Siege of Amida

In 359, while Constantius II was occupied in the West, Shapur crossed the Tigris with the Chionites of King Grumbates and contingents of Albani, Gelani and Segestani. He meant to bypass the great fortresses such as Nisibis and strike into Syria, but Amida, where the Roman commanders had gathered several legions, stood in his way. When Grumbates’ son was killed by a ballista bolt from the walls, the Persian army committed itself to the siege. For 73 days the defenders repulsed assaults with siege towers and elephants; a night sally by two Gallic legions inflicted heavy losses on the besiegers, and a plague that broke out in the crowded city ended after ten days. At last the Persians raised earth ramps up to the walls, part of the Roman counter-works collapsed, and the city was stormed and sacked. The count Aelianus, who had led the defence, and his officers were crucified, and the surviving inhabitants were deported to Khuzestan. Ammianus, then on the staff of the general Ursicinus, hid in the city and escaped by night.

By Ammianus’s count Shapur lost 30,000 men, and the season was too far advanced to go further. The next year he took Singara and Bezabde; Constantius’s counter-offensive failed, and his successor Julian set out in 363 to avenge these defeats. The historian Khodadad Rezakhani has noted that the king whom Ammianus describes before the walls, wearing a golden ram’s head instead of a diadem, may have been the Kidarite ruler Peroz rather than Shapur himself.