[1] The prelude to the conflict in Crete was the commercial war between the cities of Rhodes and Byzantium about the toll introduced by the Byzantines for all ships passing through the Bosporus on their way to the Pontus Euxinus.

[3] Meanwhile in Crete the allied cities of Knossos and Gortys had gained control of the whole island, except for the Spartan colony of Lyttos which alone resisted.

Soon after his arrival, however, the people of Eleutherna accused him of assassinating a citizen, Timarchus, and, in response, they declared war on the Rhodians.

As a result, in 220 BC the Social War broke out, which was to involve the Macedonian king Philip V of Macedon as he was a key ally of the Achaeans.

The Polyrrhenians on the opposite side did the same by sending 500 Cretans to support Philip V.[10] The war continued for several years, but the further narration by Polybius is lost.

[12] Among the mercenary leaders fighting on the island was a young Arcadian named Philopoemen, who acquired great fame and experience which would serve him well in his later years as strategos of the Achaean League.

[13] As a side effect of the conflict, Cretan mercenaries (the famed archers and the so-called Neocretans) are recorded all over the Hellenistic world, although none of the leaders (Cnopias of Allaria, Philon the Knossian, Eurylochus of Crete, Zelys the Gortynian at Raphia 217 BC; Lagoras, Kambylos and Bolis at the siege of Sardis 215/13 BC) can be traced directly to the civil war.

[14] The conflict over Crete was renewed in 205 BC, when Philip V of Macedon used the island as a base for naval raids against the Rhodians.