| Antiochus III
- an-tī´o-kus International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
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| (Μέγας,
Mégas,
“The Great,” mentioned in 1 Macc 1:10; 8:6-8): Son of Seleucus
Kallinikos; succeeded to the throne of Syria in 222 bc; put to death his
general, Hermeas, and then led an army against Egypt. Theodotus
surrendered to him Tyre, Ptolemais and his naval fleet. Rhodes and
Cyzicus, as well as Byzantium and Aetolia, desired peace, but Antiochus
declined to accept their terms. He renewed the war, but was defeated at
Raphia in 217, and was obliged to give up Phoenicia and Coelesyria;
Seleucia, however, he retained. He undertook to bring under his sway
again all the territory of the Far East. His expedition against Bactria
and Parthia gained for him the surname of “The Great.” In 209 he carried
away the treasure of the goddess Aine in Ecbatana, defeated the
Parthians, and in 208 marched against the Bactrians. Later he made a
treaty with an Indian rajah, and then returned to the West by way of
Arachosia and Carmania, forcing the Gerraean Arabs to furnish him with
frankincense, myrrh and silver. Then he took Ephesus, which he made his
headquarters. In 196 he had crossed the Hellespont and rebuilt
Lysimachia. Hannibal visited Antiochus in Ephesus the next year and
became one of the king's advisers. He sought the friendship also of
Eumenes of Pergamum, but without success. Rome now requested the king
not to interfere in Europe, or to recognize the right of the Romans to
protect the Greeks in Asia. A war broke out in 192, and Antiochus was
persuaded to come to Greece. The Aetolians elected him their general,
who asked the Acheans to remain neutral. But the patriotic Philopoemen
decided that an alliance with Rome was to be preferred. Antiochus first
captured Calchis; then succeeded in gaining a footing in Boeotia, and
later made an effort to get possession of Thessaly, but retired on the
approach of the Macedonian army. In 191 the Romans made a formal
declaration of war on Antiochus, who, being at that time in Acarnania,
returned to Calchis, and finally sailed back to Ephesus. The Romans
regained possession of Boeotia, Euboea and Sestus; but Polyxenidas
defeated the Roman fleet near Samos, which island, together with Cyme
and Phocaea, fell into the hands of Antiochus. The victorious
Polyxenidas, however, soon sustained a crushing defeat at the hands of
the Romans, and Antiochus abandoned Lysimachia, leaving an open road to
Asia to the Romans. He was finally defeated at Magnesia and sent word to
Scipio, who was at Sardis, that he was willing to make peace; but Scipio
ordered him to send envoys to Rome. A decision was reached in 189; the
Asiatic monarch was obliged to renounce everything on the Roman side of
the Taurus; give up all his ships of war but ten and pay 15,000 talents
to Rome, and 500 to Eumenes. Antiochus marched against the revolted
Armenians in 187. In order to replenish his exhausted treasury, he
attempted to plunder a temple and both he and his soldiers were slain by
the Elymeans. Literature Polyb. v.40.21; Livy xxxi.14; xxxiii. 19ff; Josephus, Ant, XII; Heyden, Res ab Ant; Babelon, Rois de Syrie, 77-86; Dan_11:10-19; Tetzlaff, De Antiochi III Magni rebus gestis (Münster, 1874). |
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Taken from: International Standard Bible Encyclopedia by James Orr, M.A., D.D., General Editor |
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