Coins, Colonies, Connectivity: Seleukid Imperialism in the Persian Gulf (20 min)

Presenters

Talia Prussin, University of British Columbia

Abstract

Revenue from the Indian Ocean trade drove Seleucid interest and investment in the Persian Gulf. While the Indian Ocean trade is better known from the Roman sources detailing the Red Sea route, a route through Mesopotamia and the Persian Gulf to the Indian Ocean was also in operation since the period of Seleucid rule. Seleucid settlements on Ikaros (modern Failaka) and Tylos (Bahrain) allowed the Seleucids control the movement of goods through the gulf toward the Indian Ocean. Although limited Seleucid activity around the gulf has long been evident from Greek literary sources, the extent of the Seleucid presence there was thought by scholars to be largely confined to a garrison on the island of Ikaros and periodic military activity throughout the gulf.

However, archaeological excavations in the region have shifted that picture considerably over the last fifty years. A dedication by the strategos of the district of Tylos and the islands, found during excavations on Bahrain, demonstrates the existence of a Seleucid administrative district for the gulf, as explicated by Paul Kosmin. Seleucid investment in colonial settlements in the gulf is illustrated by the Ikaros stela. A letter preserved on the stela lays out arrangements for the settlement on Ikaros, including a grant of ateleia on imports, distributions of land, and the establishment of agones. Coins found on Ikaros have been connected to a mint at Antiocheia-Charax, located near where the river of Mesopotamia debouched into the sea. Antiocheia-Charax, in addition to providing local coinage, connected trade moving through the gulf to Mesopotamia, Syria, and finally the Mediterranean. These administrative provisions and colonial settlements allowed the Seleucids to manage the movement of goods coming from the Indian Ocean trade as they passed through the Persian Gulf.