Parthian Empire

“ In so far the Parthian empire was the genuine counterpart to the Roman. As in the one the Oriental viceroyship is an exceptional occurrence, so in the other is the Greek city; the general Oriental aristocratic character of the Parthian government is as little injuriously affected by the Greek mercantile towns on the west coast as is the civic organisation of the Roman state by the vassal kingdoms of Cappadocia and Armenia. ”

“ Those bonds which for two centuries and a half had sufficed to hold together a heterogeneous kingdom extending from the Euphrates to the Indus, and from the Oxus to the Southern Ocean, were beginning to grow weak, and the Parthian Empire appeared to be falling to pieces. There seemed to be at once a call and an opportunity for a fresh arrangement of the East, for the introduction of a unifying power, such as Rome recognized in her own administrative system, which should compel the crumbling atoms of the Oriental world once more into cohesion. ”

“ The Parthian Empire had for nearly a century been gradually growing in power and extending itself at the expense of the Syro-Macedonian; and, about B.C. 163, an energetic prince, Mithridates I., commenced a series of conquests towards the West, which terminated (about B.C. 150) in the transference from the Syro-Macedonian to the Parthian rule of Media Magna, Susiana, Persia, Babylonia, and Assyria Proper. It would seem that the Persians offered no resistance to the progress of the new conqueror. ”

“ Careful distinction is made by some contemporary writers between Greek and Parthian cities within the Parthian empire. This may well imply a difference in administration as well as population, for documents from Dura and Susa show that the governments of these places preserved the pattern of the Hellenistic city-state. Such places rarely held Parthian garrisons. Ctesiphon, for example, is said to have been built to house Parthian troops, which evidently could not be installed in Seleucia across the river. ”

“ Individual groups may have penetrated into the heart of the Parthian empire, perhaps even as far as Mesopotamia; but the majority of the Sacae were turned back by the exertions of the Parthians, and thus the Roman orient was spared their ravages. The explanation for the close interrelation in later times between the Sacae and the Parthians lies in the contacts which occurred as the hordes moved slowly southward toward India, contacts which must also explain the Parthian cultural influences at Taxila in India. ”

“ The vitaxæ, or eighteen most powerful satraps, were permitted to assume the regal title, and the vain pride of the monarch was delighted with a nominal dominion over so many vassal kings. Even tribes of barbarians in their mountains, and the Greek cities of Upper Asia, [36] within their walls, scarcely acknowledged, or seldom obeyed, any superior; and the Parthian empire exhibited, under other names, a lively image of the feudal system [37] which has since prevailed in Europe. But the active victor, at the head of a numerous and disciplined army, visited in person every province of Persia. ”

“ In either case, the rulers, so long as they paid tribute regularly to the Parthian monarchs and aided them in their wars, were allowed to govern the people beneath their sway at their pleasure. Among monarchs, in the higher sense of the term, may be enumerated the kings of Persia, Elymaiis, Adiabene, Osrhoene, and of Armenia and Media Atropatene, when they formed, as they sometimes did, portions of the Parthian Empire. ”

“ When Alexander invaded Asia, the Parthians submitted, like the other dependent provinces of Persia, and they were for some time under the power of Eumenes, Antigonus, Seleucus, Nicanor, and Antiochus, till the rapacity and oppression of Agathocles, a lieutenant of the latter, roused their spirit, and fomented rebellion. Arsaces, a man of obscure origin, but blessed with great military powers, placed himself at the head of his countrymen, and laid the foundation of the Parthian empire, about 250 years before the christian era. ”

“ He pointed out that the Roman and the Parthian empires were the largest in the world; if they were united by marriage, one empire without a rival would result when they were no longer divided by a river. 3. The rest of the barbarian nations now not subject to their authority could easily be reduced, as they were governed by tribes and confederacies. Furthermore, the Roman infantry were invincible in close-quarter combat with spears, and the Parthians had a large force of highly skilled horse-archers. ”

“ In addition to all this the new Parthian empire from the eastward pressed hard on the aliens not merely with its material power, but with the whole superiority of its national language and religion and of its national military and political organization. ”

“ They exercised a real control over the monarch, and had a voice in the direction of the Empire. Like the great feudal vassals of the Middle Ages, they from time to time quarrelled with their liege lord, and disturbed the tranquillity of the kingdom by prolonged and dangerous civil wars; but these contentions served to keep alive a vigor, a life, and a spirit of sturdy independence very unusual in the East, and gave a stubborn strength to the Parthian monarchy, in which Oriental governments have for the most part been wanting. ”

“ The Parthian expedition. Death of Trajan. After seven years of wise administration, he again was called into the field to extend the eastern frontier of the empire. His efforts were directed against Armenia and Parthia. He reduced the former to a Roman province, and advanced into those Caucasian regions where no Roman imperator had preceded him, except Pompey, receiving the submission of Iberians and Albanians. To overthrow Parthia was now his object, and he advanced across the Tigris to Ctesiphon. In the Parthian capital he was saluted as imperator ”

“ Discarding the Parthian plan of intrusting the military defence of the empire and the preservation of domestic order to a mere militia, he maintained on a war footing a considerable force, regularly paid and drilled. “There can be no power,” he remarked, “without an army, no army without money, no money without agriculture, and no agriculture without justice.” To administer strict justice was therefore among his chief endeavors. Daily reports were made to him of all that passed not only in his capital, but in every province of his vast empire ”

“ The victory gained by Tiridates over Callinicus put an end to these doubts. It proved to the world at large, and also to the Parthians themselves, that they had nothing to fear—that they were strong enough to preserve their freedom. Considering the enormous disproportion between the military strength and resources of the narrow Parthian State and the vast Syrian Empire—considering that the one comprised about fifty thousand and the other above a million of square miles; that the one had inherited the wealth of ages and the other was probably as poor as any province in Asia ”

“ The figure of the horseman is much defaced by time. The winter rains have worn thin his armour, the spring floods have undermined the rock on which he stands, but shadowy though his image may be, it marks the triumph of a European civilization, and its prototypes are to be sought not among the bearded divinities and winged monsters of Assyria, but in the work of Western sculptors. The Parthian, who was the bitter enemy of the Roman empire, carved it upon the rocks of Ḳaṣr Ghellî, and bore witness with his own hand to the overmastery of Roman culture. ”

“ Thus perished the great Parthian monarchy after an existence of nearly five centuries. Its end must be attributed in the main to internal decay, working itself out especially in two directions. The Arsacid race, with which the idea of the empire was bound up, instead of clinging together with that close “union” which is “strength,” allowed itself to be torn to pieces by dissensions, to waste its force in quarrels, and to be made a handle of by every foreign invader, or domestic rebel, who chose to use its name in order to cloak his own selfish projects. ”

“ Beyond the Euphrates, even beyond the Tigris, the Roman dominion took in Mesopotamia, Atropatênê, and Babylonia. The Parthian capital of Ktesiphôn and the outlying Greek free city of Seleukeia were included within the boundaries of an Empire which for a moment touched the Caspian and the Persian Gulf. Rome, as the champion of the West, seemed to have triumphed for ever over her Eastern rival, when the Parthian kingdom was thus shorn of the border lands of the two worlds, and when its king was forced to become a Roman vassal for the dominions that were left to him. ”

“ The Parthian institutions possessed great simplicity; and it is probable that they took a shape in the reign of Arsaces I., or, at any rate, of Tiridates, which was not greatly altered afterwards. Permanency is the law of Oriental governments; and in a monarchy which lasted less than five hundred years, it is not likely that many changes occurred. The Parthian institutions are referred to Mithridates I., rather than to Tiridates, because in the reign of Mithridates Parthia entered upon a new phase of her existence—became an empire instead of a mere monarchy ”

“ They showed their own sense of this inferiority by an affectation of Persian manners. But this affectation was not very successful. It is evident that in art, in architecture, in manners, in habits of life, the Parthian race reached only a low standard; they stood to their Hellenic and Iranian subjects in much the same relation that the Turks of the present day stand to the modern Greeks; they made themselves respected by their strength and their talent for organization ”

“ They formed a recognized community, had some cities which were entirely their own, possessed a common treasury, and from time to time sent up to Jerusalem the offerings of the people under the protection of a convoy of 30,000 or 40,000 men. The Parthian kings treated them well, and no doubt valued them as a counterpoise to the disaffected Greeks and Syrians of this part of their Empire. ”

“ The independent republic was governed by a senate of three hundred nobles; the people consisted of six hundred thousand citizens; the walls were strong, and as long as concord prevailed among the several orders of the state, they viewed with contempt the power of the Parthian: but the madness of faction was sometimes provoked to implore the dangerous aid of the common enemy, who was posted almost at the gates of the colony. 39 The Parthian monarchs, like the Mogul sovereigns of Hindostan, delighted in the pastoral life of their Scythian ancestors ”

“ Language.The language of the land in the Parthian empire was the native language of Iran. There is no trace pointing to any foreign language having ever been in public use under the Arsacids. ”

“ Still this division of the empire must naturally have tended to weaken it; and the position of Volagases has to be taken into account in estimating the difficulties under which the last monarch of the Arsacid series found himself placed—difficulties to which, after a struggle, he was at last forced to succumb. Domestic dissension, wars with a powerful neighbor (Rome) , and internal disaffection and rebellion formed a combination, against which the last Parthian monarch, albeit a man of considerable energy, strove in vain. ”

“ When the Parthian prince was defeated in personal combat by Pharasmanes, the troops of the defeated leader, supposing him to be dead, fled from the field. [61]
Artabanus in 36 gathered the remaining forces of his empire and advanced against the Iberians. The Alani, possibly incited by agents of Vitellius, had moved through the passes of the Caucasus and, unopposed by the Iberians, had swarmed into Parthian territory. [62] Before Artabanus could force a decisive engagement, Vitellius took the field at the head of his legions and spread the rumor that he was about to invade Mesopotamia. ”

“ Such a movement would necessarily have thrown the entire previous population of those parts into commotion, and would probably have precipitated them upon their neighbors. It accounts satisfactorily for the pressure of the northern hordes at this period on the Parthians, Bactrians, and even the Indians; and it completely explains the crisis in Parthian history, which we have now reached, and the necessity which lay upon the nation of meeting and, if possible, overcoming, an entirely new danger. ”

“ Together these bodies constituted the strength of the army; and though the royal bodyguard might perhaps have been capable of dealing successfully with each group of retainers separately, yet such an esprit de corps was sure to animate the nobles generally, that they would make common cause in case one of their number were attacked, and would support him against the crown with the zeal inspired by self-interest. Thus the Parthian nobility were far more powerful and independent than any similar class under the Achaemenian, Sassanian, Modern Persian, or Turkish sovereigns. ”

“ They generally discharged their arrows backwards, holding the bow behind the shoulder; a mode of attack more dangerous to a pursuing enemy than to one in order of battle. The Parthians first appeared in history as subject to the great Persian empire. After the death of Alexander the Great, Parthia formed part of the Syrian kingdom, but revolted under Antiochus II., and constituted itself into an independent kingdom under the Arsacidæ, 250 B.C., a race of kings who exercised the most completely despotic authority ever known. ”

“ The friendship between Rome and Parthia was a public matter; it bound the Romans to help the nation allied to them—a nation which, though equal to them in strength, was content on account of its respect for Rome to yield her precedence. Parthian princes were allowed to be hostages in foreign lands for the very reason that then it was always possible, if their own monarch displeased them, for the people to obtain a king from abroad, brought up under milder influences. ”