Mediterranean Hegemon of Ancient Greece - Chapter 535

[Chapter 202 Xenophanes’ Advice]

Aristillas actually sent his own younger brother to Sicily, which shows that he really put a lot of effort into this place!

Antonios’s spirit was lifted, and he immediately asked: “Where is he now?”

“Cataana or Syracuse? I don’t know.” Xenophonis shrugged and said, “But you come After

arriving in Sicily, he should get the news soon, and he will send someone to contact us immediately.”

Antonios nodded and asked earnestly: “Now that the First Army has occupied Mayaro, what should you do next, you Do you have any suggestions?”

“My lord, I don’t know much about military matters. I can tell you what I have learned about the situation here for your reference.” Xenophanes’ modesty won the favor of Antonios, He hurriedly put on the table the map of Sicily that he had taken from Davos when he left the Silitin camp: “Please tell me!”

Xenophonis did not refuse, stepped forward, and carefully distinguished the map , then pointed to the map and said: “Lord, you see the location of Meyaro is actually very good. To the east of it is the ocean, to the west is the huge Mount Etna, and to the north is Tauromenian. It’s only a little over ten miles away, but its population is too small, I’m afraid it can’t even send 500 soldiers. Sikuli to the south is more than 20 miles away, which is also a small city-state. Citizens of Sikuli, it is hard to say whether the tyrants of Sikuli can make up 3,000 civilian soldiers. More than 40 miles to the south is Katana——”

Xenophonis said here, his expression showed pain, and he vomited lightly He breathed a sigh of relief and said: “Originally, Catania was a large city with 50,000 or 60,000 citizens. The fertile Catania plains provided the people there with sufficient grain, and could easily organize an army of tens of thousands of people… …but… after Catane was destroyed by Dionysius, he let Campania mercenaries take over the city, Catane… no longer Catane!…”

“You are The Catanes?” Antonios asked suddenly.

“Yes, like Aristiras, I was once a Katanai!” Xenophanes said solemnly: “But now I am a citizen of Dionia!”

“When Syracuse is defeated, His Majesty will definitely let the Catanes rebuild your homeland!” Antonios comforted, and then asked, “How many civic soldiers does Catane have now?” When it comes to Campa Nia mercenaries, Antonios raised his vigilance. He had just fought them in the Battle of Crotone and knew that these mercenaries were not easy to deal with.

“…There may be four or five thousand people. After I returned to Sicily this time, I haven’t been to the Catania Plain. I just heard from the people in Mejaro.” Xenophonis speculated hesitantly. Then he suggested: “Sir, if you want to know more details, you need to wait for the arrival of the people from Antrapolis.”

Antonios nodded and pointed to the column between Catane and Syracuse on the map. The icon of Orthini,

asked: “Is this city-state also occupied by Campania mercenaries?”

“Leotine is not, it was once a sub-state of Syracuse. After Dionysius usurped power, He once formed an alliance with our Catanes against Syracuse, but after Catane was defeated, it had to surrender to Syracuse. Dionysius, in order to punish its betrayal, Most of Leotini’s citizens were forcibly relocated to Syracuse, and now Leotini is just a small city-state in terms of population…” Xenophanes said with a sad look in his eyes.

“Then how many troops are there in Syracuse?” Antonios asked seriously.

Xenophanes had to speculate again: “This… I don’t know very well. But a few months ago, Dionysius led an army to invade our Great Greece, and his general Macias also led about Seven or eight thousand Syracuse soldiers went to the Mile Peninsula in the northernmost part of Sicily and destroyed the new city built by the exiles of Naxos and Catane. I think there must be tens of thousands of soldiers in Syracuse… …”

Tens of thousands!

Antonio’s face became gloomy, and he stared at the circle of city-state icons around Syracuse on the map: Taunis, Barclays, Hebesus, Pachinus… These are all Syracuse Loyal affiliate, it is estimated that Syracuse can easily and quickly organize an army of 20,000 people!

No matter how strong the first legion is, after repeated battles, there are only more than 5,000 people left… Antonios believes that he does not have the magic of Davos, and can defeat so many enemies with such a small force.

Xenofannis saw Antonios’ concern, he thought for a moment and said: “Sir, Syracuse has so many affiliated city-states in Sicily, it seems to be very powerful, but the people of these city-states are very interested in Syracuse. Dissatisfaction has been a long time coming, and even the people of Syracuse are very dissatisfied with the dictatorship of Dionysius!”

“Oh?!” Antonios was interested: “Tell me about the situation in detail.”

“In the past few years, Syracuse has been fighting externally. The scale of the war is very large, and the money and materials consumed are also very large, so Dionysius forcibly demanded high tribute from each affiliated city-state, and He has no mercy on the people of Syracuse, and the special war tax levied has risen to 25%; in addition, he not only needs money but also people, before each war, he requires each city-state to provide a large number of troops, and in At the end of the war, these citizens were killed, wounded and wounded, but their families received nothing; he also supported tyrants in various city-states and attacked those citizens who resisted tyranny, so not only the people of the city-states resented him, but even the nobles. They are also very dissatisfied with him, but they are afraid of his powerful force and dare not resist…

Dionysius’s men must also be very aware of this situation, I think they dare not withdraw all the troops to deal with you… After Dionysius led his army to attack Greater Greece, Meyaro’s Siculi attackers often privately cursed him for the failure of this expedition. A few days ago, when ‘our fleet defeated the Syracuse Navy’ After the news reached Meyaro, not only the freedmen and slaves, but even the citizens of Sikuli seemed a little excited, so the people in the town were talking a lot these days, and the topic of discussion was more about Dio Nia, even my task has become much smoother. Like the two riot organizers who have been lukewarm to me before, they have contacted me these days…

Mayaro is like this, and the situation in other city-states should be similar.

It gives me the feeling that these city-states in Sicily are now like a pile of dry wood, just need a torch, they can burn into a raging fire!

Now, the news of ‘His Majesty defeated the army of Dionysius in the battle’ has reached Sicily, and I believe it will have a greater impact on the people of the city-states!

As long as you can defeat the Syracuse army once in Sicily, Sicily will inevitably be in chaos!

“Serofenice said impassionedly, with excitement in his eyes.

“It is not so easy to defeat the Syracuses in Sicily.

“Antonios said with a wry smile. Having said that, after listening to the details of Sicily introduced by Serofenice, he felt a little more confident: “Our current number of soldiers is still too small!”

Before coming, His Majesty mentioned the Sikeles to me. Do you think we can unite them against the Syracuses?

Xenofannis

thought for a while, then shook his head and said, “Although the Sikelians are natives of Sicily, they are different from the Lucanians and Brutians of Greater Greece. They are far less savage than them… oh, No, it is brave and fierce.

Serofannis remembered that these two races were already citizens of the Alliance, and quickly changed his mind and said: “The lives of the Sikelians are no different from our Greeks, but they prefer to live in the inland mountains of Sicily.

They are a race with no reputation. When the Carthaginians attacked, they took refuge in Carthage. When Syracuse was strong, they joined with Syracuse…

But their fickleness was punished by the gods. , Dionysius pretended to form an alliance with them, and after defeating Carthage, he murdered Aguilas, the king of the Sikelians, and sent an army to capture the central town of the Sikelians, Aguirion , UU reading www.sonicmtl.com to completely destroy it, his atrocities frightened the Sikere people, other Sikere towns quickly surrendered to Syracuse.

This time, Dionysius invaded our great Greece, and the Sikelians sent him some troops.

So I don’t think the cowardly Sikeles would dare to join us in attacking Syracuse, but they may not attack us, but remain neutral.

But if Syracuse loses either of us, they’ll join the victor…”

Antonios understood: this is a race that bullies the soft and fears the hard.

Note: In fact, it is not only Sikel who has this characteristic of bullying the soft and fearing the hard, but other city-states and races in Sicily are all such sloppy grass, because this is determined by the special political situation of Sicily: in the history of Sicily in the past hundred years, There are only two superpowers in this small island – Carthage and Syracuse, and there is no third force that can compete with it.

On this relatively closed and small island, other city-states and forces can only depend on whoever is stronger. If they resist, they can only be destroyed. Of course, Carthage and Syracuse are peaceful because of their balance of strength. Other city-states can have a few days of peace.

In the history that Davos knew in his previous life, it was not until the intrusion of a powerful foreign force, Rome, that completely broke the closed political and military ecology of Sicily and finally unified Sicily.

And the first time Dionia appears in Sicily in this book, will it break the balance of power in Sicily?