Ptolemy

Also known as: Ptolemy the Triumvir / the king of Egypt · Family: Macedon · Role: ruler · First appears: Pelopidas

Ptolemy, the king of Egypt, was recorded as the parent of Philoxenus, whom he gave as a hostage with fifty companions, and as an enemy of Alexander, king of Macedon. He was married to Berenice and Apame, and was the parent of Pyrrhus, Ptolemais, and sons by Cleopatra; he also named Ptolemy as his son by Antigone. Thais was his mistress. Oryssus of Aptera in Crete was his enemy and gave him a mortal wound.

He was connected by friendship with Eumenes and Aratus, giving Aratus one hundred and fifty talents for the relief of his city, while Antigonus sent his nephew Ptolemy to a fort. He showed kindness to Lucullus by giving him lodging and diet in the palace, and Pompey was indebted to him for friendship and favor shown to his father; Theodotus was Ptolemy’s paid rhetoric master. He advised Cato the Younger to return home and reconcile himself with his subjects, offered Cleomenes ships and money to regain his kingdom, and was afraid of his brother Magas. Sosibius was his greatest favorite, while the affairs of state were managed by Agathoclea, her mother, and Oenanthes. He was an enemy of Demetrius Poliorcetes and Antigonus, employed Cilles as his lieutenant, and was a friend and ally of Antony, receiving Phoenicia, Syria, and Cilicia while his sons by Cleopatra were given the style of kings of kings.

At Alexandria, after Cleomenes’s revolt, Ptolemy ordered Cleomenes’s body displayed and his children, mother Cratesiclea, and the women with her killed. Later, Cornelia refused Ptolemy’s crown and marriage proposal, and “chose rather to live a widow.”