ROMSO Cyprus Knowledge Base

--- CONTENT--
The war of the sceptres was a armed conflict fought between the Tolemaic Kingdom of Cyprus of Ptolemy IX, the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt of Cleopatra III and Ptolemy X and the reign of Judea of Alexander Ianneus in the second century BC, from 103 to 101 BC, in Celesiria. The war began with the intervention of Ptolemy IX in the affairs of Judea but soon became a civil war between the Ptolemy, leaving Ianneus a less important position within the conflict.

Front
In 116 B.C. died the king of Egypt Ptolemy VIII Evergete, who left the kingdom to his wife Cleopatra III and his eldest son Ptolemy IX Sother; Cleopatra III, however, preferred the second-born Ptolemy X Alexander, who in 107 B.C. replaced his brother under the rule of Egypt. Ptolemy Sother went to Cyprus, then an Egyptian governorship, where he imposed himself as an independent monarch from the central kingdom.

From 134 BC. John Ircan I ruled the kingdom of Judea and in 104 BC died; the eldest son Aristobulus I succeeded him, but he was killed by his brother Alexander Ianneus the following year. Ianneus took power in Judea.

War
At the beginning of 103 BC. Alexander Ianneus attacked the city of Ptolemaid in Phoenicia (current Acres) to conquer it; the citizens of Ptolemaid called in their help the Ptolemaic ruler of the kingdom of Cyprus Ptolemaeus IX Sotere. He agreed to go to Judea, thinking that from there he could easily vent an attack on Egypt to regain the throne that had been taken away from him. A citizen of Tolemaide, Demeneto, however, convinced his fellow citizens not to welcome Tolomeo Sotere, who would bring war and also bring the Egyptian armies that would have devastated the entire Celesiria. When Ptolemy came, then Ptolemaid closed his doors and he camped outside the city.

In the meantime Alexander Ianneus called in his help the rulers of Egypt Cleopatra III and Ptolemy X Alexander; they decided to go to Judea, probably not to help the Jews, but to conquer the territories of Celesiria and the nearby Seleucid Empire. When Ptolemy IX discovered that Ianneus had called his rivals, he left his generals to besiege Tolemaide, and he himself went into Judea with an army of thirty thousand men to face the Jewish king. For Iannex had gathered an army of fifty thousand, and the two rulers met on the banks of the Jordan River; Ptolemy and his general Philistine, despite the numerical inferiority, won against the Jews.

Meanwhile Cleopatra III and Ptolemy Alexander had arrived in the war territory and, while Cleopatra began a siege of Tolemaide, he sent his son Alexander to Damascus, probably to have strongholds from which he then conquered the whole territory. At the beginning of the winter Ptolemy IX went to Gaza, where a series of attacks on Egypt began, convinced that he could resume.