CHAP. XXXIV. ARATUS AND THE ACHAIAN LEAGUE. b.c. 267.
ntigonus Gonatas was now quite the most powerful person left in Macedon or Greece, and though Sparta and Athens tried to get the help of Egypt against him, they could do nothing to shake off his power.
There were twelve little cities in the Peloponnesus, which were all united together in one league, called the Achaian, each governing itself, but all joining together against any enemy outside. In the good old times they had sent men to the wars as allies of Sparta, but they had never had a man of much mark among them. In the evil times, Sicyon, a city near Achaia, fell under the power of a tyrant, and about the time that Pyrrhus was killed, Clinias, a citizen of Sicyon, made a great attempt to free his townsmen, but he was found out, his house attacked, and he and his family all put to death, except his son Aratus, a little boy of seven years old, who ran away from the dreadful sight, and went wandering about the town, till by chance he came into
the house of the tyrant’s sister. She took pity on the poor boy, hid him from her brother all day, and at night sent him to Argos to some friends of his father, by whom he was brought up.
When he was only twenty he wrote to friends at Sicyon, and finding them of the same mind with himself, he climbed the walls at night and met them. The people gathered round him, and he caused it to be proclaimed with a loud voice, “Aratus, the son of Clinias, calls on Sicyon to resume her liberty.” The people all began rushing to the tyrant’s house. He fled by an underground passage, and his house was set on fire, but not one person on either side was killed or wounded. Aratus was resolved to keep Sicyon free, and in order to make her strong enough, he persuaded the citizens to join her to the Achaian League; and he soon became the leading man among all the Achaians, and his example made other cities come into the same band of union. He further tried to gain strength by an alliance with Egypt, and he went thither to see Ptolemy III., called Euergetes, or the Benefactor. It is said that Ptolemy’s good-will was won by Aratus’ love of art, and especially of pictures. Apelles, the greatest Grecian painter, was then living, and had taken a portrait of one of the tyrants of Sicyon. Aratus had destroyed all their likenesses, and he stood a long time looking at this one before he could bring himself to condemn it, but at last he made up his mind that it must not be spared. Ptolemy liked him so
much that he granted him 150 talents for the city, and the Achaians were so much pleased that they twice elected him their general, and the second time he did them a great service.
In the middle of the Isthmus of Corinth stood the city, and in the midst was a fort called Acro-Corinthus, perched on a high hill in the very centre of the city, so that whoever held it was master of all to the south, and old Philip of Macedon used to call it the Corinthian shackles of Greece. The king of Macedon, Antigonus III., now held it; but Aratus devised a scheme to take it. A Corinthian named Erginus had come to Sicyon on business, and there met a friend of Aratus, to whom he chanced to mention that there was
a narrow path leading up to the Acro-Corinthus at a place where the wall was low. Aratus heard of this, and promised Erginus sixty talents if he would guide him to the spot; but as he had not the money, he placed all his gold and silver plate and his wife’s jewels in pledge for the amount.