Third Mithridatic War

Third Mithridatic War
Part of the Mithridatic Wars
Date 73– 63 BC Location Asia Minor Result Roman victory Territorial changes Pontus and Syria became Roman provinces. Judea became client state of Rome and Kingdom of Armenia became Allies of Rome.
Belligerents
Roman Republic, Bithynia	Kingdom of Pontus, Kingdom of Armenia
Commanders and leaders
Lucullus, Pompey	Mithridates VI of Pontus, Tigranes the Great

The Third Mithridatic War (73-63 BC) was the last and longest of three Mithridatic Wars fought between Mithridates VI of Pontus and his allies and the Roman Republic. The war ended in defeat for Mithridates, ending the menace of his Pontic Kingdom and resulted in the Kingdom of Armenia becoming an allied client state of Rome.

Prior to War

The period between the Second and Third wars of Rome and the Pontic Kingdom (81-75 BC) is discussed under the Kingdom of Pontus. There it can be seen how the long piracy wars were a development out of the First Mithridatic War and especially of the alliance between Mithridates VI and Sertorius, which in joining those two threats into a unity much larger than its parts had the serious potential of overturning Roman power.

Forces and initial deployments, 74-73 BC

Having launched an attack at the same time as a revolt by Sertorius swept through the Spanish provinces, Mithridates was initially virtually unopposed. The Senate responded by sending the consul Lucius Licinius Lucullus to deal with the Pontic threat. The only other possible general for such an important command, Pompey, was in Gaul, marching to Hispania to help crush the revolt led by Sertorius.

Roman - Armenian War

Lucullus in command

Tigranes the Great's empire circa 80 BC.

Upon his arrival, Lucullus met up with Roman forces which had been campaigning in Asia Minor. In 69 BC Lucullus led a campaign into Armenia against Tigranes II, Mithridates' son-in-law and ally, to whom Mithridates had fled after Cabeira. He began a siege of the new Armenian imperial capital of Tigranocerta in the Arzenene district. Tigranes returned from mopping up a Seleukid rebellion in Syria with his main host, and sought battle with the Romans. Lucullus' army annihilated the Armenian host, despite odds of about more than two to one against him. This was the famous battle of Tigranocerta. It was fought on the same (pre-Julian) calendar date as the Roman disaster at Arausio 36 years earlier, the day before the Nones of October according to the reckoning of the time (or October 6), which is Julian October 16, 69 BC. Tigranes then retired to the northern regions of his kingdom to gather another army and defend his hereditary capital of Artaxata. Meanwhile, Lucullus moved off south-eastwards to the kingdom of the Kurds (Korduene) on the frontiers of the Armenian and Parthian empires. During the winter of 69-68 BC both sides opened negotiations with the Parthian king, Arsakes XVI, who was presently defending himself against a major onslaught from his rival Frahates III coming from Bactria and the far east.

In the summer of 68 BC Lucullus marched against Tigranes and crossed the Anti-Taurus range heading for the old Armenian capital Artaxata. Once again Tigranes was provoked to attack and in a major battle at the Aratsani River Lucullus was heavily defeated by the Armenian army. Soon he left this campaign and when winter came on early in the Armenian tablelands, his troops mutinied, refusing to go further, and he was forced to withdraw southwards back into Arzenene. From there he proceeded back down through Korduene into old Assyria and in the late autumn and early winter besieged and took Nisibis, the main Armenian fortress city in Northern Mesopotamia.

During the winter of 68-67 BC at Nisibis, his authority over his army was more seriously undermined by the efforts of his young brother-in-law Publius Clodius Pulcher, apparently acting in the interests and pay of Pompey the Great, who was eager to succeed Lucullus in the eastern command. After mutiny spread in the legions with the troops refusing to obey Lucullus' commands, the senate sent Pompey to succeed Lucullus. This lull allowed Mithridates and Tigranes to retake part of their respective kingdoms.

Pompey in Command

On the approach of Pompey, Mithridates retreated towards Armenia but was defeated. As Tigranes the Great now refused to receive him into his dominions, Mithridates resolved to plunge into the heart of Colchis, and thence make his way to his own dominions in the Cimmerian Bosporus. Pompey now marched against Tigranes, whose kingdom and authority were now severely weakened. Tigranes then sued for peace and met with Pompey to plead a cessation of hostilities. The Armenian Kingdom now became an allied client state of Rome.

In 65 BC, Pompey had set out in pursuit of Mithridates meeting opposition from the tribal Caucasian and after advancing as far as Phasis in Colchis, where he met his Servilius, the admiral of his Euxine fleet. Pompey now retook his steps, and spent the winter at Pontus, which he declared would become a Roman province.

Complete Roman Victory

After his defeat by Pompey in 65 BC, Mithridates VI fled with a small army from Colchis (modern Georgia) over the Caucausus Mountains to Crimea and attempted to raise yet another army to take on the Romans but failed to do so. In 63, he withdrew to the citadel in Panticapaeum. His eldest son, Machares, now king of Cimmerian Bosporus, whose kingdom had been reorganized by the Romans, was unwilling to aid his father. Mithridates had Machares murdered and took the throne of the Bosporan Kingdom, intent on retaking Pontus from the Romans. His younger son, Pharnaces II, backed by a disgruntled and war weary populace, led a rebellion against his father. This betrayal, after the decisive defeat in battle, hurt Mithridates more than any other and seeing his loss of authority he attempted suicide by poison. The attempt failed as he had gained immunity to various poisons from taking tiny doses of all available poisons throughout his life to guard against assassination. According to Appian's Roman History, he then ordered his Gallic bodyguard and friend, Bituitus, to kill him by the sword: Mithridates body was buried in Sinope, the capital of Pontus, on the orders of Pompey himself.

References

Ancient sources

• FHG = Karl Müller (ed.) Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum
• FGrH = Felix Jacoby (ed. & critical commentary) , Die Fragmente der griechischen Historiker (commenced 1923)

• Memnon of Herakleia Pontike, 9th century epitome in the ΒΙΒΛΙΟΘΗΚΗ of Photius of Byzantium (codex 224)

- ed. René Henry Photius Bibliotheque Tome IV: Codices 223-229 (Association Guillaume Budé, Paris, 1965), pp. 48–99: Greek text with French translation
- ed. K. Müller FHG III, 525: Greek text with Latin translation
- ed. F. Jacoby FGrH no.434: Greek text, detailed commentary in German

• Phlegon of Tralles fragmenta

- ed. K. Müller FHG III, 602ff.
- ed. F. Jacoby FGrH no.257
- English translations and commentary by William Hansen, Phlegon of Tralles' Book of Marvels (University of Exeter Press, 1996)

Modern works

Abbreviations
RE = Real-Encyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft, eds. Pauly, Wissowa, Kroll

Major studies.

• Eckhardt, Kurt. "Die armenischen Feldzüge des Lukullus",

I. Introduction. Klio, 9 (1909), 400-412
II. Das Kriegsjahr 69. Klio, 10 (1910), 72-115
III. Das Kriegsjahr 68. Klio, 10 (1910), 192-231

• Holmes, T. Rice: The Roman Republic and the Founder of the Empire, vol.I (1923), 398-436
• Gelzer, Matthias: "L. Licinius Lucullus cos.74", RE vol.XIII (1926), s. v. Licinius (104), colls.376-414.
• Magie, David: Roman Rule in Asia Minor, to the End of the Third Century after Christ 2 vols. (Princeton University Press, 1950)
• Van Ooteghem, J: Lucius Licinius Lucullus, (Brussels, 1959)
• Keaveney, Arthur: Lucullus. A Life. (London/New York: Routledge, 1992). ISBN 0-415-03219-9.

Shorter articles.

• Anderson, J G C: "Pompey's Campaign against Mithradates", JRS 12 (1922), 99ff.
• Downey, Glanville: "Q. Marcius Rex at Antioch", Classical Philology 32 (1937), 144-151
• Bennett, William H: "The Death of Sertorius and the Coin", Historia, 10 (1961), 459-72
• McGing, B C: "The Date of the outbreak of the Third Mithridatic War", Phoenix, 38 (1984), 12-18
• Williams, Richard S: "The Appointment of Glabrio (COS.67) to the Eastern Command", Phoenix 38 (1984), 221-234
• Tatum, W J: "Lucullus and Clodius at Nisibis (Plutarch, Lucullus 33-34)", Athenaeum, 79 (1991)

See also

• Mithridatic Wars