Читать книгу Claimants to Royalty - John Henry Ingram - Страница 10

In some respects more fortunate than many of his successors in the art of claiming royal kinship, Alexander Balas has obtained the sanction of several Jewish and Roman historians to the legality of his pretensions. In his "Antiquities of the Jews," Josephus, from obvious nationalistic reasons, accepts without a query the pseudo Alexander as the legitimate sovereign of Syria; and more recent Latin chroniclers have copied his narration without doubting—probably without having heard anything to the contrary. Justin, and other later writers, however, positively assert that the real name of this pretender was Prompale; and that so far from having been born in the purple, his parents were of the very lowest ranks of society.

According to these more reliable authorities, Balas was a Rhodian youth employed by various monarchs hostile to the pretensions of Demetrius Soter, then in possession of the kingdom of Syria, to personate Alexander, a long deceased son of Antiochus Epiphanos. The impostor, assuming the name and title of the deceased prince, speedily found himself, through the assistance of the allied sovereigns and the favour of the Roman senate, at the head of a large army, with which he invaded Syria. The garrison of Ptolemais having been betrayed into his hands, and other advantages accruing to him by reason of the hatred which the Syrians entertained for Demetrius, awoke that king to the real danger of the situation. He sent an embassy with rich gifts, and still richer promises, to Jonathan, the Jewish ruler, in order to obtain his friendly assistance, and then, collecting his forces, marched against Balas.

The pretender was not ignorant of the great value of Jonathan's services, and by means of greater presents and more flattering promises managed to withdraw him from an alliance with Demetrius. With the loans obtained from his allies, and by means of extortion, Balas was enabled to gather a large army of mercenary soldiers together, with which to give battle to the Syrian monarch. After a hardly-contested fight Demetrius was slain, and the kingdom fell an easy prey into the hands of the victor, who, elated with his triumph, demanded the hand of Cleopatra, daughter of Ptolemy Philopater, King of Egypt, declaring that as he had now recovered the principality of his forefathers, he was worthy of his alliance. The Egyptian monarch, pleased with this offer, replied that he would meet Alexander at Ptolemais, and there give him his daughter in marriage.

The meeting soon afterwards took place, and the new king was united in marriage to the Princess Cleopatra, receiving with his bride a right royal dower. Jonathan, the Jew, assisted at the wedding fêtes, and was very cordially and magnificently treated by the two monarchs. A short time, however, and the impostor began to show the cloven hoof. He commenced his almost unaccountable perfidies by an attempt to overthrow Jonathan, but his forces being defeated by that skilful warrior, he repudiated the affair as carried out without his sanction, and pretended to be pleased with the want of success of his own troops. Aroused from the voluptuousness and profligacy into which he had plunged by the intelligence of an invasion of his dominions by Demetrius, a son of the late king of that name, he prepared for war. About this time he treacherously endeavoured to destroy his father-in-law, Ptolemy, by means of Ammonius, a friend of his; the plot being discovered, Ptolemy wrote to Alexander, and demanded that condign punishment should be administered to Ammonius, but when he found that his demands were disregarded, he soon perceived whence the conspiracy had originated, and repented of having given his daughter in marriage to the pseudo Alexander. Having succeeded in getting the princess back into his own hands, he broke off his alliance with her husband, and at once entered into a league of mutual assistance and friendship with the young Demetrius, to whom he subsequently offered his daughter in marriage.

This prince was only too delighted with the terms of the embassage, and, without troubling himself as to the existence of Balas's prior claim, gladly accepted the hand of Cleopatra, coupled as it was with the armed assistance of her father. After some difficulty the Egyptian king persuaded the people of Antioch to receive Demetrius as their king, and then took the field with a force capable of supporting his new son-in-law's claims.

In the meanwhile Balas was not idle; but, hastening into Syria from Cecilia, where he was when the war broke out, he collected a large army, and, in right royal fashion, burnt and pillaged the country belonging to Antioch. Forced to give battle to the combined strength of Ptolemy and his son-in-law (for Demetrius had already espoused his antagonist's wife), the pretender was, however, beaten and put to flight. Seeking refuge in Arabia, his head was cut off by Zabdiel, an Arabian prince, and sent to Ptolemy. The Egyptian monarch, however, did not long enjoy his triumph, for shortly after the arrival of the head of his first son-in-law, he died from the effect of the wounds received in defeating him. For five years the pseudo Alexander reigned over a large portion of Asia, during which period he thoroughly disgusted his subjects by his absurd vanity and profligate conduct.

Some years after the death of Balas, Diodotus Tryphon, one of his commanders, finding the nation as dissatisfied with Demetrius as they had been with Alexander, excited a rebellion against him, and set up a son, or a pretended son, of his late master as king. Tryphon ultimately proving victorious over Demetrius, and obtaining the entire control of the country, put his youthful protégé to death, and, according to the account of Livy and Josephus, usurped the government himself; but after a reign of three years was overthrown and slain.