Seleucid Empire

The Seleucid Empire (323BC – 63BC) was the largest successor state to Alexander the Great's empire. It spanned the region from modern-day Israel to the Indus River Valley, and as far north as Turkmenistan. Hellenistic culture was heavily preserved in the Seleucid empire, leading to an interesting mix of Greek mythology and Zoroastrianism as the main religions of the empire.

List of Seleucid emperors

This list was compiled by French Christian historian Nicolas Lenglet Dufresnoy in his book Tablettes chronologiques de l'histoire universelle (1745) as the Kings of Syria. It does not include data that was found after the cuneiform language was rediscovered in the 19th century.

#	Emperor	Start	Duration	Notes
1	Seleucus [Nicator]	312 BC	31	Awarded satrapy of Babylon, 321 BC, regained in 312 BC; 301 BC Syria added to domain, founded Antioch same year; captured in 285 BC Demetrius (son of Antigonus) who was biographized in Plutarch's Lives; was assassinated 281 BC.
2	Antiochus Soter	281 BC	20	Half-Persian; called Soter (savior) for defeating Gauls in Asia Minor after 278 BC.
3	Antiochus II Theos	261 BC	15	Second son of Antiochus Soter; son of Stratonice, Macedonian daughter of Demetrius. In 250 BC, divorced his first wife and married Egyptian king Ptolemy III's daughter Berenice; by 246 BC, left her and his infant son to return to his first wife Laodice in Asia Minor, who poisoned him and proclaimed her son Seleucus II Callinicus king, while her partisans captured Berenice and her son back in Antioch.
4	Seleucus II Callinicus	246 BC	20
5	Seleucus III Ceraunos	226 BC	3
6	Antiochus III The Great	223 BC	37
7	Seleucus IV Philopator	186 BC	11	Seleucus IV killed in 175 BC
8	Antiochus IV Epiphanes	175 BC	12	Conquered Egypt in 169 BC; despoiled Jewish temple in Jerusalem
9	Antiochus V Eupator	163 BC	2	Under his guardian Lysias
10	Demetrius Soter	161 BC	11	Attacked Israel; later made a league with Jonathan against his successor
11	Alexander Bala	150 BC	5
12	Demetrius II Nicator	145 BC	1
13	Antiochus, son of Bala	144 BC	2
14	Diodotus Tryphon	142 BC	4
15	Antiochus VII Sidetes	138 BC	9
12	Demetrius II Nicator	130 BC	4	Restored
16	Alexander Zabynas	128 BC	-	The tyrant
17	Seleucus V	126 BC	1
18	Antiochus VIII Grypus	125 BC	12
19	Antiochus IX from Cyzicus	113 BC	18
20	Seleucus VI	96 BC	2	Son of Grypus
21	Antiochus X	94 BC	1	Son of Cyzicus (sic)
	Antíoco XI	93 BC		not included as king
22	Phillip, Demetrius III, Antiochus XII	92 BC		in war
23	Tigranes	83 BC	18	66 BC: Tigranes was defeated by the Romans
24	Antiochus XII	69 BC

In 63 BC, Syria becomes a Roman province.

Bibliography

• "A General Chronological Table of the Holy Bible" (1904). The Popular and Critical Bible Encyclopaedia and Scriptural Dictonary ed. Fallows, Rev. Samuel (Chicago: Howard-Severance, 1920), vol. 3, app. p. 2-37.
• Hellenistic Greek rule of Syria occurred between 323 BC and 66 BC. "Tigranes" (1911). Encyclopedia Britannica (New York: Encyclopædia Britannica), vol. 26, p. 969.
• 1st Maccabees Biblical book (Apocrypha)

External links

• Lendering, Jona (2018). "The Seleucid Empire". Livius.org website, ed. rev. from 1999 1st ed.