King of Sparta (r. 359-338 b. c.e.)
Born: c. 400 b. c.e.; Sparta
Died: 338 b. c.e.; Manduria, Calabria (in modern Italy) Category: Government and politics
Life Son of Agesilaus II of Sparta, Archidamus III (ahr-kuh-DAY-muhs) of Sparta led an unimpressive career in the twilight of Spartan greatness. He commanded the relief force that escorted the defeated Spartans back from Leuctra (371 b. c.e.). He successfully led Spartan forces against Arcadia in 368 and 365 b. c.e. The height of his success was his victory over Arcadia and Argos in the “Tearless Battle,” in which he routed the enemy without loss to his own forces. When Epaminondas attacked Sparta in 362 b. c.e., Archidamus led a counterattack that saved the city. The Athenian orator Isocrates wrote two open appeals to him to recapture Messenia, which Sparta had lost in 369 b. c.e., and to continue the war against Thebes. Archidamus officially ascended the throne only in 359 b. c.e.
During the Third Sacred War (355-346 b. c.e.), Archidamus officially supported the Phocians, who had seized and plundered Apollo’s sanctuary at Delphi. In the Peloponnese, he unsuccessfully attacked Megalopolis. At the end of the Sacred War, he attempted to take control of Thermopylae to thwart Philip II of Macedonia but failed.
After the Sacred War, Archidamus served as a mercenary to earn money for Sparta. In 346 b. c.e., he won a small victory in Crete before sailing to Tarentum (Taranto). There he defended the Spartan colony against the Lucanians but was killed in action. Many Greeks felt that he deserved his fate because of his aid to sacrilegious Phocis.
Influence Archidamus III, though a Spartan king, was insignificant. Like his state, he stood in the shadow of greater events.
Archidamus III of Sparta Further Reading
Cartledge, Paul. Agesilaos and the Crisis of Sparta. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1987.
Cartledge, Paul, and Antony Spawforth. Hellenistic and Roman Sparta: A Tale of Two Cities. 2d ed. London: Routledge, 2002.
John Buckler
See also: Agesilaus II of Sparta; Epaminondas; Isocrates; Leuctra, Battle of; Philip II of Macedonia; Sacred Wars; Sparta.
World History
