42.51
This
council was held at Pella, the capital of Macedonia. "Let us then," said
Perseus, "wage war with the help of the gods, since thus you decide."
Written orders were despatched to all his generals and he assembled the
whole of his forces at Citium, a town in Macedonia. After sacrificing in regal
style one hundred victims to Minerva, whom they call Alcidemos, he set out
for Citium, accompanied by a number of court nobles and his bodyguard.
The whole of the army, both Macedonians and auxiliaries, were assembled
there. The camp was fixed in front of the city and he drew up all his soldiers
in the plain. The total number of those who bore arms was 43,000, nearly
half of whom formed the phalanx; Hippias of Beroea was in command. Out
of the whole force of caetrati, 2000 men in the prime of strength and
manhood were selected to form a body known as the "agema," their
commanders were Leonnatus and Thrasippus. Antiphilus of Edessa was in
command of the rest of the caetrati, numbering about 3000 men. The
Paeonians and the contingents from Paroria and Parstrymonia, places in the
lowlands of Thrace, and the Agrianes, including some Thracian immigrants,
made up a force of about 3000. They had been armed and mustered by Didas
the Paeonian, the murderer of the young Demetrius. There were also 2000
Gauls under Asclepiodotus, a native of Heraclea in Sintice. Three thousand
"free" Thracians had their own leader, and about the same number of
Cretans followed their own generals, Susus of Phalasarna and Syllus of
Gnossus. Leonides the Lacedaemonian was at the head of a mixed force of
Greeks. He was said to be of royal blood, and after his letter to Perseus had
been seized, had been sentenced to banishment in a full council of the
Achaeans. The Aetolians and Boeotians, who, all told, did not amount to
more than 500 men, were under the command of Lyco, an Achaean. Out of
these contingents drawn from so many people and tribes, a force of about
12,000 men was formed. Perseus had collected 3000 cavalry out of the
whole of Macedonia. Cotys, the son of Suthis and king of the Odrysae, had
come in with a picked force of 1000 horse and about the same number of
infantry. Thus the total number of the army was 39,000 infantry and 4000
cavalry. It was generally admitted that, next to the army which Alexander the
Great had led into Asia, no Macedonian king had ever possessed so large a
force.
