Musa of Parthia

A bust from The National Museum of Iran of Queen Musa, excavated by a French team in Khuzestan in 1939.

Coin of Phraataces (obverse, with Nike on each side) and Musa (reverse). The Greek inscription reads ΒΑΣΙΛΕΣΣΕΣ ΘΕΑ ΟΥΡΑΝΙΑΣ (queen, goddess in heaven).

Musa was queen of Parthia c. 2 BC – AD 4. Called Thermusa by Josephus, she was an Italian slave given as a concubine by the Roman emperor Augustus (27 BC – AD 14) to king Phraates IV of Parthia (37–2 BC) as part payment for the return of the eagles lost by Marcus Licinius Crassus in the Battle of Carrhae in 53 BC. She became a favourite of Phraates IV and he made her his legitimate wife under the name of "the goddess Musa"; her son Phraates V (2 BC – AD 4), commonly called Phraataces (a diminutive form), he appointed successor. She persuaded Phraates IV to send his other sons to Rome as hostages. With all rivals out of the way, she and Phraataces poisoned the king and assumed the throne in 2 BC. They appear together on their coins, and were apparently co-rulers. Josephus alleges that Musa then married Phraates V, and, this being unacceptable to the Parthians, they rose up and overthrew them, offering the crown to Orodes III (who ruled briefly in AD 6)

References

• This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
• Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, xviii, 2–4.