ABSTRACT
The Seleucid kingdom was slowly squeezed into a rump state between the Romans, Parthians, and the many minor kings and dynasts who sought to profit from its weakness. The area was riven with problems, many of which were related to the almost total collapse of Seleucid authority, the vacuum left by the defeat of Tigranes, and the weakness of Parthia. Like many others, Arab princes, kings, and nomads fell under Roman and Parthian influence, and were eventually swept up in an ever more polarised political environment. Edessa found itself in a borderlands region that rather quickly became a zone of competition between Rome and Parthia. Characene ‘went over’ to the Romans for a brief period in response to the expedition of Trajan, before emerging from the conflict under tightened Parthian control. Lucullus and Pompey had both confirmed a wary Roman friendship with Parthia that fixed the Euphrates as the border between the two states.
