Battle of Mount Lycaeum

A map of depicting the location of the Battle of Mount Lycaeum.

Date	227 BC
Location	Mount Lycaeum, border of Elis and Arcadia
Result	Spartan victory

Belligerents

Sparta

Achaean League

Commanders and leaders

Cleomenes III

Aratus

Casualties and losses

Light

Heavy

The Battle of Mount Lycaeum was a battle fought between Sparta led by Cleomenes III and the Achaean League commanded by Aratus. It was the first major battle of the Cleomenean War. The battle occurred at Mount Lycaeum on the border of Elis and Arcadia and ended in a Spartan victory.

In 229 BC, Cleomenes III, King of Sparta, initiated a campaign with the aim of extending the regional power of his kingdom. This was opposed by the major power in the Peloponnese, the Achaean League. In an attempt to curtail the resurgent power of Sparta, the Achaeans led by their strategos, Aratus, moved to re-capture the cities of Tegea and Orchomenus. This failure was compounded when a vastly numerically superior Achaean army commanded by Aristomachos of Argos declined to offer battle to the army of Cleomenes.

Though these failures were somewhat offset by the occupation of Caphyae, a city that had previously been taken over by Cleomenes, the Spartan ascendancy in the war was becoming apparent. Ptolemy III of Egypt, who had been supporting the Achaean campaign against Macedon, shifted his financial backing from the Achaean League to Sparta. Ptolemy based this on the assumption that Sparta would a more useful ally in counterbalancing Macedon.

Aratus was re-elected strategos in 227 BC and responded by launching an invasion of Elis, a Spartan ally. The Elians, unable to defeat the Achaeans, sent to Sparta for assistance. The Spartan response was to dispatch Cleomenes with an army to aid their allies. As the Achaeans were returning from Elis, Cleomenes launched an attack on Mount Lycaeum, on the border of Elis and Arcadia. The Achaeans, who were unprepared for battle, began a disarrayed flight from the combat. The Spartans scored a comprehensive victory, routing the opposing army. They managed to capture a great part of the Achaean division as well as inflicting massive casualties. The victory was so complete that it was thought that Aratus had been slain in the midst of battle.

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