The
Battle of Panium was fought in
198 BC-Roman Republic:* After his election to the consulship, Titus Quinctius Flamininus is chosen to replace Publius Sulpicius Galba Maximus as the leading Roman general in Macedonia. He then crosses into Macedonia with his army. Flamininus realizes that future peace depends on breaking the power of...
between
SeleucidThe Seleucid Empire was a Hellenistic empire, i.e. a successor state of Alexander the Great's empire. The Seleucid Empire was centered in the near East and at the height of its power included central Anatolia, the Levant, Mesopotamia, Persia, today's Turkmenistan, Pamir and parts of Pakistan...
and
PtolemaicPtolemaic Egypt began when Ptolemy I Soter declared himself Pharaoh of Egypt in 305 BC and ended with the death of queen Cleopatra of Egypt and the Roman conquest in 30 BC. The Ptolemaic Kingdom was a powerful Hellenistic state, extending from southern Syria in the east, to Cyrene to the west, and...
forces as part of the
Syrian WarsThe Syrian Wars were a series of six wars between the Seleucid Empire and the Ptolemaic Kingdom during the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC over the region of Coele-Syria, one of the few avenues into Egypt...
. The Seleucids were led by
Antiochus III the GreatAntiochus III the Great, , younger son of Seleucus II Callinicus, became the 6th ruler of the Seleucid Empire as a youth of about eighteen in 223 BC. Ascending the throne at young age, Antiochus was an ambitious ruler...
, while the Ptolemaic army was led by
Scopas of AetoliaScopas was an Aetolian general, who served both his native Aetolian League in the Social War and Ptolemaic Egypt against the Seleucids, with mixed success...
. The Seleucids won the battle. Details of this battle are not clear, but it is known today that major factor in the Seleucid victory was that the Seleucid army used the
cataphractA cataphract was a form of heavy cavalry utilised in ancient warfare by a number of peoples in Western Eurasia and the Eurasian Steppe.The word in English is derived from the Kataphraktos , literally meaning "armored" or "completely enclosed"...
in a decisive manner. The cataphracts attacked the Egyptian cavalry on the flanks and drove the enemy cavalry off, leaving the backs of the enemy infantry to the front of the line exposed.
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The
Battle of Panium was fought in
198 BC-Roman Republic:* After his election to the consulship, Titus Quinctius Flamininus is chosen to replace Publius Sulpicius Galba Maximus as the leading Roman general in Macedonia. He then crosses into Macedonia with his army. Flamininus realizes that future peace depends on breaking the power of...
between
SeleucidThe Seleucid Empire was a Hellenistic empire, i.e. a successor state of Alexander the Great's empire. The Seleucid Empire was centered in the near East and at the height of its power included central Anatolia, the Levant, Mesopotamia, Persia, today's Turkmenistan, Pamir and parts of Pakistan...
and
PtolemaicPtolemaic Egypt began when Ptolemy I Soter declared himself Pharaoh of Egypt in 305 BC and ended with the death of queen Cleopatra of Egypt and the Roman conquest in 30 BC. The Ptolemaic Kingdom was a powerful Hellenistic state, extending from southern Syria in the east, to Cyrene to the west, and...
forces as part of the
Syrian WarsThe Syrian Wars were a series of six wars between the Seleucid Empire and the Ptolemaic Kingdom during the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC over the region of Coele-Syria, one of the few avenues into Egypt...
. The Seleucids were led by
Antiochus III the GreatAntiochus III the Great, , younger son of Seleucus II Callinicus, became the 6th ruler of the Seleucid Empire as a youth of about eighteen in 223 BC. Ascending the throne at young age, Antiochus was an ambitious ruler...
, while the Ptolemaic army was led by
Scopas of AetoliaScopas was an Aetolian general, who served both his native Aetolian League in the Social War and Ptolemaic Egypt against the Seleucids, with mixed success...
. The Seleucids won the battle. Details of this battle are not clear, but it is known today that major factor in the Seleucid victory was that the Seleucid army used the
cataphractA cataphract was a form of heavy cavalry utilised in ancient warfare by a number of peoples in Western Eurasia and the Eurasian Steppe.The word in English is derived from the Kataphraktos , literally meaning "armored" or "completely enclosed"...
in a decisive manner. The cataphracts attacked the Egyptian cavalry on the flanks and drove the enemy cavalry off, leaving the backs of the enemy infantry to the front of the line exposed. The Seleucid cataphracts then attacked their infantry in the rear, thus leading to an Egyptian rout. The specific equipment used by these relatively early cataphracts is not clearly known.
The battle was fought near
PaneasThe temenos included a temple, courtyards, a grotto and niches for rituals, and was dedicated to Pan. It was constructed on an elevated, 80m long natural terrace along the cliff which towered over the north of the city...
, (Caesarea Philippi) and marked the end of Ptolemaic rule in
JudeaJudea or Judæa is the name given to the mountainous southern part of the historic Land of Israel , an area now divided between Israel and the West Bank Judea or Judæa (Hebrew: יהודה,
Standard Yəhuda
Tiberian , "praised, celebrated"; Greek: Ιουδαία, Ioudaía; ) is the...
.
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