It would seem that Antiochus, sunk in luxury at his capital, could not bring himself to make even an effort to check the spirit of rebellion, and recover his revolted subjects.  Bactria was allowed to establish itself as an independent monarchy, without having to undergo the ordeal of a bloody struggle.  Antiochus neither marched against Diodotus in person, nor sent a general to contend with him.  The authority of Diodotus was confirmed and riveted on his subjects by an undisturbed reign of eighteen years before a Syrian army even showed itself in his neighborhood.

The precedent of successful revolt thus set could not well be barren of consequences.  If one province might throw off the yoke of its feudal lord with impunity, why might not others?  Accordingly, within a few years the example set by Bactria was followed in the neighboring country of Parthia, but with certain very important differences.  In Bactria the Greek satrap took the lead, and the Bactrian kingdom was, at any rate at its commencement, as thoroughly Greek as that of the Seleucidae.  But in Parthia Greek rule was from the first cast aside.  The natives rebelled against their masters.  An Asiatic race of a rude and uncivilized type, coarse and savage, but brave and freedom-loving, rose up against the polished but effeminate Greeks who held them in subjection, and claimed and established their independence.  The Parthian kingdom was thoroughly anti-Hellenic.  It appealed to patriotic feelings, and to the hate universally felt towards the stranger.  It set itself to undo the work of Alexander, to cast out the Europeans, to recover to the Asiatics the possession of Asia.  It was naturally almost as hostile to Bactria as to Syria, although danger from a common enemy might cause it sometimes to make a temporary alliance with that kingdom.  It had, no doubt, the general sympathy of the populations in the adjacent countries, and represented to them the cause of freedom and autonomy.

The exact circumstances under which the Parthian revolt took place are involved in much obscurity.  According to one account the leader of the revolt, Arsaces, was a Bactrian, to whom the success of Diodotus was disagreeable, and who therefore quitted the newly-founded kingdom, and betook himself to Parthia, where he induced the natives to revolt and to accept him for their monarch.  Another account, which is attractive from the minute details into which it enters, is the following:—­“Arsaces and Tiridates were brothers, descendants of Phriapites, the son of Arsaces.  Pherecles, who had been made satrap of their country by Antiochus Theus, offered a gross insult to one of them, whereupon, as they could not brook the indignity, they took five men into counsel, and with their aid slew the insolent one.  They then induced their nation to revolt from the Macedonians, and set up a government of their own, which attained to great power.”  A third version says that the Arsaces, whom all represent as the first king,