Desperate for plunder in 349 BCE, Thebes…

Philip advances into Chalcidice, threatening the city of Olynthus.

The center of a Chalcidian League reformed after Sparta's decline, Olynthus has stood against Athens in alliance with Philip until, intimidated by the Macedonian monarch's growing power, it plots against him with the Athenians.

With Etesian winds about to blow, Philip, despite the alliance of 356, in summer 349 attacks Olynthus, which turns to the only and obvious place for help, …

…Athens.

This is the occasion of the three Olynthiac Orations delivered by Demosthenes to elicit aid for Olynthus.

One of Demosthenes' stirringly patriotic pleas is to make the reserves of the so-called Festival, or Theoric, Fund immediately available for military purposes—in fact, to finance an Olynthian expedition.

Eubulus, the leader of the pacifist party, champions the less glamorous policy of building up Athens' financial resources slowly in preparation for the time when Philip has to be confronted nearer home.

Olynthus falls in 348 BCE, despite the Athenian help that had eventually been sent.

Many of the inhabitants of the city, their lands expropriated and distributed to Philip's followers, are sold into slavery.

Although Greek warfare has always permitted this theoretically, and the Greeks themselves occasionally have treated small cities with brutality, the treatment of the large city of Olynthus is, nevertheless, shocking to Greek sentiment.

In addition, there is no comfort for Athens from the events in its front yard; …

…Euboea, which Eubulus and his supporters have agreed should always be defended, in 348 successfully revolts.

Phocion, earlier a pupil of Plato who has served Persia as a mercenary, is drawn into Athens' efforts to remain independent of Macedon; his tactical skills save an Athenian force sent in 348 to crush Philip's allies in Euboea.

Rome concludes another treaty with Carthage in 348 BCE.

The Sacred War, which the Thessalians, Thebans, and others still are unable to finish for themselves, brings Philip back into Greece, when desultory warfare in 347 causes the Boeotians to call him in; in alarm, Phocis appeals to Athens and Sparta.

The Phocian commander Phalaecus, however, unexpectedly declines to allow the Athenians and Spartans to occupy Thermopylae.

Plato, in his Philebus, considers the place of pleasure in the good life.

In the Laws, his longest and last work—he dies in 348/347 BCE at the age of about eighty—Plato considers a model constitution for an ideal city.

It must seem to Athenians, with Amphipolis and Olynthus gone, that there is no immediate further point in fighting; Philip, moreover, has been putting out peace feelers for some time.

The Phocians surrender to Philip, who exacts an indemnity and receives their Amphictyonic votes.

Many individual Phocian troops, branded as temple robbers, have already fled (some of them in the late 340s will eventually join Timoleon in Sicily).

The cities of Phocis are physically destroyed and the remaining inhabitants distributed among villages.

It is doubtful whether Philip ever seriously intended any other solution to the war in its Phocian dimension.

Philip under the peace terms, gains control of northern and central Greece, including Thermopylae and …

…Delphi.

He is admitted to membership of the Delphic Amphictyony, an association of neighboring states.

The votes of the Thessalians and their clients give him a control of its council, which can be used on occasion for political and diplomatic ends.