No More Learning

His political position was utterly perverse. He was a Sullan officenand under
obligation to stand up for the restoredconstitiitipmiiiyet again in opposition to Sulla personally as well asgtvo the
whole senatorial government. The genrfofwthg ,Bgmpgji,
which had only been named for spume sixtywygavrsu in the
consular lists, had by no means acquired full standingjn
the ‘53%;? the aristocracy; even the father of thislfgmpgius
had‘occupied a very invidious equivocal positioaatowards
the senate (iii. 546, p. 61), and he himself had onceggegn ihwtqhgnranks of the Cinnans 85)-—recollect' us which
were suppressed perhaps, but not forgotten. “The promi nent position which Pompeius acquired for himself under Sulla set him at inward variance with the aristocracy, quite as much as brought him into outward connection with itmeak-headed as he was, Pompeius was seized with giddiness on the height of glory which he had climbed with such dangerous rapidity and ease. Just as he would himself ridicule his dry prosaic nature by the parallel with the most poetical of all heroic figures, he began to compare himself with Alexander the Great, and to account himself man of unique standing, whom did not beseem to be merely one of the five hundred senators of Rome: In reality, no one was more fitted to take his place as member of an aristocratic government than Pompeius. His dignified outward appearance, his solemn formality, his personal bravery, his decorous private life, his want of all initiative might have gained for him, had he been born two hundred years earlier, an honourable place the side of Quintus Maximus and Publius Decius: this mediocrity, so characteristic of the genuine Optimate and the genuine
by
a
a
it
if
it
(p.
can). I QUINTUS SERTORIUS 275
Roman, contributed not a little to the elective aflinity which subsisted at all times between Pompeius and the mass of the burgesses and the senate. Even in his own age he would have had a clearly defined and respectable
position, had he contented himself with being the general of the senate, for which he was from the outset destined. With
this he was not content, and so he fell into the fatal plight of wishing to be something else than he could be. He was constantly aspiring to a special position in the state, and, when it offered itself, he could not make up his mind to occupy it; he was deeply indignant when persons and laws did not bend unconditionally before him, and yet he everywhere bore himself with no mere affectation of modesty as one of many peers, and trembled at the mere thought of undertaking anything unconstitutional. Thus constantly at fundamental variance with, and yet at the same time the obedient servant of, the oligarchy, constantly tormented by an ambition which was frightened at its own aims, his much-agitated life passed joylessly away in a per petual inward contradiction.
Marcus Crassus cannot, any more than Pompeius, be Crassus reckoned among the unconditional adherents of the oli
garchy. He is a personage highly characteristic of this epoch.
Like Pompeius, whose senior he was by a few years, he belonged to the circle of the high Roman aristocracy, had obtained the usual education befitting his rank, and had
like Pompeius fought with distinction under Sulla in the Italian war. Far inferior to many of his peers in mental gifts, literary culture, and military talent, he outstripped them by his boundless activity, and by the perseverance with which he strove to possess everything and to become all-important. Above all, he threw himself into specula tion. Purchases of estates during the revolution formed the foundation of his wealth ; but he disdained no branch of gain; he carried on the business of building in the
his colleagues
account.
He was far from nice in the matter of making On occasion of the Sullan proscriptions a forgery
MARCUS LEPIDUS AND I00! V
on a great scale and with prudence; he entered
376
Rome, in person or by his agents; he advanced money to
capital
into partnership
undertakings; he acted as banker both in and out of
with his freedmen in the most varied
in the senate, and undertook—as it might happen—to execute works or to bribe the tribunals on their
profit.
in the lists had been proved against him, for which reason
Sulla made no more use of him thenceforward in the affairs
he did not refuse to accept an inheritance, because the testamentary document which contained his name was notoriously forged; he made no objection, when his bailifl‘s by force or by fraud dislodged the petty holders
of state:
his own. He avoided open collisions, however, with criminal justice, and lived himself like a genuine moneyed man in homely and simple style. In this way Crassus rose in the course of a few years from
a man of ordinary senatorial fortune to be the master of wealth which not long before his death, after defraying
from lands which adjoined
enormous
extraordinary expenses, sesterces (£r,7oo,ooo).
still amounted to He had become the
170,000,000
richest of Romans and thereby, at the same time, a great
If, according to his expression, no one might call himself rich who could not maintain an army from his revenues, one who could do this was hardly any
longer a mere citizen. In reality the views of Crassus aimed at a higher object than the possession of the best
political power.
in Rome. He grudged no pains to
filled money-chest
extend his connections.
every burgess of the capital.
his assistance in court. Nature, indeed, had not done
much for him as an orator: his speaking was dry, his delivery monotonous, he had difficulty of hearing; but his tenacity of purpose, which no wearisomeness deterred and
He knew how to salute by name He refused to no suppliant
can. t QUINTUS SERTORIUS 277
no enjoyment distracted, overcame such obstacles. He never appeared unprepared, he never extemporized, and so he became a pleader at all times in request and at all times ready; to whom it was no derogation that a cause was rarely too bad for him, and that he knew how to influence the judges not merely by his oratory, but also by his connections and, on occasion, by his gold. Half the senate was in debt to him; his habit of advancing to “friends” money without interest revocable at pleasure rendered a number of influential men dependent on him, and the more so that, like a genuine man of business, he made no distinction among the parties, maintained connec tions on all hands, and readily lent to every one who was able to pay or otherwise useful. The most daring party leaders, who made their attacks recklessly in all directions, were careful not to quarrel with Crassus; he was compared to the bull of the herd, whom it was advisable for none to provoke. That such a man, so disposed and so situated, could not strive after humble aims is clear; and, in a very different way from Pompeius, Crassus knew exactly like a banker the objects and the means of political speculation. From the origin of Rome capital was a political power
there; the age was of such a sort, that everything seemed accessible to gold as to iron. If in the time of revolution a capitalist aristocracy might have thought of overthrowing the oligarchy of the gem’er, a man like Crassus might raise
his eyes higher than to the farm‘ and embroidered mantle of the triumphators. For the moment he was a Sullan and adherent of the senate; but he was too much of a financier to devote himself to a definite political party, or to pursue aught else than his personal advantage. Why should Crassus, the wealthiest and most intriguing man in Rome, and no penurious miser but a speculator on the greatest scale, not speculate also on the crown? Alone,
he could not attain this object; but he had
perhaps,
Leaders
of the democrats.
already carried out various great transactions in partner ship; it was not impossible that for this also a suitable partner might present himself. It is a trait characteristic of the time, that a mediocre orator and oflicer, a politician who took his activity for energy and his covetousness for ambition, one who at bottom had nothing but a colossal fortune and the mercantile talent of forming connections— that such a man, relying on the omnipotence of coteries and intrigues, could deem himself on a level with the first generals and statesmen of his day, and could contend with them for the highest prize which allures political ambition.
In the opposition proper, both among the liberal con servatives and among the Populares, the storms of revolu tion had made fearful havoc. Among the former, the only
278
MARCUS LEPIDUS AND BOOK v
124-78. surviving man of note was Gaius Cotta (630-0. 681), the 91. friend and ally of Drusus, and as such banished in 663 (iii. 503), and then by Sulla’s victory brought back to his native land 112) he was shrewd man and a capable advocate, but not called, either by the weight of his party
62.
or by that of his personal standing, to act more than a respectable secondary part. In the democratic party, among the rising youth, Gaius Julius Caesar, who was
102. twenty-four years of age (born I2 July 52 ? 1), drew
100. It usual to set down the year 54 as that of Caesar's birth, because according to Suetonius (Cacr. 88), Plutarch (Cuer. 69), and Anpian (5. 6‘. 44. ii. 149) he was at his death March 710) in his 56th year with which also the statement that he was 18 years old at the time of the Sullan
82. prescription (672; Vell. ii. 4r) nearly accords. But this view utterly 65. inconsistent with the facts that Caesar filled the aedileship in 689, the 59. praetorship in 692, and the consulship in 695, and that these ofiices could,
according to the lager annular, be held at the very earliest in the 37th-38th, 4oth-4rst, and 43rd-44th years of a man's life respectively. We cannot conceive why Caesar should have filled all the curule ofl‘ices two years before the legal time, and still less why there should be no mention any where of his having done so. These facts rather suggest the conjecture
100. that, as his birthday fell undoubtedly on July 12, he was born not in 654,
102. 82.
but in 652 so that in 672 he was in his 2oth-zrst year, and he died not in his 56th year, but at the age of 57 years months. In favour of this latter view we may moreover adduce the circumstance, which has been
8
;
is
(I 5
1 is
6
a
6 ;
(p. ;
cHAr. ! QUINTUS SERTORIUS 279
towards him the eyes of friend and foe. His relationship with Marius and Cinna (his father’s sister had been the wife of Marius, he himself had married Cinna’s daughter); the courageous refusal of the youth who had scarce out grown the age of boyhood to send a divorce to his young wife Cornelia at the bidding of the dictator, as Pompeius had in the like case done; his bold persistence in the
conferred upon him by Marius, but revoked by Sulla; his wanderings during the proscription with which he was threatened, and which was with difficulty averted by the intercession of his relatives; his bravery in the conflicts before Mytilene and in Cilicia, a bravery which no one had expected from the tenderly reared and almost effeminately foppish boy; even the warnings of Sulla regarding the “boy in the petticoat ” in whom more than a
strangely brought forward in opposition to that Caesar "pane M"
was appointed by Marius and Cinna as Flamen of Jupiter (Vell. ii. 43);
for Marius died in January 668, when Caesar was, according to the usual 86. view, 13 years months old, and therefore not "almost," as Velleius
says, but actually still a boy, and most probably for this very reason not
at all capable of holding such a priesthood. If, again, he was born in
July 652, he was at the death of Marius in his sixteenth year and with 102. this the expression in Velleius agrees, as well as the general rule that
civil positions were not assumed before the expiry of the age of boyhood. Further, with this latter view alone accords the fact that the d:narii struck by Caesar about the outbreak of the civil war are marked with the number LIL, probably the year of his life; for when began, Caesar's
age was according to this view somewhat over 52 years. Nor so
rash as appears to us who are accustomed to regular and official lists of births, to charge our authorities with an error in this respect. Those four statements may very well be all traceable to common source nor can
they at all lay claim to any very high credibility, seeing that for the ealier period before the commencement of the Mid diuma the statements
as to the natal years of even the best known and most prominent Romans,
e. g. as to that of Pompeius, vary in the most surprising manner. (Comp. SIaaIsrec/zt, I. ‘ p. 570. )
In the Life of Caesar by Napoleon III.
this view, first, that the [ex annalir would point for Caesar’s birth-year
not to 652, but to 651; secondly and especially, that other cases are 102. known where was not attended to. But the first assertion rests on a mistake; for, as the example of Cicero shows, the lax annalir required
only that at the entering on oflice the 43rd year should be begun, not that
should be completed. None of the alleged exceptions to the rule, more over, are pertinent. When Tacitus (Ann. xi. 22) says that formerly in conferring magistracies no regard we: had to age, and that the wnaulate
priesthood
(B.
2, ch. objected to
I‘
it
it
1) it is
it
a
it,
;
it
is it
;
6
280 MARCUS LEPIDUS AND BOOK v
Marius lay concealed—all these were precisely so many recommendations in the eyes of the democratic party. But Caesar could only be the object of hopes for the future; and the men who from their age and their public position would have been called now to seize the reins of
the party and the state, were all dead or in exile.
Thus the leadership of the democracy, in the absence
of a man with a true vocation for was to be had by any one who might please to give himself forth as the champion of oppressed popular freedom and in this way came to Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, Sullan, who from motives more than ambiguous deserted to the camp of the demo cracy. Once zealous Optimate, and large purchaser at the auctions of the proscribed estates, he had, as
of Sicily, so scandalously plundered the province
and dictatorship were entrusted to quite young men, he has in view, of course, as all commentators acknowledge, the earlier period before the issuing of the legrr annular-the consulship of M. Valerius Corvus at twenty-three, and similar cases. The assertion that Lucullus received the supreme magistraey before the legal age erroneous; only stated
(Cicero, And. pr. that on the ground of an exceptional clause not more particularly known to us, in reward for some sort of act performed by him, he had a dispensation from the legal two years’ interval between the aedileship and praetorship-in reality he was aedile in 675, probably praetor in 677, consul in 680. That the case of Pompeius was a totally
the same thing should have been done with Caesar on his candidature for the minor magistracies, when he was of little more importance than other political beginners; and would be‘ possible, more surprising still, that, while there mention of that—in itself readily understood—excep tion, there should be no notice of this more than strange deviation, how ever naturally such notices would have suggested themselves, especially with reference to Octavianus consul at 21 (comp. , e. g. , Appian, iii. 88). When from these irrelevant examples the inference drawn, "that the lawwas little observed in Rome, where distinguished men were concerned,"
anything more erroneous than this sentence was never uttered regarding Rome and the Romans. The greatness of the Roman commonwealth. and not less that of its grmt generals and statesmen, depends above all things on the fact that the law held good in their case also.
governor
different one obvious: but even as to Pompeius,
occasions expressly stated (Cicero, de Imp. Porn). 21, 62
that the senate released him from the laws as to age.
have been done with Pompeius, who had solicited the consulship as a. cornmander-in-chief crowned with victory and a triumphator, at the head of an army and after his coalition with Crassus also of a powerful party, we can readily conceive. But would be in the highest degree surprising,
on several Appian, iii. 88) That this should
is
it
it
if
if
is
is i. a
; it is
it is
it
I)
is
it,
a
a
;
CHAP. I QUINTUS SERTORIUS 28!
that he was threatened with impeachment, and, to evade threw himself into opposition. It was gain of doubtful
value. No doubt the opposition thus acquired well known name, man of quality, vehement orator in the Forum; but Lepidus was an insignificant and indiscreet personage, who did not deserve to stand‘ at the head either
in council or in the field. Nevertheless the opposition welcomed him, and the new leader of the democrats succeeded not only in deterring his accusers from prose cuting the attack on him which they had begun, but also
in carrying his election to the consulship for 676 in which, 78. we may add, he was helped not only by the treasures exacted in Sicily, but also by the foolish endeavour of Pompeius to show Sulla and the pure Sullans on this occasion what he could do. Now that the opposition had,
on the death of Sulla, found head once more in Lepidus, and now that this their leader had become the supreme magistrate of the state, the speedy outbreak of new revolution in the capital might with certainty be foreseen.
But even before the democrats moved in the capital,
the democratic emigrants had again bestirred themselves in emigrants in Spain.
Spain. The soul of this movement was Quintus Sertorius. Sertorius. This excellent man, native of Nursia in the Sabine land,
was from the first of tender and even soft organization
as his almost enthusiastic love for his mother, Raia, shows
—and at the same time of the most chivalrous bravery, as was proved by the honourable scars which he brought home from the Cimbrian, Spanish, and Italian wars. Although wholly untrained as an orator, he excited the admiration of learned advocates the natural flow and the striking self-possession of his address. His remarkable
military and statesmanly talent had found opportunity of shining by contrast, more particularly in the revolutionary war which the democrats so wretchedly and stupidly mis managed; he was confessedly the only democratic oflicer
by
aa
a
a
a
;
a
a
it,
a
Renewed outbreak
enrrectlon
282
MARCUS LEPIDUS AND BOOK V
who knew how to prepare and to conduct war, and the only democratic statesman who opposed the insensate and
of his party with statesmanlike energy. soldiers called him the new Hannibal, and not merely because he had, like that hero, lost an eye in war. He in reality reminds us of the great Phoenician by cunning and courageous strategy, by his rare talent of organizing war by means of war, by his adroitness
furious doings His Spanish
his equally
nations to his interest and making them serviceable to his ends, by his prudence in success and misfortune, by the quickness of his ingenuity in turning
to good account his victories and averting the consequences of his defeats. It may be doubted whether any Roman statesman of the earlier period, or of the present, can be
in attracting foreign
in point of versatile talent to Sertorius. After
compared
Sulla’s generals had compelled him to quit Spain (p. 93), he had led a restless life of adventure along the Spanish and African coasts, sometimes in league, sometimes at war, with the Cilician pirates who haunted these seas, and with the chieftains of the roving tribes of Libya. The victorious
Roman restoration had pursued
he was besieging Tingis (Tangiers),
ciaecus from Roman Africa had come to the help of the prince of the town; but Pacciaecus was totally defeated, and Tingis was taken by Sertorius. On the report of such achievements by the. Roman refugee spreading abroad, the
their pretended sub mission to the Roman supremacy, practically maintained
Lusitanians, who, notwithstanding
their independence, and annually fought with the governors
sent envoys to Sertorius in Africa, to invite him to join them, and to commit to him the com
mand of their militia.
Sertorius, who twenty years before had served under
Titus Didius in Spain and knew the resources of the land,
of Further Spain,
of the with the invitation, and, leaving behind Spnishln- resolved to comply
him even thither: when
a corps under Pac
CHAP- t QUINTUS SERTORIUS 283
a small detachment on the Mauretanian coast, embarked for Spain (about 674). The straits separating Spain and Africa 80. were occupied by a Roman squadron commanded by Cotta ;
to steal through it was impossible; so Sertorius fought
his way through and succeeded in reaching the Lusitanians. There were not more than twenty Lusitanian communities that placed themselves under his orders; and even of
“ Romans ” he mustered only 2600 men, a considerable part of whom were deserters from the army of Pacciaecus
or Africans armed after the Roman style. Sertorius saw that everything depended on his associating with the loose
a strong nucleus of troops possessing Roman organization and discipline: for this end he reinforced the
band which he had brought with him by levying
infantry and 700 cavalry, and with this one legion and the swarms of Spanish volunteers advanced against the Romans.
The command in Further Spain was held by Lucius Fufidius,
who through his absolute devotion to Sulla—well tried
amidst the proscriptions—had risen from a subaltern to be propraetor; he was totally defeated on the Baetis; 2ooo Romans covered the field of battle. Messengers in all
haste summoned the governor of the adjoining province of
the Ebro, Marcus Domitius Calvinus, to check the farther advance of the Sertorians ; and there soon appeared (67 5) 79, also the experienced general Quintus Metellus, sent by Metellus Sulla to relieve the incapable Fufidius in southern Spain.
But they did not succeed in mastering the revolt. In the
Ebro province not only was the army of Calvinus destroyed
and he himself slain by the lieutenant of Sertorius, the quaestor Lucius Hirtuleius, but Lucius Manlius, the governor
of Transalpine Gaul, who had crossed the Pyrenees with
three legions to the help of his colleague, was totally defeated by the same brave leader. With difliculty Manlius escaped with a few men to Ilerda (Lerida) and thence to
his province, losing on the march his whole baggage through
guerilla-bands
4000
tions of Sertorius.
234
MARCUS LEPIDUS AND BOOK v
a sudden attack of the Aquitanian tribes. In Further Spain Metellus penetrated into the Lusitanian territory ; but Sertorius succeeded during the siege of Longobriga (not far from the mouth of the Tagus)v. in alluring a division under Aquinus into an ambush, and thereby compelling Metellus
himself to raise the siege and to evacuate the Lusitanian territory. Sertorius followed him, defeated on the Anas
the corps of Thorius, and inflicted vast damage by guerilla warfare on the army of the commander-in-chief himself. Metellus, a methodical and somewhat clumsy tactician, was in despair as to this opponent, who obstinately declined a decisive battle, but cut off his supplies and com munications and constantly hovered round him on all sides.
These extraordinary successes obtained by Sertorius in the two Spanish provinces were the more significant, that they were not achieved merely by arms and were not of a mere military nature. The emigrants as such were not formidable; nor were isolated successes of the Lusitanians under this or that foreign leader of much moment. But with the most decided political and patriotic tact Sertorius acted, whenever he could do so, not as condottiere of the Lusitanians in revolt against Rome, but as Roman general and governor of Spain, in which capacity he had in fact been sent thither . by the former rulers. He began 1 to form the heads of the
(Guadiana)
into a senate, which was to increase to members and to conduct affairs and to nominate magistrates in Roman form. He regarded his army as a Roman one, and filled the officers’ posts, without exception, with Romans. When facing the Spaniards, he was the governor, who by virtue of his office levied troops and other support from them; but he was a governor who, instead of exercising the usual despotic sway, endeavoured to attach the pro
emigration
300
1 At least the outline of these organlmtions must be assigned to the 80, 79, 78. years 674, 67 5, 676, although the execution of them doubtless belonged,
in great part, only to the subsequent years.
‘I’
CRAP. I QUINTUS SERTORIUS 285
vincials to Rome and to himself personally. His chivalrous character rendered it easy for him to enter into Spanish habits, and excited in the Spanish nobility the most ardent enthusiasm for the wonderful foreigner who had a spirit so kindred with their own. According to the warlike custom of personal following which subsisted in Spain as among the Celts and the Germans, thousands of the noblest Spaniards swore to stand faithfully by their Roman general unto death; and in them Sertorius found more trustworthy comrades than in his countrymen and party-associates. He did not disdain to turn to account the superstition of the ruder Spanish tribes, and to have his plans of war brought to him as commands of Diana by the white fawn of the goddess. Throughout he exercised a just and gentle rule.
His troops, at least so far as his eye and his arm reached, had to maintain the strictest discipline. Gentle as he generally was in punishing, he showed himself inexorable when any outrage was perpetrated by his soldiers on friendly soil. Nor was he inattentive to the permanent alleviation of the condition of the provincials; he reduced the tribute, and directed the soldiers to construct winter barracks for themselves, so that the oppressive burden of quartering the
‘ troops was done away and thus a source of unspeakable mischief and annoyance was stopped. For the children of Spaniards of quality an academy was erected at Osca (Huesca), in which they received the higher instruction usual in Rome, learning to speak Latin and Greek, and to wear the toga—a remarkable‘ measure, which was by no means designed merely to take from the allies in as gentle a form as possible the hostages that in Spain were inevitable, but was above all an emanation from, and an advance on, the great project of Gaius Gracchus and the democratic party for gradually Romanizing the provinces. It was the first attempt to accomplish their Romanization not by
extirpating
the old inhabitants and filling their places with
286 MARCUS LEPIDUS AND BOOK v
Italian emigrants, but by Romanizing the provincials them selves. The Optimates in Rome sneered at the wretched emigrant, the runaway from the Italian army, the last of the robber-band of Carbo ; the sorry taunt recoiled upon its authors. The masses that had been brought into the field against Sertorius were reckoned, including the Spanish general levy, at 120,000 infantry, 2000 archers and slingers, and 6000 cavalry. Against this enormous superiority of force Sertorius had not only held his ground in a series of successful conflicts and victories, but had also reduced the greater part of Spain under his power. In the Further province Metellus found himself confined to the districts immediately occupied by his troops; here all the tribes, who could, had taken the side of Sertorius. In the Hither province, after the victories of Hirtuleius, there no longer existed a Roman army. Emissaries of Sertorius roamed
the whole territory of Gaul; there, too, the tribes began to stir, and bands gathering together began to make the Alpine passes insecure. Lastly the sea too belonged quite as much to the insurgents as to the legitimate govern ment, since the allies of the former—the pirates—were almost as powerful in the Spanish waters as the Roman ‘ships of war. At the promontory of Diana (now Denia, between Valencia and Alicante) Sertorius established for the corsairs a fixed station, where they partly lay in wait for such Roman ships as were conveying supplies to the Roman maritime towns and the army, partly carried away or delivered goods for the insurgents, and partly formed their medium of intercourse with Italy and Asia Minor. The constant readiness of these men moving to and fro to carry everywhere sparks from the scene of conflagration tended
in a high degree to excite apprehension, especially at a time when so much combustible matter was everywhere accumulated in the Roman empire.
Amidst this state of matters the sudden death of Sulla
through
CHAP- l QUINTUS SERTORIUS 287
took place (676). So long as the man lived, at whose Death [1: voice a trained and trustworthy army of veterans was ready
any moment to rise, the oligarchy might tolerate the conse almost (as it seemed) definite abandonment of the Spanish quences' provinces to the emigrants, and the election of the leader
of the opposition at home to be supreme magistrate, at all events as transient misfortunes; and in their shortsighted way, yet not wholly without reason, might cherish con fidenoe either that the opposition would not venture to proceed to open conflict, or that, if it did venture, he who
had twice saved the oligarchy would set it up a third time. Now the state of things was changed. The democratic Hotspurs in the capital, long impatient of the endless delay and inflamed by the brilliant news from Spain, urged that a blow should be struck; and Lepidus, with whom the decision for the moment lay, entered into the proposal with all the zeal of a renegade and with his own character istic frivolity. For a moment it seemed as if the torch which kindled the funeral pile of the regent would also kindle civil war; but the influence of Pompeius and the
temper of the Sullan veterans induced the opposition to let the obsequies of the regent pass over in peace.
Yet all the more openly were arrangements thenceforth
made to introduce a fresh revolution. Daily the Forum 32,31; resounded with accusations against the “mock Romulus”
and his executioners. Even before the great potentate
had closed his eyes, the overthrow of the Sullan constitu
tion, the re-establishment of the distributions of grain, the reinstating of the tribunes of the people in their former position, the recall of those who were banished contrary to
law, the restoration of the confiscated lands, were openly
indicated by Lepidus and his adherents as the objects at which they aimed. Now communications were entered into with the proscribed; Marcus Perpenna, governor of Sicily in the days of Cinna 92), arrived in the capital.
Insurrec
(p.
288 MARCUS LEPIDUS AND BOOK v
The sons of those whom Sulla had declared guilty of treason*on whom the laws of the restoration bore with intolerable severity—and generally the more noted men of Marian views were invited to give their accession. Not a few, such as the young Lucius Cinna, joined the move ment; others, however, followed the example of Gaius Caesar, who had returned home from Asia on receiving the accounts of the death of Sulla and of the plans of Lepidus, but after becoming more accurately acquainted with the character of the leader and of the movement prudently withdrew. Carousing and recruiting went on in behalf of Lepidus in the taverns and brothels of the capital. At length a conspiracy against the new order of things was concocted among the Etruscan malcontents. 1
All this took place under the eyes of the government The consul Catulus as well as the more judicious Opti mates urged an immediate decisive interference and suppression of the revolt in the bud ; the indolent majority, however, could not make up their minds to begin the
struggle, but tried to deceive themselves as long as possible by a system of compromises and concessions. Lepidus also on his part at first entered into it. The suggestion, which proposed a restoration of the prerogatives taken away from the tribunes of the people, he as well as his col league Catulus repelled. On the other hand, the Gracchan distribution of grain was to a limited extent re-established. According to it not all (as according to the Sempronian law) but only a definite number-—presumably 4o,ooo— of the poorer burgesses appear to have received the earlier
as Gracchus had fixed them, of five moa'ii monthly at the price of 6% arrer (3d. )—a regulation which occasioned to the treasury an annual net loss of at least
1 The following narrative rests substantially on the account of Licini anus, which, fragmentary as it is at this very point, still givu important information as to the insurrection of Lepidus.
largesses,
CRAP. i QUINTUS SERTORIUS 289
£40,000. ‘ The opposition, naturally as little satisfied as it was decidedly emboldened by this partial concession, displayed all the more rudeness and violence in the capital; and in Etruria, the true centre of all insurrections of the Italian proletariate, civil war already broke out, the dispossessed Faesulans resumed possession of their lost estates by force of arms, and several of the veterans settled there by Sulla perished in the tumult. The senate on learning what had occurred resolved to send the two consuls thither, in order to raise troops and suppress the insurrection. ‘z It was impossible to adopt a more irra
1 Under the year 676 Licinianus states (p. 23, Pertz; p. 42, Bonn); 78, (Lepidu: f) [lelgem frummtarzIam] nullo rerirtant: )[argz'jtur :41, ut ann0n[ae] quinque modi popu[la da]rmtur. According to this account, therefore, the law of the consuls of 681 Marcus Terentius Lucullus and 73,
Gaius Cassius Varus, which Cicero mentions (in Verr. iii. 70, I36; v. 2:, 52), and to which also Sallust refers (Hirt. iii. 61, 19 Dietsch), did not first re-establish the five modii, but only secured the largesses of grain by regu lating the purchases of Sicilian corn, and perhaps made various alterations of detaiL That the Sempronian law (iii. 344) allowed every burgess domiciled in Rome to share in the largesses of grain, is certain. But the later distri bution of grain was not so extensive as this, for, seeing that the monthly corn of the Roman burgesses amounted to little more than 33,000 medimm'
=198,ooo modz'i (Cic. Verr. iii. 30, 72), only some 40,000 burgesses at that time received grain, whereas the number of burgesses domiciled in the capital was certainly far more considerable. This arrangement probably proceeded from the Octavian law, which introduced instead of the ex travagant Sempronian amount “a moderate largess, tolerable for the state and necessary for the common people" (Cic. d: 015 21, 72, Brut. 62, 222) and to all appearance this very law that the lexfrumen {aria mentioned by Licinianus. That Lepidus should have entered into such a proposal of compromise, accords with his attitude as regards the restoration of the tribunate. It likewise in keeping with the circum stances that the democracy should find itself not at all satisfied by the regulation, brought about in this way, of the distribution of grain (Sallust, 1. 0. The amount of loss calculated on the basis of the grain being worth at least double (iii. 344); when piracy or other causes drove up the price of grain, a far more considerable loss must have resulted.
From the fragments of ‘the account of Licinianus (p. 44, Bonn) plain that the decree of the senate, uti Lepidur :t Calulur decretir exer n'tibur maturrime proficz'rcerentur (Sallust, Hirt. 44 Dietsch), to be understood not of a despatch of the consuls before the expiry of their consulship to their proconsular provinces, for which there would have been no reason, but of their being sent to Etruria against the revolted Faesulans, just as in the Catilinarian war the consul Gaius Antonius was dapatched to the same quarter. The statement of Philippus in Sallust
110
(Hist.
VOL IV
48, that Lepidus ob . redz'lionem provinciam cum exercitu adtplus
i. 4)
;
i.
is
it is
’
is
is
it is
is
ii.
=90
MARCUS LEPIDUS AND aoorc v
tional course. The senate, in presence of the insurrec tion, evinced its pusillanimity and its fears by the re establishment of the com-law; in order to be relieved from a street-riot, it furnished the notorious head of the insurrection with an army; and, when the two consuls were bound by the most solemn oath which could be contrived not to turn the arms entrusted to them against each other, it must have required the superhuman obduracy of oligarchic consciences to think of erecting such a bulwark against the impending insurrection. Of course Lepidus armed in Etruria not for the senate, but for the insurrec tion—sarcastically declaring that the oath which he had taken bound him only for the current year. The senate put the oracular machinery in motion to induce him to return, and committed to him the conduct of the impend ing consular elections; but Lepidus evaded compliance, and, while messengers passed to and fro and the official year drew to an end amidst proposals of accommodation, his force swelled to an army. When at length, in the
77o beginning of the following year (677), the definite order of the senate was issued to Lepidus to return without delay, the proconsul haughtily refused obedience, and de manded in his turn the renewal of the former tribunician power, the reinstatement of those who had been forcibly ejected from their civic rights and their property, and, besides this, his own re-election as consul for the current year or, in other words, the zj’ranm'r in legal form.
Thus war was declared. The senatorial party could
Outbreak
of the war. reckon, in addition to the Sullan veterans whose civil exist
ence was threatened by Lepidus, upon the army assembled by the proconsul Catulus; and so, in compliance with the
urgent warnings
of the more sagacious, particularly of
at, is entirely in harmony with this view; for the extraordinary consular wmrnand in Etruria was just as much a prom‘rwia u the ordinary pra oonsular command in Narbonese Gaul.
can. i QUINTUS SERTORIUS 291
Philippus, Catulus was entrusted by the senate with the defence of the capital and the repelling of the main force of the democratic party stationed in Etruria. At the same time Gnaeus Pompeius was despatched with another corps
tgwsst from
his former protégé the valley of the Po, which was held by Lepidus’ lieutenant, Marcushlirutus.
While Pompeius speedily
and shut up the enemy’s general closely in Mutina, Lepidus_ appeared before the capital in order to conquer it for the revolution as Marius had formerly done by storm.
The “right bank of thewfl‘iberwfellwwhollyv into vhiswpower, and'he' was gEBTé’Eéen ‘to cross the river. The decisive
battle waswfdught on the Campus Martius, close under the
walls of the city. But Catulus conquered ;v and Lepidus Lepidus was compelled toretrggt to ‘Etruria, while another division, defeated. underhi's‘son Scipio, threw itself into the fortress of Alba. Thereupon the rising was substantially at an end. Mutina surwgmpgiji; and Brutus was, notwithstand
ing the safe-conduct promised to him, subsequently put
to death by order of that general. Alba too was, after a
long siege, reduced by famine, and the leader there was
likewise executed. Lepidus, pressed on two sides by
Catulus and Pompeius, fought another engagement on the
Etruria in order merely to procure the means of retreatfafi'd’theii embarked at the port of Cosa for Sardinia,
from which point he hoped to cut off the supplies of the
capital, and to obtain communication with the Spanish insurgents. But the governor of the island opposed to
him a vigorous resistance; and he himself died, not long Death of after his landing, of consumption (677), whereupon the Lepidus. war in Sardinia came to an end. A part of his soldiers dispersed; with the flower of the insurrectionary army
and with a well-filled chest the late praetor, Marcus Perpenna, proceeded to Liguria, and thence to Spain to
join the Seitorians.
c‘dagtbf
aCCOmpllSlledg_l'll§m commission
Pompeius mom
command in Spain.
The oligarchy was thus victorious over Lepidus; but it found itself compelled by the dangérbifsmr the SEELw torian wvarto concessions, which violated the letter as well as the “spirit of the Sullan constitution. It was absolutely
:92
MARCUS LEPIDUS AND BOOK v
‘mu-wu
necessary to send7 gawstfong army and an able generali to
Spain; and. Pompeius indicated, very plainly,v that he desired, or rather demanded, this cornmjgjon. The pre tensio‘rY‘wa's bold. Itgwas already had enough that they had allowed this secret‘ opponent agaiiiFattaimanmextra ordinary command in the pressuie of the hepidiaiivtr‘eivolu tion; but it was far more hazardous, in disregard of all the rules instituted by Sulla for the magisterial hieraifqhy, to invest a man who had hitherto filled no civil oflice with one of the most important ordinary proyincialgvqggrnworships, under'circumstances in which the observance of the legal term of a year was not to be thought of. The oligarchy had thus, even apart from the respect due to their general Metellus, good reason to oppose with all earnestness this new attempt of the ambitious youth to perpetuate his exceptional position. But this was not easy. In the first place, they had not a single man fitted for the diflicult post of general inSp’a‘Hin. ‘ 'mtfla'é'fgfiiié' consuls 6f1h€§é§r showed any desire to measure himself against Sertorius; and what Lucius Philippus said in a full meeting of the senate had to be admitted as too true—that, a‘nigpgaailihe senators of note, not one was able and willing to command in a seriousyyar. Yet they might, perhaps, have got over this, and after the manner of oligarchs, when they had no capable candidate, have filled the place with some sort of makeshift, if Pompeius had merely desired the command and had not demanded it at the head of angarrny. He had already rent a deaf ear to the injunctions of Catulus that he shouldwdismissmtglgguagm ; it was at least doubtful whethe'r'those of the senate would find a better reception, and the consequences of a breach no one could calculate
CHAP. l QUINTUS SERTORIUS 293
—the scale of aristocracy might very easily mount up, if the sword of a well-known general were thrown into the
scale. So the majority resolved on concession. Not from the people, which constitutionally ought to have been consulted in a case where a private man was to be invested with the supreme magisterial power, but from the séiia‘t'e, Pompeius received proconsular authority
chief v epfiirfiind‘in Hither Spain; and, forty days after he had 'received crossed the Alps in the summer of 677. 77.
First of all the new general found employment in Gaul, Pompeius where no formal insurrection had broken out, but serioushuGmL disturbances of the peace had occurred at several places;
in consequence of which Pompeius deprived the cantons of
the Volcae-Arecomici and the Helvii of their independence,
and placed them under Massilia. He also laid out new
road over the Cottian Alps (Mont Genevre, 258), and
so established a shorter communication between the valley
of the Po and Gaul. Amidst this work the best season of
the year passed away; was not till late in autumn that Pompeius crossed the Pyrenees.
Sertorius had meanwhile not been idle. He had de spatched Hirtuleius into the Further province to keep Metellus in check, and had himself endeavoured to follow up his complete victory in the Hither province, and to
for the reception of Pompeius. The isolated Celtiberian towns there, which still adhered to Rome, were attacked and reduced one after another; at last, in the very middle of winter, the strong Contrebia (south-east of Saragossa) had fallen. In vain the hard-pressed towns had sent message after message to Pompeius; would not be
opposite
prepare
any entreaties to depart from his wonted ,rut of slowly advancing. With the exception of the maritime towns, which were defended the Roman fleet, and the
induced
of the Indigetes and Laletani in the north-east corner of Spain, where Pompeius established himself after
Appear.
2:35;“, in Spain.
districts
andwthe
"
by
by
he
it
ii.
a
r)
\v
it,
294
MARCUS LEPIDUS AND 8001! v
he had at length crossed the Pyrenees, and made his raw troops bivouac throughout the winter to inure them to hardships, the whole of Hither Spain had at the end of
77. 677 become by treaty or force dependent on Sertorius, and the district on the upper and middle Ebro thenceforth continued the main stay of his power. Even the appre hension, which the fresh Roman force and the celebrated name of the general excited in the army of the insurgents, had a salutary effect on Marcus Perpenna, who hitherto as the equal of Sertorius in rank had claimed an inde
command over the force which he had brought with him from Liguria, was, on the news of the arrival of Pompeius in Spain, compelled by his soldiers to place himself under the orders of his ables colleague.
{Ear the campaign of 678 Sertorius again employed the corpslof Hirtuleius against Metellus, while Perpenna with strong army took up his position along the lower course
of the Ebro to prevent Pompeius from crossing the river, he should march, as was to be expected, in southerly
direction with the view of effecting junction with Metellus, and along the coast for the sake of procuring supplies for his troops‘; The corps of Gaius Herennius was destined to the immediate support of Perpenna farther inland on the upper Ebro, Sertorius in person prosecuted meanwhile the subjugation of several districts friendly to Rome, and held himself at the same time ready to hasten according to circumstances to the aid of Perpenna or Hirtuleius. It was still his intention to avoid any pitched battle, and to anno the enemy by petty conflicts and cutting off supplies.
Ebmpeius, however, forced the passageioifwthe Ebro against Perpenna and took up position on the river Pallantias, near Saguntum, whence, as we have already said, the Sertorians maintained their communications with Italy and the It was time that Sertorius should appear in persona, asn? throw the superiority of his numbers
pendent
Pompeius defeated.
76.
a;a
if
a
a
it.
CHAP. I QUINTUS SERTORIUS 295
and of his genius into the scale against the greater excellence of the soldiers of his opponent. For a considerable time the struggle was concentrated around the town of Lauro (on the ' Xucar, south of Valencia), which had declared for Pompeius and was on that account besieged by Sertorius.
himself to the utmost to relieve it; but, after several of his divisions had already been assailed
Pompeiusgxerted
separately and cut to pieces, the great warrior found himsel
—just when he thought that he had surrounded the Ser "Tl-W.
\. v torians, and when he had already invited the besieged to
be spectators of the capture of the besieging army-—all owfwakm sudden completelyoutmanoeuvred; and in order that he might name himself surrounded, he had to look on fromuhivsficgmp
at the capture and reduction to ashes of the allied town and
‘at the carrying oil‘ of its inhabitants to Lusitania—an event whichin'duced a number of towns that had been wavering in middle and eastern Spain to adhere anew to Sertorius.
Meanwhile MetelluSiQBEht uhhhsttermfottnne- In a Victoriesd sharp engagement at Italica (not far from Seville), which Metellus‘
Hirtuleius had imprudently risked, and in which both generals fought hand to hand and Hirtuleius was wounded, Metellus defeated him and compelled him to evacuate the Ranaii’fénimy proper, and to throw himself into Lusitania.
This victory permitted Metellus to unite“ flitll'gompgius.
The two generals took up their winter-quarters in 678-79 at 76-75, the Pyrenees, and in the next campaign in 679 they resolved 75, to make a joint attack on the enemy in his position near Valentia. But while Metellus was advancing, Pompeius offered battle beforehand-to the main army of the enemy,
with a view to wipe out the of Lauro to gaipathe ‘ stain and
expect-ed laurels, if possible, alone. With “36'; Sertorius embraced the opportunity of fighting with Pompeius before Metellus arrived.
The armies met on the river Sucgo (Xpsar) : after “a Battle on sharp conflictvPompeius was beaten on the right wing,
/_~. -‘
II! w";- the sum
-
,- p-n- . . . pm
296
MARCUS LEPIDUS AND Boox v
and was himself carried from thejeldvsevergllmulided. M
Afranius no doubt conquerednwipth;the'lefiand topk the camp of the Sertorians,‘ but during its pillage he was
suddenly assailed by Sertorius‘ compelleslwalso to give way. Had Sertorius been able to renew the battle on the
following day, the army of Pompeius would iié'fiiEtiiGé been
annihilated. But meanwhile Metellus had come up, had over . v. . . . . . _-v. M ‘ . va g- . |. »_ “exams-us
thrown the corps of Perpenna ranged take anmd“nW' “M
his camp: it was not possible to resume the battle against’:
the two armies united. The successeggf
junction of the hostile forces, the sudden stagnation after the victory, diffused terror among the Sertorians ; and, as not unfrequently happened with Spanish armies, in con sequence of this turn of things the greater portion of the Sertorian soldiers dispersed. But the despondency passed away as quickly as it had come; the white fawn, which represented in the eyes of the multitude the military plans of the general, was soon more popular than ever; in a short time Sertorius appeared with a new army confronting the Romans in the level country to the south of §agtirivtum
M§t§1lus,_the
which firmly adhered to Rome, while the Sertorian privateers impeded the Roman supplies by sea, and scarcity was already making itself felt in the Roman camp. Another battle took place in the plains of the river Turia
(Murviedro),
and the struggle was long undecided.
(Guadalaviar),
Pompeius with the cavalry was defeated.
his brother-in-law and quaestor, the brave Lucius Memmius,
was slain; on the other hand Metellus vwp. v.
vanquished vlierpenna,
and victoriously repelled the attack of the enemy’is'“iinain army directed against him, receiving himself {5065331 the
conflict. Once more the Sertorian army
Valentia, which Gaius Herennius hetdTor
taken and razed to the ground. The Romans,
for a moment, cherished a hope that they were done with their tough antagonist. The Sertorian army had dis
bygiertggipsliid
MwIM
dispersed. SerrormsT‘waS
probably
cm. 1 QUINTUS SERTORIUS 297
appeared; the Roman troops, penetrating far into the interior, besieged the*general himself in thefortress. Clunia on the upper Douro. But while they vainly invested this rocky stronghold, the contingents of the insurgent com munities assembled elsewhere; Sertoriusstole. outof. the fortress and even before the expiry of the year stood once
at the head of an army.
Again the‘ Roman generals had to take up their winter
quarters with the cheerless prospect of an inevitable renewal of their Sisyphean war-toils. It was not even possible to choose quarters in the region of Valentia, so important on account of the communication with Italy and the east, but fearfully devastated by friend and foe; Pompeius led his troops first intothe. writers‘012 . theXascoaesl (Biscay) and then spent the winter in the territory of the Vaccaei (about Valladolid), and Metellus even in Gaul.
For five “W Indefinite . v,v~w. . _. years the soerlgwrianwwar wthu“sbconwtinuedhapd
still there seemed no prospect of its termination. The state 2:210“, it beyond description. The flower of the character
rtalian youth perished amid the exhausting fatigues of these campaigns. The public treasuryv was not only deprived of war. the Spanishwgevenues, but had annually to send to Spain ror‘ui'éfiiy and maintenance of the Spanish armies very considerable‘ sums, which the government hardly knew how
to raise. Spain was devastated and impoverished, and the Roman civilization, which unfolded so fair a promise there, received a severe shock; as was naturally to be expected
in the case of an insurrectionary war waged with so much bitterness, and but too often occasioning the destruction of whole communities. Even the towns which adhered to
the dominant party in Rome had countless hardships to
1 In the recently found fragments of Sallust, which appear to belong
to the campaign of 679. the following words relate to this incident: 75. Romania [urn-Pita: (of Pompeius)frumenti g‘rn[tia rjmotur in Van-ant:
ei
m'o'ie'asmgeneral
i Aria: fer-ind:
. . . [itjemgue Serlan'u: man . . . e, cuiur mullum ne
[r'kr
e! Italiae in[lntr]at, inferdudcrdur].
an
298
MARCUS LEPIDUS AND BOOK v
endure; those situated on the coast had to be provided with necessaries by the Roman fleet, and the situation of the faithful communities in the interior was almost desperate. Gaul suffered hardly less, partly from the requisitions for contingents of infantry and cavalry, for grain and money, partly from the oppressive burden of the winter-quarters, which rose to an intolerable degree in consequence of the
14. bad harvest of 680 ; almost all the local treasuries were compelled to betake themselves to the Roman bankers, and to burden themselves with a crushing load of debt. Generals and soldiers carried on the war with reluctance. The‘genefalsmhad‘ encounteredan opponent far supeiiormm talent, a tough and protracted resistance, a warfare of very serious perils and of successes difficult to be attained and far from brilliant; it was asserted that Pompeius was scheming to get himself recalled from Spain. and entrusted with a more desirable command somewhere else. The soldiersdoq-foun‘d‘little satisfaction in ‘a campaign in which not only was there nothing to be got save hard blows and worthless booty, but their very pay was doled out to them with extreme irregularity. Pompeius reportedwttlthe senatg
76. at the end of 679, that the paymwas'two‘years infiarregraand that the army was threatening to break up. The Roman government might certainly have obviated a considerable portion of these evils, if they could have prevailed on them selves to carry on the Spanish war with less remissness, to say nothing of better will. In the main, however, it was neither their fault nor the fault of their generals that a genius so superior as that of Sertorius was able to carry on this petty warfare year after year, despite of all numerical and military superiority, on ground so thoroughly favourable to insurrectionary and piratical warfare. So little could its end be foreseen, that the Sertorian insurrection seemed rather as if it would become intermingled with other contemporary revolts and thereby add to its dangerous character.
Just
can. I QUINTUS SERTORIUS 299
at that time the Romans were contending on every sea with piratical fleets, in Italy with the revolted slaves, in Mace donia with the tribes on the lower Danube; and in the east Mithradates, partly induced by the successes of the Spanish insurrection, resolved once more to try the fortune of arms. That Sertorius had formed connections vLith the Italian and Macedonian enemies of Rome, cannot be distinctly affirmed,
he certainly was in constant intercourse with the Marians in Italy. With the pirates, on the other hand, he had previously formed an avowed league, and with the Pontic king—with whom he had long maintained relations through the medium of the Roman emigrants staying at his court—he now concluded a formal treaty of alliance, in which Sertorius ceded to the king the client-states of Asia Minor, but not the Roman province of Asia, and promised, moreover, to send him an oflicer qualified to lead his troops, and a number of soldiers, while the king, in turn, bound himself to transmit to Sertorius forty ships and 3000 talents (£720,000). The wise politicians in the capital were already recalling the time when Italy found itself threatened by Philip from the east and by Hannibal from the west; they conceived that the new Hannibal, just like his pre decessor, after having by himself subdued Spain, could easily arrive with the forces of Spain in Italy sooner than Pompeius, in order that, like the Phoenician formerly, he might summon the Etruscans and Samnites to arms against Rome.
But this comparison was more ingenious than accurate. Collapse
although
Sertorius was far from being strong enough to renew the of the power of
gigantic enterprise of Hannibal. He was lost if he left Spain, Sertorius. where all his successes were bound up with the peculiarities
of the country and the people ; and even there he was more
and more compelled to renounce the offensive. His admirable skill as a leader could not change the nature of
his troops. The Spanish militia retained its
. “cHha-rMacs,ter,
',s. _wa~ (“m““M wm-“fi-rwwi’amr . t, ‘. .