Antiochus II Theos

Antiochus II Theos succeeded Antiochus I Soter as ruler of the Seleucid Empire in 261 BCE. His reign included continued rivalry with Ptolemaic Egypt and a peace settlement that involved repudiating his first wife, Laodice I, and marrying the Ptolemaic princess Berenice Phernophorus.

After the death of Ptolemy II in 246 BCE, Antiochus returned to Laodice and died soon afterwards. The succession was immediately contested between the children of his two marriages. The deaths of Berenice and her young son brought her brother Ptolemy III into the conflict and contributed directly to the outbreak of the Third Syrian War.

Gillian Bradshaw’s The Sun’s Bride places Antiochus II at the centre of the dynastic crisis that triggers its story. A Rhodian warship rescues Dionysia, described as the Seleucid king’s mistress, carrying information from his court at the end of his reign; the resulting struggle over succession and Ptolemaic intervention develops into the Third Syrian War and threatens the neutrality of Rhodes.