Roman-Persian Wars

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Cross the Persian side of the border from northern Mesopotamia, however, and one entered a region of possibly even greater wealth. Here, one passed into Mesopotamia proper, the central Tigris-Euphrates Valley, an area of ancient cities and rich agriculture supported by vast irrigation projects. It was more sophisticated and richer than the Persian plateau. It is estimated, for example, that the Sassanid dynasty derived two-fifths of its wealth from Mesopotamia. As on the Roman side of the border, most of the population spoke Syriac. Not the least of the ironies of the Roman-Persian conflict is linguistic: Very few of the inhabitants of the lands over which the two sides fought spoke either Latin or Persian.

The prizes then, were clear. On the one side stood Roman Cappadocia, Pontus, and, above all, Syria; on the other was Persian Mesopotamia. The border regions of Armenia and northern Mesopotamia were the places where the two empires met.

Rome’s intervention in the Near East was the culmination of four centuries of conquest that transformed a tiny Italian city-state into a world empire. During those centuries, the Roman governing elite developed a distinct style of political and military behavior in the international arena. The dominant trait was a tendency toward preventive war against any potentially hostile power. Rome’s wars against Carthage, Macedonia, and the Gauls are examples of conflicts that conformed to this pattern. Coexistence did not come easily to Romans.

The Roman empire’s desire for glory pushed their armies eastward toward Persia. For centuries, every ambitious young Roman dreamed of winning a battle and returning home to celebrate a triumph. A triumph was not merely a victory parade, although the successful general–in a chariot pulled by white horses and with a laurel wreath on his head–would ride through the city of Rome to the cheers of the crowd, accompanied by his troops and with booty and captives on display. The ostentatious parade was an official recognition by the Roman Senate that the general had won a major victory and that, in effect, he was a man to be reckoned with. For many a Roman noble, the triumphal procession led to the Forum, where political success began.

In 55 B.C., Marcus Licinius Crassus anticipated following precisely that road. The ambitious army commander envisioned leading Rome’s eastern legions to victory against Parthia. He would then have outdone Pompey the Great’s deeds in the East and matched Julius Caesar’s current victories in Gaul, both of whom were his rivals in Rome’s First Triumvirate. In addition to fear and glory, a third time-honored Roman motive for war underlay Crassus’ expedition–greed. Considered by many to be the richest man in Rome (Crassus once said that no one was wealthy unless he could raise a private army), Crassus understood this motive well. With the booty of Mesopotamia to tempt him, and with a glorious triumph in prospect, he could all but taste the political fruit that his war in the East would bear.

It did not turn out that way, though. Although Crassus is cited in some sources as planning an Alexander-style march on India, he probably intended the less grandiose objective of marching down the Euphrates Valley to capture Ctesiphon and the rich Greek city of Seleucia nearby. Victory would permit the expansion of Rome’s empire to include some or all of the land between the Tigris and Euphrates.

Alas, Crassus’ campaign was a clear violation of Pompey’s earlier treaty, which set the northwest boundary of the Parthian empire on the Wadi Balik, leaving the little kingdom of Osroene, between Parthia and Roman Syria, about sixty miles to the west, independent. Nor had Parthia done anything to provoke Roman intervention. But treaties counted for little against glory, fear, and greed. It could, moreover, be argued that since the Greek-speaking Seleucid monarchs had once controlled Mesopotamia, the area was a natural part of the Roman empire. In any case, Crassus expected an easy victory, since the Parthian army had performed tepidly when last observed by Rome in Armenia about a dozen years earlier. Crassus also had plenty of manpower: seven legions, a fighting force of about thirty thousand men, plus about ten thousand cavalry and light troops. Unfortunately, he failed as a tactician.

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Tags: Ancient-Medieval, Historical Conflicts

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