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Updated: June 6, 2025
Himilco, who thought that the Roman legion which had been landed at Panormus, would doubtless fall a prey to him on its way to Syracuse, was mistaken in his road; for the Carthaginian marched through the inland parts of the country, while the legion, keeping along the coast, and attended by the fleet, came up with Appius Claudius, who had advanced to Pachynum with a part of his forces to meet it.
I should exhort you at greater length my soldiers, if you were about to fight with armed men, men unarmed and off their guard, you will slay to satiety. The consul's camp too is near, so that nothing can be apprehended from Himilco and the Carthaginians'." Being allowed to retire immediately after this exhortation, they employed themselves in taking refreshment.
When the siege of the city thus began to assume a turn favourable to the Romans, the two armies under Himilco and Hippocrates advanced to its relief, and attempted a simultaneous attack on the Roman positions, combined with an attempt at landing on the part of the Carthaginian fleet and a sally of the Syracusan garrison; but the attack was repulsed on all sides, and the two relieving armies were obliged to content themselves with encamping before the city, in the low marshy grounds along the Anapus, which in the height of summer and autumn engender pestilences fatal to those that tarry in them.
The latter, having passed by night through the intervals between the posts, with ten thousand foot and five hundred horse, was pitching a camp near the city Acrillae, when Marcellus came upon them, while engaged in raising the fortifications, on his return from Agrigentum, which was already occupied by the enemy, having failed in his attempt to get there before the enemy by expeditious marching, Marcellus calculated upon any thing rather than meeting with a Syracusan army at that time and place; but still through fear of Himilco and the Carthaginians, for whom he was by no means a match with the forces he had with him, he was marching with all possible circumspection, and with his troops so arranged, as to be prepared for any thing which might occur.
To effect a junction with Himilco, the bold and able Hippocrates marched forth from Syracuse with an army: the position of Marcellus between the garrison of Syracuse and the two hostile armies began to be critical. With the help of some reinforcements, however, which arrived from Italy, he maintained his position in the island and continued the blockade of Syracuse.
The Carthaginian army, under Hasdrubal, encamped on the other side of the lake near the fortress of Nepheris, whence it obstructed the labours of the Roman soldiers despatched to cut timber for constructing machines, and the able cavalry-leader in particular, Himilco Phameas, slew many of the Romans.
The voyages of the Carthaginians were, from the situation of their territory, and the imperfect state of geography and navigation at that period, usually confined to the Mediterranean and to the western shores of Africa and Europe; but several years antecedent to the date usually assigned to the voyages of Himilco and Hanno, a voyage of discovery is said to have been accomplished by the king of a nation little given to maritime affairs.
Accordingly, by day and night equally, every thing was kept in readiness, and every place furnished with guards and watches, the soldiery being continually under arms and at their posts. But when the principal men in Enna, who had already entered into a covenant with Himilco to betray the garrison, found that they could get no opportunity of circumventing the Roman, they resolved to act openly.
Now fate turned the special defence of the city into the means of its destruction; while the army of Marcellus quartered in the suburbs suffered but little, fevers desolated the Phoenician and Syracusan bivouacs. Hippocrates died; Himilco and most of the Africans died also; the survivors of the two armies, mostly native Siceli, dispersed into the neighbouring cities.
In the meanwhile Carthage, which hitherto had only supported the Syracusans with her fleets, on receiving news of their renewed rising in arms against the Romans had despatched a strong land army under Himilco to Sicily, which landed without interruption at Heraclea Minoa and immediately occupied the important town of Agrigentum.
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