CHAERONEIA, or CHAERONEA  , an ancient town of Boeotia, said by some to be the Homeric Arne, situated about 7 M . W. of Orchomenus . Until the 4th century B.C. it was a dependency of Orchomenus, and at all times it played but a subordinate part in Boeotian politics . Its importance lay in its strategic position near the head of the defile which presents the last serious obstacle to an invader in central Greece . Two great battles were fought on this site in antiquity . Ir 338 B.C . Philip II. and Alexander of Macedon were confronted by a confederate host from central Greece and Peloponnese under the leadership of Thebes and Athens, which here made the last stand on behalf of Greek liberty . A hard-fought conflict, in which the Greek infantry displayed admirable firmness, was decided in favour of Philip through the superior organization of his army . In 86 B.c. the Roman general L . Cornelius Sulla defeated the army of Mithradates VI., king of Pontus, near Chaeroneia . The latter's enormous numerical superiority was neutralized by Sulla's judicious choice of ground and the steadiness of his legionaries; the Asiatics after the failure of their attack were worn down and almost annihilated . Chaeroneia is also notable as the birth-place of Plutarch, who returned to his native town in old age, and was held in honour by its citizens for many successive generations .

Pausanias (ix . 40) mentions the divine honours accorded at Chaeroneia to the sceptre of Agamemnon, the work of Hephaestus (cf . Iliad, ii . 'or) . The site of the town is partly occupied by the village of Kapraena; the ancient citadel was known as the Petrachus, and there is a theatre cut in the rock . A colossal seated lion a little to the S.E. of the site marks the grave of the Boeotians who fell fighting against Philip; this lion was found broken to pieces; the tradition that it was blown up by Odysseus Androutsos is incorrect (see Murray, Handbook for Greece, ed . 5, 1884, p . 409) . It has now been restored and re-erected (190.5) . AuTHoxrTIEs.—Thucydides iv . 76; Diodorus xvi . 85-86; Plutarch, Alexander, ch .

9; Sulla, chs . 16-19;

Appian, Mithradatica, chs . 42-45; W . M . Leake, Travels in Northern Greece (London, 1835), ii . 112-117, 192-201; B . V . Head, Historia Numorum (Oxford, 1887), p . 292; J . Kromayer, Antike Schlachtf elder in Griechenland (Berlin, 1903), pp . 127-195; G . Sotiriades in Athen .

Milteil . 1903, pp . 301 ff.; 1905, p . 120; 1906, p . 396; 'Ec/%µ . 'ApxatoX., 1908, p . 65 .