List of known Achaean League Strategoi1° part (from the origin to end of the Demetrian War)

From 281/0 to 256/5 the Achaians elected two strategoi for a year. These twin strategiai derived from the fact that originally the founders of the renewed Achaean League were the two poleis of Patrai and Dyme which Pharai and Triteia soon joined (Polybios 2. 41), 281/0 BC.

None of the names of these early strategoi have been handed down. Later, in 256, the Achaians decided to elect only one strategos for a year. The first was Margos of Karyneia. Subsequently also the names of the early single strategoi have escaped record until the first strategy of Aratos of Sikyon (245/4) and even after that there are some empty years and dubious dates.A list of the attested strategoi follows below.

255/4: Margos of Karyneia. (Polybios 2. 43.)...........................

245/4: Aratos of Sykyon I (Plutarchos, “ Life of Aratos” 16. 1; Polybios 2. 43) [1]

244/3:

243/2: Aratos of Sikyon II. (Polybios 2.43) [2]

242/1:

241/0: Aratos of Sikyon III

240/39:

239/8: Aratos of Sikyon. IV

238/7: Aigialeas (Dittenberger³ 471) [3]

237/6: Aratos of Sikyon V

236/5: Dioitas (Polyainos 2. 36) [4]

235/4: Aratos of Sikyon VI

234/3: Lydiades of Megalopolis I (Plut.Aratos 30. 6)

233/2: Aratos of Sikyon VII

232/1: Lydiades of Megalopolis II (Plut.Aratos 30. 7)

231/0: Aratos of Sikyon VIII

230/29: Lydiades of Megalopolis III

229/8: Aratos of Sikyon IX

[1] The chronology is fixed thanks to the indications of Polybios (2. 43. 4). Aratos was elected strategos for the

second time in the 8th

year after the liberation of Sikyon (251), that is in 243 BC. So his first strategy roughly falls in the Achaian year 245/4. The Achaian strategoi entered office “at the rise of the Pleiades” (about the first half of May). There are few doubts that Sikyon was liberated in 251 BC, even though the month is uncertain as between February or May. [The meteorological conditions incline me to prefer the latter; IF the Sikyonian calendar (about which we know nothing) was roughly aligned with the seasons that year].Polybios testifies that Aratos chased the Macedonians out of Corinth during his 2nd strategy and that this happened the year before the battle of the Aegades Insulae (20 March 241 BC according to Eutropius 2. 27. 2) that is in the Achaean year 242/1. So Aratos’ strategy II belongs to the Achaian year 243/2. We can arrive at the same date by another calculation. Polybios 2. 41 establishes that the renewed Achaian League was born in the 124° Olympiad, at the time of Pyrrhos’ expedition in Italy (spring 280 BC) so in the Achaean year 281/0. 25 years later comes Margos’ strategy (255/4), and the 4th year after this Aratos freed Sikyon by the tyrant Nikokles and 8 years later he was elected strategos for the second time.

[2] It was not permitted to hold the strategia in consecutive years (Plut.Aratos 24. 5), and Aratos was always elected in alternate years until the Kleomenian War. Aratos' office-holding pattern, in combination with the certain dated offices of other strategoi, also helps to establish the dates of his initial strategiai.

[3] Aigialeas’ strategy may actually be assigned any year between 244/3 and 236/5 when Aratos was not strategos.

[4] Dioitas’ strategy is only known from Polyainos’ passage on his successful siege of Heraia, in SW Arkadia. This episode, which very probably belongs to the Demetrian War, might have happened in 238/7. But I maintain that his assignment to 236/5 is more probable because the Achaian siege of Heraia has to post-date to the admission of Kleitor and Telphusa to the League, which I believe did not happen at the beginning of the war.

[The Achaian elections (archairesiai) probably happened until 217 BC, in the period February-April]

BRIEF HISTORY OF THE ACHAEAN LEAGUE (281/0-229 BC)

The birth of the Achaean League.

The founders of the renewed Achaean League were the two poleis of Patrai and Dyme, while Pharai and Triteia joined soon after (Polybios 2. 41), 281/0 BC.It is possible that the initial reestablishment of the League was helped by Areus, king of Sparta who in that period had undertaken a war against Antigonos Gonatas, who inherited his father Demetrios I Poliorketes' control of several strongholds in Hellenic peninsula, and his Aitolian allies. Areus received some ships at Patrai which permitted him to cross to Aitolia where he was ruinously defeated. According to W:W. Tarn, originally the Achaean towns had entered the Spartan alliance and only after Areus’ defeat, set up an autonomous koinon. [W.W. Tarn “Antigonos Gonatas” 1913, p.150-155]However the expansion of the League was under way. In ca.275 the people of Aigion expelled their garrison and joined the League. Polybios does not specify who maintained a garrison in the most important Achaian town, but it was very probably Antigonos, since we know from Diodoros (19. 66. 3) that the Antigonids dominated the town

from 314/3. Soon after “Margos and the Achaians” killed the tyrant of Bura and Iseas, tyrant of Karyneia “abdicated and, on receiving an assurance from the Achaeans that his life would be spared, added his town to the League” (Pol. 2. 41. 13-15)The Margos here mentioned by Polybios is probably Margos of Karyneia (the name is rare). He may have been a sort of international revolutionary, quite similar to the professional liberators Ecdelos and Damophanes of Megalopolis. We only know about him from these brief references in Polybios, but he could have been a significant figure in the earlier years of the Achaian League (perhaps diminished in the memoirs of Aratos). In 255 he was the first sole strategos and it is probable he had been one of the earlier twin strategoi. His career was very long and only terminated, presumably at a very advanced age, by his death in the naval battle of Paxos (230 BC) when he was probably Achaian nauarchos. Other Achaian towns, Aigeira, Pellana and Leontion joined to the League during the Peloponnesian expedition of Pyrrhos, king of Epirus (272 BC). We know from Justinus that he was allied to the Achaians (25. 4. 4).

In sum, the resurrection of the League began in the western corner of Achaia and the founders were the cities of Dyme and Patrai, which Pharai and Tritaia soon joined. Later Aigion was annexed with the two small towns of Karyneia and Bura, then the by now isolated Leontion (to the Arkadian border) and Aigeira and Pellana furthest east

The League becomes a regional power.

A few years later we find the Achaian League in the alliance promoted by the Athenian politician Chremonides of Aitalides and by the Spartan king Areus against the Macedonian king Antigonos Gonatas. Their allies are some Arkadian and Kretan towns but above all the king of Egypt, Ptolemy II Philadelphos (268/7 BC). The hopes of these allies collapsed miserably with the defeat of Corinth (265 BC) and subsequent surrender of Athens (263/2). The Achaians were twice threatened with reprisals from Antigonos II, following Pyrrhos’ death and at the conclusion of the Chremonidean War. But on the first occasion he was dissuaded by the necessity of reorganizing the Macedonian kingdom and later by his desire to undertake a contest at sea with the Ptolemaic kingdom.

We know little of the successive fifteen years of peace. Evidently the League stabilized and reorganized, concentrating executive powers in the hands of a sole strategos. But the events that changed its destiny were the membership of Sikyon, led by the young Aratos son of Kleinias and the almost contemporary rebellion of Alexander son of Krateros, the governor of Corinth and Euboia, against his uncle Antigonos Gonatas. Two blocs were formed: Antigonos supported by the Aitolian League, Argos and Sparta against Alexander allied with Achaians, Arkadians and Boiotians, supported by Ptolemy II of Egypt. Initially the Achaians and Arkadians put Sparta out of action with the battle of Mantineia (ca.250 BC) while Alexander forced Argos to make peace, while a new Lagid fleet dominated the Aegean Sea. But later the Aitolians defeated the Boiotians at Chaironeia (245 BC) compelling them to join their League. Subsequently Alexander died while Antigonos retook Corinth and destroyed the Ptolemaic fleet at Andros island. The Arkadian League broke up and the Achaians too were probably compelled to sign a treaty of peace.Although the Achaian League was now in great danger, in the following year Aratos, strategos for the second time, breaks the encompass, conquering Corinth with a coup de main and obtaining the adhesion of Megara, Epidauros and Troizen. Waiting for the Antigonid response, the Achaians entered into an alliance with Sparta where the reformer king Agis IV was reigning and an Aitolian attack was beaten off at the battle of Pellana. Old Antigonos died but his son Demetrios II, renouncing his father's maritime hegemonial ambitions, concentrated against the unprecedented and dangerous alliance between the Achaean and Aitolian Leagues.

The Demetrian War (239-229)

The Achaian expansion now spread out in three directions: Western Arkadia, the Argolid and Attika, assisted by Aitolian incursions in Lakonia and in the territories of Argos and Mantineia.Against Athens Aratos limited himself to a war of raids without significant results. He defeated and slew the Argive tyrant Aristippos but only captured Kleonai without succeeding in liberating Argos. On the Western

Arkadian front, supported by the Eleans, the League obtained great successes. Kleitor and Telphusa became members (we do not know the circumstances). Later the Achaian strategos Dioitas captured Heraia. The tyrant of Megalopolis Lydiades abdicated and brought his city into the League (235 BC) becoming very popular and being elected strategos several times. These successes were also possible because Demetrios II was mostly engaged against the Aitolians in Epirus and Central Greece (where he succeeded in detaching Boiotia and perhaps Western Phokis from the Aitolian League), in Western Aitolia and on the northern border of Macedonia where the pressure of the barbarian Dardanians was strong .Demetrios II did manage to send an army south under his general Bytis, who defeated Aratos at Philakia, but without any significant result. In 229 BC Demetrios was defeated and possibly slain by the Dardani, precipitating a serious crisis for the Macedonian kingdom. The two Leagues exploited this disaster to expand in all directions. Argos, Hermion and Phlious were brought into the Achean Laegue by tyrants resigning their power (after the example of Lydiades). Aigina joined too. Athens succeeded in bribing its Macedonian garrison to withdraw. Aratos played an important role in these negotiations, and had hoped that the Athenians would also join the League, partly in order to balance the importance of Megalopolis. But he was to be disappointed. Athens preferred to maintain his autonomy without a real power rather to play an important role inside the League.