Horace
addressed
to
him one of his odes.
him one of his odes.
Napoleon - History of Julius Caesar - b
_, 2.
--Dio Cassius, XLIII.
31.
) Made
by Cæsar’s will the heir of one-eighth of his wealth, he gave up what
was left to him to Octavius. (Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 83. --Appian, _Civil
Wars_, III. 94. ) It was at the motion of Q. Pedius, then consul, that
the law was passed which has received its name from him, and which was
directed against the murderers of the Dictator. (Velleius Paterculus,
II. 65. --Suetonius, _Nero_, 3. ) Q. Pedius remained faithful to Octavius,
yet he proposed the retractation of the declaration of war launched
against Antony and Lepidus. He was admitted to the secret of the
triumvirate, which was on the point of being concluded, and died
suddenly before the end of the year 711. (Dio Cassius, XLVI. 52--Appian,
_Civil Wars_, IV. 6. )
6. SERVIUS SULPICIUS GALBA.
Servius Sulpicius Galba, whom the Emperor Galba reckoned among his
ancestors, was of the illustrious family of the Sulpicii; he descended
from Sulpicius Galba, consul in 610, who had left the reputation of a
great orator. S. Sulpicius Galba, Cæsar’s lieutenant in Gaul, had
already served in the war in that country under C. Pomptinus, in 693
(Dio Cassius, XXXVII. 48), which explains the choice made of him by the
future Dictator. He must have quitted Cæsar’s army at latest in 699, for
he was, at his recommendation, elected prætor in 700. (Dio Cassins,
XXXIX. 65. ) He solicited the consulship in vain in 705. Pressed by the
creditors of Pompey, for whom he had made himself surety, he was
relieved from his difficulties by Cæsar, who paid his debts. (Valerius
Maximus, V. 2, §11. ) Finding himself finally deceived in his hope of
arriving at the consulship, S. Galba joined the conspiracy against his
old chief. (Suetonius, _Galba_, 3. --Appian, _Civil Wars_, II. 113. ) He
served in the war against Antony, under the Consul Hirtius. We have a
letter from him to Cicero, written from the camp of Modena. (Cicero,
_Epist. Familiar_. , X. 30. ) Prosecuted, in virtue of the law Pedia, as a
murderer of Cæsar, (Suetonius, _Galba_, 3), he was condemned, and died
probably in exile.
The Senate granted Cæsar, in 608, ten lieutenants: Labienus, Arunculeius
Cotta, Titurias Sabinus, already in Gaul, Decimus Brutus, P. Sulpicius
Rufus, Munatius Plancus, M. Crassus, C. Fabius, L. Roscius, and T.
Sextius. As to Sulpicius Galba, P. Crassus, and Q. Pedius, they had
returned to Italy.
7. DECIMUS JUNIUS BRUTUS.
Decimus Junius Brutus, belonging to the family of the _Junii_, was son
of Decimus Junius Brutus, elected consul in the year 677, and of
Sempronia, who performed so celebrated a part in Catiline’s conspiracy.
He was adopted by A. Postumius Albinus, consul in 655, and took, for
this reason, the surname of Albinus, by which we find him sometimes
designated. When Cæsar took him into Gaul, he was still very young; the
“Commentaries” apply to him the epithet _adolescens_. He must have
returned to Rome in January, 704, since a letter of Cicero mentions his
presence there at that period. (_Epist. Familiar. _, VIII. 7. ) The year
following he commanded Cæsar’s fleet before Marseilles. (Cæsar, _De
Bello Civili_, I. 36. --Dio Cassius, XLI. 19. ) He gained, although with
unequal forces, a naval victory over L. Domitius. (Cæsar, _De Bello
Civili_, II. 5. ) Having received from Cæsar, in 706, the government of
Transalpine Gaul, he repressed, in 708, an insurrection of the
Bellovaci. (Titos Livius, _Epitome_, CXIV. ) An object of the special
favours of his old general, who felt for him a warm affection, D.
Brutus, along with Antony and Octavius, was associated in the triumph
which Cæsar celebrated in 709, on his return from Spain, and mounted
with them on the car. (Plutarch, _Antony_, 13. ) By his will of the Ides
of September, the Dictator named him one of the guardians of Octavius,
and made him one of his second heirs (Dio Cassius, XLIV. 35. --Appian,
_Civil Wars_, II, 143. --Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 83); he caused to be given
him, for the year 712, the government of Cisalpine Gaul. In spite of
this friendship, of which Cæsar had given him so many proofs, and which
the latter believed to be paid by a requital, Brutus, who had remained
faithful to his benefactor in the civil war, lent his ear to the
proposals of the conspirators, and yielded to the seductions of M.
Brutus, his kinsman. He not only went to the Senate to assist in
striking the victim, but he accepted the mission of going to persuade
the Dictator, who was hesitating, to repair to the curia. (Dio Cassius,
XLIV. 14, 18. --Appian, _Civil Wars_, II. 115. --Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 70. )
Exposed to public hatred (Cicero, _Philippic. _, X. 7), and intimidated
by the threats of Antony, he left Rome to go and take possession of the
province which Cæsar had caused to be assigned to him. (Cicero, _Epist.
ad Atticum_, XIV. 13. )
He appears, however, to have acted but feebly in favour of the party he
had embraced. Antony, having obtained from the people, in exchange for
Macedonia, the province commanded by Brutus (Appian, _Civil Wars_, III.
30), the latter refused to abandon his government, and, supported by
Cicero, he obtained from the Senate an edict maintaining him in it
(Cicero, _Philippic. _, III. 4. --Appian, _Civil War_, III. 45), which led
to an armed contest between the two competitors. Pursued by his rival,
Brutus threw himself into Modena, and there sustained a long siege
(Appian, _Civil Wars_, III. 49. --Titus Livius, _Epitome_, CXVII), which
had for its final result the celebrated battle in which Antony was
defeated. D. Brutus, overlooked among new actors in this sanguinary
drama, remained in it almost a mere spectator. (Dio Cassius, XLVI. 40. )
He then ranged himself on the side of Octavius, yet without the
existence of any very close or very sincere intimacy between these two
men. He continued to exercise an important command during the war, but
fortune was not long in turning against him. Pressed by Antony, who had
united with Lepidus, and threatened personally by the prosecutions which
Octavius, armed with the law Pedia, was directing against the murderers
of Cæsar (Titus Livius, _Epitome_, CXX. --Dio Cassius, XLVI. 53), he
found himself deserted by his troops, and, after a vain attempt to cross
into Macedonia, he directed his steps with a small escort towards
Aquileia; but a Gaulish chief, named Camillus, betrayed towards him the
rites of hospitality, kept him prisoner, and sent information of what he
had done to Antony. The old lieutenant of Cæsar immediately sent Furius
with a party of cavalry, who slew Brutus, and carried away his head.
(Appian, _Civil Wars_, III. 97, 98. --Velleius Paterculus, III. 63, 64. )
Brutus was one of the correspondents of Cicero, who gives him praise,
especially for his constancy in friendship, of which he was certainly
little worthy.
8. PUBLIUS SULPICIUS RUFUS.
Publius Sulpicius Rufus, who belonged to the same family as S. Sulpicius
Galba, served, in 705, the cause of Cæsar in Spain (Cæsar, _De Bello
Civili_, I. 74); he commanded in the following year, with the title of
prætor, the fleet which was cruising at Vibo, on the coast of Bruttium
(Cæsar, _De Bella Civili_, III. 101); subsequently he obtained the
government of Illyria, a country where he had served in the ranks of the
Cæsarians, and consequently succeeded Q. Cornificius (Cæsar, _De Bello
Afric. _, 10; _De Bello Alexandrin. _, 42). A letter of Cicero, addressed
to him (_Epist. Familiar. _, XIII. 77), shows that he was still in that
province in 709. We know nothing certain relating to his actions. It has
been supposed with probability that he is the same with a P. Sulpicius,
censor under the triumvirate, and mentioned in a Latin inscription
_(Tabula Collatina_), to which Drumann refers (tom. i. , p. 528).
9. LUCIUS MUNATIUS PLANCUS.
Lucius Munatius Plancus, whose name is found in several inscriptions and
on a rather great number of medals (see especially Orelli,
_Inscriptions_, N. 591), belonged to an illustrious plebeian family.
Intimate at first with Cato, he subsequently gained the entire affection
of Cæsar (Plutarch, _Cato of Utica_, 42. --Cicero, _Epist. Familiar. _, X.
24), and remained faithful to him to the last. After having served in
Gaul, he became, in 705, one of his most active lieutenants in Spain
(Cæsar, _De Bello Civili_, I. 40), and afterwards in Africa. (Cæsar, _De
Bello Afr. _, 4. ) Cæsar caused to be given to him, for the year 710, the
government of Transalpine Gaul, without the Narbonnese and Belgic Gaul
(Appian, _Civil Wars_, III. 46--Cicero, _Philipp. _, III. 15), and named
him, with P. Brutus, for the consulship in 712 (Velleius Paterculus, II.
63. --Dio Cassius, XLVI. 53); he was then in great favour with the
Dictator: Cicero made his approaches through him to obtain Cæsar’s
favour. (_Epist. Familiar. _, X. 3; XIII. 29. )
After the murder of Cæsar, Plancus, who no doubt, like Antony, feared
the vengeance of the party of the conspirators, proposed an amnesty, in
concert with him and Cicero (Plutarch, _Brutus_, 22), and hastened to go
into the province which had been assigned to him. In Gaul he founded the
colonies of Lugdunum and Raurica (Orelli, _Inscriptiones_, No. 590. --Dio
Cassius, XLVI. 50); subsequently, gained by Antony, he abandoned to his
vengeance, during the proscription, Plotius, his own brother. (Appian,
_Civil Wars_, IV. 12. --Valerias Maximus, VI. 8, § 5. ) In 712, Plancus
took, with Lepidus, on the 1st of January, the consulship which Cæsar
had destined for him. (Dio Cassius, XLVI. 53; LXVII. 16. ) In the war of
Perusia, he commanded the troops of Antony, who sent him, in 714, into
Asia. In 719 he still governed Syria for that triumvir, and he has been
accused of the death of Sextus Pompey. (Appian, _Civil Wars_, V. 144. )
He proceeded to Egypt with Antony, to the court of Cleopatra. (Velleius
Paterculus, II. 83. ) Foreseeing the ruin of Antony, of whom he has been
reproached with being the base flatterer, he did not wait for the defeat
of Actium to embrace the party of Octavius: he returned to Rome, and
attacked his former friend bitterly in the Senate. (Velleius Paterculus,
II. 83. ) Dio Cassius (L. 3) accuses him of having revealed Antony’s
will. From this time devoted to Octavius, he proposed, in 727, to confer
upon him the title of Augustus. (Suetonius, _Octavius_, 7. --Velleius
Paterculus, II. 91. ) In 732, he held the office of censor. (Dio Cassias,
LIV. 2. ) The inscriptions and medals show that he was also invested with
other dignities. The date of his death is unknown.
Horace addressed to
him one of his odes. (Book I. , Ode 7. )
10. MARCUS LICINIUS CRASSUS.
Marcus Licinius Crassus Dives was the elder brother of young Crassus,
whose place he had taken as Cæsar’s lieutenant in Gaul. Little is known
of his life. Cicero, less intimate with him than with his younger
brother, has mentioned him but slightly. (_Epist. Familiar. _, 8. ) He
ranged himself on Cæsar’s side at the time of the civil war, and became,
in 705, governor of Citerior Gaul. (Appian, _Civil Wars_, II.
41. --Justin, XLII. 4. ) The time of his death is unknown.
11. CAIUS FABIUS.
It is not known what Caius Fabius had been before the campaign of Gaul.
When the civil war broke out, he remained faithful to Cæsar, who sent
him orders to proceed from Narbonnese Gaul to Spain. With his usual
rapidity, he moved by forced marches to Herda (_Herida_), near which
town Afranius was encamped. He distinguished himself in the whole of
this campaign, in which the army of Cæsar, which had joined him, was for
a moment in danger.
No further mention is made of C. Fabius. His name does not occur either
in the campaigns of Greece, Alexandria, or Africa, or in that of the
second Spanish war, or elsewhere.
12. L. ROSCIUS.
L. Roscius, who only played a secondary part in the war of Gaul, appears
to be the same as a personage to whom Cicero gives the name of _L.
Fabatus_, and who fell in the battle of Modena in 711. (_Epist.
Familiar. _, X. 33. ) He was prætor in 705, and Pompey, who knew the
friendship which Cæsar had for Roscius, deputed him to him at Ariminum
with proposals of peace. (Cæsar, _De Bello Civili_, I. 8, 10. --Dio
Cassius, XLI 5. ) It is believed that it is his name which, followed by
the surname Fabatus, figures on the Roman denarii which bear the image
of Juno Lanuvina. It is also believed to occur in a Latin inscription.
13. TITUS SEXTIUS.
Titus Sextius, whose history before his arrival in Gaul is not known,
became, in 710, governor of Numidia. (Dio Cassius, XLVIII. 21. )
According to Appian (_Civil Wars_, IV. 53), he took the side of
Octavius; according to Dio Cassius (XLVIII. 21), that of Antony. He made
war against Q. Cornificius, who sought to keep the ancient province of
Africa, which the Senate had given him. Sextius aspired to the same
government, and prepared to exercise it for Octavius, to whom Africa had
been assigned in the partition of the triumvirs. (Appian, _Civil Wars_,
IV. 53. ) The defeat and death of Cornificius allowed him to realise his
projects, and he remained in possession of his province until 713.
Appian and Dio Cassius have told differently the events which forced
Sextius, after the battle of Philippi, to abandon Numidia, where
Octavius had sent a new governor. Nothing else is known of his
biography.
In the year 700 two new lieutenants make their appearance, Q. Tullius
Cicero and C. Trebonius, who came to replace Arunculeius Cotta and
Titurius Sabinus, slain by the Gauls at Tongres.
14. Q. TULLIUS CICERO.
Quintus Tullius Cicero, younger brother of the great orator, was born in
652, and went with him to Athens, in order to perfect himself in
literature, which he cultivated with success. The correspondence of the
two brothers which has been preserved is a proof of this, and we know,
from other sources, that Quintus had composed divers works which are
lost. Quintas had married, before the year 686, Pomponia, sister of
Atticus (Cicero, _Epist. ad Atticum_, I. 5, 6), with whom he lived on
bad terms, and from whom he finally separated. He was ædile in 688, the
year of his brother’s prætorship; and in 691, when his brother was
consul, he lent him in the affair of Catiline his intelligent support,
and shared the same dangers. (Cicero, _Epist. ad Quintum_, I. 1;
_Catilinaria Quarta_, 2, 3. ) However, he did not share in his opinion in
the judgment of the conspirators, when he voted, with Cæsar, against the
punishment of death. (Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 14. ) He became prætor in 692,
defeated in Bruttium the bands of the Catilinarian Marcellus (Orosius,
VI. 6), and presided over the tribunal which judged Archias. (_Scholiast
of Bobbio on the Oration for Archias_, p. 354, edit. Orelli. ) In March
of the year 693, he proceeded to the province of Asia, of which he had
obtained the government (Cicero, _Pro Flacco_, 14); he administered that
province with as much equity as talent, seconded by able lieutenants.
(Cicero, _Epist. ad Quintum_, I. 1. ) They had, however, to reproach him
with frequent fits of anger, which drew upon him the remonstrances of
his brother. At the end of April, 696, Quintus left Asia in order to
proceed direct to Rome, without taking time to visit at Thessalonica M.
Cicero, who was still under the weight of his condemnation to exile. The
fact was, he feared an accusation of extortion, which his enemies, and
those of his brother, endeavoured to prepare against him. (Cicero,
_Epist. ad Atticum_, III. 9; _Epist. ad Quintum_, I. 3; _Oratio pro Domo
sua_, 36. ) He employed himself actively in favour of his brother, and
narrowly escaped being killed in the riot raised by Clodius, on the 8th
of the Calends of February, 697, on the occasion of the proposition of
the tribune Fabricius. (Cicero, _Oratio pro Sextio_, 35. --Plutarch,
_Cicero_, 44. ) When this same Clodius opposed the rebuilding of the
house of M. Cicero, Quintus saw his own, which was next to that of his
brother, burnt by the partisans of that turbulent demagogue. (Cicero,
_Epist. ad Atticum_, IV. 3. ) Towards the end of the same year, Quintus
was one of the fifteen lieutenants given to Pompey in order to direct
the supplying of victuals, and in that quality he proceeded to Sardinia.
(Cicero, _Epist. ad Quintum_, II. 2. ) He started for Gaul in the
beginning of 700, and it appears from a passage in the _Oratio pro
Milone_ that he was still there in 702. He left Cæsar’s army in 703, and
joined, in the quality of legate, his brother, who had been made
proconsul of Cilicia, and to whom he lent the indispensable support of
his experience and ability in matters of war. (Cicero, _Epist.
Familiar_. , XV. 4; _Epist. ad Atticum_, V, 20. ) During the civil war,
Quintus took the side of Pompey, but he imitated his brother’s
circumspection, and, after the battle of Pharsalia, he made every effort
to clear himself in the eyes of Cæsar, to whom he sent as his deputy in
Asia his own son, and thus obtained his pardon. After the death of
Cæsar, Quintus pronounced energetically, like M. Cicero, against Antony,
an opposition which turned out equally fatal to him, for, like his
brother, he was comprised in the proscription. Having vainly attempted
with him to reach Macedonia, he returned to Rome accompanied by his son,
and both were delivered up by slaves to the executioner. (Appian, _Civil
Wars_, IV. 20. --Plutarch, _Cicero_, 62. )
15. CAIUS TREBONIUS.
Caius Trebonius was the son of a Roman knight, of whom Cicero speaks in
his _Philippica_ (XIII. 10). Being quæstor in 694, he opposed the law
Herennia, which authorised the adoption of Clodius by a plebeian; as
tribune of the people in 699, he proposed the celebrated laws which gave
to Pompey and Crassus important provinces, and continued for five years
Cæsar’s command in Gaul. Having been called by Cæsar the year after in
quality of legate, he remained in Gaul until the commencement of the
civil war. He was afterwards sent to Spain against Afranius, and next
charged with the siege of Marseilles by land. (Cæsar, _De Bello Civili_,
I. 36. --Dio Cassius, XLI. 19;) In 706, he became præter urbanus (Dio
Cassius, XLII. 20); a year later he succeeded Cassius Longinus in the
government of one of the two Spains. (Cæsar, _De Bello Alexandrino_, 64;
_De Bello Hispano_, 7. --Dio Cassius, XLIII. 29. ) Compelled to leave the
Peninsula, after some checks, he returned to Rome, where Cæsar caused
him to be named consul in October, 709, and with the province of Asia,
on quitting office. (Dio Cassius, XLIII. 46. --Appian, _Civil Wars_, III.
2. ) All these acts of kindness, however, could not secure to the
dictator the devotedness of his lieutenant: even before Trebonius had
taken possession of his proconsulate of Asia, he entered into the
conspiracy formed against the life of Cæsar. But, detained by Antony
outside the curia, he could not strike him with his own hand. (Appian,
_Civil Wars_, II. 117. --Dio Cassius, XLIV. 19. --Cicero, _Philippica_,
II. 14; XIII. 10. ) After the death of Cæsar, Trebonius started quietly
for his government of Asia, and was in May, 710, at Athens. (Cicero,
_Epist. Familiar_. , XII. 16. ) During his proconsulship he supported the
party of Brutus and Cassius. In February, 711, Dolabella, who had come
to replace him, drew him into a snare at Smyrna; slew him, and threw his
head at the foot of a statue of Cæsar, thus revenging his friend who had
been so shamefully betrayed. (Cicero, _Philippica_, XIII. 10. --Appian,
_Civil Wars_, III. 26. --Velleius Paterculus, II. 69. --Dio Cassius,
XLVII. 29. ) Cicero, whose correspondent Trebonius had been, stigmatises
this murder, in which Antony saw the just punishment of a villain and a
parricide. It is certain that Trebonius had entered the conspiracy
without remorse, since afterwards he wrote to Cicero: “If you compose
anything on the murder of Cæsar, do not attribute a small part of it to
me. ” (Cicero, _Epist. Familiar. _, XII. 16. )
During the years 701 to 705 new lieutenants joined Cæsar in Gaul: they
were Minucius Basilus, Antistius Reginus, M. Silanus, Caninius Rebilus,
Sempronius Rutilus, Marcus Antonius, P. Vatinius, Q. Calenus, and Lucius
Cæsar.
16. MINUCIUS BASILUS.
L. Minucius Basilus had taken his name and surname from a rich Roman who
had adopted him. Previously his name was L. Satrius. Cicero names him
thus in one of his treatises (_De Officiis_, III. 18), although
elsewhere (_Epist. ad Atticum_, XI. 5) he designates him by his name and
surname. He became prætor in 709. (Dio Cassius, XLIII. 47. ) Irritated at
not having obtained, on leaving office, the province which he coveted,
and at having only received money from Cæsar, he entered into the
conspiracy formed against the Dictator. (Appian, _Civil Wars_, II;
113. --Dio Cassius, XLIII. 47. ) A few months after, he was assassinated
by his slaves, who thus took revenge for his having subjected several of
them to the punishment of castration. (Appian, _Civil Wars_, III. 98. )
17. C. ANTISTIUS REGINUS.
Nothing is known of the antecedents or the end of this lieutenant of
Cæsar. To judge by his name, he must have belonged to the family of the
_Antistii_, which produced divers magistrates of the Republic, and
several members of which have perpetuated their memory in inscriptions.
18. M. SILANUS.
by Cæsar’s will the heir of one-eighth of his wealth, he gave up what
was left to him to Octavius. (Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 83. --Appian, _Civil
Wars_, III. 94. ) It was at the motion of Q. Pedius, then consul, that
the law was passed which has received its name from him, and which was
directed against the murderers of the Dictator. (Velleius Paterculus,
II. 65. --Suetonius, _Nero_, 3. ) Q. Pedius remained faithful to Octavius,
yet he proposed the retractation of the declaration of war launched
against Antony and Lepidus. He was admitted to the secret of the
triumvirate, which was on the point of being concluded, and died
suddenly before the end of the year 711. (Dio Cassius, XLVI. 52--Appian,
_Civil Wars_, IV. 6. )
6. SERVIUS SULPICIUS GALBA.
Servius Sulpicius Galba, whom the Emperor Galba reckoned among his
ancestors, was of the illustrious family of the Sulpicii; he descended
from Sulpicius Galba, consul in 610, who had left the reputation of a
great orator. S. Sulpicius Galba, Cæsar’s lieutenant in Gaul, had
already served in the war in that country under C. Pomptinus, in 693
(Dio Cassius, XXXVII. 48), which explains the choice made of him by the
future Dictator. He must have quitted Cæsar’s army at latest in 699, for
he was, at his recommendation, elected prætor in 700. (Dio Cassins,
XXXIX. 65. ) He solicited the consulship in vain in 705. Pressed by the
creditors of Pompey, for whom he had made himself surety, he was
relieved from his difficulties by Cæsar, who paid his debts. (Valerius
Maximus, V. 2, §11. ) Finding himself finally deceived in his hope of
arriving at the consulship, S. Galba joined the conspiracy against his
old chief. (Suetonius, _Galba_, 3. --Appian, _Civil Wars_, II. 113. ) He
served in the war against Antony, under the Consul Hirtius. We have a
letter from him to Cicero, written from the camp of Modena. (Cicero,
_Epist. Familiar_. , X. 30. ) Prosecuted, in virtue of the law Pedia, as a
murderer of Cæsar, (Suetonius, _Galba_, 3), he was condemned, and died
probably in exile.
The Senate granted Cæsar, in 608, ten lieutenants: Labienus, Arunculeius
Cotta, Titurias Sabinus, already in Gaul, Decimus Brutus, P. Sulpicius
Rufus, Munatius Plancus, M. Crassus, C. Fabius, L. Roscius, and T.
Sextius. As to Sulpicius Galba, P. Crassus, and Q. Pedius, they had
returned to Italy.
7. DECIMUS JUNIUS BRUTUS.
Decimus Junius Brutus, belonging to the family of the _Junii_, was son
of Decimus Junius Brutus, elected consul in the year 677, and of
Sempronia, who performed so celebrated a part in Catiline’s conspiracy.
He was adopted by A. Postumius Albinus, consul in 655, and took, for
this reason, the surname of Albinus, by which we find him sometimes
designated. When Cæsar took him into Gaul, he was still very young; the
“Commentaries” apply to him the epithet _adolescens_. He must have
returned to Rome in January, 704, since a letter of Cicero mentions his
presence there at that period. (_Epist. Familiar. _, VIII. 7. ) The year
following he commanded Cæsar’s fleet before Marseilles. (Cæsar, _De
Bello Civili_, I. 36. --Dio Cassius, XLI. 19. ) He gained, although with
unequal forces, a naval victory over L. Domitius. (Cæsar, _De Bello
Civili_, II. 5. ) Having received from Cæsar, in 706, the government of
Transalpine Gaul, he repressed, in 708, an insurrection of the
Bellovaci. (Titos Livius, _Epitome_, CXIV. ) An object of the special
favours of his old general, who felt for him a warm affection, D.
Brutus, along with Antony and Octavius, was associated in the triumph
which Cæsar celebrated in 709, on his return from Spain, and mounted
with them on the car. (Plutarch, _Antony_, 13. ) By his will of the Ides
of September, the Dictator named him one of the guardians of Octavius,
and made him one of his second heirs (Dio Cassius, XLIV. 35. --Appian,
_Civil Wars_, II, 143. --Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 83); he caused to be given
him, for the year 712, the government of Cisalpine Gaul. In spite of
this friendship, of which Cæsar had given him so many proofs, and which
the latter believed to be paid by a requital, Brutus, who had remained
faithful to his benefactor in the civil war, lent his ear to the
proposals of the conspirators, and yielded to the seductions of M.
Brutus, his kinsman. He not only went to the Senate to assist in
striking the victim, but he accepted the mission of going to persuade
the Dictator, who was hesitating, to repair to the curia. (Dio Cassius,
XLIV. 14, 18. --Appian, _Civil Wars_, II. 115. --Plutarch, _Cæsar_, 70. )
Exposed to public hatred (Cicero, _Philippic. _, X. 7), and intimidated
by the threats of Antony, he left Rome to go and take possession of the
province which Cæsar had caused to be assigned to him. (Cicero, _Epist.
ad Atticum_, XIV. 13. )
He appears, however, to have acted but feebly in favour of the party he
had embraced. Antony, having obtained from the people, in exchange for
Macedonia, the province commanded by Brutus (Appian, _Civil Wars_, III.
30), the latter refused to abandon his government, and, supported by
Cicero, he obtained from the Senate an edict maintaining him in it
(Cicero, _Philippic. _, III. 4. --Appian, _Civil War_, III. 45), which led
to an armed contest between the two competitors. Pursued by his rival,
Brutus threw himself into Modena, and there sustained a long siege
(Appian, _Civil Wars_, III. 49. --Titus Livius, _Epitome_, CXVII), which
had for its final result the celebrated battle in which Antony was
defeated. D. Brutus, overlooked among new actors in this sanguinary
drama, remained in it almost a mere spectator. (Dio Cassius, XLVI. 40. )
He then ranged himself on the side of Octavius, yet without the
existence of any very close or very sincere intimacy between these two
men. He continued to exercise an important command during the war, but
fortune was not long in turning against him. Pressed by Antony, who had
united with Lepidus, and threatened personally by the prosecutions which
Octavius, armed with the law Pedia, was directing against the murderers
of Cæsar (Titus Livius, _Epitome_, CXX. --Dio Cassius, XLVI. 53), he
found himself deserted by his troops, and, after a vain attempt to cross
into Macedonia, he directed his steps with a small escort towards
Aquileia; but a Gaulish chief, named Camillus, betrayed towards him the
rites of hospitality, kept him prisoner, and sent information of what he
had done to Antony. The old lieutenant of Cæsar immediately sent Furius
with a party of cavalry, who slew Brutus, and carried away his head.
(Appian, _Civil Wars_, III. 97, 98. --Velleius Paterculus, III. 63, 64. )
Brutus was one of the correspondents of Cicero, who gives him praise,
especially for his constancy in friendship, of which he was certainly
little worthy.
8. PUBLIUS SULPICIUS RUFUS.
Publius Sulpicius Rufus, who belonged to the same family as S. Sulpicius
Galba, served, in 705, the cause of Cæsar in Spain (Cæsar, _De Bello
Civili_, I. 74); he commanded in the following year, with the title of
prætor, the fleet which was cruising at Vibo, on the coast of Bruttium
(Cæsar, _De Bella Civili_, III. 101); subsequently he obtained the
government of Illyria, a country where he had served in the ranks of the
Cæsarians, and consequently succeeded Q. Cornificius (Cæsar, _De Bello
Afric. _, 10; _De Bello Alexandrin. _, 42). A letter of Cicero, addressed
to him (_Epist. Familiar. _, XIII. 77), shows that he was still in that
province in 709. We know nothing certain relating to his actions. It has
been supposed with probability that he is the same with a P. Sulpicius,
censor under the triumvirate, and mentioned in a Latin inscription
_(Tabula Collatina_), to which Drumann refers (tom. i. , p. 528).
9. LUCIUS MUNATIUS PLANCUS.
Lucius Munatius Plancus, whose name is found in several inscriptions and
on a rather great number of medals (see especially Orelli,
_Inscriptions_, N. 591), belonged to an illustrious plebeian family.
Intimate at first with Cato, he subsequently gained the entire affection
of Cæsar (Plutarch, _Cato of Utica_, 42. --Cicero, _Epist. Familiar. _, X.
24), and remained faithful to him to the last. After having served in
Gaul, he became, in 705, one of his most active lieutenants in Spain
(Cæsar, _De Bello Civili_, I. 40), and afterwards in Africa. (Cæsar, _De
Bello Afr. _, 4. ) Cæsar caused to be given to him, for the year 710, the
government of Transalpine Gaul, without the Narbonnese and Belgic Gaul
(Appian, _Civil Wars_, III. 46--Cicero, _Philipp. _, III. 15), and named
him, with P. Brutus, for the consulship in 712 (Velleius Paterculus, II.
63. --Dio Cassius, XLVI. 53); he was then in great favour with the
Dictator: Cicero made his approaches through him to obtain Cæsar’s
favour. (_Epist. Familiar. _, X. 3; XIII. 29. )
After the murder of Cæsar, Plancus, who no doubt, like Antony, feared
the vengeance of the party of the conspirators, proposed an amnesty, in
concert with him and Cicero (Plutarch, _Brutus_, 22), and hastened to go
into the province which had been assigned to him. In Gaul he founded the
colonies of Lugdunum and Raurica (Orelli, _Inscriptiones_, No. 590. --Dio
Cassius, XLVI. 50); subsequently, gained by Antony, he abandoned to his
vengeance, during the proscription, Plotius, his own brother. (Appian,
_Civil Wars_, IV. 12. --Valerias Maximus, VI. 8, § 5. ) In 712, Plancus
took, with Lepidus, on the 1st of January, the consulship which Cæsar
had destined for him. (Dio Cassius, XLVI. 53; LXVII. 16. ) In the war of
Perusia, he commanded the troops of Antony, who sent him, in 714, into
Asia. In 719 he still governed Syria for that triumvir, and he has been
accused of the death of Sextus Pompey. (Appian, _Civil Wars_, V. 144. )
He proceeded to Egypt with Antony, to the court of Cleopatra. (Velleius
Paterculus, II. 83. ) Foreseeing the ruin of Antony, of whom he has been
reproached with being the base flatterer, he did not wait for the defeat
of Actium to embrace the party of Octavius: he returned to Rome, and
attacked his former friend bitterly in the Senate. (Velleius Paterculus,
II. 83. ) Dio Cassius (L. 3) accuses him of having revealed Antony’s
will. From this time devoted to Octavius, he proposed, in 727, to confer
upon him the title of Augustus. (Suetonius, _Octavius_, 7. --Velleius
Paterculus, II. 91. ) In 732, he held the office of censor. (Dio Cassias,
LIV. 2. ) The inscriptions and medals show that he was also invested with
other dignities. The date of his death is unknown.
Horace addressed to
him one of his odes. (Book I. , Ode 7. )
10. MARCUS LICINIUS CRASSUS.
Marcus Licinius Crassus Dives was the elder brother of young Crassus,
whose place he had taken as Cæsar’s lieutenant in Gaul. Little is known
of his life. Cicero, less intimate with him than with his younger
brother, has mentioned him but slightly. (_Epist. Familiar. _, 8. ) He
ranged himself on Cæsar’s side at the time of the civil war, and became,
in 705, governor of Citerior Gaul. (Appian, _Civil Wars_, II.
41. --Justin, XLII. 4. ) The time of his death is unknown.
11. CAIUS FABIUS.
It is not known what Caius Fabius had been before the campaign of Gaul.
When the civil war broke out, he remained faithful to Cæsar, who sent
him orders to proceed from Narbonnese Gaul to Spain. With his usual
rapidity, he moved by forced marches to Herda (_Herida_), near which
town Afranius was encamped. He distinguished himself in the whole of
this campaign, in which the army of Cæsar, which had joined him, was for
a moment in danger.
No further mention is made of C. Fabius. His name does not occur either
in the campaigns of Greece, Alexandria, or Africa, or in that of the
second Spanish war, or elsewhere.
12. L. ROSCIUS.
L. Roscius, who only played a secondary part in the war of Gaul, appears
to be the same as a personage to whom Cicero gives the name of _L.
Fabatus_, and who fell in the battle of Modena in 711. (_Epist.
Familiar. _, X. 33. ) He was prætor in 705, and Pompey, who knew the
friendship which Cæsar had for Roscius, deputed him to him at Ariminum
with proposals of peace. (Cæsar, _De Bello Civili_, I. 8, 10. --Dio
Cassius, XLI 5. ) It is believed that it is his name which, followed by
the surname Fabatus, figures on the Roman denarii which bear the image
of Juno Lanuvina. It is also believed to occur in a Latin inscription.
13. TITUS SEXTIUS.
Titus Sextius, whose history before his arrival in Gaul is not known,
became, in 710, governor of Numidia. (Dio Cassius, XLVIII. 21. )
According to Appian (_Civil Wars_, IV. 53), he took the side of
Octavius; according to Dio Cassius (XLVIII. 21), that of Antony. He made
war against Q. Cornificius, who sought to keep the ancient province of
Africa, which the Senate had given him. Sextius aspired to the same
government, and prepared to exercise it for Octavius, to whom Africa had
been assigned in the partition of the triumvirs. (Appian, _Civil Wars_,
IV. 53. ) The defeat and death of Cornificius allowed him to realise his
projects, and he remained in possession of his province until 713.
Appian and Dio Cassius have told differently the events which forced
Sextius, after the battle of Philippi, to abandon Numidia, where
Octavius had sent a new governor. Nothing else is known of his
biography.
In the year 700 two new lieutenants make their appearance, Q. Tullius
Cicero and C. Trebonius, who came to replace Arunculeius Cotta and
Titurius Sabinus, slain by the Gauls at Tongres.
14. Q. TULLIUS CICERO.
Quintus Tullius Cicero, younger brother of the great orator, was born in
652, and went with him to Athens, in order to perfect himself in
literature, which he cultivated with success. The correspondence of the
two brothers which has been preserved is a proof of this, and we know,
from other sources, that Quintus had composed divers works which are
lost. Quintas had married, before the year 686, Pomponia, sister of
Atticus (Cicero, _Epist. ad Atticum_, I. 5, 6), with whom he lived on
bad terms, and from whom he finally separated. He was ædile in 688, the
year of his brother’s prætorship; and in 691, when his brother was
consul, he lent him in the affair of Catiline his intelligent support,
and shared the same dangers. (Cicero, _Epist. ad Quintum_, I. 1;
_Catilinaria Quarta_, 2, 3. ) However, he did not share in his opinion in
the judgment of the conspirators, when he voted, with Cæsar, against the
punishment of death. (Suetonius, _Cæsar_, 14. ) He became prætor in 692,
defeated in Bruttium the bands of the Catilinarian Marcellus (Orosius,
VI. 6), and presided over the tribunal which judged Archias. (_Scholiast
of Bobbio on the Oration for Archias_, p. 354, edit. Orelli. ) In March
of the year 693, he proceeded to the province of Asia, of which he had
obtained the government (Cicero, _Pro Flacco_, 14); he administered that
province with as much equity as talent, seconded by able lieutenants.
(Cicero, _Epist. ad Quintum_, I. 1. ) They had, however, to reproach him
with frequent fits of anger, which drew upon him the remonstrances of
his brother. At the end of April, 696, Quintus left Asia in order to
proceed direct to Rome, without taking time to visit at Thessalonica M.
Cicero, who was still under the weight of his condemnation to exile. The
fact was, he feared an accusation of extortion, which his enemies, and
those of his brother, endeavoured to prepare against him. (Cicero,
_Epist. ad Atticum_, III. 9; _Epist. ad Quintum_, I. 3; _Oratio pro Domo
sua_, 36. ) He employed himself actively in favour of his brother, and
narrowly escaped being killed in the riot raised by Clodius, on the 8th
of the Calends of February, 697, on the occasion of the proposition of
the tribune Fabricius. (Cicero, _Oratio pro Sextio_, 35. --Plutarch,
_Cicero_, 44. ) When this same Clodius opposed the rebuilding of the
house of M. Cicero, Quintus saw his own, which was next to that of his
brother, burnt by the partisans of that turbulent demagogue. (Cicero,
_Epist. ad Atticum_, IV. 3. ) Towards the end of the same year, Quintus
was one of the fifteen lieutenants given to Pompey in order to direct
the supplying of victuals, and in that quality he proceeded to Sardinia.
(Cicero, _Epist. ad Quintum_, II. 2. ) He started for Gaul in the
beginning of 700, and it appears from a passage in the _Oratio pro
Milone_ that he was still there in 702. He left Cæsar’s army in 703, and
joined, in the quality of legate, his brother, who had been made
proconsul of Cilicia, and to whom he lent the indispensable support of
his experience and ability in matters of war. (Cicero, _Epist.
Familiar_. , XV. 4; _Epist. ad Atticum_, V, 20. ) During the civil war,
Quintus took the side of Pompey, but he imitated his brother’s
circumspection, and, after the battle of Pharsalia, he made every effort
to clear himself in the eyes of Cæsar, to whom he sent as his deputy in
Asia his own son, and thus obtained his pardon. After the death of
Cæsar, Quintus pronounced energetically, like M. Cicero, against Antony,
an opposition which turned out equally fatal to him, for, like his
brother, he was comprised in the proscription. Having vainly attempted
with him to reach Macedonia, he returned to Rome accompanied by his son,
and both were delivered up by slaves to the executioner. (Appian, _Civil
Wars_, IV. 20. --Plutarch, _Cicero_, 62. )
15. CAIUS TREBONIUS.
Caius Trebonius was the son of a Roman knight, of whom Cicero speaks in
his _Philippica_ (XIII. 10). Being quæstor in 694, he opposed the law
Herennia, which authorised the adoption of Clodius by a plebeian; as
tribune of the people in 699, he proposed the celebrated laws which gave
to Pompey and Crassus important provinces, and continued for five years
Cæsar’s command in Gaul. Having been called by Cæsar the year after in
quality of legate, he remained in Gaul until the commencement of the
civil war. He was afterwards sent to Spain against Afranius, and next
charged with the siege of Marseilles by land. (Cæsar, _De Bello Civili_,
I. 36. --Dio Cassius, XLI. 19;) In 706, he became præter urbanus (Dio
Cassius, XLII. 20); a year later he succeeded Cassius Longinus in the
government of one of the two Spains. (Cæsar, _De Bello Alexandrino_, 64;
_De Bello Hispano_, 7. --Dio Cassius, XLIII. 29. ) Compelled to leave the
Peninsula, after some checks, he returned to Rome, where Cæsar caused
him to be named consul in October, 709, and with the province of Asia,
on quitting office. (Dio Cassius, XLIII. 46. --Appian, _Civil Wars_, III.
2. ) All these acts of kindness, however, could not secure to the
dictator the devotedness of his lieutenant: even before Trebonius had
taken possession of his proconsulate of Asia, he entered into the
conspiracy formed against the life of Cæsar. But, detained by Antony
outside the curia, he could not strike him with his own hand. (Appian,
_Civil Wars_, II. 117. --Dio Cassius, XLIV. 19. --Cicero, _Philippica_,
II. 14; XIII. 10. ) After the death of Cæsar, Trebonius started quietly
for his government of Asia, and was in May, 710, at Athens. (Cicero,
_Epist. Familiar_. , XII. 16. ) During his proconsulship he supported the
party of Brutus and Cassius. In February, 711, Dolabella, who had come
to replace him, drew him into a snare at Smyrna; slew him, and threw his
head at the foot of a statue of Cæsar, thus revenging his friend who had
been so shamefully betrayed. (Cicero, _Philippica_, XIII. 10. --Appian,
_Civil Wars_, III. 26. --Velleius Paterculus, II. 69. --Dio Cassius,
XLVII. 29. ) Cicero, whose correspondent Trebonius had been, stigmatises
this murder, in which Antony saw the just punishment of a villain and a
parricide. It is certain that Trebonius had entered the conspiracy
without remorse, since afterwards he wrote to Cicero: “If you compose
anything on the murder of Cæsar, do not attribute a small part of it to
me. ” (Cicero, _Epist. Familiar. _, XII. 16. )
During the years 701 to 705 new lieutenants joined Cæsar in Gaul: they
were Minucius Basilus, Antistius Reginus, M. Silanus, Caninius Rebilus,
Sempronius Rutilus, Marcus Antonius, P. Vatinius, Q. Calenus, and Lucius
Cæsar.
16. MINUCIUS BASILUS.
L. Minucius Basilus had taken his name and surname from a rich Roman who
had adopted him. Previously his name was L. Satrius. Cicero names him
thus in one of his treatises (_De Officiis_, III. 18), although
elsewhere (_Epist. ad Atticum_, XI. 5) he designates him by his name and
surname. He became prætor in 709. (Dio Cassius, XLIII. 47. ) Irritated at
not having obtained, on leaving office, the province which he coveted,
and at having only received money from Cæsar, he entered into the
conspiracy formed against the Dictator. (Appian, _Civil Wars_, II;
113. --Dio Cassius, XLIII. 47. ) A few months after, he was assassinated
by his slaves, who thus took revenge for his having subjected several of
them to the punishment of castration. (Appian, _Civil Wars_, III. 98. )
17. C. ANTISTIUS REGINUS.
Nothing is known of the antecedents or the end of this lieutenant of
Cæsar. To judge by his name, he must have belonged to the family of the
_Antistii_, which produced divers magistrates of the Republic, and
several members of which have perpetuated their memory in inscriptions.
18. M. SILANUS.
