Philip II and Alexander the Great: Father and Son ... - Historia Antigua

280 NOTES TO PAGES 120–123
author highlights Demetrius’s “vengeance” against Cassander’s family:
(Demetrius addresses the army) Cassandrum . . . , extinctorem regiae domus,
non feminis, non pueris pepercisse nec cessasse, quoad omnem stirpem
regiae subolis deleret. Horum scelerum ultionem, quia nequisset ab ipso
Cassandro exigere, ad liberos eius translatam. Quamobrem etiam
Philippum Alexandrumque, si quis manium sensus est, non interfectores
suos ac stirpis suae, sed ultores eorum Macedoniae regnum tenere malle.
Per haec mitigato populo rex Macedoniae appellatur. See also Plut. Demetr.
37.2–4, describing Demetrius’ accession to the Macedonian throne. Plutarch
omits any explicit reference to Demetrius’ role as “avenger,” but
accuses Cassander of having committed serious abuses against Alexander,
even after the latter’s death (on this Plutarch passage, see Landucci
Gattinoni 2003a: 169–84).
Chapter 12
1. Paradoxically, the enormous wealth of Egypt kept it from being
annexed sooner that it was: Cic. De Rege Alexandrino, esp. FF 1–6. For a
recent commentary on the fragments see Crawford 1994: 44–57.
2. For the decline in Ptolemaic international status and the shift in
the balance of power that followed the premature death of Ptolemy IV, see
Eckstein 2006: 104–16.
3. For example, in 163 B.C. the Roman Senate supported the partition
of Ptolemaic rule between Ptolemy VI Philometor and his younger brother
Ptolemy VIII Physcon, Pol. 31.10.
4. Ptolemaic Egypt was annexed by Octavian in 30 B.C. Thirty years
earlier (63 B.C.) the Seleukid kingdom had succumbed to the forces of
Pompeius and Lucullus. For a detailed history of the dynastic state of
affairs in the Hellenistic Kingdoms, see Ogden 1999 and Whitehorne
1994.
5. One should note the proposal of Ptolemy I at the conference of
Babylon, namely that the empire could, instead of depending upon a
king, be governed by a council of generals that would decide by majorityvoting
(Curt. 10.6.13–15, Just. 13.2.12). As Mooren argues (1983: 233–40),
this incident could suggest that kingship might not have been “that essential
to the Macedonian state.” In practice, however, such alternatives
were only considered in times of real crisis. This recommendation,
essentially to bypass the traditional constitution of Macedonia, vanished
into thin air when Ptolemy was assigned his own satrapy. He exhibited
no interest in governing his satrapy according to majority vote. For royal
succession in Argead Macedonia see Hatzopoulos 1986, contra Greenwalt
1989.