Ancient Coin Stories

Ptolemy Epigonos led a complicated life, not facilitated by the simple fact that he was significantly impacted by four other people also named Ptolemy.

Our Ptolemy grew up with the finest luxuries as the son of the Diadochos Lysimachos. His mother was high-maintenance extreme in Arsinoe II, daughter of Ptolemy I Soter, who was another close confidant of Alexander the Great and who ruled over Egypt.

As the potential heir to two kingdoms, Ptolemy was in a good place. Unfortunately, on the Asia Minor side that was complicated by his older-brother-from-another-mother in Agathokles. In his favor, though, was his mother – who was as devious as Lysimachos was brave.

She convinced him that his first-born Agathokles was plotting against him. Lysimachos, renowned for wrestling a lion as a youth and serving at the fore of Alexander’s bodyguards, made up for those heroic traits in gullibility. He put his son to death, and Arsinoe II’s plan was complete.

Of course, where one domino falls in thrones, others inevitable go. In this case, Agathokles’ wife Lysandra fled to Seleukos I Nikator, easily the most powerful Diadochos of the time. He led an army that killed Lysimachos and took over his kingdom, which basically ruined that plan.

But just when things may have seemed the darkest, Ptolemy’s uncle (you guessed the first name) Ptolemy Keraunos, murdered Seleukos in prayer.

Arsinoe II then had a new plan. Since both laid claim to Macedonia, she and Ptolemy Keraunos simply needed to marry, and our Ptolemy would then be heir to the Macedonian kingdom. While normally the fact that they were half-siblings would put a dent in things, that was no challenge for Egyptians, who were the world experts in birth deformities.

The two married, and again it seemed like Arsinoe II had the right idea. Of course, it had a fatal flaw. In this case, the problem was that Ptolemy Keraunos was a major asshole. The two feuded, and when Keraunos doubted her loyalty, he killed her two young sons, both full brothers of Ptolemy Epigonos. This development was obviously unplanned.

So, they fled Macedonia to home-sweet-home Egypt, which at the time was ruled by Ptolemy I Soter’s son, Ptolemy II Philadelphos, who was Arsinoe II’s full brother. Since they were in Egypt and twisted romance was in the air, the two married.

What was Arsinoe II’s final attempt seemed to work. Her brother declared Epigonos a regent of Egypt, and he was destined by succeed him. This time, it was his turn to mess things up.

Some time after his mother’s death, he decided to revolt. We don’t know exactly why? Was he upset at the quality of dining establishments? Or was the issue that he had no sister of child-bearing age he could marry? All we know is his revolt failed and his name was summarily scraped from any regent mentions.

However, lucky for Epigonos, Ptolemy II’s name was Philadelphos, which means “brotherly love” (which in the Egyptian case was taken literally). The two reconciled over their love of dune surfing and binge-watching, and Epigonos was given a small post in Telmessos.

After Ptolemy II died, the Egyptian throne was taken by his son Ptolemy III, who allowed Epigonos to keep his post for the remainder of his life.

So, though Epigonos wound up nowhere near his potential, by the standards of the era he achieved an incredibly rare death of old age.

Note that this coin was most likely not minted during Ptolemy Epigonos’ lifetime, as he died in 240 BCE. His son, Lysimachos (Greek family reunions must have been impossible), took over Telmessos after that. However, we’ll never truly know exactly who minted this coin.