Arsinoe IV of Egypt

Arsinoë IV
Rescue of Arsinoe, by Jacopo Tintoretto, 1555-1556
Queen of Egypt
Reign September 48 BC
with Ptolemy XIII (December 48 – January 47 BC)
Successor Ptolemy XIV of Egypt and Cleopatra VII
Born betw. 68 – 59 BC
Alexandria, Egypt
Died 41 BC
Ephesus
Burial Ephesus
Dynasty Ptolemaic
Father Ptolemy XII Auletes
Mother Unknown

Arsinoë IV (Greek: Ἀρσινόη; between 68 and 63 BC – 41 BC) was the fourth of six children and the youngest daughter of Ptolemy XII Auletes. Queen and co-ruler of Egypt with her brother Ptolemy XIII from 48 BC – 47 BC, she was one of the last members of the Ptolemaic dynasty of ancient Egypt. Arsinoë IV was also the half sister of Cleopatra VII.[1][2][3][4]

History

When Ptolemy XII died in 51 BC, he left his eldest son and daughter, Ptolemy and Cleopatra, as joint rulers of Egypt, but Ptolemy soon dethroned Cleopatra and forced her to flee from Alexandria. Julius Caesar arrived in Alexandria in 48 BC pursuing his rival, Pompey, whom he had defeated at the Battle of Pharsalus. When he arrived in Alexandria, he was presented with Pompey's head. The execution of his longtime friend and foe ended the possibility of an alliance between Caesar and Ptolemy, and instead he sided with Cleopatra's faction. He declared that in accordance with Ptolemy XII's will, Cleopatra and Ptolemy would rule Egypt jointly, and in a similar motion restored Cyprus, which had been annexed by Rome in 58 BC, to Egypt's rule and gifted it to Arsinoë and her youngest brother, Ptolemy XIV.[5][6] Caesar had Ptolemy's regent, the eunuch Pothinus, executed while the general Achillas escaped and began besieging Alexandria.

However Arsinoë then escaped from the capital with her mentor, the eunuch Ganymedes, and took command of the Egyptian army, proclaiming herself Queen as Arsinoe IV, executing Achillas, who had assumed the title of pharaoh, and placing Ganymedes second in command of the army immediately below herself.[7][8][9] Under Arsinoe's leadership, the Egyptians enjoyed some success against the Romans. The Egyptians had already trapped Caesar in a section of the city, by the building of walls to close off the streets, and she now directed Ganymedes to order the drawing of water from the sea, which was poured into the canals that supplied Caesar’s cisterns, causing panic among Caesar’s troops.[10] Caesar countered this measure by digging wells into the porous limestone beneath the city that contained fresh water, which only partially alleviated the situation, so he then sent ships out along the coast to search for more fresh water there.[11] Caesar realised he would soon have to break out from the city, and attacked the island of Pharos, upon which stood the great lighthouse, in order to gain control of the harbor. But Arsinoe's forces drove him back, inflicting upon him a humiliating defeat, in which Caesar himself was forced to tear off his armour and his purple cloak, and swim to the safety of a nearby Roman ship in the bay. However the leading Egyptian officers, having become disappointed with Ganymedes, and under a pretext of wanting peace, negotiated with Caesar to exchange Arsinoë for Ptolemy XIII, who was subsequently released.[12][13] But Ptolemy continued the war, until the Romans received reinforcements and inflicted a decisive defeat upon the Egyptians.

Captive, Arsinoë was transported to Rome, where in 46 BC she was forced to appear in Caesar's triumph and was paraded behind a burning effigy of the Lighthouse of Alexandria, which had been the scene of her victory over him. [14] Despite the custom of strangling prominent prisoners in triumphs when the festivities concluded, Caesar was pressured to spare Arsinoë and granted her sanctuary at the temple of Artemis in Ephesus. Arsinoë lived in the temple for a few years, always keeping a watchful eye on her sister Cleopatra, who perceived Arsinoë as a threat to her power. In 41 BC, at Cleopatra's instigation, Mark Antony ordered Arsinoë's execution on the steps of the temple. Her murder was a gross violation of the temple sanctuary and an act which scandalised Rome.[15] The eunuch priest (Megabyzos) who had welcomed Arsinoë on her arrival at the temple as Queen was only pardoned when an embassy from Ephesus made a petition to Cleopatra.[16]

Year of birth

Arsinoe's year of birth is generally regarded as being between 68 and 63 BCE. The Encyclopedia Britannica cites 63 BC, making her 15 at the time of her uprising and defeat against Julius Caesar and 22 at her death,[17] while the researcher Alissa Lyon cites 68 BC making her 27 at her death.[18] An alternate hypothesis was in the docudrama "Cleopatra: Portrait of a Killer", in which it was conjectured a skeleton of a female headless child between the ages of 15 and 18 may be Arsinoe.[19]

Her actions in the brief war against Caesar naturally suggest that she was older than that and thus, would make it impossible for her to be the headless female child buried in the tomb. Perhaps the strongest evidence that she was in fact exercising her own authority is that Caesar, after the Pharos debacle, was prepared to release Ptolemy XIII — a male, who continued the war against Caesar — just to get his hands on her.[20][21] Stacy Schiff, who places Arsinoe's age at around seventeen during the events of 48-47 BC, notes that Arsinoe "burned with ambition" and was "not the kind of girl who inspired complacency," writing that once Arsinoe escaped the royal palace she became more vocal against her half-sister and that she assumed her position as head of the army alongside anti-Caesar courtier Achillas.[22]

Tomb at Ephesus

In the 1990s, an octagonal monument situated in the centre of Ephesus was hypothesized by Hilke Thür of the Austrian Academy of Sciences to be the tomb of Arsinoë.[15] Although no inscription remains on the tomb, it was dated to between 50 and 20 BC. In 1926 the skeleton of a headless female child estimated to be between the ages of 15–18 years at the time of her death was found in the burial chamber.[23][24] Thür's identification of the skeleton was based on the shape of the tomb, which was octagonal, like the second tier of the Lighthouse of Alexandria, the carbon dating of the bones (between 200 – 20 BC), the gender of the skeleton, and the age of the young woman at death.[25][26] It was also claimed that the tomb boasts Egyptian motifs, such as "papyri-bundle" columns.[15]

A DNA test was also attempted to determine the identity of the child. However, it was impossible to get an accurate reading since the bones had been handled too many times,[27] and the skull had been lost in Germany during World War II. Hilke Thür examined the old notes and photographs of the now-missing skull,[28][29] which was reconstructed using computer technology by forensic anthropologist Caroline Wilkinson to show what the woman may have looked like.[30] Thür alleged that it shows signs of African and Egyptian ancestry mixed with classical Grecian features[15] – despite the fact that Boas, Gravlee, Bernard and Leonard, and others have demonstrated that skull measurements are not a reliable indicator of race.[31] Mary Beard wrote a dissenting essay criticizing the findings, pointing out that one, there is no surviving name on the tomb and that the claim the tomb is alleged to invoke the shape of the Pharos Lighthouse "doesn't add up"; second, the skull doesn't survive intact and the age of the skeleton is too young to be that of Arsinoe's (the bones said to be that of a 15-18 year old child, with Arsinoe being around her mid twenties at her death); and thirdly, since Cleopatra and Arsinoe were not known to have the same mother, "the ethnic argument goes largely out of the window." [32]

A writer from The Times described the identification of the skeleton as "a triumph of conjecture over certainty".[33] If the monument is the tomb of Arsinoë, she would be the only member of the Ptolemaic dynasty whose remains have been recovered.[34] Forensic and archaeological analysis of the origins of the skeleton and tomb are ongoing. To date, it has never been definitively proved the skeleton is that of Arsinoe IV.

Ancestry

References and sources

References
  1. ↑ Grant, Michael. Cleopatra. p. 35.
  2. ↑ Kleiner, Diana E. E. Cleopatra and Rome. p. 102.
  3. ↑ Roberts, Peter. HSC Ancient History. p. 125.
  4. ↑ Beard, Mary "The skeleton of Cleopatra's sister? Steady on." Times Literary Supplement, March 16, 2009
  5. ↑ "Arsinoe IV". www.reocities.com. Archived from the original on 2017-06-13. Retrieved 2017-04-07.
  6. ↑ "Pharaohs of Ancient Egypt: Cleopatra VII". www.ancientegyptonline.co.uk. Retrieved 2017-04-04.
  7. ↑ "Total War Center - The Siege of Alexandria and the Battle of the Nile". http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?480346-The-Siege-of-Alexandria-and-the-Battle-of-the-Nile-48-47-BCE
  8. ↑ "Pharaohs of Ancient Egypt: Cleopatra VII". www.ancientegyptonline.co.uk. Retrieved 2017-04-07.
  9. ↑ Julius Caesar, Commentarii de Bello Civili 3.112.10-12; De Bello Alexandrino 4; Cassius Dio, Roman History 42.39.1-2; 42.40.1; Lucan, Pharsalia 10.519-523
  10. ↑ Total War Center: "The Siege of Alexandria and the Battle of the Nile" http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?480346-The-Siege-of-Alexandria-and-the-Battle-of-the-Nile-48-47-BCE
  11. ↑ "The Internet Classics Archive | The Alexandrian Wars by Julius Caesar". classics.mit.edu. Retrieved 2017-04-14.
  12. ↑ De Bello Alexandrino 23-24 and, with some deviations, Cassius Dio, Roman History 42.42
  13. ↑ "E. R. Bevan: The House of Ptolemy • Chap. XIII". penelope.uchicago.edu. Retrieved 2017-04-14.
  14. ↑ Cassius Dio, Roman History 43.19.2-3; Appian, Civil Wars 2.101.420
  15. 1 2 3 4 BBC One documentary, Cleopatra: Portrait of a Killer
  16. ↑ Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews 15.89; Josephus, Contra Apion 2.57; inaccurate Appian, Civil Wars 5.9.34-36 and Cassius Dio Roman History 48.24.2
  17. ↑ https://www.britannica.com/biography/Arsinoe-IV
  18. ↑ “ANP455: Archaeology of Ancient Egypt, 25 September 2014. http://anthropology.msu.edu/anp455-fs14/2014/09/25/arsinoe-iv/
  19. ↑ “Cleopatra: Portrait of a Killer”, BBC, 2009. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00jhv9g
  20. ↑ “Dangerous Women”, Karen Murdarasi, 2016
  21. ↑ Cassius Dio, Roman History, vols 42-43
  22. ↑ Schiff2011, p. 48-49.
  23. ↑ Josef Keil (1929) Excavations In Ephesos
  24. ↑ "The skeleton of Cleopatra's sister? Steady on". The Times Literary Supplement. Retrieved 2018-06-12.
  25. ↑ Dr. Fabian Kanz, "Arsinoe IV of Egypt: Sister of Cleopatra identified?" April 2009
  26. ↑ http://insidecatholic.com/Joomla/index.php?option=com_myblog&show=The-BBC-invents-its-own-Cleopatra..html&Itemid=102%5Bpermanent+dead+link%5D
  27. ↑ "Have Bones of Cleopatra's Murdered Sister Been Found?". Live Science. Retrieved 2017-04-07.
  28. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2011-06-29. Retrieved 2010-04-15.
  29. ↑ Cleopatra's mother 'was African' - BBC (2009)
  30. ↑ rogueclassicist, David Meadows ~ (2009-03-15). "Cleopatra, Arsinoe, and the Implications". rogueclassicism. Retrieved 2017-04-14.
  31. ↑ Clarence C. Gravlee, H. Russell Bernard, and William R. Leonard. "Heredity, Environment, and Cranial Form: A Re-Analysis of Boas’s Immigrant Data" American Anthropologist 105[1]:123–136, 2003.
  32. ↑ "The skeleton of Cleopatra's sister? Steady on". The Times Literary Supplement. Retrieved 2018-06-12.
  33. ↑ http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/tv_and_radio/article5931845.ece%5Bdead+link%5D
  34. ↑ Hilke Thür: Arsinoë IV, eine Schwester Kleopatras VII, Grabinhaberin des Oktogons von Ephesos? Ein Vorschlag. ("Arsinoë IV, a sister of Cleopatra VII, grave owner of the Octagon in Ephesus? A suggestion.") In: Jahreshefte des Österreichischen Archäologischen Instituts, vol. 60, 1990, p. 43–56.
Sources
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