ear Medinet-Habu, dedicated to Amon-Ra and the
goddess Hathor; his name is also seen upon the temple at Karnak, and
on the additions to the sculptures on the temple of Thot at Pselcis in
Ethiopia.

Some of this king's coins bear the name of "Ptolemy Philopator," while
those of the queen have her name, "Arsinoe Philopator," around the head.
They are of a good style of art. He was also sometimes named Eupator;
and it was under that name that the people of Paphos set up a monument
to him in the temple of Venus.

The first three Ptolemies had been loved by their subjects and feared by
their enemies; but Philopator, though his power was still acknowledged
abroad, had by his vices and cruelty made himself hated at home, and had
undermined the foundations of the government. He began his reign like an
Eastern despot; instead of looking to his brother as a friend for help
and strength, he distrusted him as a rival, and had him put to death. He
employed the ministers of his vicious pleasures in the high offices of
government; and instead of philosophers and men of learning, he brought
eunuchs into the palace as the companions of his son. In B.C. 204 he
died, worn out with disease, in the seventeenth year of his reign and
about the fifty-first of his age; and very few lamented his decease.

On the death of Philopator his son was only five years old. The minister
Agathocles, who had ruled over the country with unbounded power,
endeavoured, by the help of his sister Agathoclea and the other
mistresses of the late king, to keep his death secret; so that while the
women seized the money and jewels of the palace, he might have time to
take such steps as would secure his own power over the kingdom.

[Illustration: 189.jpg COIN OF ARSINOE PHILOPATE]

But the secret could not be long kept, and Agathocles called together
the citizens of Alexandria to tell them of the death of Philopator, and
to show them their young king.

He went to the meeting, followed by his sister Agathoclea and the young
Ptolemy, afterwards called Epiphanes. He began his speech, "Ye men of
Macedonia," as this mixed body of Greeks and Jews was always called. He
wiped his eyes in well-feigned grief, and showed them the new king,
who had been trusted, he said, by his father, to the motherly care of
Agathoclea and to their loyalty. He then accused Tlepolemus of aiming at
the throne, and brought forward a creature of his own to prove the truth
of the charge. But his