CASSANDER IN POWER
[316-307 B.C.]
When Cassander was once in possession of Macedonia, he extirpated the family of Alexander, without a hand being raised in their defence. Aristobulus, who wished to interfere, was delivered up and sacrificed. Hence it is remarkable that he married Thessalonice, the only surviving daughter of Philip; but this may have arisen from the pride of the usurper, or from the hope of thereby establishing his dominion. His government of Macedonia was at the same time a perfect dominion over Greece, with very few exceptions, one of which was Sparta.
Thebes had been restored by Cassander immediately after the conquest of Macedonia (316 B.C.), for, in his hatred of Alexander, he undid all that Alexander had done. By their possession of the Theban territory the Bœotians were so much bound up with the interests of Macedonia, that it became a question as to whether it was prudent to restore Thebes. It is not certain whether they had incurred the suspicion of Cassander. It was a matter of great difficulty to induce the Bœotians to consent to the restoration; in all of the rest of Greece it was regarded as an act of the greatest justice, and it seems to have been a general national consolation.
About the same time Cassander founded Cassandrea, a remarkable proof that he was a man of practical sagacity. Philip had extirpated or sold the Greek population on the Macedonian coast, with the exception of that of Amphipolis and Pydna. One of these destroyed cities was Potidæa, which had at first been a Corinthian colony, but afterwards belonged to Athenian cleruchi. Now, on that site, Cassander assembled, not only many strangers, but all the Greeks, especially those Olynthians who were still surviving from the destruction of their city, and built Cassandrea. On the site of the insignificant town of Therma, he founded Thessalonica, which he called after the name of his wife. This act also shows great practical wisdom. Thessalonica, situated on a fine harbour, and in a fertile district, being now extended, became the chief commercial place in Macedonia, a rank which it has maintained down to the present day. Cassandrea (now Cassandra) soon became great and powerful; it has often been destroyed, but was always restored again; and its situation was so happily chosen, that it naturally always recovered.
This was the condition of Greece at the time when the appearance of Demetrius Poliorcetes, the son of Antigonus (307 B.C.), stirred up everything without doing any good. He had even before been actively engaged in a war against Ptolemy.
The defeat and death of Eumenes put Antigonus in possession of a vast monarchy, extending from the Hellespont as far as India. According to the early invented principle of the balance of power, the others now demanded that he should give up a part of his conquests; they even thought it necessary, for the sake of justice and for the balance of power, that the countries of upper Asia should form a separate state.
Seleucus, the child of fortune, was destined to obtain that empire; a man who was the pet of fortune, but in no way distinguished as a hero or statesman. In the same year (316 B.C.) in which Cassander had conquered Macedonia, and Antigonus, after the conquest of Eumenes, returned from Upper Asia, Antigonus intended to order Seleucus to be arrested at Babylon. But he escaped, and the Chaldeans now foretold Antigonus, that the fate of his family was involved in the affair. It was easy to foretell the beginning, but not the end, for the Seleucidæ did not overthrow Antigonus. Seleucus now went to Ptolemy whom he urged on to wage war against Antigonus.
Thus arose, in 316 B.C., the second or third great internal war among the Macedonian princes—we say the second or third, because the recommencement of the war in 318 B.C. may either be regarded as a continuation of the first or as a second war. In this war, Antigonus fell out with Cassander, and Ptolemy allied himself with Cassander and Lysimachus against Antigonus. Lysimachus, however, was cunning enough to keep aloof as much as he could, and Cassander, too, at first took much less part in it than Ptolemy. In the beginning it was, properly speaking, only Antigonus and Ptolemy that were arrayed against each other.
The war was at first carried on especially in Syria and Cyprus. Ptolemy had taken possession of Cœle-Syria and southern Phœnicia. Antigonus now directed his arms against him, and at first generally with success, so that he made himself master of Syria and a great part of Cyprus; until, in the fourth year of the war, Demetrius Poliorcetes lost the battle of Gaza against Ptolemy, of which we shall speak hereafter.
In the meantime, however, the generals of Antigonus were carrying on a war in Greece against Cassander, from 315 B.C. till the end of 312 B.C. It is worthy of remark that both Antigonus and Ptolemy considered the Greeks of sufficient importance, to endeavour to gain their favour by proclaiming the struggle a war of independence for the Greeks; neither of them, however, had any serious intention of this kind. In the very first year of the war, Antigonus sent Aristodemus of Miletus with a fleet and large sums of money to Greece, probably with no other intention than to make a diversion against Cassander and prevent him from crossing over into Asia.
[312-311 B.C.]
This brought unspeakable misery upon Greece. Each city was too weak, and also but little inclined to defend itself; each threw itself into the arms of the party that happened to be at its gates. Alexander, the son of Polysperchon, had remained in Peloponnesus, establishing himself mainly at Corinth and Sicyon; he now joined Antigonus, from whom he received money and troops. He and Aristodemus also enlisted soldiers in Greece, and the war now broke out, especially in Peloponnesus. Cassander, forcing his way into the peninsula, conquered Cenchreæ, the port of Corinth.
But all on a sudden, Alexander deserted Antigonus, and faithlessly concluded a peace with Cassander in his own name and that of his father. By this means, Aristodemus was driven out of Peloponnesus, and now went to Ætolia, whence he carried on the war against the opposite countries of Peloponnesus, Achaia, and Elis. The watchword always was, “Liberty and Autonomy for Greece;” but the towns were, notwithstanding, treated in a most terrible manner. During the first campaign, the principal scene of operations was Arcadia and Argolis, and in the second, Elis and Achaia. Almost the whole of Achaia was laid waste during this campaign, and Patræ and Ægium were taken. Alexander was then murdered, and Cratesipolis, his widow, keeping possession of Corinth and Sicyon, ruled there almost as an absolute queen.
A Scene in Syria
But Cassander transferred the war into Ætolia; these occurrences rendered the conflict more and more important, and the Acarnanians, therefore, beginning to be apprehensive, threw themselves into the arms of Cassander and the Macedonians. Being now supported by Cassander, they endeavoured to rid themselves of their connection with the Ætolians. The year following saw the commencement of the war of Cassander against Ætolia.
In 312 B.C., Antigonus made great preparations, and under the command of Ptolemy, a son of his sister, sent an army into Greece, more especially into Bœotia, which was exasperated against Cassander, for having been obliged by him to give up the territory of Thebes. In conjunction with them, Ptolemy conquered Chalcis, and wherever they went, they were successful in expelling the garrisons of Cassander, who had no other city in Greece left that sided with him except Athens. But while Antigonus was victorious there, he was losing ground in other parts; and thus he found himself obliged, in 311 B.C., to conclude a peace with his opponents.
[312-308 B.C.]
In Syria, Antigonus had entrusted the supreme command against Ptolemy and Seleucus to his son Demetrius, who was then still a very young man. This Demetrius plays a very prominent part in history. He has the honour of having his life described among the biographies in Plutarch—an honour which we might reasonably grudge Demetrius, for he is a despicable person. We know him, partly from Plutarch’s biographies, and partly from a number of anecdotes in Athenæus, to have been the most unprincipled and most detestable man in existence: the acts of faithlessness which he committed against Alexander, the son of Cassander, are not the only things for which he deserves our detestation. He was also a voluptuary of the vulgarest and most abject description; the lowest crapule was the element in the filth of which he revelled; and he was quite a heartless man, who knew no friendship; the basest creatures, the companions of his lusts, were his only friends. Cassander was, after all, capable of distinguishing persons deserving of respect, as he showed in the selection of Demetrius Phalereus; and so also was Ptolemy; but we know that Demetrius Poliorcetes lived at Athens in intimacy with the most abject and abandoned persons of the time. He also showed towards his soldiers an ingratitude and a heartlessness, which are quite revolting; they were perfectly indifferent to him, and he regarded them only as his tools. They accomplished great things for him, but he always sacrificed them without any scruple, leaving to destruction on the morrow those who had saved his life the day before. In addition to this, he was a gambler, whose dull torpor could be excited only by great changes of fortune, and who staked everything upon a card. He is remarkable for his enormous good fortune: “fortune raised him beyond all conception, and then deserted him, but when he seemed entirely lost, she again held out her hand to him,” says Plutarch, in a verse which he applies to him.
Such a man would deserve no attention at all, were it not that he acted a great part, and that nature had endowed him with great abilities, especially in mechanics, according to the leaning of that age toward the mechanical sciences. In this respect, as in many others, we may compare him with a modern person, the regent Philip of Orleans, who, however, was a far better man. Demetrius was a great inventor in mechanics, and he did much for the improvement of military engineering: this is a merit which he did not unfairly assume, but he is fully entitled to his reputation in this respect. A short time before, a great impulse had been given to mechanics in the affairs of war, and machines of every description were improved. Engines, which for centuries had remained unchanged, were now, partly through the progress of mathematics, and partly through the increased wealth that could be employed upon them, improved in one year, more than they were formerly in the course of centuries.
Demetrius was eighteen years old when Antigonus commissioned him to undertake the command of an army against Ptolemy. The first attempt failed, for at Gaza he was completely defeated, and Ptolemy again took possession of Cœle-Syria. Ptolemy carried on the war in a generous spirit, for, declaring it to be a civil war between Macedonians, he set the prisoners free without ransom, whereby he gained the good will of the Macedonians. Antigonus now undertook the command himself, and Ptolemy again evacuating the towns of Cœle-Syria, ravaged them.
Peace was then concluded, but it lasted only for a short time. Cassander succeeded in inducing Ptolemy, the nephew of Antigonus, who was stationed in Bœotia, as well as another general on the Hellespont, to revolt. Yet Antigonus soon recovered those countries. In the same year Ptolemy took Cyprus and extended his power on the coast of Asia Minor.
In the year following Ptolemy appeared with a fleet in Greece, having until then been the ally of Cassander. It was probably the Bœotians and Peloponnesians that called in his assistance against Polysperchon, and he had a fair opportunity of being able to say that he was coming to avenge the murder of Roxane and Alexander. Cratesipolis surrendered to him her principality of Argos and Sicyon, being unable to maintain those cities any longer; but it was not without difficulty that the mercenaries were prevailed upon to surrender: it was effected only by stratagem. The Peloponnesians afterwards were slow in doing what they had promised, and Ptolemy himself probably did not care much about the conquest. Hence he concluded a treaty with Cassander, whereby he obtained possession of Peloponnesus with the exception of Argos and Sicyon.
[308-306 B.C.]
Antigonus now sent his son Demetrius with a fleet to Greece. No one there was willing to sacrifice himself for Cassander, who had no fleet, so that he was unable to undertake anything against Demetrius. The latter appeared unexpectedly before Piræus: the harbour not being closed, he landed and quickly took Piræus, before the posts could be occupied. He immediately proclaimed that the expedition had been undertaken for the purpose of restoring to Athens her freedom and autonomy, and he was accordingly received with enthusiasm. The Macedonian garrison under Dionysius shut itself up in Munychia, and negotiations were commenced between Demetrius Poliorcetes and the city. Demetrius Phalereus was sent as ambassador down to the camp in Piræus: Demetrius promised the Athenians an amnesty, the city was declared free, and the ancient democratic constitution was restored; but Demetrius Phalereus was sent into exile.
Demetrius Poliorcetes now besieged the Macedonians in Munychia. He would not go to Athens till he had taken that fortress; it was at first blockaded, while the preparations for a siege were going on. While the engines were building, Demetrius marched against Megara, where there was a garrison of Cassander. The town was taken by storm and plundered, and it was only at the urgent request of the Athenian ambassadors, that its inhabitants were saved and not dragged away into slavery. He then returned to Piræus, where he attacked Munychia, until the feeble garrison being exhausted, was obliged, after several days, to surrender, and then departed. The fortifications were razed to the ground, and the place given up to the Athenians. Athens was now free, but Demetrius, for the protection of the Athenians, gave them a garrison of his own troops. After this he stayed for a time at Athens, where he was received with enthusiasm, as elsewhere described.
If Demetrius had remained at Athens, and continued the war against Cassander, he might easily have conquered all Greece; but he was called away by his father Antigonus, because Ptolemy had made himself master of Cyprus. About the month of Hecatombæon, Demetrius sailed to Cyprus; and now, by a brilliant victory of Demetrius over Menelaus, the brother of Ptolemy, near Salamis in Cyprus, Antigonus and Demetrius gained the mastery at sea. Cyprus was reconquered. Menelaus, with all his forces in the island, was obliged to capitulate; and thus the sea far and wide was in the power of Antigonus and his son. But an expedition which the two undertook against Egypt proved a failure.