by
Damien F. Mackey
The invasions of the
supposed C1st BC Armenian ruler, Tigranes ‘the Great’, have been suggested as providing
the basis for the Jewish story of the heroine Judith.
Introduction
Encyclopaedia Iranica introduces the C1st BC King Tigranes
II (Tigran) ‘the Great’ as follows (http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/tigran-ii):
TIGRAN II, THE GREAT, king of Armenia (r. 95-55 BCE).
Tigran (Tigranes) II was the most distinguished member of the so-called
Artašēsid/Artaxiad dynasty, which has now been identified as a branch of the
earlier Eruandid dynasty of Iranian origin attested as ruling in Armenia from
at least the 5th century B.C.E …. During Tigran’s reign Armenia briefly reached
its widest extension in the vacuum of power resulting from the final decline of
the Seleucids, the still incomplete consolidation of the Parthian empire, and
the absence as yet of Rome’s full commitment to an expansionist policy in the
East. Despite considerable information, Tigran’s achievements have been
difficult to reconstruct and evaluate, because of the almost exclusively
classical sources, whose treatment of him, as the son-in-law and supporter of
Rome’s greatest enemy Mithradates
VI Eupator (r. 120-63 BCE) of Pontus, is invariably hostile, and the much
later and anachronistic account in the Armenian History of Movsēs
Xorenac’i.
The beginning of Tigran II’s reign in 95BCE was not auspicious. He
apparently succeeded his father Tigran I, of whom nothing is known beyond a few
possible copper coins, rather than his uncle, as has sometimes been argued. ….
[End of quote]
Unfortunately, there seems to be a
fair amount of obscurity here, “Tigran’s achievements have been difficult to reconstruct and evaluate”, “the
much later and anachronistic account …”, “his father Tigran I, of whom nothing
is known beyond a few possible copper coins …”.
Yet, the military activities of Tigranes
have been proposed as the model for the story of Judith, which can also be thought
- again wrongly, I suggest - to have been Maccabean influenced
And so we read of the theories of Samuel Rocca and Gabriele Boccaccini on this http://www.4enoch.org/wiki4/index.php?title=Category:Salome_Alexandra--history_(subject:
In 2005 Samuel Rocca first suggested that the story of Judith could
contains echoes of the crisis generated by the invasion of the Armenian King
Tigranes the Great.
The argument was taken up in 2009 by Gabriele Boccaccini who drew attention
on the Armenian and Roman sources that seem to confirm the chronological and
geographical details provided in the Book of Judith about the military campaign
of the new "Nebuchadnezzar," Tigranes the Great.
[End of quote]
We read further of the striking similarities between the Judith
account and Queen Salome against Tigranes in Rocca’s article, “The Book of
Judith, Queen Salome Alexandra, and Tigranes of Armenia”:
Tigranes did not stop at Seleucid Syria. The Armenian King was
ready to move against Judaea. For the Eastern potentate to face a small
kingdom, moreover under the leadership of a woman, would have been nothing more
than a promenade! He thus came against Judaea. According to Josephus, the queen
and the nation were terrified! It was then that Queen Salome Alexandra opted
for a diplomatic solution. She sent ambassadors to Tigranes. It seems that the
ambassadors, with the help of many expensive gifts, persuaded Tigranes not to
move against Judaea, for the time being at least. Queen Salome Alexandra had
then the time to organize an army to face the Armenian despot. But she was not
going at war alone. She cleverly bought enough time to allow her Roman ally,
Lucullus to move against Tigranes, striking at the Armenian heartland. Thus as
soon as Seleucid Ptolemais fell to the Armenian horde, Tigranes received
the bad news that Lucullus, pursuing Mithridates was lying waste Armenia.
Tigranes had to go home. And after him now there was a professional army
of around 40.000, a Hasmonean Army, ready to fight …! In fact in 69 BCE
Lucullus invaded Armenia, defeated Tigranes and conquered Tigranocerta his
capital. The Hasmonean Queen and her subjects could now breath freely. This
important episode makes up the main part of the Book of Judith.
[End of quote]
Returning again to
http://www.4enoch.org/wiki4/index.php?title=Category:Tigranes_the_Great--history_(subject)
we read this:
Tigranes the Great is quite a neglected figure in Biblical and Judaic
Studies. Only Armenian scholarship has preserved vivid memory of his military
campaigns, in which Judea also was subdued. As an example of the way in which
the relationship between Tigranes and Queen Alexandra is retold in modern
Armenian culture, we may read the passage in Armen’s biography (1940):
“As the king’s forces poured into southern Phoenicia, Jews were alarmed
at the proximity of such vast hosts to Judea. Queen Alexandra of Jerusalem, and
the Jewish leaders already visioned Armenian cuirassiers riding into the sacred
city, and once more the recollection of Babylonian captivity intensified their
present panic. The undimmed prestige of Tigranes as a conqueror, who moved
peoples, among them Jews from Syria, to populate his native territories, made
him appear as a new Nebuchadnezzar, while the prospect of singing the songs of
Zion on the banks of Euphrates and Tigris to satisfy the disdainful curiosity
of their enslavers terrified them. For “how shall we sing the Lord’s songs in a
strange land!” Trembling Jewish ambassadors met Tigranes in Phoenicia, they “interceded
with him, and entreated him he would determine nothing that was severe about
their queen and nation.”
Tigranes alleviated their fears and assured then of his peaceful
intentions toward Judea” (p.150).
[End of quotes]
It reads
suspiciously like a pinch from the Hebrew Book of Judith.
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