The Appointment of Parthamaspates

264, Lot: 408. Estimate $200. Sold for $1800. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

Trajan. AD 98-117. Æ Sestertius (35mm, 25.66 g, 6h). Rome mint. Struck AD 116-117. Laureate and draped bust right / REX PARTHIS DATVS, Trajan seated left on daïs, presenting Parthamaspates to Parthia kneeling right; behind Trajan, prefect standing left. RIC II 667; Woytek 594v-2. VF, dark green surfaces, heavily tooled and smoothed.

Parthian interference in Armenia prompted Trajan to declare war against their king Osroes I in 114. He quickly re-established Roman control of Armenia, forced the submission of Osrhoene, and in 116 took Mesopotamia by defeating Osroes I. Rather than pursuing the Parthians into Iran, Trajan set up a pro-Roman Parthian "buffer state" in Mesopotamia under a puppet-king Parthamaspates.