Seleucid Sentence Examples

Samsat itself represents the ancient Samosata, the capital of the Seleucid kings of Commagene (Kuinukh of the Assyrian inscriptions), and here the Persian Royal Road from Sardis to Susa is supposed to have crossed the river.

He was the real founder of the Parthian empire, which was of very limited extent until the final decay of the Seleucid empire, occasioned by the Roman intrigues after the death of Antiochus IV.

Whether the master of the provinces, in which there were Jews, be an Alexander, a Ptolemy, a Seleucid or a Roman, the force by which he rules is the force of Greek culture.

The Jewish aristocracy became peers of the Seleucid kingdom.

Two Seleucid princes, children of Soter's sister Selene, appeared in Rome in 73 to urge their claim to the Ptolemaic throne.

His return to Babylon in that year was afterwards officially regarded as the beginning of the Seleucid empire.

Berenice's brother, Ptolemy III., who had just succeeded to the Egyptian throne, at once invaded the Seleucid realm and marched victoriously to the Tigris or beyond, receiving the submission of the eastern provinces, whilst his fleets swept the coasts of Asia Minor.

Only in Asia Minor, where the Seleucid cause was represented by the king's cousin, the able Achaeus, was its prestige restored and the Pergamene power driven back to its earlier limits.

The campaigns of 219 and 218 carried the Seleucid arms almost to the confines of Egypt, but in 217 Ptolemy IV.

Having thus recovered the central part of Asia Minor - for the dynasties in Pergamum, Bithynia and Cappadocia the Seleucid government was obliged to tolerate - Antiochus turned to recover the outlying provinces of the north and east.

Antiochus seemed to have restored the Seleucid empire in the east, and the achievement brought him the title of "the Great King."

By the peace of Apamea (188) the Seleucid king abandoned all the country north of the Taurus, which was distributed among the friends of Rome.

As a consequence of this blow to the Seleucid power, the outlying provinces of the empire, recovered by Antiochus, reasserted their independence.

The Seleucid kingdom as Antiochus left it to his son, Seleucus Iv.

The series of native inscriptions, written in Aramaic, begins a few years after; the earliest bears the date 304 of the Seleucid era, i.e.

Dates were reckoned by the Seleucid era, which began in October 312 B.C.

The site of Nisibis, on the great road between the Tigris and the Mediterranean, and commanding alike the mountain country to the north and the then fertile plain to the south, gave it an importance which began during the Assyrian period and continued under the Seleucid empire.

Before the Roman period Marash doubtless shared the fortunes of the Seleucid kingdom of Commagene.

For the detailed accounts of the separate dynasties into which it was divided after Alexander's death, see Seleucid Dynasty, Antigonus, Pergamum, &C., and for its effect on the spread of Hellenic culture see Hellenism.

Armenia, never effectively conquered by the Macedonians, was left in the hands of native princes, tributary only when the Seleucid court was strong enough to compel.

Whilst the Antigonid kingdom remained practically whole till the Roman conquest ended it in 168 B.C., and the house of Ptolemy ruled in Egypt till the death of Cleopatra in 30 B.C., the Seleucid Empire perished by a slow process of disruption.

Commagene was independent under a king,MithradatesCallinicus, in the earlier part of the last century B.C. Syria itself in the last days of the Seleucid dynasty is seen to be breaking up into petty principalities, Greek or native.

From 83 to 69 is the transient episode of Armenian conquest, and in 64 the last shadow of Seleucid rule vanished, when Syria was made a Roman province by Pompey.

In the loosely-knit Seleucid realm it is plain that a great deal more independence was left to the various communities, - cities or native tribes, - than in Egypt, where the conditions made a bureaucratic system so easy to carry through.

Demetrius had presented himself in 307 as the liberator, and driven the Macedonian garrison from the Peiraeus; but his own garrisons held Athens thirteen years later, when he was king of Macedonia, and the Antigonid dynasty clung to the points of vantage in Greece, especially Chalcis and Corinth, till their garrisons were finally expelled by the Romans in the name of Hellenic liberty., The new movement of commerce initiated by the conquest of Alexander continued under his successors, though the breakup of the Macedonian Empire in Asia in the 3rd century and the distractions of the Seleucid court must have withheld many advantages from the Greek merchants which a strong central government might have afforded them.

An alternative route went from the Indian ports to the Persian Gulf, and thence found the Mediterranean by caravan across Arabia from the country of Gerrha to Gaza; and to control it was no doubt a motive in the long struggle of the Ptolemaic and Seleucid houses for Palestine, as well as in the attempt of Antiochus III.

Or from the Persian Gulf wares might be taken up the Euphrates and carried across to Antioch; this route lay altogether in the Seleucid sphere.

Corinth, however, was allowed to go on striking staters under Antigonus Gonatas; Ephesus, Cos and the greater cities of Phoenicia retained their right of coinage under Seleucid or Ptolemaic supremacy.

At the Seleucid court there seems to be an instance of it in 195, when the heirapparent, Antiochus, married his sister Laodice.

The Friends (at any rate under the later Seleucid and Ptolemaic reigns) were distinguished by a special dress and badge of gold analogous to the stars and crosses of modern orders.

In Egypt we find them classified as avyyeve;s, 46rtpot rag cvyyevEat y, apXcvwµarocuAalEs, 7rpwTot 0LAot, q5LAot (in the narrower sense),Sca60xoc. For the Seleucid kingdom vwyyEvEis,7rpWToc 0LAoc and 4'LAot are mentioned.

These classes do not appear in Egypt before the 2nd century; Strack conjectures that they were created in imitation of the Seleucid court.

We have no direct evidence as to the institutions of the Seleucid court in the 3rd century.

The Seleucid court did not rival either of the last named in brilliance of culture; and yet some names of distinction were associated with it.

The Antigonid and Seleucid courts had much valuable material at hand for their armies in the barbarian races under their sway.

Thenceforward elephants, either brought fresh from India or bred in the royal stables at Apamea, regularly figured in the Seleucid armies.

By the Peace of Apamea (188) the Seleucid navy was abolished; Antiochus undertook to keep no more than to ships of war.

To their native subjects the Seleucid and Ptolemaic kings were always foreigners.

North of the old Seljuk capital are the ruins of Iskender Kalah, probably to be identified with the ancient Mery of the Seleucid dynasty.

As Beroea we hear of the place in Seleucid wars and dissensions.

The satrapic administration was retained by Alexander and his successors, especially in the Seleucid empire, where the satrap generally is designated as strategus; but their provinces were much smaller than under the Persians.

Meanwhile the Seleucid kingdom was torn by internal dissensions, fostered by Roman intrigues.

In Seleucid and Parthian times the astronomical reports were of a thoroughly scientific character; how far the advanced knowledge and method they display may reach back we do not yet know.

It is remarkable that thus far no cemetery older than the Seleucid or Parthian period has been found in Assyria.

Nor apparently did the Greek Seleucid kingdom have much to do with the Mountain.

This temple had been razed and a fortress built upon its ruins, in the Greek or Seleucid period, some of the bricks found bearing the inscription in Aramaic and Greek of a certain Hadad-nadin-akhe, king of a small Babylonian kingdom.

After the time of Gudea, Lagash seems to have lost its importance; at least we know nothing more about it until the construction of the Seleucid fortress mentioned, when it seems to have become part of the Greek kingdom of Characene.

Reinaud thought of the Seleucid era, which is not impossible; but Halevy observes that the fortress of Mawiyyat (now Hisn Ghorab) bears the date 640, and is said to have been erected " when the Abyssinians overran the country and destroyed the king of Himyar and his princes."

It was situated where the Marsyas leaves the hills to join the Maeander, and it became a seat of Seleucid power, and a centre of Graeco-Roman and Graeco-Hebrew civilization and commerce.

There Antiochus the Great collected the army with which he met the Romans at Magnesia, and there two years later the treaty between Rome and the Seleucid realm was signed.

In Syria the independent action of the cities greatly increased during the last weakness of the Seleucid monarchy.

The loyalty, too, expressed towards the Seleucid king implies a predominant interest in pan-hellenic unity, natural in colonies isolated among barbarians.

In the middle of the 3rd century B.C. Bactria and Sogdiana broke away from the Seleucid empire; independent Greek kings reigned there till the country was conquered by nomads from Central Asia (Sacae and Yue-chi) a kingdoms. century later.

When the Parthians rent away provinces from the Seleucid empire, the Greek cities did not cease to exist by passing under barbarian rule.

Then we have the great system of Seleucid foundations.

Sardis, the Seleucid capital in Asia Minor, had become a Greek city before the end of the 3rd century B.C. The main high road between the Aegean coast and the East was held by a series of new cities.

With the rise of the Attalid dynasty of Pergamum, a system of Pergamene foundation begins to oppose the Seleucid in the interior, bearing such names as Attalia, Philetaeria, Eumenia, Apollonis.

The minor dynasties of non-Greek origin, the native Bithynian and the two Persian dynasties in Pontus and Cappadocia, were Hellenized before the Romans drove the Seleucid out Native of the country.

The whole of Syria was brought under the Seleucid sceptre, together with Cilicia, by Antiochus III.

With the ever-growing weakness of the Seleucid dynasty, the independence and activity of the cities increased, although, if, on the one hand, they were less suppressed by a strong central government, they were less protected against military adventurers and barbarian chieftains.

See works quoted in articles Greece, History; Rome, History; Ptolemies; Seleucid Dynasty; Bactria, &C.

Antioch became the capital and court-city of the western Seleucid empire under Antiochus I., its counterpart in the east being Seleucia-on-Tigris; but its paramount importance dates from the battle of Ancyra (240 B.C.), which shifted the Seleucid centre of gravity from Asia Minor, and led indirectly to the rise of Pergamum.

It enjoyed a great reputation for letters and the arts (Cicero pro Archia, 3); but the only names of distinction in these pursuits during the Seleucid period, that have come down to us, are Apollophanes, the Stoic, and one Phoebus, a writer on dreams. The mass of the population seems to have been only superficially Hellenic, and to have spoken Aramaic in non-official life.

In the many dissensions of the Seleucid house they took violent part, and frequently rose in rebellion, for example against Alexander Balas in 147 B.C., and Demetrius II.

In the last struggles of the Seleucid house, Antioch turned definitely against its feeble rulers, invited Tigranes of Armenia to occupy the city in 83, tried to unseat Antiochus XIII.

The many difficulties against which the Seleucid kings had to fight and the attacks of Ptolemy II., gave to Diodotus, satrap of Bactria, the opportunity of making himself independent (about 255 B.C.) and of conquering Sogdiana.

It was different when the Jews who wished to be men of the world took their Hellenism from the Seleucid court and courted the favour of Antiochus Epiphanes.

Already he had allies among the Jews and, if Daniel is to be trusted, there were other Jews who rose up to shake off the yoke of foreign supremacy, Seleucid or Egyptian, and succeeded only in rendering the triumph of Antiochus easier of achievement.

The rebels' appeal to the Seleucid governor of part of Syria (88 B.C.) caused a revulsion in his favour, and finally he made peace by more than Roman methods.

At the same time he was obliged to open war on the Seleucid kingdom, where Antiochus II.

Ptolemy marched triumphantly into the heart of the Seleucid realm, as far at any rate as Babylonia, and received the formal submission of the provinces of Iran, while his fleets in the Aegean recovered what his father had lost upon the seaboard, and made fresh conquests as far as Thrace.

The Buddhist dynasty of Chandragupta profoundly modified the religion of northern India from the east; the Seleucid empire, with its Bactrian and later offshoots, deeply influenced the science and art of Hindustan from the west.

Towards the close of the 2nd century B.C., when the Ptolemaic and Seleucid kingdoms were equally depressed, the Nabataean kingdom came to the front; under Aretas III.

After that E-kur appears to have gradually fallen into decay, until finally, in the Seleucid period, the ancient temple was turned into a fortress.

Soon, however, the two elements began to coalesce; in the Seleucid Empire, the process seems generally to have been both rapid and complete.

In Bactria From that time onward the Seleucid Empire was and never at rest.

Epiphanes led to a war with Rome in which the power of the Seleucid Empire was shattered (190 B.C.), Decayofthe Asia Minor lost, and the king compelled to pay a Seleucid heavy contribution to Rome for a long term of years.

With this battle the Seleucid dominion over the countries east of the Euphrates was definitely lost.

But how For the whole of this period see further ANTIGONUS; ANTIOCHUS I.IV.; SELEUCID DYNASTY; HELLENISM.

The first year of his reign (Seleucid year 170 143-142 B.C.) was made the beginning of a new era, and the issue of a Jewish coinage betokened the independence of his sovereignty.

Henderson's The Age of the Maccabees (1907); also articles JEWS; SELEUCID DYNASTY.

Straightway they overran the greater part of Asia Minor, and laid under tribute all west of Taurus, even the Seleucid kings.

The other members of the coalition had assigned Palestine to Seleucus after what they regarded as Ptolemy's desertion, and for the next hundred years the question of its ownership becomes the standing ground of enmity between the Seleucid and Ptolemaic dynasties.

Her death was followed by a rupture between the Ptolemaic and Seleucid courts, on the old question of Palestine.

In 152 Philometor joined the coalition against the Seleucid king Demetrius I.

He himself at Antioch was entreated by the people to assume the Seleucid diadem, but he declined and installed Demetrius as king.

As a centre of native influences it was overawed by the Seleucid foundation of Apamea; but it opposed the Roman advance.

The kingdoms into which the Macedonian empire was divided under these rulers are known as Hellenistic. The chief were Asia Minor and Syria under the Seleucid Dynasty, Egypt under the Ptolemies, Macedonia under the successors of Antigonus Gonatas, Pergamum under the Attalid dynasty.

In its careful chronology, based upon the Seleucid era, in the minuteness of its geographical knowledge, in the frankness with which it records defeat as well as victory, on the restraint with which it speaks of the enemies of the Jews, in its command of details, it bears on its face the stamp of genuineness.

The theory of the ecliptic as representing the course of the sun through the year, divided among twelve constellations with a measurement of 30 to each division, is also of Babylonian origin, as has now been definitely proved; but it does not appear to have been perfected until after the fall of the Babylonian empire in 539 B.C. Similarly, the other accomplishments of Babylonian astronomers, such as their system or rather systems of moon calculations and the drawing up of planetary tablets, belong to this late period, so that the golden age of Babylonian astronomy belongs not to the remote past, as was until recently supposed, but to the Seleucid period, i.e.

Ardvates, 317-284 B.C., freed himself from Seleucid control; and after the defeat of Antiochus the Great by the Romans, 190 B.C., Artaxias (Ardashes), and Zadriades, the governors of Armenia Major and Armenia Minor, became independent kings, with the concurrence of Rome.

The walls of the city seem to be Seleucid in origin; some of the Roman gateways being still in good order.

With the decay of the Seleucid power, weakened by Rome and Parthia, the old influx from the desert would recommence, and an Arabic element begin to show.

Seleucid kings appointed local officers, who had Greek secretaries.

Whatever part vanity or the flattery of courtiers may have played with others, or with Alexander, it is significant that the dynasties of Alexander's various successors all claim divine honours of some sort (see Ptolemies, Seleucid Dynasty, &c.).

After two years (according to Arrian) he was killed, and his brother Tiridates, who succeeded him and maintained himself for a short time in Parthia, during the dissolution of the Seleucid empire by the attacks of Ptolemy III.

Antiochus Grypus had given his daughter in marriage to Mithradates, a king of Commagene, and the subsequent kings of Commagene (see under ANTIOCxus) claimed in consequence still to represent the Seleucid house after it had become extinct in the male line, and adopted Antiochus as the dynastic name.

In Asia Minor, Philetaerus a Greek of Tios (Tieium) in Paphlagonia, had established himself in a position of practical independence at Pergamum, and his nephew, Attalus, was the father of the line of kings who reigned in Pergamum till 1 33 - antagonistic to the Seleucid house, till in 189 they took over the Seleucid possessions west of the Taurus.

Epiphanes (176-164 B.C.) who tried to suppress Judaism by persecution (see Seleucid Dynasty) .

To the south of this high road we have among the Seleucid foundations Antioch in Pisidia (colonized with Magnesians from the Meander) and Stratonicea in Caria; in the region to the north of it the most famous Seleucid colony was Thyatira.

Bactria became a province of the Macedonian empire, and soon came under the rule of Seleucus, king of Asia (see Seleucid Dynasty and Hellenism).

A large body of his troops remained in Bactria; and, in the partition of the empire which followed Alexander's death in 323 B.C., Bactria and India eventually fell to Seleucus Nicator, the founder of the Syrian monarchy (see Seleucid).

The weakness of Persian rule was disclosed by the expedition of Cyrus and the Ten Thousand Greeks, 402 B.C.; and in the following century Asia Minor was invaded by Alexander the Great, 334 B.C. (See Greece; Persia; Ionia.) The wars which followed the death of Alexander eventually gave Asia Minor to Seleucus, but none of the Seleucid kings was able to establish his rule over the whole peninsula.

We shall not be astonished to find, therefore, in the Hellenistic states of Asia a population of peasants who seem to have been in a condition of hereditary subjection and adherent to the glebe on the great estates of the Seleucid kings (see Rostowtzew in Lehmann's Beitrdge zur alten Geschichte, ii.).

Some 4 centuries later in 168 B.C.E., when Jews regained their independence from their Seleucid rulers, internal conflict became more acute.

During the Hellenistic period, the city came under the rule of the Ptolemaic and Seleucid Kingdoms and the Kingdom of Pergamum.

The Ptolemaic and Seleucid kings appointed local officers, who had Greek secretaries.

Persis remained a part of the Seleucid empire down to Antiochus IV.