Artabanus II., the Parthian monarch who succeeded Phraates II., appears to have appreciated aright the perils of his position.  He was not content, when the particular body of barbarians which had defeated and slain his predecessor, having ravaged Parthia Proper, returned home, to fold his arms and wait until he was again attacked.  According to the brief, but expressive words of Justin, he assumed the aggressive, and invaded the country of the Tochari, one of the most powerful of the Scythic tribes, which was now settled in a portion of the region that had, till lately, belonged to the Bactrian kingdom.  Artabanus evidently felt that what was needed was to roll back the flood of invasion which had advanced so near to the sacred home of his nation; that the barbarians required to be taught a lesson; that they must at least be made to understand that Parthia was to be respected; or that, if this could not be done, the fate of the Empire was sealed.  He therefore, with a gallantry and boldness that we cannot sufficiently admire—­a boldness that seemed like rashness, but was in reality prudence—­without calculating too closely the immediate chances of battle, led his troops against one of the most forward of the advancing tribes.  But fortune, unhappily, was adverse.  How the battle was progressing we are not told; but it appears that in the thick of an engagement Artabanus received a wound in the forearm, from the effects of which he died almost immediately.  The death of the leader decides in the East, almost to a certainty, the issue of a contest.  We cannot doubt that the Parthians, having lost their monarch, were repulsed; that the expedition failed; and that the situation of affairs became once more at least as threatening as it had been before Artabanus made his attempt.  Two Parthian monarchs had now fallen within the space of a few years in combat with the aggressive Scyths—­two Parthian armies had suffered defeat.  Was this to be always so?  If it was, then Parthia had only to make up her mind to fall, and, like the great Roman, to let it be her care that she should fall grandly and with dignity.

CHAPTER IX.

Accession of Mithridates II.  Termination of the Scythic Wars.  Commencement of the struggle with Armenia.  Previous history of Armenia.  Result of the first Armenian War.  First contact of Rome with Parthia.  Attitude of Rome towards the East at this time.  Second Armenian War.  Death of Mithridates.

On the death of Artabanus II., about B.C. 124, his son, Mithridates II., was proclaimed king.  Of this monarch, whose achievements (according to Justin) procured him the epithet of “the Great,” the accounts which have come down to us are extremely scanty and unsatisfactory.  Justin, who is our principal informant on the subject of the early Parthian history, has unfortunately confounded him with the third monarch of the name, who ascended the throne more than sixty years later, and has left us only the slightest and most meagre outline of his actions.  The other classical writers, only to a very small extent, supplement Justin’s narrative; and the result is that of a reign which was one of the most important in the early Parthian series, the historical inquirer at the present day can form but a most incomplete conception.