Ptolemy III Euergetes
King of Egypt
Gold coin depicting Ptolemy III issued by Ptolemy IV to honor his deified father
Reign	246–222 BCE
Greek	Πτολεμαῖος Εὐεργέτης
Ancient Egyptian	Iwaennetjerwysenwy Sekhemankhre Setepamun[1]
Predecessor	Ptolemy II
Successor	Ptolemy IV
Consort	Berenice II
Offspring	Ptolemy IV, Arsinoe III, Alexander, Magas, Berenice
Dynasty	Ptolemaic
Father	Ptolemy II
Mother	Arsinoe II

Ptolemy III Euergetes, (Greek: Πτολεμαῖος Εὐεργέτης, Ptolemaĩos Euergétēs, reigned 246 BC – 222 BC) was the third ruler of the Ptolemaic dynasty in Egypt.

Family[link]

Statue of Ptolemy III in the guise of Hermes wearing the chlamys cloak. Ptolemaic Egypt.

Euergetes ("Benefactor") was the eldest son of Ptolemy II Philadelphus and his first wife, Arsinoe I, and came to power in 246 BC upon the death of his father. He married Berenice of Cyrene in the year corresponding to 244/243 BC; and their children were:

• Arsinoe III, born in ca 246/245 BC. She later married her brother Ptolemy IV
• Ptolemy IV Philopator, born ca 244 BC
• Possibly Lysimachus. The name of the son is not known, but he is said to have been born in ca 243 BC.^[2]
• Alexander, born in c. 242 BC ^[3]
• Magas, probably born in ca 241 BC. Scalded to death in his bath by Theogos or Theodotus, at the orders of Ptolemy IV.^[4]
• Berenice, probably born in ca 239 BC and died a year later.^[5]

Leadership[link]

Ptolemy III Euergetes was responsible for the first known example of a series of decrees published as bilingual inscriptions on massive stone blocks in three writing systems. Ptolemy III's stone stela is the Canopus Stone of 238 BC. Other well-known examples are the Memphis Stele (Memphis Stone), bearing the Decree of Memphis, about 218 BC, passed by his son, Ptolemy IV, and the famous Rosetta Stone erected by Ptolemy Epiphanes, his grandson, in 196 BC.

Ptolemy III's stone contains decrees about priestly orders, and is a memorial for his daughter Berenice. But two of its 26 lines of hieroglyphs decree the use of a leap day added to the Egyptian calendar of 365 days, and the associated changes in festivals.

He is also credited with the foundation of the Serapeum.

War with Seleucids[link]

Bronze coin issued by Ptolemy III depicting Zeus-Amun (obverse) and traditional Ptolemaic eagle (reverse). Ptolemy III did not issue coins with his own image.

Due to a falling out at the Seleucid court, his eldest sister Berenice Phernophorus was murdered along with her infant son. In response Ptolemy III invaded Syria.^[6] During this war, the Third Syrian War, he occupied Antioch and even reached Babylon.^[7] In exchange for a peace in 241 BC, Ptolemy was awarded new territories on the northern coast of Syria, including Seleucia Pieria, the port of Antioch. The Ptolemaic kingdom reached the height of its power.

This war is cryptically alluded to in Daniel 11:7-9.^[8]

See also[link]

• History of Ptolemaic Egypt-
• Ptolemais - towns and cities named after members of the Ptolemaic dynasty.
• Decree of Canopus

References[link]

Bibliography[link]

• Clayton, Peter A. (2006). Chronicles of the Pharaohs: the reign-by-reign record of the rulers and dynasties of ancient Egypt. Thames & Hudson. ISBN 0-500-28628-0. 

External links[link]

• Ptolemy Euergetes I at LacusCurtius — (Chapter VI of E. R Bevan's House of Ptolemy, 1923)
• Ptolemy III — (Royal Egyptian Genealogy)
• Ptolemy III Euergetes entry in historical sourcebook by Mahlon H. Smith

Ptolemy
An early Baroque artist's rendition of Claudius Ptolemaeus
Born	c. AD 90 Egypt
Died	c. AD 168 (aged 77–78) Alexandria, Egypt
Occupation	mathematician, geographer, astronomer, astrologer

Claudius Ptolemy ( /ˈtɒləmi/; Greek: Κλαύδιος Πτολεμαῖος, Klaudios Ptolemaios; Latin: Claudius Ptolemaeus; c. AD 90 – c. AD 168), was a Greek-Roman citizen of Egypt who wrote in Greek.^[1] He was a mathematician, astronomer, geographer, astrologer, and poet of a single epigram in the Greek Anthology.^[2][3] He lived in Egypt under Roman rule, and is believed to have been born in the town of Ptolemais Hermiou in the Thebaid. This theory, proposed by Theodore Meliteniotes, could be correct, but it is late (ca. 1360) and unsupported.^[4] There is no reason to suppose that he ever lived anywhere else than Alexandria,^[4] where he died around AD 168.^[5]

Ptolemy was the author of several scientific treatises, at least three of which were of continuing importance to later Islamic and European science. The first is the astronomical treatise now known as the Almagest (in Greek, Ἡ Μεγάλη Σύνταξις, "The Great Treatise", originally Μαθηματικὴ Σύνταξις, "Mathematical Treatise"). The second is the Geography, which is a thorough discussion of the geographic knowledge of the Greco-Roman world. The third is the astrological treatise known sometimes in Greek as the Apotelesmatika (Ἀποτελεσματικά), more commonly in Greek as the Tetrabiblos (Τετράβιβλος "Four books"), and in Latin as the Quadripartitum (or four books) in which he attempted to adapt horoscopic astrology to the Aristotelian natural philosophy of his day.