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At the same time as he was putting an end to the vassal principalities to the west of the Euphrates, Trajan was initiating a policy of aggression to the east of the river. On the pretext that the Parthians were intervening in Armenian affairs, which violated the compromise established back in the time of Nero, Trajan launched an expedition against the Parthians in 114 ce, which allowed him to gain the allegiance of various princes on the other side of the river (Abgar VII of Edessa, the Arab dynasts of Upper Mesopotamia, the princes of Hatra), burn the Parthian capital Ctesiphon, and attain the banks of the Persian Gulf where he rekindled a traditional friendship with the king of Characene-Mesene, Attambelos V. He created three new provinces: Assyria, Armenia, and Mesopotamia, and gave a new king to the Parthians, considered henceforth as a client state. One might have hoped to have seen a renewal of the political unity between Syria and Mesopotamia that was typical under the first Seleucids. But uprisings in several Mesopotamian cities and then the death of Trajan convinced his successor Hadrian to abandon the new conquests (118 ce). The three provinces were in effect eliminated, but Rome conserved her friendships beyond the river, and even some supporters. A meeting on the Euphrates between Hadrian and the Parthian king Chosroes I brought the conflict to a definitive close in 123 ce.