Geography
The terrain of the plain of Chaeronea was integral to the beginning and end of the battle. Sulla consistently refused to offer Archelaus battle until he found his enemy encamped in terrain favourable to his Roman force. Archelaus' camp was in a rocky region near a broad plain at the bottom of a slope. Sulla took advantage of the favourable ground and arrayed his forces before the plain on the hill, with a tactically advantageous view into the camp. Plutarch states that in this way Archelaus had no choice but to array his army on the plain, or risk being stoned to death by the Romans from above. There was no other way out of the battle since the camp was surrounded by rocks; Archelaus had to array his army before the Romans on the plain below the hill. Moving his army out of the camp onto the rocks would have disordered their formations, and prevented their horses and chariots from being effective.
Read more about this topic: Battle Of Chaeronea (86 BC)
Famous quotes containing the word geography:
“Ktaadn, near which we were to pass the next day, is said to mean “Highest Land.” So much geography is there in their names.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“At present cats have more purchasing power and influence than the poor of this planet. Accidents of geography and colonial history should no longer determine who gets the fish.”
—Derek Wall (b. 1965)
“Where the heart is, there the muses, there the gods sojourn, and not in any geography of fame. Massachusetts, Connecticut River, and Boston Bay, you think paltry places, and the ear loves names of foreign and classic topography. But here we are; and, if we tarry a little, we may come to learn that here is best. See to it, only, that thyself is here;—and art and nature, hope and fate, friends, angels, and the Supreme Being, shall not absent from the chamber where thou sittest.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)