Enter Macedon

Philip II of Macedon — Alexander the Great's father — watched Greece tear itself apart and seized the moment. He modernized the Macedonian army, armed it with the sarissa (a 6-meter pike), and picked off Greek states one by one.

At Chaeronea in 338 BC, Philip crushed the combined armies of Athens and Thebes, and Greek independence was over.

• Philip forced Greece into the League of Corinth under Macedonian control
• His son Alexander would use Greek soldiers to conquer the Persian Empire
• Greece would not be a fully independent nation again until 1832