CHAP. I. OF THE SUCCESSORS OF ALEXANDER. 



talent, be rendered into money of the present 

 day, it will give the amount as one hundred and 

 seventy-eight millions. If the smaller talent, 

 which seems most correct, be taken, it will 

 amount to at least one quarter of that sum. 

 Though an account of this kind may appear 

 exaggerated, yet there seems no reason to doubt 

 its general veracity. The revenues of the Pto- 

 lemies were excessively large, and the countries 

 over which their dominions extended were, by 

 the collections, completely drained of all their 

 wrought gold and silver ; and the tributes were 

 collected by the farmers of the revenue with 

 the assistance of an armed force, composed, not 

 of regular soldiers, but of organized bands of 

 robbers. 



Some idea of the degree of rapacity in ex- 

 tracting revenue under Ptolemy may be formed 

 by comparing the tribute drawn from the pro- 

 vinces of Ccelesyria, Palestine, and Samaria, 

 under Cyrus, as given by Herodotus, and that 

 extorted by the successor of Alexander, as 

 given by Josephus. At the time of Cyrus, the 

 island of Cyprus was included in the province 

 of Ccelesyria, but in the time of Ptolemy was 

 separated from it. In the first instance, the 

 tribute paid was three hundred and fifty talents *. 

 In the latter instance, it was farmed to Euergetes 



1 Herodotus, book iii. cap. 89. 



