Published at 26th of March 2024 7:36 am

Chapter 893: The Eastern Phoenicians Fleet

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The mother city of Carthage, Tyre, didn't disregard the request for help from the Carthaginian envoy. They promptly reached out to other neighbouring Phoenician city-states, such as Sidon, Akkar, Arwad, and others, who unanimously agreed to come to Carthage's aid. After all, one of the primary reasons they could live relatively comfortably under Persia's rule for all these years was their annual offerings of considerable wealth to the Persian royal court. These offerings were mainly derived from trading with Carthage at reduced prices.

Although the Phoenician city-states under Persia were small in size and territory, they possessed hundreds of warships. This was because, being inland, the Persians lacked the ability to sail and relied on foreigners, primarily Phoenicians and Greeks from Asia Minor, to provide their navy. Additionally, with the Persian king expressing his intentions to reclaim Egypt and had been preparing the army for war in recent years, the Phoenicians, who would serve as the main force of the Persian navy, had received ample training.

Still, they have a critical issue. That is, since the Phoenician city-states in the eastern Mediterranean were under Persian rule and their warships were also under the Persian navy, they naturally couldn't leave without permission to go to the western Mediterranean. Therefore, Tyr, Sidon…and the others had to send envoys to the Persian royal court to seek the approval of the Persian King Artaxerxes.

Since the signing of the King's Peace treaty, Persia's biggest enemy, the Greek city-states, not only ceased to be their enemies but also appointed them as the arbitrator to mediate conflicts and disputes among the Greek city-states, which was equivalent to them showing their submission to Persia and thus made Artaxerxes felt he had achieved a considerable achievement that even the great kings of the past could not have achieved. In addition, with the stable political situation in Persia and the four barbarian tribes obedient to him, his throne was very secure and made him complacent. Therefore, he decided to attack Egypt. Although they suffered a minor setback, it didn't hurt them much.

While Persia prepared more completely for an attack on Egypt, Tyr's envoy met with Artaxerxes and conveyed the Phoenicians' request to him.

It wasn't the first time Artaxerxes heard of Theonia. Despite the two kingdoms being thousands of kilometres apart, the Mediterranean's thriving maritime trade also allowed for news to spread rapidly, resulting in the miraculous story of Theonia's swift rise to power becoming widely known in Asia Minor and, naturally, in Persia as well.

Naturally, the Persian King, Artaxerxes, began paying attention to this newly rising kingdom in the distant west, which allowed his spymaster to discover that Theonia was a kingdom established by Greek mercenaries who followed the rebel – Cyrus the Younger. After all, the story of Greek mercenaries fighting thousands of kilometres in Persia and successfully escaping was widely popular in Greece and also spread in Asia Minor, which was a shame for Artaxerxes and his Persian army.

With further probing by the spymaster, Artaxerxes learned more details. For instance, he discovered that, like Persia, the Kingdom of Theonia was more tolerant of foreign gods and religions. He also found out that they exercised stricter control over conquered territories. He even knew that Theonia and Egypt had just recently formed a military alliance… So, in Artaxerxes' view, the Kingdom of Theonia was an enemy of Persia. However, he deemed Theonia too distant and insignificant(which Artaxerxes and many Persian officials shared the same thought) to be taken seriously.

But given that this situation involved Theonia, Artaxerxes was naturally happy to cause them some trouble. Thus, without much consideration, he agreed to the Phoenicians sending a fleet to assist Carthage and graciously permitted them, if necessary, to do so under Persia's banner.

With the promise of the King of Persia, the Phoenicians soon sent a fleet of one hundred thirty large and small warships, of which ninety were triremes, and another thirty transport ships to carry food supplies. The fleet sailed under the banner of the Persian navy, allowing them to sail westward along the coast of Asia Minor unimpeded. Along the way, the Greek city-states that saw this fleet became nervous and started speculating on what big military action the Persians were taking again.

The most nervous was undoubtedly the Athenians, as they were currently joining forces with Thebes to fight Sparta, and the fact that the Persian fleet was sailing westward at this time could not help but cause them to panic, ‘Do the Persians want to support Sparta and join the war? If so, our future would be terrible!’

Despite the Phoenician fleet was like a stone dropped into water and stirred up waves, it didn't attract much attention from the Theonians, who were fully occupied with several wars and unable to divert their energy to focus on events in the eastern Mediterranean. In the minds of the Theonians, they believed that the Persian fleet's target was unlikely to be the western Mediterranean, so they would just let them stir up as much chaos as possible in the eastern Mediterranean.

Furthermore, with autumn already approaching and the farms within Theonia on the brink of a bountiful harvest, the kingdom's merchants ceased purchasing food from the eastern Mediterranean. Instead, they redirected considerable manpower to flock to the Latium region in central Italia, seeking new business opportunities and profits in this newly conquered land of the Kingdom. This naturally led to a drastic reduction in the number of Theonian merchant ships shuttling back and forth on the trade routes towards the eastern Mediterranea., resulting in the Ministry of Military obtaining little information about this Persian fleet.

Later, the westward-bound Phoenician fleet docked at the port of Kydonia on the island of Crete, which made the Athenians even more nervous. After all, Crete was allies of Sparta, with Kydonia being closer to the Greek mainland.

But a few days later, the Athenians received news that the Persian fleet had disappeared from Crete, which puzzled them. However, no one saw any trace of this fleet on the coast of Greece afterwards.

After resting in Kydonia, the truth was that the Phoenician fleet seized the opportunity of a strong wind to quietly sail out of the port to the southwest, avoiding the usual routes frequented by Greek merchant ships. They arrived at Cyrenaica, a subordinate city-state of Sparta, before proceeding westward along the African coast to the Phoenician colony of Leptis, the easternmost colonial city among the Phoenician colonies in Africa.

After arriving and receiving the town people's warm welcome, the crew of the Phoenician fleet finally relaxed. They then continued westward and eventually arrived at Hadrumetum.

This Phoenician city-state, affiliated with Carthage, lay just south of the city but was seldom frequented by foreign merchant ships. Thus, the Phoenician fleet remained at the port and refrained from heading west. Then, while conversing with their fellow kinsmen, the shrewd Phoenicians realised the formidable might of the Theonian navy they were about to confront. Therefore, they opted not to enter the city of Carthage to avoid being forced into confronting the enemy directly, as they wished to autonomously choose the timing of the attack instead of succumbing to Carthaginian pleas.

Naturally, there is another hidden reason. Despite the Phoenicians in the east having close trade relations with Carthage, they barely had major political and military exchanges for decades. On the one hand, it was due to Persia. On the other hand, the Phoenicians of the east(especially the nobility of Tyre) remained wary of Carthage, which had taken control of all their colonial trading points in the western Mediterranean. Hence, they didn't want to enter the city of Carthage, known as the centre of the Phoenicians in the West.

Later, the Phoenician fleet stationed in Hadrumetum refused to provide an escort for the Carthaginian army to land in Sicily, as that would inevitably mean they would bear the fierce attack of the Theonian navy.

Only after the daring landing of the Carthaginian army in Sicily, which diverted the attention of the Theonian navy to the western part of the island, did the Carthaginian Senate and the Phoenician fleet discuss and ultimately agree to Mago's plan, as suggested by the Carthaginian commander.

So the fleet quietly left Hadrumetum and sailed north, barely making it into Kossyra.

Kossyra is a small island belonging to Carthage, with a town of about two thousand people and a small port south of the island. This island is located between Sicily and Carthage and faces the city of Selinus to the north.

The Phoenician fleet crowded the island of Kossyra. After staying for a few days, the fast-sailing ship they sent out to scout brought back news that, as Mago expected, Theonia's warship departed the port full of soldiers!

So, how could the Phoenician fleet miss this great opportunity to wipe out the enemy? Hence, their warships raised their sails, set sail northward and caught up with the Theonian fleet in time, thanks to the southern wind.

The Phoenician ships lowered their sails and began picking up speed, with their entire fleet gradually spreading to both sides as they advanced. However, they didn't implement any special tactics because the situation of the Theonian fleet in front wasn't worth wasting their time in arranging tactics. They merely increased the number of ships in front as much as possible to sink enough enemy ships in the first impact.

The Theonian fast-sailing ships, positioned on the outermost edge, had raised two yellow flags one after another, from west to east. Despite the rough information about the enemy already transmitted to the entire fleet, the easternmost ships only received the order to approach the flagship while the ships close to the flagship had already begun retreating towards the coast. This led to the disorganisation of the entire fleet, rendering them unable to coordinate effectively. As a result, the crews panicked, and morale plummeted.

.............

At this moment, Seclian, who knew of the dire situation, commanded the fast-sailing ship he was riding on to catch up with a returning trireme. He then anxiously ordered his crew to approach the trireme immediately.

Then, he stood at the ship's bow and shouted, “I am Seclian. Who is the captain of this ship?!”

As soon as he said that, a loud cry of surprise echoed from the ship's cabin, “Did you hear that? It was Lord Seclian's voice!”

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