Vologases disappears from history.[1] Pacorus II[2] is seldom mentioned in our scanty literary sources, nor is there any hint as to what relation he bore to his predecessor, save that his succession was not a friendly one.
In 79 there appeared in the East a pseudo-Nero, in reality a Roman citizen from Asia Minor named Terentius Maximus. He progressed as far as the Euphrates, but was at last forced to take refuge with one of the pretenders to the Parthian throne, Artabanus (IV), who struck coins at the Seleucia mint in the years 80–81.[3] The pseudo-Nero won a welcome from the Parthians on the ground that he had returned Armenia to Parthian control. Preparations were being made to restore him when his imposture was discovered and he died.[4]
By 82/83 Pacorus II had apparently driven his rivals from the field; in any case they no longer had
- ↑ McDowell, Coins from Seleucia, pp. 119 f., rightly assigns to Vologases I the issues of 78–80 formerly given to Vologases II. This clears up the difficulty of a two-year reign of Vologases II in 78–80 and his reappearance thirty years later, in 111/112, when his real period of power commenced. Cf. Wroth, Parthia, p. lvi.
- ↑ Not the ruler of Media (see p. 194), for his earliest coins (see Wroth, Parthia, p. lvi) show a youthful and beardless head.
- ↑ Wroth, Parthia, p. 203; McDowell, Coins from Seleucia, pp. 193 and 230.
- ↑ Dio Cass. lxvi. 19. 3b; Joan. Antioch. (FHG, IV, fr. 104); Zonaras xi. 18. C. Another pseudo-Nero appeared ten years later; to one of the two must refer the Orac. Sibyl. iv. 125. 138 f.
