Ptolemaic Kingdom I

  General Description   The Ptolemaic Kingdom (or Empire) was one of the successor states to the Macedonian Empire created by the conquests of Alexander the Great in the late 4th century BCE. When Alexander died in Babylon in 323, Ptolemy, as one of his most favoured generals and bodyguards, was appointed satrap (governor) of Egypt, Libya and parts of Arabia. ^{[1] [2]} The next few decades after 323 were characterized by incessant warfare between those who wished to maintain the unity of the Macedonian Empire, nominally still intact, ^[3] and those who aspired to rule their own kingdoms independently. ^[2] Ptolemy was firmly on the separatist side, and in 305 BCE he successfully declared himself king of Egypt. In doing so, he became Ptolemy I Soter (’the saviour’) ^[4] , founder of a powerful dynasty (sometimes known as the Lagides, after his father Lagos) ^[5] that was to rule Egypt for almost three centuries.
Ptolemy I and his successors had expansionist ambitions, seeking to carve out more and more territory for their new kingdom, often at the expense of the other kingdoms that had splintered from Alexander’s empire, especially the Seleucid Kingdom of the Middle East. ^[6] At its greatest extent, the Ptolemaic Empire reached as far south as Lower Nubia (southern Egypt), west to Cyrenaica (modern-day Libya), east to Cyprus, Syria, Phoenicia and Asia Minor (Turkey), and north into the Aegean. ^[7] In the words of one researcher, Egypt became for the first time a true ’Mediterranean power’ under its new Macedonian rulers. ^[6]
The peak of the Ptolemaic period is generally considered to correspond to the reigns of the first three Ptolemies in the 3rd century BCE. ^[8] We divide the kingdom into two polities: the first begins with Ptolemy I’s accession in 305 and ends with the Battle of Raphia in 217. In this battle, Ptolemy IV defeated the Seleucid king Antiochus III, who had invaded Ptolemaic-controlled lands in Palestine. ^[9] The late 3rd and early 2nd centuries saw conflict within the ruling family and revolts by the Egyptian population, representing an ’age of crisis’ between two periods of relative stability. ^[10] Our second polity runs from 217 up to the famous suicide of Cleopatra VII, the last ruler in the Ptolemaic line, and the Roman annexation of Egypt in 30 BCE. ^{[3] [11]} Overall, the Ptolemies were a successful dynasty: in concert with their expansionist policies, they managed to transform Egypt ‒ and the new city of Alexandria in particular ‒ into the cultural and economic centre of the Hellenistic world. ^[12]
Population and Political Organization
The Ptolemies were the longest-lived foreign dynasty ever to rule Egypt. ^[13] They presided over a ’double society’, portraying themselves as Graeco-Macedonian kings to the many resident Greeks and divine pharaohs to the ’native’ Egyptian population. ^{[14] [15]} Greeks and Egyptians were subject to different judicial systems and Greeks tended to dominate the highest echelons of society. ^{[16] [17]} Alexandria, built as an ideal Greek-style Hellenistic city with its magnificent library, stadium, theatre, gymnasium and lighthouse, was always set apart from the rest of the country. ^{[18] [19]} Over time, however, and especially from 200 BCE onwards, the boundaries between ’Greek’ and ’Egyptian’ became blurred. ^[20]
The chief aim of government was to draw as much revenue ‒ in money and in wheat ‒ as possible from the population, and for this reason the burden of taxation was heavy. ^[21] The Ptolemies left many Pharaonic Egyptian institutions intact, such as the temple hierarchy with its priests and scribes. However, they used state functionaries and tax farmers to divert more and more wealth from temples, agricultural estates, especially those of granted to soldiers (known as cleruchs), and ordinary peasant farmers to the royal coffers. ^[22] Egypt under the Ptolemies also became more outward-looking, extending commercial and political power into the Levant, the Black Sea and the shores of the Mediterranean as far west as Sicily. ^[23]
The population of Egypt during the Ptolemaic period has been estimated at around 4 million people in the 3rd century BCE, of which between 5 and 10 percent were Greeks. ^[24] The total population of the entire Ptolemaic Empire may have reached 7 million. ^[25]

[1]: (Hӧlbl 2001, 12, 14) Günther Hӧlbl. 2001. A History of the Ptolemaic Empire. London: Routledge.

[2]: (Lloyd 2000, 389) Alan B. Lloyd. 2000. ’The Ptolemaic Period (332-30 BC)’, in The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, edited by Ian Shaw, 388-413. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

[3]: (Lloyd 2010, xl) Alan B. Lloyd. 2010. ’Chronology’, in A Companion to Ancient Egypt, Volume 1, edited by Alan B. Lloyd, xxxii-xliii. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.

[4]: (Thompson 2005, 113) Dorothy J. Thompson. 2005. ’The Ptolemies and Egypt’, in A Companion to the Hellenistic World, edited by Andrew Erskine, 105-20. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.

[5]: (Myśliwiec 2000, 179) Karol Myśliwiec. 2000. The Twilight of Ancient Egypt: First Millennium B.C.E., translated by David Lorton. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

[6]: (Vandorpe 2010, 169) Katelijn Vandorpe. 2010. ’The Ptolemaic Period’, in A Companion to Ancient Egypt, Volume 1, edited by Alan B. Lloyd, 159-79. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.

[7]: (Vandorpe 2010, 169-71) Katelijn Vandorpe. 2010. ’The Ptolemaic Period’, in A Companion to Ancient Egypt, Volume 1, edited by Alan B. Lloyd, 159-79. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.

[8]: (Chauveau 2000, 11) Michel Chauveau. 2000. Egypt in the Age of Cleopatra, translated by David Lorton. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

[9]: (Lloyd 2000, 394) Alan B. Lloyd. 2000. ’The Ptolemaic Period (332-30 BC)’, in The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, edited by Ian Shaw, 388-413. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

[10]: (Vandorpe 2010, 165-66) Katelijn Vandorpe. 2010. ’The Ptolemaic Period’, in A Companion to Ancient Egypt, Volume 1, edited by Alan B. Lloyd, 159-79. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.

[11]: (Newman 2015) Frances Stickney Newman. 2015. ’Cleopatra VII’, in Salem Press Biographical Encyclopedia. Ipswich, MA: Salem Press. Accessed 22 February 2017.

[12]: (Vandorpe 2010, 173-75) Katelijn Vandorpe. 2010. ’The Ptolemaic Period’, in A Companion to Ancient Egypt, Volume 1, edited by Alan B. Lloyd, 159-79. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.

[13]: (Vandorpe 2010, 159) Katelijn Vandorpe. 2010. ’The Ptolemaic Period’, in A Companion to Ancient Egypt, Volume 1, edited by Alan B. Lloyd, 159-79. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.

[14]: (Chauveau 2000, 33, 37) Michel Chauveau. 2000. Egypt in the Age of Cleopatra, translated by David Lorton. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

[15]: (Vandorpe 2010, 171) Katelijn Vandorpe. 2010. ’The Ptolemaic Period’, in A Companion to Ancient Egypt, Volume 1, edited by Alan B. Lloyd, 159-79. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.

[16]: (Manning 2003, 53, 131) J. G. Manning. 2003. Land and Power in Ptolemaic Egypt: The Structure of Land Tenure. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[17]: (Lloyd 2000, 409) Alan B. Lloyd. 2000. ’The Ptolemaic Period (332-30 BC)’, in The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, edited by Ian Shaw, 388-413. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

[18]: (Vandorpe 2010, 174) Katelijn Vandorpe. 2010. ’The Ptolemaic Period’, in A Companion to Ancient Egypt, Volume 1, edited by Alan B. Lloyd, 159-79. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.

[19]: (Lloyd 2000, 400-01) Alan B. Lloyd. 2000. ’The Ptolemaic Period (332-30 BC)’, in The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, edited by Ian Shaw, 388-413. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

[20]: (Vandorpe 2010, 171-73) Katelijn Vandorpe. 2010. ’The Ptolemaic Period’, in A Companion to Ancient Egypt, Volume 1, edited by Alan B. Lloyd, 159-79. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.

[21]: (Chauveau 2000, 78) Michel Chauveau. 2000. Egypt in the Age of Cleopatra, translated by David Lorton. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

[22]: (Lloyd 2000, 404-05) Alan B. Lloyd. 2000. ’The Ptolemaic Period (332-30 BC)’, in The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, edited by Ian Shaw, 388-413. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

[23]: (Thompson and Buraselis 2013, 2-4) Dorothy J. Thompson and Kostas Buraselis. ’Introduction’, in The Ptolemies, the Sea and the Nile: Studies in Waterborne Power, edited by Kostas Buraselis, Mary Stefanou and Dorothy J. Thompson, 1-18. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[24]: (Fischer-Bovet 2011, 135-37) Christelle Fischer-Bovet. 2011. ’Counting the Greeks in Egypt: Immigration in the First Century of Ptolemaic Rule’, in Demography in the Graeco-Roman World, edited by C. Holleran and A. Pudsey, 135-54. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[25]: (Fischer-Bovet 2014, 149) Christelle Fischer-Bovet. 2014. Army and Society in Ptolemaic Egypt. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.