View source for Hellenistic Greece

{{short description|Historical period of Greece following Classical Greece}}
{{morefootnotes|date=February 2023}}
{{About|the geopolitics of Greece during the Hellenistic period | all aspects of the Hellenistic period internationally | Hellenistic Period}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2023}}
[[File:Macedonia and the Aegean World c.200.png|thumb|400px|A map of Hellenistic Greece in 200 BC, with the [[Macedonia (ancient kingdom)|Kingdom of Macedonia]] (orange) under [[Philip V of Macedon|Philip{{nbsp}}V]] ({{reign|221|179|era=BC}}), Macedonian [[dependent state]]s (dark yellow), the [[Seleucid Empire]] (bright yellow), [[Ancient Rome|Roman]] [[protectorate]]s (dark green), the [[Kingdom of Pergamon]] (light green), independent states (light purple), and possessions of the [[Ptolemaic Empire]] (violet purple)]]
{{History of Greece}}
'''Hellenistic Greece''' is the historical period of [[Ancient Greece]] following [[Classical Greece]] and between the death of [[Alexander the Great]] in 323 BC and the annexation of the classical Greek [[Achaean League]] heartlands by the [[Roman Republic]]. This culminated at the [[Battle of Corinth (146 BC)|Battle of Corinth]] in 146 BC, a crushing Roman victory in the [[Peloponnese]] that led to the destruction of [[Ancient Corinth|Corinth]] and ushered in the period of [[Roman Greece]]. Hellenistic Greece's definitive end was with the [[Battle of Actium]] in 31 BC, when [[Augustus|Octavian]] defeated [[Ptolemaic dynasty|Ptolemaic]] queen [[Cleopatra VII]] and [[Mark Antony]], the next year taking over [[Alexandria]], the last great center of Hellenistic Greece.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia | first=John | last=Ferguson | title=Hellenistic Age | year=2024 | url=https://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/260307/Hellenistic-Age | encyclopedia=[[Encyclopædia Britannica]] | access-date=21 June 2022 | archive-date=14 May 2013 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130514031055/https://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/260307/Hellenistic-Age | url-status=bot: unknown }}</ref>

The [[Hellenistic period]] began with the [[wars of the Diadochi]], armed contests among the former generals of Alexander the Great to carve up [[Wars of Alexander the Great|his empire]] in Europe, Asia, and North Africa. The wars lasted until 275 BC, witnessing the fall of both the [[Argead dynasty|Argead]] and [[Antipatrid dynasty|Antipatrid]] dynasties of [[Macedonia (ancient kingdom)|Macedonia]] in favor of the [[Antigonid dynasty]]. The era was also marked by successive wars between the [[Macedonia (ancient kingdom)|Kingdom of Macedonia]], the kingdom of [[Epirus (ancient state)|Epirus]], the [[Aetolian League]], [[Achaean League]], [[Sparta]], [[Rhodes]], [[kingdom of Pergamum]] as well as the [[Seleucid Empire|Seleucid]] and [[Ptolemaic empire|Ptolemaic]] empires.

During the reign of [[Philip V of Macedon]] (r. 221–179 BC), the Macedonians not only lost the [[Cretan War (205–200 BC)]] to an alliance led by [[Rhodes]], but their [[Macedonian–Carthaginian Treaty|erstwhile alliance]] with [[Hannibal]] of [[Carthage]] also entangled them in the [[First Macedonian War|First]] and [[Second Macedonian War]] with [[ancient Rome]]. The perceived weakness of Macedonia in the aftermath of these conflicts encouraged [[Antiochus III the Great]] of the Seleucid Empire to invade [[mainland Greece]], yet his defeat by the Romans at [[Battle of Thermopylae (191 BC)|Thermopylae]] in 191 BC and [[Battle of Magnesia|Magnesia]] in 190 BC secured Rome's position as the leading military power in the region. Within roughly two decades after conquering [[History of Macedonia (ancient kingdom)|Macedonia]] in 168 BC and [[Epirus (ancient state)|Epirus]] in 167 BC, the Romans would eventually control the whole of Greece.

During the Hellenistic period the importance of Greece proper within the Greek-speaking world declined sharply. The great centers of [[Hellenistic civilization|Hellenistic culture]] were [[Alexandria]] and [[Antioch]], capitals of [[Ptolemaic Kingdom|Ptolemaic]] and [[Seleucid dynasty|Seleucid Kingdoms]] respectively. Cities such as [[Pergamon]], [[Ephesus]], [[Rhodes]] and [[Seleucia]] were also important, and increasing urbanisation of the Eastern Mediterranean was characteristic of the time.

==Macedon and other Hellenistic kingdoms==
{{further|History of Macedonia (ancient kingdom)}}
[[File:Macedonia - king Kassandros - 316-297 BC - silver tetradrachm - head of Alexander III - Zeus aetophoros - München AS.jpg|thumb|left|[[Coin]] depicting [[Cassander]], first post-[[Argead dynasty|Argead]] leader of Hellenistic Greece and founder of [[Thessaloniki]]]]

The quests of [[Alexander the Great|Alexander]] had a number of consequences for the Greek city-states. It greatly widened the horizons of the Greeks, making the endless conflicts between the cities which had marked the 5th and 4th centuries BC seem petty and unimportant. It led to a steady emigration, particularly of the young and ambitious, to the new Greek empires in the east. Many Greeks migrated to Alexandria, Antioch and the many other new Hellenistic cities founded in Alexander's wake, as far away as what are now [[Afghanistan]] and [[Pakistan]], where the [[Greco-Bactrian Kingdom]] and the [[Indo-Greek Kingdom]] survived until the end of the 1st century BC.

The defeat of the Greek city-states by [[Philip II of Macedon|Philip]] and Alexander also taught them that they could never again be powers in their own right, and that the hegemony of [[Macedon]] and its successor states could not be challenged unless the city states united, or at least federated. The Greeks valued their local independence too much to consider actual unification, but they made several attempts to form federations through which they could hope to reassert their independence.

Following Alexander's death a struggle for power broke out among his generals, which resulted in the break-up of his empire and the establishment of a number of new kingdoms. Macedon fell to [[Cassander]], son of Alexander's leading general [[Antipater]], who after several years of warfare made himself master of most of the rest of Greece. He founded a new Macedonian capital at [[Thessaloniki]] and was generally a constructive ruler.

Cassander's power was challenged by [[Antigonus I Monophthalmus|Antigonus]], ruler of Anatolia, who promised the Greek cities that he would restore their freedom if they supported him. This led to successful revolts against Cassander's local rulers. In 307 BC, Antigonus's son [[Demetrius I of Macedon|Demetrius]] captured [[Athens]] and restored its democratic system, which had been suppressed by Alexander. But in 301 BC a coalition of Cassander and the other Hellenistic kings defeated Antigonus at the [[Battle of Ipsus]], ending his challenge.

[[File:Smuseum 011hellenistic greek tomb door.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[Hellenistic art|Hellenistic Greek]] tomb door bas [[relief]], [[Leeds City Museum]].]]
After Cassander's death in 298 BC, however, Demetrius seized the Macedonian throne and gained control of most of Greece. He was defeated by a second coalition of Greek rulers in 285 BC, and mastery of Greece passed to the king [[Lysimachus]] [[Thrace|of Thrace]]. Lysimachus was in turn defeated and killed in 280 BC. The Macedonian throne then passed to Demetrius's son [[Antigonus II]], who also defeated an [[Gallic invasion of the Balkans|invasion of the Greek lands]] by the [[Gauls]], who at this time were living in the Balkans. The battle against the Gauls united the [[Antigonids]] of Macedon and the [[Seleucid Empire|Seleucids]] of Asia, an alliance which was also directed against the wealthiest Hellenistic power, the [[Ptolemaic Kingdom|Ptolemies]] of Egypt. The [[Epirote]] king [[Pyrrhus of Epirus|Pyrrhus]] is known to have made [[Epirus (ancient state)|Epirus]] a powerful state in the wider Hellenistic world (during 297–272 BC) that was comparable to the likes of Macedon and [[Ancient Rome]]. Pyrrhus' armies also attempted an assault against the state of Ancient Rome during their unsuccessful campaign in what is now modern-day [[Italian Peninsula|Italy]] in 280-275 BC. Pyrrhus died in 272 BC leaving Antigonus Gonatas' Macedon the stronger power in Greece.

Antigonus II ruled until his death in 239 BC, and his family retained the Macedonian throne until it was abolished by the Romans in 146 BC. Their control over the Greek city states was intermittent, however, since other rulers, particularly the Ptolemies, subsidised anti-Macedonian parties in Greece to undermine the Antigonids' power. Antigonus placed a garrison at [[Corinth]], the strategic centre of Greece, but [[Rhodes]], [[Pergamum]], [[Achaean League]] and [[Aetolian League]] and other Greek states retained substantial independence. [[Sparta]] also remained independent and generally refused to join any league.

In 267 BC, [[Ptolemy II]] persuaded the Greek cities to revolt against Antigonus, in what became the [[Chremonidean War]], after the Athenian leader [[Chremonides]]. The cities were defeated and Athens lost her independence and her democratic institutions. The Aetolian League was restricted to the [[Peloponnese]], but on being allowed to gain control of [[Thebes (Greece)|Thebes]] in 245 BC became a Macedonian ally. This marked the end of Athens as a political actor, although it remained the largest, wealthiest and most cultivated city in Greece. In 255 BC, Antigonus defeated the Ptolemaic fleet at [[Kos|Cos]] and brought the [[Aegean Sea|Aegean]] islands, except Rhodes, under his rule as well.

==City states and leagues==
[[File:Hellenistic mosaic floor panel of an Alexandrine parakeet from Pergamon, 2nd century BC, Pergamon Museum (8408107096).jpg|thumb|Detail of a [[Hellenistic art|Hellenistic]] [[mosaic]] floor panel showing an [[Alexandrine parakeet]], from the acropolis of [[Pergamon]] (near modern [[Bergama]], [[Turkey]]), dated to the middle of the 2nd century BC (during the reigns of [[Eumenes II]] and [[Attalus II]] of Pergamon)]]

In spite of their decreased political power and autonomy, the Greek city state or [[polis]] continued to be the basic form of political and social organization in Greece. Classical city states such as [[Athens]] and [[Ephesus]] grew and even thrived in this period. While warfare between Greek cities continued, the cities responded to the threat of the post Alexandrian Hellenistic states by banding together into alliances or becoming allies of a strong Hellenistic state which could come to its defense therefore making it ''asylos'' or inviolate to attack by other cities.

The Aetolians and the Achaeans developed strong federal states or leagues (''koinon''), which were governed by councils of city representatives and assemblies of league citizens. Initially ethnic leagues, these leagues later began to include cities outside of their traditional regions.<ref>[[Sarah B. Pomeroy]], Stanley M. Burstein, Walter Donlan, Jennifer Tolbert Roberts, and David Tandy, ''Ancient Greece: A Political, Social, and Cultural History'', 2011, p. 476.</ref> The [[Achaean League]] eventually included all of the [[Peloponnese]] except [[Sparta]], while the [[Aetolian League]] expanded into [[Phocis]]. During the third century BCE these leagues were able to defend themselves against [[Macedon]] and the Aetolian league defeated a [[Brennus (3rd century BC)|Celtic invasion]] of Greece at Delphi.

After Alexander's death, [[Athens]] had been defeated by [[Antipater]] in the [[Lamian War]] and its port in the [[Piraeus]] housed a Macedonian garrison. To counter the power of Macedon under Cassander, Athens courted alliances with other Hellenistic rulers such as [[Antigonus I Monophthalmus]], and in 307 Antigonus sent his son [[Demetrius I of Macedon|Demetrius]] to capture the city. After Demetrius captured Macedon, Athens became allied with Ptolemaic Egypt in an effort to gain its independence from Demetrius, and with Ptolemaic troops they managed to rebel and defeat Macedon in 287, though the Piraeus remained garrisoned. Athens fought more unsuccessful wars against Macedon with Ptolemaic aid such as the [[Chremonidean War]]. The Ptolemaic kingdom was now the city's main ally, supporting it with troops, monies and material in multiple conflicts. Athens rewarded the [[Ptolemaic Kingdom]] in 224/223 BC by naming the 13th [[phyle]] Ptolemais and establishing a religious cult called the Ptolemaia. Hellenistic Athens also saw the rise of [[New Comedy]] and the Hellenistic schools of philosophy such as [[Stoicism]] and [[Epicureanism]]. By the turn of the century, the [[Attalid dynasty|Attalids]] in [[Pergamon]] became patrons and protectors of Athens as the Ptolemaic empire weakened. Athens would later also establish a cult for the Pergamene king [[Attalos I]].

==Philip V==
[[File:Philip V of Macedon.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[Philip V of Macedon|Philip V]], "''the darling of Hellas''", wearing the [[Monarchy|royal]] [[diadem (personal wear)|diadem]].]]

Antigonus II died in 239 BC. His death saw another revolt of the city-states of the [[Achaean League]], whose dominant figure was [[Aratus of Sicyon]]. Antigonus's son [[Demetrius II of Macedon|Demetrius II]] died in 229 BC, leaving a child (Philip V) as king, with the general [[Antigonus Doson]] as regent. The Achaeans, while nominally subject to Ptolemy, were in effect independent, and controlled most of southern Greece. Athens remained aloof from this conflict by common consent.

Sparta remained hostile to the Achaeans, and in 227 BC Sparta's king [[Cleomenes III]] invaded Achaea and seized control of the League. Aratus preferred distant Macedon to nearby Sparta, and allied himself with Doson, who in 222 BC defeated the Spartans and annexed their city – the first time Sparta had ever been occupied by a foreign power.

Philip V, who came to power when Doson died in 221 BC, was the last Macedonian ruler with both the talent and the opportunity to unite Greece and preserve its independence against the "cloud rising in the west": the ever-increasing power of Rome. He was known as "the darling of Hellas". Under his auspices the Peace of Naupactus (217 BC) brought conflict between Macedon and the Greek leagues to an end, and at this time he controlled all of Greece except Athens, Rhodes and Pergamum.

In 215 BC, however, Philip formed an alliance with Rome's enemy [[Carthage]], which drew Rome directly into Greek affairs for the first time. Rome promptly lured the Achaean cities away from their nominal loyalty to Philip, and formed alliances with Rhodes and Pergamum, now the strongest power in [[Anatolia|Asia Minor]]. The [[First Macedonian War]] broke out in 212 BC, and ended inconclusively in 205 BC, but Macedon was now marked as an enemy of Rome. Rome's ally Rhodes gained control of the Aegean islands.

In 202 BC, Rome defeated Carthage, and was free to turn her attention eastwards, urged on by her Greek allies, Rhodes and Pergamum. In 198 BC, the [[Second Macedonian War]] broke out for obscure reasons, but very likely because Rome saw Macedon as a potential ally of the Seleucids, the greatest power in the east. Philip's allies in Greece deserted him and in 197 BC he was decisively defeated at the [[Battle of Cynoscephalae|Cynoscephalae]] by the Roman proconsul [[Titus Quinctius Flamininus]].

Luckily for the Greeks, Flamininus was a moderate man and an admirer of Greek culture. Philip had to surrender his fleet and become a Roman ally, but was otherwise spared. At the [[Isthmian Games]] in 196 BC, Flamininus declared all the Greek cities free, although Roman garrisons were placed at Corinth and [[Chalcis]]. But the freedom promised by Rome was an illusion. All the cities except Rhodes were enrolled in a new League which Rome ultimately controlled, and democracies were replaced by aristocratic regimes allied to Rome.

==Rise of Rome==
[[File:Antiochus III 197 BC.JPG|thumb|A [[tetradrachm]] of [[Antiochus III the Great]] (r. 222–187 BC), struck after 197 BC in [[Mesopotamia]], a region of the [[Seleucid Empire]]]]
In 192 BC, war broke out between Rome and the Seleucid ruler [[Antiochus III]]. Antiochus invaded Greece with a 10,000 man army, and was elected the commander in chief of the Aetolians. Some Greek cities now thought of Antiochus as their saviour from Roman rule, but Macedon threw its lot in with Rome. In 191 BC, the Romans under Manius Acilius Glabrio routed him at Thermopylae and obliged him to withdraw to Asia. During the course of this war Roman troops moved into Asia for the first time, where they defeated Antiochus again at [[Magnesia on the Sipylum]] (190 BC). Greece now lay across Rome's line of communications with the east, and Roman soldiers became a permanent presence. The Peace of Apamaea (188 BC) left Rome in a dominant position throughout Greece.

During the following years Rome was drawn deeper into Greek politics, since the defeated party in any dispute appealed to Rome for help. Macedon was still independent, though nominally a Roman ally. When Philip V died in 179 BC, he was succeeded by his son [[Perseus of Macedon|Perseus]], who like all the Macedonian kings dreamed of uniting the Greeks under Macedonian rule. Macedon was now too weak to achieve this objective, but Rome's ally [[Eumenes II]] of [[Pergamum]] persuaded Rome that Perseus was a potential threat to Rome's position.

==End of Greek independence==
[[File:Delos Museum Mosaik Dionysos 05.jpg|thumb|left|A [[Hellenistic art|Hellenistic Greek]] [[mosaic]] depicting the god [[Dionysos]] as a winged [[daimon]] riding on a tiger, from [[Mosaics of Delos|the House of Dionysos]] at [[Delos]] in the [[South Aegean]] [[Administrative regions of Greece|region]] of [[Greece]], late 2nd century BC, [[Archaeological Museum of Delos]]]]
As a result of Eumenes's intrigues Rome declared war on Macedon in 171 BC, bringing 100,000 troops into Greece. Macedon was no match for this army, and Perseus was unable to rally the other Greek states to his aid. Poor generalship by the Romans enabled him to hold out for three years, but in 168 BC the Romans sent [[Lucius Aemilius Paullus Macedonicus|Lucius Aemilius Paullus]] to Greece, and at [[Battle of Pydna|Pydna]] the Macedonians were crushingly defeated. Perseus was captured and taken to Rome, the Macedonian kingdom was broken up into four smaller states, and all the Greek cities who aided her, even rhetorically, were punished. Even Rome's allies Rhodes and Pergamum effectively lost their independence.

Under the leadership of an adventurer called [[Andriscus]], Macedon rebelled against Roman rule in 149 BC: as a result it was directly annexed the following year and became a [[Roman province]], the first of the Greek states to suffer this fate. Rome now demanded that the Achaean League, the last stronghold of Greek independence, be dissolved. The Achaeans refused and, feeling that they might as well die fighting, declared war on Rome. Many Greek cities rallied to the Achaeans' side, while even slaves were freed to fight for Greek independence. The Roman consul [[Lucius Mummius]] advanced from Macedonia and defeated the Greeks at [[Corinth]], which was razed to the ground.

In 146 BC, the Greek peninsula, though not the islands, became a Roman protectorate. Roman taxes were imposed, except in Athens and Sparta, and all the cities had to accept rule by Rome's local allies. In 133 BC, the last king of Pergamum died and left his kingdom to Rome: this brought most of the Aegean peninsula under direct Roman rule as part of the province of Asia.

[[File:NileMosaicOfPalestrinaSoldiers.jpg|thumb|350px|Macedo-Ptolemaic soldiers of the Ptolemaic kingdom, 100 BC, detail of the [[Nile mosaic of Palestrina]].]]

The final downfall of Greece came in 88 BC, when King [[Mithridates VI of Pontus|Mithridates]] [[Kingdom of Pontus|of Pontus]] rebelled against Rome, and massacred up to 100,000 Romans and Roman allies across Asia Minor. Some Greek cities, more importantly [[Athens]] among them, overthrew their Roman puppet rulers and joined him. When he was driven out of Greece by the Roman general [[Lucius Cornelius Sulla]], Roman vengeance fell upon the Greek cities allied to him. Mithridates was finally defeated by [[Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus]] (Pompey the Great) in 65 BC.

Further ruin was brought to Greece by the Roman civil wars, which were partly fought in Greece. Finally, in 27 BC, [[Caesar Augustus|Augustus]] directly annexed Greece to the new [[Roman Empire]] as the [[Achaea Province, Roman Empire|province of Achaea]]. The struggles with Rome had left certain areas of Greece depopulated and demoralised. Nevertheless, Roman rule at least brought an end to warfare, and cities such as Athens, Corinth, [[Thessaloniki]] and [[Patras]] soon recovered their prosperity.

==See also==
* [[Ancient Greek architecture]]
* [[Ancient Greek art]]
* [[Culture of ancient Greece]]
* [[Hellenization]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
*Austin, M. M. ''The Hellenistic World From Alexander to the Roman Conquest: A Selection of Ancient Sources In Translation''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981.
*--, editor and translator. ''The Hellenistic world from Alexander to the Roman conquest: A selection of ancient sources in translation''. 2nd edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
*Bagnall, Roger, and Peter Derow, editors and translators. ''Historical sources in translation: The Hellenistic period''. 2nd edition. Oxford: Blackwell, 2004.
*Bugh, Glenn. R., editor. ''The Cambridge companion to the Hellenistic world''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
*Chaniotis, Angelos. ''War in the Hellenistic world: A Social and Cultural History''. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2005.
*Crook, J. A., Andrew Lintott, and Elizabeth Rawson, editors. ''The Cambridge ancient history. volume IX, part 1: The last age of the Roman Republic, 146–43 BC''. 2nd edition. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1994.
*Errington, R. Malcolm. ''A history of the Hellenistic world, 323–30 BC''. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2008.
*Erskine, Andrew, editor. ''A companion to the Hellenistic world''. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2003.
*Green, Peter. ''Alexander to Actium: The Historical Evolution of the Hellenistic Age''. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990.
*Gruen, Erich S. ''The Hellenistic world and the coming of Rome''. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984.
*Lewis, David M., John Boardman, Simon Hornblower, and Martin Ostwald, editors. ''The Cambridge ancient history, volume VI: The fourth century BC''. 2nd edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994.
*Shipley, Graham. ''The Greek World after Alexander, 323–30 BC''. London: Routledge, 2000.
*Walbank, Frank W. ''A historical commentary on Polybius. Volume I: Commentary on Books I–VI. Volume II: Commentary on Books VII–XVIII. Volume III: Commentary on Books XIX–XL''. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1957–79.
*--. ''The Hellenistic World''. Brighton, Sussex: Harvester Press, 1981.
*Walbank, Frank W., Alan E. Astin, Martin W. Frederiksen, and Robert M. Ogilvie, editors. ''The Cambridge ancient history, volume VIII: Rome and the Mediterranean to 133 BC''. 2nd edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989.
*--. ''The Cambridge ancient history, volume VII, part 1: The Hellenistic world''. 2nd edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994.

==External links==
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