CHAPTER VI
ANTONY AND ARMENIA
PHRAATES IV came into power shortly before 37 b.c.[1] Not long thereafter he attempted to hasten the death of his aged father by a dose of aconite.[2] When this failed he resorted to the more certain method of strangulation. To make his position more secure, he shortly murdered his brothers[3] and was thus apparently without opposition. But soon he found himself compelled to remove numbers of prominent Parthians, while the remainder fled to refuge among various peoples and in distant cities.
- ↑ No coins are known to have been struck in 38/37 b.c. either by Orodes II or by Phraates IV; see McDowell, Coins from Seleucia, p. 184. Phraates' first known issue, A. Ritter von Petrowicz, Arsaciden-Münzen (Wien, 1904), p. 77, No. 1, is dated June, 37 b.c. Horace Ep. 7. 9 should be placed about this time.
- ↑ Plut. Crassus 33. In dropsy the excess blood which the heart cannot handle backs up into the extremities, causing them to swell. When given in small doses, aconite strengthens and steadies the heart action and might thus effect a temporary cure, though larger quantities would be fatal. The drug is made from common monkshood and would be in an impure state as prepared in antiquity—a fact which may account for the cure rather than the death of Orodes. The whole incident may be a later Greek or Roman addition.
- ↑ There is almost no agreement of sources with regard to the time of these murders: no clue in Justin xlii. 5. 1; Plut. Antony 37, Phraates put Orodes to death; Dio Cass. xlix. 23, Orodes dies of grief and old age before the murder of the sons. Cf. Rawlinson, Sixth Mon., p. 196 and note 1.
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