The Roman conquest of Greece is a lengthy process initiated by the Punic Wars and then perpetuated by the conflicts between the Greek succesors and the subsequent roman intervention. The major time stamps in the conquest of Greece are the four Macedonian Wars and the Roman-Seleucid War.

The First Macedonian War (214-205 BC) took place because Philip V, king of Macedon had allied himself with Rome's enemy, Carthage. With the Punic Wars raging, the romans worried of a possible Macedonian invasion in Southern Italy so they decided to mount a preemptive strike against them.

A roman army crossed the Adriatic and ocupied coastal setlements claiming to "combat piracy". A few inconclusive skirmishes took place, but nothing decisive happened. The romans at this point had little interest in expansion, they only seeked to keep one of Hanibal's allies in check and the hostilities ended with the Treaty of Phocea.

This small and often overlooked war served as a set up for future roman involvements in Greece as now Rome owned a small strip of land in Greece.

The Second Macedonian War (200-196 BC) took place as a result of tensions between the Greek Successor States.

Following the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC, his empire was divided amongst his generals in the subsequent civil war. The most proeminent of these Succesor States or "diadochi" where the Seleucid Empire founded by Seleucus Nicator owning most of the former Persian Empire and The Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt founded by Ptolemy.

These two states where bitter rivals due to a quarell on teritories in Syria and the Levant and had been waging numerous wars ever since ( see The Syrian Wars). The second half of the third century saw a relative peace between the two neighbours. Hostilities escalated once more with the ascension to the Seleucid throne of emperor Antiochus III the Great. He started assembling a massive army for the invasion of Egypt, the Egyptians responded with their own mobilisation and the two nations marched uppon each other. While the Egyptians where met with some success at the Battle of Raphia,with the death of pharaoh Ptolemy IV, leadership of Egypt came in the hands of his 5 year old son Ptolemy V, this plumetted the nation into chaos, the army mutinied and regents started fighting for supremacy.

With Egypt at its weakest, Antiochus now sought to deliver de coup de grace against his arch nemesis and prepared to mount a second invasion of Egypt. To solidify his position, he forged an alliance with Philip V and agreed to divide egyptian teritories amongst each other. This threatened the delicate balance of the Greek world and the smaller states in the proximity of Macedon and Seleucia now cowered in fear of being anexed by their much more powerfull neighbours, Antiochus seeked to reform Alexander's empire and Philip wanted to become Hegemon of Greece once more, so it is easy to see why small city states and kingdoms would feel threatened by this change in the balance of power.

Thus, these smaller greek states turned to Rome for protection, delegations arived from the Kingdom of Pergamon, Rhodes and The Achaean League asking the romans to do something against the ambitions of Antigonus and Philip. Now Rome still did not want to get involved in this mess and limited itself to sendind diplomatic threats to Philip which he promptly ignored. The pridefull romans took this as an insult and no willing to back down increased their hostility towards Macedon, the macedonians did the same.

Eventually, both nations declared war on each other, Rome sent her armies into Greece and with help of numerous allied greek contingents seeking to topple macedonian supremacy won a crushing victory at Cynoscephalae in 197 BC. Peace was agreed upon with the Macedonians and Rome got a hefty chunk of Western Greece and Thessaly in return.

The Romans then left Greece alone considering the region pacified.

The Roman-Seleucid War (192-188 BC) By striking down Macedon Rome believed that they had brought stability to the Greek world but what they did instead was turn the Seleucid Empire into the most powerfull greek state. With Egypt engulfed in civil war and Macedon severely weakened, there was no one left to check on the seleucid expansion.

Smelling blood, Antigonus saw the oportunity to expand Seleucid influence all the way to Europe. Even worse, after his defeat in the Punic Wars, Hanibal defected from Carthage and now served Antigonus as a military advisor.

The seleucids thus mounted a full scale invasion of Greece, the romans could not afford to ignore the pleas for aid from their allies since they now owned a significant chunk of land in Greece. The roman armies defeated the seleucids at Thermopylae (the same place where the Spartans fought) and with the destruction of the seleucid fleet in the Mediteranean, Antigonus decided to retreat his army back into Asia. The romans pursued their enemies over the Helespont and with the help of their greek allies, most proeminently Pergamon, Rome won a decisive victory at Magnesia in Anatolia. Antigonus sued for peace and the romans imposed harsh terms, forcing the seleucids to give all of their land in Anatolia to Rome's trusted ally, Pergamon and give up their recently conquered posesions in Greece to Rome.

The romans thus toppled seleucid supremacy, up untill Magnesia, the Seleucid Empire was the most powerfull nation in the known world but their catastrophic defeat and loss of teritory caused a long period of decline where the empire would have to face against increasing agression from the Parthians.

With the Seleucid Empire no longer a meaninfull power in the East Mediteranean, the romans belived they had pacified Greece, they where wrong.

The Third Macedonian War (172-168 BC) King Philip died in 179 BC, his son, Perseus succeeded to the throne and saught revenge against the romans. He started by consolidating his aliance with Antigonus by taking the hand of his daughter and then aranged the mariage of his own daughter with king Prusias of Bhithynia (North Western Anatolia close to the Bosphorus). Now Bithynia was an enemy of Pergamon, the trusted ally of Rome and Perganon was also at odds with the seleucids due to the newly aquired territories. As a result this system of alliances forged by Perseus left Pergamon surounded by enemies.

Also, a thracian tribe allied to Rome attacked Macedon but was defeated in battle, increasing the tensions between the two sides. Meanwhile, Perseus forged an alliance with king Cotys IV of the Odrysian Kingdom (the most powerfull kingdom in Thrace) and started gaining allies amongst the city states in Southern Greece, while many of theese city states initially oposed Macedon, they now viewed Rome as a greater threat.

As a result of these events, King Eumenes II of Pergamon made a speech in the roman Senate, asking for Rome's aid and stating that Macedon was preparing for war (he was right). With escalating tensions, Perseus viewed war as inevitable and decided to draw the first blood by killing his rival Eumenes. The plot was uncovered and Rome promptly declared war on Macedon.

The Macedonian phalanx was swiftly defeated at the Battle of Pydna and the romans decided to quell the unrest in Greece once and for all by fully anexing Macedon.

The Fourth Macedonian War (150-148 BC) This short and final war was fought against Andriscus, a pretender to the Macedonian throne who seeked to reestablish the old kingdom. He was easily defeated at the Second Battle of Pydna.

With Rome now controlling most of Greece, the southern city states making up the Achaean League realising that roman hegemony was iminent rose up against their former allies in a desparate last stand to protect their independence. They where swiftly defeated and in 148 BC, the city of Corinth was sacked as a punishment and Rome anexed Attica and the Peloponese, completing the conquest of Greece.

And this is how it all took place, the reckless actions of Philip, Perseus and Antigonus destabilised the Greek world and created a power vacuum that only Rome could replace.