Pacorus
2. A contemporary of Pacorus, the son of Orodes [No. I], was one of the royal cup-bearers. After Pacorus, the son of Orodes, had conquered Saxa, Antony's quaestor (B. C. 40), and had overrun a great part of Syria, Antigonus, the son of Aristobolus, applied to hmt for help to restore him to the Jewish throne. This request was immediately complied with; and Pacorus, the cup-bearer, was sent with a large force against Jerusalem. The city surrendered: Hyrcanus and Phasael were taken prisoners, and Herod fled to Rome. (J. AJ 14.13. B. Jad. 1.13; comp HYRCANUS. p. 544. b.) Dio Cassius, who makes no mention of Pacorns, the cup-bearer, attributes this expedition to the soil of Orodes (48.26); and Tacitus in like manner speaks of Jerusalem having been taken by the king Pacorus (Hist. 5.9); but the authority of Josephus on all matters relating to Jewish history is superior to that of these historians.
From William Smith (ed.), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. Text provided under a CC BY-SA license by Perseus Digital Library, http://www.perseus.tufts.edu, with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities and Tufts University. Data accessed from https://github.com/PerseusDL/canonical-pdlrefwk/ on 17 October 2026.