Antiochus III the Great and Philip V of Macedon made a compact to divide the Ptolemaic possessions overseas. Philip seized several islands and places in Caria and Thrace, whilst the Battle of Panium (198 BC) definitely transferred Palestine from the Ptolemies to the Seleucids.

Antiochus after this concluded peace, giving his own daughter Cleopatra to Epiphanes to wife (193 -192 BC). Nevertheless, when war broke out between Antiochus and Rome, Egypt ranged itself with the latter power. Epiphanes in manhood was chiefly remarkable as a passionate sportsman; he excelled in athletic exercises and the chase. Great cruelty and perfidy were displayed in the suppression of the native rebellion, and some accounts represent him as personally tyrannical.

Great cruelty and perfidy were displayed in the suppression of the native rebellion, and some accounts represent him as personally tyrannical. In 197 BC Lycopolis was held by the forces of Ankmachis, (also known as Chaonnophris) the secessionist pharaoh of Upper Egypt, but was forced to withdraw to Thebes. The war between North and South continued until 185 BC with the arrest of Ankmachis by Ptolemaic General Conanus.

The Rosetta Stone was a statement of thanks to the Egyptian priesthood for help during the crisis.

The elder of his two sons, Ptolemy VI Philometor (181-145 BC), succeeded as an infant under the regency of his mother Cleopatra. Her death was followed by a rupture between the Ptolemaic and Seleucid courts, on the old question of Coele-Syria.

Links

Ptolemy V COINS

Ptolemy Epiphanes at LacusCurtius (http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/Africa/Egypt/_Texts/BEVHOP/8*.html) — (Chapter VIII of E. R. Bevan's House of Ptolemy, 1923)

Ptolemy V (http://www.tyndale.cam.ac.uk/Egypt/ptolemies/ptolemy_v.htm) — (Egyptian Royal Genealogy)

This article incorporates text from the public domain 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica.