Rise and Fall of the Seleucid Empire (Who were the Seleucids?)

[Applause] for more than two centuries the persian empire was the most powerful military and political entity on earth alexander of macedon conquered this massive empire in a few years with a relatively small army this event shook the ancient world alexander is most commonly known as alexander the great for this great accomplishment however he did not enjoy it for a great deal of time upon returning to babylon and relaxing for about five minutes he got sick and died in 323 bc his top generals officials and relatives all former friends allies and battle brothers turned on each other the chaotic struggle for the unbelievable amount of wealth and power obtained by the macedonians unleashed decades of war between the successors of alexander known as the wars of the diadoki of alexander's many illustrious generals officers and retainers who fought to control his empire seleucus was an unlikely prospect to emerge victorious from the fray during the conquests of alexander selugus had worked his way up the ranks from a minor officer to an elite infantry unit commander he had no territory and a little over two thousand men personally loyal to himself which was relatively insignificant compared to an empire populated by millions where hundreds of thousands were being marshaled throughout by the top contenders to succeed alexander socieucus a beefy hulk of a man who played up the association between himself and a bull was compelled to play a supporting role for quite some time war was initially instigated when the corpse of alexander was stolen in route for burial in macedon by ptolemy alexander's general who had been appointed governor of egypt seleucus and his men first backed perticus who was initially the most powerful however after leading a poorly planned invasion of egypt perticus was assassinated by his own men so lucas was likely involved in the second war of the diodoki which soon followed after peace interrupted for a short time seleucus backed his old friend antigonus the one-eyed who replaced perticus as a leading power antagonist appointed seleucus saitrap of babylon there seleucos ingratiated himself with the local population with whom he was quite popular he generously funded temples and local institutions additionally a year before alexander's death around 100 of his top officers were compelled to marry persian wives in an effort to amalgamate persian and greek culture power and people alexander's vision was abandoned not long after his corpse was cold seleucus was the only top officer of note who remained married to his persian bride while the rest discarded theirs some have said this was out of love but it may also have been a calculated strategic decision having the knowledge and credibility of a native noble family on one side was a valuable asset which was overlooked by seleucus's peers and superiors he even later claimed that his wife was the daughter of darius the last persian shah and shah which made their son the legitimate heir and rightful ruler of the persian empire because of seleucus's growing popularity antigonus likely viewed him as a potential rival after antagonists executed a mutual friend who was accused of plotting a rebellion seleucus feared and heges was planning to execute him next so he fled to egypt there ptolemy provided him protection and later an army seleucus used the army to conquer babylon while ptolemy and antagonists were sparring in the levant in babylonia seleucus finally established independent rule in 312 bc that lasted for about a year while seleucus was expanding his territory in the east many of the local iranians switched sides and rallied to his cause meanwhile he lost babylon and the city was sacked following a two-year war with antigonus salyucus retook babylon and then made peace after alexander's death his brother and son inherited his titles lord of asia shanzha persia along with many other regal titles but in reality those with armies at their command wielded true authority and controlled the empire's finances both alexander's brother and young son were murdered after all of alexander's potential heirs had been hunted down and killed his generals officially proclaimed themselves kings which they already kind of were so lucas did so in 305 bc zolyukus authority was firmly established over the eastern provinces during a four-year period transforming his territory into a proper empire this brought the cellucids into contact with another rapidly expanding empire the mauryan empire of chandragupta not much is known about the ensuing war between these two empires other than that the macedonians were expelled from the indian subcontinent a peace treaty was then successfully negotiated which recognized mauryan territorial gains and an alliance formed sealed with a diplomatic marriage between seleucus's daughter and the indian ember in exchange chandragupta gave seleucus a formidable force of 500 trained war elephants two years later these elephants were used to great effect to decisively defeat antagonists at the battle of ipsis where old one eye lost his life after the battle the seleucid empire enjoyed more than a decade of relative peace during which time seleucus was able to indulge in his real passion city building his greatest project had already begun a few years before salukia a brand new capital city it was built near babylon and no expense was spared trying to outshine the grand old city salukia's population did not grow fast enough to fill the massive metropolis being built so much of babylon's population was relocated to the nearby city to realize seleucus's vision of a grand metropolitan capital city bearing his name in addition to this dozens of cities were built in which greek immigrants were encouraged to settle in many of these cities seleucus named after himself his father or his wife who passed away after ipsis seleucus made an alliance with demetrius the son of antigonus the one-eyed to seal the alliance he married demetrius's daughter who was 40 years younger than him while demetrius was establishing himself as king in macedon one of history's more weird events took place seleucus's son antiochus fell madly in love with his stepmom to an unhealthy level his father felt sorry for the young lad and worried that he might die of sadness so he let him marry his stepmom who the old king had just had a child with this was scandalous even by the standards of the time however this may have all been part of a plan to insult demetrius who seleucus hated after ditching the daughter the two kings promptly went to war demetrius was militarily successful in the beginning but his unpaid soldiers became disgruntled as soon as they saw seljukus who had gained a reputation for being wealthy and generous with his soldiers demetrius army immediately surrendered before the battle demetrius was captured and later died in captivity in 282 bc the pharaoh ptolemy died in egypt leaving celiucus and lysimicus as the last two surviving successors of alexander so naturally they went to war with each other for one last old man fight seleucus won and lysimicus died in battle with little to no resistance standing in his way seleucus traveled towards macedon and planned to live out his final days in his homeland which he had not seen for over half a century then he was assassinated by son of ptolemy who he had given refuge the death of seleucus marked the end of the wars of the deodoki he had been the last contemporary of alexander to be left standing with the largest piece of his empire his son antiochus reigned for two decades which was arguably the most peaceful and prosperous period in the empire's history as large-scale commerce flowed between the mauryan empire in india and the seleucid empire early in antiochus's reign a major gallic invasion into asia minor was crushed in large part thanks to his indian elephants which the gauls had never seen before for this victory he was given the title savior his reign also saw the first of many largely inconclusive wars fought against the ptolemies of egypt his son antiochus ii also waged war against the ptolemies while he was distracted there the eastern half of the empire which cared little for these wars broke off with their governor solidifying their independence by the end of his reign seleucus ii followed with a long series of disasters he was competent determined and very unlucky from the onset of his reign he faced numerous rebellions invasions and civil wars two of his brothers attempted to become independent rulers with some success before they were killed after many years of war he was able to hold the empire together in the west while launching failed campaigns in the east he also built a large fleet that sank then unexpectedly he fell off a horse and died his son seleucus iii was even more unfortunate and was assassinated before he really got to do anything the empire in turmoil then passed to another son antiochus iii who waged successful campaigns in every direction and for a short time he made this elusive empire great again near the end of his reign the roman republic decisively defeated antiochus the great in the west fun fact hannibal barca famous for nearly defeating rome during the punic wars was one of antiochus the great's military advisors and generals during his failed war with rome like the carthaginians they were forced to pay massive war reparations 450 tons of silver in their case the eastern provinces took the opportunity to break off antiochus moved to retake the eastern territory and was slaying during a minor raid on a temple he died without fully repaying the war reparations to rome this compelled his successors to raise taxes throughout the empire and confiscate temple treasuries including the hebrew temple in jerusalem relations with judea deteriorated during the reign of antiochus iv the long-held cellucid policy of respecting local culture and institutions was reversed making the worship of greek gods mandatory this triggered the maccabean revolt leading up to this antiochus launched the first successful seleucid invasion of egypt there he placed a puppet on the throne then the romans told him to leave egypt alone so he did in the east the semi-nomadic parthians began annexing the iranian plateau which caused the seleucid army to split with some trying to quash the rebellion in judea while the rest attempted to stop the parthians both failed the cellucid suffered heavy losses against the maccabees who waged a hit-and-run guerrilla war against them after retaking jerusalem the temple was reconsecrated which the jewish holiday of hanukkah celebrates a few years after the death of antiochus iv the maccabees negotiated peace on very favorable terms where they became a sovereign vassal state this later evolved into the hassemonian kingdom of judah which had further conflict with the seleucids the cellucid empire attempted to concentrate all of their resources on stopping the parthian threat which failed urban unrest in the cities rebellion by governors civil war and palace intrigue all handicapped their response in 141 bc the parthians captured celusia in the later decades of the second century bc the seleucid empire shrank into a small bickering shadow of its former self which was under heavy roman influence in 83 bc internal strife was so bad that one faction offered the seleucid crown to tigranus of armenia who was seen as strong and competent tagranus easily conquered them effectively ending the empire fourteen years later tigranus was defeated by the romans and made a vassal the reanimated corpse of the seleucid kingdom was revived so they decided to have one last civil war then the romans came in and put an end to all the silliness and annexed the territory this has been epimetheus thank you so much for watching if you like this video be sure to leave a like and let me know what you think of the video down in the comments also sharing 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Channel: Epimetheus

Views: 407,869

Keywords: Alexander the Great, Seleucid empire, Seleucus, diadochi, Antigonus, Demetrius, Macedon, Alexander’s successors, Ptolemy, Antiochus, Antiochus the great, history, documentary, rise and fall of the Seleucid empire, Seleucid rome, ancient, ancient history, mesopotamia, maccabees, seleucid judea, hanukkah, hanukkah story, mauryan seleucid, hanukkah history, mauryan empire, Chandragupta, greeks india, greco bactrian kingdom, Hellenistic, Hellenistic empires, parthian empire, seleucid documentary

Id: v_Qxex9M60Q

Length: 12min 29sec (749 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 23 2020