III. Roman period; from B. C. 53, to A. D. 226; comprising the wars with Rome. Arsaces XIV. (Orodes I.) d. 36. In his reign the first war with Rome, caused by the invasion of Crassus; it ends in the annihilation of the invading army and general, 53. In consequence of this victory the Parthians acquired such preponderance, that during the civil wars they were frequently masters on this side of the Euphrates, and in 52—51 proceeded to attack Syria.—In the war between Pompey and Cæsar they sided with the former, and thus furnished the latter with a pretext for his Parthian expedition, which, however, was prevented by his murder in 44; again in the war between the triumviri and Brutus and Cassius, 42, they took the republican side. After the defeat of Brutus and Cassius, the Parthians, at the instigation of the Roman general and ambassador Labienus, and commanded by him and Pacorus, (eldest son to Arsaces,) spread over the whole of Syria and Asia Minor, 40; but, after violent exertions, were driven back by Ventidius, Antony's general, 39, 38; Pacorus lost his life, and his father died of grief. Arsaces XV. (Phraates IV.) d. A. D. 4, contemporary of Augustus. He confirmed his power by murdering his brothers and their dependents; his views were likewise furthered by the failure of Antony's expedition, B. C. 36, which ended pretty nearly in the same manner as that of Crassus. The remainder of his reign was disturbed by a pretender to the throne, Tiridates, who, after his defeat, 25, found an asylum at the court of Augustus. The threatened attack of Augustus was diverted by Phraates's restoration of the standards taken from Crassus, 20; a dispute, however, subsequently arose respecting the possession of the Armenian throne, A. D. 2, on which account Caius Cæsar was despatched into Asia, and accommodated matters by a treaty. The ultimate fate both of the king and the empire was principally decided by a female slave, Thermusa, sent as a present from Augustus; this woman, wishing to ensure the succession to her own son, prevailed upon the king to send his four sons to Rome as hostages, under the pretext of anticipating domestic troubles, 18.—A practice which from that time became frequent, the Parthian kings thinking it a convenient mode of ridding themselves of dangerous competitors, while the Romans knew how to make the proper use of them.—Thermusa's son having grown up, she removed the king, and seated Phraataces on the throne, under the name of Arsaces XVI; he was, however, put to death by the Parthians, A. D. 4; and the crown given to one of the Arsacidæ, Orodes II, (Arsaces XVII.) who was, however, immediately afterwards slain by reason of his cruelty. In consequence, Vonones I. the eldest of the sons of Phraates sent to Rome, was called back and placed on the throne (Arsaces XVIII.); but that prince having brought with him Roman customs and luxury, was expelled, A. D. 14, with the assistance of the northern nomads, by Artabanes III. (Arsaces XIX.) d. 44, a distant relation: the fugitive took possession of the vacant throne of Armenia, but was soon after driven from thence likewise by his rival. Tiberius took advantage of the consequent disorders to send Germanicus into the east, A. D. 17, from whence he was never to return. The remainder of the reign of Artabanus was very stormy, Tiberius on the one hand taking advantage of the factions between the nobles to support pretenders to the crown; the revolts of the satraps, on the other hand, giving proof of the declension of the Parthian power. After his death war raged between his sons; the second, Vardanes, (Arsaces XX.) d. 47, made good his pretensions to the crown, and took North Media, (Atropatene;) he was succeeded by his elder brother Gotarzes, (Arsaces XXI.) d. 50, to whom Claudius unsuccessfully opposed Meherdates, educated as an hostage at Rome. Arsaces XXII. (Vonones II.) succeeded, after a reign of a few months, by Arsaces XXIII. (Vologeses I.) d. 90. The possession of the Armenian throne, given by this prince to his brother Tiridates, by the Romans to Tigranes, grandson of Herod the Great, excited a series of disputes, which began so early as the reign of Claudius, A. D. 52, and under Nero broke out into open war, waged with some success on the Roman side by Corbulo, 56—64, and closed by Tiridates going, after the death of Tigranes, to Rome, and there accepting the crown of Armenia as a gift at the hands of Nero, 65. Arsaces XXIV. (Pacorus,) d. 107, contemporary with Domitian. All that we know of him is, that he embellished the city of Ctesiphon. Arsaces XXV. (Cosroes,) d. about 121. The claims to the throne of Armenia implicated him in a war with Trajan, 114, during which Armenia, together with Mesopotamia and Assyria, were converted into Roman provinces. Trajan's consequent and successful inroad into the interior parts of the Parthian dominions, 115—116, followed by the capture of Ctesiphon, and the appointment of Parthamaspates as king, appears to have been facilitated by the domestic commotions and civil wars which had for a long time harassed the empire. Nevertheless, in the following year, 117, Hadrian was compelled to give up all the conquered country; the Euphrates was again acknowledged as the boundary; Parthamaspates was appointed king of Armenia; and Cosroes, who had taken refuge in the upper satrapies, was reinstated on the throne, of which he seems ever after to have kept quiet possession. Arsaces XXVI. (Vologeses II.) d. 149. Parthia under his reign, and Rome under that of Antoninus Pius, remained on good terms. Arsaces XXVII. (Vologeses III.) d. 191. Under the reign of this king, the contemporary of Marcus Aurelius and L. Verus, the war with Rome was again kindled, 161, by Verus, and carried on in Armenia and Syria; Cassius, the legate of Verus, at last got possession of Seleucia, and demolished that city, 165.—Arsaces XXVIII. (Ardawan or Vologeses IV.) d. 207. This king having taken the part of Pescenninus Niger, in the war between him and Septimius Severus, was, after the defeat of his friend, 194, routed in a war with Septimius Severus, 197, and the chief towns of Parthia were sacked by the invaders. He is, without authority, represented as succeeded by a Pacorus, who took the name of Arsaces XXIX.: his real successor, however, appears to have been Arsaces XXIX. (Vologeses V.) d. 216. Domestic wars among his sons, fomented by Caracalla. Arsaces XXX. (Artabanus IV.) At the beginning of his reign, this prince likewise was contemporary with Caracalla, who, in order to pick a quarrel, demanded his daughter in marriage; according to some, Arsaces refused her, in consequence of which the Roman emperor undertook a campaign into Armenia; according to others, Arsaces having assented, and escorted his daughter to Caracalla, was, by an abominable stroke of treachery, cut off, together with all his train, A. D. 216. Caracalla having been murdered, 217, his successor, Macrinus, signed a peace with the Parthians. But Arsaces subsequently raised his brother Tiridates to the throne of Armenia; this act spurred the Persian Artaxerxes, son of Sassan, to rebellion; the Parthian king, defeated in three battles, fell in the last, thus putting a period to the family and dominion of the Arsacidæ, 226, and Artaxerxes became the founder of the New Persian kingdom, or that of the Sassanidæ. The revolution was accompanied not only with a change of dynasty, but with a total subversion of the constitution.
Vaillant, Imperium Arsacidarum et Achæmenidarum, Paris, 1725, 2 vols. 4to. The first part comprises the Arsacidæ; the second the kings of Bithynia, Pontus, and Bosporus. It is an attempt, not altogether faultless, to arrange the series of kings, by the assistance of coins.
† C. F. Richter, Historico-critical essay upon the dynasties of the Arsacidæ and Sassanidæ, according to the Persian, Grecian, and Roman authorities. A prize essay. Leipzic, 1804. A comparative research into the eastern and western sources. The chronology in the above sketch has been corrected by this work, in conjunction with
Th. Chr. Tychsen, Commentationes de Nummis Persarum et Arsacidarum; inserted in Commentat. Nov. Soc. Sc. Gotting. vol. i. iii.
Bactria.
5. The Bactrian kingdom arose nearly at the same time as the Parthian, 254; its origin, however, was of a different nature,—the independence of this state being asserted by the Grecian governor, who was consequently succeeded by Greeks;—its duration likewise was much shorter, extending only from B. C. 254 to B. C. 126. Scarce any fragments have been preserved of the history of this empire, the borders of which appear at one time to have extended to the banks of the Ganges, and the frontiers of China.
Founder of the empire, Diodatus or Theodotus I. B. C. 254; he threw off his allegiance to the Syrian king, under Antiochus II. He appears to have been master not only of Bactria, but also of Sogdiana. He likewise threatened the Parthians; after his decease, 243, his son and successor, Theodotus II. signed a treaty and alliance with Arsaces II. but was nevertheless deprived of his crown by Euthydemus of Magnesia, about 221. Antiochus the Great, at the conclusion of the Parthian war, directed his arms against Euthydemus, 209—206; the contest ended in a peace, by which Euthydemus, after delivering up his elephants, was not only left in possession of the crown, but was allied to the Syrian family by the marriage of his son Demetrius with a daughter of Antiochus. Demetrius, though a great conqueror, does not seem to have been king of Bactria; his dominions comprised, it is probable, North India and Malabar, whose history now becomes closely connected with that of Bactria, although consisting only of mere fragments. The throne of Bactria fell to Apollodotus, and after him to Menander, who extended his conquests as far as Serica, while Demetrius was establishing his dominion in India, [as sovereign of which country he is represented in a medal lately discovered,] and where, about this time, several Greek states appear to have existed, perhaps ever since the expedition of Antiochus III. 205. Menander was succeeded, about 181, by Eucratidas, under whose reign the Bactrian empire attained its greatest extension; after defeating the Indian king, Demetrius, who had been the aggressor, he, with the assistance of the Parthian conqueror, Mithridates, (Arsaces VI.) annexed India to his own empire, 148. On his return, he was murdered by his son; the same, probably, that is mentioned afterwards by the name of Eucratidas II. He was the ally of Demetrius II. of Syria, and the main instigator of his expedition against the Parthians, 142; Demetrius being defeated by Arsaces VI. Eucratidas was, in consequence, deprived of a portion of his territory; overpowered soon after by the nomad races of Central Asia, the Bactrian empire fell to the ground, and Bactria itself, together with the other countries on this side of the Oxus, became a prey to the Parthians.
Th. Sieg. Bayer, Historia regni Græcorum Bactriani. Petropol. 1738, 4to. The few remaining fragments are in this work collected with industry and arranged with skill.
[Tod, Account of Greek, Parthian, and Hindu Medals, in Transactions of the R. Asiatic Society, vol. i. part ii, p. 316.
Tychsen, De Nummis Græcis et Barbaris in Bochara nuper retectis, in Comment. Nov. Soc. Sc. Gotting. vol. vi.]