Primul Razboi-Mithridatic (89–85 BC)

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The First Mithridatic War (89–85 BC) was a war challenging the Roman Republic's expanding empire and rule over the Greek world. In this conflict, the Kingdom of Pontus and many Greek cities rebelling against Roman rule were led by Mithridates VI the Great of Pontus against Rome and the allied Kingdom of Bithynia. The war lasted five years and ended in a Roman victory which forced Mithridates to abandon all of his conquests and return to Pontus. The conflict with Mithridates VI later resumed in two further Mithridatic Wars.

Following his ascension to the throne of Kingdom of Pontus, Mithridates VI of Pontus focused on expanding his kingdom. Mithridates' neighbours, however, were Roman client states, and expansion at their expense would inevitably lead him to conflict with Rome. After successfully incorporating most of the coast around the Black Sea into his kingdom, he turned his attention towards Asia Minor, in particular the Kingdom of Cappadocia, where his sister Laodice was Queen. Mithridates had his brother-in-law, Ariarathes VI, assassinated by Gordius (a Cappadocian nobleman who was allied with Mithridates) leaving the kingdom in the hands of Laodice, who ruled as regent for her son Ariarathes VII of Cappadocia.

Laodice married Nicomedes III of Bithynia, whose country was Pontus' traditional enemy. Nicomedes occupied Cappadocia and Mithridates retaliated by driving him out of Cappadocia and establishing himself as patron of his nephew's kingship on the throne. When Ariarathes refused to welcome Gordius back, Mithridates invaded Cappadocia again and killed Ariarathes. He proceeded to place his son, also called Ariarathes, on the throne of Cappadocia under the guardianship of Gordius.

Nicomedes appealed to the Roman Senate, which decreed that Mithridates be removed from Cappadocia and Nicomedes be removed from Paphlagonia and the Senate appointed Ariobarzanes I of Cappadocia as King of Cappadocia. Mithridates prompted his son-in-law Tigranes the Great of Armenia to invade Cappadocia and remove Ariobarzanes.

The Senate sent special orders to Lucius Cornelius Sulla, the propraetor who was in charge of reducing the pirates infesting Cilicia (south of Cappadocia), and charged him with driving out Mithridates's adherents and the Armenians. After initial difficulties Sulla succeeded and Ariobarzanes was restored to his throne.

In Bithynia Nicomedes III had died. He was succeeded by his son Nicomedes IV. Unfortunately for Nicomedes IV, his bastard half-brother, Socrates Chrestus, supported by Mithridates drove him from his kingdom. Nicomedes fled to Rome and got the support of the Romans who promised to restore him to his throne.

Mithridates main ally, his son-in-law Tigranes, had once again invaded Cappadocia and driven Ariobarzanes from his throne.

In Bithynia Mithridates received a radical and strange piece of advice from a prominent Greek philosopher at his court, Metrodoros of Skepsis, who was known as ho misoromaios (the Roman-hater) on account of the extremity of his anti-Roman sentiments. Metrodoros suggested that in order to bind the communities of the Roman province to the Pontic cause the king should arrange for the extermination of all Romans in the province without regard to age or sex and force the participation of all the Greek civic authorities, thus shaking off Roman rule permanently and irrevocably.

Soon after securing control of the province in about early April Mithridates proceeded with his plans. The massacre was carefully planned and co-ordinated to take the victims by surprise, in every community and all at once. In writing to all the civic authorities of the province, detailing the measures to be taken, the king stipulated that the killings were to be carried out exactly one month after the date of his letter. The date in question is not recorded but fell around early May 88 BC.

What took place on that day profoundly affected Roman/Hellenistic relations. Appian states that 80,000 Romans and Italians were killed in these "Asiatic Vespers", while Plutarch gives a much higher number.

At this point, Mithridates finished capturing Asia Minor and established a presence in Greece. Archelaus was sent to Greece, where he established Aristion as a tyrant in Athens.

The Romans quickly declared war. In 87 BC, Consul Lucius Cornelius Sulla landed in Epirus (western Greece) and marched on Athens. Marching into Attica through Boeotia, Sulla found the immediate allegiance of most of its cities, foremost among them Thebes. Most of the Peloponnese would soon follow after a victory mentioned by Pausanias and Memnon. Athens, nevertheless, remained loyal to Mithridates, despite a bitter siege throughout the winter of 87/6. Sulla captured Athens on March 1, 86 BC, but Archelaus evacuated Piraeus, and landed in Boeotia, where he was defeated at the Battle of Chaeronea. Philip II of Macedon and a young Alexander the Great had defeated combined Athenian and Theban resistance at Chaeronea 250 years before, securing Macedonian supremacy.

Sulla's army took Athens on the Kalends of March, in the consulate of Marius and Cinna, February 12, 86 BC. The siege of Athens was a long and brutal campaign, and Sulla's rough battle-hardened legions, veterans of the Social War, thoroughly besieged and stormed Athens. Soon afterwards he captured Athens' harbor of Piraeus, looting and demolishing this area, most of which was destroyed by fire, including architect Philon's famous arsenal.

Caius Scribonius Curio Burbulieus was put in charge of the siege of the Acropolis of Athens, and it was "some time" before Aristion and his followers surrendered when their water ran out. Athens was punished severely, a show of vengeance that ensured Greece would remain docile during later civil wars and Mithridatic wars.

Even after Sulla seized Piraeus, Archelaeus persisted in exploiting his command of the sea lanes, holding position off Mounychia with his fleet and preventing any food or materiel reaching the city or the Roman army by sea.

By the early spring Archelaos' strategy was biting hard. Rocky Attica provided good security for operations against the large Pontic cavalry forces massed in Macedonia, but it was infertile and notoriously incapable even of fully supporting the population of the astu, let alone the large Roman army in addition, with no imports coming in by sea.

Early in the spring of 86 BC, Taxiles concentrated most of his troops, sent word to Archelaos to join him in the Magnetic ports, and marched south from Macedonia into Thessaly. Archelaos rejected the suggestion. He was the senior officer and preferred to persist with his blockade of Attica. Thessaly was only held by a modest Roman observation force under the legatus Lucius Hortensius, elder brother of Quintus Hortensius the orator. But despite his great energy and reputation as an experienced vir militaris, there was little Hortensius could do against the enormous disproportion of the forces descending upon him, other than gather together some Thessalian auxiliary units he had been commissioned to recruit, and fall back southwards.

In about April 86 BC, beginning to run short of supplies and increasingly anxious about Lucius Hortensius' safety, Sulla took the bold decision to quit Attica and march into the fertile plains of Boeotia to feed his army, but also expose it to the great cavalry strength of the Pontic army. This move gave Archelaeus little choice but to sail northward and link up with Taxiles.

In Boeotia, Sulla met and defeated Archelaeus in the Battle of Chaeronea (86 BC). Archelaeus gathered his remaining forces on the island of Euboea where he was reinforced by Mithridates with 80,000 men from Asia Minor. He then returned to mainland Greece where he was again defeated by Sulla, this time at the Battle of Orchomenus. Greece was fully restored to Roman rule.

By now, Rome had also sent a force under Valerius Flaccus, to apprehend Sulla and deal with Mithridates. Flaccus' army passed through Macedonia, crossed the Hellespont and landed in Asia, where many of the Greek cities were in rebellion against Mithridates. This rebellion was prompted in no small part by Mithridates' harsh treatment of the islanders of Chios, whom he ordered into slavery after they allegedly kept back loot collected from the previously massacred Romans of the island.

After crossing the Hellespont, Flaccus was killed in a mutiny led by Flavius Fimbria, who went on to defeat Mithridates and recapture Pergamum. However, his lack of a navy allowed Mithridates to escape immediate danger by sea, as Lucullus, Sulla's admiral, refused to collaborate with Fimbria to prevent Mithridates sailing away from the port. Mithridates met with Sulla at Dardanus later in 85 BC, and accepted terms which restored all his gains in Asia, Cappadocia and Bithynia to their original rulers, but left him his own kingdom, in return for a huge indemnity and the loan of 70 ships to Sulla to return to Rome and face his enemies.

Following this and realizing that he could not face Sulla, Fimbria fell on his sword. This left Sulla to settle Asia, which he did by imposing a huge indemnity on the Greek cities there, along with demands for five years of back taxes, thus leaving the Asian cities heavily in debt for a long time to come.