The House of Seleucus

This two-volume 1902 work covers the rise and fall of the Seleucid dynasty, Hellenistic rulers of an eastern empire.

Edwyn Robert Bevan (Author)

9781108082761, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 12 November 2015

360 pages, 4 b/w illus. 1 map
21.7 x 14 x 2 cm, 0.5 kg

Edwyn Bevan (1870–1943) remarks in his preface to this two-volume work of 1902 that there is 'much to discourage an attempt to write a history of the Seleucid dynasty', notably 'how often the narrative must halt for deficiency of materials'. However, Bevan, a scholar of early Christianity as well as of the Hellenistic period, pulls together written and archaeological sources to present an account of the creation of an eastern empire by Seleucus, one of the successors of Alexander the Great. Beginning with an account of Hellenism in the east, Bevan describes the conflict between the generals after Alexander's death, and the complexity of the events which led Seleucus from governorship in Babylon to exile, and to the eventual conquest of an empire which spread from the Aegean Sea to the borders of India. Volume 2 continues until the disintegration of the dynasty in the last century BCE.

16. Achaeus
17. The reconquest of the east
18. The conquest of Palestine
19. The advance of the west
20. The war in Greece
21. The war in Asia
22. The interval of peace
23. Antiochus IV and the conquest of Egypt
24. Antiochus the god manifest
25. Antiochus and the Jews
26. Antiochus V Eupator
27. Demetrius the saviour
28. Alexander I and the Ptolemaic ascendancy
29. The Cretan tyranny
30. Antiochus Sidetes
31. The last convulsions
32. Government, court, and army
Appendices
Index.

Subject Areas: Ancient history: to c 500 CE [HBLA]