Palmyrene Empire

The Palmyrene Empire was a short-lived breakaway state that emerged from the Roman Empire during the Crisis of the Third Century, centred on the caravan city of Palmyra in the Syrian desert. Its rise followed the Roman defeat at Edessa in 260, when the Palmyrene leader Odaenathus was declared king and, while nominally loyal to Gallienus, campaigned against the Sassanids and the usurpers in Syria. After Odaenathus was murdered in 267, his young son Vaballathus inherited the throne under the regency of his mother Zenobia, who quickly took effective power. From 270 her armies overran Roman Arabia and Egypt, and in 271 they pushed into Asia Minor as far as Ancyra, while still issuing coins in the name of the emperor Aurelian. Late that year Vaballathus and Zenobia assumed the imperial title, prompting Aurelian to march east. He recovered Egypt and Anatolia in 272, defeated the Palmyrene army near Emesa and captured the city; a revolt the next year ended with Palmyra being sacked and its power destroyed. Although it lasted little more than a decade, the episode is remembered above all for Zenobia, one of the most ambitious rulers of antiquity.