Page:History of Greece Vol XI.djvu/39

 DEFEAT OF THE THURIANS. 13 rentine Gulf. Thurii was the successor, though with far ferior power, of the ancient Sybaris ; whose dominion had once stretched across from sea to sea, comprehending the town of Laus, now a Lucanian possession. 1 Immediately on the appeai-ance of the Lucanians, the Thurians had despatched an urgent message to their allies, who were making all haste to arrive, pursuant to cov- enant. 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 Thu- rians, who followed them even into that mountainous region of the Appenines which stretches between the two seas, and which pre- sents the most formidable danger and difficulty for all military operations. 2 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 Laus 3 once the dependency of their Sybaritan prede- cessors. But the Lucanians, having allured them into these im- practicable paths, closed upon them behind with greatly increased numbers, forbade all retreat, and shut them up in a plain sur- rounded with high and precipitous cliffs. Attacked in this plain by numbers double their own, the unfortunate Thurians under- went 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 re- mainder contrived to flee to a hill near the sea-shore, frcm whence they saw a fleet of ships of war coasting along at no great distance. 1 Herodot. vi. 21 ; Strabo, vi. p. 253. Gulf and the Tyrrhenian Sea, in an interesting work by a French General employed in Calabria in 180t Calabria during a military residence of Three Years, Letters, 17, 18, 19 (translated and published by Effingharn Wilson. London, 1832). 3 Dioclor. xiv. 101. pov7Mfievoi A.UOV, irohiv evdaiftova, Tiol.iopKTiaai. This appears the true reading: it is an acute conjecture proposed by Nicbuhi (llomisch. Geschicht. i. p. 96) in place of the vord3 (3ov7io f i . -vot 7,ativ KU o/Ui> ev6aifj.ova TTo^-iopK^aai. VOL. XI. 2
 * See the description of this mountainous region between the Tarentinc