The accounts of the outcome of the war were distinctly different in the Roman and Persian traditions. The SKZ reported a total Persian victory over Gordian III, and the rock reliefs depict him lying dead beneath Shapur’s horse. The Roman and Byzantine texts focused more on the fate of Gordian III himself and provided little detail of the campaign. A particular issue to emerge from the Roman and Byzantine texts was whether Gordian III was killed in battle at the hands of the Persians or whether he was killed as a result of a conspiracy of the Praetorian Prefect, Philip. The SKZ reported that Gordian III marched against the Persian Empire and that a great battle took place at Meshike on the lower Euphrates where Gordian was killed and the Roman army annihilated.114 The Naqsh-i Rustam relief carvings depicting the dead Gordian being trampled beneath Shapur I’s horse vividly illustrated the Persian claim.115 In the inscription Meshike was refounded by Shapur as Pirisabora (modern Anbar).
While the defeat of Gordian’s army was not mentioned in the Roman and Byzantine texts there were numerous reports regarding his death, but they are difficult to reconcile.116 The death of Gordian is generally attributed to Philip rather than Shapur. According to Oracula Sibyllina XIII, on leading his forces against Persia, Gordian commanded the Roman force against the Persians before being killed in battle near the Euphrates as a result of treachery.117 Philip is probably the companion referred to in the oracle who was in some way responsible for arranging the betrayal or deliberate exposure of the emperor to danger while he was in the front line.118 The genre of Oracula Sibyllina XIII relied on stories that were well known in order for oblique references to be easily recognized as evidence of faithful predictions. By its nature it was not able to provide intricate detail. Zosimus claimed that ‘Gordian fought against the Persians and lost his life in the midst of the enemy’s country’.119 This may suggest that Gordian died at the hands of the Persian king or his forces, but it is a vague reference and no mention is made of a serious defeat of the Roman army as claimed by the SKZ.
In an interesting eyewitness account, Ammianus Marcellinus saw the tomb of Gordian III at a location called Zaitha while marching with the army of the emperor Julian in 363.120 Julian’s army marched from the fortress of Circesium at the confluence of the Euphrates and Khabur rivers and was on its way to the deserted town of Dura Europos when it came to Gordian III’s tomb. The tomb was apparently large as it was visible from a long way off.121 Ammianus did not mention when and where Gordian died, but other texts claimed that Gordian returned from Persia after a successful campaign and that he was murdered at the instigation of Philip.122 Of these texts there were those that reported that Gordian had first successfully prosecuted the war in Persia before being murdered by Philip just as he was about to arrive back in Roman territory.123 This would account for the presence of his tomb at Zaitha. Ammianus claimed elsewhere that Gordian had won a major victory over the Persian king at Rhesaina in northern Mesopotamia before he was murdered by Philip.124
There were at least some Roman and Byzantine sources that agreed with the SKZ’s assertion that Gordian died in Persia, but the nature of his death was the centre of the controversy. The Roman and Byzantine accounts were suspicious regarding Philip’s actions, but were not able to be specific - perhaps because Philip succeeded in controlling information to the point where his treachery was suspected but could not be proved. The GraecoRoman tradition sought an explanation that did not involve Gordian’s death at the hands of the enemy and instead laid the blame on Philip, the main beneficiary of Gordian’s demise.125 The burial of Gordian III on the edges of the empire and the deliberate creation of uncertain accounts of his death may have served to deflect questions regarding Philip’s negotiations with the Persian king. This was important in establishing his own legitimacy on returning to Antioch and Rome. Shapur, on the other hand, had his own agenda and exploited the events to maximum rhetorical effect.
World History
