War Between Rome and Philip V
At the beginning of the winter in which Publius Sulpicius was elected consul at Rome, king Philip,
Winter of B.C. 201-200. Coss. P. Sulpicius, Galba, Maximus II., C. Aurelius. Cotta (for B.C. 200). |
who was staying at Bargylia, was rendered exceedingly uneasy and filled with many conflicting anxieties for the future, when he
observed that the Rhodians and Attalus, far
from dismissing their navy, were actually manning additional ships and paying more earnest
attention than ever to guarding the coasts.
He had a double
cause, indeed, for uneasiness: he was afraid of
sailing from Bargylia, and foresaw that he would
have to encounter danger at sea; and at the same time he
was not satisfied with the state of things in Macedonia, and
therefore was unwilling on any consideration to spend the
winter in Asia, being afraid both of the Aetolians and the
Romans; for he was fully aware of the embassies sent to
Rome to denounce him [as soon as it was known] that the
war in Libya was ended.
and the starving state of his army. |
These considerations caused him
overwhelming perplexity; but he was compelled for the
present to remain where he was, leading the life of a wolf, to
use the common expression: for he robbed and stole from
some, and used force to others, while he did
violence to his nature by fawning on others, because his army was suffering from famine; and
by these means managed sometimes to get meat to eat, sometimes figs, and sometimes nothing but a very short allowance
of corn. Some of these provisions were supplied to him by
Zeuxis, and some by the people of Mylae, Alabanda, and
Magnesia, whom he flattered whenever they gave him anything, and barked at and plotted against when they did not.
Finally, he made a plot to seize Mylae by the agency of
Philocles, but failed from the clumsiness with which the
scheme was contrived. The territory of Alabanda he harried
as though it were an enemy's, alleging that it was imperatively
necessary to get food for his troops. . . .
When this Philip, father of Perseus, was thus overrunning
Asia, being unable to get provisions for his army, he accepted
a present of figs from the Magnesians, as they had no corn.
For which reason, when he conquered Myus, he granted its
territory to the Magnesians in return for their figs. . . .
