v53_0074 - ACHEAN LEAGUE - SIKYON Hemidrachme

ACHAEAN LEAGUE - SICYON

(II - I century BC)

Sicyone, at the mouth of the Isthmus of Corinth in the Peloponnese, was the smallest political entity in this region with Phlius which it touched. Landlocked between Achaia and Argolis, it had been described by Homer in the Iliad as having been part of the kingdom of Agamemnon. We have little information on the history of the city before the end of the Persian Wars except that the region was often devastated by the Athenians, in particular under Pericles in 454 BC, according to E. Babelon. Coinage would only begin to become important after the end of the Peloponnesian War in 404 BC. After the First Macedonian War, Sicyon entered the Achaean League. The latter was dissolved in 146 BC after the fall and destruction of Corinth and the final enslavement of Greece.