History of the Peloponnesian War

About the same time in the course of this summer, Brasidas, who was on his way to Thrace with one thousand seven hundred hoplites, reached Heracleia in Trachis and sent forward a messenger to his friends at Pharsalus requesting them to conduct him and his army through. Accordingly he was met at Meliteia in Achaia by Panaerus, Dorus, Hippolochidas, Torylaüs, and Strophacus, who was proxenus of the Chalcidians, and then proceeded on his march. He was conducted by several Thessalians also, among whom were Niconidas of Larisa, a friend of Perdiccas.

Indeed, Thessaly was not in any case an easy country to traverse without an escort, and especially with an armed force; and among all the Hellenes alike to traverse the territory of neighbours without their consent was looked on with suspicion. Besides, the common people of Thessaly had always been well disposed to the Athenians. If, therefore, the Thessalians had not been under the sway of a few powerful men, as is usual in that country, rather than under a free democracy, Brasidas would not have made headway;

even as it was, he was confronted on his march, when he reached the river Enipeus, by other Thessalians belonging to the opposite party. These tried to stop him, warning him that he was doing wrong in proceeding without the consent of the whole people.

But his conductors reassured them, saying that, it they were unwilling, they would not conduct him further, and that they were merely playing the part of hosts in escorting an unexpected visitor. Brasidas himself explained that he came as a friend to Thessaly and its inhabitants and was bearing arms against the Athenians, who were enemies, and not against them; moreover, he was not aware of any such hostility between the Thessalians and the Lacedaemonians as to debar them from access to each other's territory, but if in this instance they were unwilling, he would go no further, nor indeed could he do so;

he hoped, however, that they would not bar his progress. On hearing this the Thessalians departed; but Brasidas, taking the advice of his escort, before a larger force could be collected to hinder him, set out at full speed and without making any halt. In fact, he finished the journey to Pharsalus on the same day on which he had set out from Meliteia, and encamped on the river Apidanus;

thence he proceeded to Phacium, and from there to Perrhaebia. Here his Thessalian escort at length turned back, and the Perrhaebians, who are subjects of the Thessalians, brought him safely to Dium in the dominions of Perdiccas, a small town in Macedonia at the foot of Mt. Olympus, facing Thessaly.