Zenobia

In the early 270s CE the desert city of Palmyra, in Syria, briefly controlled most of the Roman East under Zenobia, widow of its king Odaenathus. Ruling for her young son, she took Egypt and much of Asia Minor, then declared herself empress in open defiance of Rome before the emperor Aurelian defeated and captured her in 272. Her story has been heavily embroidered: the main Latin source, the Historia Augusta, is known to invent letters and episodes, so much of what is told about her remains uncertain.

Zenobia was born around 240 or 241 CE. Her Palmyrene name, Bat-Zabbai, is Aramaic for "daughter of Zabbai"; she also bore the Roman family name Septimia. Palmyra's population mixed Arab and Aramean peoples, and her ancestry cannot be assigned to either with confidence. One inscription calls her the daughter of an Antiochus, whose identity is unknown. The Historia Augusta has her claiming descent from Cleopatra, and some medieval Arab writers linked her to the Queen of Sheba; both are treated as legend. She was probably of noble birth, and at about fourteen she became the second wife of Odaenathus, lord of Palmyra.

Palmyra was then a city subject to Rome, part of the province of Syria Phoenice. In 260 CE the Persian king Shapur I defeated and captured the Roman emperor Valerian. Odaenathus, nominally loyal to Valerian's son Gallienus, was proclaimed king, beat back the Persians and took the title King of Kings in 263, becoming the real power in the Roman East. Zenobia is barely visible in the record during his reign.

In 267 CE Odaenathus and his eldest son were assassinated, apparently in Asia Minor. The Historia Augusta names a cousin as the killer and hints at Zenobia's involvement, but modern historians such as Alaric Watson dismiss the story. The army quickly accepted her as regent for her young son Vaballathus, who inherited his father's royal titles; she also claimed for him the Roman command posts Odaenathus had held, which irritated Rome.

While the emperor Claudius Gothicus fought invaders in Europe, Zenobia moved to impose her authority. In spring 270 CE her general Zabdas defeated and killed the Roman governor of Arabia and sacked Bostra. Later that year Palmyrene forces invaded Egypt, Rome's chief grain supplier; the historian Zosimus speaks of 70,000 men, figures that cannot be checked. By mid-271 CE her power reached from Ancyra, modern Ankara, to Upper Egypt. At first she styled her son a subordinate of the new emperor Aurelian, minting coins with both their portraits.

Zenobia governed a realm of many languages and religions, presenting herself at once as a Syrian queen, a Hellenistic monarch and a Roman empress. According to Zosimus, she kept a residence in Antioch. Her court attracted scholars, among them the philosopher Longinus. She protected Christians and Jews, and later Christian writers called her Jewish; the scholar Javier Teixidor thought she was probably a convert to Judaism.

In 272 CE, as Aurelian prepared to march east, Zenobia proclaimed Vaballathus emperor and herself Augusta, breaking openly with Rome. Aurelian crossed into Asia Minor that spring and beat her army at Immae near Antioch and then at Emesa, where her troops, reportedly 70,000 strong, nearly prevailed before their lines broke. Besieged in Palmyra, Zenobia fled towards Persia but was caught near the Euphrates, and the city surrendered in August 272 CE.

Accounts of her end conflict. Zosimus says she died on the way to Rome; John Malalas, generally unreliable, has her beheaded. Most historians think she was paraded in Aurelian's triumph in 274 CE, and the Historia Augusta claims she then lived out her life in a villa at Tibur near Rome. She has since become a heroine of novels, plays and operas, and a national symbol in Syria, where her portrait has appeared on banknotes.

Our 200 and 300 CE maps show the Roman Empire before and after the crisis in which Palmyra rose and fell, with the Sasanian Empire of Shapur I on its eastern frontier by 300. See also Cleopatra, whose descendant she was said to be, and modern Syria.