Achaean War

The Achaean War resulted in the defeat of the Achaean League, the last important and independent military force in Hellenistic Greece.

Date: 146 b. c.e.

Category: Wars and battles Locale: Peloponnese, southern Greece

Summary In the second century, the Peloponnese housed two competing powers, Sparta and the Achaean (ah-KEE-uhn) League. After decades of disagreement, their quarreling provoked decisive Roman intervention.

At first, Rome attempted to arbitrate. Responsible for the Republic’s foreign affairs, the Roman senate dispatched ambassadors in 147 b. c.e. However, its instructions to detach several cities from the league angered the Achaeans, who at Corinth threatened the ambassadors with violence. Although Rome sent another, more conciliatory embassy, the Achaeans obstructed negotiations and soon afterward declared war on Sparta.

In 146 b. c.e., Quintus Caecilius Metellus Macedonicus and a Roman army marched south from Macedonia, defeating Achaean troops in central Greece. Caecilius’s successor, Lucius Mummius, crushed the league’s remaining forces at the isthmus in late summer. After sacking Corinth, Mummius began organizing Greek affairs with the assistance of ten commissioners from Rome.

Significance While Corinth was razed to the ground, those communities that had fought against the Republic were attached to the Roman province in Macedonia. Kept under the watchful eye of a Roman governor, the entire Greek peninsula was eventually incorporated into Rome’s overseas empire.

Achaean War Further Reading

Cartledge, Paul, and Antony Spawforth. Hellenistic and Roman Sparta: A Tale of Two Cities. 2d ed. London: Routledge, 2002.

Green, Peter. Alexander to Actium: The Historical Evolution of the Hellenistic Age. Reprint. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993. Gruen, Erich S. “The Origins of the Achaean War.” Journal of Hellenic Studies 96 (1976): 46-69.

Denvy A. Bowman

See also: Achaean League; Hellenistic Greece.