The Liber Memorialis of Lucius Ampelius on Macedonia and its kings

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 We actually know almost nothing about Lucius Ampelius, the author of the Liber Memoralis. Nevertheless, his work has survived the years and is accessible to us.


He is the author of the textbook of ancient mythology, geography, and history, and that's pretty much all we know about him—and, of course, that he was a Roman who lived either in the time of Trajan or Constantine. Researchers therefore consider a rather long period of more than two hundred years in which he could have lived—according to Wikipedia, from 98 to 337 AD.

But, let's turn to his work Liber Memorialis and jump straight into chapter six, which could be titled "On the Planet Earth".

There, Ampelius lists various "most well-known peoples" in a list that, according to him, represents three inhabited continents out of a total of four: Africa (located between the Tanais and the Nile), Libya (between the Nile and the Gulf of Gades), and Europe (between the Strait and the Tanais).

We quote the following passage from the chapter:

In Europe, the most famous peoples are: the Scythians, the Sarmatians, the Germans, the Dacians, the Moesians, the Thracians, the Macedonians, the Dalmatians, the Pannonians, the Illyrians, the Greeks, the Italians, the Gauls, and the Spanish. In Libya, the most famous peoples are: the Ethiopians, the Moors, the Numidians, the Phoenicians, the Gaetulians, the Garamantes, the Nasamones, and the Egyptians...

As we can see, Lucius Ampelius clearly distinguishes between Macedonians and Greeks among the most well-known peoples. This differentiation becomes even clearer later in his work.


Also interesting in this section, or rather in the following sentence, which we have withheld from writing here but can be seen in the screenshot, is the mention of Mount Olympus in Macedonia as one of the most famous mountains on planet Earth.

On the Kingdom of Macedonia

Let's move on to the tenth chapter, "On Empires." There, the Kingdom of Macedonia is mentioned among the seven kingdoms since "the beginning of modern history."

From the beginning of the memory of time, there have been seven empires. The first who were in charge of things were the Assyrians, then the Medians, after that, the Persians, then the Lacedaemonians, then the Athenians, after whom came the Macedonians, and then the Romans.


Much more specific information about the Macedonians, the Macedonian Empire, and the Macedonian kings is provided in Chapter 16, entitled "Reges Macedonum" (Kings of Macedonia).

There we find five kings mentioned (actually only four real ones), for each of whom Ampelius has written a brief description or a short history. Among them, of course, are Alexander the Great and his father Philip II, as well as Philip V, Perseus—the last king of Macedonia, and Andriskus 'the Fake King'.

Here is the chapter translated into English, taken from Topos Text. We have noted the Roman numerals after the names of each king. In the original, Ampelius writes, for example, "Philip, the son of Amyntas" in the first paragraph, so we now know these are Philip II and Amyntas IV.


Quote:

Kings of the Macedonians

  • Philip II, son of Amyntas IV, was the first of the Macedonians to grab Thrace and place it under his own control; and he wanted to cross over to Asia, but right in the midst of the preparations for this war he was killed in the theatre by Pausanias.
  • Alexander III, son of Philip II and Olympias, set out from Pella in Macedon with 40,000 soldiers, crossed over into Asia and defeated King Darius of the Persians, first at the River Granicus, then at Issus in Cilicia, and a third time at Arbela - in three battles he defeated three hundred thousand infantry, fifty thousand cavalry, two thousand scythed chariots. He soon brought the king of the Indians and all the peoples of Asia under his control and captured the most noble cities of Asia: Sardes, Bactra, Susa, Babylonia. At the last of these he died (whether from excessive drinking or from poison is unclear), although before that he had travelled through Africa all the way to Jupiter Ammon and become the first of all men to sail on the Ocean.
  • Philip V, who reigned over Macedonia in the seventh place after Alexander III, invaded Greece and ruled it savagely until he was defeated by Sulpicius the consul in Phocis, then by Flaminius in [Macedonia] Thessaly at Cynoscephalae, where having given his son Demetrius as a hostage he was stripped of part of his kingdom.
  • Perses, son of Philip V, with massive Macedonian armies and when he had made an attack on Greece, was defeated with empty models of elephants by Marcius the consul at the Ascyris Marsh, threw his treasure into the sea and fled; soon he was been chased from Macedonia altogether by Aemilius Paulus and sought asylum on Samothrace. From there, after promises had been made, he surrendered himself to Paulus, was led before his chariot in a triumph and then grew old in free custody at Albanus.
  • Pseudo-Philip was a commoner and a degenerate man, who used his similar appearance to Philip V to persuade people that he was his son and led the Macedonians in war, but as disorder broke out, he was captured and sent under guard to Rome, where he escaped from custody, roused up Macedonia again and took the war to Thrace. In the citadel of the kingdom, dressed in a military cloak, he gave legal judgements. Soon he was defeated by Caecilius Metellus in a massive battle and fled into Thrace, but he was betrayed by the kings and taken away for the triumph.

In these five points, we find an important detail, even mentioned twice.

Ampelius recounts how Perseus attacked Greece. He further writes that "Philip invaded Greece" and ruled brutally until the Romans liberated Greece from Macedonian rule.

Admittedly, we don't find the latter mentioned exactly as we just wrote. But further in the book we find this important detail in the complex history of Macedonia.

This passage is found in Chapter 18, in which Ampelius describes the "Most Brilliant Roman Generals."

In the description of Paul (Lucius Aemilius Paullus Macedonicus), we find the following statement by Ampelius:

Paulus, who had conquered Macedonia, freed Greece and brought back the most opulent triumph, when he lost his two sons during the very days of the triumph, but said publicly that he was grateful to fate, because it had attacked his own house rather than the Republic.

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