Barsine
Barsine | |
|---|---|
| Born | 363 BC |
| Died | 309 BC |
| Known for | Mistress of Alexander the Great |
| Children | Heracles of Macedon |
| Parent |
|
Rhodes
Barsine was half-Rhodian Greek by her mother, and half-Persian by her father, the satrap Artabazos II.
Barsine (
Artabazus, satrap of Hellespontine Phrygia, and a Greek Rhodian mother, the sister of mercenaries Mentor of Rhodes and Memnon of Rhodes.[1]
Barsine became the wife of her uncle Mentor, and after his death married her second uncle, Memnon.
In 334 BC, the year of
Heracles. The relationship with Alexander is highly doubtful – of the five main sources, only Plutarch and Justin mention Barsine as Alexander's mistress. Arrian does mention Barsine once – not that she was Alexander's mistress, but that Alexander gave the daughter of Barsine and Mentor in marriage to Nearchus at the Susa weddings
. It is probable that the relationship of Barsine and Alexander was made up to justify the parentage of Heracles.
Twelve years after Alexander's death in 323, Nearchus, who was Barsine's son-in-law, unsuccessfully advocated for Heracles' claim to the throne, who was, then, seventeen, which meant he was born about five years after Barsine and Alexander supposedly met in Damascus, in 333 BC. From a comparison of the accounts of
Stateira II, wife of Alexander, and who also may have been called "Barsine".[2]
Notes
- ISBN 9780806132129.
- ^ Plutarch, Parallel Lives, "Alexander", 21, "Eumenes", 1; Diodorus, Bibliotheca, xvii. 23, xx. 20, 28; Curtius Rufus, Historiae Alexandri Magni, iii. 13, x. 6; Justin, Epitome of Pompeius Trogus, xi. 10, xiii. 2, xv. 2; Pausanias, Description of Greece, ix. 7
References
- Smith, William (editor); Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, "Barsine (1)", Boston, (1867)
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Smith, William, ed. (1870). "Barsine". Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. p. 464.
