Gallic Invasion of Greece

In 279 BC, a large army of Celtic warriors, whom the Greeks called Galatians or Gauls, invaded Macedon and Greece from the north. In the chaos after the murder of Seleucus, the Gauls defeated and killed the new Macedonian king Ptolemy Keraunos and plundered the countryside. A second force under a leader named Brennus pushed south into Greece. A Greek alliance tried to hold them at Thermopylae, and the Gauls, like the Persians two centuries earlier, eventually found a way around the pass. Brennus then marched on Delphi, hoping to seize the sanctuary's legendary treasures. According to Greek accounts, the defenders, led largely by the Aetolians and Phocians, were aided by earthquakes, thunderstorms, snow and falling rocks, which they credited to Apollo himself. The Gauls were driven back with heavy losses, and Brennus, wounded, is said to have taken his own life. The Aetolians gained enormous prestige and established a festival, the Soteria, to celebrate the rescue. Some of the surviving Gauls crossed into Anatolia, where they settled in the region later known as Galatia.