Seleukids

Alexander the Great of Macedon invaded the mighty Achaemenid Persian Empire in 334 BC. By his death in 323 he had been more successful than anyone but him could ever have imagined. Yet he left no heir, and his generals immediately began to divvy the Empire up among themselves; Egypt fell to Ptolemaios, Makedon and Greece to Antipatros, Anatolia and Syria to Antigonos the One-Eyed, while Perdikkas controlled the centre of the Empire and was nominally Regent over it all. Perdikkas completely failed to hold the Empire together; he died in Egypt in 321, trying to bring Ptolemaios to heel. His lieutenant, Seleukos, proved more of a survivor. Allying with Ptolemaios against Antigonos, he established a powerbase in Babylonia, eventually expanding his power until he controlled most of Asia. Only in India was he turned back, but there he acquired the war elephants that allowed him to finally defeat Antigonos, leaving his empire secure.

He took the title of Basileus (King) without specifying what he was King of; which suggests ambitions of universal rule. These were never realised, but the Seleukid domains were plenty large enough; stretching from the Aegean Sea to Afghanistan they were heterogeneous in terrain, language, culture and religion. The heartland came to be Babylonia and Syria, with outward regions allowed some autonomy, as buffer zones - the most practical policy given the size of the realm. These buffer zones gradually drifted from autonomy to independence. In the east, Bactria and Parthia became their own kingdoms, which the Seleukids appear to have accepted without challenge (perhaps without any real awareness). Anatolia, smashed by a Gaulish invasion soon after Seleukos I's death was frequently independent as well. The Seleukid kings occassionally launched campaigns to reassert or reclaim their authority, but the main focus of their aggression was the Egyptian held territory of Coele-Syria (Modern Lebanon and Israel); the accession of a new monarch in either territory would, inevitably, lead to a new war over this territory. For the most part, the Egyptians had the best of these wars.

Under Antiochos III Megas, the Seleukids regained control far to the east, brought the Egyptians low, and were finally in a position to properly reassert their control in Anatolia. But the situation had changed - minor kingdoms had sprouted up, and a new power, the Romans, had acquired control of Greece. Antiochos argued with them over Thrace and eventually invaded Greece to drive them out, but was defeated at Thermopylae in 191, and driven out of Asia Minor altogether after the Battle of Magnesia in 190. The Romans increasingly hemmed the Seleukids in, blocking activity in Asia Minor and Egypt, and working to subvert their control in Judaea. For a kingdom legitimated and funded by aggressive wars this restriction was fatal. The Seleukids fell into a slow decline; Roman hostage princes and Ptolemaic princesses repeatedly disputed the succession. While they were distracted by all this trouble eminating from the west, the Seleukids were completely blindsided by an invasion from the East by their former vassals, the Parthians. The Parthians took Persia in 145 and Mesopotamia in 129, and from that point, the Seleukid domains consisted of little more than Syria itself. Yet, even as their domains were drastically reduced, the Seleukid Civil War intensified. There were five separate claimants for the throne by 94 BC, and little more than Antioch and Damascus for the victor to rule over. Tigran of Armenia conquered the region in 74, and, when he was driven out in 69, a final few Seleukid princelings ruled the region as Roman vassals until 64, when Pompeius Magnus decided they were an annoyance and deposed them.

SOURCES

Diodorus Siculus, Bibliotheca Historica written c. 50 BC, covering 480 BC to 145 BC (Loeb Translation from Greek available here: http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Diodorus_Siculus/home.html)

Appian, Roman History: Syriaca, written c. AD 125, covering 323 BC – 64 BC (Translation from Greek available here: http://www.livius.org/ap-ark/appian/appian_syriaca_00.html).

Eusebius of Caesaria, The Chronicon, written, covering mythic times to AD 325 (Translation from Armenian available here: http://rbedrosian.com/euseb.html).

St Jerome, The Chronicle, written c. 380, covering mythic times to AD 379 (Translation from Latin available here: http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/index.htm#JeromeChronicle).

Gera, Dov. "Philonides the Epicurean at Court: Early Connections." Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik Bd. 125 (1999): 77 - 83.

Grainger, John D. Seleukos Nikator: Constructing a Hellenistic Kingdom. London: Routledge, 1990.

———. A Seleukid Prosopography and Gazeteer. Leiden, New York & Cologne: Brill, 1997.

Hoover, Oliver. "A Revised Chronology for the Late Seleucids at Antioch (121/0 - 64 BC)." Historia: Zeitschrift fur Alte Geschichte Bd. 56 H. 3 (2007): 280 - 301.

Houghton, Arthur & Catherine Lorber. Seleucid Coins: A Comprehensive Catalogue. New York: American Numismatic Society, 2002.

Ogden, Daniel. Polygamy, Prostitutes and Death: The Hellenistic Dynasties. Swansea, Wales: The Classical Press of Wales, 1999.

Rigsby, Kent J. "Seleucid Notes." Transactions of the American Philological Association (1974-), Vol. 110 (1980): 233 - 254.

Sherwin-White, Susan & Amelie Kuhrt. From Samarkand to Sardis: A New Approach to the Seleukid Empire. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993.