Ekaterina Berzon

The article considers all the examples of changes of name in the Hellenistic royal dynasties known from the sources (and partly reconstructed on the basis of indirect data). Authors attempt to explore the goals, meaning and significance of such actions. The practice of accepting the throne name directly upon accession to the throne was widely used by the Achaemenids, and in the Hellenistic world it spread after the change of name of Arrhidaeus, the half-brother of Alexander the Great, to Philip (III) in 323 BC, when he was proclaimed king. A change of name was carried out more often directly by the assuming the royal title in order to give one of the “main” throne names to one or another member of the royal house, who was not initially intended to be a king, but for some reason received the right to the throne. This is most clearly seen in the dynastic history of Cappadocia and Pontus – apparently, in accordance with the Achaemenid patterns. Sometimes a change of name was used in the situation of interference in the internal affairs of other states with the aim to put on the throne a member of the “outer” royal house, changing its name to the traditional one for the dynasty of that country. Finally, some cases of metonomacy (especially in the Seleucid state) reflected the collisions of a specific situation and could be associated with a wide variety of factors.

We are glad to inform you that an international symposium on the region Bithynia in north-western Turkey took place on May 10, 2023 on Zoom. Bithynia was an ancient region and Roman province located on the south-eastern edge of the Marmara Sea in north-western part of present-day Turkey. It was bordered by Mysia, Paphlagonia and Phrygia. From the fourth century B.C. it was an independent Hellenistic kingdom, and around 74 B.C. it became a Roman province. During the seventh century A.D. it was incorporated into the Byzantine theme of Opsikion. It became a border region to the Seljuk Empire in the 13th century, and was eventually conquered by the Ottoman Empire in the early 14th century. Several major cities of Bithynia sat on the fertile shores of the Propontis or in the forested inland, such as Nicomedia (İzmit-Kocaeli), Nicaea (İznik), Chalcedon (Kadıköy), Cius (Gemlik), Prusa ad Olympum (Bursa) and Apamea Myrlea (Mudanya). Beside being a coastal region, it is also occupied by mountains as well as forests, and has valleys of great fertility. Since the studies of F.K. Dörner in the 1950s, archaeologically and historically Bithynia became a special focus in the fields of ancient Anatolian studies.
The aim of this online video conference is to report on the state of research concerning Bithynia during the Greek, Roman and Byzantine periods between ca. early sixth century B.C. and early 14th century A.D. We warmly welcome submissions from senior and junior scholars, including advanced graduate students and postdoctoral scholars from a variety of disciplines related to this Anatolian region. We intended to bring together researchers who can present new syntheses of archaeological data from Bithynia and enter into dialogue with scholars working on the same material subsets. Intended to bring together scholars of Greek, Roman and Byzantine archaeology to discuss a range of issues concerning Bithynia, this electronic conference is an excellent opportunity to increase our knowledge about this region. Such papers that engage the following themes and topics are invited:

- Bithynia during the Archaic, Classical, Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine periods,
- Archaeological field projects in Bithynia,
- Museum studies in Kocaeli, İznik, Bursa, Istanbul, Bolu and Düzce as well as abroad,
- Ancient Greek, Latin and Byzantine authors and other textual as well as cartographic sources on Bithynia and Bithynians,
- Bithynia during the Late Iron Age,
- Bithynia and the Achaemenid Persian Empire during the sixth and fifth centuries B.C.,
- The Hellenistic kingdom of Bithynia and its rulers,
- Pre-Roman tumuli in Bithynia and their archaeology,
- The coinage of the Kingdom of Bithynia and Roman province of Bithynia,
- The Roman province of Bithynia et Pontus (after the two legendary volumes of Chr. Marek in 1993 and 2003),
- Roman provincial administration in Bithynia,
- Historical geography and settlement patterns in pre-Hellenistic, Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine Bithynia,
- Bithynia and Propontis,
- Two Bithynian cities and their interregional relationships: Nicomedia and Nicaea (after the 2020 volume of Asia Minor Studien no. 96 on the recent studies about Nicomedia and Nicaea),
- Epigraphic and numismatic studies in Bithynia during the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine periods,
- Geographical, cultural and ethnic borders of Bithynia,
- Relationships between Bithynia and neighbouring regions,
- Roads, routes and population in Bithynia,
- Military archaeology in Roman Bithynia,
- The province Bithynia under the tetrarchy reform of Emperor Diocletian in A.D. 296,
- Roman Bithynia and Christianity to the mid-fourth century A.D. (after the Michigan dissertation of G.J. Johnson in 1984),
- Religious conflict in Late Roman Nicomedia and the rest of Bithynia,
- The Christian martyrs of the late third-early fourth century A.D. in Bithynia,
- Forms of Christian presence in Late Roman and Early Byzantine Bithynia,
- Episcopal sees of the Late Roman Bithynia,
- Jews and Jewish heritage in Roman and Early Byzantine Bithynia,
- Bithynia’s companion for the Christianity and early eastern Orthodox Church,
- Notable personalities of Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine Bithynia (e.g., Arrian, Cassisus Dio and Helena),
- The Byzantine province of Opsikion (after the TIB volume no. 13 in 2020 on Bithynia and Hellespontus by K. Belke)
- Middle and Late Byzantine studies in Bithynia,
- Miscellanea.

On these themes and questions, all approaches and methods susceptible to bring some progress to our current knowledge were of course welcome: archaeology, ancient history, historical geography, epigraphy, numismatic, history of art, cultural anthropology etc. The symposium took place virtually on Zoom. All the readings and discussions in our e-conference were in English, and recorded for later viewing on YouTube. The proceedings of the symposium will be published in 2025. The symposium was free of charge.
Records of the e-conference in YouTube

All videos:

https://www.youtube.com/@ergunlafli9033/videos

Bithynia e-symposium held on May 10, 2023, part 1:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMn4GyJozA4

Bithynia e-symposium held on May 10, 2023, part 2:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dR7zlivGWFg&t=4167s

Bithynia e-symposium held on May 10, 2023, part 3:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5JzxxVFGdus

Bithynia e-symposium held on May 10, 2023, part 4:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPLBMrf1HiM

Bithynia e-symposium held on May 10, 2023, part 5:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uaWsJI7DUZ4

Bithynia e-symposium held on May 10, 2023, part 6:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-tPAeIUdpA

Bithynia e-symposium held on May 10, 2023, part 7:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGcW_ZMOwF8

Bithynia e-symposium held on May 10, 2023, part 8:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2I3Szjukus&t=480s

Bithynia e-symposium held on May 10, 2023, lecture by Sean Silvia:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mm1kr1iZPtY