Cotys III (
Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...
: Κότυς, Kotys) was a king of the
Odrysians
The Odrysian Kingdom (; Ancient Greek: ) was a state grouping many Thracian tribes united by the Odrysae, which arose in the early 5th century BC and existed at least until the late 1st century BC. It consisted mainly of present-day Bulgaria and ...
in
Thrace
Thrace (; el, Θράκη, Thráki; bg, Тракия, Trakiya; tr, Trakya) or Thrake is a geographical and historical region in Southeast Europe, now split among Bulgaria, Greece, and Turkey, which is bounded by the Balkan Mountains to t ...
in the early 3rd-century BC. His one secure attestation is an inscription from
Delphi
Delphi (; ), in legend previously called Pytho (Πυθώ), in ancient times was a sacred precinct that served as the seat of Pythia, the major oracle who was consulted about important decisions throughout the ancient classical world. The oracle ...
dated to sometime between 276 and 267 BC (usually given as 270/269 BC), in which he is named as the son of
Raizdos Raizdos (Ῥαίζδος, the Latin form would be Rhaezdus) was possibly a king of the Odrysians in Thrace in the early 3rd century BC. He is attested in an inscription from Delphi as the father of Kotys III, who was king sometime between 276 and ...
, his probable predecessor. Scholarship has long associated a coin type struck for a king Cotys on one side and a king Rhescuporis on the other and also a king Cotys, father of a Rhescuporis, named in a decree from Apollonia (
Sozopol
Sozopol ( bg, Созопол , el, Σωζόπολη, translit=Sozopoli) is an ancient seaside town located 35 km south of Burgas on the southern Bulgarian Black Sea Coast. Today it is one of the major seaside resorts in the country, known for the ...
) with Cotys III. However, these identifications have been doubted, and some scholars have redated both the coin type and the inscription to almost three centuries later. It is therefore uncertain whether Cotys III was succeeded by a son named
Rhescuporis.
Mladjov, Rulers of Thrace, University of Michigan
/ref>
See also
*List of Thracian tribes
This is a list of ancient tribes in Thrace and Dacia ( grc, Θρᾴκη, Δακία) including possibly or partly Thracian or Dacian tribes, and non-Thracian or non-Dacian tribes that inhabited the lands known as Thrace and Dacia. A great number o ...
References
Bibliography
* D. Dana, Inscriptions, in: J. Valeva et al. (eds.), ''A Companion to Ancient Thrace'', Wiley, 2015: 243-264.
* P. Delev, From Koroupedion to the Beginning of the Third Mithridatic War (281-73 BCE), in: J. Valeva et al. (eds.), ''A Companion to Ancient Thrace'', Wiley, 2015: 59-74.
* J. Jurukova, ''Monetite na trakijskite plemena i vladeteli'', vol. 1., Sofia, 1992.
* M. Manov, "Dekret na Apolonija s novo datirane," ''Numizmatika, Sfragistika i Epigrafika'' 11 (2015) 167-173.
* R. Werner, in: W.-D. von Barloewen (ed.), ''Abriss der Geschichte antiker Randkulturen'', Munich, 1961: 83-150, 239-242.
{{Dacia-stub
3rd-century BC rulers
Odrysian kings