Medes
The Medes were an ancient Iranian people who spoke the Median language and who inhabited an area known as Media between western and northern Iran. Under the Neo-Assyrian Empire, late 9th to early 7th centuries BC, the region of Media was bounded by the Zagros Mountains to its west, to its south by the Garrin Mountain in Lorestan Province, to its northwest by the Qaflankuh Mountains in Zanjan Province, to its east by the Dasht-e Kavir desert, its neighbors were the kingdoms of Gizilbunda and Mannea in the northwest, Ellipi and Elam in the south. In the 7th century BC, Media's tribes came together to form the Median Kingdom, which remained a Neo-Assyrian vassal. Between 616 and 609 BC, King Cyaxares, allied with King Nabopolassar of the Neo-Babylonian Empire against the Neo-Assyrian Empire, after which the Median Empire stretched across the Iranian Plateau as far as Anatolia, its precise geographical extent remains unknown. A few archaeological sites and textual sources provide a brief documentation of the history and culture of the Median state.
Apart from a few personal names, the language of the Medes is unknown. The Medes had an ancient Iranian religion with a priesthood named as "Magi". During the reigns of the last Median kings, the reforms of Zoroaster spread into western Iran. According to the Histories of Herodotus, there were six Median tribes: The six Median tribes resided in Media proper, the triangular area between Rhagae and Ecbatana. In present-day Iran, the area between Tehran and Hamadan, respectively. Of the Median tribes, the Magi resided in Rhaga, modern Tehran, they were of a sacred caste. The Paretaceni tribe resided in and around Aspadana, modern Isfahan, the Arizanti lived in and around Kashan, the Busae tribe lived in and around the future Median capital of Ecbatana, near modern Hamadan; the Struchates and the Budii lived in villages in the Median triangle. The original source for their name and homeland is a directly transmitted Old Iranian geographical name, attested as the Old Persian "Māda-"; the meaning of this word is not known.
However, the linguist W. Skalmowski proposes a relation with the proto-Indo European word "med-", meaning "central, suited in the middle", by referring to the Old Indic "madhya-" and Old Iranian "maidiia-" which both carry the same meaning; the Latin medium, Greek méso and German mittel are derived from it. Greek scholars during antiquity would base ethnological conclusions on Greek legends and the similarity of names. According to the Histories of Herodotus: In the Greek myth of Jason and the Argonauts, Medea is the daughter of King Aeëtes of Colchis and a paternal granddaughter of the sun-god Helios. Following her failed marriage to Jason while in Corinth, for one of several reasons depending on the version, she marries King Aegeus of Athens and bears a son Medus. After failing to make Aegeus kill his older son Theseus and her son fled to Aria, where the Medes take their name from her, according to several Greek and Roman accounts, including in Pausanias' Description of Greece. According to other versions, such as in Strabo's Geographica and Justin's Epitoma Historiarum Philippicarum, she returned home to conquer neighboring lands with her husband Jason, one of, named after her.
The discoveries of Median sites in Iran happened only after the 1960s. For 1960 the search for Median archeological sources has focused in an area known as the “Median triangle,” defined as the region bounded by Hamadān and Malāyer and Kangāvar. Three major sites from central western Iran in the Iron Age III period are: Tepe Nush-i Jan,The site is located 14 km west of Malāyer in Hamadan province; the excavations started in 1967 with D. Stronach as the director; the remains of four main buildings in the site are "the central temple, the western temple, the fort, the columned hall" which according to Stronach were to have been built in the order named and predate the latter occupation of the first half of the 6th century BC. According to Stronach, the central temple, with its stark design, "provides a notable, if mute, expression of religious belief and practice". A number of ceramics from the Median levels at Tepe Nush-i Jan have been found which are associated with a period of power consolidation in the Hamadān areas.
These findings show four different wares known as “common ware” including jars in various size the largest of, a form of ribbed pithoi. Smaller and more elaborate vessels were in “grey ware”; the “cooking ware” and “crumbly ware” are recognized each in single handmade products. Godin Tepe,The site is located 13 km east of Kangāvar city on the left bank of the river Gamas Āb"; the excavations, started in 1965, were led by T. C. Young, Jr. which according to David Stronach, evidently shows an important Bronze Age construction th
Ilkhanate
The Ilkhanate spelled Il-khanate, was established as a khanate that formed the southwestern sector of the Mongol Empire, ruled by the Mongol House of Hulagu. It was founded in the 13th century and was based in Iran as well as neighboring territories, such as present-day Azerbaijan and the central and eastern parts of present-day Turkey; the Ilkhanate was based on the campaigns of Genghis Khan in the Khwarazmian Empire in 1219–24 and was founded by Hulagu Khan, son of Tolui and grandson of Genghis Khan. With the fragmentation of the Mongol Empire after 1259 it became a functionally separate khanate. At its greatest extent, the state expanded into territories that today comprise most of Iran, Armenia, Georgia, Turkey, western Afghanistan, the Northwestern edge of the Indian sub-continent. Ilkhanate rulers, beginning with Ghazan in 1295, converted to Islam. According to the historian Rashid-al-Din Hamadani, Kublai Khan granted Hulagu the title of Ilkhan after his defeat of Ariq Böke; the term ilkhan here means " khan of the tribe, khan of the'ulus'" and this inferior "khanship" refers to the initial deference to Möngke Khan and his successor Great Khans of the Mongol empire.
The title "Ilkhan", borne by the descendants of Hulagu and other Borjigin princes in Persia, does not materialize in the sources until after 1260. When Muhammad II of Khwarezm executed a contingent of merchants dispatched by the Mongols, Genghis Khan declared war on the Khwārazm-Shāh dynasty in 1219; the Mongols overran the empire, occupying the major cities and population centers between 1219 and 1221. Persian Iran was ravaged by the Mongol detachment under Subedei, who left the area in ruin. Transoxiana came under Mongol control after the invasion; the undivided area west of the Transoxiana was the inheritance of Genghis Khan's Borjigin family. Thus, the families of the latter's four sons appointed their officials under the Great Khan's governors, Chin-Temür, Korguz, in that region. Muhammad's son Jalal ad-Din Mingburnu returned to Iran in c. 1224 after his exile in India. The rival Turkic states, which were all that remained of his father's empire declared their allegiance to Jalal, he repulsed the first Mongol attempt to take Central Persia.
However, Jalal ad-Din was overwhelmed and crushed by Chormaqan's army sent by the Great Khan Ögedei in 1231. During the Mongol expedition and the southern Persian dynasties in Fars and Kerman voluntarily submitted to the Mongols and agreed to pay tribute. To the west and the rest of Persia was secured by Chormaqan; the Mongols invaded Armenia and Georgia in 1234 or 1236, completing the conquest of the Kingdom of Georgia in 1238. They began to attack the western parts of Greater Armenia, under the Seljuks, the following year. In 1236 Ögedei proceeded to populate Herat; the Mongol military governors made camp in the Mughan plain in what is now Azerbaijan. Realizing the danger posed by the Mongols, the rulers of Mosul and Cilician Armenia submitted to the Great Khan. Chormaqan divided the Transcaucasia region into three districts based on the Mongol military hierarchy. In Georgia, the population was temporarily divided into eight tumens. By 1237 the Mongol Empire had subjugated most of Persia, Georgia, as well as all of Afghanistan and Kashmir.
After the battle of Köse Dağ in 1243, the Mongols under Baiju occupied Anatolia, while the Seljuk Sultanate of Rûm and the Empire of Trebizond became vassals of the Mongols. Güyük Khan abolished decrees issued by the Mongol princes that had ordered the raising of revenue from districts in Persia as well as offering tax exemptions to others in c. 1244. In accordance with a complaint by the governor Arghun the Elder, Möngke Khan prohibited ortog-merchants and nobles from abusing relay stations and civilians in 1251, he ordered a new census and decreed that each man in the Mongol-ruled Middle East must pay in proportion to his property. Persia was divided between four districts under Arghun. Möngke Khan granted the Kartids authority over Herat, Pushang, Khaysar, Firuz-Kuh, Farah, Kabul and Afghanistan; the founder of the Ilkhanate dynasty was Hulagu Khan, grandson of Genghis Khan and brother of both Möngke Khan and Kublai Khan. Möngke dispatched Hulagu to establish a firm Toluid control over the Middle East and ordered him return to Mongolia when his task was accomplished.
Taking over from Baiju in 1255 or 1256, Hulagu had been charged with subduing the Muslim kingdoms to the west "as far as the borders of Egypt". This occupation led the Turkmens to move west into Anatolia to escape from the Mongolian rule, he established his dynasty over the southwestern part of the Mongol Empire that stretched from Transoxiana to Syria. He destroyed the Ismaili Nizari Hashshashins and the Abbasid Caliphate in 1256 and 1258 respectively. After that he advanced as far as Gaza conquering Ayyubid Syria; the death of Möngke forced Hulagu to return from the Persian heartland for the preparation of Khurultai. He left a small force behind to continue the Mongol advance, but it was halted in Palestine in 1260 by a major defeat at the battle of Ain Jalut at the hands of the Mamluks of Egypt. Due to geo-political and religious issues and deaths of three Jochid princes in Hulagu's service, Berke declared open war on Hulagu in 1262 and called his troops back to Iran. According to Mamluk historians, Hulagu might have massacred Berke's troops and refused to share his war booty with Berke.
Hulagu's descendants r
Kingdom of Armenia (antiquity)
The Kingdom of Armenia the Kingdom of Greater Armenia, or Greater Armenia, sometimes referred to as the Armenian Empire, was a monarchy in the Ancient Near East which existed from 321 BC to 428 AD. Its history is divided into successive reigns by three royal dynasties: Orontid and Arsacid; the root of the kingdom lies in one of the satrapies of the Achaemenid Empire of Persia called Armenia, formed from the territory of the Kingdom of Ararat after it was conquered by the Median Empire in 590 BC. The satrapy became a kingdom in 321 BC during the reign of the Orontid dynasty after the conquest of Persia by Alexander the Great, incorporated as one of the Hellenistic kingdoms of the Seleucid Empire. Under the Seleucid Empire, the Armenian throne was divided in two – Armenia Maior and Sophene – both of which passed to members of the Artaxiad dynasty in 189 BC. During the Roman Republic's eastern expansion, the Kingdom of Armenia, under Tigranes the Great, reached its peak, from 83 to 69 BC, after it reincorporated Sophene and conquered the remaining territories of the falling Seleucid Empire ending its existence and raising Armenia into an empire for a brief period, until it was itself conquered by Rome in 69 BC.
The remaining Artaxiad kings ruled as clients of Rome until they were overthrown in 12 AD due to their possible allegiance to Rome's main rival in the region, Parthia. During the Roman–Parthian Wars, the Arsacid dynasty of Armenia was founded when Tiridates I, a member of the Parthian Arsacid dynasty, was proclaimed King of Armenia in 52. Throughout most of its history during this period, Armenia was contested between Rome and Parthia, the Armenian nobility was divided among pro-Roman, pro-Parthian or neutrals. From 114 to 118, Armenia became a province of the Roman Empire under Emperor Trajan; the Kingdom of Armenia served as a client state or vassal at the frontier of the two large empires and their successors, the Byzantine and Sassanid empires. In 301, Tiridates III proclaimed Christianity as the state religion of Armenia, making the Armenian kingdom the first state to embrace Christianity officially. During the Byzantine–Sasanian wars, Armenia was partitioned into Byzantine Armenia in 387 and Persian Armenia in 428.
The geographic Armenian Highlands known as the highlands of Ararat, was inhabited by Proto-Armenian tribes which did not yet constitute a unitary state or nation. The highlands were first united by tribes in the vicinity of Lake Van into the Kingdom of Van; the kingdom competed with Assyria over supremacy in the highlands of Ararat and the Fertile Crescent. Both kingdoms fell to Iranian invaders from the neighbouring East in the 6th century BC, its territory was reorganized into a satrapy called Armenia. The Orontid dynasty ruled as satraps of the Achaemenid Empire for three centuries until the empire's defeat against Alexander the Great's Macedonian Empire at the Battle of Gaugamela in 331 BC. After Alexander's death in 323 BC, a Macedonian general named Neoptolemus obtained Armenia until he died in 321 BC and the Orontids returned, not as satraps, but as kings. Orontes III and the ruler of Lesser Armenia, recognized themselves independent, thus elevating the former Armenian satrapy into a kingdom, giving birth to the kingdoms of Armenia and Lesser Armenia.
Orontes III defeated the Thessalian commander Menon, who wanted to capture Sper's gold mines. Weakened by the Seleucid Empire which succeeded the Macedonian Empire, the last Orontid king, Orontes IV, was overthrown in 200/201 BC and the kingdom was taken over by a commander of the Seleucid Empire, Artashes I, presumed to be related to the Orontid dynasty himself; the Seleucid Empire's influence over Armenia had weakened after it was defeated by the Romans in the Battle of Magnesia in 190 BC. A Hellenistic Armenian state was thus founded in the same year by Artaxias I alongside the Armenian kingdom of Sophene led by Zariadres. Artaxias seized Yervandashat, united the Armenian Highlands at the expense of neighboring tribes and founded the new royal capital of Artaxata near the Araxes River. According to Strabo and Plutarch, Hannibal Barca received hospitality at the Armenian court of Artaxias I; the authors add an apocryphal story of how Hannibal supervised the building of Artaxata. The new city was laid on a strategic position at the juncture of trade routes that connected the Ancient Greek world with Bactria and the Black Sea which permitted the Armenians to prosper.
Tigranes the Great saw an opportunity for expansion in the constant civil strife to the south. In 83 BC, at the invitation of one of the factions in the interminable civil wars, he entered Syria, soon established himself as ruler of Syria—putting the Seleucid Empire at an end—and ruled peacefully for 17 years. During the zenith of his rule, Tigranes the Great extended Armenia's territory outside of the Armenian Highland over parts of the Caucasus and the area, now south-eastern Turkey, Iran and Lebanon, becoming one of the most powerful states in the Roman East. Armenia came under the Ancient Roman sphere of influence in 66 BC, after the battle of Tigranocerta and the final defeat of Armenia's ally, Mithridates VI of Pontus. Mark Antony invaded and defeated the kingdom in 34 BC, but the Romans lost hegemony during the Final War of the Roman Republic in 32–30 BC. In 20 BC, Augustus negotiated a truce with the Parthians, making Armenia a buffer zone between the two major powers. Augustus i
Mountains of Ararat
In the Book of Genesis, the mountains of Ararat is the term used to designate the region in which Noah's Ark comes to rest after the Great Flood. It corresponds to an exonym for the Kingdom of Van. Citing historians Berossus, Hieronymus the Egyptian and Nicolaus of Damascus, Josephus writes in his Antiquities of the Jews that "he ark rested on the top of a certain mountain in Armenia... over Minyas, called Baris."Likewise, in the Latin Vulgate, Jerome translates Genesis 8:4 to read: "requievitque arca... super montes Armeniae". By contrast, early Syrian and Eastern tradition placed the ark on Mount Judi in what is today Şırnak Province, Southeastern Anatolia Region, an association that had faded by the Middle Ages and is now confined to Quranic tradition; the Book of Jubilees specifies that the ark came to rest on the peak of a mountain of Ararat. Sir Walter Raleigh devotes several chapters of his Historie of the World to an argument that in ancient times the mountains of Ararat were understood to include not only those of Armenia, but all of the taller mountain ranges extending into Asia.
He maintains that since Armenia is not located east of Shinar, the ark must have landed somewhere in the Orient. Mount Ararat Mount Judi Searches for Noah's Ark Murat, Friedrich. Ararat und Masis: Studien zur armenischen Altertumskunde und Litteratur. Heidelberg: Carl Winter's Universitätsbuchhandlung. Raleigh, Walter Sir; the Historie of the World. London: Printed by William Stansby for Walter Burre, are to be sold at his shop in Paules Church-yard at the signe of the Crane
Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia
The Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia known as the Cilician Armenia, Lesser Armenia, or New Armenia, was an independent principality formed during the High Middle Ages by Armenian refugees fleeing the Seljuq invasion of Armenia. Located outside the Armenian Highland and distinct from the Armenian Kingdom of antiquity, it was centered in the Cilicia region northwest of the Gulf of Alexandretta; the kingdom had its origins in the principality founded c. 1080 by the Rubenid dynasty, an alleged offshoot of the larger Bagratid family, which at various times had held the thrones of Armenia and Georgia. Their capital was at Tarsus, became Sis. Cilicia was a strong ally of the European Crusaders, saw itself as a bastion of Christendom in the East, it served as a focus for Armenian nationalism and culture, since Armenia proper was under foreign occupation at the time. Cilicia's significance in Armenian history and statehood is attested by the transfer of the seat of the Catholicos of the Armenian Apostolic Church, spiritual leader of the Armenian people, to the region.
In 1198, with the crowning of Leo the Magnificent of the Rubenid dynasty, Cilician Armenia became a kingdom. In 1226, the crown was passed to rival Hethumids through Leo's daughter Isabella's second husband, Hethum I; as the Mongols conquered vast regions of Central Asia and the Middle East and succeeding Hethumid rulers sought to create an Armeno-Mongol alliance against common Muslim foes, most notably the Mamluks. In the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, the Crusader states and the Mongol Ilkhanate disintegrated, leaving the Armenian Kingdom without any regional allies. After relentless attacks by the Mamluks in Egypt in the fourteenth century, the Cilician Armenia of the Lusignan dynasty, mired in an internal religious conflict fell in 1375. Commercial and military interactions with Europeans brought new Western influences to the Cilician Armenian society. Many aspects of Western European life were adopted by the nobility including chivalry, fashions in clothing, the use of French titles and language.
Moreover, the organization of the Cilician society shifted from its traditional system to become closer to Western feudalism. The European Crusaders themselves borrowed know-how, such as elements of Armenian castle-building and church architecture. Cilician Armenia thrived economically, with the port of Ayas serving as a center for East-West trade. Armenian presence in Cilicia dates back to the first century BC, when under Tigranes the Great, the Kingdom of Armenia expanded and conquered a vast region in the Levant. In 83 BC, the Greek aristocracy of Seleucid Syria, weakened by a bloody civil war, offered their allegiance to the ambitious Armenian king. Tigranes conquered Phoenicia and Cilicia ending the Seleucid Empire; the southern border of his domain reached as far as Ptolemais. Many of the inhabitants of conquered cities were sent to the new metropolis of Tigranakert. At its height, Tigranes' Armenian Empire extended from the Pontic Alps to Mesopotamia, from the Caspian to the Mediterranean.
Tigranes invaded as far southeast as the Parthian capital of Ecbatana, located in modern-day western Iran. In 27 BC, the Roman Empire transformed it into one of its eastern provinces. After the 395 AD partition of the Roman Empire into halves, Cilicia became incorporated into the Eastern Roman Empire called the Byzantine Empire. In the sixth century AD, Armenian families relocated to Byzantine territories. Many served in the Byzantine army as soldiers or as generals, rose to prominent imperial positions. Cilicia fell to Arab invasions in the seventh century and was incorporated into the Rashidun Caliphate. However, the Caliphate failed to gain a permanent foothold in Anatolia, as Cilicia was reconquered in the year 965 by Byzantine Emperor Nicephorus II Phocas; the Caliphate's occupation of Cilicia and of other areas in Asia Minor led many Armenians to seek refuge and protection further west in the Byzantine Empire, which created demographic imbalances in the region. In order to better protect their eastern territories after their reconquest, the Byzantines resorted to a policy of mass transfer and relocation of native populations within the Empire's borders.
Nicephorus thus expelled the Muslims living in Cilicia, encouraged Christians from Syria and Armenia to settle in the region. Emperor Basil II tried to expand into Armenian Vaspurakan in the east and Arab-held Syria towards the south; as a result of the Byzantine military campaigns, the Armenians spread into Cappadocia, eastward from Cilicia into the mountainous areas of northern Syria and Mesopotamia. The formal annexation of Greater Armenia to the Byzantine Empire in 1045 and its conquest by the Seljuk Turks 19 years caused two new waves of Armenian migration to Cilicia; the Armenians could not re-establish an independent state in their native highland after the fall of Bagratid Armenia as it remained under foreign occupation. Following its conquest in 1045, in the midst of Byzantine efforts to further repopulate the Empire's east, the Armenian immigration into Cilicia intensified and turned into a major socio-political movement; the Armenians came to serve the Byzantines as military officers or governors, were given control of important cities on the Byzantine Empire's eastern frontier.
The Seljuks played a significant role in the Armenian population movement into Cilicia. In 1064, the Seljuk Turks led by Alp Arslan made their advance towards Anatolia by capturing Ani in Byzantine-held Armenia. Seven years they earned a decisive victory against
Kingdom of Georgia
The Kingdom of Georgia known as the Georgian Empire, was a medieval Eurasian monarchy which emerged circa 1008 AD. It reached its Golden Age of political and economic strength during the reign of King David IV and Queen Tamar the Great from 11th to 13th centuries. Georgia became one of the pre-eminent nations of the Christian East, her pan-Caucasian empire stretching, at its largest extent, from Eastern Europe and the North Caucasus to the northern portion of Iran and Anatolia, while maintaining religious possessions abroad, such as the Monastery of the Cross in Jerusalem and the Monastery of Iviron in Greece, it was the principal historical precursor of present-day Georgia. Lasting for several centuries, the kingdom fell to the Mongol invasions in the 13th century, but managed to re-assert sovereignty by the 1340s; the following decades were marked by Black Death, as well as numerous invasions under the leadership of Timur, who devastated the country's economy and urban centers. The Kingdom's geopolitical situation further worsened after the fall of the Byzantine and Empire of Trebizond.
As a result of these processes, by the end of the 15th century Georgia turned into a fractured entity. Renewed incursions by Timur from 1386, the invasions by the Kara Koyunlu and Ak Koyunlu led to the final collapse of the kingdom into anarchy by 1466 and the mutual recognition of its constituent kingdoms of Kartli and Imereti as independent states between 1490 and 1493 – each led by a rival branch of the Bagrationi dynasty, into five semi-independent principalities – Odishi, Abkhazia and Samtskhe – dominated by their own feudal clans. Located on the crossroads of protracted Roman–Persian wars, the early Georgian kingdoms disintegrated into various feudal regions by the early Middle Ages; this made it easy for the remaining Georgian realms to fall prey to the early Muslim conquests in the 7th century. In struggle against the Arab occupation, Iberian princes of Bagrationi dynasty came to rule over Tao-Klarjeti, the former southern provinces of Iberia, established Kouropalatate of Iberia as a nominal vassal of the Byzantine Empire.
Bagrationi's continued fighting for the central Georgian land, known as Kartli, contested by the Kingdom of Abkhazia, the Arab emirs of Tbilisi and by Kakhetian and Armenian Bagratid rulers of Tashir-Dzoraget. The restoration of the Iberian kingship begins in 888, however Bagrationi dynasty failed to maintain the integrity of their kingdom, divided between the three branches of the family with the main branch retaining in Tao and another controlling Klarjeti. An Arab incursion into western Georgia was repelled by Abkhazians jointly with Lazic and Iberian allies in 736; the successful defense against the Arabs, the expansionist tendencies of the kingdom to the east and the struggle against Byzantium, fighting for the hegemony within the Georgian territories speed up the process of unification of Georgian states into a single feudal monarchy. In 9th century western Georgian Church broke away from Constantinople and recognized the authority of the Catholicate of Mtskheta. At the end of the 10th century David III of Tao invaded the Kartli and gave it to his foster-son Bagrat III and installed his father Gurgen as his regent, crowned as "King of the Iberians" in 994.
Through his mother Gurandukht, sister of the childless Abkhazian king Theodosius III, Bagrat was a potential heir to the realm of Abkhazia. Kingdom of Abkhazia was engulfed into complete chaos and feudal warfare under the rule of Bagrat's uncle Theodosius the Blind, a weak and inauspicious king. In 978, the former duke of Kartli, Ivane Marushisdze, aided by David III, forced Theodosius to abdicate the throne in favour of his nephew Bagrat; the latter proceeded to Kutaisi to be crowned King of the Abkhazia. Bagrat's descent from both Bagratid and Abkhazian dynasties made him an acceptable choice for the nobles of the realm who were growing weary of internecine quarrels. In 1008, Gurgen died, Bagrat succeeded him as "King of the Iberians", thus becoming the first King of a unified realm of Abkhazia and Iberia. After he had secured his patrimony, Bagrat proceeded to press a claim to the easternmost Georgian kingdom of Kakheti-Hereti and annexed it in or around 1010, after two years of fighting and aggressive diplomacy.
Anxious to create more stable and centralized monarchy, Bagrat eliminated or at least diminished the autonomy of the dynastic princes. In his eyes, the most possible internal danger came from the Klarjeti line of the Bagrationi. To secure the succession to his son, George I, Bagrat lured his cousins, on pretext of a reconciliatory meeting and threw them in prison in 1011, their possessions passed to his progeny. Their children – Bagrat, son of Sumbat, Demetre, son of Gurgen – fled to Constantinople from where they would try to retrieve patrimonial lands with the Byzantine aid, for the last time in 1032, but to no avail. Bagrat's reign, a period of uttermost importance in the history of Georgia, brought about the final victory of the Georgian Bagratids in the centuries-long power struggles. Bagrat's foreign policy was peaceful and the king manoeuvred to avoid the conflicts with both the Byzantine and Muslim neighbours though David's domains of Tao remained in the Byzantine and Tbilisi in the Arab hands.
The major political and military event during George I’s reign, a war against the Byzantine Empire, had its roots back to the 990s, when the Georgian prince David III of Tao, following his abortive rebellion against Emperor Basil II, had to agree to cede his
Arsacid dynasty of Armenia
The Arsacid dynasty or Arshakuni, ruled the Kingdom of Armenia from 54 to 428. The dynasty was a branch of the Arsacid dynasty of Parthia. Arsacid Kings reigned intermittently throughout the chaotic years following the fall of the Artaxiad dynasty until 62 when Tiridates I secured Arsacid dynasty of Parthia rule in Armenia. An independent line of Kings was established by Vologases II in 180. Two of the most notable events under Arsacid rule in Armenian history were the conversion of Armenia to Christianity by Gregory the Illuminator in 301 and the creation of the Armenian alphabet by Mesrop Mashtots in c. 405. The reign of the Arsacids of Armenia marked the predominance of Iranianism in the country; the first appearance of an Arsacid on the Armenian throne came about in 12 when the Parthian King Vonones I was exiled from Parthia due to his pro-Roman policies and Occidental manners. Vonones I acquired the Armenian throne with Roman consent, but Artabanus III demanded his deposition, as Emperor Augustus did not wish to begin a war with the Parthians he deposed Vonones I and sent him to Syria.
Artabanus III did not waste time after the deposition of Vonones I. Emperor Tiberius had no intention of giving up the buffer states of the Eastern frontier and sent his nephew and heir Germanicus to the East. Germanicus concluded a treaty with Artabanus III, in which he was recognized as king and friend of the Romans. Armenia was given in 18 to Zeno the son of Polemon I of Pontus, who assumed the Armenian name Artaxias; the Parthians under Artabanus III were too distracted by internal strife to oppose the Roman-appointed King. Zeno's reign was remarkably peaceful in Armenian history. After Zeno's death in 36, Artabanus III decided to reinstate an Arsacid over the Armenian throne, choosing his eldest son Arsaces I as a suitable candidate, but his succession to the Armenian throne was disputed by his younger brother Orodes, overthrown by Zeno. Tiberius concentrated more forces on the Roman frontier and once again after a decade of peace, Armenia was to become the theater of bitter warfare between the two greatest powers of the known world for the next twenty-five years.
Tiberius, sent. Mithridates subjugated Armenia to the Roman rule and deposed Arsaces inflicting huge devastation to the country. Mithridates was summoned back to Rome where he was kept a prisoner, Armenia was given back to Artabanus III who gave the throne to his younger son Orodes. Another civil war erupted in Parthia upon Artabanus III's death. In the meantime Mithridates was put back on the Armenian throne, with the help of his brother, Pharasmanes I, Roman troops. Civil war continued in Parthia for several years with Gotarzes seizing the throne in 45. In 51 Mithridates' nephew Rhadamistus killed his uncle; the governor of Cappadocia, Julius Pailinus, decided to conquer Armenia but he settled with the crowning of Radamistus who generously rewarded him. The current Parthian King Vologases I, saw an opportunity, invaded Armenia and succeeded in forcing the Iberians to withdraw from Armenia; the harsh winter that followed proved too much for the Parthians who withdrew, thus leaving open doors for Radamistus to regain his throne.
After regaining power, according to Tacitus, the Iberian was so cruel that the Armenians stormed the palace and forced Radamistus out of the country and Vologases I got the opportunity to install his brother Tiridates on the throne. Unhappy with the growing Parthian influence at their doorstep, Roman Emperor Nero sent General Gnaeus Domitius Corbulo with a large army to the east in order to install Roman client kings. After Tiridates I escaped, Roman client king Tigranes VI was installed and in 61 he invaded the Kingdom of Adiabene, one of the Parthian vassal kingdoms. Vologases I considered this as an act of aggression from Rome and restarted a campaign to restore Tiridates I onto the Armenian throne. In the following battle of Rhandeia in 62, command of the Roman troops was again entrusted to Corbulo, who marched into Armenia and set a camp in Rhandeia, where he made a peace agreement with Tiridates upon which he was recognized as a king of Armenia but he agreed to become Roman client king in that he would go to Rome to be crowned by Emperor Nero.
Tiridates ruled Armenia until his death or deposition around 110 when Parthian king Osroes I invaded Armenia and throned his nephew Axidares, son of the previous Parthian king Pacorus II, as King of Armenia. This encroachment on the traditional sphere of influence of the Roman Empire ended the peace since Emperor Nero's times some half century earlier and started a new war with the new Roman Emperor Trajan. Trajan marched towards Armenia in October 113 to restore a Roman client king in Armenia. Envoys from Osroes I met Trajan at Athens, informing him that Axidares had been deposed and asking that Axidares' elder brother, Parthamasiris, be granted the throne. Trajan declined their proposal and in August 114 captured Arsamosata where Parthamasiris asked to be crowned, but instead of crowning him he annexed his kingdom as a new province to the Roman Empire. Parthamasiris was died mysteriously soon afterwards; as a Roman province Armenia was administered along with Cappadocia by Lucius Catilius Severus.
The Roman Senate issued coins which had celebrated this occasion and had borne the following inscription: ARMENIA ET MESOPOTAMIA IN POTESTATEM P. R. REDACTÆ. After a rebellion led by a pretender to the Parthian throne (Sanatruces II, son of Mithri
