When the Romans took the one thousand leading Achaeans in 167 BC, they had robbed the league of its most experienced statesmen and left it at the mercy of the hated pro-Roman Callicrates (d.150 BC). As to free the prisoners would be to admit that their detention had been unjust, the Senate in an attempt at compensation had allowed the league to arbitrate in disputes between Sparta and Megalopolis in 164 BC and between Athens and Oropus in 156 BC.
Callicrates’ death in 150 BC boosted the anti-Roman factions in the league. When Achaea tried to coerce Sparta, who had seceded from the league, the Senate in 148 BC ordered Achaea to restore full independence to Sparta, Corinth, Argos, Heraclea Trachinia and Orchomenus (Arcadia). At Corinth the anti-Roman feeling ran strong and the senators bearing the decree were mobbed. A conciliatory message from the Senate brought a second demonstration reaction from the city. Achaea then declared war on Sparta and Heraclea Trachinia, and there were rallies in support in Boeotia and Euboea.
While the Achaeans’ general Critolaus was attacking Heraclea, an army under Metellus came south from Macedonia and swept him aside (146 BC). A second Achaean army raised by the league’s general Diaeus (d.146 BC) checked Metellus at Corinth, but 01Mummius Achaicus (cos.146 BC) arrived and routed the enemy at the Isthmus. He then entered Corinth.
His orders were to sell the remaining citizens into slavery, plunder the city’s treasures then burn it to the ground. This destruction of Corinth was intended to punish the inhabitants for their violent outbreak against Rome and as a warning to others. Leagues were dissolved, democracies were abolished and replaced by aristocracies and timocracies (government consisting of property owners only), and the whole of Greece was put under the supervision of the governor of Macedonia.
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