262 VICTORIES OF ARTAXERXES. [CH. VIII. If we compare the adminstration of the house of Sassan with that of the house of Sefi, the political influence of the Magian with that of the Mahometan religion, we shall probably infer, that the kingdom of Artaxerxes contained at least as great a number of cities, villages, and inhabitants. But it must likewise be confessed, that in every age the want of harbours on the sea-coast, and the scarcity of fresh water in the inland provinces, have been very unfavourable to the commerce and agriculture of the Persians; who, in the calculation of their numbers, seem to have indulged one of the meanest, though most common artifices of national vanity. As soon as the ambitious mind of Artaxexes had triumphed over the resistance of his vassals, he began to threaten the neighbouring states, who, during the long slumber of his predecessors, had insulted Persia with impunity. He obtained some victories over the wild Scythians and the effeminate Indians; but the Romans were an enemy, who, by their past injuries* and present power, deserved the utmost efforts of his arms. A forty years' tranquillity, the fruit of valour and moderation, had succeeded the victories of Trajan. During the period that elapsed from the accession of Marcus to the reign of Alexander, the Roman and the Parthian empires were twice engaged in war; and although the whole strength of the Arsacides contended with a part only of the forces of Rome, the event was most commonly in favour of the latter. Macrinus, indeed, prompted by his precarious situation and pusillanimous temper, purchased a peace at the expense of near two millions of our money : but the generals of Marcus, the emperor Severus, and his son, erected many trophies in Armenia, Mesopotamia, and Assyria. Among their exploits, the imperfect relation of which would have * The latest of these injuries was undoubtedly inflicted by the shameless perfidy of Caracalla. Proposals of marriage with the daughter of Artabanes were made by him, and accepted by her father. Under the pretence of receiving his bride, he advanced at the head of a numerous army to the Persian capital, suddenly attacked the unsuspecting monarch, who expected to receive him as a son-in-law, and instead of nuptial festivities, created a scene of bloodshed and destruction. This is related by Herodian (lib. 4, c. 10); and a French writer, commenting on the transaction, calls it, "le modèle ou du moins l'ébauche de la St. Barthé lemi de Catherine de Medicis."-SCHREITER. + Dion, L. 28, p. 1335. unseasonably interrupted the more important series of domestic revolutions, we shall only mention the repeated calamities of the two great cities of Seleucia and Ctesiphon. Seleucia, on the western bank of the Tigris, about fortyfive miles to the north of ancient Babylon, was the capital of the Macedonian conquests in Upper Asia.* Many ages after the fall of their empire, Seleucia retained the genuine characters of a Grecian colony, arts, military virtue, and the love of freedom. 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. The Parthian monarchs, like the Mogul sovereigns of Hindostan, delighted in the pastoral life of their Scythian ancestors; and the imperial camp was frequently pitched in the plain of Ctesiphon, on the eastern bank of the Tigris, at the distance of only three miles from Seleucia. The innumerable attendants on luxury and despotism resorted to the court, and the little village of Ctesiphon insensibly swelled into a great city. § Under the reign of Marcus, the Roman generals penetrated as far as Ctesiphon and Seleucia. They were received as friends by the Greek colony; they attacked as enemies the seat of the Parthian kings, yet both cities experienced the same treatment. The sack and conflagration of Seleucia, with the massacre of three hundred thousand of the inhabitants, tarnished the glory of the Roman triumph. Seleucia, already exhausted by the neighbour For the precise situation of Babylon, Seleucia, Ctesiphon, Modain, and Bagdad, cities often confounded with each other, see an excel lent geographical tract of M. d'Anville, in the Mém. de l'Académie, tom. xxx. [See also Layard's Nineveh and Babylon, pp. 472, 483, 570, &c.-ED.] Tacit. Annal. 11, 42. Plin. Hist. Nat. 6, 26. This may be inferred from Strabo, 1. 16, p. 743. § That most curious traveller, Bernier, who followed the camp of Aurengzebe from Delhi to Cashmir, describes, with great accuracy, the immense moving city. The guard of cavalry consisted of thirty-five thousand men, and that of infantry of ten thousand. It was computed that the camp contained one hundred and fifty thousand horses, mules, and elephants; fifty thousand camels; fifty thousand oxen; and between three hundred thousand and four hundred thousand persons. Almost all Delhi followed the court, whose magnificence supp rted its industry. ¶ Dion, 1. 71, p. 1178. Hist 264 KINGDOM OF OSRHOENE. [CH. VIII hood of a too powerful rival, sunk under the fatal blow; but Ctesiphon, in about thirty-three years, had sufficiently recovered its strength to maintain an obstinate siege against the emperor Severus. The city was, however, taken by assault; the king, who defended it in person, escaped with precipitation; a hundred thousand captives, and a rich booty, rewarded the fatigues of the Roman soldiers.* Notwithstanding these misfortunes, Ctesiphon succeeded to Babylon and to Seleucia, as one of the great capitals of the east. In summer, the monarch of Persia enjoyed at Ecbatana the cool breezes of the mountains of Media; but the mildness of the climate engaged him to prefer Ctesiphon for his winter residence. From these successful inroads the Romans derived no real or lasting benefits; nor did they attempt to preserve such distant conquests, separated from the provinces of the empire by a large tract of intermediate desert. The reduction of the kingdom of Osrhoene was an acquisition of less splendour indeed, but of a far more solid advantage. That little estate occupied the northern and most fertile part of Mesopotamia, between the Euphrates and the Tigris. Edessa, its capital, was situated about twenty miles beyond the former of those rivers: and the inhabitants, since the time of Alexander, were a mixed race of Greeks, Arabs, Syrians, and Armenians.t The feeble sovereigns of Osrhoene, placed on the dangerous verge of two contending empires, were attached from inclination to the Parthian cause; but the superior power of Rome exacted from them a reluctant homage, which is still attested by their medals. After the conclusion of the Parthian war under Marcus, it was judged prudent to secure some substantial pledges of their doubtful fidelity. Forts were constructed in several parts of the country, and a Roman garrison was fixed in the strong town of Nisibis. During the troubles that followed the death of Commodus, the princes of Osrhoene attempted August. p. 38. Eutrop. 8. 10. Euseb. in Chronic. Quadratus (quoted in the Augustan History) attempted to vindicate the Romans, by alleging that the citizens of Seleucia had first violated their faith. * Dion, 1. 75, p. 1263. Herodian, 1. 3, p. 120. Hist. August. p. 70. The polished citizens of Antioch called those of Edessa mixed barbarians. It was, however, some praise, that of the three dialects of the Syriac, the purest and most elegant (the Aramæan) was spoken at Edessa This remark M. Bayer (Hist. Edess. p. 5) has borrowed from to shake off the yoke; but the stern policy of Severus confirmed their dependence,* and the perfidy of Caracalla completed the easy conquest. Abgarus, the last king of Edessa, was sent in chains to Rome, his dominions reduced into a province, and his capital dignified with the rank of colony; and thus the Romans, about ten years before the fall of the Parthian monarchy, obtained a firm and permanent establishment beyond the Euphrates.t Prudence, as well as glory, might have justified a war on the side of Artaxerxes, had his views been confined to the defence or the acquisition of a useful frontier. But the ambitious Persian openly avowed a far more extensive design of conquest; and he thought himself able to support his lofty pretensions by the arms of reason as well as by those of power. Cyrus, he alleged, had first subdued, and his successors had for a long time possessed, the whole extent of Asia, as far as the Propontis and the Egean sea ; the provinces of Caria and Ionia, under their empire, had been governed by Persian satraps, and all Egypt, to the confines of Ethiopia, had acknowledged their sovereignty.‡ Their rights had been suspended, though not destroyed, by a long usurpation; and as soon as he received the Persian diadem, which birth and successful valour had placed upon his head, the first great duty of his station called upon him to restore the ancient limits and splendour of the monarchy. The great king, therefore (such was the haughty style of his embassies to the emperor Alexander), commanded the Romans instantly to depart from all the provinces of his ancestors, and yielding to the Persians the empire of Asia, to content themselves with the undisturbed possession of Europe. This haughty mandate was delivered by four hundred of the tallest and most beautiful of the Persians; who, by their fine horses, splendid arms, and rich apparel, George of Malatia, a Syrian writer. Dion, 1. 75, p. 1248-1250. M. Bayer has neglected to use this most important passage. + This kingdom, from Csrhoes, who gave a new name to the country, to the last Abgarus, had lasted three hundred and fifty-three years. See the learned work of M. Bayer, Historia Osrhona et Edessena. + Xenophon, in the preface to the Cyropædia, gives a clear and magnificent idea of the extent of the empire of Cyrus. Herodotus (1. 3, c. 79, &c.) enters into a curious and particular description of the twenty great satrapies into which the Persian empire was divided by Darius Hya taspes. [CH. VIIL Such displayed the pride and greatness of their master. an embassy was much less an offer of negotiation than a declaration of war. Both Alexander Severus and Artaxerxes, collecting the military force of the Roman and Persiau monarchies, resolved in this important contest to lead their armies in person. If we credit what should seem the most authentic of all records, an oration, still extant, and delivered by the emperor himself to the senate, we must allow that the victory of Alexander Severus was not inferior to any of those formerly obtained over the Persians by the son of Philip. The army of the great king consisted of one hundred and twenty thousand horse, clothed in complete armour of steel; of seven hundred elephants, with towers filled with archers on their backs, and of eighteen hundred chariots armed with scythes. This formidable host, the like of which is not to be found in eastern history, and has scarcely been imagined in eastern_romance,t was discomfited in a great battle, in which the Roman Alexander approved himself an intrepid soldier and a skilful general. The great king fled before his valour; an immense booty, and the conquest of Mesopotamia, were the immediate fruits of this signal victory. Such are the circumstances of this ostentatious and improbable relation, dictated, as it too plainly appears, by the vanity of the monarch, adorned by the unblushing servility of his flatterers, and received without contradiction * Herodian, 6, 202, 212. There were two hundred scythed chariots at the battle of Arbela, in the host of Darius. In the vast army of Tigranes, which was vanquished by Lucullus, seventeen thousand horse only were completely armed. Antiochus brought fiftyfour elephants into the field against the Romans. By his frequent wars and negotiations with the princes of India, he had once collected a hundred and fifty of those great animals; but it may be questioned whether the most powerful monarch of Hindostan ever formed a line of battle of seven hundred elephants. Instead of three or four thousand elephants, which the Great Mogul was supposed to possess, Tavernier (Voyages, part 2, 1. 1, p. 1, 198) discovered, by a more accurate inquiry, that he had only five hundred for his baggage, and eighty or ninety for the service of war. The Greeks have varied with regard to the number which Porus brought into the field; but Quintus Curtius (8, 13), in this instance judicious and moderate, is contented with eighty-five elephants, distinguished by their size and strength. In Siam, where these animals are the most numerous, and the most esteemed, eighteen elephants are allowed as a sufficient proportion for each of the nine brigades into which a just army is divided. The whole number, of one |