Inscription from Caria Mentioning Antiochus III, Ptolemy V, and Philip V

Abstract

The ‘Three Kings’ Inscription’ bears the fragment of a Rhodian arbitration between Bargylia and another town in Caria. It is an important document, for it described major political events which affected western Caria on the eve of the Second Macedonian War (200‑197 BC). Above all, it makes it evident that Rhodes eventually came to know about the same Syro-Macedonian connivance against Egypt and the child king Ptolemy V which Polybius (3.2.8; 15.20) later described in big words. After a detailed status quaestionis, the importance of comparing the Rhodian, Ptolemaic, and Polybian perspectives on Antiochus III and Philip V’s conduct is stressed here.