Eirenias of Miletus’ Career between the Attalids and the Seleucids

Abstract

The role played by Eirenias of Miletus in the mid-2nd century B.C. between his city and the Attalids and Seleucids demonstrates the vitality of his polis, which had de facto the status of a free city after the Treaty of Apamea of 188. A small corpus of Milesian inscriptions shows that Eirenias, known only from epigraphy, dedicated most of his political activity to relations with external powers, playing numerous times the role of ambassador in favour of his city, for which he was able to obtain many privileges from the Attalids and, to a lesser extent, from the Seleucids. Notables such as Eirenias, who used their external relations for the benefit of their own cites, constituted the connecting element between the euergetism of kings and powerful outsiders and that of private citizens.