The tranquillity in which the immediate successors Of Artaxias seem to have reigned, was more favourable to their present happiness than to their future One. During a period of seventy years, the names o Arminian kings do not so much as appear on the page of history. We are only told, that the king, who reigned at the conclusion of that period, waged an unsuccessful war with the Parthians, and delivered to the conquerors his son Tigranes, as a pledge that he would fulfil the articles of an inglorious peace. Tigranes, at the death of his father, purchased his liberty, by ceding to the Parthians a hart of his paternal dominions; and the first act of his administration was an alliance with Mithri dates Eupater, king of Pontus. The design of this confederacy was to circumscribe the rising power of the Romans ; and its principal articles were, that Ti granes should receive in marriage Cleopatra, the daugh ter of Mithridates ; that he should have all the spoil and captives of the country which they conquered ; and that the country itself should belong to the Pontic prince. No sooner was his marriage solemnized, than, according to the fixed plan of operations, Tigranes in vaded Cappadocia, and expelled Ariobarzanes, who was raised by the Romans to the sovereignty of that state, after they had wrested it from the hand of Mithridates; and who proved himself unworthy of the dignity, by abandoning his kingdom, and flying to Rome, before he had tried his fortune in battle. Tigranes seized upon the spoil; but delivered the country to Ariarathes, son of who, in right of his father, ascended the throne of Cappadocia.
Scarcely had Tigranes from this expedition, when lie received an embassy from the Syrians, giving him an account of the distracted state of their country, desolated by the civil wars which the princes of the Seleucidx had waged, and soliciting him to take pos session of their throne. The commotions which had alienated the affections of the subjects from their native princes, rendered the princes themselves unable to op pose the invaders, and Tigranes annexed the kingdom of Syria to his own. This accession of power extended the views of his ambition. At the head of a mighty army he entered Armenia Minor, routed the forces of Artenas, the last king of the Zadriadan race, who fell bravely on the field of battle, and took possession of that kingdom. Directing his victorious march eastward, the Adiabenians, Assyrians, and Gordians, yielded to his arms ; and, having annexed them to his dominions, he returned home with an immense plunder. At the request of Mithridates, who had been forced by the Romans to abandon Cappadocia, he invaded that coun try a second time, surrounded it with his numerous forces, and swept it of its inhabitants. The captives, to the number of 300,000, he employed in building and peopling a magnificent city, which he raised to be the capital of his empire, on the spot where the Armenian crown was first put upon his head, and which he called TioTanocerta, after his own name.
'Mithridates, who now designed to break an insidibus peace which he had made with the Romans, endeavoured a second time to rouse Tigranes to arms. Tigranes, however, who had other schemes in view, would have refused him every assistance, had it not been for the earnest entreaties of his wife. But though her impor tunity prevailed upon him to send him some supplies, yet he took no decided part in the war; and the Romans, not wishing to draw upon themselves the whole power of his kingdom, dissembled their resentment. The army of Mithridates, however, was cut to pieces by the Ro-.
man veterans under Lucullus ; he himself fled for refuge into Armenia ; and the cold reception which he expe rienced from his son-in-law, .who, though he allowed him a castle and attendants suited to his dignity, would not admit Inn into his presence, proved that he had nothing to hope. While the Romans were completing the conquest of Pontus, Tigranes, whose true interest ought to have induced him to circumscribe the Roman victories, led his forces to recover the seventy vallies which he had yielded to the Parthians as the price of his liberty ; but, not content with their reduction, he subjugated Mesopotamia, the countries round Ninus and Arbela, and the fruitful province of Mygdonia. At
this time Cleopatra Selene, the widow of Antiochus Pius, who, with her sons, still retained and governed a small territory in Syria, fomented a rebellion in the neighbour ing provinces belonging to Tigranes. Indignant at her conduct, he left Mesopotamia; and almost with the ter ror of his name, not only quelled the rebellion of his own subjects, but subdued the dynasty of Cleopatra, took the queen prisoner, and, after confining her a short time in the castle of Seleucia, caused her to be put to death. Phoenicia was then doomed to feel the ravages of his unconquered army ; and having almost subdued it, the fame of his victories, and the dread of his power, compelled all the Asiatic princes, who were not protect ed by the power of the Romans, to pay him homage.
Proud of past victories, and elated with the anticipa tion of victories to come, Tigranes now assumed the title of King of Kings ; and, to prove his claim to the lofty appellation, he was attended by captive princes in livery like menial servants. When the ambassadors of the neighbouring nations appeared in his presence, they were arranged on either side of his throne, and their hands clasped together ; an attitude which, in that coun try, marked the most abject state of dependence, not only flattered his vanity, but confessed the slavery to which they were reduced. But a haughty spirit is the harbinger of degradation. An ambassador from Lucul lus, who had finished the conquest of Pontus, arrived ; and, in the unsubmissive tone of Roman magnani mity, demanded Mithridates, who still resided in his dominions, or offered war. Tigranes, knowing the power of the Romans, restrained his resentment, and answered, that though he never approved of the conduct of Mithri dates, yet both honour and duty forbade him to deliver his father-in-law into the hands of his enemies ; and if the Romans, upon such an ungenerous pretence, should invade his dominions,•his army would meet them in the field. Tigranes, perceiving that war was inevitable, and understanding that Zarbienus, the captive king of the Gordians, had privately promised to join Lucullus, caused him, with his wife and children, to be put to death ; received, with the greatest magnificence, Mith ridates into his presence ; sent him to Pontus, at the head of 10,000 horse, to rouse his subjects to vindicate their liberty ; and summoned the forces of his numerous provinces to join his standard at Mount Taurus. Lucul lus, who wanted only a pretence to begin hostilities, left 6000 men to keep Pontus in subjection, crossed the Eu phrates at the head of only two legions of foot and 3000 horse, and sent a detachment of his army, under the command of Muraena, in pursuit of the king, who had set out for Mount Taurus to join his army. But though Tigranes was overtaken and defeated by Mureana, yet he escaped from the field, and, eluding all the hands that were dispatched to intercept his flight, arrived at the place of rendezvous, and found an army of 150,000 foot, 55,000 horse, 20,000 archers and stingers, and 35,000 pioneers. Lucullus, instead•f being afraid of this mighty army, was only afraid lest they should decline an engagement, and, to provoke them to fight, Ibrined the siege of Tigranocerta. Enraged at the insult thus offered to his capital and dignity, Tigranes rejected, with disdain, the prudent counsel of Mithridates, giver} by his ambassador, to decline an engagement, and, after holding a council of war, marched to meet Lucullus. The Romans, who were probate about 15,000 men, trembled when they beheld the vast army of the Arme nians; but, being fired by the worth and example of their leader, they burst with impetuous fury upon their enemies, dissipated at the first shock that unwieldy body, and night only put an end to the carnage and the pur suit. It is probable that Tigranes, by this battle, had to lament the loss of his capital, the slaughter of 100,000 foot, and almost all his cavalry, as Plutarch informs us; but we shall hesitate to believe, that defeat was embit tered by the galling recollection that he had acted un worthy of his former fame, had set an example of flight at the commencement of the battle, and that his vast army had slain only five men, and wounded a hundred of their enemies, on that disastrous day.