[190] A
technical
term for the beams of the pediment.
Tacitus
[167] At Narnia.
[168] The two prefects of the guard.
[169] See chap. 43.
[170] Properly a festival to celebrate the first cutting of
the beard. Nero forced high officials and their wives to take
part in unseemly performances (ii. 62), and the festivities
became a public scandal, culminating in Nero's own appearance
as a lyrist.
[171] See i. 7, 8.
THE ABDICATION OF VITELLIUS AND THE BURNING OF THE CAPITOL
During these days Antonius and Varus kept sending messages to
Vitellius, in which they offered him his life, a gift of money, and
the choice of a safe retreat in Campania, if he would stop the war and
surrender himself and his children to Vespasian. Mucianus wrote him
letters to the same effect. Vitellius usually took these offers
seriously and talked about the number of slaves he would have and the
choice of a seaside place. He had sunk, indeed, into such mental
torpor that, if other people had not remembered that he was an
emperor, he was certainly beginning to forget it himself. However, 64
it was to Flavius Sabinus, the City Prefect, that the leading men at
Rome addressed themselves. They urged him secretly not to lose all
share in the glory of victory. They pointed out that the City Garrison
was under his own command, and that he could count on the police and
their own bands of slaves, to say nothing of the good fortune of the
party and all the advantage that victory gives. He must not leave all
the glory to Antonius and Varus. Vitellius had nothing left but a few
regiments of guards, who were seriously alarmed at the bad news which
came from every quarter. As for the populace, their feelings soon
changed, and if he put himself at their head, they would be just as
loud in their flattery of Vespasian. Vitellius himself could not even
cope with success, and disaster had positively paralysed him. The
credit of ending the war would go to the man who seized the city. It
was eminently fitting that Sabinus should secure the throne for his
brother, and that Vespasian should hold him higher than any one else.
Age had enfeebled Sabinus, and he showed no alacrity to listen to 65
such talk as this. Some people covertly insinuated that he was jealous
of his brother's success and was trying to delay its realization.
Flavius Sabinus was the elder brother and, while they were both
private persons, he had been the richer and more influential. It was
also believed that he had been chary in helping Vespasian to recover
his financial position, and had taken a mortgage on his house and
estates. Consequently, though they remained openly friendly, there
were suspicions of a secret enmity between them. The more charitable
explanation is that Sabinus's gentle nature shrank from the idea of
bloodshed and massacre, and that this was his reason for so constantly
discussing with Vitellius the prospects of peace and a capitulation on
terms. After several interviews at his house they finally came to a
settlement--so the report went--at the Temple of Apollo. [172] To the
actual conversation there were only two witnesses, Cluvius Rufus[173]
and Silius Italicus,[174] but the expression of their faces was
watched from a distance. Vitellius was said to look abject and
demoralized: Sabinus showed less sign of pride than of pity.
Had Vitellius found it no harder to persuade his friends than to 66
make his own renunciation, Vespasian's army might have marched into
Rome without bloodshed. But as it was, each of his friends in
proportion to his loyalty persisted in refusing terms of peace. They
pointed to the danger and disgrace. Would their conqueror keep his
promises any longer than he liked? However great Vespasian's
self-confidence, he could not allow Vitellius to live in private. Nor
would the losers acquiesce: their very pity would be a menace. [175]
'Of course,' they said, 'you are an old man. You have done with
fortune, good or bad. But what sort of repute or position would your
son Germanicus[176] enjoy? At present they are promising you money and
a household, and the pleasant shores of Campania. But when once
Vespasian has seized the throne, neither he nor his friends nor even
his army will feel their safety assured until the rival claimant is
dead. They imprisoned Fabius Valens and meant to make use of him if a
crisis occurred, but they found him too great an incubus. You may be
sure that Antonius and Fuscus and that typical representative of the
party, Mucianus, will have no choice but to kill you. Julius Caesar
did not let Pompey live unmolested, nor Augustus Antony. [177] Do you
suppose that Vespasian's is a loftier disposition? Why, he was one of
your father's dependants,[178] when your father was Claudius's
colleague. [179] No, think of your father's censorship, his three
consulships,[179] and all the honour your great house has won. You
must not disgrace them. Despair, at least, should nerve your courage.
The troops are steadfast; you still enjoy the people's favour. Indeed,
nothing worse can happen to you than what we are eager to face of our
own free will. If we are defeated, we must die; if we surrender, we
must die. All that matters is whether we breathe our last amid mockery
and insult or bravely and with honour. '
But Vitellius was deaf to all courageous counsel. His mind was 67
obsessed with pity for his wife and children, and an anxious fear that
obstinate resistance might make the conqueror merciless towards them.
He had also a mother,[180] very old and infirm, but she had
opportunely died a few days before and thus forestalled the ruin of
her house. All she had got out of her son's principate was sorrow and
a good name. On December 17 he heard the news that the legion and the
Guards at Narnia had deserted him and surrendered to the enemy. He at
once put on mourning and left the palace, surrounded by his sorrowful
household. His small son was carried in a little litter, as though
this had been his funeral. The populace uttered untimely flatteries:
the soldiers kept an ominous silence.
On that day there was no one so indifferent to the tragedy of 68
human life as to be unmoved by this spectacle. A Roman emperor,
yesterday master of the inhabited world, had left the seat of his
authority, and was now passing through the streets of the city,
through the crowding populace, quitting the throne. Such a sight had
never been seen or heard of before. The dictator, Caesar, had been the
victim of sudden violence; Caligula of a secret conspiracy. Nero's had
been a stealthy flight to some obscure country house under cover of
night. Piso and Galba might almost be said to have fallen on the field
of battle. But here was Vitellius--before the assembly of his own
people, his own soldiers around him, with women even looking
on--uttering a few sentences suitable to his miserable situation. He
said it was in the interest of peace and of his country that he now
resigned. He begged them only to retain his memory in their hearts and
to take pity on his brother, his wife, and his little innocent
children. As he said this, he held out his son to them and commended
him, now to individuals, now to the whole assembly. At last tears
choked his voice. Turning to the consul, Caecilius Simplex,[181] who
was standing by, he unstrapped his sword and offered to surrender it
as a symbol of his power over the life and death of his subjects. The
consul refused. The people in the assembly shouted 'No'. So he left
them with the intention of depositing the regalia in the Temple of
Concord and then going to his brother's house. But he was faced with a
still louder uproar. They refused to let him enter a private house,
and shouted to him to return to the palace. They blocked every other
way and only left the road leading into the Via Sacra open. [182] Not
knowing what else to do, Vitellius returned to the palace.
A rumour of his abdication had preceded him, and Flavius Sabinus 69
had sent written instructions to the Guards'[183] officers to keep the
men in hand. Thus the whole empire seemed to have fallen into
Vespasian's lap. The chief senators, the majority of the knights, and
the whole of the city garrison and the police came flocking to the
house of Flavius Sabinus. There they heard the news of the popular
enthusiasm for Vitellius and the threatening attitude of the German
Guards. [184] But Sabinus had gone too far to draw back, and when he
showed hesitation, they all began to urge him to fight, each being
afraid for his own safety if the Vitellians were to fall on them when
they were disunited and consequently weaker. However, as so often
happens on these occasions, every one offered to give advice but few
to share the danger. While Sabinus' Body Guard were marching down by
the Fundane reservoir[185] they were attacked by some of the most
determined Vitellians. The surprise was unpremeditated, but the
Vitellians got the best of an unimportant skirmish. In the panic
Sabinus chose what was at the moment the safest course, and occupied
the summit of the Capitol,[186] where his troops were joined by a few
senators and knights. It is not easy to record their names, since
after Vespasian's victory crowds of people claimed credit for this
service to the party. There were even some women who endured the
siege, the most famous of them being Verulana Gratilla, who had
neither children nor relatives to attract her, but only her love of
danger. [187]
The Vitellians, who were investing them, kept a half-hearted watch,
and Sabinus was thus enabled to send for his own children and his
nephew Domitian at dead of night, dispatching a courier by an
unguarded route to tell the Flavian generals that he and his men were
under siege, and would be in great straits unless they were rescued.
All night, indeed, he was quite unmolested, and could have escaped
with perfect safety. The Vitellian troops could face danger with
spirit, but were much too careless in the task of keeping guard;
besides which a sudden storm of chilly rain interfered with their
sight and hearing.
At daybreak, before the two sides commenced hostilities, Sabinus 70
sent Cornelius Martialis, who had been a senior centurion, to
Vitellius with instructions to complain that the conditions were being
violated; that he had evidently made a mere empty show of abdication,
meant to deceive a number of eminent gentlemen. Else why had he gone
from the meeting to his brother's house, which caught the eye from a
conspicuous position overlooking the Forum, and not rather to his
wife's on the Aventine. That was the proper course for a private
citizen, anxious to avoid all pretension to supreme authority. But no,
Vitellius had returned to the palace, the very stronghold of imperial
majesty. From there he had launched a column of armed men, who had
strewn with innocent dead the most crowded quarter of Rome, and even
laid violent hands upon the Capitol. As for Sabinus himself, the
messenger was to say, he was only a civilian, a mere member of the
senate. While the issue was being decided between Vespasian and
Vitellius by the engagement of legions, the capture of towns, the
capitulation of cohorts; even when the provinces of Spain, of Germany,
of Britain, had risen in revolt; he, though Vespasian's brother, had
still remained faithful to his allegiance, until Vitellius, unasked,
began to invite him to a conference. Peace and union, he was to remind
him, serve the interest of the losers, and only the reputation of the
winners. If Vitellius regretted their compact, he ought not to take
arms against Sabinus, whom he had treacherously deceived, and against
Vespasian's son, who was still a mere boy. What was the good of
killing one youth and one old man? He ought rather to march out
against the legions and fight for the empire on the field. The result
of the battle would decide all other questions.
Greatly alarmed, Vitellius replied with a few words in which he tried
to excuse himself and throw the blame on his soldiers. 'I am too
unassuming,' he said, 'to cope with their overpowering impatience. ' He
then warned Martialis to make his way out of the house by a secret
passage, for fear that the soldiers should kill him as an ambassador
of the peace to which they were so hostile. Vitellius himself was not
in a position to issue orders or prohibitions; no longer an emperor,
merely an excuse for war.
Martialis had hardly returned to the Capitol when the furious 71
soldiery arrived. They had no general to lead them: each was a law to
himself. Their column marched at full speed through the Forum and past
the temples overlooking it. Then in battle order they advanced up the
steep hill in front of them, until they reached the lowest gates of
the fortress on the Capitol. In old days there was a series of
colonnades at the side of this slope, on the right as you go up.
Emerging on to the roof of these, the besieged overwhelmed the
Vitellians with showers of stones and tiles. The attacking party
carried nothing but swords, and it seemed a long business to send for
siege-engines and missiles. So they flung torches into the
nearest[188] colonnade and, following in the wake of the flames, would
have burst through the burnt gates of the Capitol, if Sabinus had not
torn down all the available statues--the monuments of our ancestors'
glory--and built a sort of barricade on the very threshold. They then
tried to attack the Capitol by two opposite approaches, one near the
'Grove of Refuge'[189] and the other by the hundred steps which lead
up to the Tarpeian Rock. This double assault came as a surprise. That
by the Refuge was the closer and more vigorous. Nothing could stop the
Vitellians, who climbed up by some contiguous houses built on to the
side of the hill, which in the days of prolonged peace had been raised
to such a height that their roofs were level with the floor of the
Capitol. It is uncertain whether the buildings at this point were
fired by the assailants or--as tradition prefers--by the besieged in
trying to dislodge their enemies who had struggled up so far. The fire
spread to the colonnades adjoining the temples, and then the
'eagles'[190] supporting the roof, which were made of very old wood,
caught the flames and fed them. And so the Capitol, with its doors
fast shut, undefended and unplundered, was burnt to the ground.
Since the foundation of the city no such deplorable and horrible 72
disaster had ever befallen the people of Rome. It was no case of
foreign invasion. Had our own wickedness allowed, the country might
have been enjoying the blessings of a benign Providence; and yet here
was the seat of Jupiter Almighty--the temple solemnly founded by our
ancestors as the pledge of their imperial greatness, on which not even
Porsenna,[191] when Rome surrendered, nor the Gauls, when they took
it, had ever dared to lay rash hands--being brought utterly to ruin by
the mad folly of two rival emperors! [192] The Capitol had been burnt
before in civil war,[193] but that was the crime of private persons.
Now it had been openly assaulted by the people of Rome and openly
burnt by them. And what was the cause of war? what the recompense for
such a disaster? Were we fighting for our country?
King Tarquinius Priscus had vowed to build this temple in the Sabine
war, and had laid the foundations on a scale that suited rather his
hope of the city's future greatness than the still moderate fortunes
of the Roman people. Later Servius Tullius, with the aid of Rome's
allies, and Tarquinius Superbus, with the spoils of the Volscians
after the capture of Suessa Pometia,[194] continued the building. But
the glory of completing it was reserved for the days of freedom. After
the expulsion of the kings, Horatius Pulvillus, in his second
consulship[195] dedicated this monument on such a magnificent scale,
that in later days, with all her boundless wealth, Rome has been able
to embellish but never to enlarge it. After an interval of four
hundred and fifteen years, in the consulship of Lucius Scipio and
Caius Norbanus,[196] it was burnt and rebuilt on the same site. Sulla
after his victory undertook the task of restoring it, but did not
dedicate it. This only was lacking to justify his title of 'Fortune's
Favourite'. [197] Much as the emperors did to it, the name of Lutatius
Catulus[198] still remained upon it up to the time of Vitellius. [199]
This was the temple that was now ablaze.
The besieged suffered more panic than their assailants. The 73
Vitellian soldiers lacked neither resource nor steadiness in moments
of crisis. But on the other side the troops were terrified, the
general[200] inert, and apparently so paralysed that he was
practically deaf and dumb. He neither adopted others' plans nor formed
any of his own, but only drifted about from place to place, attracted
by the shouts of the enemy, contradicting all his own orders. The
result was what always happens in a hopeless disaster: everybody gave
orders and nobody obeyed them. At last they threw away their weapons
and began to peer round for a way of escape or some means of hiding.
Then the Vitellians came bursting in, and with fire and sword made one
red havoc. A few good soldiers dared to show fight and were cut to
pieces. Of these the most notable were Cornelius Martialis,[201]
Aemilius Pacensis,[202] Casperius Niger, and Didius Scaeva. Flavius
Sabinus, who stood unarmed and making no attempt to escape, was
surrounded together with the consul Quintius Atticus,[203] whose empty
title made him a marked man, as well as his personal vanity, which had
led him to distribute manifestoes full of compliments to Vespasian and
insults against Vitellius. The rest escaped by various means. Some
disguised themselves as slaves: some were sheltered by faithful
dependants: some hid among the baggage. Others again caught the
Vitellians' password, by which they recognized each other, and
actually went about demanding it and giving it when challenged, thus
escaping under a cloak of effrontery.
When the enemy first broke in, Domitian had taken refuge with the 74
sacristan, and was enabled by the ingenuity of a freedman to escape
among a crowd of worshippers in a linen dress,[204] and to take refuge
near the Velabrum with Cornelius Primus, one of his father's
dependants. When his father came to the throne, Domitian pulled down
the sacristan's lodging and built a little chapel to Jupiter the
Saviour with an altar, on which his adventures were depicted in marble
relief. Later, when he became emperor, he dedicated a huge temple to
Jupiter the Guardian with a statue of himself in the lap of the god.
Sabinus and Atticus were loaded with chains and taken to Vitellius,
who received them without any language or looks of disfavour, much to
the chagrin of those who wanted to see them punished with death and
themselves rewarded for their successful labours. When those who stood
nearest started an outcry, the dregs of the populace soon began to
demand Sabinus' execution with mingled threats and flatteries.
Vitellius came out on to the steps of the palace prepared to plead for
him: but they forced him to desist. Sabinus was stabbed and riddled
with wounds: his head was cut off and the trunk dragged away to 75
the Ladder of Sighs. [205] Such was the end of a man who certainly
merits no contempt. He had served his country for thirty-five years,
and won credit both as civilian and soldier. His integrity and
fairness were beyond criticism. He talked too much about himself, but
this is the one charge which rumour could hint against him in the
seven years when he was Governor of Moesia, and the twelve years
during which he was Prefect of the City. At the end of his life some
thought he showed a lack of enterprise, but many believed him a
moderate man, who was anxious to save his fellow citizens from
bloodshed. In this, at any rate, all would agree, that before
Vespasian became emperor the reputation of his house rested on
Sabinus. It is said that Mucianus was delighted to hear of his murder,
and many people maintained that it served the interests of peace by
putting an end to the jealousy of two rivals, one of whom was the
emperor's brother, while the other posed as his partner in the
empire. [206]
When the people further demanded the execution of the consul,
Vitellius withstood them. He had forgiven Atticus, and felt that he
owed him a favour, for, when asked who had set fire to the Capitol,
Atticus had taken the blame on himself, by which avowal--or was it a
well-timed falsehood? --he had fixed all the guilt and odium on himself
and exonerated the Vitellian party.
FOOTNOTES:
[172] On the Palatine.
[173] See i. 8.
[174] A friend of Vitellius and the author of the historical
epic on the second Punic War.
[175] This apparently means that, if Vitellius were spared,
pity for his position would inspire his supporters to make
further trouble.
[176] See ii. 59.
[177] Two good points, but both untrue.
[178] This too is probably hyperbole, but Vespasian may have
owed his command in Germany to the influence of Vitellius'
father.
[179] See i. 52, note 99.
[180] See ii. 64, 89.
[181] See ii. 60.
[182] i. e. the way back from the Forum to the Palace.
[183] Including the city garrison and police.
[184] In chap. 78 we find three cohorts of Guards still
faithful to Vitellius, and, as it appears from ii. 93, 94 that
men from the legions of Germany had been enlisted in the
Guards, the term _Germanicae cohortes_ seems to refer to these
three cohorts, in which perhaps the majority were men from the
German army.
[185] Said to be on the Quirinal.
[186] Either the whole hill, or, if the expression is exact,
the south-west summit.
[187] This seems to have led her later into the paths of
conspiracy, for she is said to have been banished by Domitian
for her friendship with Arulenus Rusticus.
[188] _Prominentem_ seems to mean the one that projected
towards them.
[189] The space lying between the two peaks of the Capitoline.
[190] A technical term for the beams of the pediment.
[191] 'Lars Porsenna of Clusium,' 507 B. C.
[192] 'Burning the Capitol' was a proverb of utter iniquity.
[193] In the war between Sulla and Marius, 83 B. C.
[194] The capital town of the Volscians. This early history is
told in the first book of Livy.
[195] 507 B. C.
[196] 83 B. C. The interval is really 425 years.
[197] This, according to Pliny, was Sulla's own saying.
[198] Consul in 69 B. C. He took the title of Capitolinus.
[199] On the monument which details his exploits Augustus says
that he restored the Capitol at immense cost without
inscribing his name on it.
[200] Flavius Sabinus.
[201] Cp. chap. 70.
[202] Cp. i. 20, 87; ii. 12.
[203] Consul for November and December. His colleague,
Caecilius Simplex, was on the other side (see chap. 68).
[204] The dress of the worshippers of the Egyptian goddess
Isis, who considered woollen clothes unclean.
[205] A flight of steps leading down from the Capitol to the
Forum. On them the bodies of criminals were exposed after
execution.
[206] Mucianus.
THE TAKING OF TARRACINA
About this same time Lucius Vitellius,[207] who had pitched his 76
camp at the Temple of Feronia,[208] made every effort to destroy
Tarracina, where he had shut up the gladiators and sailors, who would
not venture to leave the shelter of the walls or to face death in the
open. The gladiators were commanded, as we have already seen,[209] by
Julianus, and the sailors by Apollinaris, men whose dissolute
inefficiency better suited gladiators than general officers. They set
no watch, and made no attempt to repair the weak places in the walls.
Day and night they idled loosely; the soldiers were dispatched in all
directions to find them luxuries; that beautiful coast rang with their
revelry; and they only spoke of war in their cups. A few days earlier,
Apinius Tiro[210] had started on his mission, and, by rigorously
requisitioning gifts of money in all the country towns, was winning
more unpopularity than assistance for the cause.
In the meantime, one of Vergilius Capito's slaves deserted to 77
Lucius Vitellius, and promised that, if he were provided with men, he
would put the abandoned castle into their hands. Accordingly, at dead
of night he established a few lightly armed cohorts on the top of the
hills which overlooked the enemy. Thence the soldiers came charging
down more to butchery than battle. They cut down their victims
standing helpless and unarmed or hunting for their weapons, or perhaps
newly startled from their sleep--all in a bewildering confusion of
darkness, panic, bugle-calls, and savage cries. A few of the
gladiators resisted and sold their lives dearly. The rest rushed to
the ships; and there the same panic and confusion reigned, for the
villagers were all mixed up with the troops, and the Vitellians
slaughtered them too, without distinction. Just as the first uproar
began, six Liburnian cruisers slipped away with the admiral
Apollinaris on board. The rest were either captured on the beach or
overweighted and sunk by the crowds that clambered over them. Julianus
was taken to Lucius Vitellius, who had him flogged till he bled and
then killed before his eyes. Some writers have accused Lucius
Vitellius' wife, Triaria,[211] of putting on a soldier's sword, and
with insolent cruelty showing herself among the horrors of the
captured town. Lucius himself sent a laurel-wreath to his brother in
token of his success, and inquired whether he wished him to return at
once or to continue reducing Campania. This delay saved not only
Vespasian's party but Rome as well. Had he marched on the city while
his men were fresh from their victory, with the flush of success added
to their natural intrepidity, there would have been a tremendous
struggle, which must have involved the city's destruction. Lucius
Vitellius, too, for all his evil repute, was a man of action. Good men
owe their power to their virtues; but he was one of that worst sort
whose vices are their only virtue.
FOOTNOTES:
[207] See chap. 58.
[208] An Italian goddess of freedom. The temple is mentioned
in Horace's _Journey to Brundisium_, where Anxur = Tarracina,
which was three miles from the temple.
[209] Chap. 57.
[210] He was in command of the rebels from the fleet at
Misenum, and engaged in bringing over the country-towns (see
chap. 57).
[211] Cp. chaps. 63 and 64.
THE SACK OF ROME AND THE END OF VITELLIUS
While things[212] went thus on Vitellius' side, the Flavian army 78
after leaving Narnia spent the days of the Saturnalian holiday[213]
quietly at Ocriculum. [214] The object of this disastrous delay was to
wait for Mucianus. Antonius has been suspected of delaying
treacherously after receiving a secret communication from Vitellius,
offering him as the price of treason the consulship, his young
daughter, and a rich dowry. Others hold that this story was invented
to gratify Mucianus. Many consider that the policy of all the Flavian
generals was rather to threaten the city than to attack it. They
realized that Vitellius had lost the best cohorts of his Guards, and
now that all his forces were cut off they expected he would abdicate.
But this prospect was spoilt first by Sabinus' precipitation and then
by his cowardice, for, after very rashly taking arms, he failed to
defend against three cohorts of Guards the strongly fortified castle
on the Capitol, which ought to have been impregnable even to a large
army. However, it is not easy to assign to any one man the blame which
they all share. Even Mucianus helped to delay the victors' advance by
the ambiguity of his dispatches, and Antonius was also to blame for
his untimely compliance with instructions--or else for trying to throw
the responsibility[215] on Mucianus. The other generals thought the
war was over, and thus rendered its final scene all the more
appalling. Petilius Cerialis was sent forward with a thousand cavalry
to make his way by cross-roads through the Sabine country, and enter
the city by the Salarian road. [216] But even he failed to make
sufficient haste, and at last the news of the siege of the Capitol
brought them all at once to their senses.
Marching up the Flaminian road, it was already deep night when 79
Antonius reached 'The Red Rocks'. [217] His help had come too late.
There he heard that Sabinus had been killed, and the Capitol burnt;
the city was in panic; everything looked black; even the populace and
the slaves were arming for Vitellius. Petilius Cerialis, too, had been
defeated in a cavalry engagement. He had pushed on without caution,
thinking the enemy already beaten, and the Vitellians with a mixed
force of horse and foot had caught him unawares. The engagement had
taken place near the city among farm buildings and gardens and winding
lanes, with which the Vitellians were familiar, while the Flavians
were terrified by their ignorance. Besides, the troopers were not all
of one mind; some of them belonged to the force which had recently
surrendered at Narnia, and were waiting to see which side won. Julius
Flavianus, who commanded a regiment of cavalry, was taken prisoner.
The rest fell into a disgraceful panic and fled, but the pursuit was
not continued beyond Fidenae.
This success served to increase the popular excitement. The city 80
rabble now took arms. A few had service-shields: most of them snatched
up any weapons they could find and clamoured to be given the sign for
battle. Vitellius expressed his gratitude to them and bade them sally
forth to protect the city. He then summoned a meeting of the senate,
at which envoys were appointed to go to the two armies and urge them
in the name of public welfare to accept peace. The fortunes of the
envoys varied. Those who approached Petilius Cerialis found themselves
in dire danger, for the soldiers indignantly refused their terms. The
praetor, Arulenus Rusticus,[218] was wounded. Apart from the wrong
done to a praetor and an envoy, the man's own acknowledged worth made
this seem all the more scandalous. His companions were flogged, and
the lictor nearest to him was killed for venturing to make a way
through the crowd. Indeed, if the guard provided by the general had
not intervened, a Roman envoy, the sanctity of whose person even
foreign nations respect, might have been wickedly murdered in the mad
rage of civil strife under the very walls of Rome. Those who went to
Antonius met with a more reasonable reception; not that the soldiers
were less violent, but the general had more authority.
A knight named Musonius Rufus had attached himself to the envoys. 81
He was a student of philosophy and an enthusiastic advocate of
Stoicism. He mingled with the armed soldiers offering them advice and
discoursing on the advantages of peace and the perils of war. This
amused many of them and bored still more. Some, indeed, wanted to
maul him and kick him out, but the advice of the more sober spirits
and the threats of others persuaded him to cut short his ill-timed
lecture. The Vestal Virgins, too, came in procession to bring Antonius
a letter from Vitellius, in which he demanded one day's postponement
of the final crisis, saying that everything could easily be settled,
if only they would grant this respite. Antonius sent the Virgins away
with all respect, and wrote in answer to Vitellius that the murder of
Sabinus and the burning of the Capitol had broken off all
negotiations. However, he summoned the legions to a meeting and 82
endeavoured to mollify them, proposing that they should pitch their
camp near the Mulvian Bridge and enter the city on the following day.
His motive for delay was a fear that the troops, when once their blood
was up after a skirmish, would have no respect for civilians or
senators, or even for the temples and shrines of the gods. But they
suspected every postponement as a hindrance to their victory.
Moreover, some colours which were seen glittering along the hills,
gave the impression of a hostile force, although none but peaceful
citizens accompanied them.
The attack was made in three columns. One advanced from its original
position on the Flaminian road, one kept near the bank of the Tiber,
and the third approached the Colline Gate along the Salarian road. The
cavalry rode into the mob and scattered them. But the Vitellian troops
faced the enemy, themselves, too, in three separate divisions. Again
and again they engaged before the walls with varying success. But the
Flavians had the advantage of being well led and thus more often won
success. Only one of the attacking parties suffered at all severely,
that which had made its way along narrow, greasy lanes to Sallust's
Gardens[219] on the left side of the city. Standing on the garden
walls, the Vitellians hurled stones and javelins down upon them and
held them back until late in the day. But at last the cavalry forced
an entrance by the Colline Gate and took the defenders in the rear.
Then the opposing forces met on the Martian Plain itself. Fortune
favoured the Flavians and the sense of victories won. The Vitellians
charged in sheer despair, but, though driven back, they gathered again
in the city.
The people came and watched the fighting, cheering and applauding 83
now one side, now the other, like spectators at a gladiatorial
contest. Whenever one side gave ground, and the soldiers began to hide
in shops or seek refuge in some private house, they clamoured for them
to be dragged out and killed, and thus got the greater part of the
plunder for themselves: for while the soldiers were busy with the
bloody work of massacre, the spoil fell to the crowd. The scene
throughout the city was hideous and terrible: on the one side fighting
and wounded men, on the other baths and restaurants: here lay heaps of
bleeding dead, and close at hand were harlots and their
companions--all the vice and licence of luxurious peace, and all the
crime and horror of a captured town. One might well have thought the
city mad with fury and mad with pleasure at the same time. Armies had
fought in the city before this, twice when Sulla mastered Rome,[220]
once under Cinna. [221] Nor were there less horrors then. What was now
so inhuman was the people's indifference. Not for one minute did they
interrupt the life of pleasure. The fighting was a new amusement for
their holiday. [222] Caring nothing for either party, they enjoyed
themselves in riotous dissipation and took a frank pleasure in their
country's disaster.
The storming of the Guards' camp was the most troublesome task. It 84
was still held by some of the bravest as a forlorn hope, which made
the victors all the more eager to take it, especially those who had
originally served in the Guards. They employed against it every means
ever devised for the storming of the most strongly fortified towns, a
'tortoise',[223] artillery, earthworks, firebrands. This, they cried,
was the crown of all the toil and danger they had undergone in all
their battles. They had restored the city to the senate and people of
Rome, and their Temples to the gods: the soldier's pride is his camp,
it is his country and his home. If they could not regain it at once,
they must spend the night in fighting. The Vitellians, for their part,
had numbers and fortune against them, but by marring their enemy's
victory, by postponing peace, by fouling houses and altars with their
blood, they embraced the last consolations that the conquered can
enjoy. Many lay more dead than alive on the towers and ramparts of the
walls and there expired. When the gates were torn down, the remainder
faced the conquerors in a body. And there they fell, every man of them
facing the enemy with all his wounds in front. Even as they died they
took care to make an honourable end.
When the city was taken, Vitellius left the Palace by a back way and
was carried in a litter to his wife's house on the Aventine. If he
could lie hid during the day, he hoped to make his escape to his
brother and the Guards at Tarracina. But it is in the very nature of
terror that, while any course looks dangerous, the present state of
things seems worst of all. His fickle determination soon changed and
he returned to the vast, deserted Palace, whence even the lowest of
his menials had fled, or at least avoided meeting him. Shuddering at
the solitude and hushed silence of the place, he wandered about,
trying closed doors, terrified to find the rooms empty; until at last,
wearied with his miserable search, he crept into some shameful
hiding-place. There Julius Placidus, an officer of the Guards, found
him and dragged him out. His hands were tied behind his back, his
clothes were torn, and thus he was led forth--a loathly spectacle at
which many hurled insults and no one shed a single tear of pity. The
ignominy of his end killed all compassion. On the way a soldier of the
German army either aimed an angry blow at him, or tried to put him
out of his shame, or meant, perhaps, to strike the officer in command;
at any rate, he cut off the officer's ear and was immediately stabbed.
With the points of their swords they made Vitellius hold up his 85
head and face their insults, forcing him again and again to watch his
own statues hurtling down, or to look at the Rostra and the spot where
Galba had been killed. At last he was dragged along to the Ladder of
Sighs,[224] where the body of Flavius Sabinus had lain. One saying of
his which was recorded had a ring of true nobility. When some officer
flung reproaches at him, he answered, 'And yet I was once your
emperor. ' After that he fell under a shower of wounds, and when he was
dead the mob abused him as loudly as they had flattered him in his
lifetime--and with as little reason.
Vitellius' home was at Luceria. [225] He was in his fifty-seventh 86
year, and had won the consulship, priesthoods, and a name and position
among Rome's greatest men, all of which he owed to no efforts of his
own, but solely to his father's eminence. [226] Those who offered him
the throne had not yet learnt to know him; and yet his slothful
cowardice won from his soldiers an enthusiasm which the best of
generals have rarely evoked. Still he had the qualities of candour and
generosity, which without moderation are liable to prove disastrous.
He had few friends, though he bought many, thinking to keep them, not
by showing moral stamina, but by giving liberal presents. It was
indubitably good for the country that Vitellius should be beaten. But
those who betrayed him to Vespasian can hardly make a merit of their
perfidy, for they were the very men who had deserted Galba for
Vitellius.
The day was already sinking into evening. The magistrates and senators
had fled in terror from the city, or were still in hiding at
dependants' houses: it was therefore impossible to call a meeting of
the senate. When all fear of violence was at an end, Domitian came
out[227] and presented himself to the generals of his party. The
crowds of soldiers at once hailed him as Caesar, and marched off,
still in full armour, to escort him to his father's house.
FOOTNOTES:
[212] The narrative is continued from chap. 63.
[213] December 17-23.
[214] Otricoli.
[215] i. e. for the delay which gave time for the burning of
the Capitol. The fact that he tried to shift the
responsibility seemed to argue an uncomfortable conscience.
[216] i. e. through the Colline Gate.
[217] Grotta Rosa.
[218] A well-known member of the Stoic opposition, executed by
Domitian's order, A. D. 94.
[219] The historian. They now belonged to the emperor.
[220] 88 and 82 B. C.
[221] 87 B. C.
[222] The Saturnalia.
[223] See chap. 27, note 77.
[224] Cp. note 205.
[225] The words are uncertain. There is probably a lacuna.
[226] Cp. vol. i, note 99.
[227] He had taken refuge with a humble friend (see chap. 74).
BOOK IV
ROME AFTER THE FALL OF VITELLIUS
(January-July, A. D.
