Antiochus VIII Epiphanes/Callinicus/Philometor, nicknamed Grypus (Greek: Γρυπός, "hook-nose"), was the ruler of the Hellenistic Seleucid Empire from 125 to 96 BC.

He may have spent his early life in Athens and returned to Syria after the deaths of his father and brother Seleucus V. At first he was joint ruler with his mother.

Their granddaughter Cleopatra Thea of the Ptolemaic dynasty married the claimant Alexander Balas half a century later in 150 BC.

[2] Shortly after taking the throne, Antiochus VIII married his cousin, the Ptolemaic princess Tryphaena.

His ugly, lazy appearance on coins (common among the last Seleucids), together with stories of his lavish banquets, made posterity believe his dynasty was degenerate and decadent.

This was, however, a conscious image invoking the Hellenistic concept of Tryphe - meaning good life, which the last Seleucids strove to be associated with, as opposed to the exhausting civil wars and feuds which troubled their reigns in reality.

[8] In 116 BC his half-brother and cousin Antiochus IX Cyzicenus returned from exile and a civil war began.