History for ready reference, Volume 3, Greece to NibelungenLarned, J. N. (Josephus Nelson)
History
History for ready reference, Volume 3, Greece to Nibelungen
Larned, J. N. (Josephus Nelson)
History -- Dictionaries
On the death of Alexander the Great, B. C. 323, a party at
Athens which still hoped for freedom in Greece set on foot a
vigorous movement designed to break the Macedonian yoke. A
league was formed in which many cities joined—a larger
assemblage of Hellenic states, says Mr. Grote, than that which
resisted Xerxes in 480 B. C. A powerful army of Greek citizens
and mercenaries was formed and placed under the command of a
capable Athenian, Leosthenes, who led it into Thessaly, to
meet the Macedonian general Antipater, who now ruled Greece.
See MACEDONIA: B. C. 323-316.
The latter was defeated in a battle which ensued, and was
driven into the fortified Thessalian town of Lamia, where he
was besieged. Unfortunately, Leosthenes was killed during the
progress of the siege, and a long interval occurred before a
new commander could be agreed on. This gave Antipater time to
obtain succor from Asia. A Macedonian army, under Leonnatus,
crossed the Hellespont, and the besiegers of Lamia were forced
to break up their camp in order to meet it. They did so with
success; Leonnatus was slain and his army driven back. But
meantime Antipater escaped from Lamia, joined the defeated
troops and retreated into Macedonia. The war thus begun, and
which took the name of the Lamian War, was continued, not
unfavorably to the confederates, on the whole, until the
following summer—August, 322 B. C.—when it was ended by a
battle fought on the plain of Krannon, in Thessaly. Antipater,
who had been joined by Kraterus, from Asia, was the victor,
and Athens with all her allies submitted to the terms which he
dictated. He established a Macedonian garrison in Munychia,
and not only suppressed the democratic constitution of Athens,
but ordered all the poorer citizens—all who possessed less
than 2,000 drachmæ's worth of property, being 12,000 out of
the 21,000 who then possessed the Athenian franchise—to be
driven from the city; thus leaving a selected citizenship of
9,000 of the richer and more manageable men. The banished or
deported 12,000 were scattered in Thrace, Illyria, Italy and
even in northern Africa. The leaders of the anti-Macedonian
rising were pursued with unrelenting animosity. Demosthenes,
the great orator, who had been conspicuous among them, was
dragged from a temple at Kalauria, to which he had fled, and
took poison to escape the worse death which probably awaited
him.
_G. Grote,
History of Greece,
part 2, chapter 95 (volume 12)._
GREECE: B. C. 323-301.
Wars of the Diadochi or Successors of Alexander.
See MACEDONIA: B. C. 323-316; 315-310; and 310-301.
GREECE: B. C. 321-312.
The contest for Athens and Peloponnesus, between Cassander and
Polysperchon.
Execution of Phocion.
Restoration of Thebes.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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