Antigoneia (Syria)

Antigonia
Antigonia
Shown within Turkey
LocationTurkey
RegionHatay Province
Coordinates36°15′14.1″N 36°12′18.6″E / 36.253917°N 36.205167°E / 36.253917; 36.205167

Antigoneia (Greek: Αντιγόνεια, also transliterated as Antigonea and Antigonia) was a Hellenistic city founded by Antigonus I Monophthalmus in 307 BC on the Orontes. Established as a joint capital of his empire alongside Celaenae in Anatolia, Antigoneia occupied a strategically important position on trade routes. A large settlement with a perimeter of seventy stades (7.5 miles (12.1 km)) and a population well over 20,000, Antigoneia was the site of several important events of Antigonus's reign.

However, following Antigonus's death in the 301 BC Battle of Ipsus, Antigoneia's prominence abruptly ended, as his rival Seleucus I Nicator took control of the region. Seleucus ensured Antigoneia's erasure by transferring its population to his own foundations at Seleucia Pieria and Antioch; he is alleged to have destroyed the city itself, but one source attests that it existed as late as 53 BC. Its location is unknown.

Description

Background

The death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC precipitated the division of the territories he had conquered amongst his leading generals, termed Diadochi.[1] A series of wars soon broke out among them; a peace treaty signed in late 311 recognised the 71-year-old diadochos Antigonus I Monophthalmus as ruler of Anatolia (then called "Asia"), in addition to Syria and Palestine. His authority over the region was however not recognised by his rival Seleucus,[2] who ruled the eastern provinces of the Macedonian Empire up to Mesopotamia.[3]

The initial primary city of Antigonus's territories was Celaenae in Phrygia, situated at the crossroads of east-west and north-south roads and thus very suitable to control Anatolia. In 306, he founded Antigoneia on the Orontes river to take on a similar position for his Syrian territories.[4] Like Celaenae, Antigoneia's location was strategically suitable, as it controlled the Orontes valley and thus the main trade routes from Syria to Anatolia, to Palestine, and to Mesopotamia and the east.[5] Antigonus had previously, in around 314 BC, founded a port city around the future site of Seleucia Pieria nearby; his naming of Antigoneia however indicates that he intended it to take precedence.[6] The historian Richard Billows emphasises that Antigoneia did not replace Celaenae as a sole capital city—that designation being anachronistically modern—but instead functioned as an administrative centre for Antigonus's eastern territories; Billows compares the arrangement to the later Seleucid Empire's dual use of Antioch and Seleucia as administrative centres.[5]

Zenith

The historian Diodorus Siculus reports that Antigoneia had a perimeter of seventy stades (7.5 miles (12.1 km)).[5] Billows estimates its Greco-Macedonian population at 20,000, not including indigenous Asians or slaves.[7] The location of the city has been the subject of some debate. A French military officer named Paul Jacquot, writing in 1931, identified a potential location on the left bank of the Orontes;[8] endorsed by the later historians Glanville Downey and Getzel Cohen, this site is located on a 3-by-4-kilometre (1.9 by 2.5 mi) plateau 8 kilometres (5.0 mi) northeast of Antioch. Bounded on all sides by water—the Lake of Antioch to the north, the Orontes to the east and south, and the Kara Su river to the west—the site was called "admirably suited for defense" by Downey.[9] However, a recent study by the archaeologist Andrea U. De Giorgi argues that the absence of archaeological evidence means this plateau can no longer be identified as the site of Antigoneia.[10]

Billows has deduced, from later figures of Antioch's foundation, that Athens deputised a draft of settlers for Antigoneia.[11] It has been suggested that a mint was founded there, but this is considered unlikely.[12] Events that took place there included: the staged acclamation, by the senior advisor Aristodemus of Miletus, of Antigonus as king, and his subsequent coronation;[13] the burial of Antigonus's younger son Philip in autumn 306, shortly before Antigonus led forth a strong army to invade Egypt;[14] and a grand festival planned for 302, intended to include theatre and sporting competitions, which was abruptly cancelled when the diadochus Lysimachus invaded Phrygia. After compensating the crestfallen entrants with a total of 200 talents, Antigonus set out to confront Lysimachus and his ally Seleucus,[15] but they defeated his army and killed him at the decisive Battle of Ipsus in 301 BC.[16]

Fall

After Ipsus, Antigonus's territories were divided between Lysimachus and Seleucus. Antigoneia and the rest of Syria fell to Seleucus, who decided like his predecessor to secure control over the important region through settlement foundation.[17] It was natural that occupying Antigoneia would not fully suit his purposes—founding a new city and destroying the previous foundation would be far more prestigious. Seleucus may have considered his defeated enemy's choice of location to his own at Antioch, which had a superior water supply, was situated in more fertile lands, and was closer to the sea.[18] Legends of Antioch's foundation record that in 300 BC Seleucus performed a sacrifice at Antigoneia for a sign from Zeus as to whether he should occupy and change the city's name, or found a replacement; an eagle carried the sacrificial meat to Antioch's, indicating the latter.[19]

According to Cohen, the ancient historians Strabo, Libanius, and John Malalas "indicate that Seleucus destroyed or depopulated Antigoneia in order to populate Antioch."[20] Libanius suggests that the very stones used to build Antigoneia were transported to help build Antioch; this is unlikely, as the latter was located at a considerable distance and had stone quarries nearby.[10] Many of Antigoneia's population were likely relocated to Seleucia Pieria, which Seleucus intended to be his western capital, although the Antiochene writers Libanius and Malalas omit this information,[21] preferring to only state that many were settled at Antioch.[22] This displacement included 5,300 Athenian and Macedonian colonists, who must have come from Antigoneia.[23]

Although Diodorus Siculus reports that Antigoneia was destroyed by Seleucus, the later Roman historian Cassius Dio records that it still existed during the early Roman–Parthian Wars in 53 BC. Dio states that the Parthians were unable to capture the settlement because of the density of its surrounding woods.[10] Cohen suggests three theories to explain Antigoneia's continued existence: it was indeed destroyed but then later rebuilt; it was only partially destroyed; or it was symbolically destroyed as an independent city but administratively incorporated as a district of Antioch.[24]

References

  1. ^ De Giorgi & Eger 2021, pp. 15–17.
  2. ^ Billows 1990, pp. 132–134.
  3. ^ De Giorgi & Eger 2021, pp. 15–16; Cohen 2006, p. 24.
  4. ^ Billows 1990, pp. 241–242.
  5. ^ a b c Billows 1990, p. 242.
  6. ^ Downey 2015, p. 60.
  7. ^ Billows 1990, p. 305.
  8. ^ De Giorgi & Eger 2021, p. 496.
  9. ^ Cohen 2006, pp. 76–77; Downey 2015, pp. 60–61.
  10. ^ a b c De Giorgi 2016, p. 51.
  11. ^ Billows 1990, p. 227.
  12. ^ Cohen 2006, pp. 76–77.
  13. ^ Billows 1990, p. 157.
  14. ^ Billows 1990, pp. 161–162.
  15. ^ Billows 1990, pp. 176–177, 312–313.
  16. ^ Billows 1990, p. 184.
  17. ^ Downey 2015, pp. 61–62.
  18. ^ Downey 2015, pp. 62–63.
  19. ^ Cohen 2006, pp. 80–81; Downey 2015, pp. 56–57.
  20. ^ Cohen 2006, p. 77.
  21. ^ Downey 2015, pp. 57–59.
  22. ^ Cohen 2006, pp. 76–78.
  23. ^ Billows 1990, p. 304.
  24. ^ Cohen 2006, p. 78.

Sources

  • Billows, Richard (1990). Antigonos the One-Eyed and the Creation of the Hellenic State. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-5202-0880-3.
  • Cohen, Getzel (2006). The Hellenistic Settlements in Syria, the Red Sea Basin, and North Africa. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-5202-4148-0. JSTOR 10.1525/j.ctt1pnd22.
  • De Giorgi, Andrea U. (2016). Ancient Antioch: From the Seleucid Era to the Islamic Conquest (1st ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-3164-4263-0.
  • De Giorgi, Andrea U.; Eger, A. Asa (2021). Antioch: A History. London: Routledge. ISBN 978-1-3157-2760-8.
  • Downey, Glanville (2015) [1961]. A History of Antioch in Syria: From Seleucus to the Arab Conquest. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-1-4008-7773-7.
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