| Was Prusias Monodous the son of Prusias II and his first wife, Apama of Macedonia? |
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Making Prusias Monodous a son of Apama and thus a full brother of Nicomedes [II] provides a possible route for the transmission of the gemination mutation through Apama; this possible route is of interest if we assume that Apama III is not the daughter of Demetrius II of Macedonia and Phthia, because then Monodous' father Prusias II has no known descent from Pyrrhus II of Epirus. (Having Apama III as the daughter of Demetrius II and Stratonice II gives a route for the transmission of the Iranian name Apama.)
The assumption that Monodous was the son of his father's first wife, Apama, is plausible if we also assume that Monodous died before Prusias II ordered the conditional murder of his son Nicomedes [II]. (William Smith's 19th century Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology says of Monodous, "He probably died early, as nothing more is known of him.") If Monodous was a son of Prusias II's first wife Apama of Macedonia and was still living when Prusias II ordered the murder of his son Nicomedes, then Justin 34.4 wouldn't make sense (because Monodous would benefit from this murder, not the children of the second marriage): About the same time, Prusias, king of Bithynia, conceived a resolution to kill his son Nicomedes, with a desire to benefit his younger children by a second marriage, whom [Nicomedes] he had sent to Rome. It is possible that the information in Justin 34.4 is not entirely accurate but is partly a reflection of the situation three generations earlier, when Etazeta the second wife of Nicomedes I of Bithynia convinced him to make her sons the heirs to the throne ahead of the sons of his first wife. However, the defeat and destruction of the Antigonid dynasty of Macedonia by Rome also destroyed the political value of Prusias' first wife, Apama of Macedonia, and thus could provide a motivation for his favoring the children of his second wife. |
| Was Prusias Monodous the son of Prusias II and his second wife, whose name and background is not currently known? |
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Justin 34.4 says (as quoted above): About the same time, Prusias, king of Bithynia, conceived a resolution to kill his son Nicomedes, with a desire to benefit his younger children by a second marriage, whom [Nicomedes] he had sent to Rome. Renzo Lucherini (email of 12/3/12) says: No sources clearly tell that Prousias Monodous was the son that his father Prousias II wished to put on the throne but the context makes this guess plausible. See Livius, Periochae 50.2: King Prusias [II the Hunter] of Bithynia, a man full of the lowest moral defects, was killed by his son Nicomedes [II Epiphanes], who received help from king Attalus [II] of Pergamon, but had a second son (who is said to have had one single bone growing in place of his upper teeth). |