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TETRARCH.—The transliteration of a Gr. word (tetrarchçs) whose literal meaning is ‘the ruler of a fourth part.’ As a title it lost its strict etymological force, and was used of ‘a petty prince,’ or ‘the ruler of a district.’ In the NT ‘Herod the tetrarch’ is Herod Antipas, son of Herod the Great; he ruled over Galilee and Peræa (Mat_14:1, Luk_3:1; Luk_3:19; Luk_9:7, Act_13:1), and is popularly styled ‘king’ (Mar_6:14 ff., Mat_14:9). Two other tetrarchs are mentioned in Luk_3:1; viz., Herod Philip, the brother of Antipas, who ruled over the Ituræan and Trachonitic territory; and Lysanias, who was Tetrarch of Abilene ‘in the fifteenth year of Tiberius’ (see Schürer, HJP [Note: JP History of the Jewish People.] i. ii., App. 1).
J. G. Tasker.