Page:History of Greece Vol XII.djvu/469

 AGATHOKLKS CAPTUHKS i:TICA. 437 unexpected rapidity (he had hitherto been on the south-east of Carthage, and he now suddenly moved to the north-west of that city), that he seized the persons of three hundred leading citi- zens, who had not yet taken the precaution of retiring within the city. Having vainly tried to prevail on the Uticans to sur render, he assailed their walls, attaching in front of his battering engines the three hundred Utican prisoners ; so that the citizens, in hurling missiles of defence, were constrained to inflict death on their own comrades and relatives. They nevertheless resisted the assault with unshaken resolution ; but Agathokles found means to force an entrance through a weak part of the walls, and thus became master of the city. lie made it a scene of indis- criminate slaughter, massacring the inhabitants, aimed and un- armed, and hanging up the prisoners. He further captured the town of Hippu-Akra, about thirty miles north-west of ITtica, which had also remained faithful to Carthage — and which now, after a brave defence, experienced the like pitiless treatment.^ The Carthaginians, seemingly not yet recovered from their re- cent shock, did not interfere, even to rescue these two important places ; so that Agathokles, firmly established in TunSs as a centre of operations, extended his African dominion more widely than ever all round Carthage, both on the coast and in the inte- rior ; while he interrupted the supplies of Carthage itself, and reduced the inhabitants to great privations." He even occupied and fortified strongly a place called Hippagreta, between Utica and Carthage ; thus pushing his posts within a short distance both east and west of her gates.^ Agatliokles. relates to operations among the towns east or south-east of Carthage. It appears to me that the passage ouglit to stand — ettI /dp HrvKatovg tarpuTEvaev ovk u cp s a t t/ k 6 t a g, i. e. t'vom Carthage; which introduces consistency into the narrative of Diodorus himself, while it brings him into harmony with Polyhius. 1 Diodor. xx. 54, 55. In attacking Hippu-Akra (otherwise called Ilippo- Zarytus, near the Promontorium Pulchrum, the northernmost point of Africa), Agathokles is siad to have got the better in a naval battle — vavfcax'ta Tzeptyevufievog. This implies that he must have got a fleet su[)c- rior to the Carthaginians even in their own gulf; perhaps ships seized at Utica. 2 Diodor. xx. 59. ' Appian distinctly mentions this place Hippagreta as havitig been forti 37*