A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology

(Σέλενκος) king of SYRIA, surnamed EPIPHANES, and also NICATOR, was the eldest of the five sons of Antiochus VIII. Grypus. On the death of his father, in B. C. 96, he immediately assumed the sovereignty, and raised an army, with which he reduced several cities of Syria. His claims were, however, resisted by his uncle Antiochus Cyzicenus, who marched from Antioch against him. A decisive battle ensued, in which Antiochus was totally defeated, and himself perished (B. C. 95); and the result of this victory enabled Seleucus to make himself master of Antioch. He was now for a short time undisputed ruler of Syria; but Antiochus Eusebes, the son of Cyzicenus, having escaped from the designs of Seleucus, who sought to put him to death, raised the standard of revolt against him, defeated him in a pitched battle, and expelled him from Syria. Seleucus took refuge in Cilicia, where He established himself in the city of Mopsuestia; but he alienated

the inhabitants by his violent and tyrannical character, and at length, by his oppressive exactions of money, excited such a sedition among them that they set tire to the gymnasium in which he had taken refuge, and he perished in the flames, or, according to another account, put an end to his own life, in order to avoid a more cruel fate (J. AJ 13.13.4; Appian, Syr. 69 ; Porphyr. apud Euseb. Arm. p. 169). The death of Seleucus may probably be assigned to the year B. C. 94.

His coins, like those of all the later Seleucidan kings, bear his titles at full length.

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