44.6
The king
was having his bath when news was brought of the approach of the enemy.
On hearing it he sprang in a panic from his seat and rushed out, exclaiming
that he was conquered without a battle. Amidst distracted plans and
contradictory orders he sent two of his ''friends", the one to Pella to throw
into the sea the treasures that were stored at Phacus, the other to burn the
fleet. He recalled Asclepiodotus and Hippias and their troops from the places
they were occupying, and left all the approaches to Macedonia open to the
enemy. All the gilded statues were carried off from Dium to prevent their
falling into the hands of the enemy, and the inhabitants were forced to
remove to Pydna. Thus what might have been thought recklessness on the
part of the consul in advancing to a place from which he could not retreat,
had the enemy chosen to stop him, was actually made to look like a
carefully-planned-out act of daring. The Romans had two passes through
which they might emerge from their present position: one through Tempe
into Thessaly, the other past Dium and into Macedonia; and both were held
by the king's troops. If, therefore, there had been an intrepid general who
could have held out for ten days against what at first sight looked like a
steadily advancing danger, there would have been no retreat open to the
Romans through Tempe into Thessaly, nor any possibility of carrying
supplies through; for the pass of Tempe is a difficult one to traverse, even if
it is not occupied by an enemy. In addition to the narrowness of the road
which for five miles affords scanty footing for a loaded animal, there are on
both sides sheer cliffs, so precipitous that you cannot look down without
feeling dizzy. The noise and depth of the Peneus flowing through the middle
of the ravine adds to the stern and forbidding effect. This district, so strong
by nature, was held by detachments of the king's troops at four different
places. One was posted at the mouth of the pass at Gonnus; a second in
Condylus, an impregnable stronghold; a third at Lapathus, which they call
Charax; a fourth on the road itself in the middle of the narrowest part of the
valley. where ten men could easily make a successful defence.
The conveyance of supplies and their own return through Tempe
were thus alike cut off, and they would have had to make their way back to
the mountains over which they had come. They had escaped the observation
of the enemy before; they could not do so now with his troops posted on the
commanding heights, and the difficulties they had experienced destroyed all
hopes. There was no course left in this rash adventure but to go through the
midst of the enemy and enter Macedonia by way of Dium, and this, if the
gods had not deprived the king of his reason, would have been a task of
enormous difficulty. The spurs of Mount Olympus leave only a width of a
mile between the mountain and the sea. Half this space is filled by the broad
marshes at the mouth of the Baphyrus, the rest of the ground is taken up
either by the temple of Jupiter or the town itself. The little bit that is left
could be blocked by a small fosse and rampart, and there was such a quantity
of stones and growing timber at hand that a wall might have been thrown up
and turrets raised. Blinded by the suddenness of the danger, the king took
none of these things into consideration; he withdrew his garrisons, leaving
every place open and defenceless, and fled to Pydna.