Greek Texts & Translations

This Antigonus at the time ruled over the Macedonians, being the guardian of Philip, the son of Demetrius, who was still a boy. He was also a cousin of Philip, whose mother he had taken to wife. With this Antigonus then and the Achaeans Cleomenes made peace, and immediately broke all the oaths he had sworn by reducing to slavery Megalopolis, the city of the Arcadians. Because of Cleomenes and his treachery the Lacedaemonians suffered the reverse at Sellasia, where they ^note were defeated by the Achaeans under Antigonus. In my account of Arcadia ^note I shall again have occasion to mention Cleomenes.

When Philip, the son of Demetrius, reached man's estate, and Antigonus without reluctance handed over the sovereignty of the Macedonians, he struck fear into the hearts of all the Greeks. He copied Philip, the son of Amyntas, who was not his ancestor but really his master, especially by flattering those who were willing to betray their country for their private advantage. At banquets he would give the right hand of friendship offering cups filled not with wine but with deadly poison, a thing which I believe never entered the head of Philip the son of Amyntas, but poisoning sat very lightly on the conscience of Philip the son of Demetrius.

He also occupied with garrisons three towns to be used as bases against Greece, and in his insolent contempt for the Greek people he called these cities the keys of Greece. To watch Peloponnesus Corinth was fortified with its citadel; to watch Euboea, the Boeotians and the Phocians, Chalcis on the Euripus; against the Thessalians themselves and the Aetolian people Philip occupied Magnesia at the foot of Mount Pelium. The Athenians especially and the Aetolians he harried with continual attacks and raids of bandits.

Already, in my account of Attica ^note I have described the alliances of Greeks and barbarians with the Athenians against Philip, and how the weakness of their allies urged the Athenians to seek help from Rome. A short time before, the Romans had sent a force ostensibly to help the Aetolians against Philip, but really more to spy on the condition of Macedonia.

At the appeal of Athens the Romans despatched an army under Otilius, to give him the name by which he was best known. For the Romans differ from the Greeks in their being called, not by the names of their fathers, but by three names at least, if not more, given to each man. Otilius had received orders from the Romans to protect Athenians and Aetolians from war with Philip.

Otilius carried out his orders up to a point, but displeased the Romans in certain of his acts. Hestiaea in Euboea and Anticyra in Phocis, which had been compelled to submit to Philip, he utterly destroyed. It was, I think, for this reason that the senate, when they heard the news, sent Flamininus to succeed Otilius in his command.

But the Achaeans greatly blamed Flamininus himself, and Otilius before him, for their savage treatment of ancient Greek cities which had done the Romans no harm, and were subject to the Macedonians against their will. They foresaw too that the Romans were coming to impose their domination both on Achaeans and on the rest of Greece, merely in fact to take the place of Philip and the Macedonians. At the meeting of the League many opposite views were put forward, but at last the Roman party prevailed, and the Achaeans joined Flamininus in besieging Corinth.

On being delivered from the Macedonians the Corinthians at once joined the Achaean League; they had joined it on a previous occasion, when the Sicyonians under Aratus drove all the garrison out of Acrocorinth, killing Persaeus, who had been placed in command of the garrison by Antigonus. Hereafter the Achaeans were called allies of the Romans, and in all respects right zealous allies they proved themselves to be. They followed the Romans to Macedonia against Philip; they took part in the campaign against the Aetolians; thirdly they fought side by side with the Romans against the Syrians under Antiochus.