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ARTAXERXES III

 
 

This is an extract from the Wikipedia entry which contains much more including illustrations

 
 

Ochus better known by his dynastic name of Artaxerxes III, was King of Kings of the Persian Empire from 358 to 338. He was the son and successor of Artaxerxes II and his mother was Stateira. Before ascending the throne Artaxerxes was a satrap and commander of his father's army. Artaxerxes came to power after one of his brothers was executed, another committed suicide, the last murdered and his father, Artaxerxes II died. Soon after becoming king, Artaxerxes murdered all of the royal family to secure his place as king. He started two major campaigns against Egypt. The first campaign failed, and was followed up by rebellions throughout the western part of his empire. In 343 Artaxerxes defeated Nectanebo II, the Pharaoh of Egypt, driving him from Egypt, stopping a revolt in Phoenicia on the way. In Artaxerxes' later years, Philip II of Macedon's power was increasing in Greece, where he tried to convince the Greeks to revolt against the Persian Empire. His activities were opposed by Artaxerxes, and with his support, the city of Perinthus resisted a Macedonian siege. In 359, just before ascending the throne, he attacked Egypt as a reaction to Egypt's failed attacks on coastal regions of Phoenicia. In 355 Artaxerxes forced Athens to conclude a peace which required the city's forces to leave Anatolia and to acknowledge the independence of its rebellious allies. Artaxerxes started a campaign against the rebellious Cadusii, but he managed to appease both of the Cadusian kings. In around 351 Artaxerxes embarked on a campaign to recover Egypt, which had revolted under his father, Artaxerxes II. At the same time a rebellion had broken out in Asia Minor, which, being supported by Thebes, threatened to become serious. Levying a vast army, Artaxerxes marched into Egypt, and engaged Nectanebo II. After a year of fighting the Egyptian Pharaoh, Nectanebo inflicted a crushing defeat on the Persians with the support of mercenaries led by the Greek generals: the Athenian Diophantus and the Spartan Lamius. Artaxerxes was compelled to retreat and postpone his plans to reconquer Egypt. Soon after this Egyptian defeat, Phoenicia, Anatolia and Cyprus declared their independence from Persian rule.
In 343 Artaxerxes committed responsibility for the suppression of the Cyprian rebels to Idrieus, prince of Caria, who employed 8000 Greek mercenaries and forty triremes, commanded by Phocion the Athenian, and Evagoras, son of the elder Evagoras, the Cypriot monarch. Idrieus succeeded in reducing Cyprus. Artaxerxes initiated a counter-offensive against Sidon by commanding the satrap of Syria Belesys and Mazaeus, the satrap of Cilicia, to invade the city and to keep the Phoenicians in check. Both satraps suffered crushing defeats at the hands of Tennes, the Sidonese king, who was aided by 40,000 Greek mercenaries sent to him by Nectanebo II and commanded by Mentor of Rhodes. As a result, the Persian forces were driven out of Phoenicia. After this, Artaxerxes personally led an army of 330,000 men against Sidon. Artaxerxes' army comprised 300,000 foot soldiers, 30,000 cavalry, 300 triremes, and 500 transports or provision ships. After gathering this army, he sought assistance from the Greeks. Though refused aid by Athens and Sparta, he succeeded in obtaining a thousand Theban heavy-armed hoplites under Lacrates, three thousand Argives under Nicostratus, and six thousand Æolians, Ionians, and Dorians from the Greek cities of Anatolia.
This Greek support was numerically small, amounting to no more than 10,000 men, but it formed, together with the Greek mercenaries from Egypt who went over to him afterwards, the force on which he placed his chief reliance, and to which the ultimate success of his expedition was mainly due. The approach of Artaxerxes sufficiently weakened the resolution of Tennes that he endeavoured to purchase his own pardon by delivering up 100 principal citizens of Sidon into the hands of the Persian king, and then admitting Artaxerxes within the defences of the town. Artaxerxes had the 100 citizens transfixed with javelins, and when 500 more came out as supplicants to seek his mercy, Artaxerxes consigned them to the same fate. Sidon was then burnt to the ground, either by Artaxerxes or by the Sidonian citizens. Forty thousand people died in the conflagration. Artaxerxes sold the ruins at a high price to speculators, who calculated on reimbursing themselves by the treasures which they hoped to dig out from among the ashes. Tennes was later put to death by Artaxerxes. Artaxerxes later sent Jews who supported the revolt to Hyrcania, on the south coast of the Caspian Sea. The reduction of Sidon was followed closely by the invasion of Egypt. In 343, Artaxerxes, in addition to his 330,000 Persians, had now a force of 14,000 Greeks furnished by the Greek cities of Asia Minor: 4,000 under Mentor, consisting of the troops which he had brought to the aid of Tennes from Egypt; 3,000 sent by Argos; and 1000 from Thebes. He divided these troops into three bodies, and placed at the head of each a Persian and a Greek. The Greek commanders were Lacrates of Thebes, Mentor of Rhodes and Nicostratus of Argos while the Persians were led by Rhossaces, Aristazanes, and Bagoas, the chief of the eunuchs. Nectanebo II resisted with an army of 100,000 of whom 20,000 were Greek mercenaries. Nectanebo II occupied the Nile and its various branches with his large navy. The character of the country, intersected by numerous canals, and full of strongly fortified towns, was in his favour and Nectanebo II might have been expected to offer a prolonged, if not even a successful, resistance. But he lacked good generals, and over-confident in his own powers of command, he was able to be out-manoeuvred by the Greek mercenary generals and his forces eventually defeated by the combined Persian armies. After his defeat, Nectanebo hastily fled to Memphis, leaving the fortified towns to be defended by their garrisons. These garrisons consisted of partly Greek and partly Egyptian troops; between whom jealousies and suspicions were easily sown by the Persian leaders. As a result, the Persians were able to rapidly reduce numerous towns across Lower Egypt and were advancing upon Memphis when Nectanebo decided to quit the country and flee southwards to Ethiopia. The Persian army completely routed the Egyptians and occupied the Lower Delta of the Nile. Following Nectanebo fleeing to Ethiopia, all of Egypt submitted to Artaxerxes. The Jews in Egypt were sent either to Babylon or to the south coast of the Caspian Sea, the same location that the Jews of Phoenicia had earlier been sent. After this victory over the Egyptians, Artaxerxes had the city walls destroyed, started a reign of terror, and set about looting all the temples. Persia gained a significant amount of wealth from this looting. Artaxerxes also raised high taxes and attempted to weaken Egypt enough that it could never revolt against Persia. For the 10 years that Persia controlled Egypt, believers in the native religion were persecuted and sacred books were stolen. Before he returned to Persia, he appointed Pherendares as satrap of Egypt. With the wealth gained from his reconquering Egypt, Artaxerxes was able to amply reward his mercenaries. He then returned to his capital having successfully completed his invasion of Egypt. After the conquest of Egypt, there were no more revolts or rebellions against Artaxerxes. Mentor of Rhodes and Bagoas, the two generals who had most distinguished themselves in the Egyptian campaign, were advanced to posts of the highest importance. Mentor, who was governor of the entire Asiatic seaboard, was successful in reducing to subjection many of the chiefs who during the recent troubles had rebelled against Persian rule. In the course of a few years Mentor and his forces were able to bring the whole Asian Mediterranean coast into complete submission and dependence. Bagoas went back to the Persian capital with Artaxerxes, where he took a leading role in the internal administration of the Empire and maintained tranquility throughout the rest of the Empire. During the last six years of the reign of Artaxerxes III, the Persian Empire was governed by a vigorous and successful government. The Persian forces in Ionia and Lycia regained control of the Aegean and the Mediterranean Sea and took over much of Athens’ former island empire. In response, Isocrates of Athens started giving speeches calling for a ‘crusade against the barbarians’ but there was not enough strength left in any of the Greek city-states to answer his call. Although there weren't any rebellions in the Persian Empire itself, the growing power and territory of Philip II of Macedon in Macedon (against which Demosthenes was in vain warning the Athenians) attracted the attention of Artaxerxes. In response, he ordered that Persian influence was to be used to check and constrain the rising power and influence of the Macedonian kingdom. In 340 a Persian force was dispatched to assist the Thracian prince, Cersobleptes, to maintain his independence. Sufficient effective aid was given to the city of Perinthus that the numerous and well-appointed army with which Philip had commenced his siege of the city was compelled to give up the attempt. By the last year of Artaxerxes' rule, Philip II already had plans in place for an invasion of the Persian Empire, which would crown his career, but the Greeks would not unite with him. In 338 Artaxerxes III was according to a Greek source, Diodorus of Sicily, poisoned by Bagoas with the assistance of a physician.

 
 

ARTAXERXES III

 
 

How to cite this article: Rickard, J (14 September 2016), Artaxerxes III, r.359-338 BC , http://www.historyofwar.org/articles/people_artaxerxes_III.html

 
 

Artaxerxes III (r.359-338) was the third-from-last Persian emperor of the Achaemenid dynasty, and restored Persian control of Egypt after just over sixty years of independence. Before he came to the throne he was called Ochus, but he took his father's name after becoming Emperor. Artaxerxes III succeeded his father Artaxerxes II to the throne in 359. In the aftermath of his succession he killed off many of his close relatives in an attempt to prevent revolts again him, leaving the Achaemenid family rather short on male heirs. In 356, in a further attempt to secure his position, he ordered the satraps to dismiss all of their mercenary troops. Although the later Persian Empire wasn't as powerful as it had been under the earlier emperors, Artaxerxes III was still able to intervene effectively in Greece.

The Social War of 357-55:
which saw Athens attempting to punish some of her allies, was a breach of the King's Peace of 387-6, which had guaranteed the autonomy of most Greek cities. Artaxerxes was able to force Athens to accept a peace in which some of their allies were granted autonomy. Egypt had revolted against the Persians in 405, and had fought off a Persian attack in 373. Artaxerxes made a first attempt to reconquer Egypt in 351-350, but without success. Few details of this campaign have survived, but it was mentioned by Demosthenes in his On the Liberty of the Rhodians of 351 as an ongoing campaign that was rumoured to have failed. This failure possibly helped to trigger a revolt that began in Sidon, and spread to Palestine, Phoenicia and Cilicia. The revolt was crushed in 345, when Artaxerxes, aided by Mentor of Rhodes, led a massive army against Sidon. In 343 Artaxerxes III raised an army with Greek contingents from Thebes, the Argive and Asia Minor and led that army in person on yet another campaign in Egypt (although the eunuch Bagoas served as commander-in-chief of the army). This time he was successful, and Persian control was restored after a great victory at Pelusium. He did fail to capture the defeated royal family and the pharaoh Nectanebo II, who fled south into Nubia. Artaxerxes had the walls of Egyptian cities destroyed, plundered their temples, and was said to have personally killed the sacred Apis Bull. Although Persian rule had been re-established, these actions made it very unpopular, and help explain why Alexander the Great was greeted so readily when he invaded.

Battles and Sieges of Philip II of Macedon, 358-338:
Artaxerxes's biggest foreign policy mistake was underestimating the threat from Philip II of Macedonia. He refused to support Athens against the Macedonians. In 340 Philip besieged Perinthus and Byzantium, on the European side of the Bosphorus. Artaxerxes sent help to the cities, and forced the Macedonians to lift the siege. This was only a temporary setback for Philip, who went on to win dominance of Greece at Chaeronea in 338, at the end of the Fourth Sacred War. Most of mainland Greece was now under Macedonia control, denying the Persians the chance to play off different Greek factions against each other as they had done so successfully in the past. In 338 Artaxerxes was poisoned by his doctor, who was following the orders of the eunuch Bagoas. All but one of his sons were also murdered at this time. Bagoas then placed the surviving son, Arses, on the throne (338-336), before finally helping raise Darius III, the last Achaemenid emperor, to power. Although Artaxerxes's reign was marked by the last significant Persian successes, he had a very bad press in the ancient sources, being described as reckless, a coward, secluded in his palace, a merciless despot and his successes were credited to either Greek mercenaries or the poor qualities of his opponents. However he must have had more qualities than he is normally given credit for, as he was able re-conquer Egypt and still had significant influence in Greece.

 

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