The Hellenistic Settlements in the East from Armenia and Mesopotamia to Bactria and India. Getzel M. Cohen

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СКАЧАТЬ Kelainai in Phrygia for many years, and that when he did found a major new settlement—ANTIGONEIA—he chose to locate it in northern Syria.³⁷ Furthermore, there is no unequivocal evidence he founded any settlements in Mesopotamia. The only possible claimant—KARRHAI—is disputed. Some scholars attribute it to Antigonos; others, to Alexander. All the other settlements founded by Antigonos—with the possible exception of EUROPOS Rhagai in Media (also a doubtful attribution)—were located either in northern Syria or in Asia Minor.³⁸ The contrast with Seleukos could not be stronger.

      Before the battle of Ipsos in 301 B.C., Seleukos’s empire was centered in Babylonia. Up to this time, Babylonia, in fact, was the westernmost point of his kingdom. After Ipsos, Seleukos came into control of, among other areas, northern Mesopotamia and northern Syria. Now, for the first time, he had access to the Mediterranean. As is well known, he immediately embarked on a major settlement founding program in northern Syria.³⁹ But, as I have mentioned, he also focused a great deal of attention on northern Mesopotamia as well as other regions farther east, a point emphasized by Appian (Syr. 57). At the same time that he was filling northern Syria with settlements, he was doing the same in northern Mesopotamia. Whereas northern Syria was sparsely populated and little developed in the years before Alexander, Babylonia was home to an ancient and highly developed urban civilization. It will not be surprising, therefore, that the major Hellenistic settlement of the region—SELEUKEIA on the Tigris—was founded at the expense of a nearby city, BABYLON . The importance of Babylonia in the Hellenistic period becomes clear if we consider the role its chief city played under Alexander the Great and, later, under the Seleucids.⁴⁰ It was at Babylon that Alexander spent his last year(s), organizing his realm and planning future enterprises.⁴¹ Of course, it is also not insignificant that he died there. The centrality of Babylonia for control of the Near East continued under Seleukos I. He, of course, began his political career as the governor of Babylonia in 321 B.C., lost control of it to Antigonos in 315, and then regained control in 312.⁴² Babylon and Babylonia, which had remained loyal to Seleukos during his struggles with Antigonos, would now serve as the core of his expanding empire.⁴³

      Babylon was a key historical and commercial focal point of the ancient Near East. It was located at the place where the Tigris and Euphrates are closest together and where one of the routes connecting Mesopotamia with the Iranian plateau opens up.⁴⁴ It will not be surprising, therefore, that over time a number of cities—for example, BABYLON, SELEUKEIA on the Tigris, KTESIPHON, Vologesias, Veh-Ardashir, and finally, Baghdad—were established in this general area. Seleukos made SELEUKEIA on the Tigris—ultimately the successor city of Babylon—the eastern capital of his kingdom. Cuneiform documents of the Seleucid period describe Seleukeia as the “city of kingship,” a clear indication of its importance. Seleukeia on the Tigris was the great terminus for trade with central Asia, India, and Arabia. Its importance as a commercial center is also to be seen in the very active mint that was established there. The Indian trade brought goods to Seleukeia via both the Persian Gulf and a land route through the Iranian plateau. Of course, these roads also provided the means for military communication between parts of the empire. The importance of Babylonia as a vital trade link between east and west can be seen, for example, in the cuneiform Astronomical Diaries (1:345, no. 273B Rev. 31), which records how the Babylonian satrap served as an intermediary for elephants sent from Bactria to the king fighting in Syria in 274/3 B.C.⁴⁵ G. Le Rider called attention to the increase in Seleukeian bronzes at Susa during the reign of Antiochos III and suggested that this reflected the new commercial realities created by the Seleucid king’s presence in these regions in 205–204 B.C.⁴⁶ He correctly attributed the increase in Seleukeian bronzes at Susa to the presence of Seleukeian merchants there and saw this as a reflection of Susa’s role as an important market for goods coming from Arabia and India.

      Moving northward from Seleukeia, a major trade route ran north on and along the Euphrates to SELEUKEIA/Zeugma and thence overland across Syria to the Mediterranean coast. I have already mentioned that settlements such as those at NIKEPHORION (Raqqah), ANTHEMOUSIAS, and APAMEIA on the east bank and DOURA EUROPOS, AMPHIPOLIS [?], JEBEL KHALID, and SELEUKEIA/Zeugma on the west bank protected these roads and the crossings to Syria.⁴⁷ Finally, the fact that a number of Seleukeians are found taking part in agonistic contests at various places in the Greek world suggests that they (or others) also engaged in commercial enterprises with the Mediterranean and Aegean worlds.⁴⁸

      

      I would also mention the Persian Gulf. As is well known, in 325 B.C. Alexander ordered Nearchos to sail from the mouth of the Indus River along the coast of Gedrosia to the Persian Gulf (Arr. 7.20.9–10). From Arrian and Strabo we learn that in 324/3 B.C. Alexander sent out three small expeditions to explore the Arabian coast and that he planned to colonize the coastal region and the offshore islands because he thought the area would become as prosperous as Phoenicia.⁴⁹ And as is also well known, at the end of his great anabasis to the eastern regions of his empire, Antiochos III visited the Persian Gulf area, and in particular the Arabian city of Gerrha.⁵⁰ There was apparently a third expedition in the Gulf, this one under Antiochos IV Epiphanes (Pliny NH 6.147, 152).⁵¹

      

      The interest of Alexander and the Seleucids in the Persian Gulf is reflected by, among other things, the presence of a number of settlements in and around the Gulf: the extant evidence indicates the presence of settlements at the head of the Gulf (ALEXANDREIA/ANTIOCH/Spasinou Charax), on the Iranian shore (ANTIOCH in Persis), and in the Gulf itself (the island of IKAROS). The exact location of SELEUKEIA on the Erythraean Sea is still not known.

      Pliny provides additional information. Thus, he mentions two small ports or stations on the Iranian coast of the Persian Gulf—PORTUS MACEDONUM and the ALTARS OF ALEXAND ER (NH 6.110).⁵² Pliny also mentions ARETHOUSA, LARISA, and CHALKIS in Arabia. In this connection, J.-F. Salles has suggested that the Seleucids maintained a permanent fleet in the Persian Gulf and that settlements/garrisons or ports were established on the coast at various points to service the vessels. Arethousa, Larisa, and Chalkis would fall in this category. But, as Salles admitted, the suggestion will probably remain unverifiable.⁵³ There is, however, an additional problem regarding these three settlements: it is not clear whether Pliny erred in placing them in Arabia rather than in Syria.⁵⁴

      If there is no firm evidence for Greek settlement on the Arabian coast, there are (scattered) material remains from a number of sites in eastern Arabia that provide some evidence for ties between the region and the rest of the Greek world: for example, at Mleiha on the Omani peninsula a few Rhodian stamped amphora handles (second century B.C.) have been found.⁵⁵ At BAHRAIN, archaeologists have found evidence for Greeks and Babylonians. Among other things, they have found four Greek inscriptions as well as a potsherd and a gourd with Greek writing on each. The Greek inscriptions include a dedication of a temple made on behalf of King Hyspaosines and Queen Thalassia by the “strategos of Tylos and the Islands” to the Dioskouroi Saviors and a fragmentary tombstone inscription probably dating to the second half of the second century B.C. that honors a kybernetes with the Babylonian name Abidistaras. Another fragmentary funerary inscription that is dated by the Seleucid era to 118/7 B.C. honors someone with the Semitic name Auidisaros who is identified as an “Alexandreian.” A funerary jar (?) that contains an Aramaic inscription mentioning the Babylonian god Nabu and that may date to the fourth or third century B.C. has also been found.⁵⁶ The most important commercial center in eastern Arabia during the Hellenistic period was Gerrha.⁵⁷ In the Aegean basin there is epigraphic evidence for a merchant from Gerrha at Delos in the mid-second century B.C.⁵⁸ At Thaj (the probable site of Gerrha) sherds of Greek black-glazed pottery and a stamped amphora handle have been found.⁵⁹ A significant number of coins—mainly dating to the latter half of the third century B.C.—have been found (practically all picked up as surface finds) in northeastern Arabia. Many have the legend ΑΛΕΞΑΝΔΡΟΥ and south Arabian letters on the reverse. Some of these were modeled after Alexander coinage—that is, with the head of Herakles on the obverse, Zeus seated in his throne on the reverse. СКАЧАТЬ