Page:Greece from the Coming of the Hellenes to AD. 14.djvu/336

306 various cities in Italy and never brought to trial till their numbers had diminished to about 300, when they were allowed to return as no longer dangerous (B.C. 151).

Their return, however, presently involved the entire dissolution of the League. For one of the restored exiles named Diaeus was elected Strategus for B.C. 150–149, and by an ill-judged quarrel with Sparta brought upon the League first the loss of Sparta and then that of Corinth, Argos, and Orchomenus in Arcadia, by the order of Roman commissioners. The Strategus of that year (B.C. 147), Critolaus, was a violent anti-Romanist, and persuaded the cities of the League to resist this order and to enrol troops. In the spring of B.C. 146, he was able to occupy Thermopylae in considerable force. But there was a Roman consul and army in Macedonia which, after the defeat of various pre- tenders, was being reduced to the form of a single Roman province, the quadruple division being abolished. Metellus, who was in command of this army in Macedonia, marched quietly down the country and defeated Critolaus, who perished in some unknown way after the battle. His predecessor, Diaeus, according to the League law, became at once Strategus, and he determined to continue the resistance, fortifying himself in Corinth. There he was so utterly defeated by the successor of Metellus, L. Mummius, that he fled to Megalopolis and took poison, while Corinth was given up to pillage and fire. Its treasures of art which were saved from the flames or the ignorant destruction of the soldiers