Excerpts from Books and Wikipedia
Destruction of Corinth in 146 BC; it was the richest city in Greece; [Beard: SPQR, p. 184, 210] "But in another way, the events of 146 BCE were seen as the beginning of the collapse of the Republic and as the herald of a century of civil wars, mass murder and assassinations that led to the return of autocratic rule." [Beard: SPQR, p. 213]