The arrival of the first Roman army in Asia Minor in 190 BC in the war between Rome and Antiochus III initiated a period of continuing fragmentation of the area. On the one hand, the kingdom of Pergamon was rewarded for its alliance with the Romans by the extension of its territory over all of western and southwestern Asia Minor. Its capital was embellished by the Pergamene kings and became an important center of Hellenistic civilization, famous for its sculptures and its library. On the other hand, new states arose elsewhere in Asia Minor: the kingdom of Bithynia to the north of Pergamon, that of Cappadocia in the east, beyond the territory of the Galatians (the Celts), and the kingdom of Pontos in the coastal regions of the Black Sea. There, as well as in Cappadocia, strong Iranian influences could still be found. Greek or Hellenized cities were practically everywhere, often royal foundations, while the elites of the various kingdoms were mostly thoroughly Hellenized. Outside the cities, however, Hellenistic culture had not penetrated very deep, and everywhere in the countryside indigenous languages were still spoken. Further to the east, in the Caucasus mountains, the kingdom of Armenia emerged, and like neighboring Cappadocia was under strong Iranian influences. In Iran itself, the kingdom of the Parthians had definitely established itself as the successor to the Seleucids and ultimately to the Achaemenids. In a series of wars, it pushed its frontier further and further to the west. The Seleucid kingdom,
Consequently, kept shrinking; after the loss of Judea in the 2nd century BC, it was limited in fact to Syria and a part of Mesopotamia that was constantly threatened by the Parthians. Even the coastal cities of Phoenicia regained their independence. Civil wars then weakened the rump state even further.
In the meantime, the influence of Rome expanded. In 168 BC, the new power forced Antiochus IV out of Egypt, and since 161 BC it seemed to protect the Jews against the Seleucids. When in 133 BC the last king of Pergamon died, he left a will in which he bequeathed his kingdom to Rome. The heir eagerly accepted the inheritance, but the population of the kingdom took up arms to defend their independence. Just as in the last war of the Greeks against Rome in 149-146 BC, social and socioeconomic motives played a significant role in the uprising. The rural poor and many of the slaves turned against the city elites that were backed by Rome. Within a few years, the rebellion was crushed, and the former kingdom transformed into the Roman provincia Asia. This meant, among other things, that Roman and Italian tax farmers, financiers, and traders entered the province, only to make themselves utterly detested by the population in a very short time.
In the beginning of the 1st century BC, the ambitious king of Pontos, Mithridates, exploited those anti-Roman feelings for his own political ends. In 88 BC, he occupied the province of Asia and had all Romans and Italians living there massacred, then sent his army on to Greece to proclaim, as Antiochus III had done before him, a war of “liberation” of the Greeks. Some Greeks enthusiastically joined the liberators, among them the city of Athens. This decision led to its ruin. For the Roman reaction was predictable: the ambitious and ruthless Roman general Sulla arrived on the scene, and besieged and took the city in 86 BC. Athens, and other cultural centers such as Delphi and Olympia, were plundered by the Roman troops. Mithridates’ army in Greece was defeated, and the king had to withdraw from his conquests in Asia Minor. Some years later, when the Seleucid kingdom was threatened by yet another civil war for the throne, Mithridates in alliance with the king of Armenia tried again to expel Roman power from Asia Minor. There followed new Roman expeditions, not always completely successful, until in 66 BC the Roman politician Pompey received a special command to restore order in the east. Mithridates fled before him, and a new Roman province could be organized, the provincia Bithynia et Pontus (for, in the meantime, the last king of Bithynia had bequeathed his kingdom to the Romans too). At the same time, in the south of Asia Minor the provincia Cilicia was installed. Then, in 64 BC, Pompey formally put an end to the Seleucid kingdom, annexing its remnants as the provincia Syria, while the king of Armenia submitted to Rome to become its vassal. In the next year, Pompey advanced on Jerusalem, where a civil war had broken out between two rival Hashmonaean brothers. Pompey recognized one of them as king and the other as high priest, making it clear that Judea, just like Armenia, now had become a vassal state of Rome.
World History
