Bible Lexicons

This characteristic Κοινή form was borrowed by Attic from B.C. 307 down : see Meisterhans Gr. p. 101, and cf. Thumb Dial. p. 380. The suffix was probably of Macedonian origin, and therefore not Greek at all (Brugmann-Thumb Gr. p. 214, where references are given to literature on the subject : add Glaser, De ratione, p. 18). It was the regular term for the wife of the ruling sovereign : see, e.g. P Petr I. 19.28 (B.C. 225) βασιλέα Πτολεμαῖον . . . καὶ βασίλισσαν Βερενίκην , P Eleph 23.10 (B.C. 223) ο ̣̔̓μ ̣ν ̣υ ̣ω ̣ βασιλέα Πτολεμαῖον . . . καὶ βασίλισσαν Βερενίκην , P Par 38.1 (B.C. 160) βασιλεῖ Πτολεμαίῳ καὶ βασιλίσσῃ [Κλεο ]πάτρᾳ τῇ ἀδελφῇ , and P Grenf II. 15i. 1 (B.C. 139). In Syll we find it in 183.8 (end of iv/B.C.) of the wife of Demetrius Poliorcetes, and in five inscrr. of iii/B.C. In OGIS 35.1 (B.C. 285–47) βασίλισσαν Φιλωτέραν , the title is given to the unmarried sister of King Ptolemy II, a proof, according to Wilcken (Archiv ii. p. 541), that amongst the Ptolemies the title was from the beginning purely titular. A similar inscription from Schedia (east of Alexandria), belonging to the reign of Ptolemy III., has the further interest that it contains the earliest known reference to a Jewish proseucha in Upper Egypt—ὑ ]πὲρ βασιλέως Πτολεμαίου καὶ βασιλίσσης Βερενίκης ἀδελφῆς καὶ γυναικὸς καὶ τῶν τέκνων τὴν προσευχὴν οἱ Ἰουδαῖοι : see Archiv ii. p. 541 with Wilcken’s note. It should be noted, however, that προσευχήν here may simply = ";prayer,"; answering to the heathen τὸ προσκύνημα .