Cover photo: Siege during the Classical period. This specific photo depicts the siege of Potidaea by the Athenians, 432 BC. From Hutchinson’s History of the Nations, published 1915.

Text by Manolis Chatzimanolis

Upon receiving news of a deadly plague outbreak in North Africa that had severely affected the Carthaginians and believing that a war with the superpower of the western Mediterranean would rally the Sicilian Greeks who were struggling under the Carthaginian yoke, the Syracusan tyrant (reign 405-367 BC) decided ruthlessly attack the Sicilian Carthaginian possessions.

Aware of the magnitude of the undertaking, Dionysius had made colossal preparations: Using high wages and monetary rewards as bait, he attracted the best and most inventive craftsmen of Sicily, Italy, mainland Greece, and Africa. Syracuse was transformed into a gigantic construction site, as every public space, theaters, gymnasiums, market stalls, even the backyards of temples, were utilized for the manufacture of thousands of weapons and armors (over 14,000 excellent armors according to Diodorus that were distributed to the officers, cavalrymen, and the tyrant’s bodyguard) and hundreds of war machines.

Timber from Mount Etna and the forests of Italy was transported to the city for the repair and construction of warships and triremes, while besides the Syracusans and the Sicilian allies of Dionysius, fierce men were recruited with the permission of the Spartan authorities and from the Peloponnese in order to form the largest army that a Greek city had ever fielded.

Finally, after two years of preparations (399-397 BC) and the rejection by the Carthaginian authorities of an ultimatum from the tyrant of Syracuse “that they(the Carthaginians) restore freedom to the Greek cities that they had subjugated” , a combined army of Syracusans, mercenaries, and Sicilian allies of Dionysius set out to conquer the main stronghold of the Carthaginians in Sicily, the Carthaginian colony of Motya. An unprecedented pogrom against the Phoenician merchants and residents in Syracuse and the other Greek cities had already occured, during which the properties of the Phoenicians were confiscated or looted, while they themselves suffered all kinds of atrocities as retaliation for the atrocities committed by the Carthaginians during the terrible campaign of the years 409-405 BC, when they sacked the Greek cities of Selinus (409 BC), Himera (409 BC), Acragas (406 BC), and Gela (405 BC).

As the army marched towards western Sicily, segments of Sicilian Greeks and native Sicilian allies joined them, as well as former subjects of Carthage who defected (the inhabitants of Camarina, Gela, Acragas, Selinus, and Himera are mentioned). The army that eventually reached Motya numbered 80,000 infantry soldiers, at least 3,000 cavalry, 200 warships (including quadriremes and quinqueremes that made their first appearance on the seas) and about 500 merchant ships that carried a multitude of supplies, provisions, and siege engines, including the first catapults that appeared on the battlefields of the Mediterranean.

Feeling awe in front of the colossal army, the Elymians of the city of Eryx, subjects of Carthage until then, allied with Dionysius, while the Sicani of western Sicily did the same. The cities of Alicyae, Soli, Egesta, Panormus, and Entella that did not defect from Carthage were attacked in their territory, while Motya, which, as it awaited help from its metropolis, refused to submit, was blockaded by land and sea.”

The siege

In addition to the Motyans themselves, it seems highly probable that some military force from Carthage already existed on the island as a garrison of the town, and it would also appear that the Greeks resident there had either been impressed into the service, or of their own free will took part in the defence of the city. That there were Greeks fighting with the Motyans we know from what Diodorus tells us l of Daimenes and others of his countrymen having been captured and crucified on the fall of Motya.

The city, built on an islet six stadia (approximately 1 km) from the Sicilian coast, was connected to the rest of Sicily by a mole, which the inhabitants promptly destroyed. Thus, the efforts of the Syracusan army focused on rebuilding the mole and gradually advancing rams and siege towers towards the wall. An attempt by the Carthaginian admiral Himilco, who had just arrived from Carthage, to break the naval blockade by trapping the Syracusan fleet under Dionysius’s brother Lepetines in the harbor of Motya failed miserably when Dionysius ordered part of the fleet to be dragged through the isthmus and shallow waters into the open sea.

As Himilco’s hundred ships rushed to confront the Syracusan fleet while being maneuvered, they were hit by a rain of projectiles from the decks of enemy ships, as well as from the Syracusans’ ballistic machines set up on the shore.(1) Dismayed by the heavy losses and his failure to prevent the superior Syracusan fleet from escaping into the open sea, Himilco withdrew to Carthage, leaving the inhabitants of Motya to face the tyrant’s wrath on their own.

Following the completion of the mole’s construction, Syracusan attacks on the city wall with rams and multi-story towers equipped with wooden bridges for landing on the fortifications were launched, while the catapults with their shots kept the besieged away from the ramparts. Dionysius, recognising the great advantage that a land approach offered to the besiegers, promptly ordered the reconstruction of the road, and, bringing his warships ” into the mouth of the harbour, while his ships of burthen lay at anchor near the shore,” as Diodorus vividly refers.

Although it is not actually so stated, the attack on Motya was apparently chiefly carried out at this northern end of the island, and in the vicinity of the mole, with its embankments, natural or artificial, on either side. This was no doubt only to be expected for here existed what was presumably the main entrance to the town, the great north gateway, in the neighbourhood of which were probably many of the principal houses and other buildings of importance. Despite the fierce resistance of the defending Phoenicians, who were not lacking in courage and ingenuity compared to their opponents, the walls fell, and brutal street fighting immediately followed within the city as the inhabitants, reflecting on “how cruelly they had treated the Greeks prisoners” (Diodorus Siculus, Library of History XIV 52-2), fought bravely with the aim of victory or total destruction.

Here the actual fighting seems chiefly to have been carried on, not on the ground, but aloft, on the flat-terraced house-tops and upper storeys of the buildings, in fact, and between them and the raised scaffoldings of the wheeled towers, which the Greeks, unable to penetrate into the ground-floors and lower buildings, and labouring under the disadvantage of their adversaries being above them, had brought inside the outer city walls and placed against the houses. In this way they were able to carry out the desperate hand-to-hand struggle under more favourable conditions, renewing the attack daily, as we are told, and retiring to their evening quarters, on the signal for retreat being sounded by a trumpet. (2) A

s the battles within the city stalled for a few days, Dionysius finally sent an elite force under Archylus the Thurian to occupy dominating points on the walls at night and enter the city. Soon, other units of the Syracusan army followed, and with the collapse of the defense, new forces began to enter from the side of the mole.

The capture of Motya was followed by a massacre of its inhabitants and brutal looting. Survivors among the captives were sold as slaves, while Greek mercenaries found within the city were crucified as traitors. Although Dionysius’ success ultimately proved short-lived, as the Carthaginians would return the following year to Sicily, even establishing a new stronghold at Cape Lilybaeum, the siege of Motya was indicative of the new order of things that would come to Greek warfare. The armies of citizen-hoplites would gradually become obsolete, replaced by colossal armies predominantly composed of and commanded by professional soldiers, while war would now take on a more technical and comprehensive form, with pioneering war machines and techniques making their appearance. These new trends would gradually reach mainland Greece from Sicily (Corinthian War, Third Sacred War, War of the Allies), reaching their peak during the era of Macedonian hegemony and the Hellenistic states.

Footnotes

(1) Seem to have been of two different types, one the πετροβόλον, for hurling large stones, the other the οξυβελείς, for throwing darts. «.. Ἰμίλκων δὲ ταῖς πρώταις τριήρεσιν ἐπιθέμενος τῷ πλήθει τῶν βελῶν ἀνείργετο· ἐπὶ μὲν γὰρ τῶν νεῶν ἐπεβεβήκει πλῆθος τοξοτῶν καὶ σφενδονητῶν, ἀπὸ δὲ τῆς γῆς τοῖς ὀξυβελέσι καταπέλταις οἱ Συρακόσιοι χρώμενοι συχνοὺς τῶν πολεμίων ἀνῄρουν· καὶ γὰρ κατάπληξιν εἶχε μεγάλην τοῦτο τὸ βέλος διὰ τὸ πρώτως εὑρεθῆναι κατ´ ἐκεῖνον τὸν καιρόν· ὥστε Ἰμίλκων οὐ δυνάμενος κρατῆσαι τῆς ἐπιβολῆς ἀπέπλευσεν εἰς τὴν Λιβύην, ναυμαχεῖν οὐ κρίνων συμφέρειν διὰ τὸ διπλασίας εἶναι τὰς ναῦς τῶν πολεμίων..»

(2) A similar combat seems to have take place in Carthage, 146 B.C.

Sources

Diodorus Siculus, Bibliotheca historica.

Bibliography

E. Freeman, The History of Sicily from the Earliest Times, publ.Clarendon Press, 1891.

J. Whitaker, Motya, A Phoenician Colony in Sicily, publ. G. Bell & Sons, 1921.