Daniel 11:18 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

After this shall he turn his face unto the isles, and shall take many After entering into this alliance, Antiochus fitted out a formidable fleet of one hundred large ships of war, and two hundred other lesser vessels, with a view to reduce under his power the maritime places of Asia, Thrace, and Greece; and he took Samos, Eubœa, and many other islands, which was a great indignity and reproach offered to the Romans, when their confederates were thus oppressed; and the cities which they had lately restored to liberty were enslaved. But a prince, &c., shall cause the reproach to cease This prince was Lucius Scipio, the Roman consul, who made the reproach, which Antiochus had offered to the Romans by invading their allies, to return upon his own head, by overthrowing him in battle at mount Sipylus, and forcing him to quit all the conquests he had made in the lesser Asia. In this battle Antiochus lost fifty thousand foot and four thousand horse; one thousand four hundred were taken prisoners, and he himself escaped with difficulty. From this great victory, whereby Asia was delivered out of the hands of Antiochus, Scipio obtained the surname of Asiaticus: see Livy, lib. xxxvii, cap 44. Antiochus, in consequence of this defeat, was obliged to sue for peace, and, to obtain it, was under the necessity of submitting to very dishonourable conditions; namely, not to set foot in Europe, and to give up all he possessed in Asia on this side mount Taurus; to defray the whole expenses of the war, &c., and to give twenty hostages for the performance of these articles, one of whom was his youngest son Antiochus, afterward called Epiphanes. By these means he and his successors became tributary to the Romans. So that nothing could be more fully accomplished than what is here said about the reproach he had brought upon others being turned upon himself.