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Not content with nominating him, or perhaps doubtful whether the nomination would be accepted by the Megistanes, he proceeded further to abdicate in his favor, whereupon Phraates became king. The transaction proved a most unhappy one.
We may suspect, from the great age of two of the monarchs chosen, that the Arsacid stock was now very limited in number, that it offered no candidates for the throne whose claims were indisputable, and that consequently at each vacancy there was a division of opinion among the "Megistanes," which led to the claimants making appeal, if the election went against them, to the arbitrament of arms.
On the flight of Artabanus to Izates it would seem that the Megistanes formally deposed him, and elected in his place a certain Kinnam, or Kinnamus, an Arsacid who had been brought up by the king. Izates, when he interfered on behalf of the deposed monarch, was met by the objection that the newly-elected prince had rights which could not be set aside.
Under such circumstances, the Megistanes usually nominated the late king's next brother to succeed him, or, if he had left behind him no brother, went back to an uncle. When the line of succession had once been changed, the right of the elder branch was lost, and did not revive unless the branch preferred died out or possessed no member qualified to rule.
Pacorus must have died about A.D. 108, or a little later. He left behind him two sons, Exedares and Parthamasiris, but neither of these two princes was allowed to succeed him. The Parthian Megistanes assigned the crown to Chosroes, the brother of their late monarch, perhaps regarding Exedares and Parthamasiris as too young to administer the government of Parthia satisfactorily.
Vardanes was ambitious, bold and prompt: he had no sooner received the invitation of the Megistanes than he set out, and, having accomplished his journey to the Court in the space of two days, found Gotarzes wholly unprepared to offer resistance. Thus Vardanes became king without fighting a battle.
The king was permanently advised by two councils, consisting of persons not of his own nomination, whom rights, conferred by birth or office, entitled to their seats. Together these two bodies constituted the Megistanes, the "Nobles" or "Great Men" the privileged class which to a considerable extent checked and controlled the monarch.
Such an institution had prevailed under the Parthians, where the monarchs were elected and might be deposed by the Megistanes; but there is no evidence that Artaxerxes continued it, or did more than call on each occasion for the advice of such persons among his subjects as he thought most capable.
Rank in Parthia being hereditary and not simply official, the "megistanes" were no mere creatures of the monarch, but a class which stood upon its own indefeasible rights.
The Megistanes further claimed and sometimes exercised the right of deposing a monarch whose conduct displeased them; but an attempt to exercise this privilege was sure to be followed by a civil war, no monarch accepting his deposition without a struggle; and force, not right, practically determining whether he should remain king or no.
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