Page:Greece from the Coming of the Hellenes to AD. 14.djvu/312

282 had got rid of its Macedonian garrison, and was enjoying a brief period of prosperity, its harbour once more secured, and its walls rebuilt. It had made an unsuccessful but gallant attempt to secure this freedom from Antigonus Gonatas in B.C. 263 (the Chremonidean war), but in B.C. 229, on the death of Demetrius II., Diogenes, the commander of the Macedonian garrison, gave up the forts to the citizens, and was commemorated as a benefactor for many centuries—his name still surviving on one of the seats in the theatre, while a gymnasium, called , was frequented till quite late times. According to one story, Aratus supplied the money which was paid to Diogenes; and Athens, though it did not join the Achaean League, took no part against it in the social war. But in the troubles that followed Athens looked to Attalus of Pergamus as offering the most profitable alliance, and therefore—though not displaying much activity—she is found among those states opposed to Achaia and Macedonia, which looked for protection to Rome.

The social war (B.C. 220–217), though it witnessed no great actions and settled no questions, had the result of giving Philip of Macedonia a decisive ascendency in Greece. In B.C. 217 he hastily patched up a peace on hearing of the Roman defeat at lake Trasimene, because he hoped that in alliance with Hannibal, and with the aid of Illyrian seamen, he might invade Italy and revive the old dream of a Western Empire. This involved a war with Rome, which lasted in a desultory way for ten years (B.C. 215–205), and created a division in the