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H. writes as if the whole Persian army used this road through the Asopus ravine (vii. 199 n.), which, ‘after winding through the mountains some three and a half miles, suddenly broadens out into a wide upland valley behind the range of Oeta, from which there is a long but not difficult passage to the Dorian plain (Grundy, p. 261).

[Probably this approach from Malis is the ‘narrow strip’ of Doris.] Thence this route, which entirely avoids Thermopylae, passes along the valleys of the Pindus and the Cephisus to Phocis and Boeotia.

But it may be deemed certain that Xerxes also used the coast-road through Thermopylae, which turns inland near Atalanta in Locris and reaches Parapotamii by Hyampolis (ch. 28). This is the only route suitable for a force of cavalry and a large baggage train. It would take the invaders to Hyampolis and Abae (ch. 33), which lie off the Doris route, the only one mentioned by H. Pro bably he regarded the use of the main coast-road as an obvious sequel of the capture of Thermopylae, which need not be explicitly stated in his narrative. Two other rough routes, which lead from Alpeni and Thronium on the Locrian coast to Elateia and the valley of the Cephisus, may possibly have been used by the Persians.

For the connexion of Dryopis (Doris) with the Dorian invasion cf. i. 56 nn.

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