Reyes, dinastas y ciudades
La asylía como mecanismo de dominación
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.34096/ahamm.v59.2.15377Keywords:
monarquía helenística – diplomacia – asylía – Imperio seléucidaAbstract
According to the decree sanctioned by the Smyrnaean in the course of the Third Syrian War (OGIS 229), king Seleucus II urged the “other kings, dynasts, cities and peoples” to accept the polis’ petition of ἀσυλία. Although this phrase is a well-known formula with universalistic intentions, its apparition in this institutional context is rather unusual, especially due to the type of relations between kings it presupposes. This article explores the consequences of a king asking to other monarchs to recognize the ἀσυλία request of a city under his own command. I understand that this strategy is part of the diplomatic repertoire available to kings during the Early Hellenism. By means of it, kings do not renounce to their typical expansionist and warlike ideology, rather, they achieve to express it through a non-violent, subtle mechanism, communicating nevertheless their dominance.
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References
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Austin, M. M. (2006). The Hellenistic world from Alexander to the Roman conquest: A selection of ancient sources in translation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Bearzot, C. (2003). I1 concetto di ‘dynasteia’ e lo stato ellenistico. En Bearzot, C., Landucci, F. Zecchini, G. (eds.), Gli stati territoriali nel mondo antico (pp. 21-44). Vita e Pensiero.
Bencivenni, A. (2014). The King’s Words: Hellenistic Royal Letters in Inscriptions. En Radner, K. (ed.). State Correspondence in the Ancient World. From New Kingdom Egypt to the Roman Empire (pp. 141-171). Oxford University Press.
Biagio, V. (2002). Lancia, diadema e porpora. Il re e la regalità ellenistica. Pisa: Giardini editori e stampatori.
Buraselis, K. (2004). Some remarks on the Koan Asylia (242 BC) against its International Background. En Höghammar, K. (ed.). The Hellenistic Polis of Kos: State, Economy and Culture (15-20). Universitatis Upsaliensis.
Capdetrey, L. (2007). Le pouvoir séleucide: Territoire, administration, finances d'un royaume hellénistique (312-129 av. J.-C.). Presses universitaires de Rennes.
Ceccarelli, P. (2013). Ancient Greek letter writing: A cultural history (600 BC-150 BC). Oxford University Press.
Ceccarelli, P. (2018). Diplomatic Protocols in the Hellenistic Period. En Ceccarelli, P., Doering, L., Fögen, T. y Gildenhard, I. (eds.). Letters and Communities: Studies in the Social-Political Dimensions of Ancient Epistolography (pp. 147-183). Oxford University Press.
Chaniotis, A. (2005). War in the Hellenistic world: a social and cultural history. Blackwell Publishing.
Chrubasik, B. (2016). Kings and Usurpers in the Seleukid Empire: the men who would be king. Oxford University Press.
Chrubasik, B. (2021). Sanctuaries, priest-dynasts and the Seleukid empire. Honigman, S., Nihan, C. y Lipschits, O. (eds.) Times of transition. Judea in the Long 3rd Century BCE (pp. 161-176). Penn State University Press.
Dittenberger, W. (1903). Orientis graeci inscriptiones selectae. Supplementum Sylloges inscriptionum graecarum [OGIS]. Hirzel.
Eckstein, A. M. (2006). Mediterranean anarchy, interstate war, and the rise of Rome. In Mediterranean Anarchy, Interstate War, and the Rise of Rome. University of California Press.
Gabelko, O. (2017). Bithynia and Cappadocia: Royal Courts and Ruling Society in the Minor Hellenistic Monarchies. En Erskine, A., Llewellyn-Jones, L. y Wallace. S. (eds.). Hellenistic Court: Monarchic Power and Elite Society From Alexander to Cleopatra (pp. 319-342). The Classical Press of Wales.
Gehrke, H-J. (2013). The victorious king: reflections on the Hellenistic monarchy, en: Luraghi, N. (ed.), The splendors and miseries of ruling alone. Encounters with monarchy from archaic Greece to the Hellenistic Mediterranean (pp. 73-98). Franz Steiner.
Grainger, J. D. (2010). The Syrian Wars. Brill.
Grainger, J. D. (2016). Great power diplomacy in the Hellenistic world. Routledge.
Kirsch, K. A. (2015). Asylia and peer polity interaction in the Hellenistic period. San José State University [Master dissertation].
Lanni, A. (2008). The laws of war in ancient Greece. Law and History Review, 26 (3), 469-489.
Ma, J. (1999). Antiochos III and the Cities of Western Asia Minor. Oxford University Press.
Ma, J. (2003). Peer polity interaction in the Hellenistic age. Past & Present, 180, 9-39.
Magnetto, A. (2016). Interstate Arbitration and Foreign Judges. En Edward M. Harris, E. M. y Canevaro, M. (eds.). The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Greek Law (pp. 85-107). Oxford University Press online.
Meeus, A. (2014) “The territorial ambitions of Ptolemy I”, Studia Hellenistica, 53, 263-306.
Rigsby, K. J. (1997). Asylia: territorial inviolability in the Hellenistic world. University of California Press.
Strootman, R. (2014) “‘Men to whose rapacity neither sea nor mountain sets a limit:’ The aims of the Diadochs”, Studia Hellenistica, 53, 307–322.
Strootman, R. (2020b). The Great Kings of Asia: Imperial titulature in the Seleukid and post-Seleukid Middle East. En R. Oetjen (ed.), New Perspectives in Seleucid history, archaeology and numismatics (pp, 123-157). De Gruyter.
Will, E. (1979) Histoire politique du monde hellénistique (323-30 av. J.-C.). Presses Universitaires de Nancy.
A.G. Woodhead, A.G. (1958). Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum [SEG], vol. 12. A.W. Sythoff, Leyde.
Zelinskyi, А. (2021). Zelinskyi, A. Foreign Policy Orientation of the Bithynian King Ziaelas in Light of New Inscriptions from Kos. The Journal of V. N. Karazin Kharkiv National University. Series: History, 60, 27-48.
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Published
2026-03-30
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Dossier: La ley y el orden
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Copyright (c) 2026 Ezequiel Martin Parra
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How to Cite
Reyes, dinastas y ciudades: La asylía como mecanismo de dominación. (2026). Anales De Historia Antigua, Medieval Y Moderna, 59(2). https://doi.org/10.34096/ahamm.v59.2.15377
