Orchomenus

Now it was the plan that Pausanias should make a circuit by way of Mount Cithaeron, and then invade Boeotia, while Lysander marched through Phocis to meet him with a large force.

He took the city of Orchomenus, which came over to him of its own accord, and assaulted and plundered Lebadea.

Then he sent a letter to Pausanias, bidding him move from Plataea and join forces with him at Haliartus, and promising that he himself would be before the walls of Haliartus at break of day.

This letter was brought to Thebes by some scouts, into whose hands its bearer fell.

He was eager to entice Sulla to battle, disregarding the protests of Archelaus, and giving it out that in the previous battle so many myriads had not perished without treachery.

Sulla, however, turning swiftly back, showed Doreleus that Archelaus was a man of prudence and best acquainted with the Roman valor, so that after a slight skirmish with Sulla near Kilfossium, he was first of those who thought it expedient not to decide the issue by a battle, but rather to wear out the war by dint of time and treasure.

Nevertheless, Archelaus was much encouraged by the nature of the country about Orchomenus, where they were encamped, since it was most favorable as a battlefield for an army superior in cavalry.

For all of the plains of Boeotia, this is the largest and fairest, and beginning from the city of Orchomenus, it spreads out smooth and treeless as far as the marshes in which the river Milos loses itself.

He let his men sack it.

Then he beat Mithridates' generals at Chaeronea and Orchomenus.

Brilliant cold battles.

In eighty-five BC, Mithridates sued for peace at Dardanos.

The chariots turned and threw the phalanx into confusion, and when Archelaus ordered up his cavalry, Sulla sent round his to take them in the rear.

At one time, however, the contest was doubtful, and the Romans wavered, till they were put to shame by their general, who, seizing a standard and advancing toward the foe, cried out, When those at home asked where it was you abandoned your leader, say it was at Orchomenus.

This great victory, in which Sulla showed generalship of a high order, ended the first Mithridatic war.

The date is not quite certain.

Now it was the plan that Pausanias should make a circuit by way of Mount Cytheron, and then invade Boeotia, while Lysander marched through Phocis to meet him with a large force.

He took the city of Orchomenus, which came over to him of its own accord, and assaulted and plundered Lebadea.

Then he sent a letter to Pausanias, bidding him move from Plataea and join forces with him at Haliartus, and promising that he himself would be before the walls of Haliartus at break of day.

This letter was brought to Thebes by some scouts, into whose hands its bearer fell.

He was eager to entice Sulla to battle, disregarding the protests of Archelaus, and giving it out that in the previous battle so many myriads had not perished without treachery.

Sulla, however, turning swiftly back, showed Dorelaus that Archelaus was a man of prudence and best acquainted with the Roman valor, so that after a slight skirmish with Sulla near Tylfossium, he was first of those who thought it expedient not to decide the issue by a battle, but rather to wear out the war by dint of time and treasure.

Nevertheless, Archelaus was much encouraged by the nature of the country about Orchomenus, where they were encamped.

since it was most favorable as a battlefield for an army superior in cavalry.

The late Bronze Age Aegean wasn't one big unified empire.

It was a patchwork of palace states, Mycenae, Pylos, Tyrens, Thebes, maybe Orchomenos and others.

Each ruled its own pocket of land, but they all shared a remarkably similar way of doing business.

At the heart of that system was the palace, not just a fancy house for a king, but an economic engine.

Now it was the plan that Pausanias should make a circuit by way of Mount Cithaeron, and then invade Boeotia, while Lysander marched through Phocis to meet him with a large force.

He took the city of Orchomenus, which came over to him of its own accord, and assaulted and plundered Lebadea.

Then he sent a letter to Pausanias, bidding him move from Plataea and join forces with him at Haliartus, and promising that he himself would be before the walls of Haliartus at break of day.

This letter was brought to Thebes by some scouts, into whose hands its bearer fell.

He was eager to entice Sulla to battle, disregarding the protests of Archelaus, and giving it out that in the previous battle so many myriads had not perished without treachery.

Sulla, however, turning swiftly back, showed Doreleus that Archelaus was a man of prudence and best acquainted with the Roman valor, so that after a slight skirmish with Sulla near Tylfossium, he was first of those who thought it expedient not to decide the issue by a battle, but rather to wear out the war by dint of time and treasure.

Nevertheless, Archelaus was much encouraged by the nature of the country about Orchomenus, where they were encamped, since it was most favorable as a battlefield for an army superior in cavalry.

For all of the plains of Boeotia, this is the largest and fairest, and beginning from the city of Orchomenus, it spreads out smooth and treeless as far as the marshes in which the river Milos loses itself.

These were commanded by Nestor, knight of Gerene, and with him there came ninety ships.

And those that held Arcadia, under the high mountain of Cyllene near the tomb of Oebalus, where the people fight hand to hand, the men of Pheneus also and Orchomenus rich in flocks, of Rhipae, Straete, the bleak Evanispa, of Tagia and fair Mantinea, of Stymphalis and Parrhasia, of these King Agepenor, son of Ancaeus, was commander, and they had sixty ships.

Many Arcadians, good soldiers, came in each one of them.

But Agamemnon found them the ships in which to cross the sea, for they were not a people that occupied their business upon the waters.

At Thespiae he elsewhere notes the most ancient image of Eros, the winged love god, was an unwrought stone.

At Orchomenus in Boeotia, where was a very ancient sanctuary of the Charites or grace-givers, their images were stones that had fallen from heaven.

The use of square-shaped images of Hermes, Pausanias in another part of his journal says, was first introduced by the Athenians who were zealous in all religious matters, and from Athens the usage passed to the rest of Greece.

How dear and how hallowed were these square-shaped herms was clearly seen by the horror and panic that ran through Athens when at the time of the fatal Sicilian expedition the hermae were sacrilegiously mutilated.