Mithridates II of Commagene: King and Diplomatic Figure in the 1st Century BC

Introduction

Mithridates II Antiochus Epiphanes Philorhomaeus Philhellen Monocrites (died 20 BC) was king of Commagene in the 1st century BC, a son of Antiochus I Theos and Queen Isias Philostorgos, of mixed Iranian and Greek descent. He succeeded his father and ruled until his death in 20 BC.

According to Plutarch, Mithridates allied with the Roman triumvir Mark Antony and personally led Commagenian forces at Actium in 31 BC. After Antony’s defeat he reconciled with Octavian (Augustus); as part of that settlement Augustus compelled him to surrender the strategic Euphrates crossing at Zeugma to the Roman province of Syria. To signal his Roman allegiance he removed the epithet Philhellen from his court titulature and adopted Philorhomaeus; his titulature also includes the otherwise unattested epithet Monocrites. During his reign he played a prominent role in the dynastic royal cult established by his father.

Internal dynastic strife touched his reign: his brother Antiochus II was summoned to Rome and executed by Augustus in 29 BC for involvement in the murder of an envoy sent by Mithridates. Epigraphic evidence from a mid–1st century BC funerary altar at Sofraz records that Mithridates’ wife was a Greek woman named Laodice and that his son by her, Mithridates III, succeeded him. Mithridates II’s rule is chiefly noted for the diplomatic shift from Antony to Augustus and for the loss of Zeugma to Roman Syria.