See also: Ancient Macedonian army and Government of Macedonia (ancient kingdom) Using
diplomacy, Philip pushed back the Paionians and Thracians promising
tributes, and crushed the 3,000 Athenian hoplites (359). Momentarily
free from his opponents, he concentrated on strengthening his internal
position and, above all, his army. His most important innovation was
doubtless the introduction of the phalanx infantry corps, armed with the
famous sarissa, an exceedingly long spear, at the time the most
important army corps in Macedonia.
Philip had married Audata,
great-granddaughter of the Illyrian king of Dardania, Bardyllis.
However, this did not prevent him from marching against the Illyrians in
358 and crushing them in a ferocious battle in which some 7,000
Illyrians died (357). By this move, Philip established his authority
inland as far as Lake Ohrid and earned the favour of the Epirotes.
The
Athenians had been unable to conquer Amphipolis, which commanded the
gold mines of Mount Pangaion. So Philip reached an agreement with Athens
to lease the city to them after its conquest, in exchange for Pydna
(lost by Macedon in 363). However, after conquering Amphipolis, Philip
kept both cities (357). As Athens had declared war against him, he
allied Macedon with the Chalkidian League of Olynthus. He subsequently
conquered Potidaea, this time keeping his word and ceding it to the
League in 356.
In 357 BC, Philip married the Epirote princess
Olympias, who was the daughter of the king of the Molossians. Alexander
was born in 356, the same year as Philip's racehorse won at the Olympic
Games.
During 356 BC, Philip conquered the town of Crenides and
changed its name to Philippi. He then established a powerful garrison
there to control its mines, which yielded much of the gold he later used
for his campaigns. In the meantime, his general Parmenion defeated the
Illyrians again.
In 355-354 he besieged Methone, the last city on
the Thermaic Gulf controlled by Athens. During the siege, Philip was
injured in his eye. It was later removed surgically. Despite the arrival
of two Athenian fleets, the city fell in 354. Philip also attacked
Abdera and Maronea, on the Thracian coast (354-353).
Third Sacred War
Philip
was involved in the Third Sacred War which had begun in Greece in 356.
In summer 353 he invaded Thessaly, defeating 7,000 Phocians under the
brother of Onomarchus. The latter however defeated Philip in the two
succeeding battles. Philip returned to Thessaly the next summer, this
time with an army of 20,000 infantry and 3,000 cavalry including all
Thessalian troops. In the Battle of Crocus Field 6,000 Phocians fell,
while 3,000 were taken as prisoners and later drowned.
This battle earned Philip immense prestige, as well as the free acquisition of Pherae. Philip was also tagus
of Thessaly, and he claimed as his own Magnesia, with the important
harbour of Pagasae. Philip did not attempt to advance into Central
Greece because the Athenians, unable to arrive in time to defend
Pagasae, had occupied Thermopylae.
There were no hostilities with
Athens yet, but Athens was threatened by the Macedonian party which
Philip's gold created in Euboea. From 352 to 346 BC, Philip did not
again travel south. He was active in completing the subjugation of the
Balkan hill-country to the west and north, and in reducing the Greek
cities of the coast as far as the Hebrus. To the chief of these coastal
cities, Olynthus, Philip continued to profess friendship until its
neighbouring cities were in his hands.
In 349 BC, Philip started
the siege of Olynthus, which, apart from its strategic position, housed
his relatives Arrhidaeus and Menelaus, pretenders to the Macedonian
throne. Olynthus had at first allied itself with Philip, but later
shifted its allegiance to Athens. The latter, however, did nothing to
help the city, its expeditions held back by a revolt in Euboea (probably
paid for by Philip's gold). The Macedonian king finally took Olynthus
in 348 BC and razed the city to the ground. The same fate was inflicted
on other cities of the Chalcidian peninsula.
Macedon and the
regions adjoining it having now been securely consolidated, Philip
celebrated his Olympic Games at Dium. In 347 BC, Philip advanced to the
conquest of the eastern districts about Hebrus, and compelled the
submission of the Thracian prince Cersobleptes. In 346 BC, he intervened
effectively in the war between Thebes and the Phocians, but his wars
with Athens continued intermittently. However, Athens had made overtures
for peace, and when Philip again moved south, peace was sworn in
Thessaly.
Later campaigns (346-336 BC)
With key Greek
city-states in submission, Philip II turned to Sparta; he sent them a
message: "If I win this war, you will be slaves forever." In another
version, he warned: "You are advised to submit without further delay,
for if I bring my army into your land, I will destroy your farms, slay
your people, and raze your city." According to both accounts, the
Spartans' laconic reply was one word: "If". Philip II and Alexander both
chose to leave Sparta alone. Later, Macedonian arms were carried across
Epirus to the Adriatic Sea.
In 345 BC, Philip conducted a
hard-fought campaign against the Ardiaioi (Ardiaei), under their king
Pleuratus I, during which Philip was seriously wounded in the lower
right leg by an Ardian soldier.
In 342 BC, Philip led a great
military expedition north against the Scythians, conquering the Thracian
fortified settlement Eumolpia to give it his name, Philippopolis (modern Plovdiv).
In
340 BC, Philip started the siege of Perinthus. Philip began another
siege in 339 of the city of Byzantium. After unsuccessful sieges of both
cities, Philip's influence all over Greece was compromised. However, he
successfully reasserted his authority in the Aegean by defeating an
alliance of Thebans and Athenians at the Battle of Chaeronea in 338 BC,
while in the same year, Philip destroyed Amfissa because the residents
had illegally cultivated part of the Crisaian plain which belonged to
Delphi.
It was these decisive victories that finally secured
Philip's position, with the majority of Greece under Macedonian
sovereignty.
Philip created and led the League of Corinth in 337
BC. Members of the League agreed never to wage war against each other,
unless it was to suppress revolution. Philip was elected as leader (hegemon)
of the army of invasion against the Persian Empire. In 336 BC, with the
Persian venture in its earliest stages, Philip was assassinated, and
was succeeded as king by his son Alexander III, the soon-to-be conqueror
of Persia.
Philip
was murdered in October 336 BC, at Aegae, the ancient capital of the
kingdom of Macedon. The court had gathered there for the celebration of
the marriage between Alexander I of Epirus and Cleopatra of Macedon, who
was Philip's daughter by his fourth wife Olympias. While the king was
entering unprotected into the town's theatre (highlighting his
approachability to the Greek diplomats present), he was killed by
Pausanias of Orestis, one of his seven bodyguards. The assassin
immediately tried to escape and reach his associates who were waiting
for him with horses at the entrance to Aegae. He was pursued by three of
Philip's bodyguards, tripped on a vine, and died by their hands.
The
reasons for the assassination are difficult to expound fully: there was
already controversy among ancient historians. The only contemporary
account in our possession is that of Aristotle, who states rather
tersely that Philip was killed because Pausanias had been offended by
the followers of Attalus, uncle of Philip's wife Cleopatra (renamed
Eurydice upon marriage).
Fifty years later, the historian
Cleitarchus expanded and embellished the story. Centuries later, this
version was to be narrated by Diodorus Siculus and all the historians
who used Cleitarchus. According to the sixteenth book of Diodorus'
history, Pausanias had been a lover of Philip, but became jealous when
Philip turned his attention to a younger man, also called Pausanias. The
elder Pausanias' taunting of the new lover caused the youth to throw
away his life, which turned his friend Attalus against the elder
Pausanias. Attalus took his revenge by inviting Pausanias to dinner,
getting him drunk, then subjecting him to sexual assault.
When
Pausanias complained to Philip, the king felt unable to chastise
Attalus, as he was about to send him to Asia with Parmenion, to
establish a bridgehead for his planned invasion. He also married
Attalus's niece, or daughter, Eurydice. Rather than offend Attalus,
Philip tried to mollify Pausanias by elevating him within the bodyguard.
Pausanias' desire for revenge seems to have turned towards the man who
had failed to avenge his damaged honour, so he planned to kill Philip.
Some time after the alleged rape, while Attalus was already in Asia
fighting the Persians, he put his plan in action.
Other historians
(e.g., Justin 9.7) suggested that Alexander and/or his mother Olympias
were at least privy to the intrigue, if not themselves instigators. The
latter seems to have been anything but discreet in manifesting her
gratitude to Pausanias, according to Justin's report: he says that the
same night of her return from exile she placed a crown on the assassin's
corpse, and later erected a tumulus to his memory, ordering annual
sacrifices to the memory of Pausanias.
Many modern historians have
observed that all the accounts are improbable. In the case of
Pausanias, the stated motive of the crime hardly seems adequate. On the
other hand, the implication of Alexander and Olympias seems specious: to
act as they did would have required brazen effrontery in the face of a
military personally loyal to Philip. What seems to be recorded are the
natural suspicions that fell on the chief beneficiaries of the murder;
their actions after the murder, however sympathetic they might seem (if
true), cannot prove their guilt in the deed itself.
Whatever the
actual background to the assassination, it might have had an enormous
effect on later world history, far beyond what any conspirators could
have predicted; as asserted by some modern historians, had the older and
more settled Philip been the one in charge of the war against Persia,
he might have rested content with relatively moderate conquests, e.g.,
making Anatolia into a Macedonian province, and not pushed further into
an overall conquest of Persia and further campaigns in India.
Marriages
The
dates of Philip's multiple marriages and the names of some of his wives
are contested. Below is the order of marriages offered by Athenaeus,
13.557b-e:
- Audata, the daughter of Illyrian King Bardyllis. Mother of Cynane.
- Phila of Elimeia, the sister of Derdas and Machatas of Elimiotis.
- Nicesipolis of Pherae, Thessaly, mother of Thessalonica.
- Olympias of Epirus, mother of Alexander the Great and Cleopatra
- Philinna of Larissa, mother of Arrhidaeus later called Philip III of Macedon.
- Meda of Odessos, daughter of the king Cothelas, of Thrace.
- Cleopatra, daughter of Hippostratus and niece of general Attalus of Macedonia. Philip renamed her Cleopatra Eurydice of Macedon.
Tomb of Philip II at Aigai
In
1977, Greek archaeologist Manolis Andronikos started excavating the
Great Tumulus at Aigai near modern Vergina, the capital and burial site
of the kings of Macedon, and found that two of the four tombs in the
tumulus were undisturbed since antiquity. Moreover, these two, and
particularly Tomb II, contained fabulous treasures and objects of great
quality and sophistication.
Although there was much debate for
some years, as suspected at the time of the discovery Tomb II has been
shown to be that of Philip II as indicated by many features, including
the greaves, one of which was shaped consistently to fit a leg with a
misaligned tibia (Philip II was recorded as having broken his tibia).
Also, the remains of the skull show damage to the right eye caused by
the penetration of an object (historically recorded to be an arrow).
A
study of the bones published in 2015 indicates that Philip was buried
in Tomb I, not Tomb II. On the basis of age, knee ankylosis and a hole
matching the penetrating wound and lameness suffered by Philip, the
authors of the study identified the remains of Tomb I in Vergina as
those of Philip II. Tomb II instead was identified in the study as that
of King Arrhidaeus and his wife Eurydice II. However this latter theory
had previously been shown to be false.
More recent research gives further evidence that Tomb II contains the remains of Philip II.
Great Tumulus of Aigai
The tomb of Philip II of Macedon at the Museum of the Royal Tombs in Vergina
The golden larnax and the golden grave crown of Philip
Cult
The
heroon at Vergina in Macedonia (the ancient city of Aegae - Αἰγαί) is
thought to have been dedicated to the worship of the family of Alexander
the Great and may have housed the cult statue of Philip. It is probable
that he was regarded as a hero or deified on his death. Though the
Macedonians did not consider Philip a god, he did receive other forms of
recognition from the Greeks, e.g. at Eresos (altar to Zeus
Philippeios), Ephesos (his statue was placed in the temple of Artemis),
and at Olympia, where the Philippeion was built.
Isocrates once
wrote to Philip that if he defeated Persia, there would be nothing left
for him to do but to become a god, and Demades proposed that Philip be
regarded as the thirteenth god; however, there is no clear evidence that
Philip was raised to the divine status accorded his son Alexander.
Fictional portrayals
- Fredric March portrayed Philip II of Macedon in the film Alexander the Great (1956).
- Val Kilmer portrayed Philip II of Macedon in Oliver Stone's 2004 biopic Alexander, opposite Colin Farrell as Alexander the Great and Angelina Jolie as Queen Olympias.
Games
- Hegemony: Philip of Macedon is a PC game about Philip II's campaigns in Greece.
- Philip II appears in the Battle of Chaeronea in Rome: Total War: Alexander
Dedications
- Filippos
Veria, one of the most successful handball teams of Greece, bears the
name of Philip II. He is also depicted in the team's emblem.
- The Philip II Arena (until 2009 known as Skopje City Stadium) is a sporting ground in Skopje.
- Philip II is depicted in the emblem of the 2nd Support Brigade of the Hellenic Army, stationed in Kozani.
Macedonia or Macedon
was an ancient kingdom on the northern periphery of Classical Greece
and later the dominant state of Hellenistic Greece. It was ruled during
most of its existence initially by the legendary founding dynasty of the
Argeads, the intermittent Antipatrids and finally the Antigonids. Home
to the Macedonians, the earliest kingdom was centered on the
northeastern part of the Greek peninsula, bordered by Epirus to the
west, Paeonia to the north, the region of Thrace to the east and
Thessaly to the south.
The rise of Macedon, from a small kingdom
at the fringe of typical Greek city states affairs, to one which came to
control the fate of the entire Hellenic world, occurred under the reign
of Philip II. With the innovative Macedonian army, he defeated the old
powers of Athens and Thebes in the decisive Battle of Chaeronea in 338
BC and subdued them, while keeping Sparta in check. His son Alexander
the Great pursued his father's effort to command the whole of Greece
through the federation of Greek states, a feat he finally accomplished
after destroying a revolting Thebes. Young Alexander was then ready to
lead this force, as he aspired, in a large campaign against the
Achaemenid Empire, in retaliation for the invasion of Greece in the 5th
century BC.
In the ensuing wars of Alexander the Great, he was
ultimately successful in conquering a territory that came to stretch 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 this new period of Ancient Greek
civilization. Greek arts and literature flourished in the new conquered
lands and advancements in philosophy and science were spread to the
ancient world. Of most importance were the contributions of Aristotle, a
teacher to Alexander, whose teachings carried on many centuries past
his death.
After the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC, the
following wars of the Diadochi and the partitioning of his short-lived
empire, Macedonia proper carried on as a Greek cultural and political
center in the Mediterranean region along with Ptolemaic Egypt, the
Seleucid Empire, and the Attalid kingdom. Important cities like Pella,
Pydna, and Amphipolis were involved in power struggles for control of
the territory, and new cities were founded, like Thessalonica by the
usurper Cassander, which is now the second largest city of modern day
Greece. Macedonia's decline of influence began with the rise of Rome
until its ultimate subjection during the second Macedonian Wars.
The Roman province of Macedonia (Latin: Provincia Macedoniae,
Greek: Ἐπαρχία Μακεδονίας) was officially established in 146 BC, after
the Roman general Quintus Caecilius Metellus defeated Andriscus of
Macedon, the last self-styled King of the ancient kingdom of Macedonia
in 148 BC, and after the four client republics (the "tetrarchy")
established by Rome in the region were dissolved. The province
incorporated ancient Macedonia, with the addition of Epirus, Thessaly,
and parts of Illyria, Paeonia and Thrace. This created a much larger
administrative area, to which the name of 'Macedonia' was still applied.
The Dardanians, to the north of the Paeonians, were not included,
because they had supported the Romans in their conquest of Macedonia.
Heracles, born Alcaeus (Alkaios) or Alcides,
was a divine hero in Greek mythology, the son of Zeus and Alcmene,
foster son of Amphitryon and great-grandson and half-brother (as they
are both sired by the god Zeus) of Perseus. He was the greatest of the
Greek heroes, a paragon of masculinity, the ancestor of royal clans who
claimed to be Heracleidae and a champion of the Olympian order against
chthonic monsters. In Rome and the modern West, he is known as Hercules,
with whom the later Roman emperors, in particular Commodus and
Maximian, often identified themselves. The Romans adopted the Greek
version of his life and works essentially unchanged, but added anecdotal
detail of their own, some of it linking the hero with the geography of
the Central Mediterranean. Details of his cult were adapted to Rome as
well.
Extraordinary strength, courage, ingenuity, and sexual
prowess with both males and females were among the characteristics
commonly attributed to him. Heracles used his wits on several occasions
when his strength did not suffice, such as when laboring for the king
Augeas of Elis, wrestling the giant Antaeus, or tricking Atlas into
taking the sky back onto his shoulders. Together with Hermes he was the
patron and protector of gymnasia and palaestrae. His iconographic
attributes are the lion skin and the club. These qualities did not
prevent him from being regarded as a playful figure who used games to
relax from his labors and played a great deal with children. By
conquering dangerous archaic forces he is said to have "made the world
safe for mankind" and to be its benefactor. Heracles was an extremely
passionate and emotional individual, capable of doing both great deeds
for his friends (such as wrestling with Thanatos on behalf of Prince
Admetus, who had regaled Heracles with his hospitality, or restoring his
friend Tyndareus to the throne of Sparta after he was overthrown) and
being a terrible enemy who would wreak horrible vengeance on those who
crossed him, as Augeas, Neleus and Laomedon all found out to their cost.
In the ancient Greek religion, Zeus was the "Father of Gods and men" who
ruled the Olympians of Mount Olympus as a father ruled the family. He
was the god of sky and thunder in Greek mythology. His Roman counterpart
is Jupiter and Etruscan counterpart is Tinia.
Zeus was the child
of Cronus and Rhea, and the youngest of his siblings. In most traditions
he was married to Hera, although, at the oracle of Dodona, his consort
was Dione: according to the Iliad, he is the father of Aphrodite
by Dione. He is known for his erotic escapades. These resulted in many
godly and heroic offspring, including Athena, Apollo and Artemis,
Hermes, Persephone (by Demeter), Dionysus, Perseus, Heracles, Helen of
Troy, Minos, and the Muses (by Mnemosyne); by Hera, he is usually said
to have fathered Ares, Hebe and Hephaestus.
As Walter Burkert points out in his book, Greek Religion,
"Even the gods who are not his natural children address him as Father,
and all the gods rise in his presence." For the Greeks, he was the King
of the Gods, who oversaw the universe. As Pausanias observed, "That Zeus
is king in heaven is a saying common to all men". In Hesiod's Theogony Zeus assigns the various gods their roles. In the Homeric Hymns he is referred to as the chieftain of the gods.
His
symbols are the thunderbolt, eagle, bull, and oak. In addition to his
Indo-European inheritance, the classical "cloud-gatherer" also derives
certain iconographic traits from the cultures of the Ancient Near East,
such as the scepter. Zeus is frequently depicted by Greek artists in one
of two poses: standing, striding forward, with a thunderbolt leveled in
his raised right hand, or seated in majesty.
In Greek and Roman mythology, Apollo, is one of the most important and diverse of the Olympian deities. The ideal of the kouros
(a beardless youth), Apollo has been variously recognized as a god of
light and the sun; truth and prophecy; archery; medicine and healing;
music, poetry, and the arts; and more. Apollo is the son of Zeus and
Leto, and has a twin sister, the chaste huntress Artemis. Apollo is
known in Greek-influenced Etruscan mythology as Apulu. Apollo was worshiped in both ancient Greek and Roman religion, as well as in the modern Greco-Roman Neopaganism.
Philip II of Macedon
(382-336 BC) was the king (Basileus) of the Ancient Greek kingdom of
Macedon from 359 BC until his assassination in 336 BC. He was a member
of the Argead dynasty of Macedonian kings, the third son of King Amyntas
III, and father of Alexander the Great and Philip III. The rise of
Macedon during the reign of Philip II was achieved in part by his
reformation of the Ancient Macedonian army, establishing the Macedonian
phalanx that proved critical in securing victories on the battlefield.
After defeating Athens and Thebes at the Battle of Chaeronea in 338 BC,
Philip II led the effort to establish a federation of Greek states known
as the League of Corinth, with him as the elected hegemon and
commander-in-chief of a planned invasion of the Achaemenid Empire of
Persia. However, his assassination led to the immediate succession of
his son Alexander, who would go on to invade the Achaemenid Empire in
his father's stead.