As a security for the performance of engagements, or for the permanent maintenance of a friendly attitude, it was usual in the East during the Parthian period to require, and give, hostages.  The princes who occupied the position of Parthian feudatories gave hostages to their suzerain, who were frequently their near relations, as sons or brothers.  And a practice grew up of the Parthian monarchs themselves depositing their own sons or brothers with the Roman Emperor, at first perhaps merely for their own security, but afterwards as pledges for their good behavior.  Such hostages lived at the expense of the Roman court, and were usually treated with distinction.  In the event of a rupture between their country and Rome, they had little to fear.  Rome found her advantage in employing them as rivals to a monarch with whom she had quarrelled, and did not think it necessary to punish them for his treachery or inconstancy.

The magnificence of the Parthian court is celebrated in general terms by various writers, but not very many particulars have come down to us respecting it.  We know that it was migratory, moving from one of the chief cities of the empire to another at different seasons of the year, and that owing to the vast number of the persons composing it, there was a difficulty sometimes in providing for their subsistence upon the road.  The court comprised the usual extensive harem of an Oriental prince, consisting of a single recognized queen, and a multitude of secondary wives or concubines.  The legitimate wife of the prince was commonly a native, and in most cases was selected from the royal race of the Arsacidae but sometimes she was the daughter of a dependent monarch, and she might even be a slave raised by royal favor from that humble position.  The concubines were frequently Greeks.  Both wives and concubines remained ordinarily in close seclusion, and we have little mention of them, in the Parthian annals.  But in one instance, at any rate, a queen, brought up in the notions of the West, succeeded in setting Oriental etiquette at defiance, took the direction of affairs out of the hands of her husband, and subsequently ruled the empire in conjunction with her son.  Generally, however, the Parthian kings were remarkably free from the weakness of subservience to women, and managed their kingdom with a firm hand, without allowing either wives or ministers to obtain any undue ascendency over them.  In particular, we may note that they never, so far as appears, fell under the baleful influence of eunuchs, who, from first to last, play a very subordinate part in the Parthian history.