MACEDONIA was ruled by Philip V., and included also a large portion of Northern Greece.
GREECE proper was divided between the ACHAEAN and AETOLIAN LEAGUES, the former including the most of the Peloponnesus, the latter the greater part of Central Greece.
Ever since the repulse of Pyrrhus, Rome had been slowly drifting into closer contact with the East. She formed an alliance with Egypt in 273. From this country had come in part her supply of corn during the Second Punic War.

ROME was now in a position to add new nations to her list of subjects. The kingdoms of the East which formerly composed a part of the vast empire of Alexander the Great, and which finally went to swell the limits of Roman authority, were Egypt, Syria, Macedonia, and Greece proper.
EGYPT was governed by the Ptolemies, and included at this time the valley of the Nile, Palestine, Phoenicia, the island of Cyprus, and a number of towns in Thrace. SYRIA, extending from the Mediterranean to the Indus.

Rome was unwilling to undertake a new war, but the people were induced to vote for one, on the representation that the only means of preventing an invasion of Italy was to carry the war abroad. This year the Consul, Publius Sulpicius Galba, was sent with a considerable force across the Adriatic. His campaign, and that of the Consul Villius during the next year, were productive of no decisive results, but in 198 the Consul TITUS QUINCTIUS FLAMINÍNUS, a man of different calibre, conducted the war with vigor. He defeated Philip on the Aóus, drove him back to the pass of Tempe.

The next year , at the Isthmian Games, the "freedom of Greece" was proclaimed to the enthusiastic crowds, and two years later Flamininus withdrew his troops from the so called "three fetters of Greece,"— Chalcis, Demetrias, and Corinth,—and, urging the Greeks to show themselves worthy of the gift of the Roman people, he returned home to enjoy a well earned triumph.
The chief result of the second Macedonian war was, therefore, the firm establishment of a ROMAN PROTECTORATE OVER GREECE AND EGYPT. The wedge had been entered and the interference of Rome in Eastern affairs was assured.

In 190, LUCIUS CORNELIUS SCIPIO was elected Consul, and put in command of the army in the East, with the understanding that he should be accompanied by his brother Africanus, and have the benefit of his military skill and experience. Under his command, the Romans crossed the Hellespont and sought Antiochus in his own kingdom.
Hannibal could do nothing with the poorly disciplined troops of the king. They were met by the invading forces at MAGNESIA, in Lydia, in 190, and 80,000 Asiatics were put to rout by 30,000 Romans, 50,000 being slain. The loss of the victors was slight.

This great soldier, after his defeat at Zama, did not relinquish the aim of his life. He became the chief magistrate of his native city, and in a short time cleared the moral atmosphere, which was charged with corruption and depravity. Under him Carthage might have risen again. But his intrigues with Antiochus, with whom he wished to make an alliance, gave Rome an opportunity to interfere. His surrender was demanded. He fled, and, after wandering from coast to coast, became the trusted adviser of the Syrian king.
Had Antiochus been energetic after his arrival in Greece, he could have accomplished something before the Roman troops came. But he disregarded the warnings of Hannibal, and spent valuable time in minor matters.

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