Battle of Olp

The Battle of Olpah is the battle of the Peloponnesian War in 426 BC. e. ^[1] between the troops of Athens and Sparta .

In 426 BC e. 3000 hoplites from Umbria invaded Amphilochian Argos in Akanarnania in the Gulf of the Ionian Sea and occupied the fortress of Olpa. Akarnantsy asked for help both from the Athenian commander Demosthenes , and from 20 Athenian ships located nearby under the command of Aristotle and Hierophon. The Abracians asked for help from Euriloch of Sparta, who managed to march his army past the Acarnanians on March. After this, Demosthenes arrived in the bay below Olpae with his ships, 200 hoplites and 60 archers. He entered with the army of Acarnadian and camped in a ravine opposite Euriloch, where both sides prepared for five days. As Ambraciot and the Peloponnesian army were larger, Demosthenes ambushed the 400 hoplites from Acarnania to be used when the battle began.

Demosthenes constituting the right wing of the Athenians — led by an army with the Athenian and Messinian troops from the center and left wing formed the Acarnanians and Amphilochians. Euriloch formed the left wing of his army, directly opposite Demosthenes, with the Ambraciots and Mantineans forming the rest of the line. When the battle began, Euriloch quickly went around Demosthenes and surround him when the Acarnanians began their ambush, causing panic among other soldiers when Euriloch was killed. The Ambraciots defeated the left wing of the Acarnanians and Amphilochians, driving them back to Argos, but they themselves were defeated by the rest of the Acarnanians when they returned. Demosthenes lost about 300 people, but came out victorious when the battle ended late in the evening.

The next day, Menedaius, who took command when Euriloch was killed, tried to negotiate a truce with Demosthenes. Demosthenes would only allow army leaders to escape. It was the psychological struggle of Demosthenes " ... to discredit the Lacedaemonians and the Peloponnesians from the Hellenes in those parts, as traitors and skins ." ^[2] however, some of the Ambraciots tried to hide with Menedaius and other commanders. ^[3] The Acarnanians chased them, the animals of Menedaius, to avoid, as agreed, and killed about 200 Ambraciots.

Meanwhile, Demosthenes learned that the second army from Ambracia was marching towards Olpae. These Ambraciots camped on the road to the fort at Idomene , having no knowledge of the defeat of the previous day. Demosthenes took them by surprise there at night, pretending to be a friend of the Ambraciot army, and killed most of them, the rest fled to the mountains or the sea, where they were captured by 20 Athenian ships. Altogether, Ambraciots lost about 1,000 people in two days.

Although Demosthenes could easily have accepted Ambracia, he did not succeed because his allies feared a strong Athens in the region and therefore the Acarnanians and Ambraciots signed a 100-year peace treaty with them. ^[four]