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Agis, afraid of his left being surrounded, and thinking that the Mantineans outflanked it too far, ordered the Sciritae and Brasideans to move out from their place in the ranks and make the line even with the Mantineans, and told the Polemarchs Hipponoidas and Aristocles to fill up the gap thus formed, by throwing themselves into it with two companies taken from the right wing; thinking that his right would still be strong enough and to spare, and that the line fronting the Mantineans would gain in solidity.
There were seven companies in the field without counting the Sciritae, who numbered six hundred men: in each company there were four Pentecostyes, and in the Pentecosty four Enomoties.
They, however, flatly refused to obey the order, and consequently the Sciritae and Brasideans were assailed in front and on both flanks by overwhelming numbers, and driven back with great loss to their camp. So completely were the Spartans out-manoeuvred and worsted in tactics, through the blunders of their general, and the cowardice of his subordinates.
The first rank of the Enomoty was composed of four soldiers: as to the depth, although they had not been all drawn up alike, but as each captain chose, they were generally ranged eight deep; the first rank along the whole line, exclusive of the Sciritae, consisted of four hundred and forty-eight men.
As soon as they came to close quarters with the enemy, the Mantinean right broke their Sciritae and Brasideans, and, bursting in with their allies and the thousand picked Argives into the unclosed breach in their line, cut up and surrounded the Lacedaemonians, and drove them in full rout to the wagons, slaying some of the older men on guard there.
The man primarily responsible for this is the first upon the right wing, who is always striving to withdraw from the enemy his unarmed side; and the same apprehension makes the rest follow him. On the present occasion the Mantineans reached with their wing far beyond the Sciritae, and the Lacedaemonians and Tegeans still farther beyond the Athenians, as their army was the largest.
Seeing that his left wing was on the point of being outflanked by the Mantineans, Agis signalled to the Sciritae and Brasideans to draw off in a lateral direction towards the left, in order to present an equal line to the right wing of the enemy.
On the left wing of the Spartan army were posted the Sciritae, hardy mountaineers from southern Arcadia; next to them stood the enfranchised Helots, who had served under Brasidas in Thrace, and others of the same race who had received the Spartan citizenship in reward for public service; then came the main body of the Spartans themselves, and after them the rest of the Arcadian allies; while the right wing was assigned by immemorial privilege to the Tegeans, with whom were a few picked Spartans.
In this battle the left wing was composed of the Sciritae, who in a Lacedaemonian army have always that post to themselves alone; next to these were the soldiers of Brasidas from Thrace, and the Neodamodes with them; then came the Lacedaemonians themselves, company after company, with the Arcadians of Heraea at their side.
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