the attack was rarely long maintained.  The Parthian warriors grew quickly weary of an equal contest, and, if they could not force their enemy to give way, soon changed their tactics.  Pretending panic, dispersing, and beating a hasty retreat, they endeavored to induce their foe to pursue hurriedly and in disorder, being ready at any moment to turn and take advantage of the least appearance of confusion.  If these tactics failed, as they commonly did after they came to be known, the simulated flight was generally converted into a real one; further conflict was avoided, or at any rate deferred to another occasion.

When the Parthians wished to parley with an enemy, they unstrung their bows, and advancing with the right hand outstretched, asked for a conference.  They are accused by the Romans of sometimes using treachery on such occasions, but, except in the single case of Crassus, the charge of bad faith cannot be sustained against them.  On solemn occasions, when the intention was to discuss grounds of complaint or to bring a war to an end by the arrangement of terms of peace, a formal meeting was arranged between their representatives and those of their enemy, generally on neutral ground, as on an island in the Euphrates, or on a bridge constructed across it.  Here the chiefs of the respective nations met, accompanied by an equal number of guards, while the remainder of their forces occupied the opposite banks of the river.  Matters were discussed in friendly fashion, the Greek language being commonly employed as the vehicle of communication; after which festivities usually took place, the two chiefs mutually entertaining each other, or accepting in common the hospitalities of a third party.  The terms of peace agreed upon were reduced to writing; hands were grasped as a sign that faith was pledged; and oaths having been interchanged, the conference broke up, and the chiefs returned to their respective residences.

Besides negotiating by means of conferences, the Parthian monarchs often sent out to neighboring states, and in return received from them formal embassies.  The ambassadors in every case conveyed, as a matter of course, gifts to the prince to whom they were accredited, which might consist of articles of value, or of persons.  Augustus included an Italian slave-girl among the presents which he transmitted to Phraates IV.; and Artabanus III. sent a Jewish giant to Tiberius.  The object of an embassy was sometimes simply to congratulate; but more often the ambassadors were instructed to convey certain demands, or proposals, from their own prince to the head of the other nation, whereto his assent was required, or requested.  These proposals were commonly formulated in a letter from the one prince to the other, which it was the chief duty of the ambassadors to convey safely.  Free powers to conclude a treaty at their discretion were rarely, or never, entrusted to them.  Their task was merely to deliver the royal letter, to explain its terms, if they were ambiguous, and to carry back to their own monarch the reply of the foreign sovereign.  The sanctity of the ambassadorial character was invariably respected by the Parthians, who are never even taxed with a violation of it.