Rome and Persia at War and Peace: Competition and Contact in the Near East, 193 to 363 AD

During the third and fourth centuries AD military conflict between the Roman and Persian Empires was at a level and depth not seen during the Parthian period. At the same time contact between the two empires increased markedly, and contributed in part to increased conflict. This book focuses on war, religion, trade and diplomacy as the means through which the two powers competed and by which they sought to gain, maintain and develop control of territories and peoples long the source of dispute between the two powers. It will also analyse the roles of regional powers such as the Armenians, Palmyrenes and Arabs in conflict and contact between the two ’super powers’. Using the broadest possible array of sources this book gives special attention to the archaeological evidence as it has tended to be overshadowed in modern studies by the literary and epigraphic sources. This is the first monograph to undertake an in-depth and critical analysis of competition and contact between Rome and the early Sasanians in the Near East using literary, archaeological, numismatic and epigraphic evidence, and one which includes the complete range of mechanisms by which the two powers competed.