This text is part of:
Search the Perseus Catalog for:
Messene, in the Peloponnese, had refused to join the Achaean league, and the Achaeans now laid siege to it. [2] Neither of the two cities, Messene and Elis, were members of the league; their sympathies were with the Aetolians. [3] The Eleans, however, after Antiochus' flight from Greece, returned a more conciliatory reply to the Achaean envoy and said that when the king's garrison was withdrawn they would consider what they ought to do. [4] The Messenians, on the other hand, dismissed the envoys without vouchsafing any reply whatever and commenced hostilities. But the devastation of their [5??] land in all directions by fire and sword and the sight of the Achaean camp near their city made them tremble for their safety, and they sent a message to T. Quinctius at Chalcis to the effect that as he was the author of their liberty the men of Messene were prepared to open their gates to the Romans and surrender their city to them, but not to the Achaeans. [6] On receipt of this message Quinctius at once left Chalcis and sent word to Diophanes, the captain-general of the Achaeans, to withdraw his army at once from Messene and go to him. [7] Diophanes obeyed and raised the siege, and then hurrying on in advance of his army met Quinctius near Andania, a town lying between Megalopolis and Messene. When he began to explain his reasons for attacking the place Quinctius gently rebuked him for taking such [8??] an important step without his sanction and ordered him to disband his army and not to disturb the peace which had been established for the good of all. [9] He commanded the Messenians to recall their banished citizens and join the Achaean league; if there were any conditions they objected to, or any safeguards for the future which they wanted, they were to go to him at Corinth. At the same time he ordered Diophanes to convene a meeting of the Achaean league forthwith, at which he would be present. [10] In his address to the council he pointed out how the island of Zacynthus had been treacherously seized, and he now demanded its restoration to the Romans. [11] The island, he explained, had at one time formed part of Philip's dominions and he had given it to Amynander as the price of being allowed to march through Athamania into the north of Aetolia, the result of his expedition being that the Aetolians abandoned all further resistance and sued for peace. [12] Amynander made Philip of Megalopolis governor of the island. Subsequently when Amynander joined Antiochus in war against Rome he recalled Philip to take up active service and sent Hierocles of Agrigentum to succeed him.
Livy. History of Rome. English Translation by. Rev. Canon Roberts. New York, New York. E. P. Dutton and Co. 1912. 1. Livy. History of Rome. English Translation. Rev. Canon Roberts. New York, New York. E. P. Dutton and Co. 1912. 2.
The National Endowment for the Humanities provided support for entering this text.
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.