The Poison King: The Life and Legend of Mithradates, Rome's Deadliest Enemy

by Adrienne Mayor

  31. Duggan 1959, 125, suggests the “hunters” were bandits on the run from M. Lucullus’s route to the stronghold and battles for Kabeira, Munro 1901, 57–58.

  32. M master of intelligence, often using advance scouts and fire signals, Sheldon 2005, 75.

  33. Appian 79–82; Plutarch Lucullus 15–17.

  34. King Parisades of the Bosporus (Ch 5) died in a Scythian-led uprising in 110 BC. Polyaenus Stratagems 7.37, Krentz and Wheeler 1994, 2:693.

  35. Route of M’s flight, Munro 1901, 52, 58; Talbert 2000, map 87, 2:1226–42. Plutarch Lucullus 17. Strabo 12.3.33 suggests that his distant relative Dorylaus was later suspected of treachery against M, but Plutarch’s account of Dorylaus’s end seems credible. Romans bribed a cousin of Dorylaus, Lagetus, to lead a revolt. M seized Lagetus’s property but did not kill him, and the family fell into poverty.

  36. Plutarch compiled his detailed account from descriptions of defectors and captives who ended up in Lucullus’s hands. Of course, some accounts may have been elaborated over time. Plutarch Lucullus 18. Appian 82. Memnon 30.1. Strabo 12.3.11. Appendix 2 for these tragic deaths in art, music, and literature. See Summerer 2009, fig 6, death of Monime (1816).

  37. Suicide to preserve freedom, liberty, independence versus survival under tyranny, Balsdon 1979, 162–67. Suicide or killing of one’s family practiced in many ancient and modern cultures, to prevent falling into enemy hands. One of many examples is Hannibal’s sister Sophonisba, who drank poison to escape capture by Romans in 203 BC.

  • 13 •

  RENEGADE KINGS

  1. Plutarch Lucullus 17.4–7; Appian 81–82; Orosius 6.4. Cf Memnon 30.1. Polyaenus Stratagems 7.29.2 described a similar ruse by M in Paphlagonia, distracting pursuers by setting his fine furniture and golden dishes on the road. Final phase of Lucullus’s campaign against M and Tigranes, 70–66 BC: Appian 82–90; Plutarch Lucullus 19–37; Memnon 30–39; Cassius Dio 36; Keaveney 1992, 91–128; Duggan 1959, 133–67, 343–76; Sherwin-White 1994, 229–47; McGing 1986, 152–63. Cicero, Pro lege Manilia 127.

  2. I base this list of companions on Plutarch’s and Appian’s reports of who was with M later in Armenia and Pontus. Location of Talaura, route into Armenia, Munro 1901, 58–59; Appian 82, 115; Plutarch Lucullus 19; Cassius Dio 36.14–16.

  3. Strabo 12.3.33. Tyrannio the Grammarian, a member of M’s circle, was captured in Amisus and taken to Rome, where he worked on books of Aristotle and Theophrastus plundered by Sulla from Athens. He later taught Strabo (12.3.16, 13.1.54). Plutarch Lucullus 19. Memnon 30 says that “many citizens of Amisus were slaughtered immediately” although Lucullus tried to stop the killing, and “Eupatoria was immediately destroyed.” Keaveney 1992, 93. Heraclea was destroyed after it was betrayed by M’s Galatian general Konnakorax, Memnon 34–36.

  4. Ancient sources are contradictory about what actually happened in Sinope. Memnon 37; Strabo 12.3.11; Appian 83; Plutarch Lucullus 23.

  5. Globe of Billarus, Strabo 12.3.11. Mastrocinque 2009. The statues and Antikythera device are in the Archaeological Museum of Athens. Recent scientific studies of gears, purpose, dating and inscriptions: Marchant 2008; Freeth et al. 2008.

  6. Plutarch Lucullus 24; Memnon 37.

  7. Plutarch Lucullus 20 (quote). Appian 83; Keaveney 1992, 95–98.

  8. The dialogue of Appius and Tigranes is based on Plutarch Lucullus 19 and 21; Memnon 31. Reinach 1890, 351; Keaveney 1992, 99–104; McGing 1986, 152–53, Ballesteros Pastor 1996, ch 7. Armenia and Tigranes: Reinach 1890, 453–55; Ussher 2007, 4041, 4085–86, 4199, 4217, 4228–29, 4264, 4282–83, 4308. Armenian view: Kurkjian 1958, ch 13. Turkish view: Tezcan 2007, 100–101.

  9. Memnon 31, Tigranes gave M “bodyguards and all other marks of hospitality”; 38, M stayed at the lodge for a year and eight months. Tigranes as philhellene, Kurkjian 1958. See also Raffi 1959.

  10. Strabo 11.14.8–9 and 16, 11.13.7. Flora and terrain of Armenia described by early travelers, Stoneman 1987, 186–207; Ravanea coccinea (wormwood parasite), Morena orientalis (flower of the sun); sacred to Zorastrians, www.rbedrosian.com/soma.htm.

  11. Plutarch Lucullus 22; Appian 82; Memnon 38. Keaveney 1992, 99–104. Kurkjian 1958 and other Armenian historians deny that Tigranes was “cold and unconcerned” about M.

  12. Plutarch Lucullus 22; Strabo 13.1.55; Memnon 38. Scullard 1970, 102–5.

  13. Memon 38. Appian 82–84. Justin 40.2. Plutarch Lucullus 22–24. McGing 1986, 153 n67. Kurkjian 1958.

  14. Plutarch Lucullus 26 and Appian 85 say Tigranes had 250,000–300,000; cf 150,000 in Plutarch, Sayings of Romans 203. Eutropius 6.9: Tigranes 600,000 and Lucullus 18,000. Phlegon of Tralles frag 12, in Hansen 1996, 62, gives Tigranes 40,000 infantry and 30,000 cavalry. Certainly Tigranes’ army was vast and probably more than twice the size of Lucullus’s 30,000 (and the Roman strength of 15,000–20,000 was probably minimized by Roman writers). See Matyszak 2008, 128–29; maps, 132–35. In 1916, an Ottoman army of 60,000 retraced Tigranes’ route over the Taurus range and lost 30,000 men to cold and starvation. Kurkjian 1958, ch 13, estimates Tigranes’ army at 70,000–100,000.

  15. Battle for Tigranocerta described by Plutarch Lucullus 25–29; Appian 84–86; Memnon 38. Cassius Dio 36.1–3. Machiavelli Art of War 2.76. In fiction: Church 1885, 233–79; Ford 2004, 259–74. Plutarch Sayings of Romans 203.1–2. Keaveney 1992, 106–11; Sherwin-White 1994, 239–47. Tribes and Tigranocerta, Strabo 11.14.14–15.

  16. Plutarch Lucullus 28; Appian 85. Duggan 1959, 147. Tigranes’ women were transported to Artaxata, but some were captured later by Lucullus and others by Pompey—that would explain how we know of the earlier rescue.

  17. This scene is detailed in Plutarch Lucullus 29; Memnon 38. Appian 87. Cassius Dio 36.1–2. Kurkjian 1958, ch 13, gives the modern Armenian view of the disaster dealt by Lucullus.

  18. Cassius Dio 36.1–2.

  19. Keaveney 1992, 111. Kurkjian 1958, ch 13 n2, placed Tigranocerta northwest of Nisibis below a spur of the Taurus chain, among other suggested sites. Based on ancient roads, in 1997 T. A. Sinclair suggested Tigranocerta lay near Arzan, Turkey, cited in Talbert 2000, map 89, and 1280, 1290. In 2006, the Armenian Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology of the Academy of Sciences and Yerevan State University, led by Dr. Hamlet Petrosyan, announced the excavation of Tigranocerta, near modern Martakert (Miyafarkin, Martyropolis, modern Silvan), constructed with advanced Hellenistic techniques and an estimated population of about 50,000; see www.armeniadiaspora.net/ADC/news.asp?id=1341.

  20. Maltha and poison arrows: Mayor 2009, 234, 245–47; Cassius Dio 36.5–8; Pliny 2.108–9; Healy 1999, 255. Samosata, Munro 1901, 62. Ammianus Marcellinus 23.4.15, 23.6.16, and 37. Naphtha wells near a fortress in this region, Stoneman 1987, 205.

  21. Plutarch Lucullus 30–31. Keaveney 1992, 112–17. Badian 1981. Duggan 1959, 153–55.

  22. Appian 87. Plutarch Pompey 32.8. Eutropius 6.12. Xenophon’s Greeks were accompanied by fighting women, Lee 2007, 272–73. Alexander and Amazon, Lane Fox 2004, 276, 432 and 531. Reinach 1890, 297, 387, Hypsicratea, “intrepide amazone.” Autonomous barbarian women and equal status with men in this period, see Konstan 2002. See Izady 1992, 194, on ancient and modern women warriors of Kurdistan. Women in M’s army, Cassius Dio 36.49.3.

  23. Letter to Arsaces, Sallust Histories 4.69 Maurenbrecher, abridged, see Lewis and Reinhold 1990, 235–36. Cassius Dio 36.1–3 and Plutarch Lucullus 30.1–2. Ahlheid 1988 gives a detailed analysis of the rhetorical strategies in M’s letter. Many modern historians have wrangled over whether Sallust’s letter is genuine or composed to represent what M communicated, see eg Erciyas 2006, 27–28; Sanford 1937, 439–40. An entire PhD dissertation is devoted to the letter, L. Raditsa, Columbia University, 1969, cited in McGing’s extensive discussion, 1986, 84, 105, 154–62. There is no doubt that M communicated with Parthia; Parthian royalty was represented in the early monument on Delos. The message is plausible, the language in M’s style; the letter appears to be either genuine or based on M’s other authentic letters
and speeches. McGing 1986, 155–62. Olbrycht 2009: “The letter reflects a genuine document found by the Romans” in M’s personal archives.

  24. Plutarch Lucullus 31.

  25. Ammianus Marcellinus 31.2.8: nomad warriors, lightly armed and swift, “purposely divide suddenly into scattered bands and attack, riding about in disorder here and there, dealing terrific slaughter.” Cf Justin 41, “alternate charge and retreat” of nomads, they “quit in the very heat of the fight,” then surge back “just when one thinks he has won!” The Macedonian cavalry’s desertion was foiled, Frontinus Stratagems 1.7.8.

  26. Plutarch Lucullus 31.5–8. Appian 88: Lucullus could not draw M into a fight. According to Keaveney 1992, 118–20, 123, M was brave vs “lesser men” but “would not face his superior” enemy, Lucullus.

  27. Scordisci: Frontinus Stratagems 3.7. Xenophon March 3.4; Lee 2007. Herodotus 4.46–48, 4.120–40.

  28. Strabo 11.13–14. Early travelers’ descriptions of Armenian winter, Stoneman 1987, 197. Cf Lee 2007, 202, 228, for Xenophon’s travails in Armenia’s rough terrain and snow.

  29. Plutarch Lucullus 32.3–5; Cassius Dio 36.6–8.

  30. M’s route from Armenia to Pontus, Munro 1901, 58.

  31. Campaign to recover Pontus: Cassius Dio 36.9–17; Plutarch Lucullus 35; Appian 88–90; Eutropius 6.9.

  32. Use of snake venom to stop hemorrhage, Hopkins 1995. Appian 88–89; Cassius Dio 36.9. Alexander suffered a gash on the thigh fighting Darius at Issus. The incident of showing Alexander to his troops took place in India. Plutarch Fortune of Alexander 341.

  33. M’s trophy at Zela, Cassius Dio 42.48. Plutarch Pompey 39; Lucullus 33–35. Keaveney 1992, 124–26; Holland 2003, 172–73.

  34. Plutarch Lucullus 35–36 and Pompey 31; Strabo 12.5.2. Keaveney 1992, 125–28. Cicero Pro lege Manilia, in favor of giving Pompey the authority in 66 BC, to destroy the menace of M who had escaped punishment for 22 years after the atrocities of 88 BC. As long as M lives, said Cicero, Rome’s economic and political status was in peril.

  35. Plutarch Lucullus 37; Keaveney 1992, 135.

  36. Plutarch Lucullus 39–43; Athenaeus 2.50–51, 5.274, and 12; Appian 90–91. Love potion, Pliny 25.7.25. Keaveney 1992, 164–65. Poison love potions, Cilliers and Retief 2000, 89.

  37. Piracy crisis, Plutarch Pompey 24–25; Appian 91–97; Cicero Pro lege Manilia; Holland 2003, 164–65.

  • 14 •

  END GAME

  1. Strabo 12.3.18; Diodorus 14.30. Lee 2007, 229. Toxic honey as weapon, Mayor 2009, 146–48, 153–54. Root-Bernstein 1991, 44–45 suggested Krateuas devised the plan, based on Xenophon’s experience.

  2. Pirates, Appian 91–96. “Odious,” Plutarch Pompey 24–30. Pompey’s war on M, Appian 97–117; Plutarch Pompey 30–45; Scullard 1970, 88–108. Cilician pirates worshipped Mithra; pirates and veterans helped spread militaristic Zoroastrian-influenced cults of Mithra/Mithras in the Roman world after Mithradatic Wars. Champlin 2003, 227–29 and n30; Wynne-Tyson 1972, 46–47; Plutarch Pompey 24.5; Balsdon 1979, 238; Holland 2003, 167–68; Tezcan 2003.

  3. Cicero, Pro lege Manilia 121.

  4. Exchange reported by Appian 97–98, based on accounts of veterans and Romans later captured by Pompey. Cassius Dio 36.45.3–4.

  5. Preceding events described by Plutarch Pompey 32; Cassius Dio 36.47–50 (deserters); Frontinus Stratagems 1.1.7; Eutropius 6.12–14; Appian 97–101. Strabo 12.3.28–41.

  6. Plutarch Pompey 32. I added Hypsicratea to M’s dream; she was with M at this time.

  7. Appian 100–101. Plutarch Alexander 31. M’s night attack on Rhodes failed, Ch 8.

  8. Moonlight Battle detailed in Plutarch Pompey 32; Appian 99–100; Livy Epit. 101, and see Florus 3.5.22–24, 1.40.23; Orosius 6.4.4–5. Cassius Dio 36.48–49, both men and women were in M’s forces. According to Frontinus Stratagems 2.1.12, Pompey attacked that night to force M to come out and fight. Turkish view of Pompey’s campaign in Pontus and Colchis, Tezcan 2007, 101–4.

  9. Orders to stab horses, Frontinus Stratagems 2.33.

  10. Plutarch Pompey, 32.8; Eutropius 6.12; Orosius 5.3–5, 6.4.6; Reinach 1890, 387. Duggan 1959, like Christine de Pizan, below, assumed Hypsicratea was a courtesan forced to throw on Persian men’s clothing for the first time during Pompey’s attack.

  11. Valerius Maximus 4.6.2, 6.6. Orosius 6.5.3–5.

  12. Boccaccio, Famous Women 6.323–27, inspired by V. Maximus. Cf Petrarch Triumphus cupidinis 3.28.30. Hypsicratea in 17th- and 18th-century French dramas, such as Behourt’s Hypsicratée, 1604, see Snaith 2007, 16–17.

  13. Typical criticism of Roman avarice in this 12th-century poem: “the treacherous Roman people . . . worshipped silver and went mad in pursuit of gain. . . . they worship the gold of Arabia, the brocaded robes of Greece, the ivory and gems of India, . . . silver and gold of England.” Sanford 1950, 36. Machiavelli Art of War 2.84–99, calls M a “valiant” hero. See Baley 1585, for blistering attack on Rome and praise of M’s gifts to the world. Christine de Pizan 1999, 110–12.

  14. Bituitus fought at M’s side in battle, traveled with M to Bosporan Kingdom, was present at M’s death in 63 BC. Walked horses, Orosius 6.4. Sagona and Sagona 2005, 67, for location and archaeological discoveries at Sinora. Talbert 2000, map 87, “Sinoria” 1256, 1241. Drypetina: Ammianus Marcellinus 16.7.9; Christine de Pizan 1999, 103–4.

  15. Appian 100–101 makes it clear that this small army fled with M to Colchis. Plutarch Pompey 32; Plutarch Fortune of Alexander 41–42 and Alexander 15 for sharing wealth. A soldier’s pay was about 1 drachma/day; 6,000 talents was about 36 million drachmas. Reinach 1890, 387–89. Mutual trust, Duggan 1959, 175. Cf Romans’ reliance on loot for pay, Ñaco del Hoyo et al. 2009, 3.

  16. Tigranes’ reward, Plutarch Pompey 32.9; Cassius Dio 36.50. Arslan 2007, 392–405, 463–70.

  17. Appian 101. Euphrates snakes, Aelian On Animals 9.29; probably Levantine vipers. Strabo 11.2.13–19, describes M’s journey of 4,000 stades (about 500 miles) from Pontus to Colchis. Ancient Colchis, Braund 1994.

  18. M and Hercules, Erciyas 2006, 148–53. Dioscurias: Appian 67 and 101–2; Strabo 11.2.19; Pliny 6.5. King 2004, 32; Ascherson 1995, 244–56.

  19. Appian 101–2; Plutarch Pompey 35.

  20. Pompey’s movements 66/65 BC: Appian 103–5; Plutarch Pompey 33–38; Cassius Dio 36–37. Strabo 11.1.6, Pompey crisscrossed the region between the Caspian and Black seas. Sherwin-White 1994.

  21. Appian 103. Strabo 11.4–8 says 22,000 cavalry; Plutarch Pompey 35 says 12,000 cavalry. Cassius Dio 37.

  22. Appian 103. Strabo 11.3.3, 11.5.1–4. Ammianus Marcellinus 22.8.26, writing in AD 350, claimed Amazons still lived between the Don and the Caspian Sea. Aelian Historical Miscellany 12.38. Plutarch Alexander 46.1–2; Curtius 6.5.24–25 and 29; Lane Fox 2004, 276. “Amazon” tombs, Ascherson 1995, 111–24. M’s allies around the Phasis, Caucasus, and beyond: Memnon 22.3–4.

  23. Cassius Dio 37.1–7. Armazi is Armozicon (Harmozica) in Strabo 11.3.5. Archaeological excavation at Armazi began 1890, ended 1940s, resumed 1985. Daryal Pass and Armazi Citadel (Armaziskhevi), Talbert 2000, map 88 and 2:1255–67; Braund 1994. Snakes, Plutarch Pompey 36; scorpions and spiders, Strabo 11.4.6.

  24. Plutarch Pompey 35. Cassius Dio 37.3.

  25. Cassius Dio 37.3.

  26. Appian 104–5; Cassius Dio 37.51–53; Plutarch Pompey 33 and Fortune of Alexander 336.3; Holland 2003, 173–74. A. E. Houseman’s poem, see Ch 11. Tigranes’ surrender, Kurkjian 1958, who laments Tigranes’ empire doomed to be “a mere flash of lightning in history because of Roman ruthlessness and the mad audacity” of M.

  27. Appian 115.

  28. Drypetina’s fate, Valerius Maximus 18.13; Ammianus Marcellinus 16.7.9; Appian 107; Pompey 36. Cassius Dio 37.7, gives a different version: Stratonice, angry at being left behind, surrendered the fort to Pompey.

  29. Aulus Gellius 17.16, cited by Totelin 2004, 5. Suetonius Grammarians 15; Balsdon 1979, 56. Baley 1585.

  30. Appian 104–6; Plutarch Pompey 33,
36–41. Cilicia and Taurus Mountains, Mitchell 1995, 1:70–79.

  31. Cassius Dio 36.50. Plutarch Pompey 35.1. Strabo 11.2.13. Appian 101–3. Livy Epit. 101. Klukhor Pass, Talbert 2000, map 87. Strabo’s embainon can mean “to set off, march out, or embark.” Jones, Loeb, 1928, translates: “only with difficulty could he go along the coast, most of the way marching on the edge of the sea.” Cf translation by Hamilton/Falconer, 1856: “embarking in vessels.” For help with translations, thanks to Henryk Jaronowski, John Ma, and Josh Ober.

  32. Reinach 1890, 396–97 and map. Covered boats, camarae, Charachidzé 1998 and Strabo 11.2.5; 11.2.11–13, on Achaea’s harborless shore with sheer cliffs. Strabo says that after M “despaired of going through the land of the Zygi, because of the rugged terrain and the ferocity of the people,” he changed his mind and “completed his journey from the Phasis, traveling about 4,000 stades” (500 miles). Appian 67, 69: M fought Achaeans in 84 BC; they sent warriors in 74 BC, but could not be relied on as allies. M never subdued the Zygi; they “were the serious obstacle to his march,” McGing 1986, 58, 164, on the “remarkable journey.” Unpredictable Achaeans: Saprykin and Maslennikov 1995, 276; map 262–63 for impassable coast and rugged western route. Reinach’s route accepted by McGing 1986, 164; 179; Gozalishvili 1965; Matyzsak 2008, 154 (quoting the 1856 translation, n31 above). Ford’s novel (2004, 324–28) describes an attempt at a coastal route, abandoned for the Klukhor route. King 2004, 49, M avoided the coast “because it was patrolled by Roman ships.” Duggan 1959, 179, follows Appian 102.

  33. Encyclopedia Britannica 11th ed. Forts, Strabo 11.3.5. Maps of the passes: Talbert 2000, maps 87–88. Daryal Pass was sometimes called Caspian Gates and confused with two other fortified passes by same name, one between eastern spur of the Caucasus and the Caspian (Diodorus 2.2.3) and the other on Silk Route south of the Caspian. Scythian Keyhole or Gates, Daryal, Dariel, Darial, Darioly, Caucasiae Pylae, Sarmatian Gates. Tacitus Annals 6.33.3: Iberi controlled strongholds and passes over the mid-Caucasus, and the Caspian Gates pass on the Caspian Sea was sometimes closed due to gale-driven floods. Pliny 5.27, “unbroken continuity” of the Caucasus, except for the “Armenian and Caspian Gates.”