[217] According to Strabo’s representation (xi. 2, 11, p. 495) the rulers of Tanais stand independently by the side of those of Panticapaeum, and the tribes to the south of the Don depend sometimes on the latter, sometimes on the former; when he adds that several of the Panticapaean princes ruled as far as Tanais, and particularly the last, Pharnaces, Asander, Polemon, this seems more exception than rule. In the inscription quoted in the next note the Tanaites stand among the subject stocks, and a series of Tanaitic inscriptions confirms this for the time from Marcus to Gordian; but the Ἕλληνες καὶ Ταναεῖται alongside of the ἄρχοντες Ταναειτῶν and of the frequently mentioned Ἑλληνάρχαι confirm the view that the town even then remained non–Greek.
[218] In the only vivid narrative from the Bosporan history which we possess, that of Tacitus, Ann. xii. 15–31, concerning the two rival brothers, Mithradates and Cotys, the neighbouring tribes, the Dandaridae, Siracae, Aorsi, are under rulers of their own not legally dependent on the Roman prince of Panticapaeum.—As to titles, the older Panticapaean princes are wont to call themselves archons of the Bosporus, that is, of Panticapaeum, and of Theudosia, and kings of the Sindi and of all the Maitae and other non–Greek tribes. In like manner what is, so far as I know, the oldest among the royal inscriptions of the Roman epoch names Aspurgos, son of Asandrochos (Stephani, Comptes rendus de la comm. pour 1866, p. 128), as βασιλεύοντα παντὸς Βοοσπόρου, Θεοδοσίης καὶ Σίνδων καί Μαϊτῶν καί Τορετῶν Ψησῶν τε καὶ Ταναειτῶν, ὑποτάσαντα Σκύθας καὶ Ταύρους. No inference as to the extent of the territory may be drawn from the simplified title.—In the inscriptions of the later period there is found once under Trajan the doubtless adulatory title βασιλεὺς βασιλέων μέγας τοῦ παντὸς Βοοσπόρου (C. I. Gr. 2123). The coins generally, from Asander onward, know no title but βασιλεύς, while yet Pharnaces calls himself βασιλεὺς βασιλέων μέγας. Beyond doubt this was the effect of the Roman sovereignty, with which a vassal–prince placed over other princes was not very compatible.
[219] This was the king Mithradates, installed by Claudius in the year 41, who some years afterwards was deposed and replaced by his brother Cotys; he lived afterwards in Rome, and perished in the confusions of the four–emperor–year (Plutarch, Galba, 13, 15). The state of the matter, however, is not clear either from the hints in Tacitus, Ann. xii. 15 (comp. Plin. H. N. vi. 5, 17), or from the report (confused by the interchange of the two, Mithradates of Bosporus, and Mithradates of Iberia) in Petrus Patricius fr. 3. The Chersonese tales in the late Constantinus Porphyrogenitus, de adm. imp. c. 53, do not, of course, come into account. The bad Bosporan king Sauromates, Κρισκωνόρου (not Ῥησκοπόρου) υἱός, who with the Sarmatians wages war against the emperors Diocletian and Constantius, as well as against the Chersonese faithful to the empire, has evidently arisen from a confusion of names between the Bosporan king and people; and just as historical as the variation on the history of David and Goliath, is the despatch of the mighty king of the Bosporans, Sauromates, by the small Chersonesite Pharnaces. The kings’ names alone, e.g. besides those named, the Asander, who comes in after the extinction of the family of the Sauromatae, suffice. The civic privileges and the localities of the city, for the explanation of which these mirabilia are invented, certainly deserve attention.
[220] There are no Bosporan gold or pseudo–gold coins without the head of the Roman emperor, and this is always that of the ruler recognised by the Roman senate. That in the years 263 and 265, when in the empire elsewhere after the captivity of Valerian Gallienus was officially regarded as sole ruler, two heads here appear on the coins, is perhaps due only to want of information; yet the Bosporans may at that time have made another choice amid the many pretenders. The names are at this time not appended, and the effigies are not to be certainly distinguished.
[221] This we may be allowed to believe at the hands of the Scythian Toxaris in the dialogue placed among those of Lucian (c. 44); for the rest he narrates not merely μύθοις ὅμοια, but a very myth, of whose kings Leucanor and Eubiotes the coins, as may well be conceived, have no knowledge.
[222] As respects the export of grain, the notice in the report of Plautius (p. 218), deserves attention.
[223] From the offer of a township of the Siracae (on the Sea of Azoff) hard pressed by the Roman troops to deliver 10,000 slaves (Tacitus, Ann. xii. 17), it may be allowable to infer a lively import of slaves from these regions.
[224] Had the state of Lysimachus endured it would probably have been otherwise. His foundations, Alexandria in the Troad and Lysimachia, Ephesos–Arsinoe strengthened by the transference of the inhabitants of Colophon and Lebedos, tended in the direction indicated.
[225] Nowhere have the boundaries of the vassal states and even of the provinces changed more than in the north–east of Asia Minor. Direct imperial administration was introduced here for the districts of king Polemon, to which Zela, Neocaesarea, Trapezus belonged, in the year 63; for Lesser Armenia, we do not know exactly when, probably at the beginning of the reign of Vespasian. The last vassal king of Lesser Armenia, of whom there is mention, was the Herodian Aristobulus (Tacitus, Ann. xiii. 7, xiv. 26; Josephus, Ant. xx. 8, 4), who still possessed it in the year 60; in the year 75 the district was Roman (C. I. L. iii. 306), and probably one of the legions garrisoning Cappadocia from Vespasian’s time was stationed from the first in the Lesser–Armenian Satala. Vespasian combined the regions mentioned, as well as Galatia and Cappadocia, into one large governorship. At the end of the reign of Domitian we find Galatia and Cappadocia separated and the north–eastern provinces attached to Galatia. Under Trajan at first the whole district is once more in one hand, subsequently (Eph. Ep. V. n. 1345) it is divided in such a way that the north–east coast belongs to Cappadocia. On that footing it remained, at least in so far that Trapezus and so also Lesser Armenia were thenceforth constantly under this governor. Consequently—apart from a short interruption under Domitian—the legate of Galatia had nothing to do with the defence of the frontier, and this, as was implied in the nature of the case, was always combined with the command of Cappadocia and of its legions.
[226] Urban coining and setting up of inscriptions are subject to so manifold conditions that the want or the abundance of the one or the other do not per se warrant inferences as to the absence or the intensity of a definite phase of civilisation. For Asia Minor in particular we must take note that it was the promised land of municipal vanity, and our memorials, including even the coins, have for by far the greatest part been called forth by the fact that the government of the Roman emperors allowed free scope to this vanity.