Barsine

This article is about the 4th-century BC Persian/Greek noblewoman. For the genus of moths, see Barsine (moth). For the elder daughter of Darius III, see Stateira (wife of Alexander the Great).

Barsine (Greek: Βαρσίνη; c. 363–309 BC) was the daughter of a Persian father, Artabazus, satrap of Hellespontine Phrygia, and a Greek Rhodian mother, the sister of mercenaries Mentor of Rhodes and Memnon of Rhodes.^[1] Barsine became the wife of her uncle Mentor, and after his death married her second uncle, Memnon.

Barsine
Born	363 BC
Died	309 BC
Known for	Mistress of Alexander the Great
Spouses	Mentor of Rhodes Memnon of Rhodes
Children	Unnamed daughter (wife of Nearchus) Heracles of Macedon
Father	Artabazos II

Rhodes

Barsine was half-Rhodian Greek by her mother, and half-Persian by her father, the satrap Artabazos II.

Claire Bloom as Barsine, and Richard Burton as Alexander the Great, in Alexander the Great (1956 film).

In 334 BC, the year of Alexander's invasion of Asia, she and her children were sent by Memnon to the king Darius III as hostages for his fidelity; and in the ensuing year, when Damascus was betrayed to the Macedonians, she fell into the hands of Alexander,^[2] by whom it is said that she became the mother of Heracles.^[3][4]

Twelve years after Alexander's death in 323 BC, Barsine's son-in-law Nearchus unsuccessfully advocated for Heracles' claim to the throne, who was then seventeen, having been born about five years after Barsine and Alexander supposedly met in Damascus in 333 BC. From a comparison of the accounts of Diodorus and Justin, it appears that he was brought up at Pergamum under his mother's care, and that she shared his fate when in 309 BC Polyperchon was induced by Cassander to murder him. Barsine is sometimes confused with Stateira II, wife of Alexander, who also may have been called "Barsine".^[5]