When Marcius and Atilius went up to Gitana in Epirus, about ten miles from the sea, where the national council of Epirus was being held, they received a most favourable hearing, and 400 of the younger men were sent as a protection to those Macedonians who had been freed by the senate. [2] From there they went into Aetolia and stayed there a few days until a chief magistrate was elected in the place of the one who had died. Lyciscus, who was known to be a supporter of the Romans, was elected, and after his election they crossed over into Thessaly. Here they were visited by envoys from Acarnania and refugees from Boeotia. [3] The envoys were told to announce to the Acarnanians that an opportunity was now offered of atoning for any faults which in reliance on the false promises of the king they had committed against Rome in the war with Philip and then in the war with Antiochus. [4] If their bad behaviour had met with the forbearance, their good behaviour would win the generosity, of Rome. [5] The Boeotians were severely censured for having formed an alliance with Perseus. They threw the blame on Ismenias, the leader of the opposite faction, and declared that some cities had been brought over against the majority of the citizens. [6] Marcius replied that this would be cleared up as they would give every city the opportunity of deciding for itself. There was a meeting of the national council of Thessaly at Larisa. The Thessalians had abundant material for thanking the Romans for the boon of liberty, and the Roman envoys for expressing their thanks for the whole-hearted assistance they had received from the Thessalians in the wars against Philip and Antiochus. [7] This mutual recognition of services rendered made the assembled council eager to adopt every measure which the Romans wished for. [8] Close on this meeting came a deputation from Perseus. Their hopes of success rested mainly on the personal tie of hospitality which Marcius had inherited from his father. After alluding to this the delegates asked that the king might be admitted to a personal interview. [9] Marcius said that he heard from his father that friendly relations had existed with Philip, and bearing that fact in mind he had undertaken this mission. [10] He would not have put off a conference so long had he been well enough; now, as soon as he could manage it, they would go to the Peneus where the road crosses from Homolium to Dium and send to the king to announce their arrival.
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.