The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 6: Parthia: The History, Geography, And Antiquities Of Chaldaea, Assyria, Babylon, Media, Persia, Parthia, And Sassanian or New Persian Empire; With Maps and Illustrations.Rawlinson, George
History
The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 6: Parthia: The History, Geography, And Antiquities Of Chaldaea, Assyria, Babylon, Media, Persia, Parthia, And Sassanian or New Persian Empire; With Maps and Illustrations.
The revolt which now occupied for a time the attention of Mithridates
was that of Hyrcania. The Hyrcanians were Arians in race; they were
brave and high-spirited, and under the Persian monarchs had enjoyed some
exceptional privileges which placed them above the great mass of the
conquered nations. It was natural that they should dislike the yoke of a
Turanian people; and it was wise of them to make their effort to obtain
their freedom before Parthia grew into a power against which revolt
would be utterly hopeless. Hyrcania might now expect to be joined by the
Medes, and even the Mardi, who were Arians like themselves, and could
not yet have forgotten the pleasures of independence. But though the
effort does not seem to have been ill-timed, it was unsuccessful. No aid
was given to the rebels, so far as we hear, by any of their neighbors.
Mithridates’s prompt return nipped the insurrection in the bud; Hyrcania
at once submitted, and became for centuries the obedient vassal of her
powerful neighbor.
The conquest of Media had brought the Parthians into contact with
the rich country of Susiana or Elymais; and it was not long before
Mithridates, having crushed the Hyrcanian revolt, again advanced
westward, and invaded this important province. Elymais appears to have
a had a king of its own, who must either have been a vassal of the
Seleucidse, or have acquired an independent position by revolt after the
death of Epiphanes. In the war which followed between this monarch and
Mithridates, the Elymseans proved wholly unsuccessful, and Mithridates
rapidly overran the country and added it to his dominions. After this he
appears to have received the submission of the Persians on the one hand
and the Babylonians on the other, and to have rested on his laurels for
some years, having extended the Parthian sway from the Hindoo Koosh to
the Euphrates.
The chronological data which have come down to us for this period
are too scanty to allow of any exact statement of the number of years
occupied by Mithridates in effecting these conquests. All that can be
said is that he appears to have commenced them about B.C. 163 and to
have concluded them some time before B.C. 140, when he was in his turn
attacked by the Syrians. Probably they had been all effected by the
year B.C. 150; since there is reason to believe that about that time
Mithridates found his power sufficiently established in the west to
allow of his once more turning his attention eastward, and renewing his
aggressions upon the Bactrian kingdom, which had passed from the rule of
Eucratidas under that of his son and successor, Heliocles.
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