Gepaepyris: Thracian Princess and Roman Client Queen of the Bosporan Kingdom

Introduction

Gepaepyris (Greek: Γηπαίπυρις; 1st century) was a Thracian princess of the Sapaean line and Roman client queen of the Bosporan Kingdom, ruling from AD 37/38 to 39. She was the daughter of Cotys III of Thrace and Antonia Tryphaena, and through her parents descended from Polemon Pythodoros and Pythodorida of Pontus and from Rhoemetalces I and Pythodoris I of Thrace. She married the Bosporan king Tiberius Julius Aspurgus, son of Dynamis and Asander, and bore two sons, Tiberius Julius Mithridates and Tiberius Julius Cotys I.

On Aspurgus’s death in 37 or 38 Gepaepyris succeeded as sole ruler; this sole sovereignty is attested by contemporary coinage and inscriptions but she does not appear in surviving ancient literary narratives. She issued coinage in her name, portraying herself on the obverse and employing imperial imagery on some issues; a series showing the head of her elder son Mithridates signals the identification of an heir. Mithridates succeeded to the throne in AD 39. Contemporary evidence indicates an imperial grant of Pontus and the Bosporan realm to her brother Polemon II in AD 38 did not displace her hold on the kingdom. Through her younger son Cotys I, her line continued to furnish Bosporan rulers into the mid-fourth century, preserving Thracian dynastic names.