United States or Belize ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Zarbienus, king of the Gordyenians, as has been told, being impatient under the tyranny of Tigranes, had by Appius secretly made overtures of confederacy with Lucullus, but, being discovered, was executed, and his wife and children with him, before the Romans entered Armenia.
Lucullus forgot not this, but coming to the Gordyenians made a solemn interment in honor of Zarbienus, and adorning the funeral pile with royal robes, and gold, and the spoils of Tigranes, he himself in person kindled the fire, and poured in perfumes with the friends and relations of the deceased, calling him his companion and the confederate of the Romans.
In it were many Greeks carried away out of Cilicia, and many barbarians in like circumstances with the Greeks, Adiabenians, Assyrians, Gordyenians, and Cappadocians, whose native cities he had destroyed, and forced away the inhabitants to settle here. It was a rich and beautiful city; every common man, and every man of rank, in imitation of the king, studied to enlarge and adorn it.
There being commanded to wait for Tigranes, who at that time was reducing some towns in Phoenicia, he won over many chiefs to his side, who unwillingly submitted to the king of Armenia, among whom was Zarbienus, king of the Gordyenians; also many of the conquered cities corresponded privately with him, whom he assured of relief from Lucullus, but ordered them to lie still at present.
For the kings of the Arabians came to him, tendering what they had, and with them the Sophenians also submitted. And he so dealt with the Gordyenians, that they were willing to leave their own habitations, and to follow him with their wives and children. Which was for this cause.
To this he hearkened at first, but when the Armenians and Gordyenians in a full body, and the whole forces of Medes and Adiabenians, under their respective kings, joined him; when many Arabians came up from the sea beyond Babylon; and from the Caspian sea, the Albanians and the Iberians their neighbors, and not a few of the free people, without kings, living about the Araxes, by entreaty and hire also came together to him; and all the king's feasts and councils rang of nothing but expectations, boastings, and barbaric threatenings, Taxiles went in danger of his life, for giving counsel against fighting, and it was imputed to envy in Mithridates thus to discourage him from so glorious an enterprise.
Word Of The Day