160s BC

This article concerns the period 169 BC – 160 BC.

Births

169 BC

Liu Fei, Chinese prince of the Han dynasty. He is also the son of Emperor Jing and a half-brother of Emperor Wu (d. 128 BC)

168 BC

Tiberius Gracchus, Roman politician who would create turmoil in the Republic through his attempts to legislate agrarian reforms in the Roman Republic (d. 133 BC)

165 BC

164 BC

Cleopatra Thea Euergetis ("Benefactress"), ruler of the Seleucid kingdom from 125 BC, a daughter of Ptolemy VI of Egypt and his sister/wife Cleopatra II (d. 121 BC) (approximate date)

163 BC

Marcus Aemilius Scaurus, Roman politician and ambassador (d. 89 BC)
Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, Roman politician, who, as a plebeian tribune, will cause political turmoil in the Republic through his attempts to legislate agrarian reforms; his political ideals will eventually lead to his death at the hands of supporters of the conservative faction (Optimates) of the Roman Senate (d. 132 BC)

161 BC

160 BC

Jugurtha, King of Numidia (d. 104 BC)^[1]
Theodosius of Bithynia, Greek astronomer and mathematician who will write Spherics, a book on the geometry of the sphere (d. c. 100 BC), later translated from Arabic back into Latin to help restore knowledge of Euclidean geometry to the West.
Quintus Caecilius Metellus Numidicus, Roman statesman and general

169 BC

Quintus Ennius, Roman epic poet, dramatist, and satirist, the most influential of the early Latin poets – and often called the founder of Roman literature or the father of Roman poetry. His epic Annales, a poem telling the story of Rome from the wanderings of Aeneas to Ennius' own time, remains the national epic until it is later eclipsed by Virgil's Aeneid.

168 BC

Caecilius Statius, Roman comic poet, admirer and imitator of the Greek playwright Menander (b. c. 219 BC)
Jia Yi, Chinese statesman and poet (b. 200 BC)
Xin Zhui, wife of Li Cang (利蒼), the Marquis of Dai and Chancellor of Changsha Kingdom, during the Western Han dynasty of ancient China. (b. c. 217 BC)

167 BC

166 BC

Mattathias, father of Judas Maccabaeus, Jewish priest from Modi'in, near Jerusalem, who has started and briefly led a rebellion by the Jews in Judea against the Seleucid kingdom of Syria
Perseus, the last Macedonian king of the Antigonid dynasty (b. c. 212 BC)

165 BC

164 BC

Antiochus IV Epiphanes ("God Manifest"), Seleucid king of the Syrian kingdom who has reigned since 175 BC, and has encouraged Greek culture and institutions but also attempted to suppress Judaism, which has led to the uprisings in Judea towards the end of his reign (b. c. 215 BC)

163 BC

Xin Zhui, Chinese noblewoman
Zhang Yan, known formally as Empress Xiaohui, empress of the Chinese Han dynasty (b. 202 BC)

162 BC

Antiochus V Eupator, ruler of the Seleucid Empire, who has reigned since 164 BC (b. c. 173 BC)
Lysias or Lusias, Seleucid general and governor of Syria and regent for Antiochus V Eupator
Saurmag I, king of Caucasian Iberia
Gnaeus Octavius, Roman statesman and general

161 BC

160 BC

Artaxias I, king of Armenia who has ruled since 190 BC and the founder of the Artaxiad dynasty, whose members would rule the Kingdom of Armenia for nearly two centuries
Apollodotus I, Indo-Greek king who, since 180 BC, has ruled the western and southern parts of the Indo-Greek kingdom, from Taxila in Punjab to the areas of Sindh and possibly Gujarat
Gaius Laelius, Roman general and politician who was involved in Rome's victory during the Second Punic War between Rome and Carthage (approximate date)
Judas Maccabeus, third son of the Jewish priest Mattathias, who led the Maccabean revolt against the Seleucid Empire until his death
Lucius Aemilius Paullus Macedonicus, Roman consul, politician and general whose victory over the Macedonians in the Battle of Pydna ended the Third Macedonian War (b. c. 229 BC)
Timarchus, Seleucid nobleman, possibly from Miletus in Anatolia, appointed governor of Media in western Iran by the Seleucid king Antiochus IV Epiphanes and who has rebelled against his successor, Demetrius I Soter, until he is killed in a battle with Demetrius' forces