A Time of Transition

Abstract

I start with a vignette that illustrates some of the major themes and characters of the book. In 251 Aratus of Sicyon expelled the current ruler of his native town and brought it into the Achaean Confederacy, despite the fact that Sicyon was not ethnically Achaean, but Dorian. He needed money and he approached the two kings on whom he thought he could count. Antigonus Gonatas of Macedon refused, but Ptolemy II of Egypt gave generously. Antigonus responded by trying to drive a wedge between Aratus and Ptolemy. So we meet three of the major players of the book, the poverty of the Greek states and their reliance on the kings for handouts, and the hostility between Egypt and Macedon. We also meet one of the two great Greek confederacies that formed as a way to stand up to the might of Macedon. I end with a discussion of the difficulty of reconstructing a history of the period, because of the paucity of the sources.