Description of Greece

​On the seventh day after the battle, a company of the Galatians attempted to ascend Mount Oeta by Heracleia; and a narrow path ascends here also, past the ruins of Trachis. There was also a temple of Athena at that time above the Trachinian city, and offerings in it. They hoped therefore both to ascend Mount Oeta by this path and at the same time to acquire as a byproduct the things from the temple, which was thought to be guarded by Telesarchus. And they defeated the barbarians in the battle, but Telesarchus himself fell, a man who, if any other, was zealous for the cause of the Greeks.

​Now the other leaders of the barbarians were terrified of the Greek force, and were at the same time at a loss concerning the future, seeing that the business in hand was making no progress for them; but a plan occurred to Brennus, that if he should compel the Aetolians to retreat homeward to Aetolia, the war against the Greek force would now become easier for him. Selecting, therefore, from the army forty thousand infantry and about eight hundred cavalry, he placed Orestorius and Combutis over them as commanders, who, going back to the bridges of the Spercheius and ​marching again through Thessaly, invaded Aetolia. And those who committed the deeds at Callieae were Combutis and Orestorius, deeds the most impious of those we know by report, and in no way resembling the daring deeds of men. For they cut off the entire male race, and likewise old men and infants at their mothers’ breasts were slaughtered; and killing the fattest of these infants, which were still fed on milk, the Galatians drank their blood and ate their flesh.

​As for the women and those who were virgins in the flower of their youth, those who had any pride of spirit killed themselves beforehand as the city was being captured; but those who still survived they subjected by sheer force to every form of outrage, since they were equally devoid of pity and of human nature and love. And those of the women who happened upon the swords of the Galatians dispatched themselves; but for the others, lack of food and sleep was soon to bring the fatal end, as the roofless barbarians outraged them in turn one after another; and some even copulated with those who were expiring, and some even with those already dead.

​The Aetolians had learned from messengers what kind of calamities had overtaken them, and immediately, with what speed they could, raising their force from Thermopylae, they hastened to Aetolia, being enraged at the sufferings of the people of Callieae, and even more eager to save the cities that had not yet been captured. And all those of military age marched out from their homes from all the cities, and because of necessity and pride, even the aged were mingled with them; and the women also marched with them voluntarily, showing an anger against the Galatians even greater than that of the men.

​When the barbarians, having plundered the houses and the temples, and having set fire to Callium, were retreating by the same way, there the Patraeans, alone of the Achaeans, aiding the Aetolians, confronted the barbarians, since they had been trained to fight as hoplites, and suffered extremely owing both to the multitude of the Galatians and to their desperation in action; but the Aetolian men and the Aetolian women, drawn up along the whole road, threw their javelins at the barbarians, and since the latter had nothing else but their native shields, they rarely missed them, and when pursued, they escaped without difficulty, and when the enemy turned back from the pursuit, they pressed upon them again with vigor.