MITHRADATES VI EUPATOR
131 BC - 63 BC

PRONOUNCE MITHRADATES EUPATOR

Mithradates, not Mithridates, means Gift of Mithra. Who the heck is Mithra?

Mithradates VI Eupator, also called Mithradates the Great, was the king of Pontus.

And here is a map of Pontus:

PONTUS BEFORE 90 BC
Click to enlarge

89-86 BC - First war of the Romans against Mithridates the Great, king of Pontus, who had overrun Asia Minor, Macedonia, and Greece. Sylla defeats his armies, and forces him to withdraw his forces from Europe. Sylla returns to Rome to carry on the civil war against the son and partisans of Marius. He makes himself Dictator.

74-64 BC - The last Mithridatic wars. Lucullus, and after him Pompeius, command against the great King of Pontus, who at last is poisoned by his son, while designing to raise the warlike tribes of the Danube against Rome, and to invade Italy from the north-east.

Great Asiatic conquests of the Romans. Besides the ancient province of Pergamus, the maritime countries of Bithynia, and nearly all Paphlagonia and Pontus, are formed into a Roman province, under the name of Bithynia; while on the southern coast Cilicia and Pamphylia form another, under the name of Cilicia; Phoenicia and Syria compose a third, under the name of Syria.

On the other hand, Great Armenia is left to Tigranes; Cappodocia to
Ariobarzanes; the Bosphorus to Pharnaces; Judaea to Hyrcanus; and
some other small states are also given to petty princes, all of whom remain dependent on Rome.

After waging three Mithradatic Wars against Rome, Mithradates had to flee to the Crimea, his last stronghold. There at Panticapaeum, which is today's Kerch in the Ukraine, one of his slaves assassinated him. The year? 63 B.C.