Vologases I

Tacitus says Vologases was, on his mother’s side, the son of a Greek concubine and became king when his brothers stood aside. He put Pacorus over Media Atropatene and meant Armenia for Tiridates. So the three sons of Vonones II held three thrones.

Tacitus describes the brothers’ “retirement” as bloodless, which is rare in Parthian history. Giving provinces to brothers continued Artabanus II’s policy: power kept in the family, but shared out.

Sharing power among brothers, instead of killing them, made the succession calmer. Where power is spread, rivals have less need to fight.

Tacitus says Vologases would not let his brother Tiridates lose the kingdom he had given him, or hold it as a gift from a foreign power. The first campaign failed in winter and disease. Then his son Vardanes’ revolt and the revolt of Hyrcania tied his hands, and Corbulo took Artaxata. In 62 CE Vologases surrounded Paetus’ army at Rhandeia and the Romans left Armenia.

Tacitus says Vologases hesitated to fight Rome and “felt reverence for a hitherto unbroken treaty”. After victory, instead of pressing on, he was flexible: he asked for the Euphrates to stay the border and accepted that Tiridates take his crown from Rome. Scholars such as Dąbrowa see this as calculated policy, not weakness.

The Rhandeia compromise gave both sides something: Parthia chose Armenia’s king, Rome crowned him. Fifty years of peace followed, and peace means trade and secure property.

Tacitus describes the scene: Parthian cavalry with their banners on one side, Roman legions with their eagles on the other, and between them a statue of Nero on a chair of state. Tiridates sacrificed, took off his crown and set it at the statue’s foot. Three years later, in 66 CE, he received it in Rome from Nero himself.

The Romans saw this as Parthia humbled; Tacitus says the soldiers thought Tiridates was going to Rome “little better than a prisoner”. But the real result was that the Arsacid house stayed in Armenia for centuries. Each side told the victory its own way.

A show of power is not the same as real power. A compromise that saves both sides’ face lasts longer than a victory that humiliates one.

Tacitus has a single sentence: just as Rome was preparing for war, Vologases’ son Vardanes rose against him and the Parthians left Armenia. Seleucia coins in the name of Vardanes II show he was recognized in Babylonia for at least a few years, c. 55–58 CE.

We know nothing of Vardanes II’s motive or fate. Some suppose the Hyrcanian revolt a few years later was linked to him; that is only a guess.

A son’s revolt against his father shows that even sharing power within the family could not calm the succession when there was no clear rule for it.

The Denkard, a ninth-century Zoroastrian book, says an Arsacid king named “Valaxš” (Vologases) had the scattered fragments of the Avesta collected, both written and oral. Kellens in Iranica counts this as the first attempt at restoring the Avesta, which the Sasanians continued.

The text does not say which Vologases. Identifying him with Vologases I is a modern guess, and five Arsacid kings bore the name. Some scholars think the story itself was made up by the Sasanians to give their own collection an older pedigree. Religious motifs on Vologases I’s coins, such as a fire altar, make the guess stronger but do not prove it.

Keeping an oral tradition alive is the work of the community that carries it. Whether or not Vologases did it, the Avesta survived because people and priests memorized it for centuries.