297 and not only of setting bounds to their ambitious projects, but of making them apprehend for their own safety. It showed that the Romans might be overthrown in a pitched battle, and fighting with all their forces; that that power, which till then, like the inundation of a mighty sea, had overflowed all countries in its way, might at length receive bounds, and be restrained for the future within them. The check received by Crassus from the Parthians was a blot on the Roman name, which the victories gained some time after by Ventidius were not capable of effacing. The standards of the vanquished legions were always shown by the Parthians as trophies. The prisoners taken on that fatal day were kept there in captivity; and the Romans, citizens or allies, contracted ignominious marriages, to the shame of Rome, as Horace emphatically describes it, and grew old in tranquillity, upon the lands, and under the standard of the barbarians.* It was not till thirty years after, in the reign of Augustus, that the king of the Parthians, without being compelled to it by arms, consented to restore their standards and prisoners to the Romans, which was looked upon by Augustus, and the whole empire, as a most glorious triumph; so much were the Romans humbled by the remembrance of that defeat, and so much did they believe it incumbent on them to efface it, if possible, to the least trace. For themselves, they never could forget it. Cæsar was on the point of setting out against the Parthians, to avenge the affront Rome had received from them, when he was killed. Antony formed the same design, which turned to his disgrace. The Romans, from that time, always regarded the war with the Parthians as the most important of their wars. It was the object of the application of their most warlike emperors, Trajan, Septimius, Severus, &c. The surname of Parthius, was the title of which they were fondest, and most sensibly flattered their ambition. If the Romans sometimes passed the Euphrates to extend their conquests beyond it, the Parthians in their turn did the same, to carry their arms and devastation into Syria, and even into Palestine. In a word, the Romans could never subject the Parthians to their yoke; and that nation was a wall of brass, which with impregnable force resisted the most violent attacks of their power. When the battle of Carræ was fought, Orodes was in Armenia, where he had lately concluded a peace with Artabazus. The latter, upon the return of the expresses he had sent to Crassus, perceiving, by the false measures he took, that the Romans were infallibly lost, formed a treaty with Orodes; and by giving one of his daughters to Pacorus, the son of the Parthian king, he cemented by that alliance the treaty he had lately made. While they were celebrating the nuptials, the head and hand of Crassus were brought to them, which Surena had caused to be cut off, and sent the king as a proof of his victory. Their joy was exceedingly augmented by that sight; and it was said that orders were given to pour molten gold into the mouth of that head, to reproach the insatiable thirst which Crassus always had for that metal. Surena did not long enjoy the pleasure of his victory. His master, jealous of his glory, and of the reputation it gave him, caused him to be put to death soon after. There are princes, near whom too shining qualities are dangerous; who take umbrage at the virtues they are forced to admire, and who can not bear to be served by superior talents, capable of eclipsing their own. Orodes was one of this character. He perceived, as Tacitus observes of Tiberius, that with all his power he could not sufficiently repay the service his general * Milesne Crassi conjuge Barbara Oblitus, eternæque Vestæ, had lately done him. Now, when a benefit is above all return, ingratitude and hatred take place, instead of acknowledgment and affection.* Surena was a general of extraordinary merit. He was of consummate ability at thirty years of age, and surpassed all men of his times in valour. He was, besides that, perfectly well made, and of the most advantageous stature. For riches, credit, and authority he had also more than any man, and was undoubtedly the greatest subject the king of Parthia had. His birth gave him the privilege of putting the crown upon the king's head at his coronation; and that right had appertained to his family from the re-establishment of the empire. When he travelled, he had always one thousand camels to carry his baggage, two hundred chariots for his wives and concubines, and for his guard, one thousand horse completely armed, besides a great number of lightarmed troops and domestics, which in all did not amount to less than ten thousand men. The Parthians expecting, after the defeat of the Roman army, to find Syria without defence, marched to conquer it. But Cassius, who had formed an army out of the ruins of the other, received them with so much vigour, that they were obliged to repass the Euphrates shamefully, without effecting any thing. The next year the consuls, M. Calpurnius Bibulus and M. Tullius Cicero, were assigned the provinces of Syria and Cilicia. Cicero repaired immediately to the latter, which had been allotted him: but Bibulus amusing himself at Rome, Cassius continued to command in Syria. And that was much to the advantage of the Romans; for the affairs of that country required a man of a quite different capacity from Bibulus. Pacorus, son of Orodes king of the Parthians, had passed the Euphrates in the beginning of the spring, at the head of a numerous army, and had entered Syria. He was too young to command alone, and was therefore accompanied by Orsaces, an old general, who disposed of every thing. He marched directly to Antioch, which he besieged. Cassius had shut himself up in that place with all his troops. Cicero, who had received advice of his condition in his province, by the means of Antiochus king of Comagena, assembled all his forces, and marched to the eastern frontier of his province, which bordered upon Armenia, to oppose any invasion on that side, should the Armenians attempt it, and at the same time to be ready to support Cassius in case of need. He sent another body of troops toward the mountain Amanus, with the same view. That detachment fell in with a strong body of the Parthian cavalry, which had entered Cilicia, and entirely defeated it; so that not a single man escaped.† The news of this defeat, and that of Cicero's approach to Antioch, extremely encouraged Cassius to make a good defence, and so much abated the ardour of the Parthians, that, despairing to carry the place, they raised the siege, and went to form that of Antigonia, which was not far from thence. But they were so little skilled in attacking towns, that they miscarried again before this, and were forced to retire. This is not to be wondered at, as the Parthians made their principal force consist in cavalry, and applied themselves most to field battle, which suited their genius best. Cassius, who was apprized of the route they would take, laid an ambuscade for them, which they did not fail to fall into. He defeated them entirely, and killed a great number of them, among whom was their general Orsaces. The remains of their army repassed the Euphrates. When Cicero saw the Parthians removed, and Antioch out of danger, he turned his arms against the inhabitants of Mount Amanus, who being situated * Destrui per hæc fortunam suam Cæsar, imparemque tanto merito rebatur. Nam beneficia eo usque læta sunt, dum videntur exsolvi posse; ubi multum antevenere, pro gratia odium redditur.-Tacit. Annal. 1. iv. c. 18 †A. M. 3953. Ant. J. C. 51. Cic. ad Famil. I. ii, epist. x. 17. iii, 2. xii. 19. xv. 1—4. Ad. Attic. I. v. 18, 20, 21. vi. 1. 8. vii. 2. between Syria and Cilicia, were independent of, and at war with both these provinces. They made continual incursions into them, and gave them great trouble. Cicero entirely subjected those mountaineers, and took and demolished all their castles and forts. He afterwards marched against another barbarous nation, a kind of savages, who called themselves free Cilicians,* and pretended to have never been subjected to the empire of any of the kings who had been masters of the countries round about. He took all their cities, and made such dispositions in the country, as very much pleased all their neighbours, whom they perpetually harassed. It is Cicero himself who relates these circumstances in several of his letters. There are two among the rest, which may be looked upon as perfect models of the manner in which a general or commander ought to give a prince or his ministry an account of a military expedition; with such simplicity, perspicuity, and precision, in which the proper character of writings and relations of this kind consists, are they expressed. The first is addressed to the senate and people of Rome, and to the principal magistrates; it is the second of his fifteenth book of familiar epistles: the other is written particularly to Cato. This last is a master-piece; wherein Cicero, who passionately desired the honour of a triumph for his military expeditions, employs all the art and address of eloquence to engage that grave senator in his favour. Plutarch tells us, that after his return to Rome, the senate offered him a triumph; and that he refused it, on account of the civil war then ready to break out between Cæsar and Pompey, not believing that it became him to celebrate a solemnity which breathed nothing but joy, and at a time when the state was on the point of falling into the greatest calamities. His refusal to triumph in the midst of the apprehensions and disorders of a bloody civil war, argues in Cicero a great love for the public good and his country, and does him much more honour than a triumph itself could have done.t During the civil war between Pompey and Cæsar, and those that followed, the Parthians, declaring sometimes for one, and sometimes for the other party, made several irruptions into Syria and Palestine. But those are events which particularly relate to the Roman or Jewish histories, and therefore do not enter into my plan. I shall conclude this abridgment of that of the Parthians, with the death of Pacorus, and Orodes his father. Ventidius, who commanded the Roman armies, under the authority of Antony the triumvir, did not a little contribute to the re-establishing the honour of the nation. He was a soldier of fortune, who, from the lowest condition of life, had raised himself by his merit to the highest dignities of the republic. In the war against the allies of Rome, who attempted to extort the freedom of the city by force, he was taken an infant, with his mother, in Asculum, the capital of the Picenians, by Strabo, the father of Pompey the Great, and led in triumph before that general. Supported by the credit of C. Cæsar, under whom he had served in Gaul, and passed through all the degrees of the army, he become prætor and consul. He was the only person who triumphed for his exploits against the Parthians, and obtained that honour, after having been led in a triumph himself.t I have said, that Ventidius contributed very much to make the Romans amends for the affront they had received at the battle of Carræ. He had begun to revenge the defeat of Crassus and his army, by two successive victories gained over those terrible enemies. A third, still greater than the former, completed the work, and was obtained in this manner. Ventidius, apprehending that the Parthians, whose preparations were much advanced, would prevent him, and pass the Euphrates before he had time to draw all his troops together out of their different quarters, had recourse to *Eleuthero Cilices. 300 this stratagem. There was a petty eastern prince in his camp, under the name of an ally, whom he knew to be entirely in the interests of the Parthians, and that he held secret intelligence with them, and gave them advice of all the designs of the Romans which he could discover. He resolved to make this man's treachery the means to draw the Parthians into a snare he had laid for them.* With this view he pretended a more than ordinary intimacy with this traitor. He conversed frequently with him upon the operations of the campaign. Affecting at length to open himself to him with great confidence, he observed, that he was much afraid, from advices he had received, that the Parthians did not design to pass the Euphrates at Zeugma, as usual, but a great way lower down. For, said he, if they pass at Zeugma, the country on this side is so mountainous, that the cavalry, in which the whole force of their army consists, can do us no great hurt; but if they pass below, there are nothing but plains, where they have every advantage over us; and it will be impossi ble for us to make head against them. As soon as he had imparted this secret to him, the spy did not fail, as Ventidius had rightly foreseen, to communicate it to the Parthians, with whom it had all the effect he could desire. Pacorus, instead of going to Zeugma, immediately took the other route, lost a great deal of time in the great compass he was obliged to take, and in the preparations necessary for passing the river there. Ventidius got forty days by this means, which he employed in making Silon of Judea join him, with the legions quar tered on the other side of Mount Taurus, and found himself in a condition to give the Parthians a good reception when they entered Syria. As they saw that they had not been attacked either in passing the river, or afterwards, they attributed that inactivity to terror and cowardice, and marched directly to charge the enemy in their camp, although situated very advantageously on an eminence, not doubting that they should soon make themselves masters of it, and that without much resistance. They were mistaken. The Romans quitted their camp, fell on them with impetuosity, and pushed them with the utmost vigour upon the declivity; and as they had the advantage of the ground, and their light-armed troops poured showers of darts upon the Parthians, they soon threw them into disorder, notwithstanding the vigorous resistance they made at first. The slaughter was very great. Pacorus was killed in the battle; and his death was followed immediately with the flight of his whole army. The vanquished made haste to regain the bridge, in order to return into their own country; but the Romans prevented them, and cut the greatest part of them in pieces. Some few escaped by flight, and retired to Antiochus, king of Comagena. History observes, that this celebrated battle, which so well revenged the defeat of Crassus, was fought exactly on the same day with the battle of Carræ, fourteen years before. Orodes was so struck with the loss of this battle, and the death of his son, that he was almost out of his senses. For several days he neither opened his mouth, nor took any nourishment. When the excess of his grief was a little abated, and would permit him to speak, nothing was heard from him but the name of Pacorus. He imagined that he saw him, and called to him; he seemed to discourse with him; and, as if he were living, to speak to him, and hear him speak. At other times he remembered that he was dead, and shed a torrent of tears.t Never was grief more just. This was the most fatal blow for the Parthian monarchy it had ever received; nor was the loss of the prince less than that of the army itself. For he was the most excellent person the house of the A. M. 3965. Ant. J. C. 39. Joseph. Antiq. xiv. 24. Plut. in Anton. p. 931. Appian. to Parth, 156. Dion. Cass. 1. xlix. p. 403, 404. Justin. 1. 42. c. 4. Orodes, repente filii morte et exercitus clade audita, ex dolore in furorem vertitur. Multis diebus non alloqui que nquam, non cibum sumere, non vocem mittere, ita ut etiam mutus factus videretur. Post multos deinde dies, ubi dolor vocem laxaverat, nihil aliud quam Pacorum vocabat. Pacorus illi videri, Pacosus audiri videbatur: cum illo loqui, cum illo consistere. Interdum quasi amissum, flebiliter dolebat.-Jus Arsacides had ever produced, for justice, clemency, valour, and all the qualities which constitute the truly great prince. He had made himself so much beloved in Syria, during the little time he resided there, that never did the people express more affection for any of their native sovereigns, than for the person of this foreign prince. When Orodes had a little recovered the dejection into which the death of his dear son Pacorus had thrown him, he found himself greatly embarrassed respecting the choice of his successor out of his other children. He had thirty by different women, each of whom solicited him in favour of her own, and made use of all the ascendency she had over a spirit impaired by age and affliction. He, however, at last determined to follow the order of birth, and nominated Phraates, the eldest and most vicious of them all. He had scarcely taken possession of the throne, when he caused all his brothers whom his father had by the daughter of Antiochus Eusebes, king of Syria, to be murdered, and that only because their mother was of a better family than his, and they had more merit than himself. The father, who was still alive, not being able to avoid expressing extreme displeasure on that occasion, that unnatural son ordered him also to be put to death. He treated the rest of his brothers in the same manner, and did not spare his own son, from the apprehension that the people would set him upon the throne in his stead. It was this prince, so cruel in regard to all his own family, that treated Hyrcanus, king of the Jews, with peculiar favour and clemency.* ARTICLE III. ABRIDGMENT OF THE HISTORY OF THE KINGS OF CAPPADOCIA. I HAVE spoken, in several parts of this history, of the kings of Cappadocia, according as I had occasion, but without mentioning either their beginning or succession. I shall here unite, in one point of view, all that relates to that kingdom. Cappadocia is a great country of Asia Minor. The Persians, to whom it first belonged, had divided it into two parts, and established two satrapies or governments in it. The Macedonians, into whose possession it fell, suffered those two governments to be changed into kingdoms. The one extended toward Mount Taurus, and was properly called Cappadocia, or Cappadocia Major; the other toward Pontus, and was called Cappadocia Pontica, or Cappadocia Minor; they were at length united into one kingdom. Strabo says, that Ariarathes was the first king of Cappadocia, but does not mention at what time he began to reign. It is probable, that it was about the time when Philip, father of Alexander the Great, began to reign in Macedonia, and Ochus in Persia; admitting that the kingdom of Cappadocia continued three hundred and seventy-six years, before it was reduced into a province of the Roman empire under Tiberius.‡ It was governed at first by a long succession of kings named Ariarathes, then by kings called Ariobarzanes, who did not exceed the third generation; and at length by the last, Archelaus. According to Diodorus Siculus, there were many kings of Cappadocia before Ariarathes; but as their history is almost entirely unknown, I shall make no mention of it in this place. Ariarathes I. He reigned jointly with his brother Holofernes, for whom he had a particular affection.§ Having joined the Persians, in the expedition against Egypt, he acquired great glory, and returned home laden with honours by king Ochus. Ariarathes II. son of the former, had lived in peace in his dominions, during the wars of Alexander the Great, who, out of impatience to come to blows A. M. 3644. Ant. J. C. 360. A. M. 3653. Ant. J. C. 351. * A. M. 3967. Ant. J. C. 37. † Strab. 1. xii. p. 533, 534. A. M. 3644. Ant. J. C. 360. |