Philip In Arcadia
Continuing his march through Arcadia, and encountering
-- 341 -- heavy snow storms and much fatigue in the pass over
Mount Oligyrtus, he arrived on the third day at
Caphyae. note There he rested his army for two
days, and was joined by Aratus the younger,
and the Achaean soldiers whom he had collected; so that,
with an army now amounting to ten thousand men, he advanced
by way of Clitoria towards Psophis, collecting missiles and
scaling ladders from the towns through which he passed.
Psophis is a place of acknowledged antiquity,
and a colony of the Arcadian town of Azanis. note
Taking the Peloponnesus as a whole, it occupies
a central position in the country; but in regard to Arcadia it
is on its western frontier, and is close also to the western
border-land of Achaia: its position also commands the territory
of the Eleans, with whom at that time it was politically united.
Philip reached this town on the third day after leaving Caphyae,
and pitched his camp on some rising ground overhanging the
city, from which he could in perfect security command a view
both of the whole town and the country round it. But when the
king saw the great strength of the place, he was at a loss what
to do. Along the left side of it rushes a violent winter torrent,
which for the greater part of the winter is impassable, and in
any case renders the city secure and difficult of approach, owing
to the size of the bed which its waters have worn out for themselves by slow degrees, in the course of ages, as it comes rushing
down from the higher ground. On the east again there is a
broad and rapid river, the Erymanthus, about which so many
tales are told. This river is joined by the winter torrent at a
point south of the town, which is thus defended on three sides
by these streams; while the fourth, or northern, side is commanded by a hill, which has been fortified, and serves as a
convenient and efficient citadel. The town has walls also of
unusual size and construction; and besides all this, a reinforcement of Eleans happened to have just come in, and Euripidas
himself was in the town after his escape from Stymphalus.
