The Asiatic Vespers (also known as the Asian Vespers, Ephesian Vespers, or the Vespers of 88 BC) refers to the massacres of

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of Roman civilization *Epistle to the Romans, shortened to Romans, a letter w ...

and other

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

-speaking peoples living in parts of western

Anatolia Anatolia (), also known as Asia Minor, is a peninsula in West Asia that makes up the majority of the land area of Turkey. It is the westernmost protrusion of Asia and is geographically bounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the south, the Aegean ...

by forces loyal to

Mithridates VI Eupator Mithridates or Mithradates VI Eupator (; 135–63 BC) was the ruler of the Kingdom of Pontus in northern Anatolia from 120 to 63 BC, and one of the Roman Republic's most formidable and determined opponents. He was an effective, ambitious, and ...

, ruler of the

Kingdom of Pontus Pontus ( ) was a Hellenistic kingdom centered in the historical region of Pontus in modern-day Turkey, and ruled by the Mithridatic dynasty of Persian origin, which may have been directly related to Darius the Great of the Achaemenid dynasty. ...

, who orchestrated the massacre in an attempt to rid

Asia Minor Anatolia (), also known as Asia Minor, is a peninsula in West Asia that makes up the majority of the land area of Turkey. It is the westernmost protrusion of Asia and is geographically bounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the south, the Aegean ...

of Roman influence. An estimated 80,000 people were killed during the episode. The incident served as the ''

casus belli A (; ) is an act or an event that either provokes or is used to justify a war. A ''casus belli'' involves direct offenses or threats against the nation declaring the war, whereas a ' involves offenses or threats against its ally—usually one bou ...

'' or immediate cause of the

First Mithridatic War The First Mithridatic War /ˌmɪθrəˈdædɪk/ (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 ...

between the

Roman Republic The Roman Republic ( ) was the era of Ancient Rome, classical Roman civilisation beginning with Overthrow of the Roman monarchy, the overthrow of the Roman Kingdom (traditionally dated to 509 BC) and ending in 27 BC with the establis ...

and the Kingdom of Pontus. Some scholars and historians consider these massacres to be a case of

genocide Genocide is violence that targets individuals because of their membership of a group and aims at the destruction of a people. Raphael Lemkin, who first coined the term, defined genocide as "the destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group" by ...

Background

In the 100s BC, Mithridates had continued to avoid confrontation with the Roman republic, which itself was occupied in the Jugurthine and Cimbric wars. However, due to Mithridates' subjugation of Armenia and other territories along the Black Sea, Roman attention fell on Pontus. With

Nicomedes III of Bithynia Nicomedes III Euergetes ("the Benefactor", ) was the king of Bithynia, from c. 127 BC to c. 94 BC. He was the son and successor of Nicomedes II of Bithynia. Life Memnon of Heraclea wrote that Nicomedes IV was the son of Nicomedes III with his ...

, Mithridates saw an opportunity in 108–107 BC and partitioned Paphlagonia. A Roman embassy protested and demanded the two kings to withdraw, but was ignored. A few years later, , Nicomedes and Mithridates came into a dispute over

Cappadocia Cappadocia (; , from ) is a historical region in Central Anatolia region, Turkey. It is largely in the provinces of Nevşehir, Kayseri, Aksaray, Kırşehir, Sivas and Niğde. Today, the touristic Cappadocia Region is located in Nevşehir ...

: Nicomedes sent a garrison into the country and married its dowager queen, Laodice. After Mithridates attempted to assassinate the king of Cappadocia, Ariarathes VII Philometor, Ariarathes went to war. Mithridates invaded with a large army and killed Ariarathes, installing his own son – Ariarathes IX – . Mithridates attempted to sway the Romans into accepting his conquests but was largely unsuccessful. After a revolution overthrew Mithridates' son in 97 BC, Nicomedes appealed to Rome for support. Mithridates did so also, but the Romans – probably finding the matter too difficult to untangle – ordered both kings to leave Cappadocia and to allow its nobility to choose a new king. It then sent the governor of Cilicia, then

Lucius Cornelius Sulla Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix (, ; 138–78 BC), commonly known as Sulla, was a Roman people, Roman general and statesman of the late Roman Republic. A great commander and ruthless politician, Sulla used violence to advance his career and his co ...

, to install the new king – Ariobarzanes I – into power. When Rome became occupied in the Social war, Mithridates took the opportunity to ally with

Tigranes I Tigranes I () was an Artaxiad dynasty, Artaxiad king of Kingdom of Armenia (antiquity), Armenia at the end of the 2nd and the beginning of the 1st century BC. Few records have survived about his and his predecessor Artavasdes I of Armenia, Artavas ...

Armenia Armenia, officially the Republic of Armenia, is a landlocked country in the Armenian Highlands of West Asia. It is a part of the Caucasus region and is bordered by Turkey to the west, Georgia (country), Georgia to the north and Azerbaijan to ...

. With the death of Nicomedes III and the accession of his son Nicomedes IV, Mithridates and Tigranes unseated Ariobarzanes from Cappadocia and, after an assassination attempt failed, expelled Nicomedes IV from Bithynia. When news reached Rome, the senate decreed that both kings were to be restored and dispatched Manius Aquillius to lead a commission. Facing Roman demands for withdrawal, Mithridates complied and had his own puppet king of Bithynia executed. However, the reinstalled kings of Cappadocia and Bithynia were faced with a Roman bill for their restoration. Unable to find the funds, the Romans encouraged them to invade Pontus. This was a "disastrous and fatal miscalculation". Mithridates responded to the provocation by invading Cappadocia and Bithynia. Manius Aquillius attempted to raise troops from Bithynia and also called upon reinforcements under Gaius Cassius, the proconsul in Asia, and Quintus Oppius, proconsul in Cilicia. After defeating Nicomedes IV, Mithridates then defeated Aquillius in Bithynia, forcing Cassius to withdraw to the Aegean and Rhodes. Proceeding south, Mithridates induced the citizens of Laodicea, where Oppius was present, to surrender the proconsul. By the middle of 89 BC, Mithridates had defeated four allied armies and conquered most of Roman Asia. He revelled in his victory as he remitted all taxes for five years and appointed satraps and overseers for the conquered territories. News reached Rome of Mithridates' victories and the collapse of Roman rule in Asia in the autumn of 89 BC. Distracted by the Social war, the Romans immediately declared war on Mithridates but moved slowly in forming up forces. The consul of 88 BC, Lucius Cornelius Sulla, was given the command against Mithridates and it took him some eighteen months to assemble five legions.

Massacre

The massacres were a calculated response to the Roman declaration of war. They were meant to force cities to take a side: "no city that did his bidding now could ever hope to be received back into Roman allegiance". The killings took place probably in the first half of the year 88 BC. Valerius Maximus and Memnon indicate a death toll of approximately 80,000; Plutarch claims – "less credibly" – a death toll of 150,000. The reported numbers, according to fragments of Dio, are however probably exaggerated. They were planned, with Mithridates writing secretly to regional satraps and leaders to kill all Italian residents (along with wives, children, and freedmen of Italian birth) thirty days after the day of writing. Mithridates furthermore offered freedom to slaves which informed on their Italian masters and debt relief to those who slew their creditors. Assassins and informers would share with the Pontic treasury half the properties of those who were killed.

Ephesus Ephesus (; ; ; may ultimately derive from ) was an Ancient Greece, ancient Greek city on the coast of Ionia, in present-day Selçuk in İzmir Province, Turkey. It was built in the 10th century BC on the site of Apasa, the former Arzawan capital ...

Pergamon Pergamon or Pergamum ( or ; ), also referred to by its modern Greek form Pergamos (), was a rich and powerful ancient Greece, ancient Greek city in Aeolis. It is located from the modern coastline of the Aegean Sea on a promontory on the north s ...

, Adramyttion, Caunus, Tralles, Nysa, and the island of

Chios Chios (; , traditionally known as Scio in English) is the fifth largest Greece, Greek list of islands of Greece, island, situated in the northern Aegean Sea, and the List of islands in the Mediterranean#By area, tenth largest island in the Medi ...

were all scenes of atrocities.Oros.
6.2.2-3
Eutrop.

Many of these cities were under the control of

tyrant A tyrant (), in the modern English usage of the word, is an absolute ruler who is unrestrained by law, or one who has usurped a legitimate ruler's sovereignty. Often portrayed as cruel, tyrants may defend their positions by resorting to ...

s, and many of the inhabitants enthusiastically fell upon their Italian neighbours, who were blamed "for the prevailing climate of aggressive greed acquisitiveness and... malicious litigation".

Roman response

The declaration of war was immediate, but implementation of the mandate was delayed by an unrelated civil war already ongoing within the Roman Republic.

Sulla Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix (, ; 138–78 BC), commonly known as Sulla, was a Roman people, Roman general and statesman of the late Roman Republic. A great commander and ruthless politician, Sulla used violence to advance his career and his co ...

received it first from the Senate. After he had taken command of the legions at

Nola Nola is a town and a municipality in the Metropolitan City of Naples, Campania, southern Italy. It lies on the plain between Mount Vesuvius and the Apennines. It is traditionally credited as the diocese that introduced bells to Christian worship. ...

, a Roman Assembly passed a law stripping him of his authority in favor of

Gaius Marius Gaius Marius (; – 13 January 86 BC) was a Roman general and statesman. Victor of the Cimbrian War, Cimbric and Jugurthine War, Jugurthine wars, he held the office of Roman consul, consul an unprecedented seven times. Rising from a fami ...

. At the instigation of his men, he marched on Rome to assert the authority of the Senate. Assured of its and his authority, he crossed the Adriatic with minimal troops and no heavy warships, after one year of doing nothing on the eastern front. Meanwhile, Mithridates had created a large fleet that scoured the Aegean of Romans. Pontic forces occupied many vacated parts of the Hellenic world. Mithridates subverted the city of

Athens Athens ( ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Greece, largest city of Greece. A significant coastal urban area in the Mediterranean, Athens is also the capital of the Attica (region), Attica region and is the southe ...

, making use of his partisans there, including the peripatetic philosophers. He could not, however, despite maximum effort, take the port of Rhodes, as the Rhodians were master mariners, on whose ships the Romans had redesigned their own. When Sulla's men finally arrived to conduct a siege of Athens, all mainland Greece had rallied to the Roman cause. A series of conflicts known as the

Mithridatic Wars The Mithridatic Wars were three conflicts fought by the Roman Republic against the Kingdom of Pontus and its allies between 88 and 63 BC. They are named after Mithridates VI, the King of Pontus during the course of the wars, who initiated the ho ...

followed.

Dating of the massacre

The precise date of the massacre is disputed by modern historians, who have written about the question at length. A. N. Sherwin-White places the event in late 89 or early 88 BC.

Ernst Badian Ernst Badian (8 August 1925 – 1 February 2011) was an Austrian-born classical scholar who served as a professor at Harvard University from 1971 to 1998. Early life and education Badian was born in Vienna in 1925 and in 1938 fled the Nazis wit ...

, saying "precision seems impossible", places it in the first half of 88 BC, no later than the middle of that year. The name "Vêpres éphésiennes" was coined in 1890 by historian

Théodore Reinach Théodore Reinach (3 July 186028 October 1928) was a French archaeologist, mathematician, lawyer, papyrologist, philologist, epigrapher, historian, numismatist, musicologist, professor, and politician. Academic career Educated at the Lycée Co ...

to describe the massacre, making a retrospective analogy with the

Sicilian Vespers The Sicilian Vespers (; ) was a successful rebellion on the island of Sicily that broke out at Easter 1282 against the rule of the French-born king Charles I of Anjou. Since taking control of the Kingdom of Sicily in 1266, the Capetian House ...

of 1282. Subsequent historians have adopted some variation of the phrase, using Vespers as a euphemism for "massacre".

Genocide claims

Some scholars and historians consider these massacres to be a case of genocide.

Notes

References

Modern sources

* * * * * * * * *

Ancient sources

Appian Appian of Alexandria (; ; ; ) was a Greek historian with Roman citizenship who prospered during the reigns of the Roman Emperors Trajan, Hadrian, and Antoninus Pius. He was born c. 95 in Alexandria. After holding the senior offices in the pr ...

''Mithridatic Wars''
* Eutropius
''Abridgement of Roman History''
*

Memnon In Greek mythology, Memnon (; Ancient Greek: Μέμνων, ) was a king of Aethiopia and son of Tithonus and Eos. During the Trojan War, he brought an army to Troy's defense and killed Antilochus, Nestor (mythology), Nestor's son, during a fi ...

''History of Heraclea''
*

Orosius Paulus Orosius (; born 375/385 – 420 AD), less often Paul Orosius in English, was a Roman priest, historian and theologian, and a student of Augustine of Hippo. It is possible that he was born in '' Bracara Augusta'' (now Braga, Portugal), ...

''Seven Books of History Against the Pagans''
. *

Plutarch Plutarch (; , ''Ploútarchos'', ; – 120s) was a Greek Middle Platonist philosopher, historian, biographer, essayist, and priest at the Temple of Apollo (Delphi), Temple of Apollo in Delphi. He is known primarily for his ''Parallel Lives'', ...

''Life of Sulla''
*

Valerius Maximus Valerius Maximus () was a 1st-century Latin writer and author of a collection of historical anecdotes: ' ("Nine books of memorable deeds and sayings", also known as ''De factis dictisque memorabilibus'' or ''Facta et dicta memorabilia''). He worke ...

, ''Memorable Deeds and Sayings''.