136 PARTHIA Phoenicia, and Palestine, in the last named country setting up Antigonus, an Asmonean prince, as priest-king, who governed Jerusalem for three years (40-87) as a Parthian satrap. Meanwhile Labienus with a portion of the Par- thian army invaded Asia Minor, defeated and slew the Roman general who opposed him, and conquered Cilicia, Pamphylia, Lycia, and Caria, and it is said pillaged even Lydia and Ionia. For about a year the Parthians were undis- puted masters of Asia, and Roman authority had disappeared. But in 39 Antony sent his lieutenant Ventidius with an army to the East. He landed on the coast of Asia Minor, and presently defeated and dispersed the in- vaders, capturing Labienus and putting him to death. He then turned his arms against Pacorus, defeated a Parthian force at the Sy- rian Gates, reconquered Syria, and drove Pa- corus across the Euphrates in 39 or 38. The next year Pacorus recrossed the Euphrates with a powerful army, but was met by Venti- dius and defeated and slain. His father Orodes, overwhelmed with grief, resigned the throne to his second son Phraates IV., who soon put him to death, killed his 30 brothers, and per- secuted the Parthian nobles so severely that most of them fled into the neighboring coun- tries. A body of them took refuge in Syria, where Antony was now in command, and per- suaded him to invade Parthia. He began his invasion in 37 with a force of more than 100,000 men, whom he led through Armenia into Media. His expedition failed, and he was compelled to retreat with the loss of a third of his army. In 20 the emperor Augustus visited the East, and persuaded Phraates to restore to him the standards taken from Orassus, which were re- ceived in Rome with extravagant delight. Af- ter the death of Phraates, who was poisoned by his wife and son about the beginning of the Christian era, the history of Parthia for more than a century seems to have been chiefly a succession of revolutions and civil wars, end- ing in a disintegration of the empire, so that three or four monarchs, each claiming to be the true Arsaces, were ruling at the same time in different portions of the Parthian dominions. The Romans knew little of these divisions, their dealings being only with the Arsaces who reigned at Ctesiphon over Mesopotamia and Adiabene. About A. D. 108 the Arsaces at Ctesiphon bore the name Chosroes, and his nephew a few years before had been made king of Armenia by the Parthians without consulting the Romans, who had long claimed the right to nominate the occupant of the Armenian throne. Trajan, who was then em- peror, having the Dacian war on his hands, had borne this insult without seeking redress until the subjugation of Dacia left him free to act. He then resolved on the conquest of Parthia, and in 114, after long preparation, be- gan his expedition. Envoys of Chosroes met him at Athens with conciliatory proposals, which he rejected. He continued his march to Armenia, which submitted with little re- sistance and was declared a Roman province. The conquest of Mesopotamia speedily fol- lowed, together with that of some adjacent territories ; but the natives were so turbulent and harassed the Romans so much that Trajan, who had occupied Ctesiphon, found it prudent to retreat into Syria at the end of 116. In the following year he was taken ill, and leaving Hadrian in command in Syria he set out for Rome, but died on his way in Cilicia. Ha- drian, who succeeded him as emperor, relin- quished the conquests of Trajan and withdrew the Roman forces to the west side of the Eu- phrates. Peace between Rome and Parthia lasted till 161, when the Parthian king Volo- geses III. on the death of Antoninus Pius suddenly invaded the Roman territories, con- quered Armenia, and carried fire and sword through Syria into Palestine. Lucius Verus went to the East, and the Roman army, com- manded by Avidius Cassius, defeated Volo- geses in a great battle near the Euphrates and drove the Parthians across that river. Cassius then carried the war into Parthia. He cap- tured and burnt the great city of Seleucia, plundered Ctesiphon, and recovered all the conquests of Trajan. The war with Rome terminated in 165, and peace between the two empires was maintained till the commotions which followed the murder of Commodus in 192 excited the Parthians of the provinces an- nexed by Cassius to rise in insurrection and massacre the Roman garrisons, and to besiege Nisibis, the Roman capital of Mesopotamia. The emperor Septimius Severus marched in 195 to the relief of Nisibis, reduced Mesopo- tamia to subjection, and added Adiabene to the empire. In the following year he returned to Rome to suppress the insurrection of Clo- dius Albinus, who had been proclaimed empe- ror. On his departure the Parthians renewed hostilities, recovered Adiabene, swept the Ro- mans from Mesopotamia or shut them up in Nisibis, to which they laid siege, and even in- vaded Syria. Severus, having suppressed and slain his rival, returned to the East in 197, drove the Parthians across the Euphrates, which he himself passed with a powerful army, captured Babylon and Seleucia, and, after de- feating the Parthian king in a great battle be- fore the walls of Ctesiphon, took that capital by assault, gave it up to plunder, and before returning to Italy established a new Roman province in the region beyond the Tigris. His son Caracalla renewed the war, and after a campaign beyond the Tigris went into winter quarters at Edessa, but was assassinated in April, 217, by one of his officers. Macrinus, who succeeded to the command of the army and was proclaimed emperor, began to retreat toward Syria, but was attacked by Artabanus IV. (Arsaces XXXIV.), the last and one of the ablest of the Parthian kings. The Romans stood at bay at Nisibis, and the battle which ensued was the last and fiercest ever fought be-
