CLA1101 - Chapter 10

Royal Pages

(See above) Members of the old nobility also benefited, receiving commands in Philip;s new model army. Their sons became royal pages, personally serving the king and providing Phillip with future officers, and also serving as hostages for the loyalty of their families.

Theoric Fund

Athenian power was further constrained in the 350s in part by this important political innovation. The Theoric Fund was in ancient Athens the name for the fund of monies expended on festivals, sacrifices, and public entertainments of various kinds; and also monies distributed among the people in the shape of largesses from the state. The fund was created by the Athenian statesman Eubulus (See Eubulus).

Olympias

For most of Philip's reign, his queen was his fourth wife, Olympias, the Epirote princess. She was the mother of Alexander, his designated heir. His other marriages served as diplomatic ends and never threatened Olympias' position at court. But his 7th to a young Macedonian women named Cleopatra was different as she was part of a noble Macedonian family. After the marriage, both Olympias and Alexander fell into exile. After Philip and Cleopatra had a daughter, Alexander returned but Olympia stayed in exile.

Phillip II

He was the king (basileus) of the ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon from 359 BC until his assassination in 336 BC. He was a member of the Argead dynasty of Macedonian kings, the third son of King Amyntas III of Macedon, and father of Alexander the Great and Philip III. The rise of Macedon during the reign of Philip II was achieved in part by his reformation of the Ancient Macedonian army, establishing the Macedonian phalanx that proved critical in securing victories on the battlefield. After defeating Athens and Thebes at the Battle of Chaeronea in 338 BC, Philip II led the effort to establish a federation of Greek states known as the League of Corinth, with him as the elected hegemon and commander-in-chief of a planned invasion of the Achaemenid Empire of Persia. However, his assassination by a royal bodyguard, Pausanias of Orestis, led to the immediate succession of his son Alexander, who would go on to invade the Achaemenid Empire in his father's stead.

Hellenization

It is the historical spread of ancient Greek culture, religion and, to a lesser extent, language, over foreign peoples conquered by Greeks or brought into their sphere of influence, particularly during the Hellenistic period following the campaigns of Alexander the Great in the fourth century BC. The result of Hellenization was that elements of Greek origin combined in various forms and degrees with local elements; these Greek influences spread from the Mediterranean basin as far east as modern-day Pakistan. The Macedonian kings encouraged hellenization of the Macedonian nobility.

Eubulus

Lived from 405 BC to 335 BC. Eubulus was Athens leading politician and persuaded the Athenians to pass a law assigning all fiscal surpluses to the Theoric Fund (which funded public benefits). The fund reduced tensions between the rich and the poor. Eubulus' cautions financial policies had drastic results: Athenian revenues rose from 130 talents to 400 talents.

Macedon

Macedonia was an ancient kingdom on the periphery of Archaic and Classical Greece, and later the dominant state of Hellenistic Greece. The kingdom was founded and initially ruled by the royal Argead dynasty, which was followed by the Antipatrid and Antigonid dynasties. Home to the ancient Macedonians, the earliest kingdom was centered on the northeastern part of the Greek peninsula, and bordered by Epirus to the west, Paeonia to the north, Thrace to the east and Thessaly to the south. Before the 4th century BC, Macedonia was a small kingdom outside of the area dominated by the great city-states of Athens, Sparta, and Thebes, and briefly subordinate to Achaemenid Persia.[3] During the reign of the Argead king Philip II (359-336 BC), Macedonia subdued mainland Greece and Thrace through conquest and diplomacy. With a reformed army containing phalanxes wielding the sarissa pike, Philip II defeated the old powers of Athens and Thebes in the Battle of Chaeronea in 338 BC. Philip II's son Alexander the Great, leading a federation of Greek states, accomplished his father's objective of commanding the whole of Greece when he destroyed Thebes after the city revolted.

Royal Companions

Perdiccas III's defeat decimated the relationship between the king and Macedonian nobility and enabled Philip to replenish the royal companions with Greeks and non-Greeks who came to Macedon in search of opportunity and wealth.

Phocis

Philip followed the lead of his predecessors, intervening in Thessaly following the conclusion of an alliance between Phocis and Macedon's old enemy Pherae. Phocis had emerged in the mid-350s as a major power in central and northern Greece, and the alliance of Pherae and Phocis alarmed both Larisa and Theres, forcing them to seek Philip's aid. Philip underestimated the power of these two allies cities. Although Philip suffered 2 sever defeats at the hands of Phocis in 353 BC, he crushed them a year later at the battle of the Crocus Field. After occupying Pherae and exiling out its tyrant, Philip was appointed by the Thessalian League archon of Thessaly, uniting Thessaly and Macedon (almost doubling his military forces).

Pausanias

Philip was assassinated at Aegae in the summer of 366 BC by Pausanias (a member of his own bodyguard). Pausanias killed Philip at the wedding ceremony of Philip's daughter Cleopatra to Alexander I of Epirus, and as he tried to flee to the city gate. The assassination climaxed a political crisis that had begun with Philip's marriage to his 7th wide in 338 BC. According to Aristotle, the assassination may have happened bc Pausanias had been raped by Cleopatra's uncle, Attalus.

Phalanx

Phillip created a new phalanx to replace the Macedonians old fighting style in his military reforms and was used by his son, Alexander the Great. Each member of the phalanx wore a metal helmet and carried a small shield and a short sword. The principle weapon, however, was the sarissa. The sarissa was a huge pike that could be as much at 18 ft long. They let the solder strike at at enemy before they could close and use their shorter weapons. Philip II's phalanx consisted of 6 brigades of 1500 men and they fought in rectangular formations 16 men deep.

Corinthian League

Representatives of all major Greek states, except Sparta, met at Corinth to learn Philip's plans. The centrepiece of the new order was an alliance (Corinthian League). Its goals were to maintain a common peace in Greece and to avenge the Persian aggression against the Greeks.

Thrace

Sandwiches Macedon on the East, along with the Chlacidian League. The ancient Greeks employed the term "Thrace" to refer to all of the territory which lay north of Thessaly inhabited by the Thracians, a region which "had no definite boundaries" and to which other regions (like Macedonia and even Scythia) were added. As the Greeks gained knowledge of world geography, "Thrace" came to designate the area bordered by the Danube on the north, by the Euxine Sea (Black Sea) on the east, by northern Macedonia in the south and by Illyria to the west. This largely coincided with the Thracian Odrysian kingdom, whose borders varied over time. After the Macedonian conquest, this region's former border with Macedonia was shifted from the Struma River to the Mesta River. Sections of Thrace particularly in the south started to become hellenized before the Peloponnesian War as a Athenian and Ionian colonies were set up in Thrace before the war.

Thessaly

Sandwiches Macedon on the South. In the summer of 480 BC, the Persians invaded Thessaly. The Greek army that guarded the Vale of Tempe evacuated the road before the enemy arrived. Not much later, Thessaly surrendered to the Persians.[3] The Thessalian family of Aleuadae joined the Persians subsequently. In the 4th century BC, after the Greco-Persian Wars had long ended, Jason of Pherae transformed the region into a significant military power, recalling the glory of Early Archaic times. Shortly after, Philip II of Macedon was appointed Archon of Thessaly, and Thessaly was thereafter associated with the Macedonian Kingdom for the next centuries. Thessaly later became part of the Roman Empire as part of the province of Macedonia; when that was broken up, the name resurfaced in two of its late Roman successor provinces: Thessalia Prima and Thessalia Secunda.

Cleopatra

The 7th wife of Philip II. She was a young Macedonian woman of a powerful noble family. Cleopatra and Philip had a daughter names Europa, which meant that Alexander was still his only heir and he had to reconcile with him, ending up in Alexander returning.

Battle of Chaeronea

The Battle of Chaeronea was fought in 338 BC, near the city of Chaeronea in Boeotia, between the Macedonians led by Philip II of Macedon and an alliance of some of the Greek city-states led by Athens and Thebes. The battle was the culmination of Philip's campaign in Greece (339-338 BC) and resulted in a decisive victory for the Macedonians. After several months of stalemate, Philip finally advanced into Boeotia in an attempt to march on Thebes and Athens. Opposing him, and blocking the road near Chaeronea, was the allied Greek army, similar in size and occupying a strong position. Details of the ensuing battle are scarce, but after a long fight the Macedonians crushed both flanks of the allied line, which then dissolved into a rout.

Theopompus

The historian of Philip's reign. He characterized his new companions as men more suited to be "courtesans" than "courtiers".

Isocrates

Was the most prominent just-war theorist and an educator. He was almost 100 years old when the Battle of Chaeronea was waged. Throughout his long career of a speechwriter and a teacher of rhetoric, he had argued that the solution to Greece's problems was conquering a portion of the Persian Empire to which economically deprived and potentially dangerous segments of Greek society could emigrate. Isocrates proposed his ideas to many, including Philip, but no one would listen.

Demosthenes

Was the most prominent politician demanding a more aggressive Athenian policy toward Macedon. Originally a supporter of Eubulus, by 351 BC D had become unhappy with E's policies and begun to forge a new political identity. In his writings he attacked Philip and encouraged Athenians to build a stronger navy in preparations for war.

Illyrians

Were a group of Indo-European tribes in antiquity, who inhabited part of the western Balkans. Illyria appears in Greco-Roman historiography from the 4th century BC. The Illyrians formed several kingdoms in the central Balkans, and the first known Illyrian king was Bardyllis. Illyrian kingdoms were often at war with ancient Macedonia, and the Illyrian pirates were also a significant danger to neighbouring peoples. After Philip II of Macedon defeated Bardylis (358 BC), the Grabaei under Grabos became the strongest state in Illyria. Philip II killed 7,000 Illyrians in a great victory and annexed the territory up to Lake Ohrid.[32] Next, Philip II reduced the Grabaei, and then went for the Ardiaei, defeated the Triballi (339 BC), and fought with Pleurias (337 BC). Phillip II's brother, Perdiccas III, was killed in battle in 360 BC by the Illyrians together with 4000 Macedonian troops and much of the Macedonian aristocracy.