List of kings of Cyrene


Cyrene or Cyrenaica was a Greek colony on the North African coast, in what is now northeastern Libya, founded by Dorian settlers from Thera in the 7th century BC. Kings of Cyrene received a recurring posthumous hero cult like that of the Dorian kings of Sparta.

Kings of Cyrene, (Battiad dynasty) 632–440 BC

In 440 BC, Cyrene became a Republic, under Persian suzerainty. Cyrene was conquered by Alexander the Great in 331 BC and fell to the portion of Ptolemy I in the division of Alexander's Empire. In 276 BC it reasserted its independence.

Kings of Cyrene, 276–249 BC

In 249 BC Cyrene again became a republic, but was restored to Ptolemaic control in 246 BC. From 163 BC, Cyrene occasionally had its own rulers from the Ptolemaic dynasty.

Kings of Cyrene, 163–30 BC

In 75 BC, the city became part of a Roman province, but it was restored to the Ptolemies by Mark Antony in 37 BC. In 34 BC Cleopatra VII and Antony's daughter, Cleopatra Selene II, was made Queen of Cyrene, but the city returned to Rome following Augustus' conquest of Egypt in 30 BC.