Book 39
48
This, which was done to enhance the dignity of the young prince, immediately aroused jealousy against him and finally proved to be his ruin. The Lacedaemonians were introduced next. Many questions, quite insignificant, were raised; there were some, however, of great importance, for instance, whether those whom the Achaeans had condemned should be restored, whether those whom they had put to death were justly or unjustly slain, and also whether the Lacedaemonians should remain in the Achaean League, or whether, as had previously been the case, that city alone out of the whole of the Peloponnese should keep its own separate laws. It was decided that the exiles should be restored and the sentences passed on them annulled, and that Lacedaemon should remain in the Achaean League. This decree was to be committed to writing and signed by the Lacedaemonians and Achaeans. Q. Marcius was sent as special commissioner to Macedonia, he was also instructed to examine the state of affairs in the Peloponnese. The unrest left by the old dissensions still prevailed there and Messene had seceded from the Achaean League. If I were to go into the origin and progress of this war I should be forgetting my resolution not to touch on foreign affairs except so far as they are connected with those of Rome.
