Pausanias' description of Greece, Volume II.

by active approximately 150-175 Pausanias

CHAPTER XIV.

At last the envoys, who had been sent from Rome to arbitrate between the Lacedæmonians and Achæans, arrived in Greece, among others Orestes, who summoned before him Diæus and the principal people in each city of the Achæans. And when they came to his head-quarters,[7] he disclosed to them all his views, viz. that the Roman Senate thought it just that neither the Lacedæmonians nor Corinth should be forced into the Achæan League, nor Argos, nor Heraclea under Mount Œta, nor the Arcadians of Orchomenus, for they had no connection with the Achæans by ancestry, but had been incorporated subsequently into the Achæan League. As Orestes said this, the principal men of the Achæans would not stay to listen to the end of his speech, but ran outside the building and called the Achæans to the meeting. And they, when they heard the decision of the Romans, immediately turned their fury on all the Spartans who at that time resided at Corinth. And they plundered everyone who they were sure was a Lacedæmonian, or whom they suspected of being so by the way he wore his hair, or by his boots or dress or name, and some who got the start of them, and fled for refuge to Orestes’ head-quarters, they dragged thence by force. And Orestes and his suite tried to check the Achæans from this outrage, and bade them remember that they were acting outrageously against Romans. And not many days afterwards the Achæans threw all the Lacedæmonians whom they had arrested into prison, but dismissed all strangers whom they had arrested on suspicion. And they sent Thearidas and several other prominent Achæans as ambassadors to Rome, who after their departure on meeting on the road some other envoys to settle the Lacedæmonian and Achæan differences, who had been despatched later than Orestes, turned back again. And after Diæus had served his time as General, Critolaus was chosen as his successor by the Achæans; this Critolaus was possessed with a grim unreasoning passion to fight against the Romans, and, as the envoys from Rome to settle the disputes between the Lacedæmonians and Achæans had just arrived, he went to Tegea in Arcadia ostensibly to confer with them, but really because he did not want the Achæans summoned to a general meeting, and, while in the hearing of the Romans he sent messengers bidding the commissioners call a general meeting of the Achæans, he privately urged the commissioners not to attend the general meeting. And when the commissioners did not come, then he displayed great guile to the Romans, for he told them to wait for another general meeting of the Achæans that would be held six months later, for he himself said that he could discuss no question privately without the common consent of the Achæans. And the Roman envoys, when they discovered they were being deceived, returned to Rome. And Critolaus collected an army of Achæans at Corinth, and persuaded them to war against Sparta, and also to wage war at once against the Romans. When king and nation undertake war and are unsuccessful, it seems rather the malignity of some divine power than the fault of the originators of the war. But audacity and weakness combined should rather be called madness than want of luck. And this was the ruin of Critolaus and the Achæans. The Achæans were also further incited against the Romans by Pytheas, who was at that time Bœotarch at Thebes, and the Thebans undertook to take an eager part in prosecuting the war. For the Thebans had been heavily punished by the decision of Metellus, first they had to pay a fine to the Phocians for invading Phocis, and secondly to the Eubœans for ravaging Eubœa, and thirdly to the people of Amphissa for destroying their corn in harvest time.

[7] Which were at Corinth, as we see in this chapter a little later.

CHAPTER XV.

And the Romans being informed of all this by the envoys whom they had sent to Greece, and by the letters which Metellus wrote, passed a vote against the Achæans that they were guilty of treason, and, as Mummius had just been chosen consul, they ordered him to lead against them both a naval and land force. And Metellus, directly he heard that Mummius and the army with him had set out against the Achæans, made all haste that he might win his laurels in the campaign first, before Mummius could get up. He sent therefore messengers to the Achæans, bidding the Lacedæmonians and all other cities mentioned by the Romans to leave the Achæan League, and for the future he promised that there should be no anger on the part of the Romans for any earlier disobedience. At the same time that he made this Proclamation he brought his army from Macedonia, marching through Thessaly and by the Lamiac Gulf. And Critolaus and the Achæans, so far from accepting this proclamation which tended to peace, sat down and blockaded Heraclea, because it would not join the Achæan League. But when Critolaus heard from his spies that Metellus and the Romans had crossed the Spercheus, then he fled to Scarphea in Locris, not being bold enough to place the Achæans in position between Heraclea and Thermopylæ, and there await the attack of Metellus: for such a panic had seized him that he could extract no hope from a spot where the Lacedæmonians had so nobly fought for Greece against the Medes, and where at a later date the Athenians displayed equal bravery against the Galati. And Metellus’ army came up with Critolaus and the Achæans as they were in retreat a little before Scarphea, and many they killed and about 1,000 they took alive. But Critolaus was not seen alive after the battle, nor was he found among the dead, but if he tried to swim across the muddy sea near Mount Œta, he would have been very likely drowned without being observed. As to his end therefore one may make various guesses. But the thousand picked men from Arcadia, who had fought on Critolaus’ side in the action, marched as far as Elatea in Phocis, and were received in that town from old kinsmanship; but when the people of Phocis got news of the reverse of Critolaus and the Achæans, they requested these Arcadians to leave Elatea. And as they marched back to the Peloponnese Metellus and the Romans met them at Chæronea. Then came the Nemesis of the Greek gods upon the Arcadians, who were cut to pieces by the Romans, in the very place where they had formerly left in the lurch the Greeks who fought against Philip and the Macedonians.

And Diæus was again made Commander-in-Chief of the Achæan army, and he imitated the action of Miltiades and the Athenians before Marathon by manumitting the slaves, and made a levy of Achæans and Arcadians in the prime of life from the various towns. And so his army altogether, including the slaves, amounted to 600 cavalry, and 14,000 infantry. Then he displayed the greatest want of strategy, for, though he knew that Critolaus and all the Achæan host had crumbled away before Metellus, yet he selected only 4,000 men, and put Alcamenes at their head. They were despatched to Megara to garrison that town and, should Metellus and the Romans come up, to stop their further progress. And Metellus, after his rout of the Arcadian picked men at Chæronea, had pushed on with his army to Thebes; for the Thebans had joined the Achæans in besieging Heraclea, and had also taken part in the fight near Scarphea. Then the inhabitants, men and women of all ages, abandoned Thebes, and wandered about all over Bœotia, and fled to the tops of the mountains. But Metellus would not allow his men either to set on fire the temples of the gods or to pull down any buildings, or to kill or take alive any of the fugitives except Pytheas, but him, if they should capture him, they were to bring before him. And Pytheas was forthwith found, and brought before Metellus, and executed. And when the Roman army marched on Megara, then Alcamenes and his men were seized with panic, and fled without striking a blow to Corinth, to the camp of the Achæans. And the Megarians delivered up their town to the Romans without a blow struck, and, when Metellus got to the Isthmus, he issued a Proclamation, inviting the Achæans even now to peace and harmony: for he had a strong desire that both Macedonia and Achaia should be settled by him. But this intention of his was frustrated by the folly of Diæus.

CHAPTER XVI.

Meantime Mummius, and with him Orestes, who was first sent from Rome to settle the disputes between the Lacedæmonians and Achæans, reached the Roman army one morning, took over the command, and sent Metellus and his forces back to Macedonia, and himself waited at the Isthmus till he had concentrated all his forces. His cavalry amounted to 3,500, his infantry to 22,000. There were also some Cretan bowmen, and Philopœmen had brought some soldiers from Attalus, from Pergamus across the Caicus. Mummius placed some of the Italian troops and allies, so as to be an advanced post for all his army, 12 stades in the van. And the Achæans, as this vanguard was left without defence through the confidence of the Romans, attacked them, and slew some, but drove still more back to the camp, and captured about 500 shields. By this success the Achæans were so elated that they attacked the Roman army without waiting for them to begin the battle. But when Mummius led out his army to battle in turn, then the Achæan cavalry, which was opposite the Roman cavalry, ran immediately, not venturing to make one stand against the attack of the enemy’s cavalry. And the infantry, though dejected at the rout of the cavalry, stood their ground against the wedge-like attack of the Roman infantry, and though outnumbered and fainting under their wounds, yet resisted bravely, till 1,000 picked men of the Romans took them in flank, and so turned the battle into a complete rout of the Achæans. And had Diæus been bold enough to hurry into Corinth after the battle, and receive within its walls the runaways from the fight and shut himself up there, the Achæans might have obtained better terms from Mummius, if the war had been lengthened out by a siege. But as it was, directly the Achæans gave way before the Romans, Diæus fled for Megalopolis, exhibiting to the Achæans none of that spirit which Callistratus, the son of Empedus, had displayed to the Athenians. For he being in command of the cavalry in Sicily, when the Athenians and their allies were badly defeated at the river Asinarus, boldly cut his way through the enemy at the head of the cavalry, and, after getting safe through with most of them to Catana, turned back again on the road to Syracuse, and finding the enemy still plundering the camp of the Athenians killed five with his own hand and then expired, himself and his horse having received fatal wounds. He won fair fame both for the Athenians and himself, and voluntarily met death, having preserved the cavalry whom he led. But Diæus after ruining the Achæans announced to the people of Megalopolis their impending ruin, and after slaying his wife with his own hand that she might not become a captive took poison and so died, resembling Menalcidas as in his greed for money so also in the cowardice of his death.

And those of the Achæans who got safe to Corinth after the battle fled during the night, as also did most of the Corinthians. But Mummius did not enter Corinth at first, though the gates were open, as he thought some ambush lay in wait for him within the walls, not till the third day did he take Corinth in full force and set it on fire. And most of those that were left in the city were slain by the Romans, and the women and children were sold by Mummius, as also were the slaves who had been manumitted and had fought on the side of the Achæans, and had not been killed in action. And the most wonderful of the votive offerings and other ornaments he carried off to Rome, and those of less value he gave to Philopœmen, the general of Attalus’ troops, and these spoils from Corinth were in my time at Pergamus. And Mummius rased the walls of all the cities which had fought against the Romans, and took away their arms, before any advisers what to do were sent from Rome. And when they arrived, then he put down all democracies, and appointed chief-magistrates according to property qualifications.[8] And taxes were laid upon Greece, and those that had money were forbidden to have land over the borders, and all the general meetings were put down altogether, as those in Achaia, or Phocis, or Bœotia, or any other part of Greece. But not many years afterwards the Romans took mercy upon Greece, and allowed them their old national meetings and to have land over the borders. They remitted also the fines which Mummius had imposed, for he had ordered the Bœotians to pay the people of Heraclea and Eubœa 100 talents, and the Achæans to pay the Lacedæmonians 200 talents. The Greeks got remission of these fines from the Romans, and a prætor was sent out from Rome, and is still, who is not called by the Romans prætor of all Greece but prætor of Achaia, because they reduced Greece through Achaia, which was then the foremost Greek power. Thus ended the war when Antitheus was Archon at Athens, in the 160th Olympiad, when Diodorus of Sicyon was victor in the course.

[8] That is, wherever Mummius found a democratical form of government, there he established an oligarchy. Cf. Plat. Rep. 550. C. Id. Legg. 698. B.