Named Entity Results, Agrigentum (Italy)

Relief Comes from Agrigentum The result was that thenceforth the Carthaginians were somewhat less forward in making such attacks, and the Romans more cautious in foraging. Finding that the Carthaginians would not come out toThe Romans form two strongly-entrenched camps. meet them at close quarters any more, the Roman generals divided their forces: with one division they occupied the ground round the temple of Asclepius outside the town; with the other they encamped in the outskirts of the city commander of the besieged forces, beginning by this time to be seriously alarmed at the state of things, kept perpetually sending messages to Carthage explaining their critical state, and begging for assistance. A relief comes from Carthage to Agrigentum.Thereupon the Carthaginian government put on board ship the fresh troops and elephants which they had collected, and despatched them to Sicily, with orders to join the other commander Hanno. Hanno seizes Herbesus. This officer collected all hi

Fall of Agrigentum He saw that the Romans were reduced by disease Hanno tempts the Roman cavalry out and defeats them. and want, owing to an epidemic that had broken out among them, and he believed that his own forces were strong enough to give them battle: he accordingly collected his elephants, of which he had about fifty, and mans, having seized the hill called Torus, at a distance of about a mile and a quarter from their opponents. After two months, Hanno is forced to try to relieve Agrigentum, but is defeated in a pitched battle, and his army cut to pieces. For two months they remained in position without any decisive action, though skirmishes took pf holding out, made up his mind that this state of things afforded him a good opportunity of escape. Hannibal escapes by night; and the Romans enter and plunder Agrigentum.He started about midnight from the town with his mercenary troops, and having choked up the trenches with baskets stuffed full of chaff, led off his force in sa

the joy of the Roman Senate when the news This success inspires the Senate with the idea of expelling the Carthaginians from Sicily. of what had taken place at Agrigentum arrived. Their ideas too were so raised that they no longer confined themselves to their original designs. They were not content with having saved the Mamertines to their land forces they saw that things were going on as well as they could wish. B. C. 261. For the Consuls elected in succession to those who had besieged Agrigentum, Lucius Valerius Flaccus and Titus Otacilius Crassus, appeared to be managing the Sicilian business as well as circumstances admitted. Yet so long as the Cartha the sea, the balance of success could not incline decisively in their favour. For instance, in the period which followed, though they were now in possession of Agrigentum, and though consequently many of the inland towns joined the Romans from dread of their land forces, yet a still larger number of seaboard towns held aloof from

sooner did the Carthaginians sight him than with joy and alacrity they put to sea with a hundred and thirty sail, feeling supreme contempt for the Roman ignorance of seamanship. Accordingly they all sailed with their prows directed straight at their enemy: they did not think the engagement worth even the trouble of ranging their ships in any order, but advanced as though to seize a booty exposed for their acceptance. Their commander was that same Hannibal who had withdrawn his forces from Agrigentum by a secret night movement, and he was on board a galley with seven banks of oars which had once belonged to King Pyrrhus. When they neared the enemy, and saw the "crows" raised aloft on the prows of the several ships, the Carthaginians were for a time in a state of perplexity; for they were quite strangers to such contrivances as these engines. Feeling, however, a complete contempt for their opponents, those on board the ships that were in the van of the squadron charged without flinching

r own to match it. Three-fourths of their force they posted in a single line, extending their right wing towards the open sea with a view of outflanking their opponents, and placing their ships with prows facing the enemy; while the other fourth part was posted to form a left wing of the whole, the vessels being at right angles to the others and close to the shore. The two Carthaginian commanders were Hanno and Hamilcar. The former was the general who had been defeated in the engagement at Agrigentum. ch. 19. He now commanded the right wing, supported by beaked vessels for charging, and the fastest sailing quinqueremes for outflanking, the enemy. ch. 25. The latter, who had been in the engagement off Tyndaris, had charge of the left wing. This officer, occupying the central position of the entire line, on this occasion employed a stratagem which I will now describe. The battle. The battle began by the Romans charging the centre of the Carthaginians, because they observed that it was we

rsuaded that the men under their command would obey their orders. They got out of the city at night, went to the enemy's camp, and held a parley with the Roman commander on the subject. But Alexon the Achaean, who on a former occasion had saved Agrigentum from destruction when the mercenary troops of Syracuse made a plot to betray it, was on this occasion once more the first to detect this treason, and to report it to the general of the Carthaginians. The latter no sooner heard it than he at onddress their men, and communicate the terms offered by the Romans, so far from finding any adherents, they could not even obtain a hearing, but were driven from the wall with volleys of stones and darts. But this treason among their mercenaries constituted a serious danger: the Carthaginians had a narrow escape from absolute ruin, and they owed their preservation from it to that same Alexon whose fidelity had on a former occasion preserved for Agrigentum her territory, constitution, and freedom.

is guard against the bad character of this particular body of them? For they had originally been driven from their native country by an outburst of popular indignation at an act of treachery done by them to their own kinsfolk and relations. at Agrigentum,at Eryx. Then having been received by the Carthaginians, because of the exigencies of the war in which the latter were engaged, and being drafted into Agrigentum to garrison it (being at the time more than three thousand strong), they seized thAgrigentum to garrison it (being at the time more than three thousand strong), they seized the opportunity of a dispute as to pay, arising between the soldiers and their generals, to plunder the city; and again being brought by the Carthaginians into Eryx to perform the same duty, they first endeavoured to betray the city and those who were shut up in it with them to the Romans who were besieging it; and when they failed in that treason, they deserted in a body to the enemy: whose trust they also betrayed by plundering the temple of Aphrodite in Eryx. Disarmed by the Romans. Thoroughly

Agrigentum The city of Agrigentum is not only superior to most Agrigentum taken by Marcus Valerius Laevinus, late in the year B. C. 210, jam magna parte anni circumacta. Livy, 26, 40. cities in the particulars I have mentioned, but above all in beauAgrigentum is not only superior to most Agrigentum taken by Marcus Valerius Laevinus, late in the year B. C. 210, jam magna parte anni circumacta. Livy, 26, 40. cities in the particulars I have mentioned, but above all in beauty and elaborate ornamentation. It stands within eighteen stades of the sea, so that it participates in every advantage from that quarter; while its circuit of fortification is particularly strong both by nature and art. For its wall is placed on a rAgrigentum taken by Marcus Valerius Laevinus, late in the year B. C. 210, jam magna parte anni circumacta. Livy, 26, 40. cities in the particulars I have mentioned, but above all in beauty and elaborate ornamentation. It stands within eighteen stades of the sea, so that it participates in every advantage from that quarter; while its circuit of fortification is particularly strong both by nature and art. For its wall is placed on a rock, steep and precipitous, on one side naturally; on the other made so artificially. And it is enclosed by rivers: for along the south side runs the river of the same name as the town, and along the west and south-west side the river called Hypsas. with only one approach from the town. On the top of it is a temple of Athene and of Zeus Atabyrius as at Rhodes: for as Agrigentum was founded by the Rhodians, it is natural that this deity should have the same appellation as at Rhodes. The city is s