When this news came to Rome (at the end of 54) the emperor Claudius had just died, and the ministers Burrus and Seneca practically governed for his young successor, seventeen years old. The procedure of Vologasus could only be answered by a declaration of war. In fact the Roman government sent to Cappadocia, which otherwise was a governorship of the second rank and was not furnished with legions, by way of exception the consular legate Gnaeus Domitius Corbulo. He had come rapidly into prominence as brother-in-law of the emperor Gaius, had then under Claudius been legate of lower Germany in the year 47 (I. 125), and was thenceforth regarded as one of the able commanders, not at that time numerous, who energetically maintained the stringency of discipline--in person a Herculean figure, equal to any fatigue, and of unshrinking courage in presence not of the enemy merely but also of his own soldiers. It appeared to be a sign of things becoming better that the government of Nero gave to him the first important command which it had to fill. The incapable Syrian legate of Syria, Quadratus, was not recalled, but was directed to put two of his four legions at the disposal of the governor of the neighbouring province. All the legions were brought up to the Euphrates, and orders were given for the immediate throwing of bridges over the stream. The two regions bordering immediately on Armenia to the westward, Lesser Armenia and Sophene, were assigned to two trustworthy Syrian princes, Aristobulus, of a lateral branch of the Herodian house, and Sohaemus, of the ruling family of Hemesa, and both were placed under Corbulo’s command. Agrippa, the king of the remnant of the Jewish state still left at that time, and Antiochus, king of Commagene, likewise received orders to march. [Sidenote: Character of his troops.]