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Macedonia ( ; , Makedonía), also called Macedon ( ), was an ancient monarchy on the periphery of Archaic Greece and Classical Greece,. which later became 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 southwest, Illyria to the northwest, Paeonia to the north, Thrace to the east and Ancient Thessaly to the south.
Before the 4th century BC, Macedonia was a small kingdom with its capital at Aigai, outside of the area dominated by the great city-states of Classical Athens, Sparta and Classical Thebes, and briefly subordinate to the Achaemenid Empire. During the reign of the Argead king PhilipII (359–336 BC), Macedonia (with its capital at Pella) subdued mainland Greece and the Thracian Odrysian kingdom through conquest and diplomacy. With a reformed army containing phalanxes wielding the sarissa pike, PhilipII defeated the old powers of Athens and Theban hegemony in the Battle of Chaeronea in 338BC. PhilipII'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. During Alexander's subsequent campaign of conquest, he overthrew the Achaemenid Empire and conquered territory that stretched as far as the Indus River. For a brief period, his Macedonian Empire was the most powerful in the world – the definitive Hellenistic state, inaugurating the transition to a new period of Ancient Greek civilization. Hellenistic art and literature flourished in the new conquered lands and advances in philosophy, engineering, and science spread across the empire and beyond. Of particular importance were the contributions of Aristotle, tutor to Alexander, Aristotelianism became a keystone of Western philosophy.
After Alexander's death in 323BC, the ensuing wars of the Diadochi, and the partitioning of Alexander's short-lived empire, Macedonia remained a Greek cultural and political center in the Mediterranean region along with Ptolemaic Egypt, the Seleucid Empire, and the Attalid kingdom. Important cities such as its capital Pella, Pydna, and Amphipolis were involved in power struggles for control of the territory. New cities were founded, such as Thessalonica by the usurper Cassander (named after his wife Thessalonike of Macedon).. Macedonia's decline began with the Macedonian Wars and the rise of ancient Rome as the leading Mediterranean power. At the end of the Third Macedonian War in 168BC, the Macedonian monarchy was abolished and replaced by Roman . A short-lived revival of the monarchy during the Fourth Macedonian War in 150–148BC ended with the establishment of the Roman province of Macedonia.
The Macedonian kings, who wielded absolute power and commanded State ownership such as gold and silver, facilitated mining operations to mint currency, finance their armies and, by the reign of PhilipII, a Macedonian navy. Unlike the other diadochi , the imperial cult fostered by Alexander was never adopted in Macedonia, yet Macedonian rulers nevertheless assumed roles as of the kingdom and leading patrons of domestic and international cults of the Hellenistic religion. The authority of Macedonian kings was theoretically limited by the institution of the army, while a few municipalities within the Macedonian commonwealth enjoyed a high degree of autonomy and even had democratic governments with popular assemblies.
The kingdom of Macedonia was situated along the Haliacmon and Vardar rivers in Lower Macedonia, north of Mount Olympus. Historian Robert Malcolm Errington suggests that one of the earliest Argead kings established Aigai (modern Vergina) as their capital in the mid-7th centuryBC.. Before the 4th centuryBC, the kingdom covered a region corresponding roughly to the western and central parts of the region of Macedonia in modern Greece.. It gradually expanded into the region of Upper Macedonia, inhabited by the Greek Lynkestis and Elimiotis tribes, and into regions of Emathia, Eordaia, Bottiaea, Mygdonia, Crestonia, and Almopia, which were inhabited by various peoples such as Thracians and Phrygians., see also for the Macedonian expulsion of original inhabitants such as the Phrygians. Macedonia's non-Greek neighbors included Thracians, inhabiting territories to the northeast, Illyrians to the northwest, and Paeonians to the north, while the lands of Thessaly to the south and Epirus to the west were inhabited by Greeks with similar cultures to that of the Macedonians..
A year after Darius I of Persia () launched an invasion into Europe against the Scythians, Paeonians, Thrace, and several Greek city-states of the Balkans, the Persian general Megabazus used diplomacy to convince AmyntasI to submit as a Vassal state of the Achaemenid Empire, ushering in the period of Achaemenid Macedonia.; ; .
Errington is skeptical that at this point Amyntas I of Macedon offered any submission as a vassal at all, at most a token one. He also mentions how the Macedonian king pursued his own course of action, such as inviting the exiled Athenian tyrant Hippias to take refuge at Anthemous in 506BC. Achaemenid Persian hegemony over Macedonia was briefly interrupted by the Ionian Revolt (499–493BC), yet the Persian general Mardonius brought it back under Achaemenid suzerainty.; ; .
Although Macedonia enjoyed a large degree of autonomy and was never made a (i.e. province) of the Achaemenid Empire, it was expected to provide troops for the Achaemenid army.; ; . AlexanderI provided Macedonian military support to Xerxes I () during the Second Persian invasion of Greece in 480–479 BC, and Macedonian soldiers fought on the side of the Persians at the 479BC Battle of Platea.; ; . Following the Greek victory at Salamis in 480BC, AlexanderI was employed as an Achaemenid diplomat to propose a peace treaty and alliance with Classical Athens, an offer that was rejected.. Soon afterwards, the Achaemenid forces were forced to withdraw from mainland Europe, marking the end of Persian control over Macedonia.; ; see also for further details.
PerdiccasII sided with Sparta in the Peloponnesian War (431–404 BC) between Athens and Sparta, and in 429 BC Athens retaliated by persuading Sitalces to invade Macedonia, but he was forced to retreat owing to a shortage of provisions in winter.; . In 424 BC, Arrhabaeus, a local ruler of Lynkestis in Upper Macedonia, rebelled against his suzerain Perdiccas, and the Spartans agreed to help in putting down the revolt.; . At the Battle of Lyncestis the Macedonians panicked and fled before the fighting began, enraging the Spartan general Brasidas, whose soldiers looted the unattended Macedonian baggage train.; . Perdiccas then changed sides and supported Athens, and he was able to put down Arrhabaeus's revolt.; .
Brasidas died in 422 BC, the year Athens and Sparta struck an accord, the Peace of Nicias, that freed Macedonia from its obligations as an Athenian ally.; . Following the 418BC Battle of Mantinea, the victorious Spartans formed an alliance with Argos, a military pact PerdiccasII was keen to join given the threat of Spartan allies remaining in Chalcidice.; see also for further details. When Argos suddenly switched sides as a pro-Athenian democracy, the Athenian navy was able to form a blockade against Macedonian and invade Chalcidice in 417BC.; see also for further details. PerdiccasII sued for peace in 414BC, forming an alliance with Athens that was continued by his son and successor ArchelausI ().; . Athens then provided naval support to ArchelausI in the 410BC Macedonian siege of Pydna, in exchange for timber and naval equipment.; .
Although Archelaus I was faced with some internal revolts and had to fend off an invasion of Illyrians led by Sirras of Lynkestis, he was able to project Macedonian power into Thessaly where he sent military aid to his allies.. Although he retained Aigai as a ceremonial and religious center, ArchelausI moved the capital city of the kingdom north to Pella, which was then positioned by a lake with a river connecting it to the Aegean Sea.; . He improved Macedonia's currency by minting with a Silver coin as well as issuing separate Coinage metals.. His royal court attracted the presence of well-known intellectuals such as the Athenian playwright Euripides.; . When ArchelausI was assassinated (perhaps following a homosexual love affair with at his court), the kingdom was plunged into chaos, in an era lasting from 399 to 393BC that included the reign of four different monarchs: Orestes, son of ArchelausI; AeropusII, uncle, regent, and murderer of Orestes; Pausanias, son of AeropusII; and AmyntasII, who was married to the youngest daughter of ArchelausI.; . Very little is known about this turbulent period; it came to an end when AmyntasIII (), son of Arrhidaeus and grandson of AmyntasI, killed Pausanias and claimed the Macedonian throne.; .
Amyntas III was forced to flee his kingdom in either 393 or 383BC (based on conflicting accounts), owing to a massive invasion by the Illyrians led by Bardylis.; see also for further details; the Greek historian Diodorus Siculus provided a seemingly conflicting account about Illyrian invasions occurring in 393BC and 383BC, which may have been representative of a single invasion led by the Illyrian king Bardylis. The pretender to the throne Argaeus ruled in his absence, yet AmyntasIII eventually returned to his kingdom with the aid of Thessalian allies.; see also for further details. AmyntasIII was also nearly overthrown by the forces of the Chalcidian city of Olynthos, but with the aid of Teleutias, brother of the Spartan king Agesilaus II, the Macedonians forced Olynthos to surrender and dissolve their Chalcidian League in 379BC.; .
Alexander II (), son of EurydiceI and AmyntasIII, succeeded his father and immediately invaded Thessaly to wage war against the tagus (supreme Thessalian military leader) Alexander of Pherae, capturing the city of Larissa.; . The Thessalians, desiring to remove both AlexanderII and Alexander of Pherae as their , appealed to Pelopidas of Thebes for aid; he succeeded in recapturing Larissa and, in the peace agreement arranged with Macedonia, received aristocratic including AlexanderII's brother and future king PhilipII ().; . When Alexander was assassinated by his brother-in-law Ptolemy of Aloros, the latter acted as an overbearing regent for PerdiccasIII (), younger brother of AlexanderII, who eventually had Ptolemy executed when reaching the age of majority in 365BC.; . The remainder of Perdiccas III's reign was marked by political stability and financial recovery.. However, an Athenian invasion led by Timotheus, son of Conon, managed to capture Methone and Pydna, and an Illyrian invasion led by Bardylis succeeded in killing PerdiccasIII and 4,000 Macedonian troops in battle.; .
Philip II spent his initial years radically transforming the Macedonian army. A reform of its organization, equipment, and training, including the introduction of the Macedonian phalanx armed with long pikes (i.e. the sarissa), proved immediately successful when tested against his Illyrian and Paeonian enemies.. Confusing accounts in ancient sources have led modern scholars to debate how much PhilipII's royal predecessors may have contributed to these reforms and the extent to which his ideas were influenced by his Adolescence years of captivity in Thebes as a political hostage during the Theban hegemony, especially after meeting with the general Epaminondas..
The Macedonians, like the other Greeks, traditionally practiced monogamy, but PhilipII practiced polygamy and married seven wives with perhaps only one that did not involve the loyalty of his aristocratic subjects or new allies..
Müller is skeptical about the claims of Plutarch and Athenaeus that PhilipII of Macedon married Cleopatra Eurydice of Macedon, a younger woman, purely out of love or due to his own midlife crisis. Cleopatra was the daughter of the general Attalus, who along with his father-in-law Parmenion were given command posts in Asia Minor (modern Turkey) soon after this wedding. Müller also suspects that this marriage was one of political convenience meant to ensure the loyalty of an influential Macedonian noble house. His first marriages were to Phila of Elimeia of the Upper Macedonian aristocracy as well as the Illyrian princess Audata to ensure a marriage alliance.. To establish an alliance with Larissa in Thessaly, he married the Thessalian noblewoman Philinna in 358BC, who bore him a son who would later rule as Philip III Arrhidaeus ().; . In 357BC, he married Olympias to secure an alliance with Arybbas, the King of Epirus and the Molossians. This marriage would bear a son who would later rule as AlexanderIII (better known as Alexander the Great) and claim descent from the legendary Achilles by way of his Aeacidae.; . It is unclear whether or not the Achaemenid Persian kings influenced PhilipII's practice of polygamy, although his predecessor AmyntasIII had three sons with a possible second wife Gygaea: Archelaus, Arrhidaeus, and Menelaus.; . PhilipII had Archelaus put to death in 359BC, while PhilipII's other two half brothers fled to Olynthos, serving as a casus belli for the Olynthian War (349–348BC) against the Chalcidian League.; ; .
While Athens was preoccupied with the Social War (357–355 BC), PhilipII retook Amphipolis from them in 357BC and the following year recaptured Pydna and Potidaea, the latter of which he handed over to the Chalcidian League as promised in a treaty.; ; . In 356BC, he took Crenides, refounding it as Philippi, while his general Parmenion defeated the Illyrian king Grabos II of the Grabaei.; ; ; . During the 355–354BC siege of Methone, PhilipII lost his right eye to an arrow wound, but managed to capture the city and treated the inhabitants cordially, unlike the Potidaeans, who had been enslaved.; ; .
Cawkwell contrarily provides the date of this siege as 354–353 BC.
Philip II then involved Macedonia in the Third Sacred War (356–346BC). It began when Phocis captured and plundered the temple of Apollo at Delphi instead of submitting unpaid fines, causing the Amphictyonic League to declare war on Phocis and a civil war among the members of the Thessalian League aligned with either Phocis or Thebes.; . PhilipII's initial campaign against Pherae in Thessaly in 353BC at the behest of Larissa ended in two disastrous defeats by the Phocian general Onomarchus.; ; ; .
Conversely, Buckler provides the date of this initial campaign as 354BC, while affirming that the second Thessalian campaign ending in the Battle of Crocus Field occurred in 353BC. PhilipII in turn defeated Onomarchus in 352BC at the Battle of Crocus Field, which led to PhilipII's election as leader ( archon) of the Thessalian League, provided him a seat on the Amphictyonic Council, and allowed for a marriage alliance with Pherae by wedding Nicesipolis, niece of the tyrant Jason of Pherae.; ; ; .
Philip II had some early involvement with the Achaemenid Empire, especially by supporting satraps and mercenaries who rebelled against the central authority of the Achaemenid king. The satrap of Hellespontine Phrygia Artabazos II, who was in rebellion against Artaxerxes III, was able to take refuge as an exile at the Macedonian court from 352 to 342 BC. He was accompanied in exile by his family and by his mercenary general Memnon of Rhodes. Barsine, daughter of Artabazos, and future wife of Alexander the Great, grew up at the Macedonian court.
After campaigning against the Thracian ruler Cersobleptes, in 349BC, PhilipII began his war against the Chalcidian League, which had been reestablished in 375BC following a temporary disbandment.; ; . Despite an Athenian intervention by Charidemus,. Olynthos was captured by PhilipII in 348BC, and its inhabitants were sold into slavery, including some Athenian citizens.; ; . The Athenians, especially in a series of speeches by Demosthenes known as the Olynthiacs, were unsuccessful in persuading their allies to counterattack and in 346BC concluded a treaty with Macedonia known as the Peace of Philocrates.; ; . The treaty stipulated that Athens would relinquish claims to Macedonian coastal territories, the Chalcidice, and Amphipolis in return for the release of the enslaved Athenians as well as guarantees that PhilipII would not attack Athenian settlements in the Thracian Chersonese.; . Meanwhile, Phocis and Thermopylae were captured by Macedonian forces, the Pythia robbers were executed, and PhilipII was awarded the two Phocian seats on the Amphictyonic Council and the position of master of ceremonies over the Pythian Games.; ; ; . Athens initially opposed his membership on the council and refused to attend the games in protest, but they eventually accepted these conditions, perhaps after some persuasion by Demosthenes in his oration On the Peace..
Over the next few years, Philip II reformed local governments in Thessaly, campaigned against the Illyrian ruler Pleuratus I, deposed Arybbas in Epirus in favor of his brother-in-law AlexanderI (through PhilipII's marriage to Olympias), and defeated Cersebleptes in Thrace. This allowed him to extend Macedonian control over the Hellespont in anticipation of an invasion into Achaemenid Anatolia.; ; ; ; . In 342BC, PhilipII conquered a Thracian city in what is now Bulgaria and renamed it Philippopolis (modern Plovdiv).. War broke out with Athens in 340BC while PhilipII was engaged in two ultimately unsuccessful sieges of Perinthus and Byzantion, followed by a successful campaign against the Scythians along the Danube and Macedonia's involvement in the Fourth Sacred War against Amphissa in 339BC.; ; . Thebes ejected a Macedonian garrison from Nicaea (near Thermopylae), leading Thebes to join Athens, Megara, Corinth, Achaea, and Euboea in a final confrontation against Macedonia at the Battle of Chaeronea in 338BC.; . After the Macedonian victory at Chaeronea, PhilipII installed an oligarchy in Thebes, yet was lenient toward Athens, wishing to utilize their navy in a planned invasion of the Achaemenid Empire.; . He was then chiefly responsible for the formation of the League of Corinth that included the major Greek city-states except Sparta. Despite the Kingdom of Macedonia's official exclusion from the league, in 337BC, PhilipII was elected as the leader ( hegemon) of its council ( synedrion) and the commander-in-chief ( strategos autokrator) of a forthcoming campaign to invade the Achaemenid Empire.; ; see also for further details. Philip's plan to punish the Persians for the suffering of the Greeks and to liberate the Greek cities of Asia Minor as well as perhaps the panhellenic fear of another Persian invasion of Greece, contributed to his decision to invade the Achaemenid Empire. The Persians offered aid to Perinthus and Byzantion in 341–340BC, highlighting Macedonia's strategic need to secure Thrace and the Aegean Sea against increasing Achaemenid encroachment, as the Persian king Artaxerxes III further consolidated his control over satrapies in western Anatolia. The latter region, yielding far more wealth and valuable resources than the Balkans, was also coveted by the Macedonian king for its sheer economic potential.
When Philip II married Cleopatra Eurydice, niece of general Attalus, talk of providing new potential heirs at the wedding feast infuriated PhilipII's son Alexander, a veteran of the Battle of Chaeronea, and his mother Olympias. They fled together to Epirus before Alexander was recalled to Pella by PhilipII.; . When PhilipII arranged a marriage between his son Arrhidaeus and Ada of Caria, daughter of Pixodarus, the Persian satrap of Caria, Alexander intervened and proposed to marry Ada instead. PhilipII then cancelled the wedding altogether and exiled Alexander's advisors Ptolemy I, Nearchus, and Harpalus.; see also for further details. To reconcile with Olympias, PhilipII had their daughter Cleopatra marry Olympias' brother (and Cleopatra's uncle) AlexanderI of Epirus, but PhilipII was assassinated by his bodyguard, Pausanias of Orestis, during their wedding feast and succeeded by Alexander in 336BC.; ; ; see for details of the arrests and judicial trials of other suspects in the conspiracy to assassinate Philip II of Macedon.
In 335 BC, Alexander fought against the Thracian tribe of the Triballi at Haemus Mons and along the Danube, forcing their surrender on Peuce Island.; . Shortly thereafter, the Illyrian chieftain Cleitus, son of Bardylis, threatened to attack Macedonia with the aid of Glaucias, king of the Taulantii, but Alexander took the initiative and besieged the Illyrians at Pelion (in modern Albania).; . When Thebes had once again revolted from the League of Corinth and was besieging the Macedonian garrison in the Cadmea, Alexander left the Illyrian front and marched to Thebes, which he placed under siege.; see also and for further details. After breaching the walls, Alexander's forces killed 6,000 Thebans, took 30,000 inhabitants as prisoners of war, and burned the city to the ground as a warning that convinced all other Greek states except Sparta not to challenge Alexander again.; see also for further details.
Throughout his military career, Alexander won every battle that he personally commanded.. His first victory against the Persians in Asia Minor at the Battle of the Granicus in 334BC used a small cavalry contingent as a distraction to allow his infantry to cross the river followed by a cavalry charge from his companion cavalry.. Alexander led the cavalry charge at the Battle of Issus in 333BC, forcing the Persian king Darius III and his army to flee. DariusIII, despite having superior numbers, was again forced to flee the Battle of Gaugamela in 331BC. The Persian king was later captured and executed by his own satrap of Bactria and kinsman, Bessus, in 330BC. The Macedonian king subsequently hunted down and executed Bessus in what is now Afghanistan, securing the region of Sogdia in the process.; . At the 326BC Battle of the Hydaspes (modern-day Punjab), when the of King Porus of the Pauravas threatened Alexander's troops, he had them form open ranks to surround the elephants and dislodge their handlers by using their sarissa pikes.. When his Macedonian troops threatened mutiny in 324BC at Opis, Babylonia (near modern Baghdad, Iraq), Alexander offered Macedonian military titles and greater responsibilities to Persian officers and units instead, forcing his troops to seek forgiveness at a staged banquet of reconciliation between Persians and Macedonians.; .
Alexander perhaps undercut his own rule by demonstrating signs of . While utilizing effective propaganda such as the cutting of the Gordian Knot, he also attempted to portray himself as a Sacred king and son of Zeus following his visit to the oracle at Siwah in the Libyan Desert (in modern-day Egypt) in 331BC.. His attempt in 327BC to have his men prostrate before him in Bactra in an act of proskynesis borrowed from the Persian kings was rejected as religious blasphemy by his Macedonian and Greek subjects after his court historian Callisthenes refused to perform this ritual.. When Alexander had Parmenion murdered at Ecbatana (near modern Hamadan, Iran) in 330BC, this was "symptomatic of the growing gulf between the king's interests and those of his country and people", according to Errington.. His murder of Cleitus the Black in 328BC is described as "vengeful and reckless" by Dawn L. Gilley and Ian Worthington.. Continuing the polygamous habits of his father, Alexander encouraged his men to marry native women in Asia, leading by example when he wed Roxana, a Sogdian princess of Bactria.. He then married Stateira II, eldest daughter of DariusIII, and Parysatis II, youngest daughter of Artaxerxes III, at the Susa weddings in 324BC..
Meanwhile, in Greece, the Spartan king Agis III attempted to lead a rebellion of the Greeks against Macedonia.; . He was defeated in 331BC at the Battle of Megalopolis by Antipater, who was serving as regent of Macedonia and deputy hegemon of the League of Corinth in Alexander's stead.; .
Gilley and Worthington discuss the ambiguity surrounding the exact title of Antipater aside from deputy hegemon of the League of Corinth, with some sources calling him a regent, others a governor, others a simple general.
N. G. L. Hammond and F. W. Walbank state that Alexander the Great left "Macedonia under the command of Antipater, in case there was a rising in Greece." . Before Antipater embarked on his campaign in the Peloponnese, Memnon, the governor of Thrace, was dissuaded from rebellion by use of diplomacy.; . Antipater deferred the punishment of Sparta to the League of Corinth headed by Alexander, who ultimately pardoned the Spartans on the condition that they submit fifty nobles as hostages.. Antipater's hegemony was somewhat unpopular in Greece due to his practice (perhaps by order of Alexander) of exiling malcontents and garrisoning cities with Macedonian troops, yet in 330BC, Alexander declared that the tyrannies installed in Greece were to be abolished and Greek freedom was to be restored..
c.301BC, after the Battle of Ipsus
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]] When Alexander the Great died at Babylon in 323BC, his mother Olympias immediately accused Antipater and his faction of poisoning him, although there is no evidence to confirm this.; see also for further details. With no official heir apparent, the Macedonian military command split, with one side proclaiming Alexander's half-brother PhilipIII Arrhidaeus () as king and the other siding with the infant son of Alexander and Roxana, AlexanderIV ().; see also for further details. Except for the Euboeans and Boeotians, the Greeks also immediately rose up in a rebellion against Antipater known as the Lamian War (323–322BC).; ; . When Antipater was defeated at the 323BC Battle of Thermopylae, he fled to Lamia where he was besieged by the Athenian commander Leosthenes. A Macedonian army led by Leonnatus rescued Antipater by lifting the siege.; ; . Antipater defeated the rebellion, yet his death in 319BC left a power vacuum wherein the two proclaimed kings of Macedonia became pawns in a power struggle between the diadochi, the former generals of Alexander's army.; see also for further details.
A council of the army convened in Babylon immediately after Alexander's death, naming PhilipIII as king and the chiliarch Perdiccas as his regent.; . Antipater, Antigonus Monophthalmus, Craterus, and Ptolemy formed a coalition against Perdiccas in a civil war initiated by Ptolemy's seizure of the hearse of Alexander the Great.; . Perdiccas was assassinated in 321BC by his own officers during a failed campaign in Egypt against Ptolemy, where his march along the Nile River resulted in the drowning of 2,000 of his men.; . Although Eumenes of Cardia managed to kill Craterus in battle, this had little to no effect on the outcome of the 321BC Partition of Triparadisus in Syria where the victorious coalition settled the issue of a new regency and territorial rights.; . Antipater was appointed as regent over the two kings. Before Antipater died in 319BC, he named the staunch Argead loyalist Polyperchon as his successor, passing over his own son Cassander and ignoring the right of the king to choose a new regent (since PhilipIII was considered mentally unstable), in effect bypassing the council of the army as well.; .
Forming an alliance with Ptolemy, Antigonus, and Lysimachus, Cassander had his officer Nicanor capture the Munichia fortress of Athens' port town Piraeus in defiance of Polyperchon's decree that Greek cities should be free of Macedonian garrisons, sparking the Second War of the Diadochi (319–315BC).; . Given a string of military failures by Polyperchon, in 317BC, PhilipIII, by way of his politically engaged wife Eurydice II of Macedon, officially replaced him as regent with Cassander. Afterwards, Polyperchon desperately sought the aid of Olympias in Epirus.; . A joint force of Epirotes, Aetolians, and Polyperchon's troops invaded Macedonia and forced the surrender of PhilipIII and Eurydice's army, allowing Olympias to execute the king and force his queen to commit suicide.; . Olympias then had Nicanor and dozens of other Macedonian nobles killed, but by the spring of 316BC, Cassander had defeated her forces, captured her, and placed her on trial for murder before sentencing her to death.; .
Cassander married Philip II's daughter Thessalonike and briefly extended Macedonian control into Illyria as far as Epidamnos (modern Durrës, Albania). By 313BC, it was retaken by the Illyrian king Glaucias of Taulantii.. By 316BC, Antigonus had taken the territory of Eumenes and managed to eject Seleucus Nicator from his Babylonian satrapy, leading Cassander, Ptolemy, and Lysimachus to issue a joint ultimatum to Antigonus in 315BC for him to surrender various territories in Asia. Antigonus promptly allied with Polyperchon, now based in Corinth, and issued an ultimatum of his own to Cassander, charging him with murder for executing Olympias and demanding that he hand over the royal family, King AlexanderIV and the queen mother Roxana.. The conflict that followed lasted until the winter of 312/311BC, when a new peace settlement recognized Cassander as general of Europe, Antigonus as "first in Asia", Ptolemy as general of Egypt, and Lysimachus as general of Thrace.. Cassander had AlexanderIV and Roxana put to death in the winter of 311/310BC, and between 306 and 305BC the diadochi were declared kings of their respective territories.; .
Cassander died in 297 BC, and his sickly son PhilipIV died the same year, succeeded by Cassander's other sons Alexander V of Macedon () and Antipater II of Macedon (), with their mother Thessalonike of Macedon acting as regent. While Demetrius fought against the Antipatrid forces in Greece, AntipaterII killed his own mother to obtain power. His desperate brother AlexanderV then requested aid from Pyrrhus of Epirus (), who had fought alongside Demetrius at the Battle of Ipsus, but was sent to Egypt as a hostage as part of an agreement between Demetrius and PtolemyI.. In exchange for defeating the forces of AntipaterII and forcing him to flee to the court of Lysimachus in Thrace, Pyrrhus was awarded the westernmost portions of the Macedonian kingdom.; . Demetrius had his nephew AlexanderV assassinated and was then proclaimed king of Macedonia, but his subjects protested against his aloof, Eastern-style autocracy..
War broke out between Pyrrhus and Demetrius in 290BC when Lanassa, wife of Pyrrhus, daughter of Agathocles of Syracuse, left him for Demetrius and offered him her dowry of Corcyra. The war dragged on until 288BC, when Demetrius lost the support of the Macedonians and fled the country. Macedonia was then divided between Pyrrhus and Lysimachus, the former taking western Macedonia and the latter eastern Macedonia.; . By 286BC, Lysimachus had expelled Pyrrhus and his forces from Macedonia.; ; .
Conversely, Errington dates Lysimachus' reunification of Macedonia by expelling Pyrrhus of Epirus as occurring in 284BC, not 286BC. In 282BC, a new war erupted between SeleucusI and Lysimachus; the latter was killed in the Battle of Corupedion, allowing SeleucusI to take control of Thrace and Macedonia.; ; . In two dramatic reversals of fortune, SeleucusI was assassinated in 281BC by his officer Ptolemy Keraunos, son of PtolemyI and grandson of Antipater, who was then proclaimed king of Macedonia before being killed in battle in 279BC by Celtic invaders in the Gallic invasion of Greece.; ; . The Macedonian army proclaimed the general Sosthenes of Macedon as king, although he apparently refused the title.. After defeating the Gauls ruler Bolgios and driving out the raiding party of Brennus, Sosthenes died and left a chaotic situation in Macedonia.. The Gallic invaders ravaged Macedonia until Antigonus Gonatas, son of Demetrius, defeated them in Thrace at the 277BC Battle of Lysimachia and was then proclaimed king Antigonus II of Macedon ().; ; .
In 280 BC, Pyrrhus embarked on a campaign in Magna Graecia (i.e. southern Italy) against the Roman Republic known as the Pyrrhic War, followed by his invasion of Sicily.; . Ptolemy Keraunos secured his position on the Macedonian throne by giving Pyrrhus five thousand soldiers and twenty for this endeavor. Pyrrhus returned to Epirus in 275BC after the ultimate failure of both campaigns, which contributed to the rise of Rome because Greek cities in southern Italy such as Taranto now became Roman allies. Pyrrhus invaded Macedonia in 274BC, defeating the largely mercenary army of AntigonusII at the 274BC Battle of Aous and driving him out of Macedonia, forcing him to seek refuge with his naval fleet in the Aegean.; ; .
Pyrrhus lost much of his support among the Macedonians in 273BC when his unruly Gallic mercenaries plundered the royal cemetery of Aigai.; . Pyrrhus pursued AntigonusII in the Peloponnese, yet AntigonusII was ultimately able to recapture Macedonia.. Pyrrhus was killed while besieging Argos in 272BC, allowing AntigonusII to reclaim the rest of Greece.; ; . He then restored the Argead dynastic graves at Aigai and annexed the Kingdom of Paeonia.; .
The Aetolian League hampered AntigonusII's control over central Greece, and the formation of the Achaean League in 251BC pushed Macedonian forces out of much of the Peloponnese and at times incorporated Athens and Sparta.; see also about the resurgence of Sparta under Areus I. While the Seleucid Empire aligned with Antigonid Macedonia against Ptolemaic Egypt during the Syrian Wars, the Ptolemaic navy heavily disrupted AntigonusII's efforts to control mainland Greece.; . With the aid of the Ptolemaic navy, the Athenian statesman Chremonides led a revolt against Macedonian authority known as the Chremonidean War (267–261BC).; . By 265BC, Athens was surrounded and besieged by AntigonusII's forces, and a Ptolemaic fleet was defeated in the Battle of Cos. Athens finally surrendered in 261BC.; . After Macedonia formed an alliance with the Seleucid ruler Antiochus II, a peace settlement between AntigonusII and Ptolemy II Philadelphus of Egypt was finally struck in 255BC..
In 251 BC, Aratus of Sicyon led a rebellion against AntigonusII, and in 250BC, PtolemyII declared his support for the self-proclaimed King Alexander of Corinth.; . Although Alexander died in 246BC and Antigonus was able to score a naval victory against the Ptolemies at Andros, the Macedonians lost the Acrocorinth to the forces of Aratus in 243BC, followed by the induction of Corinth into the Achaean League.; . AntigonusII made peace with the Achaean League in 240BC, ceding the territories that he had lost in Greece.; . AntigonusII died in 239BC and was succeeded by his son Demetrius II of Macedon (). Seeking an alliance with Macedonia to defend against the Aetolians, the queen mother and regent of Epirus, Olympias II, offered her daughter Phthia of Macedon to DemetriusII in marriage. Demetrius II accepted her proposal, but he damaged relations with the Seleucids by divorcing Stratonice of Macedon.; . Although the Aetolians formed an alliance with the Achaean League as a result, DemetriusII was able to invade Boeotia and capture it from the Aetolians by 236BC..
The Achaean League managed to capture Megalopolis in 235BC, and by the end of DemetriusII's reign most of the Peloponnese except Argos was taken from the Macedonians.; . DemetriusII also lost an ally in Epirus when the monarchy was toppled in a Epirote League.; . DemetriusII enlisted the aid of the king Agron to defend Acarnania against Aetolia, and in 229BC, they managed to defeat the combined navies of the Aetolian and Achaean Leagues at the Battle of Paxos. Another Illyrian ruler, Longarus of the Dardanian Kingdom, invaded Macedonia and defeated an army of DemetriusII shortly before his death in 229BC.; . Although his young son Philip immediately inherited the throne, his regent Antigonus III Doson (), nephew of AntigonusII, was proclaimed king by the army, with Philip as his heir, following a string of military victories against the Illyrians in the north and the Aetolians in Thessaly.; .
Aratus sent an embassy to Antigonus III in 226BC seeking an unexpected alliance now that the reformist king Cleomenes III of Sparta was threatening the rest of Greece in the Cleomenean War (229–222BC).; ; see also for further details. In exchange for military aid, AntigonusIII demanded the return of Corinth to Macedonian control, which Aratus finally agreed to in 225BC.; ; . In 224BC, AntigonusIII's forces took Arcadia from Sparta. After forming a Hellenic league in the same vein as PhilipII's League of Corinth, he managed to defeat Sparta at the Battle of Sellasia in 222BC.; ; . Sparta was occupied by a foreign power for the first time in its history, restoring Macedonia's position as the leading power in Greece.; see also about the Macedonian military's occupation of Sparta following the Battle of Sellasia. Antigonus died a year later, perhaps from tuberculosis, leaving behind a strong Hellenistic kingdom for his successor PhilipV.; .
Philip V of Macedon () faced immediate challenges to his authority by the Illyrian Dardani and Aetolian League.; . PhilipV and his allies were successful against the Aetolians and their allies in the Social War (220–217 BC), yet he made peace with the Aetolians once he heard of incursions by the Dardani in the north and the Carthaginian victory over the Romans at the Battle of Lake Trasimene in 217BC.; . Demetrius of Pharos is alleged to have convinced PhilipV to first Illyrian Wars in advance of an invasion of the Italian peninsula.; see also for further details.
Errington is skeptical that Philip V at this point had any intentions of invading southern Italy via Illyria once the latter was secured, deeming his plans to be "more modest", . In 216BC, PhilipV sent a hundred light warships into the Adriatic Sea to attack Illyria, a move that prompted Scerdilaidas of the Ardiaean Kingdom to appeal to the Romans for aid.; . Rome responded by sending ten heavy from Roman Sicily to patrol the Illyrian coasts, causing PhilipV to reverse course and order his fleet to retreat, averting open conflict for the time being.; .
The Aetolian League concluded a peace agreement with PhilipV in 206BC, and the Roman Republic negotiated the Treaty of Phoenice in 205BC, ending the war and allowing the Macedonians to retain some captured settlements in Illyria.; ; ; ; see also for details on the Aetolian League's treaty with Philip V of Macedon and Rome's rejection of the second attempt by the Aetolians to seek Roman aid, viewing the Aetolians as having violated the earlier treaty. Although the Romans rejected an Aetolian request in 202BC for Rome to declare war on Macedonia once again, the Roman Senate gave serious consideration to the similar offer made by Pergamon and its ally Rhodes in 201BC.; see also for further details. These states were concerned about PhilipV's alliance with Antiochus III the Great of the Seleucid Empire, which invaded the war-weary and financially exhausted Ptolemaic Empire in the Fifth Syrian War (202–195BC) as PhilipV captured Ptolemaic settlements in the Aegean Sea.; ; see also for further details. Although Rome's envoys played a critical role in convincing Athens to join the anti-Macedonian alliance with Pergamon and Rhodes in 200BC, the comitia centuriata (people's assembly) rejected the Roman Senate's proposal for a declaration of war on Macedonia.; ; ; . Meanwhile, PhilipV conquered territories in the Hellespont and Bosporus as well as Ptolemaic Samos, which led Rhodes to form an alliance with Pergamon, Byzantium, Cyzicus, and Chios against Macedonia.; see also for further details. Despite PhilipV's nominal alliance with the Seleucid king, he lost the naval Battle of Chios in 201BC and was blockaded at Bargylia by the Rhodian and Pergamene navies.; .
While Philip V was busy fighting Rome's Greek allies, Rome viewed this as an opportunity to punish this former ally of Hannibal with a war that they hoped would supply a victory and require few resources..
: "Roman desire for revenge and private hopes of famous victories were probably the decisive reasons for the outbreak of the war." The Roman Senate demanded that PhilipV cease hostilities against neighboring Greek powers and defer to an international arbitration committee for settling grievances.. When the comitia centuriata finally voted in approval of the Roman Senate's declaration of war in 200BC and handed their ultimatum to PhilipV, demanding that a tribunal assess the damages owed to Rhodes and Pergamon, the Macedonian king rejected it. This marked the beginning of the Second Macedonian War (200–197BC), with Publius Sulpicius Galba Maximus spearheading military operations in Apollonia.; ; see also for further details.
The Macedonians successfully defended their territory for roughly two years,. but the Roman consul Titus Quinctius Flamininus managed to expel PhilipV from Macedonia in 198BC, forcing his men to take refuge in Thessaly.. When the Achaean League switched their loyalties from Macedonia to Rome, the Macedonian king sued for peace, but the terms offered were considered too stringent, and so the war continued. In June 197BC, the Macedonians were defeated at the Battle of Cynoscephalae.; ; . Rome then ratified a treaty that forced Macedonia to relinquish control of much of its Greek possessions outside of Macedonia proper, if only to act as a buffer against Illyrian and Thracian incursions into Greece.; ; . Although some Greeks suspected Roman intentions of supplanting Macedonia as the new hegemonic power in Greece, Flaminius announced at the Isthmian Games of 196BC that Rome intended to preserve Greek liberty by leaving behind no garrisons and by not exacting tribute of any kind.; . His promise was delayed by negotiations with the Spartan king Nabis, who had meanwhile captured Argos, yet Roman forces evacuated Greece in 194BC.; see also and for further details.
Encouraged by the Aetolian League and their calls to liberate Greece from the Romans, the Seleucid dynasty AntiochusIII landed with his army at Demetrias, Thessaly, in 192BC, and was elected strategos by the Aetolians.; . Macedonia, the Achaean League, and other Greek city-states maintained their alliance with Rome.; . The Romans defeated the Seleucids in the 191BC Battle of Thermopylae as well as the Battle of Magnesia in 190BC, forcing the Seleucids to pay a war indemnity, dismantle most of its navy, and abandon its claims to any territories north or west of the Taurus Mountains in the 188BC Treaty of Apamea.; ; see also for further details. With Rome's acceptance, PhilipV was able to capture some cities in central Greece in 191–189BC that had been allied to AntiochusIII, while Rhodes and Eumenes II () of Pergamon gained territories in Asia Minor.; .
Failing to please all sides in various territorial disputes, the Roman Senate decided in 184/183BC to force PhilipV to abandon Aenus and Maroneia, since these had been declared free cities in the Treaty of Apamea.; ; .
Bringmann dates this event of handing over Aenus and Maroneia along the Thracian coast as 183BC, while Eckstein dates it as 184BC. This assuaged the fear of EumenesII that Macedonia could pose a threat to his lands in the Hellespont.; see also for further details. Perseus of Macedon () succeeded PhilipV and executed his brother Demetrius, who had been favored by the Romans but was charged by Perseus with high treason.; ; see also for a discussion about Perseus's actions during the early part of his reign. Perseus then attempted to form marriage alliances with Prusias II of Bithynia and Seleucus IV Philopator of the Seleucid Empire, along with renewed relations with Rhodes that greatly unsettled EumenesII.; . Although EumenesII attempted to undermine these diplomatic relationships, Perseus fostered an alliance with the Boeotian League, extended his authority into Illyria Abrupolis, and in 174BC, won the role of managing the Temple of Apollo at Delphi as a member of the Amphictyonic Council.; ; .
Eumenes II came to Rome in 172 BC and delivered a speech to the Senate denouncing the alleged crimes and transgressions of Perseus.; . This convinced the Roman Senate to declare the Third Macedonian War (171–168BC).; see also , who says that "Rome ... as the sole remaining superpower ... would not accept Macedonia as a peer competitor or equal."
Klaus Bringmann asserts that negotiations with Macedonia were completely ignored due to Rome's "Realpolitik" that the Macedonian kingdom had to be destroyed to ensure the elimination of the "supposed source of all the difficulties which Rome was having in the Greek world". Although Perseus's forces were victorious against the Romans at the Battle of Callinicus in 171BC, the Macedonian army was defeated at the Battle of Pydna in June 168BC.; ; ; . Perseus fled to Samothrace but surrendered shortly afterwards, was brought to Rome for the Roman triumph of Lucius Aemilius Paullus Macedonicus, and was placed under house arrest at Alba Fucens, where he died in 166BC.; ; ; see also for further details. The Romans abolished the Macedonian monarchy by installing four separate allied in its stead, their capitals located at Amphipolis, Thessalonica, Pella, and Pelagonia.; ; ; see also for further details. The Romans imposed severe laws inhibiting many social and economic interactions between the inhabitants of these republics, including the banning of marriages between them and the (temporary) prohibition on gold and silver mining. A certain Andriscus, claiming Antigonid descent, rebelled against the Romans and was pronounced king of Macedonia, defeating the army of the Roman praetor Publius Juventius Thalna during the Fourth Macedonian War (150–148BC).; . Despite this, Andriscus was defeated in 148BC at the second Battle of Pydna by Quintus Caecilius Metellus Macedonicus, whose forces occupied the kingdom.; ; . This was followed in 146BC by the Roman destruction of Carthage and victory over the Achaean League at the Battle of Corinth, ushering in the era of Roman Greece and the gradual establishment of the Roman province of Macedonia.; ; .
It is known that Macedonian kings before PhilipII upheld the privileges and carried out the responsibilities of hosting foreign diplomats, determining the kingdom's foreign policies, and negotiating alliances with foreign powers.. After the Greek victory at Salamis in 480BC, the Persian commander Mardonius had Alexander I of Macedon sent to Athens as a chief envoy to orchestrate an alliance between the Achaemenid Empire and Athens. The decision to send Alexander was based on his marriage alliance with a noble Persian house and his previous formal relationship with the city-state of Athens. With their ownership of natural resources including gold, silver, timber, and royal land, the early Macedonian kings were also capable of Bribery foreign and domestic parties with impressive gifts..
Little is known about the Judiciary of ancient Macedonia except that the king acted as the of the kingdom. The Macedonian kings were also supreme commanders of the military.; ; early evidence for this includes not only Alexander I's role as a commander in the Greco-Persian Wars but also the city-state of Potidaea's acceptance of Perdiccas II of Macedon as their commander-in-chief during their rebellion against the Delian League of Athens in 432 BC. PhilipII was also highly regarded for his acts of piety in serving as the high priest of the nation. He performed daily and led religious festivals.. Alexander imitated various aspects of his father's reign, such as granting land and gifts to loyal aristocratic followers, but lost some core support among them for adopting some of the trappings of an Eastern, Persian monarch, a "lord and master" as Carol J. King suggests, instead of a "comrade-in-arms" as was the traditional relationship of Macedonian kings with their companions.; for further context, see . Alexander's father, PhilipII, was perhaps influenced by Persian traditions when he adopted institutions similar to those found in the Achaemenid realm, such as having a Royal Secretary, royal archive, royal pages, and a seated throne..
Members of the council had the right to speak freely, and although there is no direct evidence that they voted on affairs of state, it is clear that the king was at least occasionally pressured to agree to their demands.. The assembly was apparently given the right to judge cases of high treason and assign punishments for them, such as when Alexander the Great acted as prosecutor in the trial and conviction of three alleged conspirators in his father's assassination plot (while many others Acquittal).. However, there is perhaps insufficient evidence to allow a conclusion that councils and assemblies were regularly upheld or constitutionally grounded, or that their decisions were always heeded by the king.; . At the death of Alexander the Great, the companions immediately formed a council to assume control of his empire, but it was soon destabilized by open rivalry and conflict between Diadochi.; . The army also used mutiny as a tool to achieve political ends.For instance, when Perdiccas had Philip II's daughter Cynane murdered to prevent her own daughter Eurydice II of Macedon from marrying Philip III of Macedon, the army revolted and ensured that the marriage took place. See and for details.
In ancient Athens, the Athenian democracy was restored on three separate occasions following the initial conquest of the city by Antipater in 322BC.. When it fell repeatedly under Macedonian rule it was governed by a Macedonian-imposed oligarchy composed of the wealthiest members of the city-state.: under Antipater's oligarchy, the lower value in terms of property for acceptable members of the oligarchy was 2,000 Ancient drachma. Athenian democracy was restored briefly after Antipater's death in 319 BC, yet his son Cassander reconquered the city, which came under the regency of Demetrius of Phalerum. Demetrius lowered the property limit for oligarchic members to 1,000 drachma, yet by 307 BC he was exiled from the city and direct democracy was restored. Demetrius I of Macedon reconquered Athens in 295 BC, yet democracy was once again restored in 287 BC with the aid of Ptolemy I of Egypt. Antigonus II Gonatas, son of Demetrius I, reconquered Athens in 260 BC, followed by a succession of Macedonian kings ruling over Athens until the Roman Republic conquered both Macedonia and then mainland Greece by 146 BC. Other city-states were handled quite differently and were allowed a greater degree of autonomy. After PhilipII conquered Amphipolis in 357BC, the city was allowed to retain its democracy, including its constitution, popular assembly, city council ( boule), and yearly for new officials, but a Macedonian garrison was housed within the city walls along with a Macedonian royal commissioner ( epistates) to monitor the city's political affairs.. Philippi, the city founded by PhilipII, was the only other city in the Macedonian commonwealth that had a democratic government with popular assemblies, since the assembly ( ecclesia) of Thessaloniki seems to have had only a passive function in practice.. Some cities also maintained their own municipal .. The Macedonian king and central government administered the revenues generated by Greek temple and ..
Within the Macedonian commonwealth, some evidence from the 3rd centuryBC indicates that foreign relations were handled by the central government. Although individual Macedonian cities nominally participated in Panhellenic events as independent entities, in reality, the granting of asylia (inviolability, diplomatic immunity, and the right of asylum at sanctuaries) to certain cities was handled directly by the king.. Likewise, the city-states within contemporary Greek Koinon (i.e., of city-states, the sympoliteia) obeyed the federal decrees on collectively by the members of their league.Unlike the sparse Macedonian examples, ample textual evidence of this exists for the Achaean League, Acarnanian League, and Achaean League; see . In city-states belonging to a league or commonwealth, the granting of proxenia (i.e. the hosting of foreign ambassadors) was usually a right shared by local and central authorities.. Abundant evidence exists for the granting of proxenia as being the sole prerogative of central authorities in the neighboring Epirote League, and some evidence suggests the same arrangement in the Macedonian commonwealth.. City-states that were Alliance with Macedonia issued their own decrees regarding proxenia.. Foreign leagues also formed alliances with the Macedonian kings, such as when the Cretan League signed treaties with Demetrius II Aetolicus and Antigonus III Doson ensuring enlistment of Cretan mercenaries into the Macedonian army, and elected Philip V of Macedon as honorary protector ( prostates) of the league..
For his lighter missile troops, Philip II employed mercenary Cretan archers as well as Thracian, Paeonian, and Illyrian javelin throwers, slingers, and archers.; . He hired engineers such as Polyidus of Thessaly and Diades of Pella, who were capable of building state of the art and artillery that fired large Crossbow bolt. Following the acquisition of the lucrative mines at Krinides (renamed Philippi), the royal treasury could afford to field a permanent, professional standing army.. The increase in state revenues under PhilipII allowed the Macedonians to build a small navy for the first time, which included .; ; .
The only Macedonian cavalry units attested under Alexander were the companion cavalry, yet he formed a hipparchia (i.e. unit of a few hundred horsemen) of companion cavalry composed entirely of ethnic Persian people while campaigning in Asia.. When marching his forces into Asia, Alexander brought 1,800 cavalrymen from Macedonia, 1,800 cavalrymen from Thessaly, 600 cavalrymen from the rest of Greece, and 900 prodromoi cavalry from Thrace.. Antipater was able to quickly raise a force of 600 native Macedonian cavalry to fight in the Lamian War when it began in 323BC. The most elite members of Alexander's hypaspistai were designated as the agema, and a new term for hypaspistai emerged after the Battle of Gaugamela in 331BC: the argyraspides (silver shields).; . The latter continued to serve after the reign of Alexander the Great and may have been of Asian origin..
: in regards to both the argyraspides and chalkaspides, "these titles were probably not functional, perhaps not even official." Overall, his pike-wielding phalanx infantry numbered some 12,000 men, 3,000 of which were elite hypaspistai and 9,000 of which were pezhetairoi..
However, in discussing the discrepancies among ancient historians about the size of Alexander the Great's army, N. G. L. Hammond and F. W. Walbank choose Diodorus Siculus' figure of 32,000 infantry as the most reliable, while disagreeing with his figure for cavalry at 4,500, asserting it was closer to 5,100 horsemen. . Alexander continued the use of Cretan archers and introduced native Macedonian archers into the army. After the Battle of Gaugamela, archers of West Asian backgrounds became commonplace..
Thanks to contemporary inscriptions from Amphipolis and Greia dated 218 and 181BC, respectively, historians have been able to partially piece together the organization of the Antigonid army under PhilipV.; for the evolution of Macedonian military titles, such as its command by tetrarchai officers assisted by grammateis (i.e. secretaries or clerks), see . From at least the time of Antigonus III Doson, the most elite Antigonid-period infantry were the , lighter and more maneuverable soldiers wielding peltai , swords, and a smaller bronze shield than Macedonian phalanx pikemen, although they sometimes served in that capacity.;
: "The other development, which happened at the latest under Doson, was the formation and training of a special unit of separate from the phalanx. This unit operated as a form of royal guard similar in function to the earlier hypaspistai." Among the peltasts, roughly 2,000 men were selected to serve in the elite agema vanguard, with other peltasts numbering roughly 3,000.. The number of peltasts varied over time, perhaps never more than 5,000 men.; the largest figure for elite Macedonian mentioned by ancient historians was 5,000 troops, an amount that existed in the Social War (220–217 BC). They fought alongside the phalanx pikemen, divided now into chalkaspides (bronze shield) and leukaspides (white shield) regiments..
The Antigonid Macedonian kings continued to expand and equip the navy.. Cassander maintained a small fleet at Pydna, Demetrius I of Macedon had one at Pella, and Antigonus II Gonatas, while serving as a general for Demetrius in Greece, used the navy to secure the Macedonian holdings in Demetrias, Chalkis, Piraeus, and Corinth.. The navy was considerably expanded during the Chremonidean War (267–261BC), allowing the Macedonian navy to defeat the Ptolemaic Egyptian navy at the 255BC Battle of Cos and 245BC Battle of Andros, and enabling Macedonian influence to spread over the Cyclades. AntigonusIII Doson used the Macedonian navy to invade Caria, while PhilipV sent 200 ships to fight in the Battle of Chios in 201BC. The Macedonian navy was reduced to a mere six vessels as agreed in the 197BC peace treaty that concluded the Second Macedonian War with the Roman Republic, although Perseus of Macedon quickly assembled some lemboi at the outbreak of the Third Macedonian War in 171BC.
In the three royal tombs at Vergina, professional painters decorated the walls with a mythological scene of Hades abducting Persephone and royal hunting scenes, while lavish grave goods including weapons, armor, drinking vessels, and personal items were housed with the dead, whose bones Cremation before burial in golden coffins.; ; see also for further details. Some grave goods and decorations were common in other Macedonian tombs, yet some items found at Vergina were distinctly tied to royalty, including a diadem, luxurious goods, and arms and armor.; see also for further details. Scholars have debated about the identity of the tomb occupants since the discovery of their remains in 1977–1978,. and recent research and forensic examination have concluded that at least one of the persons buried was PhilipII.; .
Rosella Lorenzi (10 October 2014). " Remains of Alexander the Great's Father Confirmed Found: King Philip II's bones are buried in a tomb along with a mysterious woman-warrior ." Seeker. Retrieved 17 January 2017. Located near Tomb1 are the above-ground ruins of a heroon, a shrine for cult worship of the dead.. In 2014, the ancient Macedonian Kasta Tomb was discovered outside of Amphipolis and is the largest ancient tomb found in Greece (as of 2017)..
The Macedonian king was an autocracy figure at the head of both government and society, with arguably unlimited authority to handle affairs of state and public policy, but he was also the leader of a very personal regime with close relationships or connections to his hetairoi, the core of the Macedonian aristocracy.. These aristocrats were second only to the king in terms of power and privilege, filling the ranks of his administration and serving as commanding officers in the military. It was in the more bureaucratic regimes of the Hellenistic kingdoms that succeeded Alexander the Great's empire where greater social mobility for members of society seeking to join the aristocracy could be found, especially in Ptolemaic Egypt.. Although governed by a king and martial aristocracy, Macedonia seems to have lacked the widespread use of slaves seen in contemporaneous Greek states..
Surviving Macedonian painted artwork includes and , but also decoration on sculpted artwork such as and . For instance, trace colors still exist on the of the late 4th-century BC Alexander Sarcophagus.; . Macedonian paintings have allowed historians to investigate the clothing fashions as well as military gear worn by the ancient Macedonians.; . Aside from metalwork and painting, are another significant form of surviving Macedonian artwork. The Stag Hunt Mosaic of Pella, with its three-dimensional qualities and illusionist style, show clear influence from painted artwork and wider Hellenistic art trends, although the rustic theme of hunting was tailored to Macedonian tastes.. The similar Lion Hunt Mosaic of Pella illustrates either a scene of Alexander the Great with his companion Craterus, or simply a conventional illustration of the royal diversion of hunting. Mosaics with mythological themes include scenes of Dionysus riding a panther and Helen of Troy being abducted by Theseus, the latter of which employs illusionist qualities and realistic shading similar to Macedonian paintings. Common themes of Macedonian paintings and mosaics include warfare, hunting, and aggressive masculine sexuality (i.e. abduction of women for rape or marriage); these subjects are at times combined within a single work and perhaps indicate a metaphorical connection.This metaphorical connection between warfare, hunting, and aggressive masculine sexuality seems to be affirmed by later Byzantine literature, particularly in the Acritic songs about Digenes Akritas. See for details.
Music was also appreciated in Macedonia. In addition to the agora, the gymnasium, the theatre, and religious sanctuaries and temples dedicated to Greek gods and goddesses, one of the main markers of a true Greek city in the empire of Alexander the Great was the presence of an odeon for Concert. This was the case not only for Alexandria in Egypt, but also for cities as distant as Ai-Khanoum in what is now modern-day Afghanistan..
In terms of early Greek historiography and later Roman historiography, Felix Jacoby identified thirteen possible ancient historians who wrote about Macedonia in his Fragmente der griechischen Historiker.. Aside from accounts in Herodotus and Thucydides, the works compiled by Jacoby are only fragmentary, whereas other works are completely lost, such as the history of an war fought by Perdiccas III written by Antipater.; see also for further details. The Macedonian historians Marsyas of Pella and Marsyas of Philippi wrote histories of Macedonia, the Ptolemaic Egypt king Ptolemy I Soter authored a history about Alexander, and Hieronymus of Cardia wrote a history about Alexander's royal successors..
For Marsyas of Pella, see also for further details. Following the Indian campaign of Alexander the Great, the Macedonian military officer Nearchus wrote a work of his voyage from the mouth of the Indus river to the Persian Gulf.. The Macedonian historian Craterus published a compilation of decrees made by the popular assembly of the Athenian democracy, ostensibly while attending the school of Aristotle. Philip V of Macedon had manuscripts of the history of PhilipII written by Theopompus gathered by his court scholars and disseminated with further copies.
The symposium in the Macedonian and wider Greek realm was a banquet for the nobility and privileged class, an occasion for feasting, drinking, entertainment, and sometimes philosophical discussion.; . The hetairoi, leading members of the Macedonian aristocracy, were expected to attend such feasts with their king.. They were also expected to accompany him on royal hunts for the acquisition of game meat as well as for sport.
Anson argues that some Hellenic authors expressed complex or even ever-changing and ambiguous ideas about the exact ethnic identity of the Macedonians, who were considered by some as barbarians and others as semi-Greek or fully Greek.; this was manifested in the different mythological genealogies concocted for the Macedonian people, with Hesiod's Catalogue of Women claiming that the Macedonians descended from Macedon, son of Zeus and Thyia, and was therefore a nephew of Hellen, progenitor of the Greeks. See: ; .
By the end of the 5th century BC, Hellanicus of Lesbos asserted Macedon was the son of Aeolus, the latter a son of Hellen and ancestor of the Aeolians, one of the major of the Greeks. As well as belonging to tribal groups such as the Aeolians, Dorians, Achaeans, and Ionians, Anson also stresses the fact that some Greeks even distinguished their ethnic identities based on the polis (i.e. city-state) they originally came from. See: . Roger D. Woodard asserts that in addition to persisting uncertainty in modern times about the proper classification of the Macedonian language and its relation to Greek, ancient authors also presented conflicting ideas about the Macedonians.For instance, Demosthenes when labeling PhilipII of Macedon as a barbarian whereas Polybius called Greeks and Macedonians as homophylos (i.e. part of the same race or Kinship). See: ; Johannes Engels also discusses this ambiguity in ancient sources: . Simon Hornblower argues on the Greek identity of the Macedonians, taking into consideration their origin, language, cults and customs related to ancient Greek traditions. (2025). 9780754665250, Routledge. ISBN 9780754665250 Any preconceived ethnic differences between Greeks and Macedonians faded by 148BC soon after the Macedonian Wars and then the rest of Greece with the defeat of the Achaean League by the Roman Republic at the Battle of Corinth (146 BC)..
Macedonian rulers also sponsored works of architecture outside of Macedonia proper. For instance, following his victory at the Battle of Chaeronea (338 BC), PhilipII raised a round memorial building at Olympia known as the Philippeion, decorated inside with statues depicting him, his parents Amyntas III of Macedon and Eurydice I of Macedon, his wife Olympias, and his son Alexander the Great.; see also for further details.
The ruins of roughly twenty survive in the present-day regions of Macedonia and Thrace in Greece: sixteen open-air theatres, three odea, and a possible theatre in Veria undergoing excavation..
During the siege of Echinus by Philip V of Macedon in 211BC, the besiegers built tunnels to protect the soldiers and as they went back and forth from the camp to the siege works. These included two siege towers connected by a makeshift wickerwork curtain wall mounted with stone-shooting ballistae, and sheds to protect the approach of the battering ram.. Despite the early reputation of Macedon as a leader in siege technology, Alexandria in Ptolemaic Egypt became the center for technological improvements to the catapult by the 3rdcenturyBC, as evidenced by the writings of Philo of Alexandria.
State revenues were also raised by collecting produce from , timber from forests, and taxes on and at .. Some mines, groves, agricultural lands, and Logging belonging to the Macedonian state were exploited by the Macedonian king, although these were often as or given as grants to members of the nobility such as the hetairoi and philoi.. exacted on goods flowing in and out of Macedonian existed from at least the reign of AmyntasIII, and Callistratus of Aphidnae (d.c.350BC) aided PerdiccasIII in doubling the kingdom's annual profits on customs duties from 20 to 40 talents.; .
After the defeat of Perseus at Pydna in 168BC, the Roman Senate allowed the reopening of iron and copper mines, but forbade the mining of gold and silver by the four newly established autonomous that replaced the monarchy in Macedonia.; see also for further details. The law may originally have been conceived by the Senate due to the fear that material wealth gained from gold and silver mining operations would allow the Macedonians to fund an armed rebellion.; see also for further details. The Romans were perhaps also concerned with stemming inflation caused by an increased money supply from Macedonian silver mining.. The Macedonians continued minting silver coins between 167 and 148BC (i.e. just before the establishment of the Roman province of Macedonia), and when the Romans lifted the ban on Macedonian silver mining in 158BC it may simply have reflected the local reality of this illicit practice continuing regardless of the Senate's decree..
The ethnic Macedonian rulers of the Ptolemaic and Seleucid successor states accepted men from all over the Greek world as their hetairoi companions and did not foster a national identity like the Antigonids.. Modern scholarship has focused on how these Hellenistic successor kingdoms were influenced more by their Macedonian origins than Eastern or southern Greek traditions.. While Spartan society remained mostly insular and Athens continued placing strict limitations on acquiring citizenship, the Cosmopolitanism Hellenistic cities of Asia and northeastern Africa bore a greater resemblance to Macedonian cities and contained a mixture of subjects including natives, Greek and Macedonian colonists, and Greek-speaking Hellenized Easterners, many of whom were the product of intermarriage between Greeks and native populations..
The deification of Macedonian monarchs perhaps began with the death of PhilipII, but it was his son Alexander the Great who unambiguously claimed to be a Imperial cult..
As pharaoh of the Egyptians, he was already titled Son of Ra and considered the living incarnation of Horus by his Egyptian subjects (a belief that the Ptolemaic successors of Alexander would foster for their own dynasty in Egypt). See: and for details. Following his visit to the oracle of Didyma in 334BC that suggested his divinity, Alexander traveled to the Oracle of Zeus Ammon—the Greek equivalent of the Egyptian Amun-Ra—at the Siwa Oasis of the Libyan Desert in 332BC to confirm his Sacred king.; .
After the priest and Oracle of Zeus Ammon at the Siwa Oasis convinced him that PhilipII was merely his mortal father and Zeus his actual father, Alexander began styling himself as the 'Son of Zeus', which brought him into contention with some of his Greek subjects who adamantly believed that living men could not be immortals. See and for details. Although the Ptolemaic and Seleucid empires maintained ancestral cults and deified their rulers, kings were not worshiped in the Kingdom of Macedonia.. While Zeus Ammon was known to the Greeks prior to Alexander's reign, particularly at the Greek colony of Cyrene, Libya, Alexander was the first Macedonian monarch to patronize Egyptian, Persian, and Babylonian priesthoods and deities, strengthening the fusion of Near Eastern and Greek religious beliefs.. After his reign, the cult of Isis gradually spread throughout the Hellenistic and Roman world, while beliefs in the Egyptian god Sarapis were thoroughly Hellenized by the Ptolemaic rulers of Egypt before the spread of his cult to Macedonia and the Aegean region.. The German historian Johann Gustav Droysen argued that the conquests of Alexander the Great and creation of the Hellenistic world allowed for the growth and establishment of Christianity in the Roman era..
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