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Seleucid Kings

The empires of the Diadochi in 283. Design Jona Lendering.

The hellenistic kingdoms
in 280 BCE (©**)

On this page, you will find a complete list of rulers of the Seleucid Empire, the largest of the kingdoms that succeeded the short-lived empire of Alexander the Great. Until quite recently, the chronology of the kings was essentially based on classical sources, but the publication of the Astronomical Diaries and other cuneiform sources offers a lot of new information, which has been collected by professor Bert van der Spek of the Free University of Amsterdam (Holland); there's one addition by dr. F. Assar.

In this table, several colors are used:

Entire realm Line of Alexander Northern branch Southern branch

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	Seleucus I Nicator	1(?) June 311 - September 281
	Antiochus I Soter	September 281 - 2 June 261
	Antiochus II Theos	2 June 261 - early July 246
	Seleucus II Callinicus	July/August 246 - December 225
	Seleucus III Keraunos (or Soter)	December 225 - April-June 222
	Antiochus III the Great	April-June 222 - 3 July 187
	Seleucus IV Philopator	3 July 187 - 3 September 175
	Antiochus IV Epiphanes	3 September 175 - November/December 164
	Antiochus V Eupator	November/December 164 - after 29 October 162
	Demetrius I Soter	before September/October 161 - beginning of June 150
	Alexander I Balas	summer 152 - beginning of August 145
	Demetrius II Nicator (first reign)	before 8 September 145 - July/August 138
	Antiochus VI Dionysus (or Epiphanes)	beginning of August 145 - summer 140?
	Diodotus Tryphon	summer 140? - after August 138
	Antiochus VII Sidetes (or Euergetes)	July/August 138 - after 20 May 129
	Demetrius II Nicator (second reign)	first months of 129 - after March 125
	Alexander II Zabinas	129 - 123
	Cleopatra Thea	125
	Seleucus V	125
	Cleopatra Thea and Antiochus VIII Grypus	125 - 121
	Antiochus VIII Grypus	121 - 96
	Antiochus IX Cyzicenus	114/113 - early 95
	Seleucus VI Epiphanes Nicator	96 - late 95
	Antiochus X Eusebes Philopator	early 95 - 92 or 83
	Antiochus XI Epiphanes Philadelphus	95 - 92
	Demetrius III Eucaerus (or Philopator)	95 - 87
	Philip I Philadelphus	95 - 83
	Antiochus XII Dionysus	87 - 84
	Tigranes II the Great of Armenia	83 - 69
	Antiochus XIII Asiaticus	69 - 64
	Philip II Philoromaeus	65 - 64

Literature

Bert van der Spek, 'New Evidence from the Babylonian Astronomical Diaries Concerning Seleucid and Arsacid History' in: Archiv für Orientforschung 44/45 (1997-1998) 167-175.

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