This took place at the same time that Hannibal, after subduing all Iberia south of the <a class="linkToPlace" target="_blank" href="/place?placename=Ebro&groupId=549&placeId=1031">Ebro</a>, began his attack on <a class="linkToPlace" target="_blank" href="/place?placename=Saguntum&groupId=938&placeId=1673">Saguntum</a>.
Now had there been any connexion at the outset between Hannibal\'s enterprise and the affairs of Greece it is evident that I should have included the latter in the previous Book, and, following the chronology, placed my narrative of them side by side in alternate sections with that of the affairs of <a class="linkToPlace" target="_blank" href="/place?placename=Spain&groupId=983&placeId=1735">Spain</a>.
But the fact being that the circumstances of <a class="linkToPlace" target="_blank" href="/place?placename=Italy&groupId=656&placeId=1199">Italy</a>, Greece, and Asia were such that the beginnings of these wars were particular to each country, while their ends were common to all, I thought it proper to give a separate account of them, until reaching the date when these conflicts came into connexion with each other and began to tend towards one end — both the narratives of the beginnings of each war being thus made more lucid, and a conspicuous place being given to that subsequent interconnexion of all three, which I mentioned at the outset, indicating when, how, and for what reason it came about — and, then upon reaching this point to comprise all three wars in a single narrative. The interconnexion I speak of took place towards the end of the Social War in the third year of the 140th Olympiad. After this date therefore I shall give a general history of events in chronological order;
but up to it, as I said, a separate account of each war, merely recapitulating the contemporary occurrences set forth in the previous Book, so that the whole narrative may not only be easy to follow but may make a due impression on my readers.
Walbank Commentary