Alexanders Heirs

by Edward M. Anson

  Lysimachus, like his predecessors at the apex of their power, was due to suffer an eclipse. Here, the coming disaster was one of his own making, a by-product of

  polygamy. Lysimachus’ eldest son Agathocles was the grandson of that Antipater

  who had been regent of Macedonia during Alexander the Great’s expedition to

  Asia. As part of the ever-changing alliances often cemented, however briefly, by

  marriage, Lysimachus had married, in addition to his son Agathocles’ mother

  Nicaea, Ptolemy’s daughter Arsinoë, and by her had three sons.15 With his mind

  poisoned against his eldest son by his new wife, he had Agathocles executed for

  treason (Just. 17.1.4; [Memnon] FGrH 434 F-5.6; Str. 13.4.1; Paus. 1.10.1; Landucci Gattinoni 1992: 164–5). Of course, the charges may have been true (Carney 2013:

  43–4). Those who had supported the young man were massacred. This led to an

  exodus of family members and supporters. These included Lysandra, Agathocles’

  wife, and her brother Ptolemy Ceraunus, who had fled to Lysimachus about the

  time his father Ptolemy Soter had set him aside for his younger half-brother, also named Ptolemy, in 284. It was this son Ptolemy, so-called Philadelphus, who did

  succeed to the throne on the death of his father in 282 ([Euseb. Chron.] FGrH

  260 F-2.3). Most of those fleeing Lysimachus fled to Seleucus (Just. 17.1.6–7),

  including Lysandra and Ceraunus. Seleucus, with the desertion of many of his

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  rival’s erstwhile military allies (among these was Philetaerus, who was in charge of the fortress at Pergamon and its treasury. which contained 9000 talents), decided the time had come for a reckoning with Lysimachus (Str. 13.4.1; Paus. 1.8.1). In the

  winter of 282/81, Seleucus invaded Lysimachus’ possessions in Asia Minor.

  The forces of the two aged dynasts – Seleucus was 77, Lysimachus 74 (Just. 17.1.10) –

  met at Corupedium early in 281. In a battle about which virtual y nothing is known due to a lack of sources, Lysimachus met his death (Just. 17.2.1; App. Syr. 62).

  According to Memnon of Heracleia’s History of Heracleia Pontica ( FGrH 434 F-5.7), Lysimachus was killed by a javelin thrown by Malacon, a Heracleian soldier serving under Seleucus. Seleucus was the last of those generals who had served the great

  Alexander. He was now not only the only surviving Diadoch, but held more power

  and territory than any of his rivals had at any time in this turbulent period. This preeminence, however, lasted but seven months ([Babylonian King List] BM 35603

  Obv. 8; Just. 17.2.4). In the summer of 281, leaving Asia in the hands of his son Antiochus, Seleucus crossed the Hellespont to take possession of Lysimachus’

  European holdings as spear-won land ([Memnon] FGrH 434 F-8.1; cf. Just. 17.2.5).

  In his homeland for the first time in over fifty years, on the verge of becoming the new king of Macedonia and uniting the vast majority of Alexander the Great’s

  former empire, he was murdered by the young man whom he had offered sanctuary,

  Ceraunus. Like so many others in the Diadoch period, he saw his opportunity to

  become a player and he took it. He fled to Lysimacheia and emerged with a diadem, the new, self-proclaimed king of Macedonia ( FGrH 434 F-8.3). He would rule until his death at the hands of the Celts in 279, after which in one of those reversal of fortunes that permeate the period and so enthralled Diodorus of Sicily, Antigonus, the son of Demetrius, became the founder of a new line of Macedonian rulers, the

  Antigonids, who would rule Macedonia until its fall to the power of Rome. With

  the passing of Seleucus, the last of the great marshals was dead, and with his death the age of the Diadochs came to a close.

  Chronology from 306 to 281

  The year 306 concluded with the failed invasion of Egypt by Antigonus and

  Demetrius in the late fal . The new campaign year began with the start of Demetrius’

  epic siege of Rhodes (Diod. 20.81.1–2). Given the context in Diodorus, it is clear that the siege began in the spring of 305. This siege is dated by the Parian Marble ( FGrH 239 B 23) in the archon year 305/4, as is Ptolemy’s assumption of a diadem.

  It is likely, however, that the siege began in the previous archon year, or in the spring of 305, and is only being noted as continuing in this year. All of the previous year’s activities cannot be read on the stone. Since the siege lasted a year (Diod. 20.100.1), and Ptolemy only took the diadem after the siege’s end (Gruen 1985: 257–8), 304

  was the year of the siege’s end and the assumption of a crown by Ptolemy. Eusebius’

  Chronica ( FGrH 260 F-2.2) also places Ptolemy’s regnal proclamation in 305/4. The year 304 is noted as an Olympic year (Diod. 20.91.1), and begins with Demetrius

  The End of the Diadochi

  185

  still besieging Rhodes. This year ended with the relief of Cassander’s siege of Athens (Plut. Demetr. 23.1), and Demetrius’ campaigning in northern Greece (Diod.

  20.100.5–6). That Diodorus’ year 304/3 is in actuality 304 is confirmed by that

  author’s listing of the death of Eumelus, the king of Bosporus, in his sixth year of rule (20.100.7). He came to the throne in 310 (Diod. 20.24.4–5). Moreover, Diodorus includes in this year Demetrius’ acquisition of Chalcis, dated by the Parian Marble in 304/3 ( FGrH 239 B 24). The year 303 begins in the spring with Demetrius’ invasion of the Peloponnesus (Diod. 20.102.1; Plut. Demetr. 25.1), and ends with him still in the Peloponnesus (Diod. 20.103.7). It is also in this year that Diodorus (20.104–5) places Cleonymus’ expedition to Tarentum (Oakley 2005: 48–50) and

  the Spartan adventurer’s capture of Corcyra (Diod. 20.104.4, 105.3).

  It is unclear where Demetrius spent the winter of 303/2.Diodorus makes no

  mention of winter quarters or any indication of the season. It would appear that

  the son of Antigonus may have wintered in Corinth. Diodorus’ archon year 302/1

  (20.106.1) is clearly the solar year 302. Early in this year (302), having over the winter summoned representatives from the Greek cities to join him in Corinth, he

  oversaw the creation of a new Hellenic League (Plut. Demetr. 25.4). It is possible that Demetrius also presided over the Isthmian Games in 302, but this is nowhere

  stated. Clear evidence places these events in the spring of 302, when the games

  were held (Gardiner 1910: 65). Diodorus notes in this same year Cassander’s

  failed attempt to reach an accord with Antigonus, followed by his alliance with

  Lysimachus, and the latter’s subsequent invasion of Asia (20.106.1–107.1).

  Lysimachus’ Asian expedition is dated by the Marble ( FGrH 239 B 25) in the archon year 303/2.When Antigonus summoned Demetrius back to Asia, the latter

  was in the midst of a campaign against Cassander in Thessaly. Demetrius imme-

  diately came to terms with the Macedonian ruler (Diod. 20.111.2). This agreement

  is dated by the Parian Marble in the archon year 302/1 ( FGrH 239 B 26). The year 302 ends with the various parties entering into winter quarters (Diod. 20.109.2,

  111.3, 112.2, 113.3). The Battle of Ipsus occurred in the late spring of the next year.

  With Diodorus’ extant narrative ending with the events leading up to the Battle

  of Ipsus, and the Parian Marble ceasing to record events after the archon year

  299/98, with the last two entries, that for 302/1 and 299/98 being so fragmentary as to supply little useful information, deducing the chronology of the years 301 to 281

  becomes much more complicated. Our sources for this information are a number

  of late chronographic works, primarily Eusebius of Caesarea’s fourth-century

  Chronica, perhaps, based on a work by Porphyry of Tyre written a century earlier,16

  and occasional dating
references in inscriptions, papyri, and in various other

  literary sources, such as Plutarch’s biographies of Demetrius and Pyrrhus.

  Eusebius ([Porphyry] FGrH 260) unfortunately survives primarily in an

  Armenian text, the translation from the original Greek text likely dating from the sixth century, but the oldest surviving manuscript from the twelfth or thirteenth.

  While its accuracy has been questioned, it has also been described as mostly reliable (see Mosshammer 1979 for a full discussion). Eusebius ( FGrH 260 F-3.4) dates Cassander’s death in 298/97, in the third year of the 120th Olympiad. The date of

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  Cassander’s death in Eusebius is supported by an anonymous chronicle ( P. Oxy.

  2082 = FGrH 257a F-3) which places the death in the late spring of 297. Demetrius’

  return to Athens and the overthrow of the tyranny can be dated in 294 by an

  Athenian inscription dated in March/April 294 ( IG II2 646, lines 1–5). Cassander’s heirs, Philip first, followed by Alexander and Antipater combined, “ruled for three years and six months,” lasting into “the third year of the 121st Olympiad” ( FGrH

  260 F-3.5). Demetrius reigned as king of Macedonia for six years, after his murder of Alexander V, from “the fourth year of the 121st Olympiad” (294/93) until “the

  first year of the 123rd Olympiad” (288/87) ( FGrH 260 F-3.5–6). The likelihood is that he became king of Macedonia in the fall of 294 and was expelled from that

  nation in the fall of 288 (see Wheatley 1997: 21–2 and n. 13). Much of this dating relies on the subsequent revolt of the Athenians from his authority. The time of

  the revolt is fairly well fixed. In an Athenian decree referenced by Plutarch ( Mor.

  851E), it is noted that the Athenian politician and orator, Demosthenes’ nephew

  Demochares, left Athens on the takeover of the city by Demetrius, and was recalled by the Athenians in 288/87. This last event clearly took place after the departure of Demetrius. Demochares was exiled and played no part in the oligarchy, i.e., that

  Poliorcetes imposed (Plut. Mor. 851 F). A number of inscriptions also attest to this time frame, and most scholars place the revolt in the spring or early summer of 287

  (Osborne 1979: 181–94; Wheatley 1997: 21–2 and n. 13; in support of 286: Shear

  1978: 21, 61–78, 82–3). Demetrius ultimately fled to Asia, where he died in 282

  (as per Wheatley 1997: 19–27). His death followed three years of house arrest in his fifty-fifth year (Plut. Demetr. 52.3). His capture by Seleucus occurred in the winter of 286/85 (Plut. Demetr. 48.1; cf. Wheatley 1997: 23).

  Demetrius was followed on the Macedonian throne by Pyrrhus and Lysimachus.

  Eusebius mistakenly states that Pyrrhus ruled the Macedonians independently for

  seven months and was then replaced in the eighth month by Lysimachus, who

  then ruled Macedonia for five years and six months, from the second year of the

  123rd Olympiad (287) until the third year of the 124th Olympiad (281) ( FGrH 260

  F-3.7–8). Plutarch ( Pyrrh. 12) makes it clear that Pyrrhus actual y ruled with Lysimachus for almost two years, from 287 to 285. Seleucus’ murder by Ptolemaeus

  Ceraunus is dated by Eusebius in the fourth year of the 124th Olympiad, or in

  281/80 ( FGrH 260 F-32.4). His murder is dated in the late summer of 281, or in his thirty-first regnal year, by the Babylonian King List (BM 35603 Obv. 7–8); Eusebius has Seleucus reigning thirty-two years ( FGrH 260 F-32.4). Seleucus’ regnal years are exactly dated by BM 41660, which relates Seleucus’ “thirtieth year” with reference to a solar eclipse (January 30, 281), as noted in the previous chapter. Ceraunus then reigned as king of Macedonia for one year and five months, from “the fourth

  year of the 124th Olympiad” (281) until “the fifth month of the first year of the 125th Olympiad” (280). The death of Ptolemy took place in 282 (for a review of the

  Egyptian evidence, see Hazzard 1987: 140, 146–7, 149–50, 154). Eusebius lists

  the Egyptian dynast as ruling as both satrap and king for forty years, beginning in the year after Arrhidaeus’ accession as Philip III and ending in 282/81 ( FGrH

  260 F-2.2–3).

  The End of the Diadochi

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  Notes

  1 Diodorus 20.53.3–4 (also Plut. Demetr. 18.2; Just. 15.2.11) states that the assumption of kingship by Ptolemy and the other Diadochs occurred shortly after the proclamation by Antigonus. These statements, however, conflict with Egyptian documents, numismatic sources (Grzybek 1990: 96–101, 171), the Parian Marble ( FGrH 239 B 23), Eusebius

  [Porphyry] ( FGrH 260 F-2.9), and Syncel us ( Chron. 321).

  2 Stanley Burstein (1978: 185) believes that Lysimachus did not official y style himself as king until after 301, and probably in 299, but see Landucci Gattinoni 1992: 132–4), who argues correctly for placing this event in 304.

  3 He is known to have married subsequently at least two more women, Lanassa (Plut.

  Pyrrh. 10.5) and Ptolemais (Plut. Demetr. 46.1).

  4 On this particular source, see the chronological section at the end of this chapter.

  5 Presumably this is a different Phoenix from another by this name who served Eumenes and later Antigonus, but became involved in the revolt of Polemaeus (Billows 1990: 424–5).

  6 This passage in Plutarch actual y says 400 elephants, but Diodorus (20.113.4) states that Seleucus arrived for the battle with 480 elephants. It has been suggested that from the original gift of 500, 480 represents the “wastage” from that time, and the 400, the loss of 80 beasts to the Cappadocian winter (Bar-Kochva 1976: 76–7; Mehl 1986: 201–2;

  Landuci Gattinoni 1992: 150), which seems excessive. The problem may be no more

  than a scribal error.

  7 Demetrius maintained this alliance until 286 (Merker 1970: 142).

  8 This particular mission is dated in the archonship of Euctemon (299/98) ( IG II2 657

  lines 7–14).

  9 The best discussion of the date remains that of Ferguson (1929: 21–4). Cassander’s death is described by Eusebius ( FGrH 260 F-3.4) and Syncel us (265A) as a wasting disease, but Pausanias (9.7.2) relates that he died of “dropsy” and that his body was filled with worms.

  10 While no source speaks of such a division, later events suggest it. When Alexander later requested help from Pyrrhus and Demetrius against his brother, he was apparently

  located in the western part of Macedonia, and Antipater, forming an alliance with Lysimachus, in the east (Plut. Pyrrh. 6.4–5).

  11 The manuscript (Plut. Pyrrh. 6.5) reads Stymphaea, which was an alternate name for Tymphaea (Arr. Anab. 1.7.5; Diod. 17.57.2).

  12 Pausanias says that it was Agathocles, Lysimachus’ eldest son, who was taken captive.

  13 While the chronographers make Demetrius’ first year as king 293/92 ( FGrH 260 F-3.4), Habicht (1979: 21; cf. Wheatley 1997: 22), uses the evidence of Athenian decrees to arrive at the correct date of 294.

  14 Shear (1978: 52–3) argues for a date in 286, but this is too late. See Wheatley (1997: 21

  n. 12).

  15 On Arsinoë ’s career, see Carney 2013.

  16 Felix Jacoby accepted this identification and includes this material from Eusebius in his fragments of Porphyry (1962: 854–63). The assumption of this dependency has

  been challenged (Croke 1983; cf. Burgess 2013).

  7

  Epilogue: The New World

  “For how men to whose rapacity neither sea nor mountain nor uninhabitable

  desert sets a limit, men to whose inordinate desires the boundaries which

  separate Europe and Asia put no stop, can remain content with what they

  have … it is impossible to say. They are perpetual y at war, because plots and jealousies are parts of their natures, and they treat the two words, war and peace, like current coins using whichever happens to be for their advantag
e…”

  (Perrin 1968 [1920]: 379)

  These men were truly Alexander’s Successors, not just because they were

  the principal contenders after his death, but because they exhibited many of his

  qualities. As Plutarch indicates in the epigraph to this chapter, like Alexander

  the Great, these men were conquerors first and foremost. Peace and quiet were

  virtual y unknown to them. After the “unpleasantness” on the Hyphasis, where

  Alexander’s troops and their commanders made it very clear that they did not

  wish to conquer India, Alexander returned to Babylon, where he planned a

  campaign of conquest all the way to the Pil ars of Heracles. In spite of recent

  attempts to limit the extent of Alexander’s ambition (Heckel 2003: 147–74; 2009: 49; Howe and Müller 2012: 21–38), the words of Arrian ( Anab. 7.1.4) still ring true:

  “Alexander had no small or mean conceptions, nor would ever have remained

  contented with any of his possessions so far, not even if he had added Europe to

  Asia, and the Britannic islands to Europe.” While Alexander was waiting to embark on his western adventure, he did not take this time to examine his overal

  administrative structure; instead he engaged in symposia with his friends.

  The extent of his involvement in his empire was to impose or depose representa-

  tives of his authority. His Successors, likewise, constantly prepared new adventures.

  Alexander’s Heirs: The Age of the Successors, First Edition. Edward M. Anson.

  © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2014 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

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  It is curious that, with the exception of the occasional foray into the Ionian Sea or across Libya, most of the struggle was over Alexander’s empire, not the pursuit of new worlds to conquer.

  With respect to Alexander’s conquests, Ian Worthington (1999: 53) has asked