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need bolstering by dynastic marriage sometimes took commoners for their primary wives. Amenhotep III of Egypt (1417-1379 B.C.) had wives sent to him by the king of Babylonia and other fellow rulers. But he chose the commoner Tiy, daughter of his high priest, to be his “Great Royal Wife.” Their son, Amenhotep IV, followed his father’s example and chose the elegant commoner Nefertiti for his primary wife. 15
    To rule out conflicts of interest between in-laws, an Egyptian pharaoh sometimes married a sister or, more frequently, a half-sister—a woman born by a different wife to the same father. This bolstered the claim to dynastic continuity both for the rulers and for any children they produced and eliminated the risk that husband and wife would be torn in different directions by the machinations of their respective kin. But it did not always prevent brother and sister from falling out, as we shall see in the story of Cleopatra.
    Ancient Chinese emperors also tried to restrict the influence of their in-laws and prevent wives from putting the interests of their kin or sons before those of their husbands. During the Ming dynasty, rulers purposely chose women from weak or low-status kin groups as their wives. The Manchu dynasty took this one step farther, choosing the emperor’s successor from among his consorts’ sons so that the empress would not be tempted to poison her husband to hasten her son’s succession. 16
    Egyptian kings, in their long campaign to bring Thebes under their control, created a different kind of political marriage. They set up a marriage alliance with the gods rather than with potentially troublesome human beings. During the eighth century B.C. the king of Egypt revived an old Theban practice of elevating a priestess to be the “divine wife of Amun,” an Egyptian god very popular in Thebes. But the king filled the position with his own daughter rather than a lady of Thebes. From then on, the Divine Wife was always a daughter of the Egyptian king. Residing in Thebes, she managed great estates and made major political decisions but was expected to remain celibate to prevent her from founding a rival dynasty to undermine the king’s power. The Divine Wife was required to adopt as her successor the daughter of the next king who ascended the Egyptian throne. That king then appointed a chief steward to administer the new Divine Wife’s estates and help her carry out his wishes.
    Even this strategy could backfire if daughters entertained their own political ambitions. One Divine Wife, Nitocris, outlived her father without adopting a successor and managed to maintain her independence from the next three kings by appointing her own men as stewards, making her essentially the independent ruler of Thebes. The Egyptian kings, left out of the loop, were in a tight spot. It was one thing to send your advisers and agents as the invited guests of the Divine Wife. But if she refused to recognize them, the city of Thebes might well rally behind her. Not until 594 B.C., when she was in her eighties, did Nitocris finally adopt her great-niece as her successor, giving the Egyptian king of the time the chance to send his own representative to serve in the retinue of the heir apparent. 17
    Alexander the Great of Macedonia conquered Egypt in the fourth century B.C., and merged it with Greece and most of Asia Minor to form a massive Greco-Macedonian empire. Thus began the Hellenistic Era, marked by the spread of Greek settlers, language, and culture into the East and the incorporation of Greeks and Macedonians into the upper circles of the Egyptian ruling class. But after Alexander’s death in 323 B.C. the empire broke apart. Syria and the lands to the east were taken over by the Seleucid dynasty and Egypt proper by the Ptolemaic dynasty. Both dynasties relied heavily on polygamy as a diplomatic tool.
    By taking more than one wife, kings could establish a network of alliances with several other rulers. But polygamy