King Mithridates VI of Pontus, after his defeat by Roman General Pompey in 63 BCE, flees with a small army from Colchis (modern Georgia) over the Caucasus Mountains to the Crimea.
Establishing himself at Panticapaeum (Kerch), he makes plans to raise yet another army to invade Italy by way of the Danube.
His eldest living son, Machares, viceroy of Cimmerian Bosporus, is unwilling to aid his father.
Mithridates VI had Machares killed, and Mithridates VI takes the throne of the Bosporan Kingdom.
Mithridates now orders the conscriptions and preparations for war.
His youngest son, Pharnaces II, leads a rebellion against his father, joined by Roman exiles in the core of Mithridates VI's Pontic army.
Mithridates withdraws to the citadel, where, after failing in an attempt to poison himself, Mithridates orders a Gallic mercenary to kill him.
His body is sent to Pompey, who buries his enemy in the rock-cut tombs of his ancestors in Amasia, the old capital of the Kingdom of Pontus.
Pharnaces II makes his submission to Pompey, who confirms him as ruler of the new province he creates, the Bosporus Cimmerius (Crimean region).
