, Segovani did not order any more attacks on the city, but instead camped on the spot.

The messenger from Herculaneum has arrived in Naples to ask for help, but at this time Naples is facing the threat of the Samnite coalition coming from the northeast. It was originally planning to send the Campanian coalition to repel the enemy. Now it is heard that When a large number of enemies attacked from the south, the Neapolitans, who were likely to be attacked from both sides, suddenly gave up the idea of ​​going to war. At the same time, they also sent messengers by boat to Dionia for help.

(Note: After the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD, not only Pompeii but also Herculaneum was buried under volcanic ash. Unlike Pompeii, which has been excavated, 75% of its towns are still buried. , most of which are intact.)
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After Dionia won the big victories of Ascurom and Vinosa one after another, the Samonites were forced to retreat to the mountains, and even the mountain reconnaissance team reported that they could not see it in the hilly area on the border of the Dauni region. to any trace of the Samnite.

Apparently suffering heavy losses, the Samnite coalition gave up its plan to continue harassing the Dauni area.Alexis, the commander of the Dauni region of the Kingdom of Dionia, did not take advantage of the opportunity to lead an army to attack the Samonai region.

On the one hand, it was because of Daves’ previous solemn reminder, “Don’t enter the Samnite Mountains to fight the Samnite people without absolute certainty.” More than ten years ago, Alexis led the Third Army in Lucca. He had fought against the Samnites in the mountains of Nia. Although he won a small victory, he also felt the power of the Samnites in mountain warfare. What's more, it was in Potentia at that time. If it was in the Samnites, In mountainous areas, with unfamiliar terrain, difficult transportation, and being in enemy territory, we will undoubtedly encounter more troubles.

The second aspect is the problem of food supply.Alexis's men gathered three legions and one cavalry legion, a total of nearly 3 people. The rations carried by the soldiers themselves had been eaten up. The amount of food provided by the kingdom every day was not a small amount.And now that King Davos is leading an army to the Latium region, the already limited military rations will naturally be allocated more to the expeditionary force.

The Ministry of Military Affairs has made a suggestion to Alexis: In view of the heavy losses suffered by the Samonites, the invasion of the Downey area has been stopped, and it is hoped that he can disband some legions to reduce the supply of military rations.

In addition, a few days ago, the administrator of Augentum sent a messenger to Dauni and told Alexis a piece of news: according to the pirates who came to the port to trade stolen goods, the pirates who fled to the other side of the Adriatic Sea had The former Puchetti Prince Vadarka is recruiting Puchetti, Messapian and Dauni people who have fled to mainland Greece in the Epirus region.

Therefore, Alexis finally decided to let the 200th, [-]th and [-]nd Cavalry Corps return to their respective areas and disband. However, each military camp still retained a brigade to garrison as usual, and they had to send another brigade of soldiers to bring their own soldiers. With four days of rations, the Cavalry Corps sent [-] cavalry to take turns coming to the city of Asculom in the Dauni region, where Alexis would lead them on duty.

In the military camp in the Dauni area, every two groups of soldiers of the 11th Army brought their own rations and took turns every four days, commanded by Capps.

The Dauni military camp is in the north, and Asculum is in the south. At the same time, a total of 4000 soldiers and 200 cavalry were in Dauni to guard the border between the entire Dauni region and Samonai, supplemented by troops from neighboring towns. Citizens, sufficient to deal with small and medium-sized Samnite incursions.

Once the remaining enemies who escaped from Apulia land in other places in the Apulian region, the defenders of other military camps can first resist, and then the waiting citizens can quickly gather from various towns under the quick notification of the messengers. Go to the military camp, form a complete legion, and then completely eliminate the enemy. This consumes very little military rations from the kingdom and basically guarantees the security of this area.

The reason why Alexis dared to do this is that the Apulia region is a plain and the terrain is basically flat. In addition to being connected by highways, there are also relatively smooth roads between the towns. From the city of Lucenia in the north A quick march to Augentum at the southern end takes just over a day.As a result, the legionnaires are relatively busy and always on the run, but for the warlike Messape and Pucheti people, having battles to fight, achievements to gain, and land to divide is the most important thing. Exciting things.

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In many exchanges with King Davos, the Ministry of Military Affairs has established that the kingdom's current strategy in this war is: attack from the north and defend from the south.

The army led by Davos is attacking in the Latium region. The troops led by Alexis have died down in the Dauni region. However, in the Sicily region further south, the troops led by Leoticides have not retreated in defense. , instead, using Selinus as a base at the western end of Sicily, they attacked in all directions, plundering all villages and towns outside the city-states such as Mazara, Lilibi, Segesta, etc., and collecting supplies to ensure adequate food supply for the army. , to achieve the purpose of disrupting the order of Carthage's ruling area in Sicily and creating favorable conditions for future battles.

Leotychides adopted an offensive and defensive approach to warfare.

Just when Daves led his army to land on the coast of Latium, the drowned body of Franios, the commander of the third fleet of Dionia, had been found on the rocks on the coast between Minoa and Agrigento. , because the body had decomposed, Leotychides led all the soldiers and fleet sailors to hold a solemn cremation funeral for him in the city of Selinus.

The whole place burst into tears.

However, traces of Cyclian, the commander-in-chief of the Sicilian fleet, have not yet been found. Leoticides once judged that Cyclian might have fallen into the coast controlled by the Carthaginians and was captured. After fighting with the Carthaginians, During the prisoner exchange, he offered to exchange more prisoners for Seclian.

The Carthaginians made no reply.

Since the order signed by Daves "agreeing to transfer the Fourth Fleet to Sicily" has not yet reached the Ministry of Military Affairs, the former commander of the squadron, Stefankas, temporarily assumed the important task of commanding the entire Sicilian fleet (in fact, today's Sicilian fleet only has Just a few dozen warships).

The Dionian army was raging in the western lands of Sicily, causing Carthage's allies and colonial cities to complain, and they all asked Lilibi for help.

The morale of the army in Lilibi City was low and the military system was in chaos. Pomirka only wanted to protect himself, and how could he dare to go out of the city to fight the Dionian army.

The Iberian army led by Hasdrubal stationed in Palermos had the ability to drive away the plundering Dionians, but Hasdrubal, reminded by Kisgo, chose Sitting on the sidelines, because of this, the allies and colonial cities in a difficult situation had to send envoys to the basic city of Carthage to ask for help, so that the still quarreling senators learned that the military situation in Sicily was urgent and made a decision quickly.

　There was a dinner party today, and I originally thought it would end at nine o'clock. Unexpectedly, because of my friend's enthusiasm, it lasted until twelve o'clock. Fortunately, I rationally refused my friend's request to continue the fun, and finally rushed back to continue updating the novel!
　　
　
(End of this chapter)