Anyone reading about the Hellenistic Period—the 3 centuries between Alexander and Cleopatra’s deaths—will inevitably learn that kings (and generals) gained legitimacy through military victory. That’s just the nature of Hellenistic kingship, or leadership, or generalship.
Sometimes a work will provide details, explaining that when Alexander left no heir and his generals fought over the remains of his empire. With no direct lineage to the Macedonian kings, these generals had to establish their legitimacy through military prowess. After these successors, would-be kings and generals followed their lead for 3 centuries until the Romans conquered the last of the Hellenistic rulers, Cleopatra.
And when you will inevitably read about legitimacy through military victory, I mean a statement on the nature of Hellenistic kingship is in just about every book that covers even a portion of this period. Here’s a sampling of statements from the past 13 years.
“One of the important symbolic notions of the Hellenistic period was conquestu2014the spear-won landu2014and the rulers of these kingdoms established their legitimacy through military victory.”
Eve MacDonald, Hannibal: A Hellenistic Life (2015)
“The importance of conquests and victories cannot be overestimated in any discussion of these newly emerging dynasties. These new monarchies were tied to imperialism [and] did not pursue policies that were concerned solely to the holding of those territories that they already possessed, but rather they constantly sought to add to their power and possessions. None of the Successors was immune to the quest. In a very real sense their royalty depended on their military success.”
Edward M. Anson, Alexander’s Heirs: The Age of the Successors (2014)
“The charisma of successful military leadership was so important that, whatever other noble qualities the king might possess, if he was poor or unlucky at warfare he risked being replaced.”
Robin Waterfield, Dividing the Spoils: The War for Alexander the Great’s Empire (2011)
“The desire to be seen as a successful general, both for the prestige and the expansion of one’s realm, was an integral part of Hellenistic kingship.”
Jeff Champion, Pyrrhus of Epirus (2009)
“For all of them, their right to rule rested ultimately upon conquest.”
James Allan Evans, Daily Life in the Hellenistic Age: From Alexander to Cleopatra (2008)
“The age of Philip and Alexander never really passed – their spirits lived on through the belief that conquest was a necessary requisite of kingship. Only the coming of the Romans brought an end to this era of competing warrior kings.”
Vincent Gabrielsen, The Cambridge History of Greek and Roman Warfare (2007)
“The Macedonian kings held power through military conquest and personal excellence.”
Kathryn Guzwiller, A Guide to Hellenistic Literature (2007)
“War was of vital importance for the monarchies, both for material reasons (control of territories and their resources, gain and redistribution of booty), and because of the ideology of kingship, which was primarily based on military victory.”
Angelos Chaniotis, War in the Hellenistic World (2005)
“The Hellenistic kings were all the descendants of a warrior culture, and their power and their kingship were measured by their arms.”
Sheila L. Ager, A Companion to the Hellenistic World (2005)
Whenever I see historians universally making similar statements over and over, my instinct is to find its origins and even challenge it. But it’s difficult in this instance. We can go as far back as the 10th-century Byzantine encyclopedia, the Suda. We don’t know the author of this massive, yet fragmentary work, but we do know that it was based on texts that are now lost to us. Thus, it is a goldmine of more history and even medieval analysis of the period.
For example, it provides a definition for kingship,
Neither has nature produced the institution of kingship among men, but it is the creation of those who can command armies and administer affairs with expertise. Philip [II] and the successors of Alexander are examples of such men. Kinship in kingship confers no advantage on a natural son, if he has a natural lack of ability, but those who are in no way related have become kings of almost the entire inhabited world. ((This translation comes from Michael M. Sage, Warfare in Ancient Greece: A Sourcebook (New York: Routledge, 1996), 200, no. 271. It’s also translated in Edward M. Anson, Alexander’s Heirs: The Age of the Successors, “Malden: Wiley Blackwell, 2014), 157; Arthur M. Eckstein, Mediterranean Anarchy, Interstate War, and the Rise of Rome (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006), 88; Angelos Chaniotis, War in the Hellenistic World: A Social and Cultural History (Malden: Blackwell, 2005), 27.))
This is by no means conclusive, but it demonstrates that this definition of Hellenistic kingship is no modern phenomenon. Still, my instinct is to challenge this notion.
However, I just finished Robin Waterfield’s Dividing the Spoils: The War for Alexander the Great’s Empire (2011), where he demonstrated that “in every case where we know the details, the Successors’ assumption of kingship followed significant military success.” ((Robin Waterfield, Dividing the Spoils: The War for Alexander the Great’s Empire (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 144.))
From there, kings and generals found legitimacy through military victory throughout this period—Agothocles, Pyrrhus, Regulas, Xanthippus, Hamilcar, Hannibal, and Flamininus to name a few.
Of course, there are exceptions to the rule, ((A. B. Bosworth, The Legacy of Alexander: Politics, Warfare, and Propaganda Under the Successors (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 251.)) but after Alexander died without an heir, his generals needed a way to legitimize their rule and these Hellenistic kings found legitimacy through military victory. That is the nature of Hellenistic kingship.