Parthian Empire: Encyclopedia II - Parthian Empire - Decline and fall

Parthian Empire - Decline and fall

The Armenian compromise served its purpose, but nothing in it covered the deposition of an Armenian king. After 110 CE, the Parthian king Vologases III dethroned the Armenian ruler, and the Roman emperor Trajan decided to invade Parthia in retaliation. War broke out in 114 CE and the Parthians were severely beaten. The Romans conquered Armenia, and in the following year, Trajan marched to the south, where the Parthians were forced to evacuate their strongholds. In 116 CE, Trajan captured Ctesiphon, and established new provinces in Assyria and Babylonia.

Rebellions soon broke out due to the continuing loyalty of the population to Parthia. At the same time, the diasporic Jews revolted and Trajan was forced to send an army to suppress them. Trajan overcame these troubles, but his successor Hadrian gave up the territories (117 CE). Nonetheless, it was clear that the Romans had learned how to defeat the Parthians.

Perhaps it was not Roman strength, but Parthian weakness that caused the disaster. In the first century CE, the Parthian nobility had become more powerful due to concessions by the Parthian king granting them greater powers over the land and the peasantry. Their power now rivaled the king's, while at the same time internal divisions in the Arsacid family had rendered them vulnerable.

But the end was not near, yet. In 161 CE king Vologases IV declared war against the Romans and reconquered Armenia. The Roman counter-offensive was slow, but in 165 CE, Ctesiphon fell, and the Parthians were only saved by the outburst of a catastrophic epidemic (probably the measles) which temporarily crippled the two empires. The Roman emperors Lucius Verus and Marcus Aurelius added northern Mesopotamia to their realm (partly as a vassal-kingdom), but as it was never secure enough for them to demilitarize the region between the Euphrates and Tigris it remained an expensive burden.

The deciding blow came thirty years later. King Vologases V had tried to reconquer Mesopotamia during another Roman civil war (193 CE), but was repulsed when general Septimius Severus counter-attacked. Again, Ctesiphon was captured (198 CE), and large spoils were brought to Rome. According to a modern estimate, the gold and silver were sufficient to postpone a European economic crisis for three or four decades, and the consequences of the looting for Parthia were dire.

Parthia, now impoverished and without any hope to recover the lost territories, was demoralized. The kings were forced to concede greater powers to the nobility, and the vassal kings began to waver in their allegiance. In 224 CE, the Persian vassal king Ardašir revolted. Two years later, he took Ctesiphon, and this time it meant the end of Parthia, replaced by the second Persian Empire, ruled by the Sassanid dynasty.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Decline and fall", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki