sufficient power to strike coins.[1] The surrender of another pseudo-Nero was demanded by the emperor Domitian in 89, and Pacorus was at last constrained to give him up.[2]
Toward the conclusion of his reign Domitian apparently planned to seek military honors in the East. Abascantius, his secretary, was ordered to learn what news came from the wandering Euphrates.[3] The Euphrates was to be crossed at Zeugma, whence the army would turn north, pass over the Araxes, and perhaps conquer regal Bactra or even India. Other forces would invade Mesopotamia; the wealth of Babylon would be theirs. M. Maecius Celer was sent in advance to take charge of the Syrian legions, and his earlier experience in fighting in the East was expected to be of great value.[4]
Although Domitian did not live to carry out this plan, it was not long before Trajan was engaged in a campaign which followed closely along the same lines. Trajan came to the throne in 98. Perhaps it was early in his reign that certain difficulties arose between
- ↑ The early issues of Pacorus after his victory depict the king on horseback receiving a diadem from a Tyche and an untied diadem(?) from a male figure in the rear. This may well be the conquered Artabanus, as E. T. Newell suggests in the forthcoming Survey of Persian Art.
- ↑ Suet. Nero 57. 2; Tac. Hist. i. 2.
- ↑ Statius Silvae v. 1. 89. Abascantius was a friend of Statius, whose poems are filled with thoughts of the proposed expedition.
- ↑ Statius Silvae i. 4. 77–81; ii. 6. 18 f.; preface to iii; iii. 2. 101 ff. and 135 f.; iv. 1. 40 ff.; 2. 49; 3. 137 and 154; 4. 30 f.; v. 1. 60 f.; 2. 140 f.; 3. 185 ff.
