Therefore the invasion of Thessaly by the Phocians brought them into contact with the Macedonians. At first Onomarchus was successful. He won two battles and drove Philip back to his native state. But another large army was quickly in the field, and this time the army of Onomarchus was utterly beaten and himself slain. As for Philip, although he probably cared not an iota for the Delphian god, he shrewdly professed to be on a crusade against the impious Phocians, and drowned all his prisoners as guilty of sacrilege.
A third leader, Phayllus by name, now took command of the Phocians, and the temple of Apollo was rifled still more freely than before. The splendid gifts of King Crœsus had not yet been touched. They were held too precious to be meddled with. But Phayllus did not hesitate to turn these into money. One hundred and seventeen ingots of gold and three hundred and sixty golden goblets went to the melting-pot, and with them a golden statue three cubits high and a lion of the same precious metal. And what added to the horror of pious Greece was that much of the proceeds of these precious treasures was lavished on favorites. The necklaces of Helen and Eriphyle were given to dissolute women, and a woman flute-player received a silver cup and a golden wreath from the temple hoard.
All this gave Philip of Macedonia the desired pretence. He marched against the Phocians, who held Thermopylæ, while keeping his Athenian enemies quiet by lies and bribes. The leader of the Phocian garrison, finding that no aid came from the Athenian fleet, surrendered to Philip, and that astute monarch won what he had long schemed for, the Pass of Thermopylæ, the Key of Greece.
The Sacred War was at an end, and with it virtually the independence of Greece. Phocis was in the hands of Philip, who professed more than ever to be the defender and guardian of Apollo. All the towns in Phocis were broken up into villages, and the inhabitants were ordered to be fined ten talents annually till they had paid back all they had stolen from the temple. Philip gave back the temple to the Delphians, and was himself voted into membership in the Amphictyonic assembly in place of the discarded Phocians. And all this took place while a treaty of peace tied the hands of the Greeks. The Sacred War had served as a splendid pretext to carry out the ambitious plans of the Macedonian king.
We have now a long story to tell in a few words. Another people, the Locrians, had also made an invasion on Delphian territory. The Amphictyonic Council called on Philip to punish them, He at once marched southward, but, instead of meddling with the Locrians, seized and fortified a town in Phocis. At once Athens, full of alarm, declared war, and Philip was as quick to declare war in return. Both sides sought the support of Thebes, and Athens gained it. In August, 338 B.C., the Grecian and Macedonian armies met and fought a decisive battle near Chæronea, a Bœotian town. In this great contest Alexander the Great took part.
It was a hotly-contested fight, but in the end Philip triumphed, and Greece was lost. Thebes was forced to yield. Athens, to regain the prisoners held by Philip, acknowledged him to be the head of Greece. All the other states did the same except Sparta, which defied him. He ravaged Laconia, but left the city untouched.
Two years afterwards Philip, lord and master of Greece, was assassinated at the marriage feast of his daughter. His son Alexander succeeded him. Here seemed an opportunity for Greece to regain her freedom. This untried young man could surely not retain what his able father had won. Demosthenes, the celebrated orator, stirred up Athens to revolt. Thebes sprang to arms and attacked the Macedonian garrison in the citadel.
They did not know the man with whom they had to deal. Alexander came upon Thebes like an avalanche, took it by assault, and sold into slavery all the inhabitants not slain in the assault. The city was razed to the ground. This terrible example dismayed the rest of Greece. Submission—with the exception of that of Sparta—was universal. The independence of Greece was at an end. More than two thousand years were to pass before that country would again be free.