 Historians state that the dynasty was of Iranian origin, and suggest, albeit not clearly, that it held dynastic familial linkages to the ruling Achaemenid dynasty.Throughout their existence, the Orontids stressed their lineage from the Achaemenids in order to strengthen their political legitimacy.Members of the dynasty ruled Armenia intermittently during the period spanning from the 6th to at least the 2nd centuries BC, first as client kings or satraps of the Median and Achaemenid empires and later, after the collapse of the Achaemenid empire, as rulers of an independent kingdom, and later as kings of Sophene and Commagene, which eventually succumbed to the Roman Empire.