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Saturday, July 31, 2010 - 3:00 PM
In the consulship of Caius Cestius and Marcus Servilius, some Parthian
nobles came to Rome without the knowledge of their
king Artabanus. Dread
of Germanicus had made that prince faithful to the
Romans and just to his
people, but he subsequently changed this behaviour for
insolence towards
us and tyranny to his subjects. He was elated by the
wars which he had
successfully waged against the surrounding nations,
while he disdained
the aged and, as he thought, unwarlike Tiberius,
eagerly coveting Armenia,
over which, on the death of Artaxias, he placed
Arsaces, his eldest son.
He further added insult, and sent envoys to reclaim
the treasures left
by Vonones in Syria and Cilicia. Then too he insisted
on the ancient boundaries
of Persia and Macedonia, and intimated, with a
vainglorious threat, that
he meant to seize on the country possessed by Cyrus
and afterwards by
Alexander.
The chief adviser of the Parthians in sending
the secret embassy
was Sinnaces, a man of distinguished family and
corresponding wealth. Next
in influence was Abdus, an eunuch, a class which, far
from being despised
among barbarians, actually possesses power. These,
with some other nobles
whom they admitted to their counsels, as there was not
a single Arsacid
whom they could put on the throne, most of the family
having been murdered
by Artabanus or being under age, demanded that
Phraates, son of king Phraates,
should be sent from Rome. "Only a name," they said,
"and an authority were
wanted; only, in fact, that, with Caesar's consent, a
scion of the house
of Arsaces should show himself on the banks of the
Euphrates."
This suited the wishes of Tiberius. He
provided Phraates with what
he needed for assuming his father's sovereignty, while
he clung to his
purpose of regulating foreign affairs by a crafty
policy and keeping war
at a distance. Artabanus meanwhile, hearing of the
treacherous arrangement,
was one moment perplexed by apprehension, the next
fired with a longing
for revenge. With barbarians, indecision is a slave's
weakness; prompt
action king-like. But now expediency prevailed, and he
invited Abdus, under
the guise of friendship, to a banquet, and disabled
him by a lingering
poison; Sinnaces he put off by pretexts and presents,
and also by various
employments. Phraates meanwhile, on arriving in Syria,
where he threw off
the Roman fashions to which for so many years he had
been accustomed, and
adapted himself to Parthian habits, unable to endure
the customs of his
country, was carried off by an illness. Still,
Tiberius did not relinquish
his purpose. He chose Tiridates, of the same stock as
Artabanus, to be
his rival, and the Iberian Mithridates to be the
instrument of recovering
Armenia, having reconciled him to his brother
Pharasmanes, who held the
throne of that country. He then intrusted the whole of
his eastern policy
to Lucius Vitellius. The man, I am aware, had a bad
name at Rome, and many
a foul story was told of him. But in the government of
provinces he acted
with the virtue of ancient times. He returned, and
then, through fear of
Caius Caesar and intimacy with Claudius, he
degenerated into a servility
so base that he is regarded by an after-generation as
the type of the most
degrading adulation. The beginning of his career was
forgotten in its end,
and an old age of infamy effaced the virtues of youth.
Of the petty chiefs Mithridates was the first
to persuade Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
to aid his enterprise by stratagem and force, and
agents of corruption
were found who tempted the servants of Arsaces into
crime by a quantity
of gold. At the same instant the Iberians burst into
Armenia with a huge
host, and captured the city of Artaxata. Artabanus, on
hearing this, made
his son Orodes the instrument of vengeance. He gave
him the Parthian army
and despatched men to hire auxiliaries. Pharasmanes,
on the other hand,
allied himself with the Albanians, and procured aid
from the Sarmatae,
whose highest chiefs took bribes from both sides,
after the fashion of
their countrymen, and engaged themselves in
conflicting interests. But
the Iberians, who were masters of the various
positions, suddenly poured
the Sarmatae into Armenia by the Caspian route.
Meanwhile those who were
coming up to the support of the Parthians were easily
kept back, all other
approaches having been closed by the enemy except one,
between the sea
and the mountains on the Albanian frontier, which
summer rendered difficult,
as there the shallows are flooded by the force of the
Etesian gales. The
south wind in winter rolls back the waves, and when
the sea is driven back
upon itself, the shallows along the coast, are
exposed.
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