Death and succession

Early in 117, Trajan grew ill and set out to sail back to Italy. His health declined throughout the spring and summer of 117, something publicly acknowledged by the fact that a bronze bust displayed at the time in the public baths of Ancyra showed him clearly aged and emaciated.^[258]After reaching Selinus (modern Gazipasa) in Cilicia, which was afterwards called Trajanopolis, he suddenly died from edema on August 8. Some say that Trajan had adopted Hadrian as his successor, but others that it was his wife Pompeia Plotina who assured the succession to Hadrian by keeping his death secret and afterwards hiring someone to impersonate Trajan by speaking with a tired voice behind a curtain, well after Trajan had died. Dio, who tells this narrative, offers his father – the then governor of Cilicia Apronianus – as a source, and therefore his narrative is possibly grounded on contemporary rumor. It may also originate in Roman displeasure at an empress meddling in political affairs.^[259]
Hadrian held an ambiguous position during Trajan's reign. After commanding Legio I Minervia during the Dacian Wars, he had been relieved from front-line duties at the decisive stage of the Second Dacian War, being sent to govern the newly created province of Pannonia Inferior. He ^[260] had pursued a senatorial career without particular distinction and had not been officially adopted by Trajan (although he received from him decorations and other marks of distinction that made him hope for the succession).^[261] He received no post after his 108 consulate,^[262] and no further honours other than being made Archon eponymos for Athens in 111/112.^[263] He probably did not take part in the Parthian War. Literary sources relate that Trajan had considered others, such as the jurist Lucius Neratius Priscus, as heir.^[264] However, Hadrian, who was eventually entrusted with the governorship of Syria at the time of Trajan's death, was Trajan's cousin and was married to Trajan's grandniece,^[265] which all made him as good as heir designate.^[266] In addition Hadrian was born in Hispania and seems to have been well connected with the powerful group of Spanish senators influential at Trajan's court through his ties to Plotina and the Prefect Attianus.^[267] The fact that during Hadrian's reign he did not pursue Trajan's senatorial policy may account for the "crass hostility" shown him by literary sources.^[268]
Aware that the Parthian campaign was an enormous setback, and that it revealed that the Roman Empire had no means for an ambitious program of conquests,^[118] Hadrian's first act as emperor was to abandon – outwardly out of his own free will^[269][270] – the distant and indefensible Mesopotamia and to restore Armenia, as well as Osrhoene, to the Parthian hegemony under Roman suzerainty.^[232] However, all the other territories conquered by Trajan were retained. Roman friendship ties with Charax (also known by the name of Mesene) were also retained (although it is debated whether this had to do more with trade concessions than with common Roman policy of exploiting dissensions amid the Empire's neighbors).^[271][272] Trajan's ashes were laid to rest underneath Trajan's column, the monument commemorating his success.^{[citation needed]}