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Escaping the fate of the older members of the Maccabæan family, Hyrcanus died in peace, B.C.106, bequeathing the sovereignty to his wife. And now the decline of the Asmonean dynasty rapidly set in. Aristobulus, the son of the deceased king, seized the supreme power, flung his mother into prison, and starved her to death. He also imprisoned three of his four brothers, sparing but one, Antigonus, the next in age to himself. Assuming the diadem and the royal title, he hastened to take advantage of the distracted state of affairs in Syria, and turning his arms against Ituræa, a district south of Anti-Libanus, forced the inhabitants, like the Idumæans, to conform to the Jewish religion, on pain of being expelled from their country. During this expedition he was seized with a dangerous illness, which compelled him to return to Jerusalem, and leave his brother Antigonus to complete the subjugation of the country. As he had no children, his queen Salome, according to the Jewish law, would, in the event of his death, be expected to marry Antigonus; but such was her aversion to him, that she resolved to compass his death rather than be united with him in marriage56.