Hi there, you're listening to the Hellenistic Age podcast.

Episode 55, the Seleucid Empire, Syrian Knights, Macedonian Dreams.

In the previous episode, the first of a two-park look at the Seleukid Empire, we spent time discussing the administration of the realm. The Seleucid kingship was transactional,

and expressed itself in terms that could be read as

Greco-Macedonian, Iranian, and Near Eastern. Delegation to those like satraps and local powerholders

was imperfect, and demanded the Peripatida government where the king constantly needed to enforce

his imperial presence among the many cities and territories by visiting them personally.

With the second part, I plan on focusing on the ways that the Salucans transform the landscape of the empire with

the creation of an imperial heartland and populated in the territory with dozens of settlements.

We will also talk about the responses of the immigrant Greeks to their new surroundings

and those of the indigenous peoples who were now faced

with a new political and cultural elite. Let us start with the landscape of the empire.

Before the arrival of the Macedonians, the Near East and Levant were home to several impressive

cities like Babylon and Tyre, so they were no strangers to the idea of urbanization. With the

conquests of Alexander in the

infighting of his successors came the creation and spread of Greek-style cities across the Hellenistic

world. But the Seleukids were unsurpassed in the scale and scope of their building program.

There are over 120 named settlements that can be attributed to the dynasty, with about

70% of them located west

of the Euphrates River. The majority of these are tied to Seleucus I and his son Antiochus I.

And Appian suggests that at least 34 cities were founded by Seleucus, however true that may be.

But new settlements would continue to be built down to the mid-second century.

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