The Conquest of GreeceGreek forces also became involved in the campaigns of the Punic Wars, setting the stage for future conflicts with Rome. The most important episode occurred during the Second Punic War (218-207 B.C.). Campaigning in Italy, the Carthaginian leader Hannibal allied with Philip V of Macedonia, then the most powerful ruler in the Balkans, to protect supply lines from North Africa. Rome responded by supporting Philip's many enemies in the Balkans as they fought the First Macedonian War (215-213 B.C.), which expanded Roman interests into the Balkans. In the Second Macedonian War (200-197 B.C.), Rome's first major military expedition into the Greek world met with brilliant success. Philip lost all his territory outside Macedonia, and the victorious commander Flamininus established a Roman protectorate over the "liberated" Greek city-states. The fortunes of Greece and Rome were henceforth intertwined for about the next 500 years.
GoGreece.comRise of RomeWars with the Greeks started because the Hellenistic kings in Greece had helped Hannibal. To get back at the kings, the Romans declared the Greek city-states "free" - i.e. free of Macedonia - and intervened to put this into effect. When Greek cities don't show proper gratitude, the Romans conquer them. 146 BC was the most dramatic year - Romans destroyed two ancient cities - Corinth and Carthage - in the same year, killing or enslaving their populations, ripping down the buildings, and declaring the land unfit for habitation... By the end of the 1st century BC, all the territory which rings the Mediterranean sea was Roman... the Romans gradually turned the people they had conquered into Romans... The Romans conquered the Greeks - but the Greeks ended up influencing Roman culture far more than Roman culture influenced Greek. In the 3rd and 2nd centuries, Greek intellectuals (and in 2nd and 1st c slaves) poured into Rome. The Romans adopted Greek literary genres (drama, epic poetry, history), Greek philosophy (Stoicism, Epicureanism), Greek art, Greek social life (like public baths, gyms, theatres), even Greek food and sexual practices (homosexual romance became acceptable in upper class circes). Even the shape of Roman houses became more Greek... addition of Greek peristyle. A few conservative Romans tried to resist the Hellenizing trend - but they failed. A truly "Graeco-Roman" culture was formed.
by Leslie Dossey
Loyola University of Chicago
To the west yes, but it wasn’t until 133B.C. that Rome inherited her first province in Asia (The Former Kingdom of Pergamum centered around Ephesus and Miletus). By 200 B.C. Rome was in Illyria and Spain and Africa, but they hadn’t crossed to the East. Thus the influence in Asia would have been from Hellenistic Greece. That was my point. Rome was still a western power, not a world power yet as Carthage had just been defeated guaranteeing Roman dominance of the Mediterranean.