Kingdom of Lesser Armenia

This article is about the specific polity Kingdom of Lesser Armenia and therefore only includes events related to its territory and not to its possessions or colonies. If you are interested in the possession, this is the link to the article about the nation which includes all possessions as well as all the different incarnations of the nation.

If you are looking for the page with the statistics about this polity you can find it here:All Statistics

During the Hellenistic period, Lesser Armenia was an indipendant Kingdom located in northern Turkey. It originated when the Achaemenids lost control of the region during the wars with Alexander the Great.

Establishment

January 329 BC: In Hellenistic times, Lesser Armenia was an independent kingdom. Presumably it broke away from the Achaemenid Empire during the Macedonian conquest.

Chronology

Interactive Chronologies with maps are available in the section Changes Navigation

1. Events

January 301 BC: Pharnavaz, victorious in a power struggle, became the first king of Iberia (c.302- c.237 BC).

January 236 BC: Iberian kin Saurmag, Colchis regained its independence.

January 189 BC: The defeat of the Seleucid King Antiochos III by the Romans at Magnesia Sipylus in 190 BC redraws the political map of the Middle East. Under the terms of the Peace of Apamea (188 BC), Antiochus III could no longer intervene north of the Taurus, creating a political vacuum which was immediately filled by new independent kingdoms. From 190 BC. BC, the satrap of Armenia Artaxias, with whom the Carthaginian Hannibal took refuge, founded on his advice the city of Artaxates (south of present-day Yerevan) on the banks of the Araxes, and makes it the capital of a kingdom of Armenia of which he proclaims himself king, with the blessing of the Romans.