(This is too long for a single post, I'm going to do it in two)
When
Alexander Jannaeus died in 76 BC, after a long illness, he left
his kingdom to
his widow, Salome
Alexander, who appears to have issued no coin in her own name. Her elder son,
Hyrcanus, was made High Priest, and was regarded as the heir to the throne.
Jannaeus had favoured the Sadducees, a small group of aristocratic and immensely wealthy priestly families which controlled the Temple and its revenues, and hostile to the Pharisees, during most of
his reign, though he was more conciliatory after the civil war of 95-89.
His widow reversed this, and followed pro-Pharisee policies. Josephus says that power was in their
hands during her reign, and according to the Mishnah, the leading Pharisee of the time was her brother.
The Pharisees, of course, tended to take revenge on their former persecutors, the Sadducees, but these, supported by Hyrcanus' brother Aristobulus, managed to gain sufficient concessions to avoid a further civil war.
Aristobulus took after
his father, unlike the much weaker Hyrcaus, and by the end of
his mother's reign, he
had gathered a powerful group of
his father's former friends around him, and taken control of 22 fortresses across the kingdom. Not surprisingly, the Pharisees viewed this with alarm.
Conflict broke out as soon as she was dead. The Pharisees supported
Hyrcanus, the Sadducees Aristobulus. The two sides soon came to battle, but most of Hyrcanus' supporters changed sides.
Hyrcanus fled, but soon surrendered to Aristobulus. Power was yielded to Aristobulus, but
Hyrcanus retained
his property and
his income. It is not clear exactly what Aristobulus' formal position was, but in all probablility he became both High Priest and
King, like
his father. Like
his mother, he does not appear to have struck coin in
his own name.
An Idumean named Antipater, father of
Herod the Great, whose own father
had held the office of
Strategos (governor) of the region under
Jannaeus, now intervened, persuading
Hyrcanus to make an agreement with the powerful
Aretas III,
king of Nabatea. In return for the return of land seized by
Jannaeus, he was to support
Hyrcanus against
his brother. Aristobulus was defeated, and took refuge with
his troops in the Temple, where he was besieged by
Aretas. At this point both brothers appealed to the
Romans for
help.
During Jannaeus' reign, the
Romans had been largely concerned with their own problems, and their war with
Mithridates VI of
Pontus; now, they were expanding again. The Republic was collapsing; out-of-control generals, with armies owing their loyalty to them rather than to the Senate, rampaged around the Mediterranean seeking the conquest, and the wealth it led to, which would enable them to take power in
Rome. It was to one of these generals,
Pompeius Maximus, to whom the brothers sent delegations, both of them offering gifts.