Talk:Ptolemy of Mauretania

Claudius

The statement that "Claudius tried a Roman Senator called Gaius Rabirius Postumus for treason who before tried unsuccessfully to recover money from Ptolemy" does not belong in the section on Ptolemy's death. I would also question the sentence. An attempt to recover money is not treason, there was obviously more involved, which should be added. Or is this entirely confused, and a reference to the trial in 54BC of Gaius Rabirius Postumus by the senate?Royalcourtier (talk) 22:12, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

The sentence before about Caligula's practical joke seems barely relevant, too. Perhaps that whole paragraph is better deleted or moved to a 'Misc mentions' section. Shuggaroth (talk) 21:03, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Ptolemy of Mauretania/CommentsTalk:Ptolemy of Mauretania/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

This article is very poorly written. There are numerous run-on sentences as well as random bits of information inserted seemingly randomly at the ends of paragraphs of differing topics. There also seem to be a few points in the article that either have no reference or seem to be based on conjecture. At the very least, this article needs to be edited for grammar.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.199.248.2 (talk • contribs) OK. Go ahead and edit it. We'd be glad to see whatever improvements you can make. Fan-1967 18:40, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Last edited at 11:44, 12 October 2010 (UTC). Substituted at 03:31, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

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Edited

As pointed out in a little notice at the top of the page, (I have yet to read this page in full, so this may be an outdated message. I understand this is a page not likely updated often D:) this page lacks the proper encyclopedic tone required in Wikipedia articles. If this is in fact still a current issue, I suggest someone fix it up. If not, the aforementioned notice should be removed. I plan to do all of this myself, but I am busy reading books about Ptolemy's mother and might forget- Thank you!

Applejuiceandpeachh (talk) 05:52, 8 February 2019 (UTC)

Drusilla

With regard to this edit: Britannica is not incorrect, it's just differentiating between the facts (last known descendant) and the speculations that Drusilla was possibly either his daughter, sister or cousin (in fact, we can't be sure since her parents are not mentioned in the literature). I have therefore restored the stable version and adjusted the footnote to make sure that the speculations are not presented as facts in Wikipedia's voice. M.Bitton (talk) 23:15, 5 August 2022 (UTC)

GA review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Ptolemy of Mauretania/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Nominator: Edward056686 (talk · contribs) 00:03, 10 April 2026 (UTC)

Reviewer: UndercoverClassicist (talk · contribs) 20:35, 28 April 2026 (UTC)

I'll have a look at this -- looking forward to it. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 20:35, 28 April 2026 (UTC)

Generally in good shape. There are a few minor nitpicks above GA level, but I'll try to keep this by the criteria as far as possible:

• There are quite a few technical terms -- triumvir, Gaetulian, duovir (not duumvir?), toga picta -- that could do with explanation.
  • Added a description for duovir (not duumvir! although I don't think it matters here). I changed Antony's title from triumvir to general, although politician can also work as an alternative to explaining the triumvirate.
    • As far as I've seen, it was pretty generally rendered as "duumvir" in the period (duovir is rarer, older and eventually less standard). But if it's a conscious decision, it's a reasonable one. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 20:13, 29 April 2026 (UTC)
      • I can't even say if it's the correct decision. The secondary sources pretty unanimously describe the Mauretanians as being duovirs of Carthago Nova (and in Juba's case Gades as well), but I have no idea if this reflects the terminology found in numismatic evidence. I changed it to duumvir for now and I'll see if I can track down Mazard or another source for more clarity. Edward056686 (talk) 22:22, 29 April 2026 (UTC)
  • The toga picta is described in the second paragraph of "Sole reign" and Gaetulians are defined in the first paragraph of "Background and co-regency". Edward056686 (talk) 17:34, 29 April 2026 (UTC)
• Is it "40 AD" or "AD 40"? The infobox disagrees with the rest of the article.
  • Fixed.
• It would be useful to put a rough date on the busts (see here, p. 107, for the Caligula, and Varner, p. 103, for the Ptolemy, with bibliography) and and their restorations. The Caligula in particular has definitely been reworked since his lifetime.
  • I changed the Caligula bust and added an approximate date. I don't see where Varner dates the bust of Ptolemy, and I don't have access to Smith to see if he did :( Edit: I found a source for a date on the Ptolemy bust.
• All images need a PD tag for the original object, not just the photograph.
• File:Monnaie - Denier, Argent, Incertain, Maurétanie, Cléopâtre Séléné II - btv1b8484164s (1 of 2).jpg: needs a US PD tag.
• File:Monnaie - Denier, Argent, Incertain, Maurétanie, Juba II - btv1b84840579 (1 of 2).jpg: ditto.
  • Done for all of these images.
• Per MOS:POPCULT, we don't include "in popular culture" mentions unless they are discussed in detail in secondary sources -- if the only thing we can say is "Ptolemy appears in this work", cited to the work itself or a trivial discussion in a review etc, we should remove.
  • Removed the whole section.
• The two footnotes need to be cited.
  • Done.
• JSTOR shouldn't be used for the |url= parameter, which assumes a free-to-read URL: use |jstor= instead.
  • Fixed.

Spot checks to follow. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 05:42, 29 April 2026 (UTC)

Thank you! I'll work on these suggestions right away. I don't mind if you have any nitpicks that go beyond GA, I might try to make this a featured article eventually. Edward056686 (talk) 17:17, 29 April 2026 (UTC)

Finished fixing those problems. Edward056686 (talk) 04:08, 30 April 2026 (UTC)

• his father's position as duumvir quinquennales,: quinquennales is plural: the singular is "quinquennalis". I would explain what it means (holding office for five years, rather than one). It wasn't usually an honorary position, but I suppose in this case we know or think that it was?
  • Fixed that typo. It's usually considered an honorary office for them because there's doubt as to whether Juba and Ptolemy ever visited Carthago Nova (plus Juba was also duumvir in Gades), and they definitely can't have been abroad long enough to actually carry out their duties. I added more explanation of the office, plus a source and explanation of honorary magistracies in the Julio-Claudian empire.

Spot checks

• Could you provide the quote from the source that supports Ptolemy was the last reigning member of the Ptolemaic dynasty, although his grandmother Cleopatra is popularly described as the last Ptolemaic ruler?
  • The sobriquet is usually attached to his grandmother, but Ptolemaios of Mauretania was truly the last of the Ptolemies, although many others were to claim descent from the Hellenistic kings of Egypt.
  • I removed the word "reigning".
    • Do we need to mention Gaius Julius Alexion here? There's a lot of maybes -- Drusilla may have been Ptolemy's daughter; Alexion may have been her son. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 20:25, 30 April 2026 (UTC)
      • We could, but the relationship between Gaius Julius Alexion and Drusilla is more speculative than the other connections because no ancient source mentions it. It's arguable whether Ptolemy was the last Ptolemy, even if I think Roller makes a good case for it, so I changed it to call him "a member of the Ptolemaic dynasty". Edward056686 (talk) 20:59, 30 April 2026 (UTC)
• Sculptures of Ptolemy portray him with a youthful appearance and comma-shaped locks around his forehead, which iconographically connected him with his relatives in the Julio-Claudian dynasty: checks out.
• He was apparently related to the princess Drusilla, who is described by the Roman historian Tacitus as the granddaughter of Cleopatra VII and Mark Antony (Bennet 2003) - no page number cited? P. 318 discusses it, but I'm not sure we have enough for "apparently": it's phrased as a "proposal" (in other words, a guess).
  • Bennett and the other sources don't challenge Tacitus' claim that Drusilla was somehow descended from Antony and Cleopatra, in fact Bennett suggests that Tacitus was probably giving a fairly accurate account. So the question isn't whether Ptolemy was her relative, and is more about what their precise relationship was (father, brother, cousin, etc). I added page ranges and removed the word "apparently".
    • Looks good. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 19:39, 30 April 2026 (UTC)
• Could you provide the quote to support but Caligula instead imprisoned him for an unknown period of time before having him executed?
  • Braund writes Ptolemy of Mauretania was not so fortunate: Gaius executed him. Before his execution, Ptolemy was held in detention, apparently at Rome, for an unspecified period. Some of the sources do their best to estimate the length of his imprisonment, but I felt it's best to mention that there isn't any specific source that mentions how much time passed.
    • Looks good to me. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 19:39, 30 April 2026 (UTC)
• In early AD 40, the emperor Caligula summoned Ptolemy to Rome: I couldn't get Barrett on this, but Shaw and Fishwick give it as the winter of AD 39/40 (p. 391).
  • Barrett spends some time on the timing of the execution, "Immediately before a major gap in his text Dio briefly informs us that he was put to death by Caligula. This is included under the events of AD 40. That is consistent with the numismatic and epigraphic evidence. [...] All of this seems to suggest that Ptolemy was summoned to Italy, imprisoned, and executed after Caligula's return from the north, sometime after the spring of 40. [...] The most plausible scenario is probably that Ptolemy was summoned in early 40 and journeyed to Italy to meet the emperor on the latter's return from the north.
  • The full section for Barrett is here[]. I added Fishwick and Shaw's dates so now it says Sometime in late AD 39[31] or early 40.
    • Looks good to me. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 19:39, 30 April 2026 (UTC)
• Historians Duncan Fishwick and Brent Shaw theorized that Ptolemy was killed because of his association with Gnaeus Cornelius Lentulus Gaetulicus (etc): I think we need to be fair to Fishwick and Shaw and say that they also say a) there's basically no good evidence for what happened and b) that he almost certainly had nothing to do with the conspiracy, but may well have been falsely rumoured to have done.
  • The entire paragraph only says that they theorized that he might have been suspected of a conspiracy because their families were linked, but I reworded it to be more clear that it's only a theory and that he was still probably innocent.
• @UndercoverClassicist: I made some changes to the article and came to a consensus with Sobek2000 on a few points. Would you mind taking a final look at the article? Edward056686 (talk) 21:52, 27 May 2026 (UTC)