conjunction with him. But Philip, when he had captured Amphipolis by a
combination of siege and intrigue, did not give it up to Athens, and instead of
waiting to receive Pydna from Athens, besieged and took it, aided once more by
treachery from within. In 356 he took Poteidaea (in conjunction with the
Olynthians, to whom he gave the town), the Athenians arriving too late to
relieve it; and then pursued his conquests along the Thracian coast. Further
inland he expelled the Thasians (allies of Athens) from Crenides and founded
Philippi on the site, in the centre of the gold-mines of Mount Pangaeus, from
which he henceforward derived a very large revenue; while the forests of the
district provided him with timber for ship-building, of which he took full
advantage: for in the next few years his ships made descents upon the Athenian
islands of Lemnos and Imbros, plundered the Athenian corn-vessels off the coast
of Euboea, and even landed a force at Marathon. In the latter part of 356 and in
355 he was occupied with the conquest of the Paeonians and Illyrians, with whom
Athens had made an alliance in 356. At the end of 355 he laid siege to Methone,
the last Athenian port on the Thermaic gulf, and captured it in 354. (Some place
the siege and capture of Methone in 354-3, but an inscription, C.I.G. II. 70,
makes it at least probable that the siege had begun by the last month of 355.)
In 353 Philip made his way to the Thracian coast, and conquered Abdera and
Maroneia. At Maroneia we find him in company with Pammenes (his former host at
Thebes), who had been sent by the Thebans to assist Artabazus in his revolt
against the Persian king; and at the same place he received Apollonides of
Cardia, the envoy of the Thracian prince Cersobleptes. On his way home his ships
escaped from Chares, off Neapolis, by a ruse. In the same year he interfered in
the affairs of Thessaly, where the Aleuadae of Larissa had invited his
assistance against Lycophron and Peitholaus of Pherae, who had invoked the aid
of the Phocians. (In opposing the Phocians, the antagonists of the Thebans in
the Sacred War, Philip was also helping the Thebans themselves, and gaining
credit as the opponent of the plunderers of the temple of Apollo at Delphi.)
Onomarchus, the Phocian leader, twice defeated Philip, but was overthrown and