Settlements > Seleucia on Tigris
Seleucia on Tigris
Background
Seleucia also known as Seleucia-on-Tigris or Seleucia on the Tigris, was a major Mesopotamian city of the Seleucid, Parthian, and Sassanid empires. It stood on the west bank of the Tigris River opposite Ctesiphon, within the present-day Babil Governorate in Iraq. Seleucia (Greek: Σελεύκεια, Seleúkeia) is named for Seleucus I Nicator, who enlarged an earlier settlement and made it the capital of his empire around 305 bc. It was the largest and most important of the many cities to bear its name but is sometimes distinguished as Seleucia-on-Tigris or Seleucia on the Tigris (Latin: Seleucia ad Tigrim) from the name of its river.
Texts from the Assyrian Church of the East's synods referred to the city as Salīq (Syriac: ܣܠܝܩ) or some times Māḥôzē (Syriac: ܡܚܘܙ̈ܐ) when referring to the metropolis of Seleucia-Ctesiphon. It also appears in the Hebrew Talmud under the names Selik, Selika, and Selikos and in the Aramaic Targum under the names Salwaḳia and Salwaḳya.
Seleucid Empire
Seleucia, as such, was founded in about 305 BC, when an earlier city was enlarged and dedicated as the first capital of the Seleucid Empire by Seleucus I Nicator. Seleucus was one of the Diadochi successors of Alexander the Great who, after Alexander's death, divided his empire among themselves. Although Seleucus soon moved his main capital to Antioch, in northern Syria, Seleucia became an important center of trade, Hellenistic culture, and regional government under the Seleucids.
The city was populated by Greeks, Syrians and Jews. Standing at the confluence of the Tigris River with a major canal from the Euphrates, Seleucia was placed to receive traffic from both great waterways. During the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC, it was one of the great Hellenistic cities, comparable to Alexandria in Egypt, and greater than Syrian Antioch. Excavations indicate that the walls of the city enclosed an area of at least 550 hectares (1,400 acres). Based on this size, the population has been estimated to number over 100,000 initially and probably more later. Its surrounding region might have supported half a million people.
Polybius (5,52ff) uses the Macedonian peliganes for the council of Seleucia, which implies a Macedonian colony, consistent with its rise to prominence under Seleucus I; Pausanias (1,16) records that Seleucus also settled Babylonians there. Archaeological finds support the presence of a large population not of Greek culture. In 141 BC, the Parthians under Mithridates I conquered the city, and Seleucia became the western capital of the Parthian Empire. Tacitus described its walls, and mentioned that it was, even under Parthian rule, a fully Hellenistic city. Ancient texts claim that the city had 600,000 inhabitants, and was ruled by a senate of 300 people. It was clearly one of the largest cities in the Western world; only Rome, Alexandria and possibly Antioch were more populous.
In 55 BC, a battle fought near Seleucia was crucial in establishing dynastic succession of the Arsacid kings. In this battle between the reigning Mithridates III (supported by a Roman army of Aulus Gabinius, governor of Syria) and the previously deposed Orodes II, the reigning monarch was defeated, allowing Orodes to re-establish himself as king. In 41 BC, Seleucia was the scene of a massacre of around 5,000 Babylonian Jewish refugees (Josephus, Ant. xviii. 9, § 9).
In 117 AD, Seleucia was burned down by the Roman emperor Trajan during his conquest of Mesopotamia, but the following year it was ceded back to the Parthians by Trajan's successor, Hadrian, then rebuilt in the Parthian style. It was completely destroyed by the Roman general Avidius Cassius in 165.
