The monarchy was very much a ‘‘family affair’’ (Bowman 1996b), passed on from father to son after a period of co-regency. The internal harmony is reflected in some of their cult names: Ptolemy IV was ‘‘father-loving’’ (Philopator), Ptolemy VI ‘‘mother-loving’’ (Philometor). The strongest ties are reflected by consanguineous marriages. Ptolemy II started a tradition of incest under pressure from his ambitious sister Arsinoe II. After being married to king Lysimachos of Thrace and, disastrously, to her half-brother Ptolemy Keraunos, Arsinoe II fled to Egypt where she became queen for the third time: Ptolemy II divorced his first wife to marry her, though they were full siblings. In order to legitimize this marriage, it was compared by the court poet Theokritos to that of Zeus and Hera, thus claiming a divine prerogative for the king (Idyll 17.128-34), paralleled by the marriage of Osiris and Isis. (The long series of incestuous marriages at the Ptolemaic court was not an isolated incident in the Hellenistic world (Hornblower 1982)). The practice was rarely followed by their subjects, but in Roman times the phenomenon appears to have been common among Egyptians (see, however, Huebner 2007; Remijsen and Clarysse 2008).
The dynastic cult contributed to the legitimization ofkingship (Pfeiffer 2008). The first steps were taken by Ptolemy I who continued Alexander’s idea of the king as a being of divine origin, claiming to be a descendant of Zeus and spreading rumors that he was a secret son of Philip II (Pausanias 1.6.2). He even carried off the body of Alexander, embalmed in Babylon and on its way to Macedon, and buried him in Alexandria where a ‘‘Priest of Alexander’’ was installed. With Ptolemy II and his sister-wife the foundation of a successful dynastic cult was laid, resulting in the worship of living kings as gods. The Egyptians considered Pharaoh the son of a god, an idea expressed in Graeco-Roman temples in the mammisi or birthhouses, associating the birth of a local child divinity with that of king, but the attribution of divine honors to the living Pharaoh and his wife had no recent parallels in Egypt.
Ptolemy II elevated his parents to divine rank, whereas the king and Arsinoe II became the Brother-Sister Gods in 272/1 bc. After her death in 270 (Cadell 1998),
Arsinoe received a priestess of her own, called the kanephoros or ‘‘basket-carrier’’ in good Greek tradition (Minas 1998). Her cult was propagated throughout the country: temples were constructed for her; her image had to be placed as guest-goddess (synnaos) in all the houses of the gods; and a specific tax on vineyards and gardens financed libations in honor of the new goddess (Clarysse & Vandorpe 1998). Many Egyptian documents mention or represent the queen (Quaegebeur 1998), and a dozen cities in the empire were named after her. The new goddess was worshipped throughout Egypt and the Eastern Mediterranean.
The Greek dynastic cult received its final form in 215/4 bc, when a marvellous mausoleum was constructed for Alexander and the Ptolemaic kings in Alexandria’s palace precinct, and when the dynastic cult was extended to the Greek city of Ptolemais in the south of the country. The Greek cult was maintained by an increasing number of Greek priests and priestesses in both Alexandria and Ptolemais. As ‘‘eponymous priests’’ in the tradition of Greek cities, they figured in all Greek and even Egyptian Demotic contracts after the statement of the regnal year of the king. These ever growing lists of priests’ names are helpful for modern researchers in dating texts (Clarysse & Van der Veken 1983) but were purely symbolic in antiquity.
After Ptolemy II the hint was taken by the Egyptian clergy, and an Egyptian dynastic cult developed, of which Alexander was not part (Pfeiffer 2008: 108). Under Ptolemy III a fifth phyle (tribe) of priests was added to temple staffs, which served the royal couple and their divine ancestors. Whereas in pre-Ptolemaic times Pharaoh had always faced the gods as the representative of humanity, he now also faced his ancestors alongside of the gods. The Egyptian version of the Ptolemaic dynastic cult was truly imbedded in Egyptian tradition, and the king’s initiative was manifestly supported by the Egyptian elite.
The king was double-faceted, but the Greek and Egyptian aspects were not separate. The idea behind legitimation, ideology, and propaganda was the same for both constituencies but is ‘‘expressed in forms and conventions that render the idea understandable for the other segment of the population’’ (Koenen 1994: 29). The dynastic cult remained successful throughout the Ptolemaic period but became a weapon in dynastic strife. The Romans would put an end to the Janus head of Ptolemaic kingship, since the Roman Pharaoh again represented humanity facing the gods, and the emperor would receive only Greek-style divine honors (Heinen 1995).
World History
