War against Nabis The War against Nabis , or the Laconian War , of 195 BC was fought between the Greek city - state of Sparta and a coalition composed of Rome , the Achaean League , Pergamum , Rhodes , and Macedon . During the Second Macedonian War ( 200 – 196 BC ) , Macedon had given Sparta control over Argos , an important city on the Aegean coast of Peloponnese . Sparta ' s continued occupation of Argos at the end of war was used as a pretext for Rome and its allies to declare war . The anti - Spartan coalition laid siege to Argos , captured the Spartan naval base at Gythium , and soon invested and besieged Sparta itself . Eventually , negotiations led to peace on Rome ' s terms , under which Argos and the coastal towns of Laconia were separated from Sparta and the Spartans were compelled to pay a war indemnity to Rome over the next eight years . Argos joined the Achaean League , and the Laconian towns were placed under Achaean protection . As a result of the war , Sparta lost its position as a major power in Greece . Subsequent Spartan attempts to recover the losses failed and Nabis , the last sovereign ruler , was eventually murdered . Soon after , Sparta was forcibly made a member of its former rival , the Achaean League , ending several centuries of fierce political independence . Background . After the death of the Spartan regent Machanidas in 207 BC in battle against the Achaean League , Nabis overthrew the reigning king Pelops with the backing of a mercenary army and placed himself on the throne , claiming descent from the Eurypontid king Demaratus . By then , the traditional constitution of Lycurgus had already lost its meaning and Sparta was dominated by a group of its former mercenaries . Polybius described Nabis ' force as " " a crowd of murderers , burglars , cutpurses and highwaymen " " . In 205 BC , Nabis signed a peace treaty with Rome , but in 201 BC he attacked the territory of Messene , at that time an ally of both parties , which Sparta had ruled until the mid 4th century BC . The Spartans captured Messene but were soon forced to abandon it when the army of Megalopolis arrived under the command of Philopoemen . Later , they were decisively defeated at the Tegea and Nabis was forced to check his expansionist ambitions for the time . During the Second Macedonian War , Nabis had another possibility for expansion . Philip of Macedon offered him the polis of Argos in exchange for Sparta defecting from the Roman coalition and joining the Macedonian alliance . Nabis accepted and received control over Argos . However , when the war turned against Macedon , he rejoined the Roman coalition and sent 600 Cretan mercenaries to support the Roman army . Philip was later decisively defeated by the Romans at the battle of Cynoscephalae , but Sparta remained in control of Argos . After the war , the Roman army did not withdraw from Greece , but instead sent garrisons to various strategic locations across Greece to secure its interests . Nabis ' reforms . In return for his assistance in the war , Rome accepted Nabis ' possession of the " polis " of Argos . While Nabis was already King of Sparta , he made his wife Apia ruler of her hometown Argos . Afterwards , Apia and Nabis staged a financial coup by confiscating large amounts of property from the wealthy families of these cities , and torturing those who resisted them ; much of the confiscated land was redistributed to liberated helot s loyal to Nabis . After increasing his territory and wealth by the aforementioned method , Nabis started to turn the port of Gythium into a major naval arsenal and fortified the city of Sparta . His Cretan allies were already allowed to have naval bases on Spartan territory , and from these they ventured on acts of piracy . His naval buildup offered a chance even for the very poor to participate , as rowers , in the profitable employment . However , the extension of the naval capacities at Gythium greatly displeased the abutting states of the Aegean Sea and the Roman Republic . Nabis ' rule was largely based on his social reforms and the rebuilding of Sparta ' s armed forces . The military of Lacedaemonia , Sparta , had traditionally been based on levies of full citizens and perioeci ( one of the free non - citizen groups of Lacedaemonia ) supported by lightly armed helots . From several thousands in the times of the Greco - Persian Wars , the numbers of full citizen Spartans had declined to a few hundred in the times of Cleomenes III . There were possibly several reasons for the decline of numbers , one of which was that every Spartan who wasn ' t able to pay his share in the " syssitia " ( common meal for men in Doric societies ) lost his full citizenship , although this didn ' t exclude his offspring from partaking in the " agoge " ( traditional Spartan education and training regime ) . As a result , the fielding of a respectable hoplite army without mercenaries or freed helots was difficult . Cleomenes increased the number of full citizens again and made the Spartan army operate with an increased reliance on more lightly armored phalangites of the Macedonian style . However , many of these restored citizens were killed in the Battle of Sellasia and Nabis ' politics drove the remainder of them into exile . In consequence , the heavy troops were no longer available in sufficient numbers . This led to a serious decline in Sparta ' s military power , and the aim of Nabis reforms was to reestablish a class of loyal subjects capable of serving as well - equipped phalangites ( operating in a close and deep formation , with a longer spear than the hoplites ' ) . Nabis ' liberation of the enslaved helots was one of the most outstanding deeds in Spartan history . With this action , Nabis eliminated a central ideological pillar of the old Spartan social system and the chief reason for objection to Spartan expansion by the surrounding " poleis " ( city - states ) . Guarding against helot revolt had been , until this time , the central concern of Spartan foreign policy , and the need to protect against internal revolt had limited adventurism abroad ; Nabis ' action abolished this concern with a single stroke . His freed helots received land from him and were wedded to wealthy wives of the exiled Spartan demos ( all former full citizens ) and widows of the rich elite , whose husbands had been killed at his orders . Preparations . The Achaean League was upset that one of its members had remained under Spartan occupation and persuaded the Romans to revisit their decision to leave Sparta ' s territorial gains intact . The Romans agreed with the Achaeans , as they did not want a strong and re - organized Sparta causing trouble after the Romans left Greece . In 195 BC , Titus Quinctius Flamininus , the Roman commander in Greece , called a council of the Greek states at Corinth to discuss whether or not to declare war on Nabis . Among the states whose delegates participated were the Aetolian League , Macedon , Rome , Pergamum , Rhodes , Thessaly and the Achaean League . All the states represented favored war , except for the Aetolian League and Thessaly , both of which wanted the Romans to leave Greece immediately . These two states offered to deal with Nabis themselves , but they met opposition from the Achaean League , which objected to any possible growth in the Aetolian League ' s power . The modern historian Erich Gruen has suggested that the Romans may have used the war as an excuse to station a few legions in Greece in order to prevent the Spartans and the Aetolian League from joining the Seleucid King Antiochus III if he invaded Greece . Flamininus first sent an envoy to Sparta , demanding that Nabis either surrender Argos to the Achaean League or face war with Rome and her Greek allies . Nabis refused to comply with Flamininus ' ultimatum , so 40 , 000 Roman soldiers and their Greek allies advanced towards the Peloponnese . Entering the Peloponnese , Flamininus joined his force with that of the Achaean commander , Aristaenos , who had 10 , 000 infantry and 1 , 000 cavalry in Cleonae . Together , they advanced towards Argos . Nabis had appointed his brother - in - law , the Argive Pythagoras , as commander of his garrison of 15 , 000 men in Argos . As the Romans and the Achaean League were advancing towards the city , a young Argive named Damocles attempted to stir up a revolution against the Spartan garrison . With a few followers , he stood in the city ' s agora and shouted to his fellow Argives , exhorting them to rise in revolt . However , no mass uprising materialized and Damocles and most of his followers were surrounded and killed by the Spartan garrison . A few survivors from Damocles ' group escaped from the city and went to Flamininus ' camp . They suggested to Flamininus that , if he moved his camp closer to the city gates , the Argives would revolt against the Spartans . The Roman commander sent his light infantry and cavalry to find a position for the new camp . Upon spotting the small group of Roman soldiers , a group of Spartan troops sallied forth from the gates and skirmished with the Romans about 300 paces from the city walls . The Romans forced the Spartans to retreat back into the city . Flamininus moved his camp to the position where the skirmish had occurred . For a day he waited for the Spartans to attack him but , when no attack came , he called a war council to discuss whether or not to press the siege . All the Greek leaders except Aristaenos thought that they should attack the city , as capturing it was their primary objective in going to war . Aristaenos , on the other hand , argued that they should instead strike directly at Sparta and Laconia . Flamininus agreed with Aristaenos and the army marched to Tegea in Arcadia . The next day , Flamininus advanced to Caryae , where he waited for allied auxiliaries to reinforce him . These forces soon arrived and joined the Romans ; they consisted of a contingent of Spartan exiles led by Agesipolis , the legitimate King of Sparta , who had been overthrown by the first Tyrant of Sparta , Lycurgus , twenty years earlier , and 1 , 500 Macedonians with 400 Thessalian cavalry sent by Philip . News also reached the allies that several fleets had arrived off the Laconian shore : a Roman fleet under Lucius Quinctius with forty ships ; a Rhodian fleet with eighteen ships , led by Sosilas , hoping that the defeat of Nabis would stop the pirates that plagued their ships ; and a Pergamene fleet of forty ships under King Eumenes II of Pergamum , who hoped to gain more favor with Rome and Roman support if Antiochus invaded . Laconian campaign . Nabis drafted 10 , 000 citizens into his army and hired 3 , 000 additional mercenaries . Nabis ' Cretan allies , who profited from the naval bases on his territory , dispatched 1 , 000 specially selected warriors to augment the 1 , 000 they had already sent to Sparta ' s aid . Nabis , fearing that the Roman approach might encourage his subjects to revolt , decided to terrorize them by ordering the execution of eighty prominent citizens . Flamininus left his base and descended upon Sellasia ; while the Romans were making camp , Nabis ' auxiliaries attacked them . The sudden surprise attack briefly threw the allies into a state of confusion , but the Spartans retreated back to the city when the main body of legionary cohorts arrived . As the Romans marched past Sparta on their way to Mount Menelaus , Nabis ' mercenaries attacked the allies ' rear . Appius Claudius , commander of the rearguard , rallied his troops and forced the mercenaries to retreat behind the city ' s walls , inflicting heavy casualties on them in the process . The coalition army then proceeded to Amyclae , from whence they plundered the surrounding countryside . Lucius Quinctius , meanwhile , received the voluntary surrender of several coastal towns in Laconia . The allies then advanced on the largest city in the area , Sparta ' s port and naval arsenal at Gythium . As the land forces began to invest the city , the allied navy arrived . The sailors from the three fleets set to construct siege engines within a few days . Though these machines had a devastating effect on the city walls , the garrison successfully held out . Eventually , Dexagoridas , one of the two garrison commanders , sent word to the Roman legate that he was willing to surrender the city . This plan fell through when Gorgopas , the other commander , learned of it and slew Dexagoridas with his own hands . Gorgopas continued to resist fiercely until Flamininus arrived with 4 , 000 additional troops that he had recently recruited . The Romans renewed their assault and Gorgopas was forced to surrender , though he did secure the condition that he and his garrison could leave unharmed and return to Sparta . Siege of Sparta . During the siege at Gythium , Pythagoras had joined Nabis at Sparta , bringing with him 3 , 000 men from Argos . When Nabis discovered that Gythium had surrendered he decided to send an envoy to Flamininus to open negotiations on the terms of a peace . Nabis offered to withdraw the rest of his garrison from Argos and to hand over to the Romans any deserters and prisoners . Flamininus called another war council . Most of the council felt that they should capture Sparta and unseat Nabis . Flamininus replied to Nabis by proposing his own terms , under which Sparta and Rome would conclude a six - month truce if Nabis would surrender Argos with all his garrisons from the Argolid ; give the coastal Laconian cities autonomy and give them his fleet ; pay a war indemnity over the next eight years and not enter into alliances with any Cretan cities . Nabis rejected this offer , claiming that he had enough supplies to withstand a siege . Flamininus therefore led his force of 50 , 000 men to Sparta and , after defeating the Spartans in a battle outside the city , began investing the city . Flamininus resolved not to lay a regular siege to the city but to instead try and storm it . The Spartans initially held out against the allies , but their resistance was hampered by the fact that the Romans ' large shields made missile attacks futile . The Romans launched an assault on Sparta and took the walls , but their advance was initially impeded by the narrowness of the roads in the city ' s outskirts . However , the streets grew wider as they advanced into the city ' s center , and the Spartans were forced further and further back . Nabis , seeing his defenses collapsing , tried to flee , but Pythagoras rallied the soldiers and ordered them to set fire to the buildings closest to the walls . Burning debris was thrown on the coalition ' s soldiers entering the city , causing many casualties . Observing this , Flamininus ordered his forces to withdraw to their base . When the attack was renewed later , the Spartans managed to hold off the Roman assaults for three days before Nabis , seeing that the situation was hopeless , decided to send Pythagoras with an offer of surrender . At first , Flaminius refused to see him , but when Pythagoras came to the Roman camp a second time Flamininus accepted the surrender , with the conditions of the treaty being the same as Flamininus had previously proposed . The treaty was later ratified by the Senate . The Argives revolted when they heard that Sparta was under siege . Under the Argive Archippas , they attacked the garrison commanded by Timocrates of Pellene . Timocrates surrendered the citadel on condition that he and his men could leave unharmed . In return all the Argives serving in Nabis ' army were allowed to return home . Aftermath . After the war Flamininus visited the Nemean Games in Argos and proclaimed the polis free . The Argives immediately decided to rejoin the Achaean League . Flamininus also separated all coastal cities of Laconia from Spartan rule and placed them under Achean protection . The remains of Sparta ' s fleet were put under custody of these coastal cities . Nabis also had to withdraw his garrisons from Cretan cities and revoke several social and economic reforms that had strengthened Sparta ' s military capabilities . The Romans did not , however , remove Nabis from the Spartan throne . Even though Sparta was a landlocked and effectively powerless state , the Romans wanted an independent Sparta to act as a counterweight against the growing Achaean League . Nabis ' allegiance was secured by the fact that he had to surrender five hostages , amongst them his son , Armenas . The Romans did not restore the exiles , wishing to avoid internal strife in Sparta . They did , however , allow any woman who was married to an ex - helot but whose husband was in exile to join him . After the legions under Flamininus had returned to Italy , the Greek states were once again on their own . The dominant powers in the region at this time were the kingdom of Macedon , which had recently lost a war against Rome , the Aetolian s , the strengthened Achaean League and a reduced Sparta . The Aetolians , who had opposed the Roman intervention in Greek affairs , incited Nabis to retake his former territories and position among the Greek powers . By 192 , Nabis who had built a new fleet and strengthened his army , besieged Gythium . The Achaeans responded by sending an envoy to Rome with a request for help . In response the Senate sent the praetor Atilius with a navy to defeat Nabis ' navy as well as an embassy headed by Flamininus . Instead of waiting for the Roman fleet to arrive , the Achaean army and navy headed towards Gythium under the command of Philopoemen . The Achaean fleet under Tiso was defeated by the recently constructed Spartan fleet , with the Achean flagship falling to pieces in the first ramming attack . On land as well the Achaeans could not defeat the Spartan forces outside Gythium and Philopoemen retreated to Tegea . When Philopoemen reentered Laconia for a second attempt his forces were ambushed by Nabis ' but nevertheless he managed to gain a victory . The Achaeans now could ravage Laconia for thirty days unopposed while the Spartan troops remained in their fortified city . Plans for capturing Sparta itself had been laid by the time the Roman envoy Flamininus arrived and convinced the Achaean strategus Philopoemen to spare it . For the time being Nabis decided to accept the status quo in return and surrender under the same conditions as the last treaty . Since Sparta ' s army was now weakened , Nabis appealed to the Aetolians for help . They sent to Sparta 1 , 000 cavalry under the command of Alexamenus . The story goes that while Nabis was observing his army ' s drills , the Aetolian commander Alexamenus charged at him and killed him with his lance . Afterwards the Aetolian troops seized the palace and set about looting the city but the inhabitants of Sparta were able to rally and rout them out of town . As Sparta was in turmoil Philopoemen entered the city with the Achaean army and made Sparta a member state of the League . The polis of Sparta was allowed to keep its laws and territory , but the exiles , and their rule of the Spartan warrior demos were not restored . In 189 BC , the hostages taken by Rome , excluding Nabis ' son , who fell ill and died , were allowed to return to Sparta . Still deprived of any port and suffering from political and economic problems from having the hostile exiles close by and not having access to the sea , the Spartans captured the city of Las , which was the home of many exiles and a member of the Union of free Laconians . The Acheans officially adopted this as the reason to finish Spartan independence once and for all . They demanded the surrender of the people responsible for the attack . The culprits responded by murdering thirty pro - Achaean citizens , seceding from the League and requesting Roman tutelage . The Romans , who wanted to see division in the League , did nothing about the situation . In 188 , Philopoemen entered northern Laconia with an army and the Spartan exiles who insisted on returning to Sparta . He first massacred eighty anti - Achaeans at Compasium , and then had the wall that Nabis built around Sparta demolished . Philopoemen then restored the exiles and abolished Spartan law , introducing Achaean law in its place . Thus ended Sparta ' s role as a major power in Greece , while Achaea became dominant throughout the Peloponnese .