Kingdom of Sophene

The Kingdom of Sophene (Armenian: Cop'kh, Ancient Greek: Σωφηνή, romanized: Sōphēnē),[4] was a Hellenistic-era political entity situated between ancient Armenia and Syria.[5] Ruled by the Orontid dynasty, the kingdom was culturally mixed with Greek, Armenian, Iranian, Syrian, Anatolian and Roman influences.[6] Founded around the 3rd century BC the kingdom maintained independence until c. 95 BC when the Artaxiad king Tigranes the Great conquered the territories as part of his empire.[7] Attempts to restore the kingdom were briefly made in 66 BC and 54 AD.[8] Sophene laid near medieval Kharput, which is present day Elazig. [9]

Kingdom of Sophene

3rd century BC–95 BC
Map of Sophene as a vassal state of the Kingdom of Armenia
CapitalKarkathiokerta
Arsamosata
Common languagesArmenian(native language)[1] and Aramaic[2]
Religion
Zoroastrianism[3]
GovernmentMonarchy
Historical eraHellenistic Age
• Established
3rd century BC
• Conquered by Tigranes the Great
95 BC
Preceded by		Succeeded by
Satrapy of Armenia
Kingdom of Armenia (Antiquity)
Kingdom of Commagene

History

Sophene was part of the kingdom of Urartu in the 8th-7th centuries BC. After unifying the region with his kingdom in the early 8th century BC, king Argishti I of Urartu resettled many of its inhabitants to his newly built city of Erebuni.

After Alexander the Great's campaigns in 330s BC and the subsequent collapse of the Achaemenid Empire, it became one of the first regions of Armenia to be exposed to Greek influence and adopted some aspects of Greek culture. Sophene remained part of the newly independent kingdom of Greater Armenia. Around the 3rd century BC, the Seleucid Empire forced Sophene to split from Greater Armenia, giving rise to the Kingdom of Sophene. The kingdom was ruled by a branch of the Orontids.

The kingdom's capital was Carcathiocerta, identified as the now abandoned town-site of Egil on the Tigris river north of Diyarbakir. However, its largest settlement and only true city was Arsamosata, located further to the north. Arsamosata was founded in the 3rd century B.C. and survived in a contracted state until perhaps the early 13th century A.D.[10]

Etymology

The etymology of the name Sophene dates back to the ethnonym Suppani, a people who lived in the region dating back to the 1st millennium BCE. The Ancient Greek: Σωφηνή, was coined after the Armenian Cop'k, which stems from Suppani.[11]

Religion

The Orontid dynasty in Sophene practiced Zoroastrianism.[3] According to modern historian Michał Marciak, the well-attested existence of Iranian culture in Sophene could be understood as a derivation of Arsacid Armenia, which came from Greater Armenia and indirectly from Iran. However, he also adds that the strong existence of Iranian culture might have influenced Roman and Greek writers to regard the region as Armenian.[12]

Iranian cults were popular in Sophene amongst the nobility, who gave themselves theophoric Iranian names, and the peasantry, who sacrificed horses in the name of the goddess Anahita.[13] Anahita was highly popular in the country, with animals such as cows and horses being regularly sacrificed in her name.[14]

Language

Armenian was the common language that spoken by the people of Sophene. However, imperial Aramaic was used in governmental and court proceedings, which was rooted in Achaemenid practices from Armenia.[15]

Kings of Sophene
  • Sames (ca. 260 B.C.)
  • Arsames I (ca. 240 B.C.)
  • Xerxes (ca. 220 B.C.)
  • Zariadres (ca. 190 B.C.)
  • Mithrobouzanes (second half of the 2nd-century BC)
  • Arkathias (second half of the 2nd-century BC)
  • Arsakes (ca. 150 B.C.)
  • Artanes (ca. 110 B.C.)
  • Tigranes the Younger (ca. 65 BC)
  • Sohaemus (ca. 54 AD)
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References
  1. Chaumont, N. (2011). "Armenia ii". Encyclopaedia Iranica. ...in the kingdoms of Armenia and Sophene all spoke one and the same language: Armenian (Strabo, ibid.); yet imperial Aramaic (with a quite strong admixture of Persian terms) was still the language of the government and the court, a survival of Achaemenid practices in Armenia... B.C.
  2. Marciak 2017, p. 117–118.
  3. Boyce & Grenet 1991, p. 320.
  4. Marciak 2017, pp. 77.
  5. Marciak 2017, p. 61.
  6. Marciak, Michal (2017). Sophene, Gordyene, and Adiabene: Three Regna Minora of Northern Mesopotamia Between East and West. Brill. p. 77. ISBN 9789004350724. The inquiry into Sophene’s cultural landscape reveals the existence of quite a number of characteristics which can be tentatively labeled as different cul- tural elements: local Anatolian, Iranian, Armenian, Greek-Hellenistic, Roman, Syrian-Mesopotamian...
  7. Marciak 2017, p. 95.
  8. Marciak 2017, p. 426.
  9. Lacey 2016, p. 109.
  10. Sinclair 1989, pp. 112, 196, 358.
  11. Marciak, Michal (2017). Sophene, Gordyene, and Adiabene: Three Regna Minora of Northern Mesopotamia Between East and West. Brill. p. 77. ISBN 9789004350724. There is no doubt that Σωφηνή and Σωφανηνή go back to the enthnonym Suppani - a people who inhabited this area in the first half of the 1st millennium BCE...Σωφηνή is coined after the Armenian toponym Cop'k, which itself is directly derived from Suppani.
  12. Marciak 2017, pp. 112.
  13. Marciak 2017, pp. 97–98, 111.
  14. Marciak 2017, pp. 57, 97–98, 111.
  15. Chaumont, N. (2011). "Armenia ii". Encyclopaedia Iranica. ...in the kingdoms of Armenia and Sophene all spoke one and the same language: Armenian (Strabo, ibid.); yet imperial Aramaic (with a quite strong admixture of Persian terms) was still the language of the government and the court, a survival of Achaemenid practices in Armenia... B.C.

Sources

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