Editing Asiatic Vespers (section)

{{Act of Villainy
|image = Asiatic_Vespers.jpg
|perpetrator = [[Mithridates VI Eupator]]<br>Kingdom of Pontus
|date = 88 BC
|location = Western Anatolia
|motive = To purge Asia Minor of Roman influence
|crimes = [[Genocide]]<br>Mass [[murder]]}}
{{Quote|In the meantime Mithridates built a large number of ships for an attack on Rhodes, and he wrote secretly to all his satraps and magistrates that on the thirtieth day thereafter they should set upon all Romans and Italians in their towns, and upon their wives and children and their domestics of Italian birth, kill them and throw their bodies out unburied, and share their goods with himself. He threatened to punish any who should bury the dead or conceal the living, and offered rewards to informers and to those who should kill persons in hiding, and freedom to slaves for betraying their masters. To debtors for killing money-lenders he offered release from one half of their obligations.|The Roman historian Appian about the Asiatic Vespers.}}
The '''Asiatic Vespers''', also called the '''Asian Vespers''', the '''Ephesian Vespers''' and the '''Vespers of 88 BC''', was the genocide of the Latin-speaking peoples in Western Anatolia by Emperor [[Mithridates VI Eupator]] of the Kingdom of Pontus. The purpose of the massacre was to purge the influence of the Roman Republic from Asia Minor. One of the deadliest recorded genocides in the Classical Era, the event resulted in around 80, 000 deaths and served as the inciting incident of the [[Mithridatic Wars]] between Pontus and Rome.