No More Learning

But they did not on this account abandon their projects. With their whole levy they appeared in front of Labienus and waited for the German bands that were to follow, for their recruiting agents found a better reception than they had met with from the dwellers on the Rhine, among the warlike tribes of the interior of Germany, especially, as it would appear, among the Chatti. But
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST
73
when Labienus seemed as if he wished to avoid these and to march off in all haste, the Treveri attacked the Romans even before the Germans arrived and in a most unfavour able spot, and were completely defeated. Nothing remained for the Germans who came up too late but to return,
for the Treverian canton but to submit; its
nothing
government
Cingetorix, the son-in-law of Indutiomarus. After these expeditions of Caesar against the Menapii and of Labienus against the Treveri the whole Roman army was again united in the territory of the latter. With the view of rendering the Germans disinclined to come back, Caesar once more crossed the Rhine, in order if possible to strike an emphatic blow against the troublesome neighbours; but, as the Chatti, faithful to their tried tactics, assembled not on their western boundary, but far in the interior, apparently at the Harz mountains, for the defence of the land, he immediately turned back and contented himself with leaving behind a garrison at the passage of the Rhine.
Accounts had thus been settled with all the tribes that Retaliatory took part in the rising; the Eburones alone were passed —^J"^ over but not forgotten. Since Caesar had met with the Eburone*, disaster of Aduatuca, he had worn mourning and had
sworn that he would only lay it aside when he should have
avenged his soldiers, who had not fallen in honourable
war, but had been treacherously murdered. Helpless and
passive the Eburones sat in their huts and looked on, as
the neighbouring cantons one after another submitted to
the Romans, till the Roman cavalry from the Treverian
territory advanced through the Ardennes into their land.
So little were they prepared for the attack, that the cavalry
had almost seized the king Ambiorix in his house; with
great difficulty, while his attendants sacrificed themselves
on his behalf, he escaped into the neighbouring thicket.
Ten Roman legions soon followed the cavalry At the
reverted to the head of the Roman party
Second in- lurrection.
The sagacious calculator had on this occasion miscal- cuiated. The fire was smothered, but not extinguished. The stroke, under which the head of Acco fell, was felt by the whole Celtic nobility. At this very moment the position of affairs presented better prospects than ever. The insurrection of the last winter had evidently failed only through Caesar himself appearing on the scene of action ; now he was at a distance, detained on the Po by the imminence of civil war, and the Gallic army, which
74 THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST hook ?
same time a summons was issued to the surrounding tribes to hunt the outlawed Eburones and pillage their land in concert with the Roman soldiers; not a few complied with the call, including even an audacious band of Sugambrian horsemen from the other side of the Rhine, who for that matter treated the Romans no better than the Eburones, and had almost by a daring coup de main surprised the Roman camp at Aduatuca. The fate of the Eburones was dreadful. However they might hide them selves in forests and morasses, there were more hunters than game. Many put themselves to death like the gray- haired prince Catuvolcus ; only a few saved life and liberty, but among these few was the man whom the Romans sought above all to seize, the prince Ambiorix; with but four horsemen he escaped over the Rhine. This execution against the canton which had transgressed above all the rest was followed in the other districts by processes of high treason against individuals. The season for clemency was past. At the bidding of the Roman proconsul the eminent Carnutic knight Acco was beheaded by Roman
68. lictors (701) and the rule of the fasces was thus formally inaugurated. Opposition was silent; tranquillity every where prevailed. Caesar went as he was wont towards
68. the end of the year (701) over the Alps, that through the winter he might observe more closely the daily-increasing complications in the capital.
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 75
was collected on the upper Seine, was far separated from its dreaded leader. If a general insurrection now broke out in central Gaul, the Roman army might be surrounded, and the almost undefended old Roman province be over run, before Caesar reappeared beyond the Alps, even if the Italian complications did not altogether prevent him
from further concerning himself about Gaul.
Conspirators from all the cantons of central Gaul The
arn
assembled ; the Carnutes, as most directly affected by the execution of Acco, offered to take the lead. On a set
day in the winter of 701-702 the Carnutic knights 58-62. Gutruatus and Conconnetodumnus gave at Cenabum (Orleans) the signal for the rising, and put to death in a
body the Romans who happened to be there. The most vehement agitation seized the length and breadth of the
great Celtic land ; the patriots everywhere bestirred them
selves. But nothing stirred the nation so deeply as the insurrection of the Arverni. The government of this The
community, which had formerly under its kings been the first in southern Gaul, and had still after the fall of its principality occasioned by the unfortunate wars against Rome (iii. 418) continued to be one of the wealthiest, most civilized, and most powerful in all Gaul, had hitherto inviolably adhered to Rome. Even now the patriot party in the governing common council was in the minority; an attempt to induce it to join the insurrection was in vain. The attacks of the patriots were therefore directed against the common council and the existing constitution itself; and the more so, that the change of constitution which among the Arverni had substituted the common council for the prince (p. 19) had taken place after the victories of the Romans and probably under their influence.
Ar"rtdm
The leader of the Arvernian patriots Vercingetorix, one Verdnge- of those nobles whom we meet with among the Celts, of Ua^ almost regal repute in and beyond his canton, and a
76 THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book v
ttately, brave, sagacious man to boot, left the capital and summoned the country people, who were as hostile to the ruling oligarchy as to the Romans, at once to re-establish the Arvernian monarchy and to go to war with Rome. The multitude quickly joined him ; the restoration of the throne of Luerius and Betuitus was at the same time the declaration of a national war against Rome. The centre of unity, from the want of which all previous attempts of the nation to shake off the foreign yoke had failed, was now found in the new self-nominated king of the Arverni. Vercingetorix became for the Celts of the continent what
Cassivellaunus was for the insular Celts; the
strongly pervaded the masses that he, if any one, was the man to save the nation.
The west from the mouth of the Garonne to that of the Seine was rapidly infected by the insurrection, and Ver cingetorix was recognized by all the cantons there as commander-in-chief; where the common council made any difficulty, the multitude compelled it to join the movement; only a few cantons, such as that of the Bituriges, required compulsion to join and these per haps only for appearance' sake. The insurrection found
less favourable soil in the regions to the east of the upper Loire. Everything here depended on the Haedui and these wavered. The patriotic party was very strong in this canton but the old antagonism to the leading of the Arverni counterbalanced their influence — to the most serious detriment of the insurrection, as the accession of the eastern cantons, particularly of the Sequani and Helvetii, was conditional on the accession of the Haedui, and generally in this part of Gaul the decision rested with them. While the insurgents were thus labouring partly to induce the cantons that still hesitated, especially the Haedui, to join them, partly to get possession of Narbo— ope of their leaders, the daring Lucterius, had already
feeling
Spread of the insur rection.
;
;
a
it,
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST
77
appeared on the Tarn within the limits of the old pro
vince — the Roman commander-in-chief suddenly presented Appear- himself in the depth of winter, unexpected alike by friend rw,7 and foe, on this side of the Alps. He quickly made the necessary preparations to cover the old province, and not
only so, but sent also a corps over the snow-covered Cevennes into the Arvernian territory ; but he could not
remain here, where the accession of the Haedui to the
Gallic alliance might any moment cut him off from his
army encamped about Sens and Langres. With all secrecy
he went to Vienna, and thence, attended by only a few horsemen, through the territory of the Haedui to his troops.
The hopes, which had induced the conspirators to declare themselves, vanished ; peace continued in Italy, and Caesar
stood once more at the head of his army.
But what were they to do? It was folly under such The circumstances to let the matter come to the decision of G,ftlllc pta*
of war. arms ; for these had already decidedly irrevocably. They
might as well attempt to shake the Alps by throwing stones at them as to shake the legions by means of the Celtic bands, whether these might be congregated in huge masses or sacrificed in detail canton after canton. Vercingetorix despaired of defeating the Romans. He adopted a system of warfare similar to that by which Cassivellaunus had saved the insular Celts. The Roman infantry was not to be vanquished ; but Caesar's cavalry consisted almost exclusively of the contingent of the Celtic nobility, and was practically dissolved by the general revolt It was possible for the insurrection, which was in fact essentially composed of the Celtic nobility, to develop such a superiority in this arm, that it could lay waste the land far and wide, burn
down towns and villages, destroy the magazines, and en danger the supplies and the communications of the enemy, without his being able seriously to hinder it Vercinge torix accordingly directed all his efforts to the increase of his
Beginning of the struggle.
78 THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book v
cavalry, and of the infantry-archers who were according to the mode of fighting of that time regularly associated with He did not send the immense and self-obstructing
masses of the militia of the line to their homes, but he did not allow them to face the enemy, and attempted to impart to them gradually some capacity of intrenching, marching, and manoeuvring, and some perception that the soldier not destined merely for hand-to-hand combat. Learning from the enemy, he adopted in particular the Roman system of encampment, on which depended the whole secret of the tactical superiority of the Romans for in consequence of every Roman corps combined all the advantages of the garrison of fortress with all the advantages of an offensive army. 1 It true that system completely adapted to Britain which had few towns and to its rude, resolute, and on the whole united inhabitants was not absolutely transferable to the rich regions on the Loire and their indolent inhabitants on the eve of utter political dissolution. Vercingetorix at least accomplished this much, that they did not attempt as hitherto to hold every town with the result of holding none they agreed to destroy the townships not capable of defence before attack reached them, but to defend with all their might the strong fortresses. At the same time the Arvernian king did what he could to bind to the cause of their country the cowardly and backward by stern severity, the hesitating by entreaties and representations, the covetous gold, the decided opponents by force, and to compel or allure the rabble high or low to some manifestation of patriotism.
Even before the winter was at an end, he threw himself
This, true, was only possible, so long as offensive weapons chiefly aimed at cutting and stabbing. In the modern mode of warfare, as Napoleon has excellently explained, this system has become inapplicable, because with our offensive weapons operating from a dis'. ance the deployed position more advantageous than the concentrated. In Caesar's time the reverse was the case.
is
is
1
it
by
a is
;
a;
it
is
it.
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST
79
on the Boii settled by Caesar in the territory of the Haedui, with the view of annihilating these, almost the sole trust worthy allies of Rome, before Caesar came up. The news of this attack induced Caesar, leaving behind the baggage and two legions in the winter quarters of Agedincum (Sens), to march immediately and earlier than he would doubtless otherwise have done, against the insurgents. He remedied the sorely-felt want of cavalry and light infantry in some measure by gradually bringing up German mercenaries, who instead of using their own small and weak ponies were furnished with Italian and Spanish horses partly bought, partly procured by requisition of the officers. Caesar, after having by the way caused Cenabum, the capital of the Carnutes, which had given the signal for the revolt, to be pillaged and laid in ashes, moved over the Loire into the country of the Bituriges. He thereby induced Vercingetorix to abandon the siege of the town of the Boii, and to resort likewise to the Bituriges. Here the new mode of warfare was first to be tried. By order of Vercingetorix more than twenty townships of the Bituriges perished in the flames on one day ; the general decreed a similar self-devastation as to the neighbour cantons, so far as they could be reached by the Roman foraging parties.
According to his intention, Avaricum (Bourges), the Caesar rich and strong capital of the Bituriges, was to meet the ^Saiicum. same fate ; but the majority of the war-council yielded to
the suppliant entreaties of the Biturigian authorities, and
resolved rather to defend that city with all their energy.
Thus the war was concentrated in the first instance around Avaricum. Vercingetorix placed his infantry amidst the morasses adjoining the town in a position so unapproach
able, that even without being covered by the cavalry they
needed not to fear the attack of the legions. The Celtic
cavalry covered all the roads and obstructed the communica
tion. The town was strongly garrisoned, and the connec-
Anrlcnm conquered
So THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book V
tion between it and the army before the walls was kept open. Caesar's position was very awkward. The attempt to induce the Celtic infantry to fight was unsuccessful ; it stirred not from its unassailable lines. Bravely as his soldiers in front of the town trenched and fought, the besieged vied with them in ingenuity and courage, and they had almost succeeded in setting fire to the siege apparatus of their opponents. The task withal of supplying an army of nearly 6o,o00 men with provisions in a country devastated far and wide and scoured by far superior bodies of cavalry became daily more difficult. The slender stores of the Boii were soon used up ; the supply promised by the Haedui failed to appear ; the corn was already consumed, and the soldier was placed exclusively on flesh-rations. But the moment was approaching when the town, with whatever contempt of death the garrison fought, could be held no longer. Still it was not impossible to withdraw the troops secretly by night and destroy the town, before the enemy occupied Vercingetorix made arrangements for this purpose, but the cry of distress raised at the moment of evacuation by the women and children left behind attracted
the attention of the Romans the departure miscarried. On the following gloomy and rainy day the Romans scaled the walls, and, exasperated the obstinate defence,
spared neither age nor sex in the conquered town. The ample stores, which the Celts had accumulated in were welcome to the starved soldiers of Caesar. With the capture
02. of Avaricum (spring of 702), first success had been achieved over the insurrection, and according to former ex perience Caesar might well expect that would now dissolve, and that would only be requisite to deal with the cantons individually. After he had therefore shown himself with his whole army in the canton of the Haedui and had by this imposing demonstration compelled the patriot party in
ferment there to keep quiet at least for the moment, he
a
it
it.
a it
by
it,
;
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 81
divided his army and sent Labienus back to Agedincum, Caesar that in combination with the troops left there he might at ^jr* the head of four legions suppress in the first instance the movement in the territory of the Carnutes and Senones,
who on this occasion once more took the lead ; while he himself with the six remaining legions turned to the south and prepared to carry the war into the Arvernian mountains, the proper territory of Vercingetorix.
Labienus moved from Agedincum up the left bank of Labienus the Seine with a view to possess himself of Lutetia (Paris), n1tetL. the town of the Parish situated on an island in the Seine,
and from this well-secured position in the heart of the insurgent country to reduce it again to subjection. But
behind Melodunum (Melun), he found his route barred by
the whole army of the insurgents, which had here taken
up a position between unassailable morasses under the leadership of the aged Camulogenus. Labienus retreated
a certain distance, crossed the Seine at Melodunum, and
moved up its right bank unhindered towards Lutetia; Camulogenus caused this town to be burnt and the bridges
leading to the left bank to be broken down, and took up a
position over against Labienus, in which the latter could
neither bring him to battle nor effect a passage under the
eyes of the hostile army.
The Roman main army in its turn advanced along the Caesar
Allier down into the canton of the Arverni. Vercingetorix attempted to prevent it from crossing to the left bank of the Allier, but Caesar overreached him and after some days stood before the Arvernian capital Gergovia. 1 Ver-
1 This place has been sought on a rising ground which is still named Gergoie, a league to the south of the Arvernian capital Nemetum, the modern Clermont ; and both the remains of rude fortress-walls brought to light in excavations there, and the tradition of the name which is traced in documents up to the tenth century, leave no room for doubt as to the correctness of this determination of the locality. Moreover it accords, as with the other statements of Caesar, so especially with the fact that he pretty clearly indicates Gergovia as the chief place of the Arverni (vii. 4).
VOL. V
139
QenSo*fa.
Fruitless blockade.
THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book v
cingetorix, however, doubtless even while he was confronting Caesar on the Allier, had caused sufficient stores to be collected in Gergovia and a fixed camp provided with strong stone ramparts to be constructed for his troops in front of the walls of the town, which was situated on the summit of a pretty steep hill ; and, as he had a sufficient start, he arrived before Caesar at Gergovia and awaited the attack in the fortified camp under the wall of the fortress. Caesar with his comparatively weak army could neither regularly besiege the place nor even sufficiently blockade it ; he pitched his camp below the rising ground occupied by Vercingetorix, and was compelled to preserve an attitude as inactive as his opponent It was almost a victory for the insurgents, that Caesar's career of advance from triumph to triumph had been suddenly checked on the Seine as on the Allier. In fact the consequences of this check for Caesar were almost equivalent to those of a defeat
The Haedui, who had hitherto continued vacillating, now made preparations in earnest to join the patriotic party; the body of men, whom Caesar had ordered to Gergovia, had on the march been induced by its officers to declare for the insurgents; at the same time they had begun in the canton itself to plunder and kill the Romans settled there. Caesar, who had gone with two-thirds of the blockading army to meet that corps of the Haedui which was being brought up to Gergovia, had by his sudden appearance recalled it to nominal obedience ; but it was more than ever a hollow and fragile relation, the continuance of which had been almost too dearly purchased
by the great peril of the two legions left behind in front of Gergovia. For Vercingetorix, rapidly and resolutely availing himself of Caesar's departure, had during his
We shall have accordingly to assume, that the Arreraians after their defeat were compelled to transfer their settlement from Gergovia to the neighbouring less strong Nemetum.
The Haedui
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 83
absence made an attack on them, which had wellnigh ended in their being overpowered, and the Roman camp being taken by storm. Caesar's unrivalled celerity alone averted a second catastrophe like that of Aduatuca. Though the Haedui made once more fair promises, it might be foreseen that, if the blockade should still be
without result, they would openly range them selves on the side of the insurgents and would thereby compel Caesar to raise it; for their accession would interrupt the communication between him and Labienus, and expose the latter especially in his isolation to the greatest peril. Caesar was resolved not to let matters come to this pass, but, however painful and even dangerous it was to retire from Gergovia without having accomplished his object, nevertheless, if it must be done, rather to set out immediately and by marching into the canton of the
Haedui to prevent at any cost their formal desertion.
Before entering however on this retreat, which was far Caesar
from agreeable to his quick and confident temperament, he ^^ made yet a last attempt to free himself from his painful Gergovia, perplexity by a brilliant success. While the bulk of the
garrison of Gergovia was occupied in intrenching the side
on which the assault was expected, the Roman general watched his opportunity to surprise another access less conveniently situated but at the moment left bare. In reality the Roman storming columns scaled the camp-wall, and occupied the nearest quarters of the camp; but the whole garrison was already alarmed, and owing to the small distances Caesar found it not advisable to risk the second assault on the city-wall. He gave the signal for retreat; but the foremost legions, carried away by the impetuosity of victory, heard not or did not wish to hear, and pushed forward without halting, up to the city-wall, some even into the city. But masses more and mors
. dense threw themselves in front of the intruders; the fore-
prolonged
Renewed Insurrec tion.
THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book v
most fell, the columns stopped; in vain centurions and legionaries fought with the most devoted and heroic courage ; the assailants were chased with very considerable loss out of the town and down the hill, where the troops stationed by Caesar in the plain received them and prevented greater mischief. The expected capture of Gergovia had been converted into a defeat, and the con siderable loss in killed and wounded — there were counted 700 soldiers that had fallen, including 46 centurions —was the least part of the misfortune suffered.
The imposing position of Caesar in Gaul depended essentially on the halo of victory that surrounded him ; and this began to grow pale. The conflicts around Avaricum, Caesar's vain attempts to compel the enemy to fight, the resolute defence of the city and its almost accidental capture by storm bore a stamp different from that of the earlier Celtic wars, and had strengthened rather than impaired the confidence of the Celts in themselves and their leader. Moreover, the new system of warfare—the making head against the enemy in intrenched camps under the protection of fortresses —had completely approved itself at Lutetia as well as at Gergovia. Lastly, this defeat, the first which Caesar in person had suffered from the Celts, crowned their success, and it accordingly gave as it were the signal for a second outbreak of the insurrection. The Haedui now broke formally with Caesar and entered into union with Vercingetorix. Their contingent, which was still with Caesar's army, not only deserted from but also took occasion to carry off the depots of the army of Caesar at Noviodunum on the Loire, whereby the chests and magazines, number of remount-horses, and all the hostages furnished to Caesar, fell into the hands of the insurgents. was of at least equal importance, that on this news the Belgae, who had hitherto kept aloof from the whole movement, began to bestir themselves. The
Rising of the Haedui.
Rising of the Belgae,
It
a
it,
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 85
canton of the Bellovaci rose with the view of in the rear the corps of Labienus, while it confronted at Lutetia the levy of the surrounding cantons of central Gaul. Everywhere else too men were taking to arms; the strength of patriotic enthusiasm carried along with it even the most decided and most favoured partisans of Rome, such as Commius king of the Atrebates, who on account of his faithful services had received from the Romans important privileges for his community and the
hegemony over the Morini. The threads of the insurrec tion ramified even into the old Roman province : they cherished the hope, perhaps not without ground, of inducing the Allobroges themselves to take arms against the Romans. With the single exception of the Remi and of the districts — dependent immediately on the Remi —of the Suessiones, Leuci, and Lingones, whose peculiar isolation was not affected even amidst this general en thusiasm, the whole Celtic nation from the Pyrenees to the Rhine was now in reality, for the first and for the last time, in arms for its freedom and nationality ; whereas, singularly enough, the whole German communities, who in the former struggles had held the foremost rank, kept aloof. In fact, the Treveri, and as it would seem the Menapii also, were prevented by their feuds with the Germans from taking an active part in the national war.
powerful attacking
It was a grave and decisive moment, when after the retreat from Gergovia and the loss of Noviodunum a *~ council of war was held in Caesar's headquarters regarding
the measures now to be adopted. Various voices expressed themselves in favour of a retreat over the Cevennes into
the old Roman province, which now lay open on all sides
to the insurrection and certainly was in urgent need of the legions that had been sent from Rome primarily for its protection. But Caesar rejected this timid strategy suggested not by the position of affairs, but by government-
Caesar"!
Caesar unites with Labienus.
86 THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book v
instructions and fear of responsibility. He contented himself with calling the general levy of the Romans settled in the province to arms, and having the frontiers guarded by that levy to the best of its ability. On the other hand he himself set out in the opposite direction and advanced by forced marches to Agedincum, to which he ordered Labienus to retreat in all haste. The Celts naturally endeavoured to prevent the junction of the two Roman armies. Labienus might by crossing the Marne and marching down the right bank of the Seine have reached Agedincum, where he had left his reserve and his baggage ; but he preferred not to allow the Celts again to behold the retreat of Roman troops. He therefore instead of crossing the Marne crossed the Seine under the eyes of the deluded enemy, and on its left bank fought a battle with the hostile forces, in which he conquered, and among many others the Celtic general himself, the old Camulogenus, was left on the field. Nor were the insurgents more successful in detaining Caesar on the Loire ; Caesar gave them no time to assemble larger masses there, and without difficulty dispersed the militia of the Haedui, which alone he found at that point
Thus the junction of the two divisions of the army was happily accomplished. The insurgents meanwhile had con sulted as to the farther conduct of the war at Bibracte (Autun) the capital of the Haedui ; the soul of these con sultations was again Vercingetorix, to whom the nation was enthusiastically attached after the victory of Gergovia. Particular interests were not, it is true, even now silent ; the Haedui still in this death-struggle of the nation asserted their claims to the hegemony, and made a proposal in the national assembly to substitute a leader of their own for Vercingetorix. But the national representatives had not merely declined this and confirmed Vercingetorix in the supreme command, but had also adopted his plan of war
Position of the insurgents at Alesia.
chap, Til THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 87
without alteration. It was substantially the same as that on which he had operated at Avaricum and at Gergovia. As the base of the new position there was selected the strong city of the Mandubii, Alesia (Alise Sainte Reine near Semur in the department Cote d'Or)1 and another entrenched camp was constructed under its walls. Im mense stores were here accumulated, and the army was ordered thither from Gergovia, having its cavalry raised by resolution of the national assembly to 15,000 horse.
Caesar with the whole strength of his army after it was reunited at Agedincum took the direction of Besancon, with the view of now approaching the alarmed province and protecting it from an invasion, for in fact bands of insurgents had already shown themselves in the territory of the Helvii on the south slope of the Cevennes. Alesia lay almost on his way ; the cavalry of the Celts, the only arm with which Vercingetorix chose to operate, attacked him on the route, but to the surprise of all was worsted by the new German squadrons of Caesar and the Roman infantry drawn up in support of them.
Vercingetorix hastened the more to shut himself up in Alesia ; and if Caesar was not disposed altogether to renounce the offensive, no course was left to him but for the third time in this campaign to proceed by way of attack with a far weaker force against an army encamped under a well-garrisoned and well-provisioned fortress and supplied with immense masses of cavalry. But, while the Celts had hitherto been opposed by only a part of the Roman legions, the whole forces of Caesar were united in the lines round Alesia, and Vercingetorix did not succeed, as he had suc ceeded at Avaricum and Gergovia, in placing his infantry under the protection of the walls of the fortress and keeping
1 The question so much discussed of late, whether Alesia is not rather to be Identified with Alaise (25 kilometres to the south of Besancon, dep. Daubs), has been rightly answered in the negative by all judicious inquirers.
Catsar ^^^
Siego of Alesi*•
88 THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST jdok *
his external communications open for his own benefit by his cavalry, while he interrupted those of the enemy. The Celtic cavalry, already discouraged by that defeat inflicted on them by their lightly esteemed opponents, was beaten by Caesar's German horse in every encounter. The line of circumvallation of the besiegers extending about nine miles invested the whole town, including the camp attached to it Vercingetorix had been prepared for a struggle under the walls, but not for being besieged in Alesia ; in that point of view the accumulated stores, considerable as they were, were yet far from sufficient for his army — which was said to amount to 80,000 infantry and 15,000 cavalry —and for the numerous inhabitants of the town. Vercinge torix could not but perceive that his plan of warfare had on this occasion turned to his own destruction, and that he was lost unless the whole nation hastened up to the rescue of its blockaded general. The existing provisions were still, when the Roman circumvallation was closed, sufficien for a month and perhaps something more ; at the last moment, when there was still free passage at least fot horsemen, Vercingetorix dismissed his whole cavalry, and sent at the same time to the heads of the nation instructions to call out all their forces and lead them to the relief of Alesia. He himself, resolved to bear in person the re
for the plan of war which he had projected and which had miscarried, remained in the fortress, to share in good or evil the fate of his followers. But Caesar made up his mind at once to besiege and to be besieged. He prepared his line of circumvallation for defence also on its outer side, and furnished himself with provisions for a longer period. The days passed ; they had no longer a boll of grain in the fortress, and they were obliged to drive out the unhappy inhabitants of the town to perish miserably between the entrenchments of the Celts and of the Romans, pitilessly rejected by both.
sponsibility
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 89
At the last hour there appeared behind Caesar's lines Attempt the interminable array of the Celto-Belgic relieving army, "*
said to amount to 250,000 infantry and 8000 cavalry.
From the Channel to the Cevennes the insurgent cantons
had strained every nerve to rescue the flower of their
patriots and the general of their choice — the Bellovaci
alone had answered that they were doubtless disposed to
fight against the Romans, but not beyond their own
bounds. The first assault, which the besieged of Alesia Conflict! and the relieving troops without made on the Roman ai^. double line, was repulsed; but, when after a day's rest it
was repeated, the Celts succeeded — at a spot where the line of circumvallation ran over the slope of a hill and could be assailed from the height above — in filling up the trenches and hurling the defenders down from the ram
Then Labienus, sent thither by Caesar, collected the nearest cohorts and threw himself with four legions on the foe. Under the eyes of the general, who himself
part.
at the most dangerous moment, the assailants were driven back in a desperate hand-to-hand conflict, and the squadrons of cavalry that came with Caesar taking the fugitives in rear completed the defeat.
It was more than a great victory; the fate of Alesia, Alesia
and indeed of the Celtic nation, was thereby irrevocably capitulate*. decided. The Celtic army, utterly disheartened, dispersed
at once from the battle-field and went home. Vercinge-
torix might perhaps have even now taken to flight, or at
least have saved himself by the last means open to a free
man ; he did not do so, but declared in a council of war
that, since he had not succeeded in breaking off the alien
yoke, he was ready to give himself up as a victim and to
avert as far as possible destruction from the nation
bringing it on his own head. This was done. The Celtic
officers delivered their general—the solemn choice of the
whole nation —over to the enemy of their country for such
appeared
by
Vercinge- toriz executed.
Five years afterwards he was led in triumph through the streets of the Italian capital, and, while his conqueror was offering solemn thanks to the gods on the summit of the Capitol, Vercingetorix was beheaded at its foot as guilty of high treason against the Roman nation. As after a day of gloom the sun may perhaps break through the clouds at its setting, so destiny may bestow on nations in their decline yet a last great man. Thus Hannibal stands at the close of the Phoenician history, and Vercingetorix at the close of the Celtic. They were not able to save the nations to which they belonged from a foreign yoke, but they spared them the last remaining disgrace — an inglorious fall. Vercingetorix, just like the Carthaginian, was obliged to contend not merely against the public foe, but also and above all against that anti-national opposition of wounded egotists and startled cowards, which regularly accompanies a degenerate civilization ; for him too a place in history is secured, not by his battles and sieges, but by the fact that he was able to furnish in his own person a centre and rallying -point to a nation distracted and ruined by the rivalry of individual interests. And yet there can hardly
be a more marked contrast than between the sober towns man of the Phoenician mercantile city, whose plans were directed towards one great object with unchanging energy throughout fifty years, and the bold prince of the Celtic land, whose mighty deeds and high-minded self-sacrifice fall within the compass of one brief summer. The whole ancient world presents no more genuine knight, whether as regards his essential character or his outward appear ance. But man ought not to be a mere knight, and least
9° THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book »
punishment as might be thought fit. Mounted on his steed and in full armour the king of the Arverni appeared before the Roman proconsul and rode round his tribunal ; then he surrendered his horse and arms, and sat down in
62. silence on the steps at Caesar's feet (702).
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 91
of all the statesman. It was the knight, not the hero, who disdained to escape from Alesia, when for the nation more depended on him than on a hundred thousand ordinary brave men. It was the knight, not the hero, who gave himself up as a sacrifice, when the only thing gained by that sacrifice was that the nation publicly dishonoured itself and with equal cowardice and absurdity employed its last breath in proclaiming that its great historical death- struggle was a crime against its oppressor. How very different was the conduct of Hannibal in similar positions ! It is impossible to part from the noble king of the Arverni without a feeling of historical and human sympathy ; but it is a significant trait of the Celtic nation, that its greatest man was after all merely a knight
The fall of Alesia and the capitulation of the army The last enclosed in it were fearful blows for the Celtic insurrection ; conflicts but blows quite as heavy had befallen the nation and yet
the conflict had been renewed. The loss of Vercingetorix, however, was irreparable. With him unity had come to
the nation; with him it seemed also to have departed. We do not find that the insurgents made any attempt to continue their joint defence and to appoint another general issimo; the league of patriots fell to pieces of itself, and every clan was left to fight or come to terms with the Romans as it pleased.
Naturally the desire after rest everywhere prevailed. Caesar too had an interest in bring ing the war quickly to an end. Of the ten years of his governorship seven had elapsed, and the last was called in question by his political opponents in the capital ; he could only reckon with some degree of certainty on two more summers, and, while his interest as well as his honour required that he should hand over the newly-acquired regions to his successor in a condition of tolerable peace and tranquillity, there was in truth but scanty time to bring about such a state of things. To exercise mercy was in
with the
^mmges Camutes,
62-61.
with the Bellovaci,
9a THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book v
this case still more a necessity for the victor than for the vanquished ; and he might thank his stars that the internal dissensions and tne easy temperament of the Celts met him in this respect half way. Where —as in the two most eminent cantons of central Gaul, those of the Haedui and Arverni — there existed a strong party well disposed to Rome, the cantons obtained immediately after the fall of Alesia a complete restoration of their former relations with Rome, and even their captives, 20,000 in number, were released without ransom, while those of the other clans passed into the hard bondage of the victorious legionaries. The greater portion of the Gallic districts submitted like the Haedui and Arverni to their fate, and allowed their
inevitable punishment to be inflicted without farther resist- ance. But not a few clung in foolish frivolity or sullen despair to the lost cause, till the Roman troops of execution appeared within their borders. Such expeditions were in the winter of 702-703 undertaken against the Bituriges and the Carnutes.
More serious resistance was offered by the Bellovaci, who in the previous year had kept aloof from the relief of Alesia ; they seem to have wished to show that their absence on that decisive day at least did not proceed from want of courage or of love for freedom. The Atrebates, Ambiani, Caletes, and other Belgic cantons took part in this struggle ; the brave king of the Atrebates Commius, whose accession to the insurrection the Romans had least of all forgiven, and against whom recently Labienus had even directed an atrocious attempt at assassination, brought to the Bellovaci 500 German horse, whose value the campaign of the pre vious year had shown. The resolute and talented Bello- vacian Correus, to whom the chief conduct of the war had fallen, waged warfare as Vercingetorix had waged and with no small success. Although Caesar had gradually brought up the greater part of his army, he could neither
it,
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 93
bring the infantry of the Bellovaci to a battle, nor even prevent it from taking up other positions which afforded better protection against his augmented forces ; while the Roman horse, especially the Celtic contingents, suffered most severe losses in various combats at the hands of the enemy's cavalry, especially of the German cavalry of Commius. But after Correus had met his death in a skirmish with the Roman foragers, the resistance here too was broken; the victor proposed tolerable conditions, to which the Bellovaci along with their confederates submitted. The Treveri were reduced to obedience by Labienus, and incidentally the territory of the outlawed Eburones was once more traversed and laid waste. Thus the last resist ance of the Belgic confederacy was broken.
The maritime cantons still made an attempt to defend on the
lr8'
themselves against the Roman domination in concert with their neighbours on the Loire. Insurgent bands from the Andian, Carnutic, and other surrounding cantons assembled
on the lower Loire and besieged in Lemonum (Poitiers) the prince of the Pictones who was friendly to the Romans. But here too a considerable Roman force soon appeared against them ; the insurgents abandoned the siege, and retreated with the view of placing the Loire between them selves and the enemy, but were overtaken on the march and defeated; whereupon the Carnutes and the other revolted cantons, including even the maritime ones, sent in their submission.
The resistance was at an end ; save that an isolated
and in leader of free bands still here and there upheld the national lo,^,^
banner. The bold Drappes and the brave comrade in arms of Vercingetorix Lucterius, after the breaking up of the army united on the Loire, gathered together the most resolute men, and with these threw themselves into the strong mountain-town of Uxellodunum on the Lot,1 which
1 This is usually sought at Capdcnac not far from Figeac ; Goler has
94 THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book v
amidst severe and fatal conflicts they succeeded in suffi ciently provisioning. In spite of the loss of their leaders, of whom Drappes had been taken prisoner, and Lucterius had been cut off from the town, the garrison resisted to the uttermost ; it was not till Caesar appeared in person, and under his orders the spring from which the besieged derived their water was diverted by means of subterranean drains, that the fortress, the last stronghold of the Celtic nation, fell. To distinguish the last champions of the cause of freedom, Caesar ordered that the whole garrison should have their hands cut off and should then be dismissed, each one to his home. Caesar, who felt it all-important to put an end at least to open resistance throughout Gaul, allowed king Commius, who still held out in the region of Arras and maintained desultory warfare with the Roman troops
61-60. there down to the winter of 703-704, to make his peace, and even acquiesced when the irritated and justly distrustful man haughtily refused to appear in person in the Roman camp. It is very probable that Caesar in a similar way allowed himself to be satisfied with a merely nominal sub mission, perhaps even with a de facto armistice, in the less accessible districts of the north-west and north-east of Gaul. 1
Gaul subdu .
68-61.
Thus was Gaul—or, in other words, the land west of tne Rhme and n0rth of the Pyrenees —rendered subject after only eight years of conflict (696-703) to the Romans. Hardly a year after the full pacification of the land, at the
49. beginning of 705, the Roman troops had to be withdrawn over the Alps in consequence of the civil war, which had now at length broken out in Italy, and there remained nothing but at the most some weak divisions of recruits in
recently declared himself In favour of Luzech to the west of Cahors, a site which had been previously suggested.
1 This indeed, as may readily be conceived, is not recorded by Caesar himself , but an intelligible hint on this subject is given by Sallust (Hist. i. 9 Kriu), although he too wrote as a partisan of Caesar. Further proofs are furnished by the coins.
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 95
Gaul. Nevertheless the Celts did not again rise against the foreign yoke ; and, while in all the old provinces of the empire there was fighting against Caesar, the newly-acquired country alone remained continuously obedient to its con
Even the Germans did not during those decisive years repeat their attempts to conquer new settlements on the left bank of the Rhine. As little did there occur in Gaul any national insurrection or German invasion during the crises that followed, although these offered the most favourable opportunities. If disturbances broke out any where, such as the rising of the Bellovaci against the Romans in 708, these movements were so isolated and so 48 unconnected with the complications in Italy, that they were suppressed without material difficulty by the Roman governors. Certainly this state of peace was most probably, just as was the peace of Spain for centuries, purchased by
provisionally allowing the regions that were most remote and most strongly pervaded by national feeling — Brittany, the districts on the Scheldt, the region of the Pyrenees—to withdraw themselves de facto in a more or less definite manner from the Roman allegiance. Nevertheless the build ing of Caesar—however scanty the time which he found for it amidst other and at the moment still more urgent labours, however unfinished and but provisionally rounded off he may have left it—in substance stood the test of this fiery
trial, as respected both the repelling of the Germans and the subjugation of the Celts.
As to administration in chief, the territories newly Organla- acquired by the governor of Narbonese Gaul remained for uon"
the time being united with the province of Narbo ; it was
not till Caesar gave up this office (710) that two new 44. governorships —Gaul proper and Belgica —were formed out
of the territory which he conquered. That the individual cantons lost their political independence, was implied in the very nature of conquest. They became throughout tributary
queror.
Roman
to the Roman community. Their system of tribute however was, of course, not that by means of which the nobles and financial aristocracy turned Asia to profitable account ; but, as was the case in Spain, a tribute fixed once for all was imposed on each individual community, and the levying of it was left to itself. In this way forty million sesterces (^400,000) flowed annually from Gaul into the chests of the Roman government ; which, no doubt, undertook in return the cost of defending the frontier of the Rhine. Moreover, the masses of gold accumulated in the temples of the gods and the treasuries of the grandees found their way, as a matter of course, to Rome ; when Caesar offered his Gallic gold throughout the Roman empire and brought such masses of it at once into the money market that gold as compared with silver fell about 25 per cent, we may guess what sums Gaul lost through the war.
The former cantonal constitutions with their hereditary kings, or their presiding feudal-oligarchies, continued in the main to subsist after the conquest, and even the system of clientship, which made certain cantons dependent on others more powerful, was not abolished, although no doubt with the loss of political independence its edge was taken off. The sole object of Caesar was, while making use of the existing dynastic, feudalist, and hegemonic divisions, to arrange matters in the interest of Rome, and to bring everywhere into power the men favourably disposed to the foreign rule. Caesar spared no pains to form a Roman party in Gaul ; extensive rewards in money and specially in confiscated estates were bestowed on his adherents, and places in the common council and the first offices of state in their cantons were procured for them by Caesar's influence Those cantons in which a sufficiently strong and trustworthy Roman party existed, such as those of the Remi, the Lingones, the Haedui, were favoured by the bestowal of a freer communal constitution —the right of alliance, as it
96
THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book v
Indulgence
^kting arrange- menu.
chaf. vh THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 97
was called — and by preferences in the regulation of the matter of hegemony. The national worship and its priests seem to have been spared by Caesar from the outset as far as possible ; no trace is found in his case of measures such as were adopted in later times by the Roman rulers against the Druidical system, and with this is probably connected the fact that his Gallic wars, so far as we see, do not at all bear the character of religious warfare after the fashion which formed so prominent a feature of the Britannic wars subsequently.
While Caesar thus showed to the conquered nation
every allowable consideration and spared their national, political, and religious institutions as far as was at all com-
patible with their subjection to Rome, he did so, not as cou,m* renouncing the fundamental idea of his conquest, the Romanization of Gaul, but with a view to realize it in the
most indulgent way. He did not content himself with
letting the same circumstances, which had already in great
part Romanized the south province, produce their effect likewise in the north; but, like a genuine statesman, he
sought to stimulate the natural course of development and, moreover, to shorten as far as possible the always painful
period of transition. To say nothing of the admission of a number of Celts of rank into Roman citizenship and even
of several perhaps into the Roman senate, it was probably
Caesar who introduced, although with certain restrictions,
the Latin instead of the native tongue as the official language
within the several cantons in Gaul, and who introduced the Roman instead of the national monetary system on the
footing of reserving the coinage of gold and of denarii to
the Roman authorities, while the smaller money was to be
coined by the several cantons, but only for circulation within
the cantonal bounds, and this too in accordance with the
Roman standard. We may smile at the Latin
which the dwellers by the Loire and the Seine henceforth
Introdno-
Roman. Wng of th«
jargon, vol. v 140
The cats.
the Celtic nation.
98 THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book v
employed in accordance with orders ; 1 but these barbarisms were pregnant with a greater future than the correct Latin of the capital. Perhaps too, if the cantonal constitution in Gaul afterwards appears more closely approximated to the Italian urban constitution, and the chief places of the canton as well as the common councils attain a more marked prominence in it than was probably the case in the original Celtic organization, the change may be referred to Caesar. No one probably felt more than the political heir of Gaius Gracchus and of Marius, how desirable in a military as well as in a political point of view it would have been to establish a series of Transalpine colonies as bases of support for the new rule and starting-points of the new civilization. If nevertheless he confined himself to the settlement of his Celtic or German horsemen in Noviodunum (p. 45) and to that of the Boii in the canton of the Haedui 44) — which latter settlement already rendered quite the services of— Roman colony in the war with Vercingetorix 79) the reason was merely that his farther plans did not permit him to put the plough instead of the sword into the hands of his legions. What he did in later years for the old Roman province in this respect, will be explained in its own place probable that the want of time alone prevented him from extending the same system to the regions which he had recently subdued.
All was over with the Celtic nation. Its political dissolution had been completed Caesar; its national dissolution was begun and in course of regular progress. This was no accidental destruction, such as destiny some times prepares even for peoples capable of development, but self-incurred and in some measure historically necessary
Thus we read on a semis which a Vergobretus of the Lexovii (I. isieux, dep. Calvados) caused to be struck, the following inscription Cisiambos Cattos vercobreto; simissos (sic) publicos Lixovio. The often scarcely legible writing and the incredibly wretched stamping of these coins are excellent harmony with their stammering Latin.
is
:
1
a
by
it is
;
(p. (p.
a
CHAR tru THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 99
catastrophe. The very course of the last war proves this, whether we view it as a whole or in detail. When the establishment of the foreign rule was in contemplation, only single districts —mostly, moreover, German or half-German —offered energetic resistance. When the foreign rule was actually established, the attempts to shake it off were either undertaken altogether without judgment, or they were to an undue extent the work of certain prominent nobles, and were therefore immediately and entirely brought to an end with the death or capture of an Indutiomarus, Camulogenus, Vercingetorix, or Correus. The sieges and guerilla warfare, in which elsewhere the whole moral depth of national struggles displays itself, were throughout this Celtic struggle of a peculiarly pitiable character. Every page of Celtic history confirms the severe saying of one of the few Romans who had the judgment not to despise the so-called bar barians—that the Celts boldly challenge danger while future, but lose their courage before its presence. In the mighty vortex of the world's history, which inexorably crushes all
peoples that are not as hard and as flexible as steel, such a
nation could not permanently maintain itself; with reason
the Celts of the continent suffered the same fate at the
hands of the Romans, as their kinsmen in Ireland suffer
down to our own day at the hands of the Saxons—the fate
of becoming merged as a leaven of future development in a
politically superior nationality. On the eve of parting from Traits
this remarkable nation we may be allowed to call attention """""J" to
Celts on the Loire and Seine we find almost every one of the characteristic traits which we are accustomed to recognize as marking the Irish. Every feature reappears : the laziness in the culture of the fields; the delight in tippling and brawling; the ostentation —we may recall that sword of Caesar hung up in the sacred grove of the Arverni after the victory of Gergovia, which its alleged former owner
the Celts to the fact, that in the accounts of the ancients as to the and Irish.
.
ioo THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book v
viewed with a smile at the consecrated spot and ordered the sacred property to be carefully spared ; the language full of comparisons and hyperboles, of allusions and quaint turns ; the droll humour —an excellent example of which was the rule, that if any one interrupted a person speaking in public, a substantial and very visible hole should be cut, as a measure of police, in the coat of the disturber of the peace ; the hearty delight in singing and reciting the deeds of past ages, and the most decided gifts of rhetoric and poetry ; the curiosity —no trader was allowed to pass, before he had told in the open street what he knew, or did not know, in the shape of news —and the extravagant credulity which acted on such accounts, for which reason in the better regulated cantons travellers were prohibited on pain of severe punishment from communicating unauthenticated reports to others than the public magistrates ; the childlike piety, which sees in the priest a father and asks for his counsel in all things ; the unsurpassed fervour of national feeling, and the closeness with which those who are fellow- countrymen cling together almost like one family in
to strangers ; the inclination to rise in revolt under the first chance-leader that presents himself and to form bands, but at the same time the utter incapacity to preserve a self-reliant courage equally remote from presump tion and from pusillanimity, to perceive the right time for waiting and for striking a blow, to attain or even barely to tolerate any organization, any sort of fixed military or political discipline. It and remains, at all times and all places the same indolent and poetical, irresolute and fervid, inquisitive, credulous, amiable, clever, but — in political point of view — thoroughly useless nation and therefore its fate has been always and everywhere the same.
opposition
But the fact that this great people was ruined by the
The
of ko^aSc Transalpine wars of Caesar, was not the most important
develop- result of that grand enterprise far more momentous than monta
;
;
a
is,
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 101
the negative was the positive result It hardly admits of a doubt that, if the rule of the senate had prolonged its semblance of life for some generations longer, the migration of peoples, as it is called, would have occurred four hundred years sooner than it did, and would have occurred at a time when the Italian civilization had not become naturalized either in Gaul, or on the Danube, or in Africa and Spain. Inasmuch as the great general and statesman of Rome with sure glance perceived in the German tribes the rival antagonists of the Romano-Greek world ; inas much as with firm hand he established the new system of aggressive defence down even to its details, and taught men to protect the frontiers of the empire by rivers or artificial ramparts, to colonize the nearest barbarian tribes along the frontier with the view of warding off the more remote, and to recruit the Roman army by enlistment from the enemy's country; he gained for the Hellenico- Italian culture the interval necessary to civilize the west just as it had already civilized the east Ordinary men see the fruits of their action ; the seed sown by men of genius germinates slowly. Centuries elapsed before men under stood that Alexander had not merely erected an ephemeral kingdom in the east, but had carried Hellenism to Asia ; centuries again elapsed before men understood that Caesar had not merely conquered a new province for the Romans, but had laid the foundation for the Romanizing of the
of the west It was only a late posterity that
regions
perceived
and Germany, so inconsiderate in a military point of view,
and so barren of immediate result An immense circle of peoples, whose existence and condition hitherto were known barely through the reports — mingling some truth with much fiction —of the mariner and the trader, was disclosed by this means to the Greek and Roman world. "Daily," it is said in a Roman writing of May 698, "the so.
the meaning of those expeditions to England
The
on the Danube,
103 THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book v
letters and messages from Gaul are announcing names of peoples, cantons, and regions hitherto unknown to us. " This enlargement of the historical horizon by the expedi tions of Caesar beyond the Alps was as significant an event in the world's history as the exploring of America by European bands. To the narrow circle of the Mediter ranean states were added the peoples of central and northern Europe, the dwellers on the Baltic and North seas ; to the old world was added a new one, which thence forth was influenced by the old and influenced it in turn. What the Gothic Theodoric afterwards succeeded in, came very near to being already carried out by Ariovistus. Had it so happened, our civilization would have hardly stood in any more intimate relation to the Romano-Greek than to the Indian and Assyrian culture. That there is a
bridge connecting the past glory of Hellas and Rome with the prouder fabric of modern history ; that Western Europe is Romanic, and Germanic Europe classic ; that the names of Themistocles and Scipio have to us a very different sound from those of Asoka and Salmanassar ; that Homer and Sophocles are not merely like the Vedas and Kalidasa attractive to the literary botanist, but bloom for us in our own garden — all this is the work of Caesar; and, while the creation of his great predecessor in the east has been almost wholly reduced to ruin by the tempests of the Middle Ages, the structure of Caesar has outlasted those thousands of years which have changed religion and polity for the human race and even shifted for it the centre of civilization itself, and it stands erect for what we may designate as eternity.
To complete the sketch of the relations of Rome to the peoples of the north at this period, it remains that we cast a glance at the countries which stretch to the north of the Italian and Greek peninsulas, from the sources of the Rhine to the Black Sea. It is true that the torch of
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 103
nistory does not illumine the mighty stir and turmoil of peoples which probably prevailed at that time there, and the solitary gleams of light that fall on this region are, like a faint glimmer amidst deep darkness, more fitted to be wilder than to enlighten. But it is the duty of the historian to indicate also the gaps in the record of the history of nations ; he may not deem it beneath him to mention, by the side of Caesar's magnificent system of defence, the paltry arrangements by which the generals of the senate professed to protect on this side the frontier of the empire.
North-eastern Italy was still as before (iii. 424) left ex- Alpine posed to the attacks of the Alpine tribes. The strong peopes- Roman army encamped at Aquileia in 695, and the 69. triumph of the governor of Cisalpine Gaul, Lucius Afranius,
lead us to infer, that about this time an expedition to the
Alps took place, and it may have been in consequence of
this that we find the Romans soon afterwards in closer connection with a king of the Noricans. But that even subsequently Italy was not at all secure on this side, is
shown by the sudden assault of the Alpine barbarians on
the nourishing town of Tergeste in 702, when the Trans- 63. alpine insurrection had compelled Caesar to divest upper
Italy wholly of troops.
The turbulent peoples also, who had possession of the niyrta. district along the Illyrian coast, gave their Roman masters constant employment The Dalmatians, even at an earlier period the most considerable people of this region, en
larged their power so much by admitting their neighbours into their union, that the number of their townships rose from twenty to eighty. When they refused to give up once more the town of Promona (not far from the river Kerka), which they had wrested from the Liburnians, Caesar after the battle of Pharsalia gave orders to march against them; but the Romans were in the first instance
Mace-
104 THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book *
worsted, and in consequence of this Dalmatia became for some time a rendezvous of the party hostile to Caesar, and the inhabitants in concert with the Pompeians and with the pirates offered an energetic resistance to the generals of Caesar both by land and by water.
Lastly Macedonia along with Epirus and Hellas lay in greater desolation and decay than almost any other part of the Roman empire. Dyrrhachium, Thessalonica, and By zantium had still some trade and commerce; Athens attracted travellers and students by its name and its philo sophical school; but on the whole there lay over the formerly populous little towns of Hellas, and her seaports once swarming with men, the calm of the grave. But if the Greeks stirred not, the inhabitants of the hardly accessible Macedonian mountains on the other hand con tinued after the old fashion their predatory raids and feuds ; for instance about 697-698 Agraeans and Dolopians over- ran the Aetolian towns, and in 700 the Pirustae dwelling in the valleys of the Drin overran southern Illyria. The neighbouring peoples did likewise. The Dardani on the northern frontier as well as the Thracians in the east had no doubt been humbled by the Romans in the eight years' conflicts from 676 to 683; the most powerful of the Thracian princes, Cotys, the ruler of the old Odrysian kingdom, was thenceforth numbered among the client kings of Rome. Nevertheless the pacified land had still as before to suffer invasions from the north and east The governor Gaius Antonius was severely handled both by the Dardani and by the tribes settled in the modern Dobrudscha, who, with the help of the dreaded Bastamae brought up from the left bank of the Danube, inflicted
67-66. 64.
78-71.
62-«l. on him an important defeat (692—693) at Istropolis (Istere, not far from Kustendji). Gaius Octavius fought with better
80. fortune against the Bessi and Thracians (694). Marcus 67-66. Piso again (697—698) as general-in-chief wretchedly mis
chap, vii THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST 105
managed matters ; which was no wonder, seeing that for money he gave friends and foes whatever they wished. The Thracian Dentheletae (on the Strymon) under his
Macedonia far and wide, and even stationed their posts on the great Roman military
road leading from Dyrrhachium to Thessalonica ; the people in Thessalonica made up their minds to stand a
from them, while the strong Roman army in the province seemed to be present only as an onlooker when the inhabitants of the mountains and neighbouring peoples levied contributions from the peaceful subjects of Rome.
Such attacks could not indeed endanger the power of The new Rome, and a fresh disgrace had long ago ceased to occasion j^^om. concern. But just about this period a people began to
acquire political consolidation beyond the Danube in the
wide Dacian steppes —a people which seemed destined to
play a different part in history from that of the Bessi and
the Dentheletae. Among the Getae or Dacians in primeval
'times there had been associated with the king of the people a holy man called Zalmoxis, who, after having explored the ways and wonders of the gods in distant travel in foreign lands, and having thoroughly studied in particular the wisdom of the Egyptian priests and of the Greek Pytha goreans, had returned to his native country to end his life as a pious hermit in a cavern of the "holy mountain. " He remained accessible only to the king and his servants, and gave forth to the king and through him to the people his oracles with reference to every important undertaking. He was regarded by his countrymen at first as priest of the supreme god and ultimately as himself a god, just as it is said of Moses and Aaron that the Lord had made Aaron the prophet and Moses the god of the prophet This had become a permanent institution ; there was regularly associated with the king of the Getae such a god, from whose mouth everything which the king ordered proceeded
governorship plundered
siege
io6 THE SUBJUGATION OF THE WEST book v
or appeared to proceed. This peculiar constitution, in which the theocratic idea had become subservient to the apparently absolute power of the king, probably gave to the kings of the Getae some such position with respect to their subjects as the caliphs had with respect to the Arabs ; and one result of it was the marvellous religious-political reform of the nation, which was carried out about this time by the king of the Getae, Burebistas, and the god Dekaeneos. The people, which had morally and politically fallen into utter decay through unexampled drunkenness, was as it were metamorphosed by the new gospel of temperance and valour; with his bands under the influ ence, so to speak, of puritanic discipline and enthusiasm king Burebistas founded within a few years a mighty kingdom, which extended along both banks of the Danube and reached southward far into Thrace, Illyria, and Noricum. No direct contact with the Romans had yet taken place, and no one could tell what might come out of this singular state, which reminds us of the early times of Islam ; but this much it needed no prophetic gift to foretell, that proconsuls like Antonius and Piso were not called to
contend with gods.
chap, via RULE OF POMPEIUS AND CAESAR
107
CHAPTER VIII
THE JOINT RULE OF POMPEIUS AND CAESAR
Among the democratic chiefs, who from the time of the Pompeim consulate of Caesar were recognized officially, so to speak, TMjuj^" as the joint rulers of the commonwealth, as the governing position.
" triumvirs," Pompeius according to public opinion occupied decidedly the first place. It was he who was called by the Optimates the "private dictator"; it was before him that Cicero prostrated himself in vain ; against him were directed the sharpest sarcasms in the wall-placards of Bibulus, and the most envenomed arrows of the talk in the saloons of the
This was only to be expected. According to the facts before the public Pompeius was indisputably the first general of his time; Caesar was a dexterous party- leader and party-orator, of undeniable talents, but as notoriously of unwarlike and indeed of effeminate tempera ment. Such opinions had been long current; it could not be expected of the rabble of quality that it should trouble itself about the real state of things and abandon once established platitudes because of obscure feats of heroism on the Tagus. Caesar evidently played in the league the mere part of the adjutant who executed for his chief the work which Flavius, Afranius, and other less capable instruments had attempted and not performed. Even his governorship seemed not to alter this state of things. Afranius had but recently occupied a very similar
opposition.
Pompeiuj and the capital.
Anarchy.
THE JOINT RULE OF BOOK ▼
position, without thereby acquiring any special importance ; several provinces at once had been of late years repeatedly placed under one governor, and often far more than four legions had been united in one hand; as matters were again quiet beyond the Alps and prince Ariovistus was recognized by the Romans as a friend and neighbour, there was no prospect of conducting a war of any moment there. It was natural to compare the position which Pompeius had obtained by the Gabinio-Manilian law with that which Caesar had obtained by the Vatinian ; but the comparison did not turn out to Caesar's advantage. Pompeius ruled over nearly the whole Roman empire ; Caesar over two provinces. Pompeius had the soldiers and the treasures of the state almost absolutely at his disposal ; Caesar had only the sums assigned to him and an army of 34,000 men. It was left to Pompeius himself to fix the point of time for his retirement ; Caesar's command was secured to him for a long period no doubt, but yet only for a limited term. Pompeius, in fine, had been entrusted with the most important undertakings by sea and land ; Caesar was sent to the north, to watch over the capital from upper Italy and to take care that Pompeius should rule it undis turbed.
But when Pompeius was appointed by the coalition to be ruler of the capital, he undertook a task far exceeding his powers. Pompeius understood nothing further of ruling than may be summed up in the word of command. The waves of agitation in the capital were swelled at once by past and by future revolutions; the problem of ruling this city—which in every respect might be compared to the Paris of the nineteenth century — without an armed force was infinitely difficult, and for that stiff and stately pattern -soldier altogether insoluble. Very soon matters reached such a pitch that friends and foes, both equally inconvenient to him, could, so far as he was concerned, do
chap, viii POMPEIUS AND CAESAR
109
what they pleased; after Caesar's departure from Rome the coalition ruled doubtless still the destinies of the world, but not the streets of the capital. The senate too, to whom there still belonged a sort of nominal government, allowed things in the capital to follow their natural course ; partly because the section of this body controlled by the coalition lacked the instructions of the regents, partly because the angry opposition kept aloof out of indifference or pessimism, but chiefly because the whole aristocratic corporation began to feel at any rate, if not to comprehend, its utter impotence. For the moment therefore there was nowhere at Rome any power of resistance in any sort of
nowhere a real authority. Men were living in an interregnum between the ruin of the aristocratic, and the rise of the military, rule ; and, if the Roman common wealth has presented all the different political functions and organizations more purely and normally than any other in ancient or modern times, it has also exhibited political disorganization —anarchy —with an unenviable clearness. It is a strange coincidence that in the same years, in which Caesar was creating beyond the Alps a work to last for ever, there was enacted in Rome one of the most extra vagant political farces that was ever produced upon the
government,
of the world's history. The new regent of the commonwealth did not rule, but shut himself up in his house and sulked in silence. The former half- deposed government likewise did not rule, but sighed, sometimes in private amidst the confidential circles of the villas, sometimes in chorus in the senate-house. The portion of the burgesses which had still at heart freedom and order was disgusted with the reign of confusion, but
without leaders and counsel it maintained a passive attitude —not merely avoiding all political activity, but keeping aloof, as far as possible, from the political Sodom itself.
On the other hand the rabble of every sort never had
stage
utterly
The
no THE JOINT RULE OF book v
better days, never found a merrier arena. The number of little great men was legion. Demagogism became quite a trade, which accordingly did not lack its professional insignia — the threadbare mantle, the shaggy beard, the long streaming hair, the deep bass voice ; and not seldom it was a trade with golden soil. For the standing declama tions the tried gargles of the theatrical staff were an article in much request ; 1 Greeks and Jews, freed men and slaves, were the most regular attenders and the loudest criers in the public assemblies ; frequently, even when it came to a vote, only a minority of those voting consisted of burgesses constitutionally entitled to do so. " Next time," it is said in a letter of this period, " we may expect our lackeys to outvote the emancipation-tax. " The real powers of the day were the compact and armed bands, the battalions of anarchy raised by adventurers of rank out of gladiatorial slaves and blackguards. Their possessors had from the outset been mostly numbered among the popular party ; but since the departure of Caesar, who alone understood how to impress the democracy, and alone knew how to
all discipline had departed from them and every partisan practised politics at his own hand. Even now, no doubt, these men fought with most pleasure under the banner of freedom; but, strictly speaking, they were neither of democratic nor of anti-democratic views; they inscribed on the — in itself indispensable — banner, as happened, now the name of the people, anon that of the senate or that of party-chief; Clodius for
instance fought or professed to fight in succession for the ruling democracy, for the senate, and for Crassus. The leaders of these bands kept to their colours only so far as they inexorably persecuted their personal enemies—as in the case of Clodius against Cicero and Milo against
This IS the meaning of cantorum convitio tantiemes ctkbrart (Cic fro Stst. 55, 118).
manage
1
it
a
it,
chap, vin POMPEIUS AND CAESAR in
Clodius—while their partisan position served them merely as a handle in these personal feuds. We might as well seek to set a charivari to music as to write the history of this political witches' revel ; nor is it of any moment to enumerate all the deeds of murder, besiegings of houses, acts of incendiarism and other scenes of violence within a great capital, and to reckon up how often the gamut was traversed from hissing and shouting to spitting on and trampling down opponents, and thence to throwing stones and drawing swords.
The principal performer in this theatre of political ciodiun rascality was that Publius Clodius, of whose services, as
already mentioned (iv. 517), the regents availed themselves against Cato and Cicero. Left to himself, this influential, talented, energetic and — in his trade — really exemplary partisan pursued during his tribunate of the people (696) 58.
an ultra-democratic policy, gave the citizens corn gratis, restricted the right of the censors to stigmatize immoral burgesses, prohibited the magistrates from obstructing the course of the comitial machinery by religious formalities,
set aside the limits which had shortly before (690), for the 64. purpose of checking the system of bands, been imposed on
the right of association of the lower classes, and re established the " street-clubs " (collegia compitalicid) at that time abolished, which were nothing else than a formal organization —subdivided according to the streets, and with
an almost military arrangement—of the whole free or slave proletariate of the capital. If in addition the further law, which Clodius had likewise already projected and purposed
to introduce when praetor in 702, should give to freedmen 62. and to slaves living in de facto possession of freedom the same political rights with the freeborn, the author of all these brave improvements of the constitution might declare
his work complete, and as a second Numa of freedom and equality might invite the sweet rabble of the capital to see
Quarrel of Pompehu with Clodiuv
only
113 THE JOINT RULE OF BOOK V
him celebrate high mass in honour of the arrival of the democratic millennium in the temple of Liberty which he had erected on the site of one of his burnings at the Palatine. Of course these exertions in behalf of freedom did not exclude a traffic in decrees of the burgesses ; like Caesar himself, Caesar's ape kept governorships and other posts great and small on sale for the benefit of his fellow- citizens, and sold the sovereign rights of the state for the benefit of subject kings and cities.
At all these things Pompeius looked on without stirring. If he did not perceive how seriously he thus compromised himself, his opponent perceived it. Clodius had the hardihood to engage in a dispute with the regent of Rome on a question of little moment, as to the sending back of
a captive Armenian prince ; and the variance soon became a formal feud, in which the utter helplessness of Pompeius was displayed. The head of the state knew not how to meet the partisan otherwise than with his own weapons,
wielded with far less dexterity. If he had been tricked by Clodius respecting the Armenian prince, he offended him in turn by releasing Cicero, who was pre eminently obnoxious to Clodius, from the exile into which Clodius had sent him; and he attained his object so
that he converted his opponent into an implacable foe. If Clodius made the streets insecure with his bands, the victorious general likewise set slaves and pugilists to work; in the frays which ensued the general naturally was worsted by the demagogue and defeated in the street, and Gaius Cato was kept almost constantly under siege in his garden by Clodius and his comrades. It is not the least remarkable feature in this remarkable
thoroughly,
that the regent and the rogue amidst their quarrel vied in courting the favour of the fallen govern ment ; Pompeius, partly to please the senate, permitted Cicero's recall, Clodius on the other hand declared the
spectacle,
chap, VIII POMPEIUS AND CAESAR
113
Julian laws null and void, and called on Marcus Bibulus publicly to testify to their having been unconstitutionally passed.
Naturally no positive result could issue from this imbroglio of dark passions ; its most distinctive character was just its utterly ludicrous want of object. Even a man of Caesar's genius had to learn by experience that demo cratic agitation was completely worn out, and that even the way to the throne no longer lay through demagogism.
It was nothing more than a historical makeshift, if now, in the interregnum between republic and monarchy, some whimsical fellow dressed himself out with the prophet's mantle and staff which Caesar had himself laid aside, and the great ideals of Gaius Gracchus came once more upon the stage distorted into a parody ; the so-called party from which this democratic agitation proceeded was so little such in reality, that afterwards it had not even a part falling to it in the decisive struggle. It cannot even be asserted that by means of this anarchical state of things the desire after a strong government based on military power had been vividly kindled in the minds of those who were indifferent to politics. Even apart from the fact that such neutral burgesses were chiefly to be sought outside of Rome, and thus were not directly affected by the rioting in the capital, those minds which could be at all influenced by such motives had been already by their former experiences, and especially by the Catilinarian conspiracy, thoroughly converted to the principle of authority; but those that were really alarmed were affected far more emphatically by a dread of the gigantic crisis inseparable from an overthrow of the constitution, than by dread of the mere continuance of the — at bottom withal very superficial —anarchy in the capital. The only result of it which historically deserves notice was the painful position in which Pompeius was placed by the attacks of the
VOL. V
141
Pompefas
to the Gallic
Cemx,
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Clodians, and which had a material share in determining his farther steps.
Little as Pompeius liked and understood taking the initiative, he was yet on this occasion compelled by the change of his position towards both Clodius and Caesar to depart from his previous inaction. The irksome and disgraceful situation to which Clodius had reduced him, could not but at length arouse even his sluggish nature to
hatred and anger. But far more important was the change which took place in his relation to Caesar. While, of the two confederate regents, Pompeius had utterly failed in the functions which he had undertaken, Caesar had the skill to turn his official position to an account which left all calculations and all fears far behind. Without much inquiry as to permission, Caesar had doubled his army by levies in his southern province inhabited in great measure by Roman burgesses ; had with this army crossed the Alps instead of keeping watch over Rome from Northern Italy ; had crushed in the bud a new Cimbrian invasion, and
68, 67. within two years (696, 697) had carried the Roman arms to the Rhine and the Channel.