Hello, fellow thrill seekers. This time I am looking at ANTIOCHUS THE GREAT by Michael Taylor, published in 2013 by Pen and Sword ($39.95 USD on Amazon).
I painted my first Ancients army in 1975 for WRG 4th Ed. it was a Seleukid army featuring a (badly painted) pike phalanx, elephants, cataphracts, and scythed chariots. Since then I have sold the army and painted up another TWICE, and I still have such an army in both 15mm and 28mm. One thing in common is that I always have a figure around who represents Antiochus III Megas, who I have always thought one of the more romantic figures in Ancient history. For years I have wished for a decent biography of the Great King, and now there is one.
The book contains a brief summary of Seleukid history both before and after the reign of Antiochus. If you are any kind of Seleukid fanboy, there's nothing here you don't already know, but the summary is worth looking at to place Antiochus in context of the dynasty as a whole, and (perhaps more importantly) to remind the reader of the difficult task any Seleukid King was signing up for. The Seleukid Kingdom was absolutely vast, and had basically no water transportation available between its far-flung outposts, which stretched from the Hellespont to the Indus and from Afghanistan to Palestine. A message from a subject in Bactria to the King in Antioch would have taken roughly 6 weeks to arrive, assuming good weather and no mishaps along the way; a response could rarely have arrived in Bactria less than 3 months after the original message was sent, and usually would have taken longer. As decision cycles go, this would be fairly daunting.
Moreover, although the kingdom had a population comparable to that of contemporary Rome, the available military manpower was relatively small, due to almost exclusive reliance on Greco-Macedonian settlers to provide the heavy infantry phalanx that was the mainstay of Seleukid military power. Some native manpower was used, but this was mostly available as poorly armed and motivated missle-armed light troops.
With this background in place, Taylor plunges into the biography proper, from Antiochus' youth as a 19 year old king immediately faced with 2 major revolts and a war with the Ptolemies, through his great Eastern Anabasis, to his defeat and humiliation at the hands of the Romans.
Taylor does a nice job of handling the available sources. These sources consist mostly of Polybius, but also include a number of other fragmentary Greek and Roman sources, with contributions from archaeology and numismatic studies. As always, there are gaps in the story, but these are convincingly bridged with a few well-educated guesses, and Taylor is careful to tell us what he has evidence for and what is simply informed speculation.
For wargamers, there is quite a lot of the good stuff. There are Orders of Battle for several of Antiochus' major engagements, primarily Raphia, Panion, and Magnesia, but useful information is there for a significant number of smaller and less well-known battles as well. There is more than enough data here for a large multi-player campaign, if anyone is interested.
Overall, it must be said that while Taylor shows us Antiochus Megas with all his faults and shortcomings (there were a lot) in full view, Taylor takes a sympathetic view of the man. He doesn't try to say Antiochus was a genius either militarily or politically, but he does point out the man's energy, drive, determination, and overall competence. It is well worth pointing out that even after the disaster at Magnesia and the harsh Peace of Apamea at the hands of Rome, Antiochus the Great left his kingdom larger, more prosperous, and more cohesive than it had been when he came to power. In hindsight, the often gross incompetence of his descendants make Antiochus' achievements appear rather trivial and ephemeral. His contemporaries did not see them in that light, however.
All in all, I enjoyed reading this book and felt it was mostly worth the 40 bucks. I recommend it to anyone curious about the history of the Seleukids and their 2nd greatest (after Seleukus Nikator) king.
