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We know absolutely nothing of this Pacorus except that he gave encouragement to a person who pretended to be Nero; that he enlarged and beautified Otesiphon; that he held friendly communications with Decebalus, the great Dacian chief, who was successively the adversary of Domitian and Trajan; and that he sold the sovereignty of Osrhoene at a high price to the Edessene prince who was cotemporary with him.
The honor of the empire was so far tarnished as to pay a tribute to Dacia, but Trajan resolved to wipe away the disgrace, and headed himself an expedition into this distant country, A.D. 101, with eighty thousand veterans, subdued Decebalus, and added Dacia to the provinces of the empire.
In the following campaign, after desperate fighting to the north of the Danube in the mountainous region of Transylvania, such as Cæsar never encountered in all his Gaulish wars, the capital of Decebalus was taken, and he was forced to terms. He agreed to raze all fortresses, to surrender all weapons, prisoners, and Roman deserters, and to become a dependent prince under the suzerainty of Rome.
Varhely is conspicuous for its dirt even among Wallachian villages, yet once it was a royal town. It is built on the site of the famous Sarmisegethusa, the capital of ancient Dacia. In Trajan's second expedition against Decebalus, King of the Dacians, he came from Orsova on the Danube by the same route that forms the highroad of this day the same I had traversed in my way hither.
We have still our traditions, if we have nothing more; and can point out what forest stands in the place of the ancient Sarmisaegethusa, and what town is built where one Decebalus overthrew the far-famed troops of the Consulate. And alas for that town! if the graves over which its houses are built should once more open, and turn the populous streets into a field of battle!
Not only did the Romans stipulate to pay to Decebalus an annual subsidy, which he must have regarded as a tribute, but they agreed to supply him with engineers and craftsmen skilled in all kinds of construction, but particularly in the erection of fortifications and defensive works.
He is our Iscariot." "What makes you think so?" "Because he calls himself Diurbanu. No genuine Wallachian would have taken the nickname of his king, Decebalus. It is as if one of us should call himself Attila. Now, then, Manasseh, I love you and am ready to follow your lead. I shall never forget how you went up to Monastery Heights and came back with our two brothers.
Decebalus can scarcely have been drawn to Pacorus by any other attraction than that which always subsists between enemies of any great dominant power. He must have looked to the Parthian monarch as a friend who might make a diversion on his behalf upon occasion; and that monarch, by accepting his gift, must be considered to have shown a willingness to accept this kind of relation.
We have still our traditions, if we have nothing more; and can point out what forest stands in the place of the ancient Sarmisaegethusa, and what town is built where one Decebalus overthrew the far-famed troops of the Consulate. And alas for that town! if the graves over which its houses are built should once more open, and turn the populous streets into a field of battle!
In 105 began the new struggle, which on the side of Decebalus could now only lead to victory or to destruction. The Dacians fought their ground inch by inch, and their army as a whole may be said to have bled to death. The prince put an end to his own life. His kingdom became an imperial province; in it many colonies were founded, and peopled by settlers drawn from different parts of the empire.
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