Antigone of Epirus

Antigone (Greek: Ἀντιγόνη, born before 317 BC^[1]–295 BC)^[2] was a Macedonian Greek noblewoman. Through her mother's second marriage she was a member of the Ptolemaic dynasty and through her marriage to Pyrrhus she was queen of Epirus.

Antigone was the daughter and the second child of Berenice, a noblewoman from Eordeaea,^[3] and her first husband Philip.^[3] She had an elder brother called Magas and a younger sister called Theoxena.^[3] Berenice's mother was the niece of the powerful regent Antipater^[4] and was related to members of the Argead dynasty.^[5]

Antigone's father, Philip, was the son of Amyntas by a mother whose name is unknown.^[6] Based on Plutarch (Pyrrhus 4.4), her father was previously married and had children, including daughters.^[7] He served as a military officer in the service of the Macedonian King Alexander the Great and commanded one of the Phalanx divisions in Alexander's wars.^[8]

About 318 BC, Antigone's father died of natural causes. After Philip's death, Antigone's mother took her and her siblings to Egypt where they were a part of the entourage of her mother's cousin Eurydice. Eurydice was then the wife of Ptolemy I Soter, the first ruler and founder of the Ptolemaic dynasty.

By 317 BC, Ptolemy I had fallen in love with Berenice and divorced Eurydice to marry her. Through her mother's marriage to Ptolemy I, Antigone was a stepdaughter to Ptolemy I and lived in her stepfather's court. Her mother bore Ptolemy I three children: two daughters, Arsinoe II, Philotera and the future Pharaoh Ptolemy II Philadelphus.^[3]

In 300 BC or 299 BC, Pyrrhus of Epirus was sent as a hostage to Egypt by Demetrius I of Macedon as part of a short-lived rapprochement between Demetrius I and Ptolemy I.^[9] In 299 BC/298 BC, Ptolemy I arranged for Pyrrhus to marry Antigone.^[10][11]

Pyrrhus obtained a fleet of ships and funding from Ptolemy I and set sail with Antigone for his kingdom in Epirus.^[12] Pyrrhus came into an agreement with his relative Neoptolemus II of Epirus, who had usurped the kingdom, to jointly rule Epirus.^[12]

Antigone bore Pyrrhus two children: a daughter called Olympias and a son called Ptolemy.^[13] Antigone possibly died in childbirth, as she seems to have died the same year as her son was born.^[14]

As a posthumous honour to his first wife, Pyrrhus founded a colony called Antigonia, which he named after her.

• G. Crabb, Universal historical dictionary: or explanation of the names of persons and places in the departments of biblical, political and eccles. history, mythology, heraldry, biography, bibliography, geography, and numismatics, Volume 1 (Google eBook), Baldwin and Cradock, 1833
• W. Heckel, Who's who in the age of Alexander the Great: prosopography of Alexander's empire, Wiley-Blackwell, 2006
• J. Ussher, The Annals of the World, New Leaf Publishing Group, 2007
• Ptolemaic Genealogy: Antigone
• Ptolemaic Genealogy: Berenice I Archived 2011-10-05 at the Wayback Machine
• Ptolemaic Dynasty - Affiliated Lines: The Antipatrids Archived 2011-07-16 at the Wayback Machine
• Ancient Library article: Magas no.1 Archived 2011-08-05 at the Wayback Machine
• Ancient Library article: Philippus no. 5
• Berenice I article at Livius.org Archived 2016-03-17 at the Wayback Machine
• Pyrrhus of Epirus Part 1 at Livius.org Archived 2016-03-03 at the Wayback Machine

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Smith, William, ed. (1870). "Antigone". Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology.