Chapter 1 The Expansion of Syracuse

When news of Dionysian's conquest of Bruti reached Syracuse, Dionysius was inspecting the construction of the fortress of Syracuse, accompanied by Marcias.

Seeing that the project was nearly completed, he was in a happy mood when he suddenly heard the news, his face immediately became gloomy, and he blurted out a curse: "Damn Carthaginians, obstructing my plan!"

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In the early spring of 397 BC, Carthage Sophie Similco led an army of 100,000 people, set off from the city of Carthage, and after a small-scale battle with the Syracuse Navy at sea, successfully landed in Sicily, and He soon sold the traitors, easily captured the city of Eryx in the west of Sicily, and then stormed Motia, which was a success.

The Syracuse army was forced to withdraw from the siege of Segsta, and Hilmico did not pursue the victory, but destroyed the city of Motia, and built a new city near its seaside, named Lillibee.

When the Carthaginian army stopped advancing, the cautious Dionysius kept his troops in the city of Syracuse.

Soon after the foundation stone was laid for the new city of Lillibe, Hilmico continued to attack eastward with the arrival of February. This time, instead of following the attacking route of last year's Syracuse, he sailed around the northeast corner of Sicily and easily took down the unsuspecting Messina.

The fall of Messina was a major stimulus to Lijim across the strait. The wealthy great Greek city-state, which relied on its favorable geographical location and prosperous port for transshipment trade, had been quietly communicating with Carthage for many years to prevent Syracuse from coveting the Strait of Messina. Suddenly, the friendly alien city-state showed its fangs and captured Lijim's sister city-state, Messina. Why sister city-states? Because Messina was first established by the joint colony of the Kumai and Karkis, it was originally called Zankele, and later changed its name to Messina because of the arrival of Mesenian immigrants. The Messina people realized early on that the other side of the strait must be in the hands of their own people to ensure security, so they encouraged the mother state of Kumai and the Messenians to establish the friendly city of Lijim.

Lijim was panicked, and they quickly made a decision to send envoys to the headquarters of the South Italian Alliance in Siliting to ask to join the alliance. So far, except for Loclery and its affiliated city-states, all other Greek city-states in Greater Greece have made a covenant with Dionia.

After Hilmicho completely destroyed the city of Messina, in order to please the natives of eastern Sicily, the Sikaers, he attacked Syracuse together with Carthage, so he planned to build a new city on the south coast of Messina. —Tauromenion, given to the Sikelians.

By March, Dionysius felt that he could no longer allow the Carthaginians to continue to attack its affiliated city-states. If nothing was done, the allies were likely to fall to Carthage. So he mobilized both land and sea armies to advance north to the Catania Plain.

In the waters near Catane, a naval battle broke out between Syracuse and Carthage. Originally, the number of Greek warships was more than that of the Carthaginians, and they also had an advantage in equipment. However, Dionysius was a crony, and his brother Leputines made a mistake as a naval commander, causing the Syracuse Navy to suffer a defeat and suffer heavy losses.

The Greek troops on the land were watching the naval battle on the shore, and they saw the tragic situation of the navy and began to shake their hearts.

Fortunately, the land army led by Hilmicho did not arrive at the battlefield in time, because in those days, Mount Etna, southwest of Tauromenion, suddenly erupted, and the hot volcanic slurry spurted down, destroying the southwards. The road, the dark volcanic ash covered the sky, made the Carthaginian army have to choose a detour.

The Syracuse army sang the hymn of the fire god Hephaestus silently all the way in awe, and hurriedly returned to the city of Syracuse. Catane and Leotini fell into the hands of Carthage one after another.

With the remnants of the victory in the naval battle, Shimilco led the army to finally reach Syracuse successfully. The Carthaginian navy also sailed into the great port of Syracuse. Siege of Syracuse.

At this time, Dionysius anxiously sent envoys to Campania in Italy, the mother state of Corinth in Greece, the overlord Sparta and other city-states by fast boat, seeking emergency assistance from them. Although Greater Greece was the closest place to Syracuse, Dionysius ignored this area intentionally or unintentionally, and did not ask for help from the Dionysian League, the overlord of southern Italy.

It is also impossible for Dionia to send troops without being invited, which would make the Sicilian suspects of ulterior motives. Moreover, after frequent wars and rapid expansion, Dionia also needs time to rest, consolidate and integrate. Therefore, at a critical moment when the Greek city-states of Sicily face all the fall, the Dionias, as well as the southern Italians The Greeks watched from the sea with mixed emotions.

Greek reinforcements from all over came one after another, especially Sparta sent a young general Phoebe Das led 30 warships and 500 hundred Spartans arrived.

At this time, the people in the city of Syracuse launched a riot under the instigation of people who wanted to drive Dionysius out of power. Phoebedas led the Greek coalition forces from all over to stop their riots, but they complained to Phoebedas: It was because of Dionysius' poor command that Syracuse was in trouble and the people were in trouble. lost loved ones. At the same time, he recounted the brutal rule of Dionysius in the country, and begged his ally Sparta to help them get rid of the tyrant's yoke.

Phoebedas remembered the previous admonition of Agesilaus, and told them with a stern face: The mission of the Spartans who came to Syracuse was to help Dionysius against Carthage, not to help Syracuse. Man overthrow Dionysius! He hoped that the rioting people could quell their anger and make concerted efforts to drive away the Carthaginians who had already invaded the city.

At the same time, he also made Dionysius promise: from now on, no revenge will be taken against the people who participated in the riot, and the future rule will be more tolerant.

With the full support of the Spartans, Dionysius temporarily survived a difficult time.

After the Carthaginians outside the city settled down, they began to destroy all the facilities outside the city of Syracuse. They not only destroyed farmland, villages and towns, but also blasphemed the gods. Not only destroyed the temple of Zeus on the heights of Popicles, but also looted the temples of the goddesses Demeter and Persephone.

This blasphemous behavior angered the Syracuses, and the two sides fought several small-scale land and sea battles outside the city and in the Grand Harbor, with the winners and losers being evenly divided.

The war lingered until summer, and as the temperature rose, the situation began to favor the Syracuses, as mosquitoes increased in the marshes near the Aspra River, and the bitten Carthaginian soldiers were plagued by plague , the number of deaths is increasing.

At this time, Dionysius, who was under pressure from internal and external troubles, also inspired his own wisdom and formulated a clever offensive plan: after marching in the dark and using the tactics of mobilizing the enemy, the navy and army simultaneously stormed the weak points of the enemy's fortresses. side.

The Carthaginians suffered from low morale due to the plague, and were unable to counterattack against the attack of the Syracuses.

Dionysius, at the cost of the lives of thousands of mercenaries, successively captured the fortresses of Polikna built by the Carthaginians on the banks of the Araps River and the fortresses of Dascon built on the coast. The Carthaginian navy was defeated, and the Carthaginians suffered heavy casualties. Shimilco's central army camp was surrounded in the middle, and the camp was in chaos, and the danger of being wiped out by the entire army was in sight.

At this moment, Dionysius ordered to stop the attack.

That night, the Carthaginian camp had frequent exchanges with the secret envoy of Dionysius.

For the next three days, the two sides remained calm and there was no fighting.

By the fourth night, Shimilco led only the remaining 30 three-deck oars to escape the Grand Port in a hurry, leaving behind most of the Carthaginian soldiers, allies and mercenaries, who were eventually attacked by Syracuse. and the total annihilation of its allies.

After the victory, Dionysius did not pursue the Carthaginians, but completely recovered Sicily and drove the Carthaginians out of the island. Because the former Syracuse people's forced palace incident has made him deeply realize that only if the Carthaginian forces continue to exist in Sicily, his tyrant status can be guaranteed, so he not only released Himilco's remnant army , and did not continue to sweep the colonial towns of Carthage in Sicily, but began to focus on attacking the forces of the Sicilian indigenous Sikaers in the eastern inland area, because in this war, the Sikaers became Carthage's The accomplice caused a lot of trouble to Syracuse, making him feel that it was not enough to unify the Greek city-states on the island. He must expand Syracuse's sphere of influence in the Sikel people's residential area and completely turn eastern Sicily into a One piece of iron.

The army of Syracuse began to conquer the towns of the Sikelians, such as Morgantina, Kepharoydion, Hena, etc., and also forced more Sikel forces to sign affiliation agreements with him.

He also surrounded Tauro Merion, the only seaside city built by Himilko for the Sikers, but failed to capture it for a while.

By the following year (396 BC), Syracuse's power had expanded northward to the northeastern corner of Sicily.

On the burnt ruins of Carthage, Dionysius rebuilt Messina, and the inhabitants of New Messina consisted of the colonists of Syracuse's allies, Locri and Medema, who were mainly attracted by the His allies in Greater Greece, as well as the hundreds of Mesenians who had just been driven out of their homeland by the Spartans, had no longer any kinship with the Ligim.

But soon, the Spartans sent messengers to express their dissatisfaction with Dionysius for placing Sparta's enemies in such an important city.