Apama / Arsinoe
Apama1, daughter of the Seleucid king Antiochus I by Stratonice I2, born c. 2923, married to Magas of Cyrene c. 2754; if different from Arsinoe, she died or was divorced before c. 267, with no known children5. She is identified with Arsinoe, married to Magas before c.2676, by whom he had one known child, Berenice II7; Arsinoe is otherwise of unknown parentage8. She survived Magas for an unknown length of time9.
[1] PP VI 14488. Gr: Apama. Ý
[2] Porphyry in Eusebius, Chronicorum I (ed. Schoene) 249. Paternity also given in Pausanias 1.7.3. Malalas (8.198, 8.203), who knows Apama but not Magas, calls her a daughter of Seleucus I, which might be explained as a confusion resulting from the marriages of her mother to both men were it not for the fact that he also names her mother as Seleucus' first wife Apama daughter of Spitamenes, the mother of Antiochus I; in any case, Malalas' account is so riddled with demonstrable errors that it is not to be trusted. Ý
[3] The marriage of Antiochus I to Stratonice, formerly the wife of his father Seleucus I, is described by Plutarch, Demetrius 38.1. It took place after Demetrius became king of Macedon and shortly before Seleucus I appointed Antiochus I king of the eastern provinces. Since both events took place in 294/3, the marriage can be dated to c. 293, so the birth of Apama cannot have occurred before c. 292. Since the marriage of Apama to Magas is unlikely to have occurred after c. 274, a birth date of c. 292 or a little later seems most likely. Ý
[4] Pausanias 1.7.3. From this, they were married between the accession of Antiochus I in 280 and the start of the First Syrian War in 274/3. Her elder half-sister Phila, daughter of Seleucus and Stratonice, was married to Antigonus Gonatas, king of Macedon, in 276. A marriage date c275 seems most likely. Ý
[5] Inferred from the career of Berenice II, who was a marriageable young girl at the time of Magas' death (Callimachus Berenice's Hair (in trans. Catullus 66.25)), thus her mother must have married Magas at least 16 years or so before his death. If her mother was not Apama, then Apama must have been out of the picture by this time. Ý
[6] Not in PP. Gr: Arsinoh. Justin 26.3 names her as the mother of Berenice II. In modern scholarship "Arsinoe" is almost universally considered an error for "Apama". Bouché-Leclercq (Histoire des Lagides I 172 n. 1) suggests that Apama took a more familiar Ptolemaic name after her marriage, a solution that still identifies the two women. But the standard reasoning that identifies them is a residue of false chronology. What we know is that Apama married Magas c 280/275 and that Berenice II was born some 15 years or so before his death. On the high chronology for Magas, dating his death to 259/8, this dates her birth at c276/5, and in this case the probability of confusion by Justin seems high. But the evidence appears to favour the low chronology rather strongly, in which case there is a fairly long interval between the marriage of Apama and the birth of Berenice II, and plenty of time for Apama to be replaced. U. Wilcken, RE 1 (1894) 2662f., argues that Justin simply made a mistake, and cites other instances where he has provably done so, but this is not sufficient to prove that he made a mistake in this particular instance. Certainly, he refers to Magas as "AgaV" in the same passage, but the example of Schol Theocritus 17.24 proves that there was confusion about Magas' name -- it does not show that there was confusion about Apama's. It is also true that Hyginus, De Astronomia 2.24, names the parents of Berenice II as Ptolemy and Arsinoe, either because sibling marriage had become part of the dynastic theology, or confusing Berenice II with Berenice Phernophoros, but in either case the parentage of Berenice II was incidental to Hyginus' theme, while it is central to Justin's story. K. J. Beloch (Griechische Geschichte IV.2, 190) argues that there is no reason to believe that Arsinoe was Ptolemaic, and that there is no other ruling house that she could have come from. To the first, one can only say "why not?", and to the second "so what?". After all, Magas was only the ruler of a minor provincial kingdom. Moreover, for the last two decades of his reign, which (on the low chronology) includes the period of the Second Syrian War, he and Ptolemy II were at peace, which strongly suggests an accommodation, that could well have been sealed in part by Magas' remarriage to a minor Ptolemaic relative. While it is perfectly possible that Apama did not bear a child till after some 10 years of marriage and even that she changed her name, and there are certainly grounds for scepticism about the separate existence of Arsinoe, it is also true that there is nothing inherently impossible or implausible in the notion that Magas married twice, except on the high chronology of his reign.
The reason I have nevertheless accepted this identity is Appian, Syriaca 1.3, in which Antiochus III tells the Roman ambassadors, shortly before the marriage of Ptolemy V to Cleopatra I, that he is already a relative of Ptolemy's. If the identity of Apama with Arsinoe is accepted then the statement has a simple explanation: they are second cousins once removed. If it is not accepted, then there is no way for this statement to be true except perhaps by invoking otherwise-unknown pre-Alexandrian ties or even mythological references. I have not seen this argument advanced anywhere. Whether Apama changed her name to Arsinoe or the name is an error of Justin's is not possible to tell.
Since writing the above, I have learned (P. J. Parsons, ZPE 25 (1977) 1 at 8) that pOxy 20.2258 = Callimachus F 110 contains a scholion which explicitly states that Berenice II was the daughter of Magas and Apama. In light of this, there is no reason at all to doubt the equation. Whether Apama changed her name or Justin made an error, based on texts that name Berenice II as daughter of Ptolemy II and Arsinoe II, is not possible to determine. Ý
[7] For the same reason that Apama, if different from Arsinoe, must have been divorced or dead by then. Ý
[8] B. G. Niebuhr, Kleine historische und philologische Schriften I 229f. n. 40, suggested that Arsinoe was none other than Arsinoe I. Apart from the name, this solution does allow Berenice II legitimately to be the sister of Ptolemy III, but the example of Cleopatra I alone is sufficient to show that the title "king's sister" was synonymous with king's wife in this period. However, Ptolemy II had exiled Arsinoe I to Coptos for attempted murder and treason. It hardly seems likely that he would then marry her off to a step-brother who he had recently been at war with, and even less likely that she would escape from Coptos across the Libyan desert to Cyrene on her own resources. So, while there is nothing chronologically impossible with this solution, it seems so implausible that it demands positive proof before it can be considered, and it has been rightly and universally rejected. Ý
[9] Justin 26.3 luridly describes how Arsinoe took Demetrius the Fair, fiance (or husband) of Berenice II, as her lover, and how he was slain when the pair were caught in flagrante delictu, while Berenice protected her mother. It seems likely that the rest of Arsinoe's life was short and unpleasant. Ý
Update Notes:
8-9 Feb 2002: Added individual trees
15 Feb 2002: Split out into separate entry. Added discussion of Apama's birthdate.
23 Aug 2003: Added Xref to online Justin
23 Oct 2003: Added Xref to online Appian
24 Feb 2004: Added Xref to online Catullus.
13 Sep 2004: Add Xref to online Eusebius
3 Nov 2004: Upgrade level of certainty of the equation Apama = Arsinoe to reflect the actual opinion.
19 Feb 2005: Added the hard evidence that Apama = Arsinoe.
11 Mar 2005: Added Greek transcription
21 Nov 2010: Add Malalas, Hyginus links, fix broken Perseus links
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