At the confluence of the Kokcha River and the Amu Darya, in northern Afghanistan’s Takhar province, lie the ruins of Ai-Khanoum (which means “Moon Princess”). This ancient settlement was home to a major Hellenistic city from the late 4th century BC to the mid-2nd century BC, whose original name remains unknown (some researchers propose Estobara, […]
Hellenism
Posted inAncient Greece
Termessos, the Impregnable Mountaintop City Alexander Never Conquered
Located about twenty kilometers from Antalya, in the Güllük Dağı National Park, there is a place called Karabunar Kiui, where the Archaeological Site of Termessos is located. It hosts the well-preserved remains of the ancient city of Termessos, a city-fortress that mythology attributes to the founding by the Homeric hero Bellerophon, and whose location at […]
Posted inAncient Egypt, Ancient Greece
The Frenzied Life of Ptolemy Ceraunus, the Man Who Ended the Last Successor of Alexander the Great
He was disinherited from the Egyptian throne, organized an expedition to overthrow his brother-in-law in Thrace, murdered the ally who helped him, married his own stepsister, killed her children, briefly ruled in Macedonia, and ultimately lost his life because, in his reckless impetuosity, he did not wait for reinforcements in his last battle, ending with […]
Posted inClassical Archaeology
A Small Hellenistic Gold Ring with a Garnet Found in an Exceptional State of Preservation in Jerusalem
A stunning piece of ancient jewelry, a small gold ring adorned with a precious red gemstone, believed to be a garnet, has been uncovered in archaeological excavations in the City of David, part of the Jerusalem Walls National Park. This remarkable find dates back approximately 2,300 years to the early Hellenistic period. The gold ring, […]
Posted inAncient Greece, Geography
Megasthenes, the 3rd Century BC Greek Geographer who Described Himalayas and Calculated the Longitude and Latitude of India
Like many lost works of antiquity, their content can be partially reconstructed through the citations of later authors. This is what happened, for example, with the Phoenician history of Sanchuniaton. And also with the work of Megasthenes titled Indica, where he recounts his journey to India in the 3rd century BC. Megasthenes was born in […]
Posted inAncient Greece
Crateros, the General who May Have Been Denied the Succession to Alexander Because of a Phonetic Error
«Tôi kratistôi». Diodorus of Sicily recounts in his Historical Library that this was the laconic response given by Alexander the Great on his deathbed to his friend Perdiccas when asked who he left as heir. The expression means “to the strongest”, but it was ambiguous – or very explicit, depending on how you look at […]
Posted inAncient Egypt
The Canopus Decree, the Inscription that Attested to the Existence of Ancient Heracleion and Created the Leap Years
The famous Rosetta Stone, which enabled the deciphering of Egyptian hieroglyphs, was found by Napoleon’s troops who invaded Egypt in 1799. It wouldn’t be long before many other similar steles and inscriptions began to appear, all with texts in two languages (Egyptian and Greek) and three writing systems (hieroglyphs, demotic, and Greek). The Rosetta Stone […]
Posted inAntiquity
Eucratides I, the Greco-Bactrian King who Minted the Largest Gold Coin of Antiquity
Eucratides I was a monarch of the Hellenistic period who ruled the Greco-Bactrian kingdom, located in present-day Afghanistan, between 172 and 145 B.C. Coming from the Diodotid dynasty, which had been overthrown by Euthydemus I, he managed to regain the throne from Demetrius I while the latter was attempting to conquer the northwest of India. […]
Posted inClassical Archaeology
New Evidence in the Identification of Philip II and his Family in the Royal Tombs of Vergina
The Royal Tombs of Vergina in northern Greece date back to the 4th century BC and are believed to belong to members of the Argead dynasty of Macedonia, including King Philip II and his son Alexander the Great. The debate over the identity of the occupants has continued since their discovery in 1977. The tombs, […]
Posted inAncient Greece
Onesicritus, the historian whom Alexander the Great sent to learn the secrets of the yogis
Astypalaia is a small island in the Greek Dodecanese, possibly a colony of Megara, where around 360 B.C. Onesicritus, a historian and cynic philosopher who followed Diogenes of Sinope ( the one who lived like a beggar in a jar), was born. In 334 BC, when he was 26 years old, he crossed the Hellespont […]