Zenobia

Abstract

Hailing from the Syrian city of Palmyra, a woman named Zenobia (and Bathzabbai) governed territory in the eastern Roman Empire from 268 to 272. She thus became the most famous Palmyrene who ever lived. But sources for her life and career are scarce. This book situates Zenobia in the social, economic, cultural, and material context of ancient Palmyra. By doing so, it aims to shed greater light on the experiences of Zenobia and Palmyrene women like her at various stages of their lives. Not limiting itself to the political aspects of her governance, it contemplates what inscriptions and material culture enable us to know about women and the practice of gender in Palmyra, and thus the world that Zenobia navigated. It also ponders Zenobia’s legacy in light of the contemporary human tragedy in Syria.