← catalogue

The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 6: Parthia

by George Rawlinson · English · Gutenberg #16166 · 612,013 chars · public domain (US)

The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 6: Parthia
    
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.

Title: The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 6: Parthia

Author: George Rawlinson


        
Release date: July 1, 2005 [eBook #16166]
                Most recently updated: December 11, 2020

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/16166

Credits: Produced by David Widger


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SEVEN GREAT MONARCHIES OF THE ANCIENT EASTERN WORLD, VOL 6: PARTHIA ***




Produced by David Widger





THE SEVEN GREAT MONARCHIES

OF THE

ANCIENT EASTERN WORLD;


OR,


THE HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, AND ANTIQUITIES OF CHALDAEA, ASSYRIA

BABYLON, MEDIA, PERSIA, PARTHIA, AND SASSANIAN,

OR NEW PERSIAN EMPIRE.


BY

GEORGE RAWLINSON, M.A.,

CAMDEN PROFESSOR OF ANCIENT HISTORY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD



IN THREE VOLUMES.



VOLUME III.



WITH MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS




[Illustration: MAP of PARTHIA PROPER]

[Illustration: MAP OF PARTHIA]




A HISTORY OF PARTHIA.




CHAPTER I.


_Geography of Parthia Proper, Character of the Region, Climate,
Character of the Surrounding Countries._


The broad tract of desert which, eastward of the Caspian Sea, extends
from the Mougbojar hills to the Indian Ocean, a distance of above 1500
miles, is interrupted about midway by a strip of territory possessing
features of much beauty and attraction. This strip, narrow compared to
the desert on either side of it, is yet, looked at by itself, a region
of no inconsiderable dimensions, extending, as it does from east to
west, a distance of 320, and from north to south of nearly 200 miles.
The mountain chain, which running southward of the Caspian, skirts the
great plateau of Iran, or Persia, on the north, broadens out, after
it passes the south-eastern corner of the sea, into a valuable and
productive mountain-region. Four or five distinct ranges here run
parallel to one another, having between them latitudinal valleys, with
glens transverse to their courses. The sides of the valleys are often
well wooded; the flat ground at the foot of the hills is fertile; water
abounds; and the streams gradually collect into rivers of a considerable
size.

The fertile territory in this quarter is further increased by the
extension of cultivation to a considerable distance from the base of
the most southern of the ranges, in the direction of the Great Iranic
desert. The mountains send down a number of small streams towards
the south; and the water of these, judiciously husbanded by means of
reservoirs and _kanats_, is capable of spreading fertility over a broad
belt at the foot of the hills; which, left to nature, would be almost as
barren as the desert itself, into which it would, in fact, be absorbed.

It was undoubtedly in the region which has been thus briefly described
that the ancient home of the Parthians lay. In this neighborhood alone
are found the geographic names which the most ancient writers who
mention the Parthians connect with them. Here evidently the Parthians
were settled at the time when Alexander the Great overran the East, and
first made the Greeks thoroughly familiar with the Parthian name and
territory. Here, lastly, in the time of the highest Parthian splendor
and prosperity, did a province of the Empire retain the name of
Parthyene, or Parthia Proper; and here, also, in their palmiest days,
did the Parthian kings continue to have a capital and a residence.

Parthia Proper, however, was at no time coextensive with the region
described. A portion of that region formed the district called Hyrcania;
and it is not altogether easy to determine what were the limits between
the two. The evidence goes, on the whole, to show that, while Hyrcania
lay towards the west and north, the Parthian country was that towards
the south and east, the valleys of the Ettrek and Gurghan constituting
the main portions of the former, while the tracts east and south of
those valleys, as far as the sixty-first degree of E. longitude,
constituted the latter.

If the limits of Parthia Proper be thus defined, it will have nearly
corresponded to the modern Persian province of Khorasan. It will have
extended from about Damaghan (long. 54° 10’) upon the west, to the
Heri-rud upon the east, and have comprised the modern districts of
Damaghan, Shah-rud, Sebzawar, Nishapur, Meshed, Shebri-No, and Tersheez.
Its length from east to west will have been about 300 miles, and its
average width about 100 or 120. It will have contained an area of about
33,000 square miles, being thus about equal in size to Ireland, Bavaria,
or St. Domingo.

The character of the district has been already stated in general terms;
but some further particulars may now be added. It consists, in the
first place, of a mountain and a plain region--the mountain region lying
towards the north and the plain region towards the south. The mountain
region is composed of three main ranges, the Daman-i-Koh, or Hills of
the Kurds, upon the north, skirting the great desert of Rharaem, the
Alatagh and Meerabee mountains in the centre; and the Jaghetai or
Djuvein range, upon the south, which may be regarded as continued in the
hills above Tersheez and Khaff. The three ranges are parallel, running
east and west, but with an inclination, more or less strong, to the
north of west and the south of east. The northern and central ranges are
connected by a water-shed, which runs nearly east and west, a little to
the south of Kooshan, and separates the head streams of the Ettrek from
those of the Meshed river. The central and southern ranges are connected
by a more decided, mountain line, a transverse ridge which runs nearly
north and south, dividing between the waters that flow westward into the
Gurghan, and those which form the river of Nishapur. This conformation
of the mountains leaves between the ranges three principal valleys, the
valley of Meshed towards the south-east, between the Kurdish range and
the Alatagh and Meerabee; that of Miyanabad towards the west, between
the Alatagh and the Jaghetai; and that of Nishapur towards the south,
between the eastern end of the Jaghetai and the western flank of the
Meerabee. As the valleys are three in number, so likewise are the
rivers, which are known respectively as the Tejend, or river of Meshed,
the river of Nishapur, and the river of Miyanabad.

The Tejend, which is the principal stream of the three, rises from
several sources in the hills south of Kooshan, and flows with a
south-easterly course down the valley of Meshed, receiving numerous
tributaries from both sides, until it reaches that city, when it bends
eastward, and, finding a way through the Kurdish range, joins the course
of the Heri-rud, about long. 01° 10’. Here its direction is completely
changed. Turning at an angle, which is slightly acute, it proceeds to
flow to the west of north, along the northern base of the Kurdish range,
from which it receives numerous small streams, till it ends finally in a
large swamp or marsh, in lat. 39°, long. 57°, nearly. The entire length
of the stream, including only main windings, is about 475 miles. In its
later course, however, it is often almost dry, the greater portion of
the water being consumed in irrigation in the neighborhood of Meshed.

The river of Nishapur is formed by numerous small streams, which descend
from the mountains that on three sides inclose that city. Its water
is at times wholly consumed in the cultivation of the plain; but the
natural course may be traced, running in a southerly and south-westerly
direction, until it debouches from the hills in the vicinity of
Tersheez. The Miyanabad stream is believed to be a tributary of the
Gurghan. It rises from several sources in the transverse range joining
the Alatagh to the Jaghetai, the streams from which all flow westward
in narrow valleys, uniting about long. 57° 35’. The course of the river
from this point to Piperne has not been traced, but it is believed
to run in a general westerly direction along the southern base of the
Alatagh, and to form a junction with the Gurghan a little below the
ruins of the same name. Its length to this point is probably about 200
miles.

The elevation of the mountain chains is not great. No very remarkable
peaks occur in them; and it may be doubted whether they anywhere attain
a height of above 6000 feet. They are for the most part barren and
rugged, very scantily supplied with timber, and only in places capable
of furnishing a tolerable pasturage to flocks and herds. The valleys,
on the other hand, are rich and fertile in the extreme; that of Meshed,
which extends a distance of above a hundred miles from north-west
to south-east, and is from twenty to thirty miles broad, has almost
everywhere a good and deep soil, is abundantly supplied with water,
and yields a plentiful return even to the simplest and most primitive
cultivation. The plain about Nishapur, which is in length from eighty to
ninety miles, and in width from forty to sixty, boasts a still greater
fertility.

The flat country along the southern base of the mountains, which ancient
writers regard as Parthia, par excellence, is A strip of territory about
300 miles long, varying in width ac cording to the labor and the skill
applied by its inhabitants to the perfecting of a system of irrigation.
At present the _kanats_, or underground water-courses, are seldom
carried to a distance of more than a mile or two from the foot of the
hills; but it is thought that anciently the cultivation was extended
considerably further. Ruined cities dispersed throughout the tract
sufficiently indicate its capabilities, and in a few places where much
attention is paid to agriculture the results are such as to imply that
the soil is more than ordinarily productive. The salt desert lies,
however, in most places within ten or fifteen miles of the hills; and
beyond this distance it is obviously impossible that the “Atak” or
“Skirt” should at any time have been inhabited.

It is evident that the entire tract above described must have been at
all times a valuable and much coveted region. Compared with the arid and
inhospitable deserts which adjoin it upon the north and south, Khorasan,
the ancient Parthia and Hyrcania, is a terrestrial Paradise. Parthia,
though scantily wooded, still produces in places the pine, the walnut,
the sycamore, the ash, the poplar, the willow, the vine, the mulberry,
the apricot, and numerous other fruit trees. Saffron, asafoetida, and
the gum ammoniac plant, are indigenous in parts of it. Much of the soil
is suited for the cultivation of wheat, barley, and cotton. The ordinary
return upon wheat and barley is reckoned at ten for one. Game abounds
in the mountains, and fish in the underground water-courses. Among the
mineral treasures of the region may be enumerated copper, lead, iron,
salt, and one of the most exquisite of gems, the turquoise. This gem
does not appear to be mentioned by ancient writers; but it is so easily
obtainable that we can scarcely suppose it was not known from very
ancient times.

The severity of the climate of Parthia is strongly stated by Justin.
According to modern travellers, the winters, though protracted, are
not very inclement, the thermometer rarely sinking below ten or eleven
degrees of Fahrenheit during the nights, and during the daytime rising,
even in December and January, to 40° or 50°. The cold weather, however,
which commences about October, continues till nearly the end of March,
when storms of sleet and hail are common. Much snow falls in the earlier
portion of the winter, and the valleys are scarcely clear of it till
March. On the mountains it remains much longer, and forms the chief
source of supply to the rivers during the spring and the early summer
time. In summer the heat is considerable, more especially in the region
known as the “Atak;” and here, too, the unwholesome wind, which blows
from the southern desert, is felt from, time to time as a terrible
scourge. But in the upland country the heat is at no time very intense,
and the natives boast that they are not compelled by it to sleep on
their house-tops during more than one month in the year.

The countries by which Parthia Proper was bounded were the following:
Chorasmia, Margiana, Aria, Sarangia, Sagartia, and Hyrcania.

Chorasmia lay upon the north, consisting of the low tract between the
most northerly of the Parthian mountain chains and the old course of the
Oxus. This region, which is for the most part an arid and inhospitable
desert, can at no time have maintained more than a sparse and scanty
population. The Turkoman tribes which at the present day roam over the
waste, feeding their flocks and herds alternately on the banks of the
Oxus and the Tejend, or finding a bare subsistence for them about the
ponds and pools left by the winter rains, represent, it is probable,
with sufficient faithfulness, the ancient inhabitants, who, whatever
their race, must always have been nomads, and can never have exceeded
a few hundred thousands. On this side Parthia must always have been
tolerably safe from attacks, unless the Cis-Oxianian tribes were
reinforced, as they sometimes were, by hordes from beyond the river.

On the north-east was Margiana, sometimes regarded as a country by
itself, sometimes reckoned a mere district of Bactria. This was the
tract of fertile land upon the Murg-ab, or ancient Margus river, which
is known among moderns as the district of Merv. The Murg-ab is a stream
flowing from the range of the Paropamisus, in a direction which is a
little east of north; it debouches from the mountains in about lat.
36° 25’, and thence makes its way through the desert. Before it reaches
Merv, it is eighty yards wide and five feet deep, thus carrying a vast
body of water. By a judicious use of dykes and canals, this fertilizing
fluid was in ancient times carried to a distance of more than
twenty-five miles from the natural course of the river; and by these
means an oasis was created with a circumference of above 170, and
consequently a diameter of above fifty miles. This tract, inclosed on
every side by deserts, was among the most fertile of all known regions;
it was especially famous for its vines, which grew to such a size that
a single man could not encircle their stems with his two arms, and
bore clusters that were a yard long. Margiana possessed, however, as a
separate country, little military strength, and it was only as a
portion of some larger and more populous territory that it could become
formidable to the Parthians.

South of Margiana, and adjoining upon Parthia toward the east, was Aria,
the tract which lies about the modern Herat. This was for the most
part a mountain region, very similar in its general character to the
mountainous portion of Parthia, but of much smaller dimensions. Its
people were fairly warlike; but the Parthian population was probably
double or triple their number, and Parthia consequently had but little
to fear in this quarter.

Upon the south-east Parthia was bordered by Sarangia, the country of the
Sarangae, or Drangae. This appears to have been the district south
of the Herat valley, reaching thence as far as the Hamoon, or Sea of
Seistan. It is a country of hills and downs, watered by a number of
somewhat scanty streams, which flow south-westward from the Paropamisus
to the Hamoon. Its population can never have been great, and they were
at no time aggressive or enterprising, so that on this side also the
Parthians were secure, and had to deal with no formidable neighbor.

Sagartia succeeded to Sarangia towards the west, and bordered Parthia
along almost the whole of its southern frontier. Excepting in the
vicinity of Tebbes and Toun (lat. 34°, long. 56° to 58°), this
district is an absolute desert, the haunt of the gazelle and the wild
ass, dry, saline, and totally devoid of vegetation. The wild nomads, who
wandered over its wastes, obtaining a scanty subsistence by means of
the lasso, were few in number, scattered, and probably divided by feuds.
Southern Parthia might occasionally suffer from their raids; but
they were far too weak to constitute a serious danger to the mountain
country.

Lastly, towards the west and the north-west, Parthia was bordered by
Hyrcania, a region geographically in the closest connection with it,
very similar in general character, but richer, warmer, and altogether
more desirable. Hyrcania was, as already observed, the western and
north-western portion of that broad mountain region which has been
described as intervening between the eastern shores of the Caspian
and the river Arius, or Heri-rud. It consisted mainly of the two rich
valleys of the Gurghan and Ettrek, with the mountain chains inclosing or
dividing them. Here on the slopes of the hills grow the oak, the beech,
the elm, the alder, the wild cherry; here luxuriant vines spring from
the soil on every side, raising themselves aloft by the aid of their
stronger sisters, and hanging in wild festoons from tree to tree;
beneath their shade the ground is covered with flowers-of various kinds,
primroses, violets, lilies, hyacinths, and others of unknown species;
while in the flat land at the bottom of the valleys are meadows of the
softest and the tenderest grass, capable of affording to numerous
flocks and herds an excellent and unfailing pasture. Abundant game finds
shelter in the forests, while towards the mouths of the rivers, where
the ground is for the most part marshy, large herds of wild boars
are frequent; a single herd sometimes containing hundreds. Altogether
Hyrcania was a most productive and desirable country, capable of
sustaining a dense population, and well deserving Strabo’s description
of it as “highly favored of Heaven.” The area of the country was,
however, small, probably not much exceeding one half that of Parthia
Proper; and thus the people were not sufficiently numerous to cause the
Parthians much apprehension.

The situation and character of Parthia thus, on the whole, favored her
becoming an imperial power. She had abundant resources within herself;
she had a territory apt for the production of a hardy race of men; and
she had no neighbors of sufficient strength to keep her down, when
she once developed the desire to become dominant. Surprise has been
expressed at her rise. But it is perhaps more astonishing that she
passed so many centuries in obscurity before she became an important
state, than that she raised herself at last to the first position among
the Oriental nations. Her ambition and her material strength were plants
of slow growth; it took several hundreds of years for them to attain
maturity: when, however, this point was reached, the circumstances
of her geographical position stood her in good stead, and enabled her
rapidly to extend her way over the greater portion of Western Asia.




CHAPTER II.


_Early notices of the Parthians. Their Ethnic character and connections.
Their position under the Persian Monarchs, from Cyrus the Great to
Darius III. (Codomannus.)_


The Parthians do not appear in history until a comparatively recent
period. Their name occurs nowhere in the Old Testament Scriptures.
They obtain no mention in the Zendavesta. The Assyrian Inscriptions
are wholly silent concerning them. It is not until the time of Darius
Hystaspis that we have trustworthy evidence of their existence as a
distinct people. In the inscriptions of this king we find their country
included under the name of Parthva or Parthwa among the provinces of
the Persian Empire, joined in two places with Sarangia, Aria, Chorasmia,
Bactria, and Sogdiana, and in a third with these same countries and
Sagartia. We find, moreover, an account of a rebellion in which the
Parthians took part. In the troubles which broke out upon the death of
the Pseudo-Smerdis, B.C. 521, Parthia revolted, in conjunction (as it
would seem) with Hyrcania, espousing the cause of that Median pretender,
who, declaring himself a descendant of the old Median monarchs, set
himself up as a rival to Darius. Hytaspes, the father of Darius, held at
this time the Parthian satrapy. In two battles within the limits of his
province he defeated the rebels, who must have brought into the field
a considerable force, since in one of the two engagements they lost in
killed and prisoners between 10,000 and 11,000 men. After their second
defeat the Parthians made their submission, and once more acknowledged
Darius for their sovereign.

With these earliest Oriental notices of the Parthians agree entirely
such passages as contain any mention of them in the more ancient
literature of the Greeks. Hecatseus of Miletus, who was contemporary
with Darius Hystaspis, made the Parthians adjoin upon the Chorasmians in
the account which he gave of the geography of Asia. Herodotus spoke of
them as a people subject to the Persians in the reign of Darius, and
assigned them to the sixteenth satrapy, which comprised also the Arians,
the Sogdians, and the Chorasmians. He said that they took part in the
expedition of Xerxes against Greece (B.C. 480), serving in the army on
foot under the same commander as the Chorasmians, and equipped like them
with bows and arrows, and with spears of no great length. In another
passage he mentioned their being compelled to pay the Persian water tax,
and spoke of the great need which they had of water for the irrigation
of their millet and sesame crops.

It is evident that these notices agree with the Persian accounts,
both as to the locality of the Parthians and as to the fact of their
subjection to the Persian government. They further agree in assigning
to the Parthians a respectable military character, yet one of no very
special eminency. On the ethnology of the nation, and the circumstances
under which the country became an integral part of the Persian
dominions, they throw no light. We have still to seek an answer to the
questions, “Who were the Parthians?” and “How did they become Persian
subjects?”

Who were the Parthians? It is not until the Parthians have emerged
from obscurity and become a great people that ancient authors trouble
themselves with inquiries as to their ethnic character and remote
antecedents. Of the first writers who take the subject into their
consideration, some are content to say that the Parthians were a race of
Scyths, who at a remote date had separated from the rest of the nation,
and had occupied the southern portion of the Chorasmian desert, whence
they had gradually made themselves masters of the mountain region
adjoining it. Others added to this that the Scythic tribe to which they
belonged was called the Dahse; that their own proper name was Parni, or
Aparni; and that they had migrated originally from the country to the
north of the Palus Maeotis, where they had left the great mass of their
fellow tribesmen. Subsequently, in the time of the Antonines, the theory
was started that the Parthians were Scyths, whom Sesostris, on his
return from his Scythian expedition, brought into Asia and settled in
the mountain-tract lying east of the Caspian.

It can scarcely be thought that these notices have very much historical
value. Moderns are generally agreed that the Scythian conquests of
Sesostris are an invention of the Egyptian priests, which they palmed
on Herodotus and Diodorus. Could they be regarded as having really taken
place, still the march back from Scythia to Egypt round the north and
east of the Caspian Sea would be in the highest degree improbable. The
settlement of the Parthians in Parthia by the returning conqueror is, in
fact, a mere duplicate of the tale commonly told of his having settled
the Colchians in Colchis, and is equally worthless. The earlier authors,
moreover, know nothing of the story, which first appears in the second
century after our era, and as time goes on becomes more circumstantial.

Even the special connection of the Parthians with the Dahse, and their
migration from the shores of the Palus Mteotis, may be doubted. Strabo
admits it to be uncertain whether there were any Dahse at all about the
Mseotis; and, if there were, it would be open to question whether they
were of the same race with the Dahse of the Caspian. As the settlement
of the Parthians in the country called after their name dated from a
time anterior to Darius Hystaspis, and the Greeks certainly did not
set on foot any inquiries into their origin till at least two centuries
later, it would be unlikely that the Parthians could give them a true
account. The real groundwork of the stories told seems to have been
twofold. First, there was a strong conviction on the part of those who
came in contact with the Parthians that they were Scyths; and secondly,
it was believed that their name meant “exile.” Hence it was necessary to
suppose that they had migrated into their country from some portion of
the tract known as Scythia to the Greeks, and it was natural to invent
stories as to the particular circumstances of the migration.

The residuum of the truth, or at any rate the important conviction of
the ancient writers, which remains after their stories are sifted, is
the Scythic character of the Parthian people. On this point, Strabo,
Justin, and Arrian are agreed. The manners of the Parthians had, they
tell us, much that was Scythic in them. Their language was half Scythic,
half Median. They armed themselves in the Scythic fashion. They were, in
fact, Scyths in descent, in habits, in character.

But what are we to understand by this? May we assume at once that
they were a Turanian people, in race, habits, and language akin to the
various tribes of Turkomans who are at present dominant over the entire
region between the Oxus and the Parthian mountain-tract, and within
that tract have many settlements? May we assume that they stood in an
attitude of natural hostility to the Arian nations by which they were
surrounded, and that their revolt was the assertion of independence by
a down-trodden people after centuries of subjection to the yoke of a
stranger? Did Turan, in their persons, rise against Iean after perhaps a
thousand years of oppression, and renew the struggle for predominance
in regions where the war had been waged before, and where it still
continues to be waged at the present day?

Such conclusions cannot safely be drawn from the mere fact that the
Scythic character of the Parthians is asserted in the strongest terms
by the ancient writers. The term “Scythic” is not, strictly speaking,
ethnical. It designates a life rather a descent, habits rather than
blood. It is applied by the Greeks and Romans to Indo-European and
Turanian races indifferently, provided that they are nomads, dwelling
in tents or carts, living on the produce of their flocks and herds,
uncivilized, and, perhaps it may be added, accustomed to pass their
lives on horseback. We cannot, therefore, assume that a nation is
Turanian simply because it is pronounced “Scythic.” Still, as in fact
the bulk of those races which have remained content with the nomadic
condition, and which from the earliest times to the present day have led
the life above described in the broad steppes of Europe and Asia, appear
to have been of the Turian type, a presumption is raised in favor of a
people being Turanian by decided and concordant statements that it is
Scythic. The presumption may of course be removed by evidence to the
contrary; but, until such evidence is produced it has weight, and
constitutes an argument, the force of which is considerable.

In the present instance the presumption raised is met by no argument
of any great weight; while on the other hand it receives important
confirmation from several different quarters. It is said, indeed, that
as all, or almost all, the other nations of these parts were confessedly
Arians (e.g. the Bactrians, the Sogdians, the Chorasmians, the
Margians, the Arians of Herat, the Sagartians, the Sarangians, and the
Hyrcanians), it would be strange if the Parthians belonged to a wholly
different ethnic family. But, in the first place, the existence of
isolated nationalities, detached fragments of some greater ethnic mass,
embodied amid alien material, is a fact familiar to ethnologists; and,
further, it is not at all certain that there were not other Turanian
races in these parts, as, for instance, the Thamanasans. Again, it is
said that the Parthians show their Arian extraction by their names; but
this argument may be turned against those who adduce it. It is true that
among the Parthian names a considerable number are not only Arian, but
distinctly Persian--e.g., Mith-ridates, Tiridates, Artabanus, Orobazus,
Rhodaspes--but the bulk of the names have an entirely different
character. There is nothing Arian in such appellations as Amminapes,
Bacasis, Pacorus, Vonones, Sinnaces, Abdus, Abdageses, Gotarzes,
Vologeses, Mnasciras, Sanatroeces; nor anything markedly Arian in
Priapatius, Himerus, Orodes, Apreetseus, Ornos-pades, Parrhaces,
Vasaces, Monesis, Exedares. If the Parthians were Arians, what account
is to be given of these words? That they employed a certain number of
Persian names is sufficiently explained by their subjection during more
than two centuries to the Persian rule. We are also distinctly told that
they affected Persian habits, and desired to be looked upon as Persians.
The Arian names borne by Parthians no more show them to be Arians in
race than the Norman names adopted so widely by the Welsh show them to
be Northmen. On the other hand, the non-Arian names in the former case
are like the non-Norman names in the latter, and equally indicate a
second source of nomenclature, in which should be contained the key to
the true ethnology of the people.

The non-Arian character of the Parthians is signified, if not proved, by
the absence of their name from the Zendavesta. The Zendavesta enumerates
among Arian nations the Bactrians, the Sogdians, the Margians, the
Hyrcanians, the Arians of Herat, and the Chorasmians, or all the
important nations of these parts except the Parthians. The Parthian
country it mentions under the name of Nisaya or Nisaea, implying
apparently that the Parthians were not yet settled in it. The only ready
way of reconciling the geography of the Zendavesta with that of later
ages is to suppose the Parthians a non-Arian nation who intruded
themselves among the early Arian settlements, coming probably from the
north, the great home of the Turanians.

Some positive arguments in favor of the Turanian origin of the Parthians
may be based upon their names. The Parthians affect, in their names,
the termination -ac or -ah, as, for instance, in Arsac-es, Sinnac-es,
Parrhaces, Vesaces, Sana-trseces, Phraataces, etc.--a termination which
characterizes the primitive Babylonian, the Basque, and most of the
Turanian tongues. The termination -geses, found in such names as
Volo-geses, Abda-geses, and the like, may be compared with the -ghiz
of Tenghiz. The Turanian root annap, “God,” is perhaps traceable in
Amm-inap-es. If the Parthian “Chos-roes” represents the Persian “Kurush”
 or Cyrus, the corruption which the word has undergone is such as to
suggest a Tatar articulation.

The remains of the Parthian language, which we possess, beyond their
names, are too scanty and too little to be depended on to afford us
any real assistance in settling the question of their ethnic character.
Besides the words surena, “Commander-in-chief,” and Jcarta or Jcerta,
“city,” “fort,” there is scarcely one of which we can be assured that it
was really understood by the Parthians in the sense assigned to it. Of
these two, the latter, which is undoubtedly Arian, may have been adopted
from the Persians: the former is non-Arian, but has no known Turanian
congeners.

If, however, the consideration of the Parthian language does not help
us to determine their race, a consideration of their manners and customs
strengthens much the presumption that they were Turanians. Like the
Turkoman and Tatar tribes generally, they passed almost their whole
lives on horseback, conversing, transacting business, buying and
selling, even eating on their horses. They practised polygamy, secluded
their women from the sight of men, punished unfaithfulness with extreme
severity, delighted in hunting, and rarely ate any flesh but that which
they obtained in this way, were moderate eaters but great drinkers, did
not speak much, but yet were very unquiet, being constantly engaged in
stirring up trouble either at home or abroad. A small portion of the
nation alone was free; the remainder were the slaves of the privileged
few. Nomadic habits continued to prevail among a portion of those who
remained in their primitive seats, even in the time of their greatest
national prosperity; and a coarse, rude, and semi-barbarous character
attached always even to the most advanced part of the nation, to the
king, the court, and the nobles generally, a character which, despite a
certain varnish of civilization, was constantly showing itself in
their dealings with each other and with foreign nations. “The Parthian
monarchs,” as Gibbon justly observes, “like the Mogul (Mongol)
sovereigns of Hindostan, delighted in the pastoral life of their
Scythian ancestors, and the imperial camp was frequently pitched in the
plain of Ctesiphon, on the eastern bank of the Tigris.” Niebuhr
seems even to doubt whether the Parthians dwelt in cities at all. He
represents them as maintaining from first to last their nomadic habits,
and regards the insurrection by which their empire was brought to an
end as a rising of the inhabitants of towns--the Tadjiks of those
times--against the Ilyats or wanderers, who had oppressed them for
centuries. This is, no doubt, an over statement; but it has a foundation
in fact, since wandering habits and even tent-life were affected by the
Parthians during the most flourishing period of their empire.

On the whole, the Turanian character of the Parthians, though not
absolutely proved, appears to be in the highest degree probable. If it
be accepted, we must regard them as in race closely allied to the vast
hordes which from a remote antiquity have roamed over the steppe region
of upper Asia, from time to time bursting upon the south, and harassing
or subjugating the comparatively unwarlike inhabitants of the warmer
countries. We must view them as the congeners of the Huns, Bulgarians,
and Comans of the ancient world; of the Kalmucks, Ouigurs, Usbegs,
Eleuts, etc., of the present day. Perhaps their nearest representatives
will be, if we look to their primitive condition at the founding
of their empire, the modern Turkomans, who occupy nearly the same
districts; if we regard them in the period of their great prosperity,
the Osmanli Turks. Like the Turks, they combined great military prowess
and vigor with a capacity for organization and government not very usual
among Asiatics. Like them, they remained at heart barbarians, though
they put on an external appearance of civilization and refinement. Like
them, they never to any extent amalgamated with the conquered races,
but continued for centuries an exclusive dominant race, encamped in the
countries which they had overrun.

The circumstances under which the Parthians became subjects of the
Persian empire may readily be conjectured, but cannot be laid down
positively. According to Diodorus, who probably followed Ctesias, they
passed from the dominion of the Assyrians to that of the Medes, and from
dependence upon the Medes to a similar position under the Persians. But
the balance of evidence is against these views. It is, on the whole,
most probable that neither the Assyrian nor the Median empire extended
so far eastward as the country of the Parthians. The Parthians probably
maintained their independence from the time of their settlement in
the district called after their name until the sudden arrival in their
country of the great Persian conqueror, Cyrus. This prince, as Herodotus
tells us, subdued the whole of Western Asia, proceeding from nation
to nation, and subjugating one people after another. The order of his
conquests is not traceable; but it is clear that after his conquest
of the Lydian empire (about B.C. 554) he proceeded eastward, with the
special object of subduing Bactria.43 To reach Bactria, he would have
to pass through, or close by, Parthia. Since, as Herodotus says, “he
conquered the whole way, as he went,” we may fairly conclude that on
his road to Bactria he subjugated the Parthians. It was thus, almost
certainly, that they lost their independence and became Persian
subjects. Competent enough to maintain themselves against the
comparatively small tribes in their near neighborhood, the Chorasmians,
Hyrcanians, Arians of Herat, Bactrians, and Sagartians, it was not
possible for them to make an effectual resistance to a monarch who
brought against them the entire force of a mighty empire. Cyrus had,
it is probable, little difficulty in obtaining their submission. It is
possible that they resisted; but perhaps it is more probable that their
course on this occasion was similar to that which they pursued when the
Macedonian conqueror swept across these same regions. The Parthians at
that period submitted without striking a blow. There is no reason to
believe that they caused any greater trouble to Cyrus.

When the Persian empire was organized by Darius Hystaspis into
satrapies, Parthia was at first united in the same government with
Chorasmia, Sogdiana, and Aria. Subsequently, however, when satrapies
were made more numerous, it was detached from these extensive countries
and made to form a distinct government, with the mere addition of the
comparatively small district of Hyrcania.40 It formed, apparently, one
of the most tractable and submissive of the Persian provinces. Except on
the single occasion already noticed, when it took part in a revolt that
extended to nearly one-half the empire, it gave its rulers no trouble;
no second attempt was made to shake off the alien yoke, which may indeed
have galled, but which was felt to be inevitable. In the final struggle
of Persia against Alexander, the Parthians were faithful to their
masters. They fought on the Persian side at Arbela; and though they
submitted to Alexander somewhat tamely when he invaded their country,
yet, as Darius was then dead, and no successor had declared himself,
they cannot be taxed with desertion. Probably they felt little interest
in the event of the struggle. Habit and circumstance caused them to send
their contingent to Arbela at the call of the Great King; but when the
Persian cause was evidently lost, they felt it needless to make further
sacrifices. Having no hope of establishing their independence, they
thought it unnecessary to prolong the contest. They might not gain, but
they could scarcely lose, by a change of masters.




CHAPTER III.


_Condition of Western Asia under the earlier Seleucidce. Revolts of
Bactria and Parthia. Conflicting accounts of the establishment of the
Parthian Kingdom. First War with Syria._


The attempt of Alexander the Great to unite the whole civilized world in
a single vast empire might perhaps have been a success if the mind which
conceived the end, and which had to a considerable extent elaborated the
means, had been spared to watch over its own work, and conduct it
past the perilous period of infancy and adolescence. But the premature
decease of the great Macedonian in the thirty-third year of his age,
when his plans of fusion and amalgamation were only just beginning to
develop themselves, and the unfortunate fact that among his “Successors”
 there was not one who inherited either his grandeur of conception or
his powers of execution, caused his scheme at once to collapse; and the
effort to unite and consolidate led only to division and disintegration.
In lieu of Europe being fused with Asia, Asia itself was split up. For
nearly a thousand years, from the formation of the great Assyrian empire
to the death of Darius Codomannus, Western Asia, from the Mediterranean
to Affghanistan, or even to India, had been united tinder one head, had
acknowledged one sovereign. Assyria, Media, Persia, had successively
held the position of dominant power; and the last of the three had
given union, and consequently peace, to a wider stretch of country and
a vaster diversity of peoples than either of her predecessors. Under
the mild yoke of the Achaemenian princes had been held together for two
centuries, not only all the nations of Western Asia, from the Indian and
Thibetan deserts to the AEgean and the Mediterranean, but a great part
of Africa also, that is to say, Egypt, north-eastern Libya, and the
Greek settlements of Cyrene and Barca. The practical effect of the
conquests of Alexander was to break up this unity, to introduce in
the place of a single consolidated empire a multitude of separate and
contending kingdoms. The result was thus the direct opposite of the
great conqueror’s design, and forms a remarkable instance of the
contradiction which so often subsists between the propositions of man
and the dispositions of an overruling Providence.

The struggle for power which broke out almost immediately after his
death among the successors of Alexander may be regarded as having been
brought to a close by the battle of Ipsus. The period of fermentation
was then concluded, and something like a settled condition of things
brought about. A quadripartite division of Alexander’s dominions was
recognized, Macedonia, Egypt, Asia Minor, and Syria (or south-western
Asia) becoming thenceforth distinct political entities. Asia Minor, the
kingdom of Lysimachus, had indeed less of unity than the other three
states. It was already disintegrated, the kingdoms of Bithynia, Pontus,
and Cappadocia, subsisting side by side with that of Lysimachus, which
was thus limited to western and south-western Asia Minor. After
the death of Lysimachus, further changes occurred; but the state of
Pergamus, which sprang up this time, may be regarded as the continuation
of Lysimachus’s kingdom, and as constituting from the time of Eumenes
I. (B.C. 263) a fourth power in the various political movements and
combinations of the Graeco-Oriental world.

Of the four powers thus established, the most important, and that with
which we are here especially concerned, was the kingdom of Syria (as
it was called), or that ruled for 247 years by the Seleucidae. Seleucus
Nicator, the founder of this kingdom, was one of Alexander’s officers,
but served without much distinction through the various compaigns by
which the conquest of the East was effected. At the first distribution
of provinces (B.C. 323) among Alexander’s generals after his death, he
received no share; and it was not until B.C. 320, when upon the death of
Perdiccas a fresh distribution was made at Triparadisus, that his
merits were recognized, and he was given the satrapy of Babylon. In this
position he acquired a character for mildness and liberality, and made
himself generally beloved, both by his soldiers and by those who were
under his government. In the struggle between Antigonus and Eumenes
(B.C. 317-316), he embraced the side of the former, and did him some
good service; but this, instead of evoking gratitude, appears to have
only roused in Antigonus a spirit of jealousy. The ambitious aspirant
after universal dominion, seeing in the popular satrap a possible, and
far from a contemptible, rival, thought it politic to sweep him out of
his way; and the career of Seleucus would have been cut short had he
not perceived his peril in time, and by a precipitate flight secured his
safety. Accompanied by a body of no more than fifty horsemen, he took
the road for Egypt, escaped the pursuit of a detachment sent to overtake
him, and threw himself on the protection of Ptolemy.

This event, untoward in appearance, proved the turning-point in
Seleucus’s fortunes. It threw him into irreconcilable hostility with
Antigonus, while it brought him forward before the eyes of men as
one whom Antigonus feared. It gave him an opportunity of showing his
military talents in the West, and of obtaining favor with Ptolemy, and
with all those by whom Antigonus was dreaded. When the great struggle
came between the confederate monarchs and the aspirant after universal
dominion, it placed him on the side of the allies. Having recovered
Babylon (B.C. 312), Seleucus led the flower of the eastern provinces to
the field of Ipsus (B.C. 301), and contributed largely to the victory,
thus winning himself a position among the foremost potentates of the
day. By the terms of the agreement made after Ipsus, Seleucus was
recognized as monarch of all the Greek conquests in Asia, with the sole
exceptions of Lower Syria and Asia Minor.

The monarchy thus established extended from the Holy Land and
the Mediterranean on the west, to the Indus valley and the Bolor
mountain-chain upon the east, and from the Caspian and Jaxartes towards
the north, to the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean towards the south. It
comprised Upper Syria, Mesopotamia, parts of Cappadocia and Phrygia,
Armenia, Assyria, Media, Babylonia, Susiana, Persia, Carmania, Sagartia,
Hyrcania, Parthia, Bactria, Sogdiana, Aria, Zarangia, Arachosia,
Sacastana, Gedrosia, and probably some part of India. Its entire area
could not have been much less than 1,200,000 square miles. Of these,
some 300,000 or 400,000 may have been desert; but the remainder was
generally fertile, and comprised within its limits some of the very most
productive regions in the whole world. The Mesopotamian lowland, the
Orontes valley, the tract between the Caspian and the mountains, the
regions about Merv and Balkh, were among the richest in Asia, and
produced grain and fruits in incredible abundance. The rich pastures
of Media and Armenia furnished excellent horses. Bactria gave an
inexhaustible supply of camels. Elephants in large numbers were readily
procurable from India. Gold, silver, copper, iron, lead, tin, were
furnished by several of the provinces, and precious stones of various
kinds abounded. Moreover, for above ten centuries, the precious metals
and the most valuable kinds of merchandise had flowed from every quarter
into the region; and though the Macedonians may have carried off, or
wasted, a considerable quantity of both, yet the accumulations of ages
withstood the drain, and the hoarded wealth which had come down from
Assyrian, Babylonian, and Median times was to be found in the days of
Seleucus chiefly within the limits of his Empire.

The situation which nature pointed out as most suitable for the capital
of a kingdom having the extension that has been here indicated was
some portion of the Mesopotamian valley, which was at once central and
fertile. The empire of Seleucus might have been conveniently ruled
from the site of the ancient Nineveh, or from either of the two still
existing and still flourishing cities of Susa and Babylon. The impetus
given to commerce by the circumstances of the time rendered a site near
the sea preferable to one so remote as that of Nineveh, and the
same consideration made a position on the Tigris or Euphrates more
advantageous than one upon a smaller river. So far, all pointed to
Babylon as the natural and best metropolis; and it was further in favor
of that place that its merits had struck the Great Conqueror, who
had designed to make it the capital of his own still vaster Empire.
Accordingly Babylon was Seleucus’s first choice; and there his Court
was held for some years previously to his march against Antigonus.
But either certain disadvantages were found to attach to Babylon as
a residence, or the mere love of variety and change caused him very
shortly to repent of his selection, and to transfer his capital to
another site. He founded, and built with great rapidity, the city of
Seleucia upon the Tigris, at the distance of about forty miles from
Babylon, and had transferred thither the seat of government even before
B.C. 301. Thus far, however, no fault had been committed. The second
capital was at least as conveniently placed as the first, and would have
served equally well as a centre from which to govern the Empire. But
after Ipsus a further change was made--a change that was injudicious in
the extreme. Either setting undue store by his newly-acquired western
provinces, or over-anxious to keep close watch on his powerful neighbors
in those parts, Lysimachus and Ptolemy, Seleucus once more transferred
the seat of empire, exchanging this time the valley of the Tigris for
that of the Orontes, and the central position of Lower Mesopotamia for
almost the extreme western point of his vast territories. Antioch arose
in extraordinary beauty and magnificence during the first few years
that succeeded Ipsus, and Seleucus in a short time made it his ordinary
residence. The change weakened the ties which bound the Empire together,
offended the bulk of the Asiatics, who saw their monarch withdraw from
them into a remote region, and particularly loosened the grasp of the
government on those more eastern districts which were at once furthest
from the new metropolis and least assimilated to the Hellenic character.
Among the causes which led to the disintegration of the Seleucid
kingdom, there is none that deserves so well to be considered the
main cause as this. It was calculated at once to produce the desire to
revolt, and to render the reduction of revolted provinces difficult,
if not impossible. The evil day, however, might have been indefinitely
delayed had the Seleucid princes either established and maintained
through their Empire a vigorous and effective administration, or
abstained from entangling themselves in wars with their neighbors in the
West, the Ptolemies and the princes of Asia Minor.

But the organization of the Empire was unsatisfactory. Instead of
pursuing the system inaugurated by Alexander and seeking to weld
the heterogeneous elements of which his kingdom was composed into a
homogeneous whole, instead of at once conciliating and elevating
the Asiatics by uniting them with the Macedonians and the Greeks, by
promoting intermarriage and social intercourse between the two classes
of his subjects, educating the Asiatics in Greek ideas and Greek
schools, opening his court to them, promoting them to high employments,
making them feel that they were as much valued and as well cared for as
the people of the conquering race, the first Seleucus, and after him
his successors, fell back upon the old simpler, ruder system, the system
pursued before Alexander’s time by the Persians, and before them perhaps
by the Medes--the system most congenial to human laziness and human
pride--that of governing a nation of slaves by means of a class
of victorious aliens. Seleucus divided his empire into satrapies,
seventy-two in number. He bestowed the office of satrap on none but
Macedonians and Greeks. The standing army, by which he maintained his
authority, was indeed composed in the main of Asiatics, disciplined
after the Greek model; but it was officered entirely by men of Greek or
Macedonian parentage. Nothing was done to keep up the self-respect of
Asiatics, or to soften the unpleasantness that must always attach to
being governed by foreigners. Even the superintendence over the satraps
seems to have been insufficient. According to some writers, it was a
gross outrage offered by a satrap to an Asiatic subject that stirred
up the Parthians to their revolt. The story may not be true; but its
currency shows of what conduct towards those under their government the
satraps of the Seleucidae were thought, by such as lived near the time,
to have been capable.

It would, perhaps, have been difficult for the Seleucid princes, even
had they desired it, to pursue a policy of absolute abstention in
the wars of their western neighbors. So long as they were resolute to
maintain their footing on the right bank of the Euphrates, in Phrygia,
Cappadocia, and upper Syria, they were of necessity mixed up with the
quarrels of the west. Could they have been content to withdraw within
the Euphrates, they might have remained for the most part clear of such
entanglements; but even then there would have been occasions when they
must have taken the field in self-defence. As it was, however, the idea
of abstention seems never to have occurred to them. It was the fond
dream of each “Successor” of Alexander that in his person might,
perhaps, be one day united all the territories of the great Conqueror.
Seleucus would have felt that he sacrificed his most cherished hopes
if he had allowed the west to go its own way, and had contented himself
with consolidating a great power in the regions east of the Euphrates.

And the policy of the founder of the house was followed by his
successors. The three Seleucid sovereigns who reigned prior to
the Parthian revolt were, one and all, engaged in frequent, if not
continual, wars with the monarchs of Egypt and Asia Minor. The first
Seleucus, by his claim to the sovereignty of Lower Syria, established a
ground of constant contention with the Ptolemies; and though he did not
prosecute the claim to the extent of actual hostility, yet in the reign
of his son, Antiochus I., called Soter, the smothered quarrel broke out.
Soter fomented the discontent of Cyrene with its subjection to Egypt,
and made at least one expedition against Ptolemy Philadelphus in person
(B.C. 264). His efforts did not meet with much success; but they were
renewed by his son, Antiochus II., surnamed “the God”, who warred with
Philadelphus from B.C. 260 to B.C. 250, contending with him chiefly in
Asia Minor. These wars were complicated with others. The first Antiochus
aimed at adding the kingdom of Bithynia to his dominions, and attacked
successively the Bythynian monarchs, Zipcetas and Nicomedes I. (B.C.
280-278). This aggression brought him into collision with the Gauls,
whom Nicomedes called to his aid, and with whom Antiochus had several
struggles, some successful and some disastrous. He also attacked Eumenes
of Pergamus (B.C. 263), but was defeated in a pitched battle near
Sardis. The second Antiochus was not engaged in so great a multiplicity
of contests; but we hear of his taking a part in the internal affairs of
Miletus, and expelling a certain Timachus, who had made himself tyrant
of that city. There is also some ground for thinking that he had a
standing quarrel with the king of Media Atropatene. Altogether it
is evident that from B.C. 280 to B.C. 250 the Seleucid princes were
incessantly occupied with wars in the west, in Asia Minor and in Syria
Proper, wars which so constantly engaged them that they had neither time
nor attention to spare for the affairs of the far east. So long as the
Bactrian and Parthian satraps paid their tributes, and supplied the
requisite quotas of troops for service in the western wars, the Antiochi
were content. The satraps were left to manage affairs at their own
discretion; and it is not surprising that the absence of a controlling
hand led to various complications and disorders.

Moreover, the personal character of the second Antiochus must be taken
into account. The vanity and impiety, which could accept the name of
“Theus” for a service that fifty other Greeks had rendered to oppressed
towns without regarding themselves as having done anything very
remarkable, would alone indicate a weak and contemptible morale, and
might justify us, did we know no more, in regarding the calamities of
his reign as the fruit of his own unfitness to rule an empire. But
there is sufficient evidence that he had other, and worse, vices. He
was noted, even among Asiatic sovereigns, for luxury and debauchery; he
neglected all state affairs in the pursuit of pleasure; his wives and
male favorites were allowed to rule his kingdom at their will; and
their most flagrant crimes were neither restrained nor punished. Such a
character could have inspired neither respect nor fear. The satraps, to
whom the conduct of their sovereign could not but become known, would
be partly encouraged to follow the bad example, partly provoked by it to
shake themselves free of so hateful and yet contemptible a master.

It was, probably, about the year B.C. 256, the fifth of the second
Antiochus, when that prince, hard pressed by Philadelphus in the west,
was also, perhaps, engaged in a war with the king of Atropatene in the
north, that the standard of revolt was first actually raised in the
eastern provinces, and a Syrian satrap ventured to declare himself an
independent sovereign. This was Diodotus, satrap of Bactria a Greek, as
his name shows. Suddenly assuming the state and style of king he
issued coins stamped with his own name, and established himself without
difficulty as sovereign over the large and flourishing province of
Bactria, or the tract of fertile land about the upper and middle
Oxus. This district had from a remote antiquity been one with special
pretensions. The country was fertile, and much of it strong; the people
were hardy and valiant; they were generally treated with exceptional
favor by the Persian monarchs; and they seem to have had traditions
which assigned them a pre-eminence among the Arian tribes at some
indefinitely distant period. We may presume that they would gladly
support the bold enterprise of their new monarch; they would feel their
vanity flattered by the establishment of an independent Bactria, even
though it were under Greek kings; and they would energetically second
him in an enterprise which gratified their pride, while it held out to
them hopes of a career of conquest, with its concomitants of plunder and
glory. The settled quiet which they had enjoyed under the Achaemenide
and the Seleucidae was probably not much to their taste; and they
would gladly exchange so tame and dull a life for the pleasures of
independence and the chances of empire.

It would seem that Antiochus, sunk in luxury at his capital, could not
bring himself to make even an effort to check the spirit of rebellion,
and recover his revolted subjects. Bactria was allowed to establish
itself as an independent monarchy, without having to undergo the ordeal
of a bloody struggle. Antiochus neither marched against Diodotus
in person, nor sent a general to contend with him. The authority of
Diodotus was confirmed and riveted on his subjects by an undisturbed
reign of eighteen years before a Syrian army even showed itself in his
neighborhood.

The precedent of successful revolt thus set could not well be barren
of consequences. If one province might throw off the yoke of its feudal
lord with impunity, why might not others? Accordingly, within a few
years the example set by Bactria was followed in the neighboring country
of Parthia, but with certain very important differences. In Bactria the
Greek satrap took the lead, and the Bactrian kingdom was, at any rate at
its commencement, as thoroughly Greek as that of the Seleucidae. But in
Parthia Greek rule was from the first cast aside. The natives rebelled
against their masters. An Asiatic race of a rude and uncivilized type,
coarse and savage, but brave and freedom-loving, rose up against the
polished but effeminate Greeks who held them in subjection, and claimed
and established their independence. The Parthian kingdom was thoroughly
anti-Hellenic. It appealed to patriotic feelings, and to the hate
universally felt towards the stranger. It set itself to undo the work
of Alexander, to cast out the Europeans, to recover to the Asiatics the
possession of Asia. It was naturally almost as hostile to Bactria as to
Syria, although danger from a common enemy might cause it sometimes
to make a temporary alliance with that kingdom. It had, no doubt, the
general sympathy of the populations in the adjacent countries, and
represented to them the cause of freedom and autonomy.

The exact circumstances under which the Parthian revolt took place are
involved in much obscurity. According to one account the leader of the
revolt, Arsaces, was a Bactrian, to whom the success of Diodotus was
disagreeable, and who therefore quitted the newly-founded kingdom, and
betook himself to Parthia, where he induced the natives to revolt and to
accept him for their monarch. Another account, which is attractive from
the minute details into which it enters, is the following:--“Arsaces and
Tiridates were brothers, descendants of Phriapites, the son of Arsaces.
Pherecles, who had been made satrap of their country by Antiochus Theus,
offered a gross insult to one of them, whereupon, as they could not
brook the indignity, they took five men into counsel, and with their aid
slew the insolent one. They then induced their nation to revolt from
the Macedonians, and set up a government of their own, which attained to
great power.” A third version says that the Arsaces, whom all represent
as the first king, was in reality a Scythian, who at the head of a body
of Parnian Dahce, nomads inhabiting the valley of the Attrek (Ochus),
invaded Parthia, soon after the establishment of Bactrian independence,
and succeeded in making himself master of it. With this account, which
Strabo seems to prefer, agrees tolerably well that of Justin, who
says that “Arsaces, having been long accustomed to live by robbery
and rapine, attacked the Parthians with a predatory band, killed their
satrap, Andragoras, and seized the supreme authority.” As there was
in all probability a close ethnic connection between the Dahae and the
Parthians, it would be likely enough that the latter might accept for
a king a chieftain of the former who had boldly entered their country,
challenged the Greek satrap to an encounter, and by defeating and
killing him freed them--at any rate for the time--from the Greek yoke.
An oppressed people gladly adopts as chief the head of an allied tribe
if he has shown skill and daring, and offers to protect them from their
oppressors.

The revolt of Arsaces has been placed by some as early as the year B.C.
256. The Bactrian revolt is assigned by most historians to that
year; and the Parthian, according to some, was contemporary. The
best authorities, however, give a short interval between the two
insurrections; and, on the whole, there is perhaps reason to regard the
Parthian independence as dating from about B.C. 250. This year was the
eleventh of Antiochus Theus, and fell into the time when he was still
engaged in his war with Ptolemy Philadelphus. It might have been
expected that when he concluded a peace with the Egyptian monarch in
B.C. 249, he would have turned his arms at once towards the east, and
have attempted at any rate the recovery of his lost dominions. But, as
already stated, his personal character was weak, and he preferred the
pleasures of repose at Antioch to the hardships of a campaign in the
Caspian region. So far as we hear, he took no steps to re-establish
his authority; and Arsaces, like Diodotus, was left undisturbed to
consolidate his power at his leisure.

Arsaces lived, however, but a short time after obtaining the crown. His
authority was disputed within the limits of Parthia itself; and he had
to engage in hostilities with a portion of his own subjects. We may
suspect that the malcontents were chiefly, if not solely, those of Greek
race, who may have been tolerably numerous, and whose strength would
lie in the towns. Hecatompylos, the chief city of Parthia, was among the
colonies founded by Alexander; and its inhabitants would naturally be
disinclined to acquiesce in the rule of a “barbarian.” Within little
more than two years of his coronation, Arsaces, who had never been able
to give his kingdom peace, was killed in battle by a spear-thrust in the
side; and was succeeded (B.C. 247) by his brother, having left, it is
probable, no sons, or none of mature age.

Tiridates, the successor of Arsaces, took upon his accession his
brother’s name, and is known in history as Arsaces II. The practice
thus begun passed into a custom, each Parthian monarch from henceforth
bearing as king the name of Arsaces in addition to his own real
appellation, whatever that might be. In the native remains the assumed
name almost supersedes the other; but, fortunately, the Greek and Roman
writers who treat of Parthian affairs, have preserved the distinctive
appellations, and thus saved the Parthian history from inextricable
confusion. It is not easy to see from what quarter this practice was
adopted; perhaps we should regard it as one previously existing among
the Dahan Scyths.

If the Parthian monarchy owed its origin to Arsaces I., it owed its
consolidation, and settled establishment to Arsaces II., or Tiridates.
This prince, who had the good fortune to reign for above thirty years,
and who is confused by many writers with the actual founder of the
monarchy, having received Parthia from his brother, in the weak and
unsettled condition above described, left it a united and powerful
kingdom, enlarged in its boundaries, strengthened in its defences, in
alliance with its nearest and most formidable neighbor, and triumphant
over the great power of Syria, which had hoped to bring it once more
into subjection. He ascended the throne, it is probable, early in B.C.
247, and had scarcely been monarch a couple of years when he witnessed
one of those vast but transient revolutions to which Asia is subject,
but which are of rare occurrence in Europe. Ptolemy Euergetes, the son
of Philadelphus, having succeeded to his father’s kingdom in the same
year with Tiridates, marched (in B.C. 245) a huge expedition into Asia,
defeated Seleucus II. (Callinicus) in Syria, took Antioch, and then,
having crossed the Euphrates, proceeded to bring the greater part of
Western Asia under his sway. Mesopotamia, Assyria, Babylonia, Susiana,
Persia, Media, submitted to him. He went in person as far as Babylon,
and, according to his own account, was acknowledged as master by all
the Eastern provinces to the very borders of Bactria. The Parthian
and Bactrian kingdoms cannot but have trembled for their newly won
independence. Here was a young warrior who, in a single campaign, had
marched the distance of a thousand miles, from the banks of the Nile to
those of the Lower Euphrates, without so much as receiving a check, and
who was threatening to repeat the career of Alexander. What resistance
could the little Parthian state hope to offer to such an enemy? It
must have rejoiced Tiridates to hear that while the new conqueror was
gathering somewhat too hastily the fruits of victory, collecting and
despatching to Egypt the most valuable works of art that he could find
in the cities which he had taken, and levying heavy contributions on the
submitted countries, a revolt had broken out in his own land, to quell
which he was compelled to retire suddenly and to relinquish the greater
part of his acquisitions. Thus the threatened conquest proved a mere
inroad, and instead of a power of greater strength replacing Syria in
these regions, Syria practically retained her hold of them, but with
enfeebled grasp, her strength crippled, her prestige lost, and her honor
tarnished. Ptolemy had, it is probable, not retired very long, when,
encouraged by what he had seen of Syria’s weakness, Tiridates took the
aggressive, and invading the neighboring district of Hyrcania, succeeded
in detaching it from the Syrian state, and adding it to his own
territory. This was throwing out a challenge which the Syrian monarch,
Callinicus, could scarcely decline to meet, unless he was prepared to
lose, one by one, all the outlying provinces of his empire.

Accordingly in B.C. 237, having patched up a peace with his brother,
Antiochus Hierax, the Syrian monarch made an expedition against Parthia.
Not feeling, however, altogether confident of success if he trusted
wholly to his own unaided efforts, he prudently entered into an alliance
with Diodotus the Bactrian king, and the two agreed to combine their
forces against Tiridates. Hereupon that monarch, impressed with a
deep sense of the impending danger, quitted Parthia, and, proceeding
northwards, took refuge with the Aspasiacae, a Scythian tribe which
dwelt between the Oxus and the Jaxartes. The Aspasiacae probably lent
him troops; at any rate, he did not remain long in retirement, but,
hearing that the Bactrian king, whom he especially feared, was dead, he
contrived to detach his son and successor from the Syrian alliance, and
to draw him over to his own side. Having made this important stroke, he
met Callinicus in battle, and completely defeated his army.

This victory was with reason regarded by the Parthians as a sort of
second beginning of their independence. Hitherto their kingdom had
existed precariously, and as it were by sufferance. It could not but
be that the power from which they had revolted would one day seek to
reclaim its lost territory; and, until the new monarchy had measured
its strength against that of its former mistress, none could feel secure
that it would be able to maintain its existence. The victory gained by
Tiridates over Callinicus put an end to these doubts. It proved to the
world at large, and also to the Parthians themselves, that they had
nothing to fear--that they were strong enough to preserve their freedom.
Considering the enormous disproportion between the military strength
and resources of the narrow Parthian State and the vast Syrian
Empire--considering that the one comprised about fifty thousand and the
other above a million of square miles; that the one had inherited the
wealth of ages and the other was probably as poor as any province in
Asia; that the one possessed the Macedonian arms, training, and tactics,
while the other knew only the rude warfare of the Steppes--the result
of the struggle cannot but be regarded as surprising. Still it was
not without precedent, and it has not been without repetition. It adds
another to the many instances where a small but brave people, bent on
resisting foreign domination, have, when standing on their defence, in
their own territory, proved more than a match for the utmost force that
a foe of overwhelming strength could bring against them. It reminds us
of Marathon, of Bannock-burn, of Morgarten. We may not sympathize wholly
with the victors, for Greek civilization, even of the type introduced by
Alexander into Asia, was ill replaced by Tatar coarseness and barbarism;
but we cannot refuse our admiration to the spectacle of a handful of
gallant men determinedly resisting in the fastness of their native land
a host of aliens, and triumphing over their would-be oppressors.

The Parthians themselves, deeply impressed with the importance of
the contest, preserved the memory of it by a solemn festival on the
anniversary of their victory, which they still celebrated in the time of
Trogus.




CHAPTER IV.


_Consolidation of the Parthian Kingdom. Death of Tiridates and accession
of Arsaces III. Attack on Media. War of Artabanus (Arsaces III.) with
Antiochus the Great. Period of inaction. Great development of Bactrian
power. Reigns of Priapatius (Arsaces IV.) and Phraates I. (Arsaces V.)_


Selbucus might perhaps not have accepted his defeat as final had he been
altogether free to choose whether he would continue the Parthian war
or no. The resources of his Empire were so vast, his command of men
and money so unbounded, that he could easily have replaced one army by
another, and so have prolonged the struggle. But renewed troubles had
broken out in the western portion of his dominions, where his brother,
Antiochus Hierax, was still in arms against his authority. Seleucus
felt it necessary to turn his attention to this quarter, and having
once retired from the Parthian contest, he never afterwards renewed it.
Tiridates was left unmolested, to act as he thought fit, and either to
attempt further conquests, or to devote himself to securing those which
he had effected. He chose the latter course, and during the remainder of
his reign--a space of above twenty years--he employed himself wholly in
strengthening and adorning his small kingdom. Having built a number
of forts in various strong positions, and placed garrisons in them, he
carefully selected a site for a new city, which he probably intended to
make his capital. The spot chosen combined the advantages of being
at once delightful and easily defensible. It was surrounded with
precipitous rocks, which enclosed a plain of extraordinary fertility.
Abundant wood and copious streams of water were in the neighborhood. The
soil was so rich that it scarcely required cultivation, and the woods
were so full of game as to afford endless amusement to hunters. To the
town which he built in this locality Tiridates gave the name of Dara, a
word which the Greeks and Romans elongated into Dareium. Unfortunately,
modern travellers have not yet succeeded in identifying the site,
which should, however, lie towards the East, perhaps in the vicinity of
Meshed.

We may presume that Tiridates, when he built this remarkable city,
intended to make it the seat of government. Hecatompylos, as a Greek
town, had the same disadvantages, which were considered in later times
to render Seleucia unfit for the residence of the Parthian Court and
monarch. Dara, like Ctesiphon, was to be wholly Parthian. Its strong
situation would render it easy of defence; its vicinity to forests
abounding in game would give it special charms in the eyes of persons
so much devoted, as the Parthian princes were, to the chase. But the
intention of Tiridates, if we have truly defined it, failed of taking
permanent effect. He may himself have fixed his abode at Dara, but his
successors did not inherit his predilections; and Hecatompylos remained,
after his reign, as before it, the head-quarters of the government, and
the recognized metropolis of Parthia Proper.

After passing in peace and prosperity the last twenty years of his
reign, Tiridates died in a good old age, leaving his crown to a son,
whose special name is a little uncertain, but who is called by most
moderns Artabanus I.

Artabanus, having ascended the Parthian throne about B.C. 214, and being
anxious to distinguish himself, took advantage of the war raging between
Antiochus III., the second son of Seleucus Callinicus, and Achseus, one
of his rebel satraps, to advance into Media, and to add to his dominions
the entire tract between Hyrcania and the Zagros mountains. Of the
manner in which he effected his conquests we have no account; but they
seem to have been the fruit of a single campaign, which must have
been conducted with great vigor and military skill. The Parthian prince
appears to have occupied Ecbatana, the ancient capital of the Median
Empire, and to have thence threatened the Mesopotamian countries. Upon
receiving intelligence of his invasion, Antiochus levied a vast army,
and set out towards the East, with a determination to subjugate all
the revolted provinces, and to recover the limits of the old Empire
of Nicator. Passing the Zagros chain, probably by way of Behistun and
Kermanshaw, he easily retook Ecbatana, which was an open town, and
undefended by the Parthians, and proceeded to prepare for a further
advance eastward. The route from Ecbatana to the Caspian Gates crosses,
of necessity, unless a considerable circuit be taken, some large tracts
of barren ground, inlets or bays of the Great Salt Desert of Iran.
Artabanus cherished the hope that here the difficulties of the way would
effectually bar his enemy’s progress, more especially as his troops were
so numerous, and as water was scanty throughout the whole region. The
streams which flow from Zagros towards the East are few and scanty; they
mostly fail in summer, which, even in Asia, is the campaigning season;
and those who cross the desert at this time must depend on the wells
wherewith the more western part of the region is supplied by means of
_kanats_ or underground conduits, which are sometimes carried many miles
from the foot of the mountains. The position of the wells, which were
few in number, was known only to the natives; and Artabanus hoped that
the Syrian monarch would be afraid to place the lives of his soldiers in
such doubtful keeping. When, however, he found that Antiochus was not
to be deterred by any fears of this kind, but was bent on crossing the
desert, he had recourse to the barbaric expedients of filling in, or
poisoning, the wells along the line of route-which the Syrian prince
was likely to follow. But these steps seem to have been taken too late.
Antiochus, advancing suddenly, caught some of the Parthian troops at
their barbarous work, and dispersed them without difficulty. He then
rapidly effected the transit, and, pressing forward, was soon in the
enemy’s country, where he occupied the chief city, Hecatompylos. Up
to this point the Parthian monarch had declined an engagement. No
information has come down to us as to his motives; but they may
be readily enough conjectured. To draw an enemy far away from his
resources, while retiring upon one’s own; to entangle a numerous host
among narrow passes and denies; to decline battle when he offers it,
and then to set upon him unawares, has always been the practice of weak
mountain races when attacked by a more numerous foe. It is often good
policy in such a case even to yield the capital without a blow, and
to retreat into a more difficult situation. The assailant must follow
whithersoever his foe retires, or quit the country, leaving him
unsubdued. Antiochus, aware of this necessity, and rendered confident of
success by the evacuation of a situation so strong, and so suitable for
the Parthian tactics as Hecatompylos, after giving his army a short
rest at the captured capital, set out in pursuit of Artabanus, who
had withdrawn his forces towards Hyrcania. To reach the rich Hyrcanian
valleys, he was forced to cross the main chain of the Elburz, which here
attains an elevation of 7000 or 8000 feet. The route which his army had
to follow was the channel of a winter-torrent, obstructed with stones
and trunks of trees, partly by nature, partly by the efforts of the
inhabitants. The long and difficult ascent was disputed by the enemy the
whole way, and something like a pitched battle was fought at the top;
but Antiochus persevered, and, though his army must have suffered
severely, descended into Hyrcanian and captured several of the towns.
Here our main authority, Polybius, suddenly deserts us, and we can give
no further account of the war beyond its general result--Artabanus and
the Parthians remained unsubdued after a struggle which seems to have
lasted some years; Artabanus himself displayed great valor; and at
length the Syrian monarch thought it best to conclude a peace with him,
in which he acknowledged the Parthian independence. It is probable that
he exacted in return a pledge that the Parthian monarch should lend him
his assistance in the expedition which he was bent on conducting against
Bactria; but there is no actual proof that the conditions of peace
contained this clause. We are left in doubt whether Artabanus stood
aloof in the war which Antiochus waged with Euthydemus of Bactria
immediately after the close of his Parthian campaigns, or whether he
lent his aid to the attempt made to crush his neighbor. Perhaps, on the
whole, it is most probable that, nominally, he was Antiochus’s ally in
the war, but that, practically, he gave him little help, having no wish
to see Syria aggrandized.

At any rate, whether Euthydemus had to meet the attack of Syria only, or
of Syria and Parthia in combination, the result was, that Bactria,
like Parthia, proved strong enough to maintain her ground, and that the
Syrian King, after a while, grew tired of the struggle, and consented to
terms of accommodation. The Bactrian monarchy, like the Parthian, came
out of the contest unscathed--indeed we may go further, and say that the
position of the two kingdoms was improved by the attacks made upon them.
If a prince possessing the personal qualities that distinguished the
third Antiochus, and justified the title of “Great” which he derived
from his oriental expedition--if such a prince, enjoying profound peace
at home, and directing the whole force of his empire against them, could
not succeed in reducing to subjection the revolted provinces of the
northeast, but, whatever military advantages he might gain, found
conquest impossible, and returned home, having acknowledged as
independent kings those whom he went out to chastise as rebellious
satraps, it was evident that the kingdoms might look upon themselves
as firmly established, or, at least, as secure from the danger of
re-absorption into the Syrian State. The repulse of Callinicus was a
probable indication of the fate of all future efforts on the part of
Syria to reduce Parthia; the conditions of peace granted by Antiochus to
both countries, after a series of military successes, constituted almost
a proof that the yoke of Syria would never be re-imposed on either the
Parthian or the Bactrian nation.

With the departure of Antiochus from the East, about B.C. 206, we enter
upon a period when Parthian history is, for a quarter of a century,
almost a blank. Nothing more is known of Arsaces III. after Antiochus
retired; and nothing at all is known of his successor, Priapatius,
beyond his name and the length of his reign, which lasted for fifteen
years (from about B.C. 196 to 181). The reigns of these princes coincide
with those of Euthydemus and his son, Demetrius, in Bactria; and perhaps
the most probable solution of the problem of Parthian inactivity at this
time is to be found in the great development of Bactrian power which
now took place, and the influence which the two neighboring kingdoms
naturally exercised upon each other. When Parthia was strong and
aggressive, Bactria was, for the most part, quiet; and when Bactria
shows signs of vigorous and active life, Parthia languishes and retires
into the shade.

The Bactrian Kingdom, founded (as we have seen) a little before the
Parthian, sought from the first its aggrandizement in the East rather
than in the West. The Empire of Alexander had included all the countries
between the Caspian Sea and the Sutlej; and these tracts, which
constitute the modern Khorasan, Afghanistan, and Punjaub, had all been
to a certain extent Hellenized by means of Greek settlements and Greek
government. But Alexander was no sooner dead than a tendency displayed
itself in these regions, and particularly in the more eastern ones,
towards a relapse into barbarism, or, if this expression be too strong,
at any rate towards a rejection of Hellenism. During the early wars
of the “Successors” the natives of the Punjaub generally seized the
opportunity to revolt; the governors placed over the various districts
by Alexander were murdered; and the tribes everywhere declared
themselves free. Among the leaders of the revolt was a certain
Chandragupta (or Sandracottus), who contrived to turn the circumstances
of the time to his own special advantage, and built up a considerable
kingdom in the far East out of the fragments which had detached
themselves from what was still called the Macedonian Empire. When
Seleucus Nicator, about B.C. 305, conducted an expedition across the
Indus, he found this monarch established in the tract between the Indus
and the Ganges, ruling over extensive dominions and at the head of
a vast force. It is uncertain whether the two rivals engaged in
hostilities or no. At any rate, a peace was soon made; and Seleucus, in
return for five hundred elephants, ceded to Sandracottus certain lands
on the west bank of the Indus, which had hitherto been regarded as
Macedonian. These probably consisted of the low grounds between the
Indus and the foot of the mountains--the districts of Peshawur, Bunnoo,
Murwut, Shikarpoor, and Kurrachee--which are now in British occupation.
Thus Hellenism in these parts receded more and more, the Sanskritic
Indians recovering by degrees the power and independence of which they
had been deprived by Alexander.

This state of things could not have been pleasing to the Greek princes
of Bactria, who must have felt that the reaction towards barbarism in
these parts tended to isolate them, and that there was a danger of their
being crushed between the Parthians on the one hand and the perpetually
advancing Indians on the other. When Antiochus the Great, after
concluding his treaty with Euthydemus, marched eastward, the Bactrian
monarch probably indulged in hopes that the Indians would receive a
check, and that the Greek frontier would be again carried to the Indus,
if not to the Sutlej. But, if so, he was disappointed. Antiochus,
instead of making war upon the Indians, contented himself with renewing
the old alliance of the Seleucidae with the Maurja princes, and
obtaining a number of elephants from Sophagesenus, the grandson of
Sandracottus. It is even possible that he went further, and made
cessions of territory in return for this last gift, which brought the
Indian frontier still nearer than before to that of Bactria, At any
rate, the result of the Indian expedition of Antiochus seems to have
been unsatisfactory to Euthydemus, who shortly afterwards commenced what
are called “Indian Wars” on his south-eastern frontier, employing in
them chiefly the arms of his son, Demetrius. During the latter years
of Euthydemus and the earlier ones of Demetrius, the Bactrian rule was
rapidly extended over the greater portion of the modern Afghanistan; nor
did it even stop there. The arms of Demetrius were carried across the
Indus into the Punjaub region; and the city of Euthymedeia upon the
Hydaspes remained to later times an evidence of the extent of his
conquests. From B.C. 206 to about B.C. 185 was the most flourishing
period of the Bactrian monarchy, which expanded during that space from a
small kingdom into a considerable empire.

The power and successes of the Bactrian princes at this time account
sufficiently for the fact that the contemporary Parthian monarchs stood
upon their guard, and undertook no great expeditions. Arsaces III., who
continued on the throne for about ten or twelve years after his peace
with Antiochus, and Priapatius, or Arsaces IV., his son, who succeeded
him, and had a reign of fifteen years, were content, as already
observed, to watch over their own State, husbanding its resources, and
living at peace with all their neighbors. It was not till Phraates I.
(Arsaces V.), the son of Priapatius, had mounted the throne, B.C. 181,
that this policy was departed from, and Parthia, which had remained
tranquil for a quarter of a century, once more aroused herself, and
assumed an attitude of aggression.

The quarter to which Phraates I. directed his arms was the country of
the Mardians, a poor but warlike people, who appear to have occupied
a portion of the Elburz range, probably that immediately south of
Mazanderan and Asterabad. The reduction of these fierce mountaineers
is likely to have occupied him for some years, since their country was
exceedingly strong and difficult. Though the Mardi were (nominally, at
any rate) subjects of the Seleucidae, we do not hear of any assistance
being rendered them, or, indeed, of any remonstrance being made against
the unprovoked aggression of the Parthian monarch. The reign of Phraates
I. in Parthia coincides with that of Seleucus IV. (Philopator) in Syria;
and we may account for the inactivity of this prince, in part by
his personal character, which was weak and pacific, in part by the
exhaustion of Syria at the time, in consequence of his father’s great
war with Rome (B.C. 197-190), and of the heavy contribution which
was imposed upon him at the close of it. Syria may scarcely have yet
recovered sufficient strength to enter upon a new struggle, especially
one with a distant and powerful enemy. The material interests of the
Empire may also have seemed to be but little touched by the war, since
the Mardi were too poor to furnish much tribute; and it is possible, if
not even probable, that their subjection to Syria had long been rather
formal than real. Seleucus therefore allowed the Mardians to be reduced,
conceiving, probably, that their transfer to the dominion of the
Arsacidse neither increased the Parthian power nor diminished his own.

But the nation which submits to be robbed of a province, however
unproductive and valueless, must look to having the process repeated
at intervals, until it bestirs itself and offers resistance. There is
reason to believe that Phraates had no sooner conquered the Mardians
than he cast his eyes on an adjacent district, and resolved to add it to
his territories. This was the tract lying immediately to the West of the
Caspian Gates, which was always reckoned to Media, forming, however,
a distinct district, know as Media Rhagiana. It was a region of much
natural fertility, being watered by numerous streams from the Elburz
range, and possessing a soil of remarkable productiveness. Its breadth
was not great, since it consisted of a mere strip between the mountains
and the Salt Desert which occupies the whole centre of the Iranic
tableland; but it extended in length at least a hundred and fifty miles,
from the Caspian Gates to the vicinity of Kasvin. Its capital city, from
a remote antiquity, was Rbages, situated near the eastern extremity
of the strip, probably at the spot now called Kaleh Erij, about
twenty-three miles from the “Gates.” On this region it is clear that
Phraates cast a covetous eye. How much of it he actually occupied is
doubtful; but it is at least certain that he effected a lodgment in its
eastern extremity, which must have put the whole region in jeopardy.
Nature has set a remarkable barrier between the more eastern and the
more western portions of Occidental Asia, about midway in the tract
which lies due south of the Caspian Sea. The Elburz range in this part
is one of so tremendous a character, and northward abuts so closely
on the Caspian, that all communication between the east and the west
necessarily passes to the south of it. In this quarter the Great Desert
offering an insuperable obstacle to transit, the line of communication
has to cling to the flanks of the mountain chain, the narrow strip
between the mountains and the desert--rarely ten miles in width--being
alone traversable. But about long. 52° 20’ this strip itself fails. A
rocky spur runs due south from the Elburz into the desert for a distance
of some twenty or thirty miles, breaking the line of communication, and
seeming at first sight to obstruct it completely. This, however, is not
the case absolutely. The spur itself is penetrable by two passes, one
where it joins the Elburz, which is the more difficult of the two, and
another, further to the south, which is easier. The latter now known
as the Girduni Sudurrah pass, constitutes the famous “Pylae Caspiae.”
 Through this pass alone can armies proceed from Armenia, Media, and
Persia eastward, or from Turkestan, Khorasan, and Afghanistan into the
more western parts of Asia. The position is therefore one of primary
importance. It was to guard it that Rhages was built so near the eastern
end of its territory. So long as it remained in the possession of Syria,
Parthian aggression was checked. Rhagiana, the rest of Media, and the
other provinces were safe, or nearly so. On the other hand, the loss of
it to Parthia laid the eastern provinces open to her, and was at once
almost equivalent to the loss of all Rhagiana, which had no other
natural protection. Now we find that Phraates surmounted the “Gates,”
 and effected a lodgment in the plain country beyond them. He removed a
portion of the conquered Mardians from their mountain homes to the city
of Charax, which was on the western side of the Gates, probably on the
site now occupied by the ruins known as Uewanikif. Their location in
this strong post was a menace to the neighboring town of Rhages, which
can scarcely have maintained itself long against an enemy encamped at
its doors. We are not informed, however, of any results which followed
on the occupation of Charax during the lifetime of Phraates. His reign
lasted only seven years--from B.C. 181 to B.C. 174--and it is thus
probable that he died before there was time for his second important
conquest to have any further consequences.

Phraates had sufficient warning of his coming decease to make
preparations with respect to a successor. Though he had several sons,
some of whom were (we must suppose) of sufficient age to have ascended
the throne, he left his crown to his brother, Mithridates. He felt,
probably, that the State required the direction of a firm hand, that war
might at any time break out with either Syria or Bactria; while, if
the career of conquest on which he had made Parthia enter were to be
pursued, he could trust his brother better than any of his sons to
conduct aggressive expeditions with combined vigor and prudence. We
shall see, as the history proceeds, how Mithridates justified his
choice. Phraates would also appear to have borne his brother especial
affection, since he takes the name of “Philadelphus” (brother-loving)
upon his coins. It must have been a satisfaction to him that he was able
by his last act at once to consult for the good of his country, and to
gratify a sentiment on which it is evident that he prided himself.




CHAPTER V.


_Reign of Mithridates I. Position of Bactria and Syria at his accession.
His first war with Bactria. His great Expedition against the Eastern
Syrian provinces, and its results. His second war with Bactria,
terminating in its conquest. Extent of his Empire. Attempt of Demetrius
Nicator to recover the lost Provinces fails. Captivity of Demetrius.
Death of Mithridates._


The reign of Mithridates I. is the most important in the Parthian
history. [PLATE 1. Fig. 3.] Receiving from his brother Phraates a
kingdom of but narrow dimensions, confined (as it would seem) between
the city of Charax on the one side, and the river Arius, or Hori-rud,
on the other, he transformed it, within the space of thirty-seven years
(which was the time that his reign lasted), into a great and nourishing
Empire. It is not too much to say that, but for him, Parthia might have
remained a more petty State on the outskirts of the Syrian kingdom,
and, instead of becoming a rival to Rome, might have sunk shortly into
obscurity and insignificance.


[Illustration: PLATE 1.]


As commonly happens in the grand changes which constitute the
turning-points of history, the way for Mithridates’s vast successes was
prepared by a long train of antecedent circumstances. To show how the
rise of the Parthians to greatness in the middle of the second century
before our era was rendered possible, we must turn aside once more
from our proper subject and cast a glance at the condition of the two
kingdoms between which Parthia stood, at the time when Mithridates
ascended the throne.

The Bactrian monarchs in their ambitious struggles to possess themselves
of the tracts south of the Paropamisus, and extending from the Heri-rud
to the Sutlej and the mouths of the Indus, overstrained the strength
of their State, and by shifting the centre of its power injured
irretrievably its principle of cohesion. As early as the reign of
Demetrius a tendency to disruption showed itself, Eucratidas having
held the supreme power for many years in Bactria itself, while Demetrius
exercised authority on the southern side of the mountains. It is true
that at the death of Demetrius this tendency was to a certain extent
checked, since Eucratidas was then able to extend his sway over almost
the whole of the Bactrian territory. But the old evil recurred shortly,
though in a less pronounced form. Eucratidas, without being actually
supplanted in the north by a rival, found that he could devote to that
portion of the Empire but a small part of his attention. The southern
countries and the prospect of southern and eastern conquests engrossed
him. While he carried on successful wars with the Arachotians, the
Drangians, and the Indians of the Punjaub region, his hold on the more
northern countries was relaxed, and they began to slip from his grasp.
Incursions of the nomad Scyths from the Steppes carried fire and
sword over portions of these provinces, some of which were Even, it is
probable, seized and occupied by the invaders.

Such was, it would seem, the condition of Bactria under Eucratidas, the
contemporary of Mithridates. In Syria, Antiochus Epiphanes had succeeded
his brother Seleucus IV. (Philopator) about a year before Mithridates
ascended the Parthian throne. He was a prince of courage and energy;
but his hands were fully occupied with wars in Egypt, Palestine, and
Armenia, and the distant East could attract but a small share of his
thought or attention. The claim put forward by Egypt to the possession
of Coele-Syria and Palestine, promised to Ptolemy V. (it was affirmed)
as a dowry with Cleopatra, the daughter of Antiochus the Great, led to
hostilities in the south-west which lasted continuously for four years
(B.C. 171 to B.C. 168), and were complicated during two of them with
troubles in Judaea, rashly provoked by the Syrian monarch, who, unaware
of the stubborn temper of the Jews, goaded them into insurrection.
The war with Egypt came to an end in B.C. 168; it brought Syria no
advantage, since Rome interposed, and required the restitution of
all conquests. The war with the Jews had no such rapid termination.
Antiochus, having not only plundered and desecrated the Temple, but
having set himself to eradicate utterly the Jewish religion, and
completely Hellenize the people, was met with the most determined
resistance on the part of a moiety of the nation. A patriotic party
rose up under devoted leaders, who asserted, and in the end secured, the
independence of their country. Not alone during the remaining years
of Epiphanes, but for half a century after his death, throughout seven
reigns, the struggle continued; Judaea taking advantage of every trouble
and difficulty in Syria to detach herself more and more completely from
her oppressor; being a continual thorn in her side, a constant source of
weakness, preventing more than anything else the recovery of her power.
The triumph which Epiphanes obtained in the distant Armenia (B.C.
166-5), where he defeated and captured the king, Artaxias, was a poor
set-off against the foe which he had created to himself at his doors
through his cruelty and intolerance.

In another quarter, too, the Syrian power received a severe shake
through the injudicious violence of Epiphanes. The Oriental temples
had, in some instances, escaped the rapacity of Alexander’s generals and
“Successors;” their treasuries remained unviolated, and contained large
hoards of the precious metals. Epiphanes, having exhausted his own
exchequer by his wars and his lavish gifts, saw in these un-plundered
stores a means of replenishing it, and made a journey into his
south-eastern provinces for the purpose. The natives of Elymais,
however, resisted his attempt, and proved strong enough to defeat it;
the baffled monarch retired to Tabae, where he shortly afterward fell
sick and died. In the popular belief his death was a judgment upon him
for his attempted sacrilege; and in the exultation caused by the event
the bands which joined these provinces to the Empire must undoubtedly
have been loosened.

Nor did the removal of Epiphanes (B.C. 164) improve the condition of
affairs in Syria. The throne fell to his son, Antiochus Eupator, a boy
of nine, according to Appian, or, according to another authority, of
twelve years of age. The regent, Lysias, exercised the chief power, and
was soon engaged in a war with the Jews, whom the death of Epiphanes
had encouraged to fresh efforts. The authority of Lysias was further
disputed by a certain Philip, whom Epiphanes, shortly before his death,
had made tutor to the young king. The claims of this tutor to the
regent’s office being supported by a considerable portion of the army, a
civil war arose between him and Lysias, which raged for the greater
part of two years (B.C. 163-2), terminating in the defeat and death
of Philip. But Syrian affairs did not even then settle down into
tranquillity. A prince of the Seleucid house, Demetrius by name, the son
of Seleucus IV., and consequently the first cousin of Eupator, was at
this time detained in Rome as a hostage, having been sent there during
his father’s lifetime as a security for his fidelity. Demetrius, with
some reason, regarded his claim to the Syrian throne as better than that
of his cousin, the son of the younger brother, and being in the full
vigor of early youth, he determined to assert his pretensions in Syria,
and to make a bold stroke for the crown. Having failed to obtain the
Senate’s consent to his quitting Italy, he took his departure secretly,
crossed the Mediterranean in a Carthaginian vessel, and, landing in
Asia, succeeded within a few months in establishing himself as Syrian
monarch.

From this review it sufficiently appears that the condition of things,
both in Syria and Bactria, was favorable to any aspirations which
the power that lay between them might entertain after dominion and
self-aggrandizement. The Syrian and Bactrian kings, at the time of
Mithridates’s accession, were, both of them, men of talent and energy;
but the Syrian monarch was soon involved in difficulties at home, while
the Bactrian had his attention attracted to prospects of advantage in a
remote quarter, Mithridates might, perhaps, have attacked the territory
of either with an equal chance of victory; and as his predecessor had
set him the example of successful warfare on his western frontier, we
might have expected his first efforts to have been in this direction,
against the dependencies of Syria. But circumstances which we cannot
exactly trace determined his choice differently. While Eucratidas was
entangled in his Indian wars, Mithridates invaded the Bactrian territory
where it adjoined Parthia, and added to his Empire, after a short
struggle, two provinces, called respectively Turiua and that of
Aspionus. It is conjectured that these provinces lay towards the north
and the north-west, the one being that of the Turanians proper, and the
other that of the Aspasiacae, who dwelt between the Jaxartes and
the Oxus. But there is scarcely sufficient ground for forming even a
conjecture on the subject, since speculation has nothing but the names
themselves to rest upon.

Successful in this quarter, Mithridates, a few years later, having
waited until the Syrian throne was occupied by the boy Eupator, and the
two claimants of the regency, Lysias and Philip, were contending in arms
for the supreme power, made suddenly an expedition towards the west,
falling upon Media, which, though claimed by the Syrian kings as a
province of their Empire, was perhaps at this time almost, if not quite,
independent. The Medes offered a vigorous resistance to his attack;
and, in the war which followed, each side had in turn the advantage;
but eventually the Parthian prince proved victorious, and the great
and valuable province of Media Magna was added to the dominons of the
Arsacidae. A certain Bacasis was appointed to govern it, whether as
satrap or as tributary monarch is not apparent; while the Parthian king,
recalled towards home by a revolt, proceeded to crush rebellion before
resuming his career of conquest.

The revolt which now occupied for a time the attention of Mithridates
was that of Hyrcania. The Hyrcanians were Arians in race; they were
brave and high-spirited, and under the Persian monarchs had enjoyed some
exceptional privileges which placed them above the great mass of the
conquered nations. It was natural that they should dislike the yoke of a
Turanian people; and it was wise of them to make their effort to obtain
their freedom before Parthia grew into a power against which revolt
would be utterly hopeless. Hyrcania might now expect to be joined by the
Medes, and even the Mardi, who were Arians like themselves, and could
not yet have forgotten the pleasures of independence. But though the
effort does not seem to have been ill-timed, it was unsuccessful. No aid
was given to the rebels, so far as we hear, by any of their neighbors.
Mithridates’s prompt return nipped the insurrection in the bud; Hyrcania
at once submitted, and became for centuries the obedient vassal of her
powerful neighbor.

The conquest of Media had brought the Parthians into contact with
the rich country of Susiana or Elymais; and it was not long before
Mithridates, having crushed the Hyrcanian revolt, again advanced
westward, and invaded this important province. Elymais appears to have
a had a king of its own, who must either have been a vassal of the
Seleucidse, or have acquired an independent position by revolt after the
death of Epiphanes. In the war which followed between this monarch and
Mithridates, the Elymseans proved wholly unsuccessful, and Mithridates
rapidly overran the country and added it to his dominions. After this he
appears to have received the submission of the Persians on the one hand
and the Babylonians on the other, and to have rested on his laurels for
some years, having extended the Parthian sway from the Hindoo Koosh to
the Euphrates.

The chronological data which have come down to us for this period
are too scanty to allow of any exact statement of the number of years
occupied by Mithridates in effecting these conquests. All that can be
said is that he appears to have commenced them about B.C. 163 and to
have concluded them some time before B.C. 140, when he was in his turn
attacked by the Syrians. Probably they had been all effected by the
year B.C. 150; since there is reason to believe that about that time
Mithridates found his power sufficiently established in the west to
allow of his once more turning his attention eastward, and renewing his
aggressions upon the Bactrian kingdom, which had passed from the rule of
Eucratidas under that of his son and successor, Heliocles.

Heliocles, who was allowed by his father a quasi-royal position,
obtained the full possession of the Bactrian throne by the crime of
parricide. It is conjectured that he regarded with disapproval his
father’s tame submission to Parthian ascendency, and desired the
recovery of the provinces which Eucratidas had been content to cede for
the sake of peace. We are told that he justified his crime on the ground
that his father was a public enemy; which is best explained by supposing
that he considered him the friend of Bactria’s great enemy, Parthia.
If this be the true account of the circumstances under which he became
king, his accession would have been a species of challenge to
the Parthian monarch, whose ally he had assassinated. Mithridates
accordingly marched against him with all speed, and, easily defeating
his troops, took possession of the greater part of his dominion. Elated
by this success, he is said to have pressed eastward, to have invaded
India, and overrun the country as far as the river Hydaspes, but, if
it be true that his arms penetrated so far, it is, at any rate, certain
that he did not here effect any conquest. Greek monarchs of the Bactrian
series continued masters of Oabul and Western India till about B.C. 126;
no Parthian coins are found in this region; nor do the best authorities
claim for Mithridates any dominion beyond the mountains which enclose on
the west the valley of the Indus.

By his war with Heliocles the empire of Mithridates reached its greatest
extension. It comprised now, besides Parthia Proper, Bactria, Aria,
Drangiana, Arachosia, Margiana, Hyrcania, the country of the Mardi,
Media Magna, Susiana, Persia and Babylonia. Very probably its limits
were still wider. The power which possessed Parthia, Hyrcania, and
Bactria, would rule almost of necessity over the whole tract between the
Elburz range and the Oxus, if not even over the region between the Oxus
and the Jaxartes; that which held the Caspian mountains and eastern
Media could not fail to have influence over the tribes of the Iranic
desert; while Assyria Proper would naturally follow the fortunes of
Babylonia and Susiana. Still the extent of territory thus indicated
rests only on conjecture. If we confine ourselves to what is known by
positive evidence, we can only say that the Parthian Kingdom of this
period contained, at least, twelve provinces above enumerated. It thus
stretched from east to west a distance of fifteen hundred miles between
the Suleiman mountains and the Euphrates, varying in width from three or
four hundred miles--or even more--towards the west and east, to a
narrow strip of less than a hundred miles toward the centre. It probably
comprised an area of about 450,000 square miles; which is somewhat less
than that of the modern Persia.

Unlike the modern Persia, however, the territory consisted almost
entirely of productive regions. The excellent quality of the soil
in Parthia Proper, Hyrcania, and Margiana, has been already noticed.
Bactria, the next province to Margiana towards the east, was less
uniformly fertile; but still it contained a considerable proportion of
good land along the course of the Oxus and its tributaries, which was
cultivated in vineyards and cornfields, or else pastured large herds of
cattle. The Mardian mountain territory was well wooded; and the plain
between the mountains and the Caspian was rich in the extreme. Media,
where it adjoined on the desert, was comparatively sterile; but still
even here an elaborate system of artificial irrigation brought a belt of
land under culture. Further west, in the Zagros chain, Media comprised
some excellent pasture lands, together with numerous valleys as
productive as any in Asia. Elymais was, in part, of the same character
with the mountainous portion of Media, while beyond the mountain it
sank down into a rich alluvium, not much inferior to the Babylonian.
Babylonia itself was confessedly the most fertile country in Asia. It
produced wheat, barley, millet, sesame, vetches, dates, and fruits
of all kinds. The return of the wheat crop was from fifty to a
hundred-and-fifty-fold; while that of the barley crop was three
hundred-fold. The dates were of unusual size and superior flavor;
and the palm, which abounded throughout the region, furnished an
inexhaustible supply both of fruit and timber.

The great increase of power which Mithridates had obtained by his
conquests could not be a matter of indifference to the Syrian monarchs.
Their domestic troubles--the contentions between Philip and Lysias,
between Lysias and Demetrius Soter, Soter and Alexander Balas, Balas and
Demetrius II., Demetrius II. and Tryphon, had so engrossed them for the
space of twenty years (from B.C. 162 to B.C. 142) that they had felt it
impossible, or hopeless, to attempt any expedition towards the East,
for the protection or recovery of their provinces. Mithridates had
been allowed to pursue his career of conquest unopposed, so far as the
Syrians were concerned, and to establish his sway from the Hindoo Koosh
to the Euphrates. But a time at last came when home dangers were less
pressing, and a prospect of engaging the terrible Parthians with success
seemed to present itself. The second Demetrius had not, indeed, wholly
overcome his domestic enemy, Tryphon; but he had so far brought him into
difficulties as to believe that he might safely be left to be dealt
with by his wife, Cleopatra, and by his captains. At the same time the
condition of affairs in the East seemed to invite his interference,
Mithridates ruled his new conquests with some strictness, suspecting,
probably, their fidelity, and determined that he would not by any
remissness allow them to escape from his grasp. The native inhabitants
could scarcely be much attached to the Syro-Macedonians, who had
certainly not treated them very tenderly; but a possession of 170 years’
duration confers prestige in the East, and a strange yoke may have
galled more than one to whose pressure they had become accustomed.
Moreover, all the provinces which Parthia took from Syria contained
Greek towns, and their inhabitants might at all times be depended on
to side with their countrymen against the Asiatics. At the present
conjuncture, too, the number of the malcontents was swelled by the
addition of the recently subdued Bactrians, who hated the Parthian yoke,
and longed earnestly for a chance of recovering their freedom. Thus when
Demetrius II., anxious to escape the reproach of inertness, determined
to make an expedition against the great Parthian monarch, he found
himself welcomed as a deliverer by a considerable number of his enemy’s
subjects, whom the harshness, or the novelty, of the Parthian rule
had offended. The malcontents joined his standard as he advanced;
and supported, as he thus was, by Persian, Elymsen, and Bactrian
contingents, he engaged and defeated the Parthians in several battles.
Upon this, Mithridates, finding himself inferior in strength, had
recourse to stratagem, and having put Demetrius off his guard by
proposals of peace, attacked him, defeated him, and took him prisoner.
The invading army appears to have been destroyed. The captive monarch
was, in the first instance, conveyed about to the several nations which
had revolted, and paraded before each in turn, as a proof to them of
their folly in lending him aid, but afterwards he was treated in a
manner befitting his rank and the high character of his captor. Assigned
a residence in Hyrcania, he was maintained in princely state, and was
even promised by Mithridates the hand of his daughter, Ehodo-guns. The
Parthian monarch, it is probable, had the design of conquering Syria,
and thought it possible that he might find it of advantage to have
a Syrian prince in his camp, well disposed towards him, connected by
marriage, and thus fitted for the position of tributary monarch. But the
schemes of Mithridates proved abortive. His career had now reached its
close. Attacked by illness not very long after his capture of Demetrius,
his strength proved insufficient to bear up against the malady, and he
died after a glorious reign of about thirty-eight years, B.C. 136.




CHAPTER VI.


_System of government established by Mithridates I. Constitution of the
Parthians. Government of the Provinces. Laws and Institutions. Character
of Mithridates I._


The Parthian institutions possessed great simplicity; and it is probable
that they took a shape in the reign of Arsaces I., or, at any rate, of
Tiridates, which was not greatly altered afterwards. Permanency is the
law of Oriental governments; and in a monarchy which lasted less than
five hundred years, it is not likely that many changes occurred. The
Parthian institutions are referred to Mithridates I., rather than to
Tiridates, because in the reign of Mithridates Parthia entered upon a
new phase of her existence--became an empire instead of a mere
monarchy; and the sovereign of the time could not but have reviewed
the circumstances of his State, and have determined either to adopt the
previous institutions of his country, or to reject them. Mithridates
I. had attained a position which entitled and enabled him to settle
the Parthian constitution as he thought best; and, if he maintained an
earlier arrangement, which is uncertain, he must have done so of his
own free will, simply because he preferred the existing Parthian
institutions to any other. Thus the institutions may be regarded as
starting from him, since he approved them, and made them those of the
Parthian EMPIRE.

Like most sovereignties which have arisen out of an association of
chiefs banding themselves together for warlike purposes under a single
head, the Parthian monarchy was limited. The king was permanently
advised by two councils, consisting of persons not of his own
nomination, whom rights, conferred by birth or office, entitled to their
seats. One of these was a family conclave (concilium domesticum), or
assembly of the full-grown males of the Royal House; the other was a
Senate comprising both the spiritual and the temporal chiefs of the
nation, the Sophi, or “Wise Men,” and the Magi, or “Priests.” Together
these two bodies constituted the Megistanes, the “Nobles” or “Great
Men”--the privileged class which to a considerable extent checked and
controlled the monarch. The monarchy was elective, but only in the house
of the Arsacidae; and the concurrent vote of both councils was necessary
in the appointment of a new king. Practically, the ordinary law of
hereditary descent appears to have been followed, unless in the case
where a king left no son of sufficient age to exercise the royal office.
Under such circumstances, the Megistanes usually nominated the late
king’s next brother to succeed him, or, if he had left behind him no
brother, went back to an uncle. When the line of succession had once
been changed, the right of the elder branch was lost, and did not revive
unless the branch preferred died out or possessed no member qualified to
rule. When a king had been duly nominated by the two councils, the
right of placing the diadem upon his head belonged to the Surena, the
“Field-Marshal,” or “Commander in Chief of the Parthian armies.” The
Megistanes further claimed and sometimes exercised the right of deposing
a monarch whose conduct displeased them; but an attempt to exercise this
privilege was sure to be followed by a civil war, no monarch accepting
his deposition without a struggle; and force, not right, practically
determining whether he should remain king or no.

After a king was once elected and firmly fixed upon the throne, his
power appears to have been nearly despotic. At any rate he could put to
death without trial whomsoever he chose; and adult members of the Royal
House, who provoked the reigning monarch’s jealousy, were constantly so
treated. Probably it would have been more dangerous to arouse the fears
of the “Sophi” and “Magi.” The latter especially were a powerful body,
consisting of an organized hierarchy, which had come down from ancient
times, and was feared and venerated by all classes of the people. Their
numbers at the close of the Empire, counting adult males only, are
reckoned at eighty thousand;’ they possessed considerable tracts of
fertile land, and were the sole inhabitants of many large towns or
villages, which they were permitted to govern as they pleased. The
arbitrary power of the monarchs must, in practice, have been largely
checked by the privileges of this numerous priestly caste, of which it
would seem that in later times they became jealous, thereby preparing
the way for their own downfall.

The dominion of the Parthians over the conquered provinces was
maintained by reverting to the system which had prevailed generally
through the East before the accession of the Persians to power, and
establishing in the various countries either viceroys, holding office
for life, or sometimes dependent dynasties of kings. In either case, the
rulers, so long as they paid tribute regularly to the Parthian monarchs
and aided them in their wars, were allowed to govern the people beneath
their sway at their pleasure. Among monarchs, in the higher sense of
the term, may be enumerated the kings of Persia, Elymaiis, Adiabene,
Osrhoene, and of Armenia and Media Atropatene, when they formed, as
they sometimes did, portions of the Parthian Empire. The viceroys,
who governed the other provinces, bore the title of Vitaxae, and were
fourteen or fifteen in number. The remark has been made by the historian
Gibbon that the system thus established “exhibited under other names a
lively image of the feudal system which has since prevailed in Europe.”
 The comparison is of some value, but, like most historical parallels, it
is inexact, the points of difference between the Parthian and the feudal
system being probably more numerous than those of resemblance, but the
points of resemblance being very main points, not fewer in number, and
striking.

It was with special reference to the system thus established that the
Parthian monarchs took the title of “King of Kings”, so frequent upon
their coins, which seems sometimes to have been exchanged for what was
regarded as an equivalent phrase, “Satrap of Satraps”. This title seems
to appear first on the coins of Mithridates I.

In the Parthian system there was one anomaly of a very curious
character. The Greek towns, which were scattered in large numbers
throughout the Empire, enjoyed a municipal government of their own, and
in some cases were almost independent communities, the Parthian kings
exercising over them little or no control. The great city of Seleucia
on the Tigris was the most important of all these: its population was
estimated in the first century after Christ at six hundred thousand
souls; it had strong walls, and was surrounded by a most fertile
territory. It had its own senate, or municipal council, of three hundred
members, elected by the people to rule them from among the wealthiest
and best educated of the citizens. Under ordinary circumstances it
enjoyed the blessing of complete self-government, and was entirely free
from Parthian interference, paying no doubt its tribute, but otherwise
holding the position of a “free city.” It was only in the case of
internal dissensions that these advantages were lost, and the Parthian
soldiery, invited within the walls, arranged the quarrels of parties,
and settled the constitution of the State at its pleasure. Privileges
of a similar character, though, probably, less extensive, belonged
(it would seem) to most of the other Greek cities of the Empire. The
Parthian monarchs thought it polite to favor them; and their practice
justified the title of “Phil-Hellene,” which they were fond of assuming
upon their coins. On the whole, the policy may have been wise, but it
diminished the unity of the Empire; and there were times when serious
danger arose from it. The Syro-Macedonian monarchs could always count
with certainty on having powerful friends in Parthia, whatever portion
of it they invaded; and even the Romans, though their ethnic connection
with the cities was not so close, were sometimes indebted to them for
very important assistance.

We are told that Mithridates I., after effecting his conquests, made a
collection of the best laws which he found to prevail among the various
subject peoples, and imposed them upon the Parthian nation. This
statement is, no doubt, an exaggeration; but we may attribute, with
some reason, to Mithridates the introduction at this time of various
practices and usages, whereby the Parthian Court was assimilated to
those of the earlier Great Monarchies of Asia, and became in the eyes
of foreigners the successor and representative of the old Assyrian and
Persian Kingdoms. The assumption of new titles and of a new state--the
organization of the Court on a new plan--the bestowal of a new character
on the subordinate officers of the Empire, were suitable to the new
phase of its life on which the monarchy had now entered, and may with
the highest probability, if not with absolute certainty, be assigned to
this period.

It has been already noticed that Mithridates appears to have been the
first Parthian sovereign who took the title of “King of Kings.”
 The title had been a favorite one with the old Assyrian and Persian
monarchs, but was not adopted either by the Seleucidae or by the Greek
kings of Bactria. Its revival implied a distinct pretension to that
mastery of Western Asia which had belonged of old to the Assyrians and
Persians, and which was, in later times, formally claimed by Artaxerxes,
the son of Sassan, the founder of the New Persian Kingdom. Previous
Parthian monarchs had been content to call themselves “the King,” or
“the Great King”--Mithridates is “the King of Kings, the great and
illustrious Arsaces.”

At the same time Mithridates appears to have assumed the tiara, or tall
stiff crown, which, with certain modifications in its shape, had
been the mark of sovereignty, both under the Assyrians and under the
Persians. Previously the royal headdress had been either a mere cap of
a Scythic type, but lower than the Scyths commonly wore it; or the
ordinary diadem, which was a band round the head terminating in two long
ribbons or ends, that hung down behind the head on the back. According
to Herodian, the diadem, in the later times, was double; but the coins
of Parthia do not exhibit this peculiarity. [PLATE 1, Fig. 4.]

Ammianus says that among the titles assumed by the Parthian monarchs was
that of “Brother of the Sun and Moon.” It appears that something of a
divine character was regarded as attaching to the race. In the civil
contentions, which occur so frequently throughout the later history,
combatants abstained from lifting their hands knowingly against an
Arsacid, to kill or wound one being looked upon as sacrilege. The
name of _Deos_ was occasionally assumed, as it was in Syria; and more
frequently kings took the epithet of [Greek], which implied the divinity
of their father. After his death a monarch seems generally to have been
the object of a qualified worship; statues were erected to him in the
temples, where (apparently) they were associated with the images of the
great luminaries.

Of the Parthian Court and its customs we have no account that is either
complete or trustworthy. Some particulars, however, may be gathered of
it on which we may place reliance. The best authorities are agreed that
it was not stationary, but migrated at different times of the year to
different cities of the Empire, in this resembling the Court of the
Achaemenians. It is not quite clear, however, which were the cities thus
honored. Ctesiphon was undoubtedly one of them. All writers agree
that it was the chief city of the Empire, and the ordinary seat of
the government. Here, according to Strabo, the kings passed the winter
months, delighting in the excellence of the air. The town was situated
on the left bank of the Tigris, opposite to Seleucia, twelve or thirteen
miles below the modern Baghdad. Pliny says that it was built by the
Parthians in order to reduce Seleucia to insignificance, and that when
it failed of its purpose they built another city.

Vologesocerta, in the same neighborhood with the same object; but the
account of Strabo is more probable--viz., that it grew up gradually out
of the wish of the Parthian kings to spare Seleucia the unpleasantness
of having the rude soldiery, which followed the Court from place to
place, quartered upon them The remainder of the year, Strabo tells us,
was spent by the Parthian kings either at the Median city of Ecbatana,
which is the modern Hamadan, or in the province of Hyrca--In Hyrcania,
the palace, according to him, was at Tape and between this place and
Ecbatana he no doubt regarded the monarchs as spending the time which
was not passed at Ctesiphon. Athenaeus, however, declares that Rhages
was the spring residence of the Parthian kings; and it seems not
unlikely that this famous city, which Isidore, writing in Parthian
times, calls “the greatest in Media,” was among the occasional
residences of the Court. Parthia itself was, it would seem, deserted;
but still a city of that region preserved in one respect a royal
character, being the place where all the earlier kings were interred.

The pomp and grandeur of the Parthian monarchs are described only in the
vaguest terms by the classical writers. No author of repute appears
to have visited the Parthian Court. We may perhaps best obtain a true
notion of the splendor of the sovereign from the accounts which have
reached us of his relations and officers, who can have reflected only
faintly the magnificence of the sovereign. Plutarch tells us that the
general whom Orodes deputed to conduct the war against Crassus came into
the field accompanied by two hundred litters wherein were contained
his concubines, and by a thousand camels which carried his baggage. His
dress was fashioned after that of the Medes; he wore his hair parted
in the middle and had his face painted with cosmetics. A body of ten
thousand horse, composed entirely, of his clients and slaves, followed
him in battle. We may conclude from this picture, and from the
general tenor of the classical notices, that the Arsacidae revived
and maintained very much such a Court as that of the old Achaemenian
princes, falling probably somewhat below their model in politeness and
refinement, but equalling it in luxury, in extravagant expenditure, and
in display.

Such seems to have been the general character of those practices and
institutions which distinguish the Parthians from the foundation of
their Empire by Mithridates, Some of them, it is probable, he rather
adopted than invented; but there is no good reason for doubting that of
many he was the originator. He appears to have been one of those rare
individuals to whom it has been given to unite the powers which form
the conqueror with those which constitute the successful organizer of a
State. Brave and enterprising in war, prompt to seize an occasion and to
turn it to the best advantage, not even averse to severities where they
seemed to be required, he yet felt no acrimony towards those who had
resisted his arms, but was ready to befriend them so soon as their
resistance ceased. Mild, clement, philanthropic, he conciliated those
whom he subdued almost more easily than he subdued them, and by the
efforts of a few years succeeded in welding together a dominion which
lasted without suffering serious mutilation for nearly four centuries.
Though not dignified with the epithet of “Great,” he was beyond all
question the greatest of the Parthian monarchs. Later times did him more
justice than his contemporaries, and, when the names of almost all the
other kings had sunk into oblivion, retained his in honor, and placed it
on a par with that of the original founder of Parthian independence.




CHAPTER VII.


_Reign of Phraates II. Expedition of Antiochus Sidetes against Parthia.
Release of Demetrius. Defeat and Death of Sidetes. War of Phraates with
the Northern Nomads. His death and character._


Mithridates was succeeded by his son, Phraates, the second monarch of
the name, and the seventh Arsaces. This prince, entertaining, like his
father, the design of invading Syria, and expecting to find some
advantage from having in his camp the rightful occupant of the Syrian
throne, treated the captive Demetrius with even greater kindness than
his father had done, not only maintaining him handsomely, but even
giving him his sister Ehodogune, in marriage. Demetrius, however, was
not to be reconciled to his captivity by any such blandishments, and
employed his thoughts chiefly in devising plans by which he might
escape. By the help of a friend he twice managed to evade the vigilance
of his guards, and to make his way from Hyrcania towards the frontiers
of his own kingdom; but each time he was pursued and caught without
effecting his purpose. The Parthian monarch was no doubt vexed at his
pertinacity, and on the second occasion thought it prudent to feign, if
he did not even really feel, offence: he banished his ungrateful
brother-in-law from his presence, but otherwise visited his crime with
no severer penalty than ridicule. Choosing to see in his attempts to
change the place of his abode no serious design, but only the wayward
conduct of a child, he sent him a present of some golden dice, implying
thereby that it was only for lack of amusement he had grown discontented
with his Hyrcanian residence.

Antiochus Sidetes, the brother of Demetrius, had been generally accepted
by the Syrians as their monarch, at the time when the news reached them
of that prince’s defeat and capture by Mithridates. He was an active and
enterprising sovereign, though fond of luxury and display. For some
years (B.C. 140-137) the pretensions of Tryphon to the throne gave him
full occupation; but, having finally established his authority after a
short war, and punished the pretender with death, he found himself, in
B.C. 137, at liberty to turn his arms against foreign enemies. He would
probably have at once attacked Parthia, but for the attitude of a nearer
neighbor, which he regarded as menacing, and as requiring his immediate
attention. Demetrius, before his departure for the East, had rewarded
the Jews for services rendered him in his war with Tryphon by an open,
acknowledgment of their independence. Sidetes, though indebted to the
Jewish High Priest, Simon, for offers of aid against the same adversary,
could not bring himself to pay the price for it which Demetrius had
thought reasonable--an independent Palestine appeared to him a danger
close to his doors, and one that imperilled the very existence of the
Syrian State. Accordingly, he had no sooner put down Tryphon than he
resolved to pick a quarrel with the Jews, and to force them to resume
their old position of vassalage to Syria. His general, Cendebseus,
invaded their country, but was defeated near Azotus. Antiochus had to
take the field in person. During two years, John Hyrcanus, who had
succeeded his father, Simon (B.C. 135), baffled all his efforts; but at
last, in B.C. 133, he was forced to submit, to acknowledge the authority
of Syria, to dismantle Jerusalem, and to resume the payment of tribute.
Sidetes then considered the time come for a Parthian expedition, and,
having made great preparations, he set out for the East in the spring
of B.C. 129.

It is impossible to accept without considerable reserve the accounts
that have come down to us of the force which Antiochus collected.
According to Justin, it consisted of no more than 80,000 fighting men,
to which was attached the incredible number of 300,000 camp-followers,
the majority being composed of cooks, bakers, and actors. As in other
extreme cases the camp-followers do but equal or a little exceed the
number of men fit for service, this estimate, which makes them nearly
four times as numerous, is entitled to but little credit. The late
writer, Orosius, corrects the error here indicated; but his account
seems to err in rating the supernumeraries too low. According to him,
the armed force amounted to 300,000, while the camp-followers, including
grooms, sutlers, courtesans, and actors, were no more than a third
of the number. From the two accounts, taken together, we are perhaps
entitled to conclude that the entire host did not fall much short of
400,000 men. This estimate receives confirmation from an independent
statement made by Diodorus, with respect to the number who fell in the
campaign--a statement of which we shall have to speak later.

The army of Phraates, according to two accounts of it (which, however,
seem to represent a single original authority), numbered no more than
120,000. An attempt which he made to enlist in his service a body of
Scythian mercenaries failed, the Scyths being willing to lend their aid,
but arriving too late to be of any use. At the same time a defection of
the subject princes deprived the Parthian monarch of contingents which
usually swelled his numbers, and threw him upon the support of his own
countrymen, chiefly or solely. Under these circumstances it is more
surprising that he was able to collect 120,000 men than that he did not
bring into the field a larger number.

The Syrian troops, magnificently appointed and supported by a body of
Jews under John Hyrcanus, advanced upon Babylon, receiving on their
way the adhesion of many of the Parthian tributaries, who professed
themselves disgusted by the arrogance and pride of their masters.
Phraates, on his part, advanced to meet his enemies, and in person or
by his generals engaged Antiochus in three battles, but without success.
Antiochus was three times a conqueror. In a battle fought upon the
river Lycus (Zab) in further Assyria he defeated the Parthian general,
Indates, and raised a trophy in honor of his victory. The exact scene
of the other combats is unknown, but they were probably in the same
neighborhood. The result of them was the conquest of Babylonia, and the
general revolt of the remaining Parthian provinces, which followed the
common practice of deserting a falling house, and drew off or declared
for the enemy.

Under these circumstances Phraates, considering that the time was come
when it was necessary for him to submit or to create a diversion by
raising troubles in the enemy’s territory, released Demetrius from his
confinement, and sent him, supported by a body of Parthian troops, to
reclaim his kingdom. He thought it probable that Antiochus, when the
intelligence reached him, would retrace his steps, and return from
Babylon to his own capital. At any rate his efforts would be distracted;
he would be able to draw fewer reinforcements from home; and he would be
less inclined to proceed to any great distance from his own country.

Antiochus, however, was either uninformed of the impending danger or did
not regard it as very pressing. The winter was approaching; and, instead
of withdrawing his troops from the occupied provinces and marching
them back into Syria, he resolved to keep them where they were, merely
dividing them, on account of their numbers, among the various cities
which he had taken, and making them go into winter quarters. It was,
no doubt, his intention to remain quiet during the two or three winter
months, after which he would have resumed the war, and have endeavored
to penetrate through Media into Parthia Proper, where he might expect
his adversary to make his last stand.

But Phraates saw that the position of affairs was favorable for striking
a blow before the spring came. The dispersion of his enemy’s troops
deprived him of all advantage from the superiority of their numbers.
The circumstance of their being quartered in towns newly reduced,
and unaccustomed to the rudeness and rapacity of soldiers and
camp-followers, made it almost certain that complications would arise,
and that it would not be long before in some places the Parthians,
so lately declared to be oppressors, would be hailed as liberators.
Moreover, the Parthians were, probably, better able than their
adversaries to endure the hardships and severities of a campaign in the
cold season. Parthia is a cold country, and the winters, both of the
great plateau of Iran and of all the mountain tracts adjoining it, are
severe. The climate of Syria is far milder. Moreover, the troops
of Antiochus had, we are informed, been enervated by an excessive
indulgence on the part of their leader during the marches and halts of
the preceding summer. Their appetites had been pampered; their habits
had become unmanly; their general tone was relaxed; and they were likely
to deteriorate still more in the wealthy and luxurious cities where they
were bidden to pass the winter.

These various circumstances raised the spirits of Phraates, and made him
hold himself in readiness to resume hostilities at a moment’s notice.
Nor was it long before the complications which he had foreseen began to
occur. The insolence of the soldiers quartered upon them exasperated the
inhabitants of the Mesopotamian towns, and caused them to look back with
regret to the time when they were Parthian subjects. The requisitions
made on them for stores of all kinds was a further grievance. After a
while they opened communications with Phraates, and offered to return
to their allegiance if he would assist them against their oppressors.
Phraates gladly listened to these overtures. At his instigation a plot
was formed like that which has given so terrible a significance to the
phrase “Sicilian vespers.” It was agreed that on an appointed day all
the cities should break out in revolt: the natives should take arms,
rise against the soldiers quartered upon them, and kill all, or as many
as possible. Phraates promised to be at hand with his army, to prevent,
the scattered detachments from giving help to each other. It was
calculated that in this way the invaders might be cut off almost to a
man without the trouble of even fighting a battle.

But, before he proceeded to extremities, the Parthian prince determined
to give his adversary a chance of escaping the fate prepared for him by
timely concessions. The winter was not over; but the snow was beginning
to melt through the increasing warmth of the sun’s rays, and the day
appointed for the general rising was probably drawing near. Phraates
felt that no time was to be lost. Accordingly, he sent ambassadors to
Antiochus to propose peace, and to inquire on what conditions it would
be granted him. The reply of Antiochus, according to Diodotus, was
as follows: “If Phraates would release his prisoner, Demetrius, from
captivity, and deliver him up without ransom, at the same time restoring
all the provinces which had been taken from Syria, and consenting to pay
a tribute for Parthia itself, peace might be had; but not otherwise.”
 To such terms it was, of course, impossible that Phraates should listen;
and his ambassadors, therefore, returned without further parley.

Soon afterwards the day appointed for the outbreak arrived. Apparently,
no suspicion had been excited. The Syrian troops were everywhere quietly
enjoying themselves in their winter quarters, when, suddenly and
without warning, they found themselves attacked by the natives. Taken
at disadvantage, it was impossible for them to make a successful
resistance; and it would seem that the great bulk of them were massacred
in their quarters. Antiochus, and the detachment stationed with him,
alone, so far as we hear, escaped into an open field and contended for
their lives in just warfare. It had been the intention of the Syrian
monarch, when he took the field, to hasten to the protection of the
troops quartered nearest to him; but he no sooner commenced his march
than he found himself confronted by Phraates, who was at the head of
his entire army, having, no doubt, anticipated Antiochus’s design and
resolved to frustrate it. The Parthian prince was anxious to engage at
once, as his force far outnumbered that commanded by his adversary;
but the latter might have declined the battle, if he had so willed, and
have, at any rate, greatly protracted the struggle. He had a mountain
region--Mount Zagros, probably--within a short distance of him, and
might have fallen back upon it, so placing the Parthian horse at great
disadvantage; but he was still at an age when caution is apt to be
considered cowardice, and temerity to pass for true courage. Despite the
advice of one of his captains, he determined to accept the battle which
the enemy offered, and not to fly before a foe whom he had three times
defeated. But the determination of the commander was ill seconded by his
army. Though Antiochus fought strenuously, he was defeated, since his
troops were without heart and offered but a poor resistance. Antiochus
himself perished, either slain by the enemy or by his own hand. His son,
Seleucus, a boy of tender age, and his niece, a daughter of Demetrius,
who had accompanied him in his expedition, were captured. His troops
were either cut to pieces or made prisoners. The entire number of those
slain in the battle, and in the previous massacre, was reckoned at
300,000.

Such was the issue of this great expedition. It was the last which any
Seleucid monarch conducted into these countries--the final attempt made
by Syria to repossess herself of her lost Eastern provinces. Henceforth
Parthia was no further troubled by the power that had hitherto been her
most dangerous enemy, but was allowed to enjoy without molestation from
Syria the conquests which she had effected. Syria, in fact, had from
this time a difficulty in preserving her own existence. The immediate
result of the destruction of Antiochus and his host was the revolt of
Judaea, which henceforth maintained its independence uninterruptedly.
The dominions of the Seleucidae were reduced to Cilicia and Syria
Proper, or the tract west of the Euphrates, between Amanus and
Palestine. Internally, the state was agitated by constant commotions
from the claims of various pretenders to the sovereignty: externally,
it was kept in continual alarm by the Egyptians, Arabians, or Romans.
During the sixty years which elapsed between the return of Demetrius
to his kingdom and the conversion of Syria into a Roman province, she
ceased wholly to be formidable to her neighbors. Her flourishing
period was gone by, and a rapid decline set in, from which there was no
recovery. It is surprising that the Romans did not step in earlier and
terminate a rule which was but a little removed from anarchy. Rome,
however, had other work on her hands; and the Syrian kingdom continued
to exist till B.C. 65, though in a feeble and moribund condition.

But Phraates could not, without prophetic foresight, have counted on
such utter prostration following as the result of a single--albeit a
terrible--blow. Accordingly, we find him still exhibiting a dread of the
Seleucid power even after his great victory. He had released Demetrius
too late to obtain any benefit from the hostile feeling which that
prince probably entertained towards his brother. Had he not released him
too soon for his own safety? Was it not to be feared that the Syrians
might rally under one who was their natural leader, might rapidly
recover their strength, and renew the struggle for the mastery of
Western Asia? The first thought of the dissatisfied monarch was to
hinder the execution of his own project. Demetrius was on his way to
Syria, but had not yet arrived there, or, at any rate, his arrival had
not been as yet reported. Was it not possible to intercept him? The
Parthian king hastily sent out a body of horse, with orders to pursue
the Syrian prince at their best speed, and endeavor to capture him
before he passed the frontier. If they succeeded, they were to bring
him hack to their master, who would probably have then committed his
prisoner to close custody. The pursuit, however, failed. Demetrius
had anticipated, or at least feared, a change of purpose, and, having
prosecuted his journey with the greatest diligence, had reached his own
territory before the emissaries of Phraates could overtake him.

It is uncertain whether policy or inclination dictated the step which
Phraates soon afterwards took of allaying himself by marriage with the
Seleucidae. He had formally given his sister, Ehodogune, as a wife to
Demetrius, and the marriage had been fruitful, Rhodogune having borne
Demetrius several children. The two houses of the Seleucidae and
Arsacidae were thus already allied to some extent. Phraates resolved
to strengthen the bond. The unmarried daughter of Demetrius whom he
had captured after his victory over Antiochus took his fancy; and he
determined to make her his wife. At the same time he adopted other
measures calculated to conciliate the Seleucid prince. He treated his
captive, Seleucus, the son of Antiochus, with the greatest respect. To
the corpse of Antiochus he paid royal honors; and, having placed it in a
silver coffin, he transmitted it to the Syrians for sepulture.

Still, if we may believe Justin, he entertained the design of carrying
his arms across the Euphrates and invading Syria, in order to avenge
the attack of Antiochus upon his territories. But events occurred which
forced him to relinquish this enterprise. The Scythians, whom he had
called to his aid under the pressure of the Syrian invasion, and who had
arrived too late to take part in the war, demanded the pay which they
had been promised, and suggested that their arms should be employed
against some other enemy. Phraates was unwilling either to requite
services not rendered, or to rush needlessly into a fresh war merely
to gratify the avarice of his auxiliaries. He therefore peremptorily
refused to comply with either suggestion. Upon this, the Scythians
determined to take their payment into their own hands, and began to
ravage Parthia and to carry off a rich booty. Phraates, who had removed
the headquarters of his government to Babylonia, felt it necessary to
entrust affairs there to an officer, and to take the field in person
against this new enemy, which was certainly not less formidable than
the Syrians. He selected for his representative at the seat of Empire
a certain Himerus (or Evemerus), a youth with whom he had a disgraceful
connection, and having established him as a sort of viceroy, marched
away to the northeast, and proceeded to encounter the Scythians in that
remote region. Besides his native troops, he took with him a number
of Greeks, whom he had made prisoners in his war with Antiochus. Their
fidelity could not but be doubtful; probably, however, he thought that
at a distance from Syria they would not dare to fail him, and that with
an enemy so barbarous as the Scythians they would have no temptation to
fraternize. But the event proved him mistaken. The Greeks were sullen at
their captivity, and exasperated by some cruel treatment which they
had received when first captured. They bided their time; and when, in a
battle with the Scythians, they saw the Parthian soldiery hard pressed
and in danger of defeat, they decided matters by going over in a body
to the enemy. The Parthian army was completely routed and destroyed, and
Phraates himself was among the slain. We are not told what became of the
victorious Greeks; but it is to be presumed that, like the Ten Thousand,
they fought their way across Asia, and rejoined their own countrymen.

Thus died Phraates I., after a reign of about eight or nine years.
Though not possessing the talents of his father, he was a brave and
warlike prince, active, enterprising, fertile in resources, and bent
on maintaining against all assailants the honor and integrity of the
Empire. In natural temperament he was probably at once soft and cruel.
But, when policy required it, he could throw his softness aside and show
himself a hardy and intrepid warrior. Similarly, he could control his
natural harshness, and act upon occasion with clemency and leniency. He
was not, perhaps, without a grim humor, which led him to threaten more
than he intended, in order to see how men would comport themselves when
greatly alarmed. There is some evidence that he aimed at saying good
things; though it must be confessed that the wit is not of a high order.
Altogether he has more character than most Oriental monarchs; and
the monotony of Arsacid biography is agreeably interrupted by the
idiosyncrasy which his words and conduct indicate.




CHAPTER VIII.


_Accession of Artabanus II. Position of Parthia. Growing pressure upon
her, and general advance towards the south, of the Saka or Scyths.
Causes and extent of the movement. Character and principal tribes of the
Saka. Scythic war of Artabanus. His death._


The successor of Phraates was his uncle, Artabanus, a son of Priapatius.
It is probable that the late king had either left no son, or none
of sufficient age to be a fit occupant of the throne at a season of
difficulty. The “Megistanes,” therefore, elected Artabanus in his
nephew’s place, a man of mature age, and, probably, of some experience
in war. The situation of Parthia, despite her recent triumph over the
Syro-Macedonians, was critical; and it was of the greatest importance
that the sceptre should be committed to one who would bring to the
discharge of his office those qualities of wisdom, promptness, and
vigor, which a crisis demands.

The difficulty of the situation was two-fold. In the first place,
there was an immediate danger to be escaped. The combined Greeks and
Scythians, who had defeated the Parthian army and slain the monarch,
might have been expected to push their advantage to the utmost, and
seek to establish themselves as conquerors in the country which lay
apparently at their mercy. At any rate, the siege and sack of some of
the chief towns was a probable contingency, if permanent occupation
of the territory did not suit the views of the confederates. The
new monarch had to rid Parthia of her invaders at as little cost as
possible, before he could allow himself to turn his attention to any
other matter whatsoever. Nor did this, under the circumstances, appear
to be an easy task. The flower of the Parthian troops had been destroyed
in the late battle, and it was not easy to replace them by another
native army. The subject-nations were at no time to be depended upon
when Parthia was reduced to straits, and at the present conjecture some
of the most important were in a condition bordering upon rebellion.
Himerus, the viceroy left by Phraates in Babylonia, had first driven
the Babylonians and Seleucians to desperation by his tyranny, and then
plunged into a war with the people of Mesene, which must have made it
difficult for him to send Artabanus any contingent. Fortunately for the
Parthians, the folly or moderation of their enemies rendered any great
effort on their part unnecessary. The Greeks, content with having
revenged themselves, gave the new monarch no trouble at all: the
Scythians were satisfied with plundering and wasting the open country,
after which they returned quietly to their homes. Artabanus found
himself quit of the immediate danger which had threatened him almost
without exertion of his own, and could now bend his thoughts to the
position of his country generally, and the proper policy to pursue under
the circumstances.

For there was a second and more formidable danger impending over the
State--a danger not casual and temporary like the one just escaped, but
arising out of a condition of things in neighboring regions which had
come about slowly, and which promised to be permanent. To give the
reader the means of estimating this danger aright, it will be necessary
to take a somewhat wide view of the state of affairs on the northern
and north-eastern frontiers of Parthia for some time previously to the
accession of Artabanus, to trace out the causes which were at work,
producing important changes in these regions, and to indicate the
results which threatened, and those which were accomplished. The
opportunity will also serve for giving such an account of the chief
races which here bordered the empire as will show the nature of the
peril to which Parthia was exposed at this period.

In the wide plains of Northern Asia, extending from the Arctic Ocean to
the Thian Chan mountains and the Jaxartes, there had been nurtured from
a remote antiquity a nomadic population, at no time very numerous in
proportion to the area over which it was spread, but liable on occasions
to accumulate, owing to a combination of circumstances, in this or that
portion of the region occupied, and at such times causing trouble to its
neighbors. From about the close of the third century B.C. symptoms
of such an accumulation had begun to display themselves in the tract
immediately north of the Jaxartes, and the inhabitants of the countries
south of that river had suffered from a succession of raids and inroads,
which were not regarded as dangerous, but which gave constant annoyance.
Crossing the great desert of Kharesm by forced marches, some of the
hordes invaded the green valleys of Hyrcania and Parthia, and carried
desolation over those fair and flourishing districts. About the same
time other tribes entered the Bactrian territory and caused alarm to the
Greek kingdom recently established in that province. It appears that
the Parthian monarchs, unable to save their country from incursions,
consented to pay a sort of black-mail to their invaders, by allowing
them the use of their pasture grounds at certain fixed times--probably
during some months of each year. The Bactrian princes had to pay a
heavier penalty. Province after province of their kingdom was swallowed
up by the northern hordes, who gradually occupied Sogdiana, or the tract
between the lower Jaxartes and the lower Oxus, whence they proceeded to
make inroads into Bactria itself. The rich land on the Polytimetus, or
Ak Su, the river of Samarkand, and even the highlands between the upper
Jaxartes and upper Oxus, were permanently occupied by the invaders;
and if the Bactrians had not compensated themselves for their losses by
acquisitions of territory in Afghanistan and India, they would soon
have had no kingdom left. The hordes were always increasing in strength
through the influx of fresh immigrants, and in lieu of Bactria a power
now stood arrayed on the north-eastern frontier of the Parthians, which
was reasonably regarded with the most serious alarm and suspicion.

The origin of the state of things here described is to be sought,
according to the best authorities, in certain movements which took
place about B.C. 200, in a remote region of inner Asia. At that time a
Turanian people called the Yue-chi were expelled from their territory on
the west of Chen-si by the Hiong-nu, whom some identified with the Huns.
The Yue-chi separated into two bands; the smaller descended southwards
into Thibet; the larger passed westwards, and after a hard struggle
dispossessed a people called ‘Su’ of the plains west of the river of Hi.
These latter advanced to Ferghana and the Jaxartes; and the Yue-chi not
long afterwards retreating from the Usiun, another nomadic race, passed
the ‘Su’ on the north and occupied the tracts between the Oxus and the
Caspian. The Su were thus in the vicinity of the Bactrian Greeks; the
Yue-chi in the neighborhood of the Parthians. On the particulars of
this account, which come from the Chinese historians, we cannot perhaps
altogether depend; but there is no reason to doubt the main fact,
attested by a writer who visited the Yue-chi in B.C. 139, that they had
migrated about the period mentioned from the interior of Asia, and had
established themselves sixty years later in the Caspian region. Such a
movement would necessarily have thrown the entire previous population
of those parts into commotion, and would probably have precipitated them
upon their neighbors. It accounts satisfactorily for the pressure of the
northern hordes at this period on the Parthians, Bactrians, and even
the Indians; and it completely explains the crisis in Parthian history,
which we have now reached, and the necessity which lay upon the nation
of meeting and, if possible, overcoming, an entirely new danger.

In fact, one of those occasions of peril had arisen, to which in ancient
times the civilized world was always liable from an outburst of northern
barbarism. Whether the peril has altogether passed away or not we need
not here inquire; but certainly in the old world there was always a
chance that civilization, art, refinement, luxury, might suddenly and
almost without warning be swept away by an overwhelming influx of savage
hordes from the unpolished North. From the reign of Oyaxares, when
the evil first showed itself, the danger was patent to all wise and
far-seeing governors both in Europe and Asia, and was from time to time
guarded against. The expeditions of Cyrus against the Massagetse, of
Darius Hystaspis against the European Scyths, of Alexander against the
Getee, of Trajan and Probus across the Danube, were designed to check
and intimidate the northern nations, to break their power, and diminish
the likelihood of their taking the offensive. It was now more than four
centuries since in this part of Asia any such effort had been made; and
the northern barbarians might naturally have ceased to fear the arms and
discipline of the South. Moreover the circumstances of the time
scarcely left them a choice. Pressed on continually more and more by the
newly-arrived Su and Yue-chi, the old inhabitants of the Transoxianian
regions were under the necessity of seeking new settlements, and could
only attempt to find them in the quarter towards which they were driven
by the new-comers. Strengthened, probably, by daring spirits from among
their conquerors themselves they crossed the rivers and the deserts
by which they had been hitherto confined, and advancing against the
Parthians, Bactrians, and Arians, threatened to carry all before them.
We have seen how successful they were against the Bactrians. In Ariana,
they passed the mountains, and, proceeding southwards, occupied the
tract below the great lake wherein the Helmend terminates, which took
from them the name of Saeastane (“land of the Saka,” or Scyths)--a name
still to be traced in the modern “Seistan.” Further to the east they
effected a lodgment in Kabul, and another in the the southern portion of
the Indus valley, which for a time bore the name of Indo-Scythia. They
even crossed the Indus and attempted to penetrate into the interior of
India, but here they were met and repulsed by a native monarch, about
the year B.C. 56.

The people engaged in this great movement are called, in a general way,
by the classical writers, Sacse, or Scythse--i.e. Scyths. They consisted
of a number of tribes, similar for the most part in language, habits,
and mode of life, and allied more or less closely to the other nomadic
races of Central and Northern Asia. Of these tribes the principal were
the Massagetse (“great Jits, or Jats”), who occupied the country on
both sides of the lower course of the Oxus; the Dahse, who bordered the
Caspian above Hyrcania, and extended thence to the latitude of Herat;
the Tochari, who settled in the mountains between the upper Jaxartes and
the upper Oxus, where they gave name to the tract known as Tokhar-estan;
the Asii, or Asiani, who were closely connected with the Tochari,
and the Sakarauli (Saracucse?), who are found connected with both the
Tochari and the Asiani. Some of these tribes contained within them
further sub-divisions; e.g. the Dahse, who comprised the Parni (or
Apariii), the Pissuri, and the Xanthii; and the Massagetse, who included
among them Chorasmii, Attasii, and others.

The general character of the barbarism in which these various races were
involved may be best learnt from the description given of one of them,
the Massagetae, with but few differences, by Herodotus and Strabo.
According to this description, the Massagetse were nomads, who moved
about in wagons or carts, accompanied by their flocks and herds, on
whose milk they chiefly sustained themselves. Each man had only one
wife, but all the wives were held in common. They were good riders and
excellent archers, but fought both on horseback and on foot, and used,
besides their bows and arrows, lances, knives, and battle-axes. They had
little or no iron, but made their spear and arrow-heads, and their other
weapons, of bronze. They had also bronze breast-plates; but otherwise
the metal with which they adorned and protected their own persons,
and the heads of their horses, was gold. To a certain extent they were
cannibals. It was their custom not to let the aged among them die a
natural death, but, when life seemed approaching its natural term, to
offer them up in sacrifice,--and then boil the flesh and feast on it.
This mode of ending life was regarded as the best and most honorable;
such as died of disease were not eaten but buried, and their friends
bewailed their misfortune.

It may be added to this that we have sufficient reason to believe that
the Massagetse and the other nomads of these parts regarded the use
of poisoned arrows as legitimate in warfare, and employed the venom of
serpents, and the corrupted blood of man, to make the wounds which they
inflicted more deadly.

Thus, what was threatened was not merely the conquest of one race by
another cognate to it, like that of the Medes by the Persians, or of
the Greeks by Rome, but the obliteration of such art, civilization,
and refinement as Western Asia had attained to in course of ages by
the successive efforts of Babylonians, Assyrians, Medes, Persians, and
Greeks--the spread over some of the fairest regions of the earth of a
low type of savagery--a type which in religion went no further than the
worship of the sun; in art knew but the easier forms of metallurgy and
the construction of carts; in manners and customs, included cannibalism,
the use of poisoned weapons, and a relation between the sexes
destructive alike of all delicacy and of all family affection. The
Parthians were, no doubt, rude and coarse in their character as compared
with the Persians; but they had been civilized to a certain extent by
three centuries of subjection to the Persians and the Greco-Macedonians
before they rose to power; they affected Persian manners; they
patronized Greek art, they appreciated the advantages of having in their
midst a number of Greek states. Had the Massagetse and their kindred
tribes of Sakas, Tochari, Dahse, Yue-chi, and Su, which now menaced the
Parthian power, succeeded in sweeping it away, the general declension of
all which is lovely or excellent in human life would have been marked.
Scythicism would have overspread Western Asia. No doubt the conquerors
would have learned something from those whom they subjected; but it
cannot be supposed that they would have learned much. The change would
have been like that which passed over the Empire of the West, when
Goths, Vandals, Burgundians, Alans, Heruli, depopulated its fairest
provinces and laid its civilization in the dust. The East would have
been barbarized; the gains of centuries would have been lost; the work
of Cyrus, Darius, Alexander, and other great benefactors of Asiatic
humanity, have been undone; Western Asia would have sunk back into a
condition not very much above that from which it was raised two thousand
years earlier by the primitive Chaldaeans and the Assyrians.

Artabanus II., the Parthian monarch who succeeded Phraates II., appears
to have appreciated aright the perils of his position. He was not
content, when the particular body of barbarians which had defeated and
slain his predecessor, having ravaged Parthia Proper, returned home,
to fold his arms and wait until he was again attacked. According to the
brief, but expressive words of Justin, he assumed the aggressive, and
invaded the country of the Tochari, one of the most powerful of the
Scythic tribes, which was now settled in a portion of the region that
had, till lately, belonged to the Bactrian kingdom. Artabanus evidently
felt that what was needed was to roll back the flood of invasion
which had advanced so near to the sacred home of his nation; that the
barbarians required to be taught a lesson; that they must at least be
made to understand that Parthia was to be respected; or that, if this
could not be done, the fate of the Empire was sealed. He therefore, with
a gallantry and boldness that we cannot sufficiently admire--a boldness
that seemed like rashness, but was in reality prudence--without
calculating too closely the immediate chances of battle, led his troops
against one of the most forward of the advancing tribes. But fortune,
unhappily, was adverse. How the battle was progressing we are not told;
but it appears that in the thick of an engagement Artabanus received
a wound in the forearm, from the effects of which he died almost
immediately. The death of the leader decides in the East, almost to a
certainty, the issue of a contest. We cannot doubt that the Parthians,
having lost their monarch, were repulsed; that the expedition failed;
and that the situation of affairs became once more at least as
threatening as it had been before Artabanus made his attempt. Two
Parthian monarchs had now fallen within the space of a few years in
combat with the aggressive Scyths--two Parthian armies had suffered
defeat. Was this to be always so? If it was, then Parthia had only to
make up her mind to fall, and, like the great Roman, to let it be her
care that she should fall grandly and with dignity.




CHAPTER IX.


_Accession of Mithridates II. Termination of the Scythic Wars.
Commencement of the struggle with Armenia. Previous history of Armenia.
Result of the first Armenian War. First contact of Rome with Parthia.
Attitude of Rome towards the East at this time. Second Armenian War.
Death of Mithridates._


On the death of Artabanus II., about B.C. 124, his son, Mithridates II.,
was proclaimed king. Of this monarch, whose achievements (according to
Justin) procured him the epithet of “the Great,” the accounts which have
come down to us are extremely scanty and unsatisfactory. Justin, who is
our principal informant on the subject of the early Parthian history,
has unfortunately confounded him with the third monarch of the name, who
ascended the throne more than sixty years later, and has left us
only the slightest and most meagre outline of his actions. The other
classical writers, only to a very small extent, supplement Justin’s
narrative; and the result is that of a reign which was one of the most
important in the early Parthian series, the historical inquirer at the
present day can form but a most incomplete conception.

It appears, however, from the account of Justin, and from such other
notices as have reached us of the condition of things at this time in
the regions lying east of the Caspian, that Mithridates was entirely
successful where his father and his cousin had signally failed. He
gained a number of victories over the Scythic hordes; and effectually
checked their direct progress towards the south, throwing them thereby
upon the east and the south-east. Danger to Parthia from the Scyths
seems after his reign to have passed away. They found a vent for their
superabundant population in Seistan, Afghanistan, and India, and ceased
to have any hopes of making an impression on the Arsacid kingdom.
Mithridates, it is probable, even took territory from them. The
acquisition of parts of Bactria by the Parthians from the Scyths, which
is attested by Strabo, belongs, in all likelihood, to his reign; and
the extension of the Parthian dominion to Seistan may well date from the
same period. Justin tells us that he added many nations to the Parthian
Empire. The statements made of the extent of Parthia on the side of
Syria in the time of Mithridates the First render it impossible for us
to discover these nations in the west: we are, therefore, compelled to
regard them as consisting of races on the eastern frontier, who could at
this period only be outlying tribes of the recent Scythic immigration.

The victories of Mithridates in the East encouraged him to turn his
arms in the opposite direction, and to make an attack on the important
country of Armenia, which bordered his north-western frontier. Armenia
was at the time under the government of a certain Ortoadistus, who seems
to have been the predecessor, and was perhaps the father, of the great
Tigranes. Ortoadistus ruled the tract called by the Romans “Armenia
Magna,” which extended from the Euphrates on the west to the mouth of
the Araxes on the east, and from the valley of the Kur northwards to
Mount Niphates and the head streams of the Tigris towards the south. The
people over which he ruled was one of the oldest in Asia and had on many
occasions shown itself impatient of a conqueror. Justin, on reaching
this point in his work, observes that he could not feel himself
justified if, when his subject brought before him so mighty a kingdom,
he did not enter at some length on its previous history. The modern
historian would be even less excusable than Justin if he omitted such
a review, since, while he has less right to assume a knowledge of early
Armenian history on the part of his readers, he has greater means of
gratifying their curiosity, owing to the recent discovery of sources of
information unknown to the ancients.

Armenia first comes before us in Genesis, where it is mentioned as the
country on whose mountains the ark rested. A recollection of it was
thenceforth retained in the semi-mythic traditions of the Babylonians.
According to some, the Egyptian monarchs of the eighteenth and
nineteenth dynasties carried their arms into its remote valleys, and
exacted tribute from the petty chiefs who then ruled there. At any rate,
it is certain that from about the ninth century B.C. it was well known
to the Assyrians, who were engaged from that time till about B.C. 640
in almost constant wars with its inhabitants. At this period three
principal races inhabited the country--the Nairi, who were spread from
the mountains west of Lake Van along both sides of the Tigris to Bir
on the Euphrates, and even further; the Urarda (Alarodii, or people of
Ararat), who dwelt north and east of the Nairi, on the upper Euphrates,
about the lake of Van, and probably on the Araxes; and the Minni, whose
country lay south-east of the Urarda, in the Urumiyeh basin and the
adjoining parts of Zagros. Of these three races, the Urarda were the
most powerful, and it was with them that the Assyrians waged their most
bloody wars. The capital city of the Urarda was Van, on the eastern
shores of the lake; and here it was that their kings set up the most
remarkable of their inscriptions. Six monarchs, who apparently all
belong to one dynasty, left inscriptions in this locality commemorative
of their military expeditions or of their offerings to the gods. The
later names of the series can be identified with those of kings who
contended with Assyrian monarchs belonging to the last, or Sargonid
dynasty; and hence we are entitled approximately to fix the series to
the seventh and eighth centuries before our era. The Urarda must at this
time have exercised a dominion over almost the whole of the region
to which the name of Armenia commonly attaches. They were worthy
antagonists of the Assyrians, and, though occasionally worsted in
fight, maintained their independence, at any rate, till the time of
Asshur-bani-pal (about B.C. 640), when the last king of the Van series,
whose name is read as Bilat-duri, succumbed to the Assyrian power, and
consented to pay a tribute for his dominions.

There is reason to believe that between the time when we obtain this
view of the primitive Armenian peoples and that at which we next have
any exact knowledge of the condition of the country--the time of the
Persian monarchy--a great revolution had taken place in the region.
The Nairi, Urarda, and Minni were Turanian, or, at any rate, non-Arian,
races. Their congeners in Western Asia were the early Babylonians and
the Susianians, not the Medes, the Persians, or the Phrygians. But by
the time of Herodotus the Arian character of the Armenians had become
established. Their close connection with the Phrygians was recognized.
They had changed their national appellation; for while in the Assyrian
period the terms Nairi and Urarda had preponderated, under the Persians
they had come to be called Armenians and their country Armenia. The
personal names of individuals in the country, both men and women, had
acquired a decidedly Arian cast. Everything seems to indicate that a
strange people had immigrated into the land, bringing with them a new
language, new manners and customs, and a new religious system. From what
quarter they had come, whether from Phrygia as Herodotus and Stephen
believed, or, as we should gather from their language and religion, from
Media, is perhaps doubtful; but it seems certain that from one quarter
or another Armenia had been Arianized; the old Turanian character had
passed away from it; immigrants had nocked in, and a new people had
been formed--the real Armenian of later times, and indeed of the present
day--by the admixture of ruling Arian tribes with a primitive Turanian
population, the descendants of the old inhabitants.

The new race, thus formed, though perhaps not less brave and warlike
than the old, was less bent on maintaining its independence. Moses of
Chorene, the Armenian historian, admits that from the time of the Median
preponderance in Western Asia the Armenians held under them a subject
position. That such was their position under the Persians is abundantly
evident;25 and, so far as appears, there was only one occasion during
the entire Achaemenian period (B.C. 559 to B.C. 331) when they exhibited
any impatience of the Persian yoke, or made any attempt to free
themselves from it. In the early portion of the reign of Darius
Hystaspis they took part in a revolt raised by a Mede called Phraortes,
and were not reduced to obedience without some difficulty. But from
henceforth their fidelity to the Achaemenian Kings was unbroken; they
paid their tribute (apparently) without reluctance, and furnished
contingents of troops to the Persian armies when called upon. After
Arbela they submitted without a struggle to Alexander; and when in the
division of his dominions, which followed upon the battle of Ipsus, they
fell naturally to Seleucus, they acquiesced in the arrangement. It was
not until Antiochus the Great suffered his great defeat at the hands of
the Romans (B.C. 190) that Armenia bestirred itself, and, after probably
four and a half centuries of subjection, became once more an independent
power. Even then the movement seems to have originated rather in the
ambition of a chief than in a desire for liberty on the part of
the people. Artaxias had been governor of the Greater Armenia under
Antiochus, and seized the opportunity afforded by the battle of Magnesia
to change his title of satrap into that of sovereign. No war followed.
Antiochus was too much weakened by his reverses to make any attempt to
reduce Artaxias or recover Armenia; and the nation obtained autonomy
without having to undergo the usual ordeal of a bloody struggle. When at
the expiration of five-and-twenty years Epiphanes, the son of Antiochus
the Great, determined on an effort to reconquer the lost province, no
very stubborn resistance was offered to him. Artaxias was defeated and
made prisoner in the very first year of the war (B.C. 165), and Armenia
seems to have passed again under the sway of the Seleucidae.

It would seem that matters remained in this state for the space of about
fifteen or sixteen years. When, however, Mithridates I. (Arsaces VI.),
about B.C. 150, had overrun the eastern provinces of Syria, and made
himself master in succession of Media, Elymais, and Babylonia, the
revolutionary movement excited by his successes reached Armenia, and the
standard of independence was once more raised in that country. According
to the Armenian historians, an Arsacid prince, Wagharshag or Valarsaces,
was established as sovereign by the influence of the Parthian monarch,
but was allowed to rule independently. A reign of twenty-two years is
assigned to this prince, whose kingdom is declared to have reached from
the Caucasus to Nisibis, and from the Caspian to the Mediterranean. He
was succeeded by his son, Arshag (Arsaces), who reigned thirteen years,
and was, like his father, active and warlike, contending chiefly with
the people of Pontus. At his death the crown descended to his son,
Ardashes, who is probably the Ortoadistus of Justin.

Such were the antecedents of Armenia when Mithridates II., having
given an effectual check to the progress of the Scythians in the east,
determined to direct his arms towards the west, and to attack the
dominions of his relative, the third of the Armenian Arsacidse. Of
the circumstances of this war, and its results, we have scarcely
any knowledge. Justin, who alone distinctly mentions it, gives us no
details. A notice, however, in Strabo, which must refer to about this
time, is thought to indicate with sufficient clearness the result of the
struggle, which seems to have been unfavorable to the Armenians. Strabo
says that Tigranes, before his accession to the throne, was for a time
a hostage among the Parthians. As hostages are only given by the
vanquished party, we may assume that Ortoadistus (Ardashes) found
himself unable to offer an effectual resistance to the Parthian
king, and consented after a while to a disadvantageous peace, for his
observance of which hostages were required by the victor.

It cannot have been more than a few years after the termination of this
war, which must have taken place towards the close of the second, or
soon after the beginning of the first century, that Parthia was for the
first time brought into contact with Rome.

The Great Republic, which after her complete victory over Antiochus
III., B.C. 190, had declined to take possession of a single foot of
ground in Asia, regarding the general state of affairs as not then ripe
for an advance of Terminus in that quarter, had now for some time seen
reason to alter its policy, and to aim at adding to its European an
extensive Asiatic dominion. Macedonia and Greece having been absorbed,
and Carthage destroyed (B.C. 148-146), the conditions of the political
problem seemed to be so far changed as to render a further advance
towards the east a safe measure; and accordingly, when it was seen that
the line of the kings of Pergamus was coming to an end, the Senate set
on foot intrigues which had for their object the devolution upon Rome
of the sovereignty belonging to those monarchs. By clever management the
third Attalus was induced, in repayment of his father’s obligations
to the Romans, to bequeath his entire dominions as a legacy to the
Republic. In vain did his illegitimate half-brother, Aristonicus,
dispute the validity of so extraordinary a testament; the Romans, aided
by Mithridates IV., then monarch of Pontus, easily triumphed over such
resistance as this unfortunate prince could offer, and having ceded to
their ally the portion of Phrygia which had belonged to the Pergamene
kingdom, entered on the possession of the remainder. Having thus
become an Asiatic power, the Great Republic was of necessity mixed
up henceforth with the various movements and struggles which agitated
Western Asia, and was naturally led to strengthen its position among the
Asiatic kingdoms by such alliances as seemed at each conjuncture best
fitted for its interests.

Hitherto no occasion had arisen for any direct dealings between Rome
and Parthia. Their respective territories were still separated by
considerable tracts, which were in the occupation of the Syrians, the
Cappadocians, and the Armenians. Their interests had neither clashed,
nor as yet sufficiently united them to give rise to any diplomatic
intercourse. But the progress of the two Empires in opposite directions
was continually bringing them nearer to each other; and events had now
reached a point at which the Empires began to have (or seem to have)
such a community of interests as led naturally to an exchange of
communications. A great power had been recently developed in these
parts. In the rapid way so common in the East. Mithridates V., of
Pontus, the son and successor of Rome’s ally, had, between B.C. 112 and
B.C. 93, built up an Empire of vast extent, numerous population, and
almost inexhaustible resources. He had established his authority over
Armenia Minor, Colchis, the entire east coast of the Black Sea, the
Chersonesus Taurica, or kingdom of the Bosporus, and even over the whole
tract lying west of the Chersonese as far as the mouth of the Tyras,
or Dniester. Nor had these gains contented him. He had obtained half of
Paphlagonia by an iniquitous compact with Nicomedes, King of Bithynia;
he had occupied Galatia; and he was engaged in attempts to bring
Cappadocia under his influence. In this last-named project he was
assisted by the Armenians, with whose king, Tigranes, he had (about B.C.
96) formed a close alliance, at the same time giving him his daughter,
Cleopatra, in marriage. Rome, though she had not yet determined on war
with Mithridates, was resolved to thwart his Cappadocian projects, and
in B.C. 92 sent Sulla into Asia with orders to put down the puppet whom
Mithridates and Tigranes were establishing, and to replace upon the
Cappadocian throne a certain Ariobarzanes, whom they had driven from
his kingdom. In the execution of this commission, Sulla was brought
into hostile collision with the Armenians, whom he defeated with great
slaughter, and drove from Cappadocia together with their puppet king.
Thus, not only did the growing power of Mithridates of Pontus, by
inspiring Rome and Parthia with a common fear, tend to draw them
together, but the course of events had actually given them a common
enemy in Tigranes of Armenia, who was equally obnoxious to both.

For Tigranes, who, during the time that he was a hostage in Parthia,
had contracted engagements towards the Parthian monarch which involved
a cession of territory, and who in consequence of his promises had been
aided by the Parthians in seating himself on his father’s throne though
he made the cession required of him in the first instance had soon
afterwards repented of his good faith, had gone to war with his
benefactors, recovered the ceded territory, and laid waste a
considerable tract of country lying within the admitted limits of
the Parthian kingdom. These proceedings had, of course, alienated
Mithridates II.; and we may with much probability ascribe to them the
step, which he now took, of sending an ambassador to Sulla. Orobazus,
the individual selected, was charged to propose an alliance offensive
and defensive between the two countries. Sulla received the overture
favorably, but probably considered that it transcended his powers to
conclude a treaty; and thus nothing more was effected by the embassy
than the establishment of a good understanding between the two States.

Soon after this Tigranes appears to have renewed his attacks upon
Parthia, which in the interval between B.C. 92 and B.C. 83 he greatly
humbled, depriving it of the whole of Upper Mesopotamia, at this time
called Gordyene, and under rule of one of the Parthian tributary kings.
Of the details of this war we have no account; and it is even uncertain
whether it fell within the reign of Mithridates II. or no. The
unfortunate mistake of Justin, whereby he confounded this monarch with
Mithridates III., has thrown this portion of the Parthian history into
confusion, and has made even the successor of Mithridates II. uncertain.

Mithridates II. probably died about B.C. 89, after a reign which
must have exceeded thirty-five years. His great successes against
the Scythians in the earlier portion of his reign were to some extent
counterbalanced by his losses to Tigranes in his old age; but on the
whole he must be regarded as one of the more vigorous and successful of
the Parthian monarchs, and as combining courage with prudence. It is to
his credit that he saw the advantage of establishing friendly relations
with Rome at a time when an ordinary Oriental monarch might have
despised the distant Republic, and have thought it beneath his dignity
to make overtures to so strange and anomalous a power. Whether he
definitely foresaw the part which Rome was about to play in the East,
we may doubt; but at any rate he must have had a prevision that the
part would not be trifling or insignificant. Of the private character of
Mithridates we have no sufficient materials to judge. If it be true that
he put his envoy, Orobazus, to death on account of his having allowed
Sulla to assume a position at their conference derogatory to the dignity
of the Parthian State, we must pronounce him a harsh master; but the
tale, which rests wholly on the weak authority of the gossip-loving
Plutarch, is perhaps scarcely to be accepted.




CHAPTER X.


_Dark period of Parthian History. Doubtful succession of the Monarchs.
Accession of Sanatrceces, ab. B.C. 76. Position of Parthia during the
Mithridatic Wars. Accession of Phraates III. His relations with Pompey.
His death. Civil War between his two sons, Mithridates and Orodes. Death
of Mithridates._


The successor of Mithridates II. is unknown. It has been argued, indeed,
that the reigns of the known monarchs of this period would not be unduly
long if we regarded them as strictly consecutive, and placed no blank
between the death of Mithridates II. and the accession of the next
Arsaces whose name has come down to us. Sanatrodoeces, it has been said,
may have been, and may, therefore, well be regarded as, the successor
of Mithridates. But the words of the epitomizer of Trogus, placed at
the head of this chapter, forbid the acceptance of this theory. The
epitomizer would not have spoken of “many kings” as intervening between
Mithridates II. and Orodes, if the number had been only three. The
expression implies, at least, four or five monarchs; and thus we have
no choice but to suppose that the succession of the kings is here
imperfect, and that at least one or two reigns were interposed between
those of the second Mithridates and of the monarch known as Sanatroeces,
Sinatroces, or Sintricus.

A casual notice of a Parthian monarch in a late writer may supply the
gap, either wholly or in part. Lucian speaks of a certain Mnasciras as
a Parthian king, who died at the advanced age of ninety-six. As there
is no other place in the Parthian history at which the succession is
doubtful, and as no such name as Mnascris occurs elsewhere in the list,
it seems necessary, unless we reject Lucian’s authority altogether, to
insert this monarch here. We cannot say, however, how long he reigned,
or ascribe to him any particular actions; nor can we say definitely
what king he either succeeded or preceded. It is possible that his reign
covered the entire interval between Mithridates II. and Sanatroeces; it
is possible, on the other hand, that he had successors and predecessors,
whose names have altogether perished.

The expression used by the epitomizer of Trogus, and a few words
dropped by Plutarch, render it probable that about this time there were
contentions between various members of the Arsacid family which issued
in actual civil war. Such contentions are a marked feature of the later
history; and, according to Plutarch, they commenced at this period. We
may suspect, from the great age of two of the monarchs chosen, that
the Arsacid stock was now very limited in number, that it offered no
candidates for the throne whose claims were indisputable, and that
consequently at each vacancy there was a division of opinion among the
“Megistanes,” which led to the claimants making appeal, if the election
went against them, to the arbitrament of arms.

The dark time of Parthian history is terminated by the
accession--probably in B.C. 76--of the king above mentioned as known
by the three names of Sanatroeces, Sinatroces, and Sintricus. The form,
Sanatroeces, which appears upon the Paithian coins, is on that account
to be preferred. The king so called had reached when elected the
advanced age of eighty. It may be suspected that he was a son of the
sixth Arsaces (Mithridates I.), and consequently a brother of Phraates
II. He had, perhaps, been made prisoner by that Scythians in the course
of the disastrous war waged by that monarch, and had been retained in
captivity for above fifty years. At any rate, he appears to have
been indebted to the Scythians in some measure for the crown which he
acquired so tardily, his enjoyment of it having been secured by the help
of a contingent of troops furnished to him by the Scythian tribe of the
Sacauracae.

The position of the Empire at the time of his accession was one of
considerable difficulty. Parthia, during the period of her civil
contentions, had lost much ground in the west, having been deprived by
Tigranes of at least two important provinces. At the same time she had
been witness of the tremendous struggle between Rome and Pontus which
commenced in B.C. 88, was still continuing, and still far from decided,
when Sanatroeces came to the throne. An octogenarian monarch was unfit
to engage in strife, and if Sanatroeces, notwithstanding this drawback,
had been ambitious of military distinction, it would have been difficult
for him to determine into which scale the interests of his country
required that he should cast the weight of his sword. On the one hand,
Parthia had evidently much to fear from the military force and the
covetous disposition of Tigranes, king of Armenia, the son-in-law of
Mithridates, and at this time his chosen alley. Tigranes had hitherto
been continually increasing in strength. By the defeat of Artanes, king
of Sophene, or Armenia Minor, he had made himself master of Armenia
in its widest extent; by his wars with Parthia herself he had acquired
Gordyene, or Northern Mesopotamia, and Adiabene, or the entire rich
tract east of the middle Tigris (including Assyria Proper and Arbelitis),
as far, at any rate, as the course of the lower Zab; by means which are
not stated he had brought under subjection the king of the important
country of Media Artropatene, independent since the time of Alexander.
Invited into Syria, about B.C. 83, by the wretched inhabitants, wearied
with the perpetual civil wars between the princes of the house of the
Seleucidae, he had found no difficulty in establishing himself as
king over Cilicia, Syria, and most of Phoenicia. About B.C. 80 he
had determined on building himself a new capital in the province of
Gordyene, a capital of a vast size, provided with all the luxuries
required by an Oriental court, and fortified with walls which recalled
the glories of the ancient cities of the Assyrians. The position of this
huge town on the very borders of the Parthian kingdom, in a province
which had till very recently been Parthian, could be no otherwise
understood that as a standing menace to Parthia itself, the proclamation
of an intention to extend the Armenian dominion southwards, and to
absorb at any rate all the rich and fertile country between Gordyene
and the sea. Thus threatened by Armenia, it was impossible for
Sanatroeces cordially to embrace the side of Mithridates, with which
Armenia and its king were so closely allied; it was impossible for him
even to wish that the two allies should be free to work their will on
the Asiatic continent unchecked by the power which alone had for the
last twelve years obstructed their ambitious projects.

On the other hand, there was already among the Asiatic princes generally
a deep distrust of Rome--a fear that in the new people, which had
crept so quietly into Asia, was to be found a power more permanently
formidable than the Macedonians, a power which would make up for want
of brilliancy and dash by a dogged perseverance in its aims, and a
stealthy, crafty policy, sure in the end to achieve great and striking
results. The acceptance of the kingdom of Attalus had not, perhaps,
alarmed any one; but the seizure of Phrygia during the minority of
Mithridates, without so much as a pretext, and the practice, soon
afterwards established, of setting up puppet kings, bound to do the
bidding of their Roman allies, had raised suspicions; the ease with
which Mithridates notwithstanding his great power and long preparation,
had been vanquished in the first war (B.C. 88-84) had aroused fears; and
Sanatroeces could not but misdoubt the advisability of lending aid to
the Romans, and so helping them to obtain a still firmer hold on Western
Asia. Accordingly we find that when the final war broke out, in B.C. 74,
his inclination was, in the first instance, to stand wholly aloof, and
when that became impossible, then to temporize. To the application
for assistance made by Mithridates in B.C. 72 a direct negative was
returned; and it was not until, in B.C. 69, the war had approached his
own frontier, and both parties made the most earnest appeals to him for
aid, that he departed from the line of pure abstention, and had recourse
to the expedient of amusing, both sides with promises, while he
helped neither. According to Plutarch, this line of procedure offended
Lucullus, and had nearly induced him to defer the final struggle with
Mithridates and Tigranes, and turn his arms against Parthia. But the
prolonged resistance of Nisibis, and the successes of Mithridates in
Pontus, diverted the danger; and the war rolling northwards, Parthia was
not yet driven to take a side, but was enabled to maintain her neutral
position for some years longer.

Meanwhile the aged Sanatroeces died, and was succeeded by his son,
Phraates III. This prince followed at first his father’s example, and
abstained from mixing himself up in the Mithridatic war; but in B.C.
66, being courted by both sides, and promised the restoration of the
provinces lost to Tigranes, he made alliance with Pompey, and undertook,
while the latter pressed the war against Mithridates, to find occupation
for the Armenian monarch in his own land. This engagement he executed
with fidelity. It had happened that the eldest living son of Tigranes, a
prince bearing the same name as his father, having raised a rebellion
in Armenia and been defeated, had taken refuge in Parthia with Phraates.
Phraates determined to take advantage of this circumstance. The young
Tigranes was supported by a party among his countrymen who wished to see
a youthful monarch upon the throne; and Phraates therefore considered
that he would best discharge his obligations to the Romans by fomenting
this family quarrel, and lending a moderate support to the younger
Tigranes against his father. He marched an army into Armenia in the
interest of the young prince, overran the open country, and advanced
on Artaxata, the capital. Tigranes, the king, fled at his approach, and
betook himself to the neighboring mountains. Artaxata was invested;
but as the siege promised to be long, the Parthian monarch after a
time withdrew, leaving the pretender with as many troops as he thought
necessary to press the siege to a successful issue. The result, however,
disappointed his expectations. Scarcely was Phraates gone, when the old
king fell upon his son, defeated him, and drove him beyond his borders.
He was forced, however, soon afterwards, to submit to Pompey, who, while
the civil war was raging in Armenia, had defeated Mithridates and driven
him to take refuge in the Tauric Chersonese.

Phraates, now, naturally expected the due reward of his services,
according to the stipulations of his agreement with Pompey. But that
general was either dissatisfied with the mode in which the Parthian had
discharged his obligations, or disinclined to strengthen the power which
he saw to be the only one in these parts capable of disputing with Rome
the headship of Asia. He could scarcely prevent, and he does not seem
to have tried to prevent, the recovery of Adiabene by the Parthians;
but the nearer province of Gordyene to which they had an equal claim,
he would by no means consent to their occupying. At first he destined it
for the younger Tigranes. When the prince offended him, he made it over
to Ariobarzanes, the Cappadocian monarch. That arrangement not taking
effect, and the tract being disputed between Phraates and the elder
Tigranes, he sent his legate, Afranius, to drive the Parthians out of
the country, and delivered it over into the hands of the Armenians.
At the same time he insulted the Parthian monarch by refusing him
his generally recognized title of “King of Kings.” He thus entirely
alienated his late ally, who remonstrated against the injustice with
which he was treated, and was only deterred from declaring war by the
wholesome fear which he entertained of the Roman arms.

Pompey, on his side, no doubt took the question into consideration
whether or no he should declare the Parthian prince a Roman enemy, and
proceed to direct against him the available forces of the Empire. He had
purposely made him hostile, and compelle

Showing first 200,000 characters. Full text: gutenberg.org/ebooks/16166