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With characteristic caution Rome did not care to retain direct dominion over the eastern portions of her new possessions, some of which, such as Isauria, Pisidia and perhaps the eastern portion of Cilicia, may have rendered a very nominal obedience to the throne of the Attalids.
Along with such recreations he wrote treatises on gardening, reared poisonous plants, and prepared wax models, till a sudden death carried him off. Province of Asia War against Aristonicus With him the house of the Attalids became extinct.
The mock sovereignty of leagues was abolished, and all remains of Grecian liberty fled. But even this State did not escape the jealousy of the Romans, and with Attalus III. the house of Attalids became extinct. Aristonicus, a natural son of Eumenes II., made his appearance at Lecuæ, a small sea-port near Smyrna, as a pretender to the crown.
From their first elevation the Attalids had been at vehement feud with Macedonia, and were politically and personally the objects of Philip's bitterest hatred; of all the eastern powers they had contributed most to maim Macedonia and Syria, and to extend the protectorate of Rome in the east; and in the last war, when Philip had voluntarily and loyally embraced the side of Rome, they had been obliged to take the same side for the sake of their very existence.
How little the Romans with all their Philhellenism had been successful in heartily conciliating Hellenic patriotism, was nowhere more clearly apparent than in the attitude of the Greeks towards the Attalids.
When the last of the legitimate Attalids had gone to his grave, it was found that the vacant kingdom had been disposed of by will, and that the Roman people was the nominated heir. The genuineness of this document was subsequently disputed by the enemies of Rome, and it was pronounced to be a forgery perpetrated by Roman diplomats.
On the mainland of Asia Minor Seleucus had in the meanwhile begun the siege of Pergamus, while Antiochus with his chief army ravaged the Pergamene territory and the possessions of the Mytilenaeans on the mainland; they hoped to crush the hated Attalids, before Roman aid appeared.
The testament was made; the Romans accepted the bequest, and the question as to the land and the treasure of the Attalids threw a new apple of contention among the conflicting political parties in Rome. In Asia also this royal testament kindled a civil war.
The eastern portion of the kingdom of the Attalids was assigned to the client kings, so as to release the Romans from the protection of the frontier and thereby from the necessity of maintaining a standing force in Asia; Telmissus went to the Lycian confederacy; the European possessions in Thrace were annexed to the province of Macedonia; the rest of the territory was organized as a new Roman province, which like that of Carthage was, not without design, designated by the name of the continent in which it lay.
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