Rome And Persia: The Seven Hundred Year Rivalry, by Adrian Goldworthy

For a large amount of world history, Persia has been a world power, and this was especially true in the ancient world, where three Persian dynasties ruled over large sections of the world for a period of almost 1000 years. For a variety of reasons, this period has been largely neglected by most historians in the West, with few exceptions. This book takes as its topic the rivalry between Rome and Persia during the last seven hundred years of the long period of Persian dominance in West Asia, during which time Rome transitioned first from its late Republic to the early Empire, and then after that into the Eastern Roman Empire, and Persia transitioned from the Parthian to the Sassanid dynasties. During this time the two shared a lengthy border (often included buffer states) that extended from the Caucasus through Armenia through the desert between Syria and Iraq, and down to Arabia. During most of that time the two nations were in periods of unwary peace that involved trade and efforts to gain control over the buffer states in the region (especially Armenia), and the Persians definitely held their own against the Romans during the entire period. This book does a good job at explaining this period in focusing on two empires that view each other as both threats but also as means of testing one’s strength and keeping a sense of unity within the political class.

This book is a large one, at almost 500 pages of material, divided into nineteen chapters. The book begins with a list of kings and emperors for Persia and Rome, a chronology, as well as a list of maps and both a foreword and introduction. The first chapter deals with the state of Rome when it first expanded into Anatolia and had to start dealing with Persian interests (1), while the second looks at the rise of the Parthians after the brief period of Greek dominance (2). After this the author discusses the period between 70 and 54 BC that marked the first time of conflict between Rome and Parthia (3). This is followed by a chapter on the disaster at Carrhae (4), and the Parthian and Roman invasions that followed (5) to the time of Augustus. This is then followed by a discussion of the period of peace that lasted for nearly two centuries, with chapters on the time of Augustus (6), the fate of Armenia between the two empires (7), the business conducted between Rome and Persia in the first and second centuries (8), and the glory and tears that both empires faced during the period ranging from Vespasian to the death of Marcus Aurelius in the West (9). After this the author looks at the dynastic fate of both Rome and Persia during the period from 199 to 240, which featured the Severen dynasty in Rome and the rise of the Sassanids in Persia (10) and a period of Persian resurgence (11) and Roman restoration (12) that followed. This is then followed by a discussion of the sieges and expeditions fought in Mesopotamia during the late third and fourth centuries (13), as well as the period of rough equality that followed in the largely peaceful firth century (14). A discussion of soldiers, walls, and gold then follows (15), before a discussion of war and eternal peace over most of the sixth century (16). At this point, the author turns to the period of Persia’s high tide (17) and then the disaster that followed (18), which led to the rise of the Arabs over the Middle East as a whole (19). The book ends with a conclusion, acknowledgements, illustration credits, a bibliography, notes, and an index.

One of the more tragic questions of the relationship between the Persians and the Romans are the two times where one of the sides sought to dominate the other. In the early third century, the gains that the Romans made against the Parthians in Mesopotamia led to the end of the Parthian regime and the rise of the Sassanids, who were a stronger empire than the Parthians and which led to Persia making generally permanent gains in the region at Roman expense. Similarly, the gains made by Persia against the Eastern Roman Empire in the early seventh century that sought to defeat the empire entirely led to a state of mutual exhaustion that allowed the Arab rise to end up taking out both empires to a great extent and leading to the extinction of the Persian empire altogether and ending their period of world leadership until the early modern period when the rise of the Safavids led to a renewed period of Persian strength. The author does not talk much about that particular period, but the book’s close provides a thoughtful analysis of the relationship between Persia and Rome and speculates, I think wisely, that had they been less excessive in their goals to destroy the Eastern Roman Empire that it would have been better for both Persia and Rome, and worse for the Arabs. I think most people would agree that would have been a better turn of events than the way that things happened.