Ptolemy IV Philopator

Ptolemy IV Philopator
Gold octadrachm issued by Ptolemy IV Philopator, British Museum
Pharaoh
Reign	221–204 BC (Ptolemaic)
Predecessor	Ptolemy III
Successor	Ptolemy V
Royal titulary
Father	Ptolemy III
Mother	Berenice II

Ptolemy IV Philopator (Greek: Πτολεμαῖος Φιλοπάτωρ Ptolemaĩos Philopátōr; reigned 221–204 BC), son of Ptolemy III and Berenice II of Egypt, was the fourth Pharaoh of Ptolemaic Egypt. The decline of the Ptolemaic dynasty began under the reign of Ptolemy IV.

Family

Among the children of Ptolemy IV Philopator and Arsinoe III of Egypt was Ptolemy V Epiphanes, who married Cleopatra I Syra, daughter of Antiochus III the Great and Laodice III.

Reign

Ptolemy IV's reign was inaugurated by the murder of his mother, and he was always under the dominion of favourites, male and female, who indulged his vices and conducted the government as they pleased. Self-interest led his ministers to make serious preparations to meet the attacks of Antiochus III the Great on Coele-Syria including Judea, and Ptolemy himself was present at the great Egyptian victory of Raphia (217 BC) which secured the northern borders of the kingdom for the remainder of his reign.

Mediterranean in 218 BC.

The arming of Egyptians in this campaign had a disturbing effect upon the native population of Egypt, leading to the secession of Upper Egypt under pharaohs Harmachis (also known as Hugronaphor) and Ankmachis (also known as Chaonnophris), thus creating a kingdom that occupied much of the country and lasted nearly twenty years.

Philopator was devoted to orgiastic forms of religion and literary dilettantism. He built a temple to Homer and composed a tragedy, to which his favourite Agathocles added a commentary. He married his sister Arsinoë III (about 220 BC), but continued to be ruled by his mistress Agathoclea, sister of Agathocles. In late c. 210 BC, Agathoclea may have given birth to a son from her affair with Ptolemy IV, who may have died shortly after his birth.

Ptolemy is said to have built a giant ship known as the tessarakonteres ("forty"), a huge galley and possibly the largest human-powered vessel ever built. This showpiece galley was described by Callixenus of Rhodes, writing in the 3rd century BC, and quoted by Athenaeus in the 2nd century AD. Plutarch also mentions that Ptolemy Philopator owned this immense vessel in his Life of Demetrios. The current theory is that Ptolemy's ship was an oversized catamaran galley, measuring 128 m 420 ft.

Ptolemy IV is a major antagonist of the apocryphal 3 Maccabees, which describes purported events following the Battle of Raphia, in both Jerusalem and Alexandria.

Legacy

Ptolemy IV's reign was also marked by trade with other contemporaneous polities. In the 1930s, excavations by Mattingly at a fortress close to Port Dunford (the likely Nikon of antiquity) in present-day southern Somalia yielded a number of Ptolemaic coins. Among these pieces were 17 copper mints from the Ptolemy III, Ptolemy IV and Ptolemy V dynasties, as well as late Imperial Rome and Mamluk Sultanate coins.

Ancestry

Family of Ptolemy IV Philopator

16. Lagus               8. Ptolemy I Soter, Pharaoh of Egypt                       17. Arsinoe of Macedon               4. Ptolemy II Philadelphus, Pharaoh of Egypt                             18. Magas of Macedon (=26)               9. Berenice I of Egypt (=13)                       19. Antigone of Macedon (daughter of Cassander) (=27)               2. Ptolemy III Euergetes, Pharaoh of Egypt                                   20. Agathocles of Pella               10. Lysimachus, King of Thrace, Asia Minor and Macedon                       21. Arsinoe               5. Arsinoe I                             22. Antipater, Regent of Macedonia               11. Nicaea of Macedon                       1. Ptolemy IV Philopator, Pharaoh of Egypt                                         24. Amyntas               12. Philip                       6. Magas, King of Cyrenaica                             26. Magas of Macedon (=18)               13. Berenice I of Egypt (=9)                       27. Antigone of Macedon (daughter of Cassander) (=19)               3. Berenice II of Egypt                                   28. Seleucus I Nicator, Basileus of the Seleucid Empire               14. Antiochus I Soter, Basileus of the Seleucid Empire                       29. Apama (daughter of Spitamenes)               7. Apama II                             30. Demetrius I, King of Macedon               15. Stratonice of Syria                       31. Phila of Macedon (daughter of 22)

Bibliography

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: 

External links

• Ptolemy Philopator I at LacusCurtius — (Chapter VII of E. R. Bevan's House of Ptolemy, 1923)
• Ptolemy IV — (Egyptian Royal Genealogy)
• Ptolemaic Genealogy: Possible child of Ptolemy IV
• The great revolt of the Egyptians:205–186 BC (2004)
• Ptolemy IV Philopator entry in historical sourcebook by Mahlon H. Smith

Ptolemy IV Philopator Ptolemaic Dynasty Born: Unknown Died: 204 BC
Preceded by Ptolemy III Euergetes	Pharaoh of Egypt 221–204 BC	Succeeded by Ptolemy V Epiphanes