Hellenic Wars database

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Hellenic Wars database

Postby Quintus Aurelius Orcus on Sun Jul 06, 2003 9:08 pm

Khairete
I shall post now a timeline/ database of the Hellenic wars starting with the Spartan Wars until the Peloponessian Wars.
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Spartan Wars (750-455 BCE):

750-550: Wars of Spartan Expansion in the direction of Messenia.
750-740: Siege of Amyclae
740: Spartans capture Helos
First Messenian War: (736-716)
Spartans conquer Messenia. Sparta, led by King Theopompus (c. 720–675), defeated Messenia and divided it into allotments (klaroi), rent which supported the individual Spartiates, leaving them free to train for war. The Spartans turned the Messenians into serfs (helots) who worked the land for them.
706 Sparta founded its only colony, Taras (Tarentum), in southern Italy.
670: Lelantine War
669: Argives defeat Spartans at battle of Hysiae
664: Corcyraeans defeat the Corinthians at the naval battle of Sybota
Second Messenian War (650-630)
Sparta crushes Messianian revolt. Messenia revolted against the Spartans. Allied to the Arcadians and Argos, Messenia won the Battle of Senyclarus. But in a 19-year war, Sparta finally defeated the Messenians and reintroduced helotry.
First Sacred War (590-589) against Crisa
575-550: Wars with Tegea
Sparta defeated Tegea after a long and difficult war (c. 575–555). Tegea became a subject ally, nominally independent, but bound to follow Spartan foreign policy and provide it with troops.
570: Lelantine War
Athens defeats Megara and captures Nisaea
560-550: War between Sparta and Tegea

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Hellenic Wars database: Spartan Wars

Postby Quintus Aurelius Orcus on Sun Jul 06, 2003 9:09 pm

550: Spartans conquer Thyreatis
Foundation of the Peloponnesian League
Sparta extended its alliance system, the Peloponnesian League, which eventually included all the states in the peninsula except Achaea and Argos. Allies contributed two-thirds of their military forces in war, always under Spartan leadership, though each member had a vote in foreign-policy decisions. King Anaxandridas (560–520) led a campaign which overthrew the tyrant of Sicyon. In Sparta, Cheilon and the other ephors dominated Spartan politics.

546: Battle of the Three Hundred Champions at Thyrea
Sparta victorious over Argos. Sparta and Argos fought a war over control of the Thyrean plain. Each side picked 300 “champions” for a fight to the death to decide the issue. When neither side accepted the result, the two armies fought a pitched battle, which the Spartans won. Argos retained its independence but lost its regional power.
546-545: Cyrus conquers the Greek city-states of western Anatolia (Asia)
535: Battle of Alalia in Corsica:
Phocaean Greeks win a nominal victory over an Etruscan-Carthaginian alliance; allows further Greek expansion into the western Mediterranean.
525: Sparta attacks Samos
512: Darius the Persian invades and conquers Thrace
unsuccessful campaign against the Scythians of the Danube basin
508-507: War between Sparta and Athens
Spartans under Cleomenes invade Attica and unsuccessfully besiege the Acropolis. The Agiad king Cleomenes I reasserted royal power in Sparta and brought the Peloponnesian League to its height. When the expulsion of the Peisistratid tyrants from Athens resulted not in a pro-Spartan oligarchy but in democratic reforms, Cleomenes led an expedition into Attica. The invasion failed due to the opposition of the Eurypontid king Demaratus (c. 515–491) and the defection of Corinth.
506: Peloponnesian army invades Attica
Athens defeats Boeotians and Chalcidians.
464-404: Struggle for Supremacy in Greece
Athens, Corinth, Thebes, Sparta and Argos and other cities want to control Greece, but the Persian Wars weaken most states, and strengthen both Sparta and Athens.
Third Messenian War (464-455)
A serious earthquake set off a revolt of the Messenian helots. Defeated in battle by the Spartans, the Messenians retreated to Mt. Ithome. Unable to take the stronghold, the Spartans summoned the Hellenic League, including Athens. In 462, Cimon led an Athenian force to the Peloponnese, but the Spartans sent it home. This insult marked the end of the Spartan-Athenian alliance. The fall of Ithome in 461 ended the helots' revolt.
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The first Peloponnesian War

Postby Quintus Aurelius Orcus on Mon Jul 07, 2003 9:51 am

First Peloponnesian War (460-445 BCE)
This war was fought between Sparta & its allies and Athens, caused in part by Athen's alliance with Megara and Argos. In the same year, the Athenians sent a fleet of some 200 ships to Egypt to aid its revolt against the Persians. The Athenians defeated a Persian fleet on the Nile and besieged a Persian army in the citadel of Memphis.

459: Battle of Halieis
The Athenians were defeated at Halieis by the Corinthians and Epidaurians
Battle of Cecryphalea
The Athenian fleet won a victory at Cecryphaleia against the Corinthian and Epidaurian fleet where their troops failed to do so..
Battle of Aegina
The Aeginetans joined the Peloponnesian alliance, but their combined fleet was defeated by the Athenians in the Battle of Aegina. The Athenians, under the command of Leosthenes, landed on the island of Aegina and besieged the city. The Corinthians invaded Attica, trying to force the Athenians to raise the siege, but were defeated by a reserve force of old men and boys under Myronides. A second force of Corinthians was surrounded and annihilated in the Megarid.
Battle of Megara
457: Battle of Tanagra:

Spartan expedition to Phocis and Boeotia. Aegina joins the Delian League and turn over their fleet to the Athenians. . Sparta then entered the war, sent an army across the Corinthian Gulf, and restored the Boeotian League under the hegemony of Thebes.
Battle of Oenophyta:
Athens conquers Boeotia Athens then enrolled all the Boeotian cities except Thebes in the Delian League; Phocis and Opuntian Locris also joined. Athens completes the Long Wall
456: the Battle of Memphis
A Persian force under Megabyzus defeated the Athenians at the citadel of Memphis. The Athenians were in turn besieged on the island of Prosopitis in the Nile Valley.
455: Achaea joins the Delian League
The Athenian general Tolmides sailed around the Peloponnese, raiding the coast, burning the Spartan naval base at Gytheum, and recruiting Achaea into the Delian League.
454: The battle of Sicyon and Oeniadea
An Athenian force led by Pericles landed in Sicyon and defeated the Sicyonians. Joined by Achaeans, Pericles unsuccessfully tried to take Oeniadea on the Corinthian Gulf, before returning to Athens. After an eighteen-month siege, the Athenians besieged on Prosipitis in Egypt were defeated, and all but a few killed or captured. The Persians also destroyed a relief expedition of 50 ships. Due to this defeat, the treasury of the Delian League was moved to Athens.
453: The Sicilian War
In Sicily, the towns of Segesta and Halicyae started a war with Selinus and approached Athens for an alliance, which was granted.
451: the 30-year peace
After three years of inactivity, Cimon returned from exile and negotiated a five years' truce with Sparta. Argos, losing Athenian protection, was forced to make a thirty years' peace with Sparta.
451: At Athens, pay was instituted for the dicasts or jurors of the popular courts, which made it possible for the poorest citizens to serve. In the same year, Pericles passed a law restricting Athenian citizenship to those having two Athenian parents (repealed in 429, reenacted in 403
450–449: The battle for Salamis
Cimon led a large Athenian force to Cyprus to fight the Persians. The Athenians defeated the Persians in the Battle of Salamis (the city in Cyprus, not the island off Attica). The Athenians beseiged the Persians at Citium, but Cimon died of disease (449). Lack of supplies forced the Athenians to return home.
450: The battle of Noae
Syracuse and Acragas defeated the Sicels under Ducetius at the Battle of Noae. Ducetius was banished to Corinth, and the Sicel federation fell apart.
450-431: Squabbling in Greece, expansion of Athens
449-448: Second Sacred War
Sparta took Delphi from Phocis and made it independent; Athens took it back and restored it to the Phocians. In 448 Athens and Persia reached a peace treaty which ended the Persian Wars officially.
447: The Boeotian Revolt
Boeotia revolted from the Delian League, and an inadequate Athenian force was crushed at the Battle of Coronea. Oligarchies were set up in all the Boeotian cities, and the Boeotian League was reestablished. The League was organized on a federal principle: the cities had proportional representation both in the federal assembly and among the magistrates (Boeotarchs) according to population. Troops were also levied in accordance with population size, and there were a federal treasury and coinage. In the same year, Phocis and Locris also quit the Delian League. Athens began constructing the Parthenon.
446 Revolt of Euboea.
Pericles crossed over to Euboea with an army, but a Peloponnesian invasion of the Megarid, which drove out the Athenian garrison there, forced him to return. The Peloponnesians reached Eleusis but came to terms with the Athenians and withdrew. Pericles then crossed back to Euboea, crushed the revolt, and established a cleruchy in Histaiaea. Negotiations with the Spartans continued.
446-445: 30 year peace between Spartans and Athenians.
Over the winter the Athenians and Spartans concluded a Thirty Years' Peace. Megara was returned to the Peloponnesian League, Troezen and Achaea became independent, Aegina was to be a tributary to Athens but autonomous, and disputes were to be settled by arbitration.
445: The failure of the anti-Spartan policy of Pericles led to an attempt to ostracize him, which failed. Instead, the opposition leader Thucydides, son of Melesias (not the historian), was ostracized. Pericles continued to hold undisputed control of Athens. He devoted much of Athens' wealth to fostering its culture, particularly in building and in the arts.
445 War between Syracuse and Acragas.
Syracuse and Acragas fought over the division of territory from the former Sicel federation. Syracuse was victorious and became the recognized leader of Sicily.
439: Athenians siege of Samos
Miletus, involved in a war with Samos, appealed to the Athenians, who replaced the Samian oligarchy with a democracy by force. Samos revolted (440) and threw out the democracy, but after a long siege, the Athenians took the city (439). Athens razed the city's walls and confiscated its fleet. Chios and Lesbos were now the only allies in the Delian League who contributed ships instead of money.
435-433: Corinthian-Corcyrean War
Corcyra, in northwestern Greece, objected to Corinth's interference with their joint colony, Epidamnus. Corcyra defeated the much more powerful Corinth but fearing reprisal, called on Athens for help and the Corinthians backed down. The Athenians then sought to break Corinthian influence over Potidaea, a colony of Corinth but a subject of Athens.
432: Potidaean Revolt
Potidaea revolted against Athens, with the tacit support of the Peloponnesian League. Athens then retaliated with the Megarian decree, barring the Megarians from Athenian harbors and markets. Outraged and fearful of further Athenian action, Megara, Corinth, and Aegina pressured a reluctant Sparta to take action. Over King Archidamus's opposition, the ephor Sthenelaïdas convinced the Spartan assembly to declare the Thirty Years' Peace broken
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The 2nd Peloponnesian War

Postby Quintus Aurelius Orcus on Tue Jul 08, 2003 8:40 am

Second Peloponnesian War (432-404 BCE)

431-421: Archidamian War
430: Siege of Athens
Plague at Athens: this plague broke out in Athens. It spread rapidly due to the crowded conditions in the city and about 25 percent of Athens' population died. The plague spread to the army besieging Potidaea, but that city fell toward the end of the year. Athens lost Perikles to the plague, but continue to win against any Spartan campaign.
429: Siege of Plataea by Spartans
Fighting began when the Thebans unsuccessfully attacked Plataea. The strategy of the Peloponnesians was to march through Attica annually, burning the fields, in order to lure the Athenians into a land battle, as well as to encourage the revolt of the allies from the Delian League. The Athenian strategy in the war, developed by Pericles, was to remain within the city and allow the countryside to be ravaged by the Peloponnesian army. Siege warfare was not sufficiently developed for the Spartans to break down Athens' walls or surmount them with a siege ramp. As long as the Athenians controlled the sea, the Long Walls connecting the city to the port at Piraeus prevented the city from being starved out. Athens hoped to wear down the Peloponnesians by coastal raids and interference with their trade.
Athenian victory at Naval battle of Phormio/Naupactus in the Corinthian Gulf
427: Revolt in Lesbos
The Athenians crushed a revolt in Lesbos, and the Spartans had their first success: the capture of Plataea.
427–424 War in Sicily
A general war broke out in Sicily. Naxos, Catana, Leontini, Rhegium, Camarina, and most of the Sicels opposed Syracuse, Gela, Messana, Himera, Lipara, and Locri. Gorgias of Leontini went to Athens and appealed for aid, which was granted. After indecisive fighting, the aristocrat Hermocrates of Syracuse persuaded the warring cities to make peace at the Conference of Gela.
425: the capture of Pylos
A fleet under Demosthenes captured Pylos, on the west coast of the Peloponnese. When reinforcements arrived under Cleon, the Athenians defeated the Spartans. Athens captured 120 Spartiates, who were held as hostages to prevent another invasion of Attica. The Spartans sued for peace. Over the objections of Nicias, leading the antiwar party, Cleon convinced the assembly to reject the Spartan peace overtures.
424-422: Brasidas' Invasion of Thrace
Nicias led an expedition which captured Cythera, an island off the coast of Laconia. The Athenians then sent an army to aid a democratic revolution in Megara, but they were outmaneuvered by the Spartan general Brasidas. Megara remained a Peloponnesian ally. Brasidas led a small force overland to Thrace and encouraged the revolt of a number of Athenian allies. The Athenians attempted to invade Boeotia but were defeated at the Battle of Delium. Brasidas took the important Athenian colony of Amphipolis in Thrace.
The Athenians and Spartans made a year's truce, but Brasidas continued operations in Thrace. The Athenians broke off peace negotiations. Cleon led a force to Thrace, and both he and Brasidas were killed at the Battle of Amphipolis.
421: Peace of Nicias
With the main prowar figures on both sides dead, the Spartans and Athenians negotiated the Peace of Nicias. It was to last 50 years, but the terms of the peace were never carried out.
The Argive War (420)
The Boeotians refused to sign the Peace of Nicias and left the Peloponnesian League, as did Elis, Mantinea, Corinth, and Argos. These last four made an alliance (called the Quadruple Alliance), which Corinth soon left and Athens joined, and went to war with Sparta.
418: First battle of Mantinea and invasion of Argos
The Spartans, led by King Agis II (427–399), invaded Argos, decisively defeating the Quadruple Alliance at the First Battle of Mantinea and restoring Spartan hegemony.
416: the siege of Melos
The island of Melos refused to join the Delian League and was besieged by Athens. When the city was taken the Athenians massacred all the men and enslaved the women and children.
416:Expedition to Sicily
Selinus, in Sicily, called on Athens for assistance in its war against Segesta. A new Athenian leader, Alcibiades, proposed an expedition to Sicily, which the assembly approved over Nicias's objections.
415-413: Athenian siege of Syracuse
THE SICILIAN EXPEDITION was organized under the joint command of Alcibiades, Nicias, and Lamachus. Soon after the Athenians' arrival in Sicily, Alcibiades was ordered to return to Athens and face charges of having mutilated the Herms (sacred pillars) and of profaning the Eleusinian mysteries. His guilt or innocence is unknown, but Alcibiades fled, eventually going over to the Spartans. The Athenians began their attack on Syracuse, which was defended by Hermocrates. A small Spartan force under Gylippus arrived and prevented an Athenian circumvolution by taking the heights of Epipolae. The Spartans invaded Argos, and an Athenian fleet supporting the Argives raided the coast of Laconia.
In 413 Athenian reinforcements arrived in Sicily under Demosthenes. Help for Syracuse came from Sparta, Corinth, and Boeotia. An Athenian assault on the heights of Epipolae failed, and their position became untenable. Nicias delayed too long in retreating, and the entire force, some 50,000 men including both generals, was killed or captured at the Battle of Assinarus.
Archelaus (c. 413–399) succeeded his father Perdiccas as king of Macedonia. He built up Macedonia's military strength, particularly in infantry. Archelaus moved the court to Pella and encouraged Hellenistic culture among the aristocracy, inviting many Greek artists, including Euripides, to Macedonia.
413: The Decelean or Ionian War
The Sicilian defeat led to the overthrow of the popular party in Athens. A college of ten “deliberators” (probouloi) was instituted which replaced many of the former functions of the Areopagus Council. A 5 percent tariff in all the harbors of the Delian League replaced the tribute paid by the allies. Following the advice of Alcibiades, the Spartans seized the fortress of Decelea in Attica and kept a garrison there year-round, bringing Athenian agriculture to a virtual standstill.
412: Sparta allies with Persia against Athens
Using the last 1,000 talents of their war reserve, the Athenians rebuilt the fleet they had lost in Sicily, but it lacked training. Alcibiades negotiated the Treaty of Miletus between the Spartans and Persians. The Spartans recognized the king's right to subjugate the Ionian cities in return for money with which to build a Peloponnesian fleet. This fleet was sent to stir up revolts along the Ionian coast and threaten Athens' grain shipments from Egypt and the Black Sea.
411: The Athenian Oligarchy
Alcibiades approached the Athenians, claiming he could obtain Persian support for them if the democracy was overthrown. Political clubs (hetairiai) took control of the government and instituted the oligarchy of the Four Hundred. The Athenian fleet at Samos refused to recognize the new government and elected its own generals: principally Thrasybulus and, remarkably, Alcibiades. When the Peloponnesians attacked Euboea, the oligarchy sent a small fleet which was defeated. When the oligarchs prepared to surrender to Sparta, they were overthrown and the democracy restored.
410: Battle of Cyzicus
Alcibiades decisively defeated the Spartan fleet at the Battle of Cyzicus. The Spartans again offered peace and were again rejected. With more Persian money, the Peloponnesian fleet was rebuilt and put under the command of Lysander.
409 The siege of Ephesus and Pylos
An Athenian expedition under Thrasyllus failed to take Ephesus. Sparta recovered Pylos.
408: the conquest of Byzantium
Both Spartans and Athenians courted the Persians, who decided to back the Spartans decisively. The Athenians recovered Byzantium.
407: the battle of Notium
The Athenians lost the sea battles of Notium (after which Alcibiades left Athens) and Mytilene.
406: the battle of Arginusae
The Athenians managed to raise another fleet and won the Battle of Arginusae, but they put several of their victorious generals to death for not rescuing drowning sailors after the battle.
405: Battle of Aegospotami;
navy of Athens destroyed
Lysander caught the Athenian fleet unawares and annihilated it in the Battle of Aegospotamai. He then sailed across the Aegean, replacing pro-Athenian democracies on the allied islands with oligarchies of Ten (decarchies) under a Spartan overseer (harmost). The Spartans then besieged Athens itself.
404: Fall of Athens
The Surrender of Athens. After holding out over the winter, Athens surrendered in 404. The Long Walls were dismantled to the sound of Spartan flutes.
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Spartan Hegemony

Postby Quintus Aurelius Orcus on Sat Jul 12, 2003 12:04 pm

Spartan Hegemony (404-371 BCE)

401: Revolt of Cyrus , battle of Cunaxa
401-400: The Anabasis
400-387: Sparta vs. Persian; Spartans invade Asia Minor

400: the liberation of Ionia
The Persian satrap Tissaphernes besieged Cyme, and the Spartans sent Thibron to hire a mercenary army and liberate the Ionians from Persia
399-397: The conquest of Aeolus
Dercyllidas took over the command of Spartan forces in Asia Minor. He played one satrap, Tissaphernes, against another, Pharnabazus, and conquered nine cities in eight days in the Aeolus. He then, against the orders of the ephors, made a truce with the Persians. The truce held, but Artaxerxes built up his fleet, putting the renegade Athenian Conon in command.
Persia gains control of all cities in Asia in 387 BCE.
396-395: The Spartan- Persian wars
King Agesilaus II (399–360) succeeded Dercyllidas as commander in Asia Minor. He campaigned in Phrygia, beating Tissaphernes' army, but was unable to defeat the Persian fleet. Persia sent Timocrates of Rhodes to bribe the leaders of Athens, Thebes, Corinth, and Argos to attack Sparta.
395-387: Corinthian War
Persian supported anti-Spartan alliance Athens made defensive alliances with Boeotia, Corinth, Argos, Megara, and Euboea. The Corinthian War (395–387) against Sparta broke out.
394: Battle of Nemea and Coronea
Agesilaus returned to Greece from Asia Minor with most of his force. The Spartans beat the Greek allies at the Battles of the Nemea and Coronea, but the Spartan fleet was annihilated by the Persians, under Conon, at the Battle of Cnidus. Persia granted autonomy to the Greek cities of Asia Minor and withdrew its garrisons. The Ionians then revolted from Sparta and established democracies.
393: Athens recovered Lemnos, Imbros, Scyros, and Delos, and made alliances with Chios, Mitylene, Rhodes, Cos, and Cnidus.
386: King’s Peace
Persia controls alliances among Greek cities with money, bribery, exiles, troops
379-371: Theban-Sparta war
Thebes becomes new center of resistance against Sparta
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Theban Hegemony

Postby Quintus Aurelius Orcus on Sat Jul 12, 2003 12:06 pm

Theban Hegemony (371-355 BCE)

371: Leuctra; Thebes defeats Sparta
A general peace settlement was reached between the allies and Sparta in the summer, but the Theban leader Epaminondas withdrew when he was not permitted to sign on behalf of all Boeotia. Sparta immediately sent King Cleombrotus to chastise Thebes, but the Spartan army was crushed by Epaminondas at the Battle of Leuctra. This defeat shattered Spartan military prestige and ended its hegemony over Greece. Thebes withdrew from the Athenian League, along with the cities in Acarnania, Euboea, and the Chalcidice.
370: Laconia invaded
An Arcadian League was formed under Theban protection as a counterweight to Sparta, and Mantinea was restored as a city. The government of the Arcadian League consisted of a general assembly (the Ten Thousand), made up of all freeborn citizens, with sovereignty in matters of war and peace. A council of damiurgoi gave proportional representation to the member cities, and a college of generals (strategoi) served as a civil and military executive. There was a standing mercenary army (eparitoi). The Theban army, under Epaminondas, liberated Messenia from Sparta, and the city of Messene was built.
369: Liberation of Messenia
The Thebans sent a army to Lakonia to defeat the Spartans and liberate the Messenians.
369: Athenian- spartan Alliance
Athens and Sparta made an alliance on equal terms. The Arcadians founded Megalopolis as a federal capital. In the following years, Thebes secured the union of all Thessaly except Pherae under a single ruler (archon).
365: Theban- Athenian War
The pro-Spartan party of Callistratus in Athens was replaced in power by the party of Timotheus. Peace was made with Thebes on the basis of the status quo. Breaking its promise, Athens sent a cleruchy to garrison its ally Samos.
364: the Battle of Cynoscephalae
The Thebans defeated Alexander, the tyrant of Pherae, in the Battle of Cynoscephalae but their commander, Pelopidas, was killed in action.
362: Batle of Mantinea:
Epaminondas defeats Spartans and Athenians at Mantinea. In the Second Battle of Mantinea the Thebans beat the Spartans, but Epaminondas was killed in the battle. A general peace was made but not accepted by Sparta, which refused to recognize the independence of Messenia.
361 Athens sent a cleruchy to occupy Potidaea.
357-355: Social War
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The Macedonian empire

Postby Quintus Aurelius Orcus on Thu Jul 17, 2003 8:56 pm

Macedonian Empire

338 BCE: Battle of Chaeronea
The war between Philipus of Macedonia and the Athenians for supremacy over Greece. Philipus wanted to form a massive army against the Persians. In order to succeed in his task, he must first defeat the Athenians, abolish the Boeotian League, which gave back its member states its independence. In the end, central Greece lost its freedom.
334 BCE: Battle of the Granicus River
In the spring, Alexander left Antipater as governor in Greece and crossed the Hellespont with an army of 32,000 infantry and 5,000 cavalry. The army was supported by a navy of 160 ships, mostly made up of Greek allies. Memnon of Rhodes, the commander of Greek forces in the Persian service, advised a tactical retreat, but the satraps insisted on fighting. The Persians were completely defeated by Alexander at the Battle of Granicus.
333 BCE: Battle of Issus
Alexander subdued Caria and Cilicia, then advanced into Syria. He again defeated the Persian army, under the personal command of Darius III, at the Battle of Issus. After this defeat, Darius offered to give up all of Asia west of the Euphrates and to pay 10,000 talents, but Alexander demanded unconditional surrender. After Issus, all of Phoenicia except Tyre submitted to Alexander.
331 BCE: Battle of Gaugamela
In October Alexander met and defeated another Persian army under Darius in the Battle of Gaugamela. Babylonia and Susa soon surrendered. One of the Persian capitals, Persepolis, was looted and burned, ostensibly in revenge for the destruction of Athens in 480.
The wars of the Diadochi (322–315 )
After Perdiccas became regent for Philip III Arrhidaeus, the other generals: Antigonus, Antipater, Craterus, and Ptolemy—formed a coalition against him. Perdiccas's general Eumenes defeated and killed Craterus in Asia Minor, but Perdiccas was himself assassinated while campaigning against Ptolemy in Egypt (320). At Triparadeisus in northern Syria, Antigonus, Ptolemy, and Antipater agreed that the latter should be regent. Antigonus then defeated and besieged Eumenes in Cappadocia. Antipater died (319) leaving Polyperchon as regent. This was unacceptable to Antigonus, to Ptolemy, and to Antipater's son Cassander. After negotiating his release, Eumenes promptly accepted Polyperchon's offer to oppose Antigonus in Asia. Meanwhile Cassander seized Piraeus and left Demetrius of Phaleron in command of Athens (317). He then drove Polyperchon from Macedonia, executed Olympias, who had earlier killed Philip Arrhidaeus, and imprisoned Roxana and her son Alexander IV, both of whom he put to death in 310. Antigonus pursued Eumenes into central Iran and, after the indecisive Battle at Paraetacene, surprised him as he was wintering in Gabiene and executed him (316). Antigonus then drove Seleucus from Babylon to Egypt, where he sought refuge with Ptolemy and where the two, together with Cassander and Lysimachus, who ruled Thrace, formed a coalition against Antigonus.
315–302: The Macedonian Civil Wars
Antigonus, after besieging and capturing Tyre (314–313), took Syria from Ptolemy. Fighting went on in the Aegean, the Peloponnese, and Asia Minor (313–312). Demetrius, Antigonus' son, was defeated at Gaza (312), and Seleucus recaptured Babylon (311). Cassander consolidated his position in Macedonia. Antigonus sent Demetrius to Athens, whence he expelled Demetrius of Phaleron (307).
In 306 Demetrius won a great naval victory over Ptolemy at Salamis in Cyprus after which both Antigonus I Monophthalmos (“one-eyed”) and Demetrius I Poliorcetes (“besieger”) took the title of king. Ptolemy assumed the royal title in 304, followed immediately by Seleucus, Lysimachus, and Cassander. Alexander's empire was thus officially dissolved. Demetrius failed to reduce Rhodes by a year's siege (305–304) but relieved Athens from the Four Years' War waged by Cassander (307–304). He then revived the Hellenic League of Philip II (302). In 302 Lysimachus, Seleucus, Ptolemy, and Cassander formed an alliance against Antigonus and Demetrius.
301: Battle of Ipsus (in Phrygia).
The armies of Lysimachus and Seleucus, but not Ptolemy, defeated and killed the eighty-one-year-old Antigonus. Demetrius escaped and continued hostilities, dominating the Aegean with his fleet. Of Antigonus's possessions, Seleucus received Syria and Lysimachus central Asia Minor. Cassander kept Macedonia, and his brother Pleistarchus was allotted Cilicia. Ptolemy seized Coele-Syria from Seleucus.
295–294 The siege of Athens and northeastern and central Greece.
Demetrius besieged and recovered Athens. He then killed Alexander V, expelled his brother, and ruled Macedonia (294). He conquered northeastern and central Greece except for Aetolia.
290: the Aetolian League:
Emergence of the Aetolian League, a military federation in western Greece. It had a council with proportional representation and a semiannual assembly. A committee of 100 apokletoi and a single general (strategos) handled affairs in wartime. The league expanded into Phocis (254) and Boeotia (245) and dominated Greece from sea to sea. It also included Elis and part of Arcadia (245) and made an alliance with Messene, thus separating Sparta from the Achaean League.
288 A coalition was formed against Demetrius, and Lysimachus and King Pyrrhus of Epirus drove him from Macedonia. Demetrius then attempted to campaign in Asia Minor but was eventually captured by Seleucus in Cilicia (286).
283 Demetrius died in captivity, leaving a son, Antigonus, in Greece.
281: Battle of Corupedium
Lysimachus, who ruled Macedonia, Thrace, and Asia Minor, was defeated and killed at the Battle of Corupedium in Lydia by Seleucus, who became master of Asia Minor. When he tried to seize Macedonia, however, he was treacherously assassinated by the disinherited son of Ptolemy, Ptolemy Ceraunus, who then ruled Macedonia until he was killed opposing the Celtic invasion in 279.
280: the Achean League
Formation of the Achaean League, consisting of twelve towns in the northern Peloponnese. It had a general (two until 255), a board of ten demiourgoi, and a federal council with proportional representation of members. There was also an annual assembly of all free citizens. After 251, Aratus of Sicyon dominated its policy, and after 245 he was strategos in alternate years. With Ptolemaic backing he opposed Macedonian and Aetolian power, extending Achaean influence in the Peloponnese and taking Corinth from Macedonia in 243.
279: the Celtic Invasion
The Celts ravaged Macedonia, defeated the Greeks at Thermopylae, and were turned back at Delphi. Celtic rule was then established in Thrace, lasting until 210. In central Asia Minor the Celtic kingdom of Galatia was established. 10 277–276 Meanwhile Demetrius's son, Antigonus Gonatas, recovered Macedonia from the Celts and established the Antigonid dynasty which lasted until 168.

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