Daughter of Ptolemy
VIII & Cleopatra III.
Sister of Ptolemy
IX & Ptolemy X.
Cousin & first wife of Antiochus VIII.
Mother of Seleucus VI, Antiochus
XI, Philip I, Demetrius
III & Antiochus
XII.
Ptolemaic princess who fueled the
internecine feud that fragmented the Seleucid dynasty in the late 2nd c.
BCE. In 124
BCE when Cleopatra
II returned to Egypt after years of exile in Syria, she married her
oldest Ptolemaic granddaughter [Tryphaena] to her oldest Seleucid grandson
[Antiochus VIII Grypus]. Years later (114
BCE), when Tryphaena's
younger sister [Cleopatra IV]
was married to her husband's sibling rival [Antiochus
IX], Tryphaena saw her as a threat to her own sons' claim to the
Syrian throne. So she had her sister assassinated at the shrine of
Daphne near Antioch (112
BCE). In retaliation, her widowed brother-in-law
had her executed, sparking open civil war between her children & her
sister's son.
References: Justin, Epitome
39.2-4.
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