The reforms proposed B. C. 230, by Agis IV., and carried, four years later, by Cleomenes, added 3,800 _periœ´ci_ to the number of citizens, and re-divided the lands of the state between these and 15,000 selected Laconians. Debts were abolished, and the old simple and frugal customs of Lycurgus restored. Sparta was now able to defeat the forces of the Achæan League, and to draw from it, into her own alliance, most of the Peloponnesian towns out of Achaia. But Aratus, the head of the League, violated all its principles by calling in Antigonus, the Macedonian regent, and putting him in possession of Acro-Corinthus. In the battle of Sella´sia, B. C. 221, Cleomenes was defeated, and forced to take refuge at the court of Ptolemy Philopator. The League which had been created to defend the liberties of Greece, had betrayed them; and there was no longer any hope either of restoring the glories of Sparta, or of checking the overwhelming power of Macedon and Rome. =78.= Antigonus died B. C. 220, and Philip, now seventeen years of age, assumed the government. The great advantages gained during the regency were soon lost by his rashness. He hastily allied himself with Hannibal against Rome, and then with Antiochus of Syria against Egypt. (See §§ 37, 59.) His first war, however, was against Ætolia, which had sprung to arms immediately upon his accession, hoping at once to overbalance its rival, Achaia, and to increase its own territories at the expense of Macedon. As early as the time of Alexander the Great, the Ætolian tribes had formed themselves into a federal republic, which occupied a similar position in central Greece to that of the Achæan League in the Peloponnesus. By the subjection or annexation of several states, it was now extended from the Ionian to the Ægean Sea. Philip overran Ætolia with great energy, captured its seat of government, and by his brilliant successes showed a military talent worthy of the early days of Macedonian conquest. But the news of a great victory gained by Hannibal at Lake Thrasyme´ne, recalled his attention to the object of his chief ambition, a war with Rome. =79.= The first movement in the new war was the siege of Apollonia, a Roman colony in Illyricum. Philip hoped to drive the Romans from the western coast of Greece, and thus prepare the way for an invasion of Italy. His camp was surprised at night by Vale´rius, and he was forced to burn his ships and retreat in all haste. The Ætolians and all their allies—Sparta, Elis, and the kings of Illyricum and Pergamus—took sides with Rome, and carried the war into Macedonia, forcing Philip to ask the aid of Carthage. The Romans captured Zacynthus, Ne´sos and Œniadæ, Antic´yra in Locris, and the island of Ægina, and presented all to the Ætolians.