Culture and Ideology under the Seleukids

Unframing a Dynasty

Eva Anagnostou-Laoutides, Stefan Pfeiffer, Eva Anagnostou-Laoutides, Stefan Pfeiffer

• Publisher: De Gruyter
• Year: 2022
• Print ISBN: 9783110755572
• eBook ISBN: 9783110755688
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Storia
• Subtopic: Storia dell'arte antica

The volume offers a timely (re-)appraisal of Seleukid cultural dynamics. While the engagement of Seleukid kings with local populations and the issue of "Hellenization" are still debated, a movement away from the Greco-centric approach to the study of the sources has gained pace. Increasingly textual sources are read alongside archaeological and numismatic evidence, and relevant near-eastern records are consulted.
Our study of Seleukid kingship adheres to two game-changing principles: 1. We are not interested in judging the Seleukids as "strong" or "weak" whether in their interactions with other Hellenistic kingdoms or with the populations they ruled. 2. While appreciating the value of the social imaginaries approach (Stavrianopoulou, 2013), we argue that the use of ethnic identity in antiquity remains problematic.
Through a pluralistic approach, in line with the complex cultural considerations that informed Seleukid royal agendas, we examine the concept of kingship and its gender aspects; tensions between centre and periphery; the level of "acculturation" intended and achieved under the Seleukids; the Seleukid-Ptolemaic interrelations. As rulers of a multi-cultural empire, the Seleukids were deeply aware of cultural politics.

I Representations and Perceptions: Ideology and the Beginnings of a Monarchy

The Seleukid Royal Family as a Reigning Triad

Alex McAuley

Introduction

At least some members of the Seleukid royal family must have been rankled by the extravagant events of 28 March 268 BCE that took place just south-west of Babylon. It was then that Antiochos I commemorated laying the foundations of the Ezida Temple in Borsippa by deposing what would later be called the Antiochos I Cylinder among the bricks that he himself had allegedly brought from Syria.¹ The eighteen year-old man who would go on to become Antiochos II, along with his sisters Stratonike and Apama, would have perhaps bristled at a simple fact that is all too easily overlooked in the analysis of this complex and multivalent text: they were not mentioned as being members of the royal family. As has been noted, it is curious that the Cylinder’s closing prayer to Nabu only asked good fate for Antiochos (I), his son Seleukos, and his wife Stratonike.² The rest of the king’s family – these three other children who were alive at the time of the cylinder’s composition and deposition – are conspicuously absent from this eminently symbolic act of public religious dedication.³ And this is neither the first nor last ancient testimonium in which the Seleukids present themselves as an artificially narrowed family. What lies behind this clearly constructed image that appears though various media in equally varied cultural contexts?

This chapter aims to pull at the thread that was first pointed out by Kyra Nourse in 2002 and then most recently elaborated by Elizabeth Carney in 2011, when in the context of her analysis of royal women in the Hellenistic dynasties Nourse noted that

The Seleucids generated an image of dynastic solidarity, one that cantered on the current royal couple and the heir… Instead of a long line of male rulers, there was the image of the current nuclear family, artificially narrowed to illustrate the succession plan.⁴

While Nourse and Carney identified this tendency in the context of discussions of female royal influence, I aim to broaden the discussion by putting this in its wider dynastic context. This artificially narrowed nuclear family that appears in representations of Seleukid monarchy is what I label here the “Reigning Triad”, comprised of the three figures of king/husband, queen/wife, and heir/son. I argue that this device of the reigning triad was formulated by the Seleukids in order to delineate a clear path of succession from the first (Seleukos I) to the second generation (Antiochos I) of the dynasty. In the process, the empire that was won by Seleukos’ individual military might and charisma was transformed into a familial realm whose inheritance was mediated and legitimized over subsequent generations by the image of the reigning triad. Despite the difficulty inherent in steering this dynastic chariot team, as it were, I argue that the image of the reigning triad nevertheless remained prominent in the dynastic ideology and practices of subsequent generations of the Seleukids themselves, while also being imitated by the client dynasties of the kingdom. To develop this argumentation, we shall begin by examining the emergence of the image in the later reign of Seleukos I and its dynastic ramifications, before turning to its evolution from the reign of Antiochos I to Antiochos III. Finally, we shall identify some subsequent echoes of the reigning triad before considering this narrow family unit in the context of previous royal traditions and the unique milieu of the Seleukid Empire to hazard a guess at its provenance.

The Creation of Tradition: Seleukos I and Antiochos I

The notion that the Seleukid Empire was a familial space held together by a tightly-knit bond among its members can be seen as early as in the aftermath of Seleukos’ victory over Antigonos Monophthalmos in 301 BCE.⁵ The victorious king destroyed Antigonos’ eponymous city of Antigoneia in northern Syria and shortly thereafter founded the four cities that would later come to be known as the Syrian tetrapolis: Antioch near Daphne, Seleukeia in Pieria, Apameia, and Laodikeia.⁶ It is not difficult to see the royal ideology embedded in the names of these cities, as Strabo relates that Seleukeia of course bears his own name, Antioch was named after Nikator’s father, Apameia after his wife Apama, and Laodikeia after his mother.⁷ On the surface the image is clear: this is meant to be a physical testament to the unity and strength of the king, his parents, and the queen, each of which complement and reinforce one another to create this critically-placed strategic stronghold. But there are also three double entendres embedded in the names of Antioch and Laodikeia that also project the unity of the royal family into the next generation: beyond his father, Antioch also evokes his eldest son by Apama, Antiochos, and Laodikeia similarly brings to mind the couple’s daughter Laodike, both of which were in turn named after their grandparents, while Apameia could equally glorify the other daughter the couple possibly produced named Apama after her mother.⁸ The Syrian tetrapolis is thus not just a monumental commemoration of the dynasty’s founder and his wife, but rather a polyvalent image of the family’s unity into the next generation as well. It is telling that even in the tumultuous aftermath of Ipsos when the Empire was still a shaky and uncertain endeavor, from its inception it is understood as a fami...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Abbreviations
• Introduction Un-Framing Seleukid Ideology
• I Representations and Perceptions: Ideology and the Beginnings of a Monarchy
• II Political Culture: A Contested Monarchy
• III Local Ideology: The Babylonian Tradition and Greek Culture
• IV Cultural Interdependencies: Empires and Ideologies in Dialogue
• Notes on Contributors (in alphabetical order)
• Index