[202] Ariarathes V. had been expelled his kingdom by Demetrius, who, in consideration of one thousand talents, had assisted his reputed brother Orophernes, who had been palmed off on Ariarathes IV. by his wife, to displace him. The Senate, when eventually appealed to, decided that the two brothers should share the kingdom. Livy, Ep. 47; Appian, Syr. 47.
[203] Ariarathes arrived in the summer of B.C. 158.
[204] τὴν Ἰακὴν καὶ τεχνητικὴν ἀσωτίαν. The translation given above is in accordance with the explanation of Casaubon, who quoted Horace (Odes 3, 6, 21), Motus doceri gaudet Ionicos matura virgo. Orophernes had been sent to Ionia, when Antiochis had a real son (Ariarathes V.), that he might not set up a claim to the throne. He had been imposed by Antiochis on her husband Ariarathes IV. before she had a real son.
[205] Orophernes was soon deposed, and Ariarathes V. restored, but we have no certain indication when this happened. See 3, [5].
[206] The episode of Oropus here referred to, Polybius’s account of which is lost, was made remarkable by the visit of the three philosophers to Rome as ambassadors from Athens. The story, as far as Athens was concerned, as told by Pausanias, 7, 11, 4-7. The Athenians had been much impoverished by the events of the war with Perseus (B.C. 172-168), and had made a raid or raids of some sort upon Oropus. The Oropians appealed to Rome. The Romans referred the assessment of damages to an Achaean court at Sicyon. The Athenians failed to appear before the court at Sicyon, and were condemned by default to a fine of five hundred talents. Thereupon Carneades the Academician, Diogenes the Stoic, and Critolaus the Peripatetic were sent to plead for a remission of a fine which the Athenians were wholly unable to pay. They made a great impression on the Roman youth by their lectures, and Cato urged that they should get their answer and be sent away as soon as possible. The Senate reduced the fine to one hundred talents: but even that the Athenians could not collect; and they seem to have managed to induce the Oropians to allow an Athenian garrison to hold Oropus, and to give hostages for their fidelity to the Athenian government. This led to fresh quarrels and an appeal to the Achaean government. The Achaean Strategus, Menalcidas of Sparta, was bribed by a present of ten talents to induce an interference in behalf of Oropus. Thereupon the Athenians withdrew their garrison from Oropus, after pillaging the town, and henceforth took no part in the quarrels which ensued, arising from the demands of Menalcidas for his ten talents; which the Oropians refused to pay, on the ground that he had not helped them as he promised; quarrels which presently centred round the question of the continuance of Sparta in the Achaean league. The date of the original quarrel between Athens and Oropus is not fixed, but the mission of the philosophers was in B.C. 155. See Plutarch, Cato, 22; Pliny, N. H. 7, 112-113; Aulus Gellius, 6, 14; Cic. ad Att. 12, 23; Tusc. 4, § 5.
[207] C. Marcius consul adversus Dalmatas parum prospere primum, postea feliciter pugnavit. The war was continued in the next year (B.C. 155), and the Dalmatians subdued for the time by the consul P. Cornelius Scipio Nasica. Livy, Ep. 47.
[208] Temnus was in Mysia, s. of the river Hermus. Cynneius or Cyneius Apollo seems to mean Apollo guardian of the shepherd dogs. There was, according to Suidas (s. v. κυνήειος), a temple to Apollo at Athens with that title, said to have been the work of Cynnis, a son of Apollo and a nymph Parnethia.
[209] The battle, in which Prusias is here said to have conquered Attalus, was a treacherous attack upon Attalus who was waiting, in accordance with an arrangement made by Roman envoys Hortensius and Arunculeius, to meet Prusias on his frontier, accompanied by only one thousand cavalry. The Roman envoys even had to fly for their lives. Appian, Mithridates, 3.
[210] Hultsch places an extract from Aulus Gellius (6, 14, 8) relating to the mission of the three philosophers as ch. 2 of this book. The substance is given in the note on p. 466. It is more in place there, as Polybius expressly said that he would give the whole story together (32, [25]).
[211] This war appears to have arisen from a treacherous attack of the Cretans upon the island of Siphnos. Exc. de Virt. et Vit. p. 588.