and all the cities
submitted to them on their approach. When the Romans drew near to
Artaxata, the king, deserted by his army and his court, went out to meet
Pompey, and threw himself before him as a suppliant. Pompey received him
with kindness, acknowledged him as King of Armenia, and demanded only
the payment of 6000 talents. His foreign possessions, however, in Syria,
Phoenicia, Cilicia, Galatia, and Cappadocia, which had been conquered
by Lucullus, were to belong to the Romans. To his son Tigranes, Sophene
and Gordyene were given as an independent kingdom; but as the young
prince was discontented with this arrangement, and even ventured to
utter threats, Pompey had him arrested, and kept him in chains to grace
his triumph.

After thus settling the affairs of Armenia, Pompey proceeded northward
in pursuit of Mithridates. But the season was so far advanced that he
took up his winter quarters on the banks of the River Cyrus. Early in
the spring (B.C. 65) he resumed his march northward, and advanced as far
as the River Phasis, but, obtaining here more certain information of the
movements of Mithridates, and of the wild and inaccessible nature of the
country through which he would have to march in order to reach the king,
he retraced his steps, and led his troops into winter quarters at
Amisus, on the Euxine. He now reduced Pontus to the form of a Roman
province.

In B.C. 64 Pompey marched into Syria, where he deposed Antiochus
Asiaticus, and made the country a Roman province. He likewise compelled
the neighboring princes, who had established independent kingdoms on the
ruins of the Syrian empire, to submit to the Roman dominion. The whole
of this year was occupied with the settlement of Syria and the adjacent
countries.

Next year (B.C. 63) Pompey advanced farther south, in order to establish
the Roman supremacy in Phoenicia, Coele-Syria, and Palestine. The
latter country was at this time distracted by a civil war between
Hyrcanus and Aristobulus. Pompey espoused the side of Hyrcanus, and
Aristobulus surrendered himself to Pompey when the latter had advanced
near to Jerusalem. But the Jews refused to follow the example of their
king, and it was not till after a siege of three months that the city
was taken. Pompey entered the Holy of Holies, the first time that any
human being, except the high-priest, had penetrated into this sacred
spot. He reinstated Hyrcanus in the high-priesthood, but compelled him
to pay an an