Mithridatic Wars (1.7-2.8)

The legates proceeded to Bithynia and ordered that the war be discontinued. Nicomedes and Attalus pretended to acquiesce. The Bithynians had been instructed to say that they could no longer endure the cruelty of Prusias, especially after they had openly complained against him. On the pretext that these complaints were not yet known at Rome the legates adjourned, leaving the business unfinished. When Prusias despaired of assistance from the Romans (in reliance upon whom he had neglected to provide [*] means for his own defence) he retired to Nicomedia in order to possess himself of the city and resist the invaders. The inhabitants, however, betrayed him and opened the gates, and Nicomedes entered with his army. Prusias fled to the temple of Zeus, where he was stabbed by some of the emissaries of Nicomedes. In this way Nicomedes succeeded Prusias as king of the Bithynians. At his death his son, Nicomedes, surnamed Philopator, succeeded him, the Senate confirming his ancestral authority. So much for Bithynia. To anticipate the sequel,[*] another Nicomedes, grandson of this one, left the kingdom to the Romans in his will.

Who were the rulers of Cappadocia before the Macedonians I am not able to say exactly -- whether it had a government of its own or was subject to Darius. I judge that Alexander left behind him governors of the conquered nations to collect the tribute while he hastened after Darius. But it appears that he restored to Amisus, a city of Pontus, of Attic origin, its original democratic form of government. Yet Hieronymus[*] says that he did not touch those nations at all, but that he went after Darius by another road, along the sea-coast of Pamphylia and Cilicia. But Perdiccas, who ruled the Macedonians after Alexander, captured and hanged Ariarthes, the governor of Cappadocia, either [*] because he had revolted or in order to bring that country under Macedonian rule, and placed Eumenes of Cardia over these peoples. Eumenes was afterward adjudged an enemy of Macedonia and put to death, and Antipater, who succeeded Perdiccas as overseer of the territory of Alexander, appointed Nicanor satrap of Cappadocia.