| Battle of Dyme | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of Cleomenean War | |||||||
 A map of Achaea showing Dyme on the left. | |||||||
| |||||||
| Belligerents | |||||||
| Sparta | Achaean League | ||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
| Cleomenes III | Hyperbatas, Aratus | ||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| Low | Heavy | ||||||
The Battle of Dyme or Dymae was fought by the Achaean League under the command of their Strategos, Hyperbatas, and a Spartan army under the command of King Cleomenes III, and was part of the Cleomenean War. The battle took in place near Dyme in north-west Achaea and was fought in 226 BC.
Following the declaration of war against Sparta by the Achaean League in around 229-228 BC, [1] the fighting between the two countries had almost been continuous. Cleomenes had crushed two Achaean armies under the command of Aratus of Sicyon at the Battle of Mount Lycaeum and at the Battle of Ladoceia in 227 BC. [2]
After these victories, Cleomenes returned to Sparta and began radical reforms. He abolished the ephors, [3] [4] changed land laws, cancelled debt, and he also changed his army into one of the Macedonian style. [4] [5] Following these reforms, Cleomenes with his reformed army answered to appeals from the city of Mantinea and after ridding it of its Achaean garrison advanced north into the Achaean heartland. [6]
After advancing into Achaea, Cleomenes descended upon Pharae, a founding member of the League. His aim was to provoke a battle with the Achaeans, or if they didn't come to meet him in battle, to discredit Aratus. The strategos at the time was Hyperbatas, however Aratus had complete control of the League. [6]
As Cleomenes was besieging the city of Dyme, the full Achaean army came out to meet him. When Cleomenes saw them pitch camp, deciding not to battle the enemy while his rear was exposed to attacks from the garrison of Dyme, he advanced on the Achaean position. [6] In the pitched battle that followed, the Spartan phalanx routed the Achaean phalanx with the Achaeans sustaining heavy casualties and with many of the survivors being captured. [6]
This defeat crushed the Achaeans and forced them to sue for peace. Cleomenes offered to give back any cities he seized from the Achaeans and to return any prisoners he had taken in return for being made strategus of the Achaean League. It may be however how Plutarch states that the Achaeans, after seeing his many victories wished for Cleomenes to command them. [7] [8] However, Aratus who was against this proposal sent ambassadors to the court of King Antigonus III Doson where he requested Antigonus' aid against the Spartans which he received in return for giving Acrocorinth to Macedon. [9]
In 224 BC, Antigonus advanced into the Peloponnese with an army of 30,000 men and forced Cleomenes to retreat to Laconia, the Spartan heartland. [10] In 222 BC, the Macedonian-Achaean army and the Spartan army clashed at the Battle of Sellasia which ended in an allied victory. [11] This victory forced Cleomenes to flee from Greece and go to Egypt. [11] [12] [13] Antigonus took Sparta, making him the first foreigner to ever capture Sparta. [13]
This article concerns the period 229 BC – 220 BC.
Cleomenes III was one of the two kings of Sparta from 235 to 222 BC. He was a member of the Agiad dynasty and succeeded his father, Leonidas II. He is known for his attempts to reform the Spartan state.
The Achaean League was a Hellenistic-era confederation of Greek city states on the northern and central Peloponnese. The league was named after the region of Achaea in the northwestern Peloponnese, which formed its original core. The first league was formed in the fifth century BC. The second Achaean League was established in 280 BC. As a rival of Antigonid Macedon and an ally of Rome, the league played a major role in the expansion of the Roman Republic into Greece. This process eventually led to the League's conquest and dissolution by the Romans in 146 BC.
Nabis was the last king of independent Sparta. He was probably a member of the Heracleidae, and he ruled from 207 BC to 192 BC, during the years of the First and Second Macedonian Wars and the eponymous "War against Nabis", i.e. against him. After taking the throne by executing two claimants, he began rebuilding Sparta's power. During the Second Macedonian War, Nabis sided with King Philip V of Macedon and in return he received the city of Argos. However, when the war began to turn against the Macedonians, he defected to Rome. After the war, the Romans, urged by the Achaean League, attacked Nabis and defeated him. He then was assassinated in 192 BC by the Aetolian League. He represented the last phase of Sparta's reformist period.
Hellenistic Greece is the historical period of the country following Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the annexation of the classical Greek Achaean League heartlands by the Roman Republic. This culminated at the Battle of Corinth in 146 BC, a crushing Roman victory in the Peloponnese that led to the destruction of Corinth and ushered in the period of Roman Greece. Hellenistic Greece's definitive end was with the Battle of Actium in 31 BC, when the future emperor Augustus defeated Greek Ptolemaic queen Cleopatra VII and Mark Antony, the next year taking over Alexandria, the last great center of Hellenistic Greece.
Antigonus III Doson was king of Macedon from 229 BC to 221 BC. He was a member of the Antigonid dynasty. He was called Euergetes, Soter and Guardian (ἐπίτροπος) as he was the guardian of Philip V of Macedon.
Philopoemen was a skilled Greek general and statesman, who was Achaean strategos on eight occasions.
The Battle of Sellasia took place during the summer of 222 BC between Macedon and the Achaean League, led by Antigonus III Doson, and Sparta under the command of King Cleomenes III. The battle was fought at Sellasia on the northern frontier of Laconia and ended in a Macedonian-Achaean victory.
Aratus of Sicyon was a politician and military commander of Hellenistic Greece. He was elected strategos of the Achaean League 17 times, leading the League through numerous military campaigns including the Cleomenean War and the Social War.
Dyme, or Dymae, was a town and polis (city-state) of ancient Achaea, and the most westerly of the 12 Achaean cities, from which circumstance it is said to have derived its name. The location of Dyme is near the modern Kato Achaia.
Lydiadas of Megalopolis or Lydiades (Λυδιάδης) was an ancient Greek tyrant of his city Megalopolis in Arcadia. He came to power around the year 245 BC, but after ten years he decided to step down, leading his city to join the Achaean League. As a reward the Achaeans elected him to the post of strategos, that is of the League, for three terms in 234/33, 232/31 and 230/29 BC. In 227 BC he lost the elections against Aratus of Sicyon, but was chosen as hipparch, in this position he fell at the gates of his city during a cavalry charge against the Spartan king Cleomenes III.
Hyperuatas or Hypervatas was a general of the Achaean League in Ancient Greece who served only for a year, 226–225 BC.
The Laconian War of 195 BC was fought between the Greek city-state of Sparta and a coalition composed of Rome, the Achaean League, Pergamum, Rhodes, and Macedon.
The Hellenistic armies is a term which refers to the various armies of the successor kingdoms to the Hellenistic period, emerging soon after the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BCE, when the Macedonian empire was split between his successors, known as the Diadochi.
The Cleomenean War was fought between Sparta and the Achaean League for the control of the Peloponnese. Under the leadership of king Cleomenes III, Sparta initially had the upper hand, which forced the Achaean League to call for help the Macedonian king Antigonos Doson, who decisively defeated Cleomenes in the battle of Sellasia in 222.
The history of Sparta describes the history of the ancient Doric Greek city-state known as Sparta from its beginning in the legendary period to its incorporation into the Achaean League under the late Roman Republic, as Allied State, in 146 BC, a period of roughly 1000 years. Since the Dorians were not the first to settle the valley of the Eurotas River in the Peloponnesus of Greece, the preceding Mycenaean and Stone Age periods are described as well. Sparta went on to become a district of modern Greece. Brief mention is made of events in the post-classical periods.
The Social War, also War of the Allies and the Aetolian War, was fought from 220 BC to 217 BC between the Hellenic League under Philip V of Macedon and the Aetolian League, Sparta and Elis. It was ended with the Peace of Naupactus.
The Antigonid Macedonian army was the army that evolved from the ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia in the period when it was ruled by the Antigonid dynasty from 276 BC to 168 BC. It was seen as one of the principal Hellenistic fighting forces until its ultimate defeat at Roman hands at the Battle of Pydna in 168 BC. However, there was a brief resurgence in 150-148 during the revolt of Andriscus, a supposed heir to Perseus.
The Battle of Mount Lycaeum was a battle fought between Sparta led by Cleomenes III and the Achaean League commanded by Aratus. It was the first major battle of the Cleomenean War. The battle occurred at Mount Lycaeum on the border of Elis and Arcadia and ended in a Spartan victory.
Langon was a town near the boundary between ancient Elis and ancient Achaea. Although properly belonging to the Eleans, it appears in the territory of the Achaean city of Dyme, lying between that city and the frontiers of Elis. In 224 BCE, Spartan king Cleomenes III took Langon following his victory over Aratus of Sicyon and the Achaeans near Hecatombaeon.