Following the Roman general Lucullus ' defeat of both Mithridates and Tigranes in 69 BC, a rump Seleucid kingdom was restored under Antiochus XIII.

At the time it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Lucullus and Longinus ( or, less frequently, year 681 Ab urbe condita ).

In response to the first threat, Rome's best general, Lucius Licinius Lucullus ( consul in 74 BC ), was sent to defeat Mithridates, followed shortly by his brother Varro Lucullus ( consul in 73 BC ).

Another theory is that it was built for another native, Sallustius Lucullus, a Roman governor of Britain of the late 1st century who may have been the son of the British prince Adminius.

If the palace was designed for Lucullus, then it may have only been in use for a few years, for the Roman historian Suetonius records that Lucullus was executed by the delusional emperor Domitian in or shortly after AD 93.

At the time it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Lucullus and Cotta ( or, less frequently, year 680 Ab urbe condita ).

At the time it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Lucullus and Albinus ( or, less frequently, year 603 Ab urbe condita ).

The name was soon changed to Apollonia, on account of a temple dedicated to Apollo in the town, containing a famous colossal statue of the god Apollo by Calamis, 30 cubits high, transported later to Rome by Lucullus and placed in the Capitol.

His mother was Porcia Catones, sister of Cato the Younger and half-sister of the two Servilias ; Servilia Caepionis Major ( Caesar's mistress ) and Servilia Caepionis Minor ( second wife of Lucullus ).

Cyzicus was held for the Romans against King Mithridates VI of Pontus who besieged it with 300, 000 men in 74 BC, but it withstood him stoutly, and the siege was raised by Lucullus: the loyalty of the city was rewarded by an extension of territory and other privileges.

Felicitas was unknown before the mid-2nd century BC, when a temple was dedicated to her in the Velabrum in the Campus Martius by Lucius Licinius Lucullus, using booty from his 151 – 150 BC campaign in Spain.

Selene was eventually captured and killed by Tigranes, but after the latter's defeat by Pompey, the residents of Antioch hailed Antiochus XIII as king, and Lucius Lucullus approved his appointment as client ruler of Syria ( 69 BC ).

Lucullus ' reaction was an attack that was so precipitate that he took Tigranes by surprise.

Tigranes was, according to Keaveney, so impressed by Mithrobazanes ' courage that he appointed Mithrobazanes to command an army against Lucullus – Mithrobazanes was however defeated and killed.

On October 6, 69 BCE, Tigranes ' much larger force was decisively defeated by the Roman army under Lucullus in the Battle of Tigranocerta.

Once again, both Mithridates and Tigranes evaded capture by the victorious Romans. However, the Armenian historians claim, that Romans lost the battle of Artaxata and Lucullus ' following withdrawal from the Kingdom of Armenia in reality was an escape due to above-mentioned defeat.

* A new category of Roman priests, the tresviri epulones, are elected to supervise the feasts of the gods ; the first three men selected are Gaius Licinius Lucullus, Publius Manlius, and Publius Porcius Laeca.

Lucullus returned in 80 BC and was elected curule aedile for 79, along with his brother Marcus Terentius Varro Lucullus, and gave splendid games.

* Lucius Licinius Lucullus ( elected 151 BC )

Lucullus was probably the Quaestor mentioned as the sole officer in Sulla's army who could stomach accompanying the Consul when he marched on Rome.

Lucullus set out from the Piraeus in mid winter 87-6 BC with three Greek yachts ( myoparones ) and three light Rhodian biremes, hoping to evade the prevailing sea power of the Pontic fleets and their piratic allies by speed and taking advantage of the worst sailing conditions.

Lucullus led them back south to the warmer climes of northern Mesopotamia and had no trouble from his troops there despite setting them the difficult task of capturing the great Armenian fortress of Nisibis, which was quickly stormed and made the Roman base for the winter of 68-7 B. C.

That winter Lucullus left his army at Nisibis and taking a small, but apparently highly mobile, escort journeyed to Syria in an attempt to permanently exclude Tigranes from all his southern possessions.

The more daring and ruthless veterans had probably been further encouraged by Lucullus ' relatively mild acceptance of their first open mutiny in the Tablelands the previous autumn: especially the so-called Fimbrian legions who had murdered their commander Lucius Valerius Flaccus at Gaius Flavius Fimbria's instigation eighteen years earlier in the winter of 86-5 B. C.

In addition Mithridates had been sent back to Pontus by Tigranes during the same winter, and made some headway against the garrison force Lucullus had left there under his legates Sornatius Barba and Fabius Hadrianus.

During the winter of 68-67 BC at Nisibis, his authority over his army was more seriously undermined by the efforts of his young brother-in-law Publius Clodius Pulcher, apparently acting in the interests and pay of Pompey the Great, who was eager to succeed Lucullus in the eastern command.

He returned to Rome with his commander in 63 in time for the elections at which Murena secured his family's first consulate, mainly with the help of Lucullus ' army veterans and the consul Cicero, Clodius almost certainly having assisted as well.

He was most eager to forge a détente between Lucullus and Pompey, who were at loggerheads over the settlement of the eastern provinces, and wished to do Lucullus a favour in this matter, while at home Terentia demanded that he give his testimony and ensure the destruction of her subversive rival's brother and lover.

The most influential ancient gardens in the western world were the Ptolemy's gardens at Alexandria and the gardening tradition brought to Rome by Lucullus.

The family of his mother Caecilia Metella ( born c. 137 BC ) was one of the most powerful of the plebeian nobilitas, and was at the height of its success and influence in the last quarter of the 2nd century BC when Lucullus was born.

Two other notable transactions took place in 76 or 75 BC following Lucullus ' return from Africa, his marriage to Claudia the youngest daughter of Appius Claudius Pulcher, and his purchase of the Marian hill top villa at Cape Misenum from Sulla's wretchedly avaricious eldest daughter Cornelia.

But after several small battles, Lucullus finally defeated him at the Battle of Cabira.

Tigranes returned from mopping up a Seleucid rebellion in Syria with an experienced army which Lucullus nonetheless annihilated at the battle of Tigranocerta.

In the summer of 68 BC Lucullus resumed the war against Tigranes, crossing the Anti-Taurus Range in a long march through very difficult mountain country directed at the old Armenian capital Artaxata.

Lucullus ' old friend Antiochos of Askalon accompanied him on this journey and died at Antioch.

However in his absence his authority over his army at Nisibis was seriously undermined by the youngest and wildest of the Claudian brothers, Publius Clodius Pulcher, apparently acting in the interests of Pompey, who was eager to succeed Lucullus in the Mithridatic War command.

In 66 BC with the majority of Lucullus ' troops now openly refusing to obey his commands, but agreeing to defend Roman positions from attack, the senate sent Pompey to take over Lucullus ' command at which point Lucullus returned to Rome.

Memmius delivered at least four speeches de triumpho Luculli Asiatico, and the antagonism towards Lucullus aroused by the Pompeians proved so effective that the enabling law ( lex curiata ) required to hold a triumph was delayed for three years.

During his long delay in the royal palace at Alexandria in the summer of 86 BC Lucullus witnessed the beginning of the major schism in the Platonic Academy in the 1st century, the so-called Sosos Affair.

Antiochos and Herakleitos dissected it at length in Lucullus ' presence, and in the ensuing weeks while the Roman party continued to await the arrival of the king from the south, Antiochos composed a vigorous polemic against Philo entitled Sosos, which marked his definitive break with Philo's so-called " Sceptical Academy ", and the beginning of the separate, more conservative, school eventually called the Old Academy.

Lucullus is reported by Plutarch to have lost his mind at the end and went intermittently mad as he aged ; Plutarch, however seems to be somewhat ambivalent as to whether the factor behind the apparent madness was what he seems to most lean towards which was the administration of some sort of love potion or if it was at least in part feigned as a political protection against changes in the Roman state, such as the rise of the popular party.

* McCracken G: " The Villa and Tomb of Lucullus at Tusculum ", AJA 46 ( 1942 )