338 HISTORY OF GREECE. tains themsdves." 1 Its length stretches from north to south, boi dered by the mountain range of Maenalus on the west, and of Arte- misium and Parthenion on the east. It has a breadth of about eight miles in the broadest part, and of one mile in the narrowest. Man- tinea is situated near its northern extemity, Tegea near its south- ern ; the direct distance between the two cities, in a line not much different from north and south, being about ten English miles. The frontier line between their two domains was formed by a pe- culiarly narrow part of the valley, where a low ridge projecting from the range of Masnalus on the one side, and another from Ar- temisium on the opposite, contract the space and make a sort of defensible pass near four miles south of Mantinea ; 9 thus about six miles distant from Tegea. It was at this position, covering the whole Mantinean territory, that the army opposed to Epaminondas was concentrated ; the main Lacedasmonian force as well as the rest having now returned from Sparta. 3 Epaminondas, having marched out from Tegea by the northern gate, arrayed his army in columns proper for advancing towards the enemy ; himself with the Theban columns forming the van. His array being completed, he at first began his forward march in a direction straight towards the enemy. But presently lie changed his course, turning to the left towards the Maenalian range of mountains which forms the western border of the plain, and which he probably reached somewhere near the site of the present Tri- politza. From thence he pursued his march northward, skirting the flank of the mountain on the side which lies over against or fronts towards Tegea ; 4 until at length he neared the enemy's po- 1 See Colonel Leakc's Travels in the Morea, vol. iii, ch. 24, p. 45. 2 Three miles from Mantinea (Leake, ib. p. 51-94) " a low ridge of rocks, which, advancing into the plain from a projecting part of the Maenalium, formed a natural division between the districts of Tegea and Mantineia." Compare the same work, vol. i, ch. 3, p. 100, 112, 114, and the recent val- uable work of Ernst Curtius, Peloponnesos (Gotha, 1851), pp. 232-247. Gell says that a wall has once been carried across the plain at this boundary (Itinerary of the Morea, p. 141-143). 3 See the indications of the locality of the battle in Pausanias, viii, 11,4, 5 ; and Colonel Leake as above referred to. 4 Xen. Hellen. vii, 5, 21. Tripolitza is reckoned by Colonel Leake as about three miles and a half from the site of Tegea; Mr. Dodwell states it as about four miles, and Gell's Itinerary of the Morea much the same.
