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was the chief town of
Amphilochia, located at the eastern end of the Ambraciot Gulf, on the river
Inachus. Up until the Peloponesian war the Greeks considered the surrounding
natives to be barbarians. The Ambraciots, however, soon expelled the original
inhabitants, and kept the town, with its territory, exclusively for themselves.
The expelled inhabitants placed themselves under the protection of the
Acarnanians, and both people applied to Athens for assistance. The Athenians
accordingly sent a force under
Phormio, in 432 who took Argos, sold the Ambraciots as slaves, and restored
the town to the Amphilochians and Acarnanians, both of whom now concluded an
alliance with Athens. The citizens sided with the Athenians during the
Peloponnesian War
along with the Acarnanians against the Ambraciots and Leucadians, who were
supported by their mother city, Corinth, and the Peloponnesian League. In 430
the Ambraciots, anxious to recover the lost town, marched against Argos, but
were unable to take it, and retired, after raiding its territory. In 426 they
made a still more vigorous effort to recover Argos. The Ambraciots having
received the promise of assistance from Eurylochus, the Spartan commander, who
was then in Aetolia, marched with 3000 hoplites into the territory of Argos,
and captured the fortified hill of Olpae, near the Ambracian gulf, and Argos
itself. Thereupon the Acarnanians marched to the protection of Argos, and took
up their position at Crenae. Meantime Eurylochus, with the Peloponnesian
forces, had marched through Acarnania, and had succeeded in joining the
Ambraciots at Olpae, passing unperceived between Argos itself and the
Acarnanian force at Crenae. He then took post at Metropolis near Olpae. Shortly
afterwards Demosthenes,
who had been invited by the Acarnanians to take the command of their troops,
arrived in the Ambraciot Gulf with 20 Athenian ships, and anchored near Olpae.
Having disembarked his men, and taken the command, he encamped near Olpae. The
two armies were separated only by a deep ravine: and as the ground was
favourable for ambush, Demosthenes hid some men in a bushy dell, so that they
might attack the rear of the enemy. The stratagem was successful, Demosthenes
gained a decisive victory, and Eurylochus was slain in the battle. This victory
was followed by another still more striking. The Ambraciots at Olpae had some
days before sent to Ambracia, to beg for reinforcements; and a large Ambraciot
force had entered the territory of Amphilochia about the time when the Battle
of Olpae was
fought. Demosthenes being informed of their march on the day after the battle,
formed a plan to surprise them in a narrow pass above Olpae. At this pass there
were two conspicuous peaks, called respectively the greater and the lesser
Idomene . The lesser Idomene seems to have been at the northern entrance of the
pass, and the greater Idomene at the southern entrance. As it was known that
the Ambraciots would rest for the night at the lower of the two peaks, ready to
march through the pass the next morning, Demosthenes sent forward a detachment
to secure the higher peak, and then marched through the pass in the night. The
Ambraciots had obtained no intelligence of the defeat of their comrades at
Olpae, or of the approach of Demosthenes; they were surprised in their sleep,
and put to the sword without any possibility of resistance. Thucydides
considers the loss of the Ambraciots to have been the greatest that befell any
Grecian city during the whole war prior to the
Peace of Nicias;
and he says, that if Demosthenes and the Acarnanians had marched against
Ambracia at once, the city must have surrendered without a blow. The
Acarnanians, however, refused to undertake the enterprise, fearing that the
Athenians might be more troublesome neighbours to them than the Ambraciots. On
the contrary, they and the Amphilochians now concluded a peace with the
Ambraciots for 100 years.
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