II. FROM ALEXANDER THE GREAT TO A.D. 70 Alexander the the year 332 Alexander passed through Palestine to Egypt, capturing Tyre after a siege of seven months and Gaza after a siege of two. He left the Jews undis turbed in their customs and their religion. Some of them enlisted in the intelligence corps of his army (Ant. XI.8.5.) and Jews were among the first settlers in the new city he founded in Egypt under the name Alexandria. The high priest remained the head of the little Jewish state in Palestine and he was probably assisted by a council of elders. This gerousia is first mentioned as such by Josephus (Ant. XII.3.3.) in connection with Antiochus the Great (223-187 B.c.) but appears to go back at least as far as the Persian period (cf. II. Chron. xix.8, and see Schtirer, Geschichte 4th ed., 11.240).
Alexander died at the age of 32 on June 13, 323, and though the great empire of which he had dreamed fell to pieces at once after his death, his name remained a romantic and glorious memory throughout the nearer East.
Perhaps the most remarkable evidence of the estimation in which he was held by those who survived him is furnished by the splendid "Alexander" sarcophagus of pentelic marble now in the museum at Constantinople. This sarcophagus dates from c. 300 B.C., and was probably made by order of Abdalonimus, whom Alexander had appointed king of Sidon. It is one of the most beautiful examples of Greek sculpture which have come down to us, and its representations of Alexander's campaigning include the figures of the king and of his senior adviser, Parmenion.
become master of Palestine. Seleucus himself, the same year, took Babylon and established the Seleucid dynasty in the north of the country, moving his capital after a victory over Anti gonus at Ipsus (301 B.c.) to Antioch on the Orontes. In the meantime Ptolemy had subdued the cities of Coele-Syria (Di odorus XX. 113) and established the northern border of his king dom on a line just north of Aradus and just south of Emesa. Seleucus felt himself entitled to this territory by the terms of his former agreement with his old friend, but he now found him self unable to establish his claim, and retired under protest. For practically a century Palestine remained subject to Egypt, the northern frontier receding considerably (to the south of Bery tus and Damascus) about 250 B.C., and advancing again to the north of Aradus 25 years later (see U. Kahrstedt, Syrische Terri torien in hellenistischer Zeit, map ma).
The rule of the first Ptolemies was despotic but tolerant. They administered Egypt itself like a huge crown estate. Immense works of irrigation and land improvement were undertaken. Col onies of Greek settlers were planted in various places, although except Alexandria, founded by Alexander himself, and Naucratis and Ptolemais in the south, founded by Ptolemy I. (Soter), there were no large cities in the whole of Egypt which had Greek insti tutions and a predominantly Greek population. (See Rostovtzeff, History of the Ancient World, I. 367.) The Ptolemies themselves were men of culture, Greek culture. They took a personal inter est in literature and science, founded a great library and academy (museum) and a zoological garden at Alexandria; and generally lived their own life apart. Thus they easily slipped into the tradi tional position of the rulers of Egypt as divine beings, and as such were accepted by the natives who did their work and paid their dues, and were not otherwise interfered with.