His cavalry
preceded him, but the order of march was different from that which had
been communicated to the Nervii by the deserters; as he approached the
enemy, he had, according to his custom, united six legions, and placed
the baggage in the tail of the column, under the guard of the two
legions recently raised, who closed the march.
preceded him, but the order of march was different from that which had
been communicated to the Nervii by the deserters; as he approached the
enemy, he had, according to his custom, united six legions, and placed
the baggage in the tail of the column, under the guard of the two
legions recently raised, who closed the march.
Napoleon - History of Julius Caesar - b
[231] The short and sharp-pointed swords
of the Romans had the advantage over the long swords of the
Germans. [232] Nevertheless, according to Appian, the legions owed their
victory chiefly to the superiority of their tactics and the steadiness
with which they kept their ranks. [233] Ariovistus’s left did not resist
long; but while it was driven back and put to flight, the right, forming
in deep masses, pressed the Romans hard. Young P. Crassus, commander of
the cavalry placed at a distance from the thick of the battle, and
better placed to judge of its incidents, perceived this, sent the third
line to the succour of the wavering legions, and restored the combat.
Soon Ariovistus’s right was obliged to give way in its turn; the rout
then became general, and the Germans desisted from flight only when they
reached the Rhine, fifty miles from the field of battle. [234] They
descended, no doubt, the valley of the Ill as far as Rhinau, thus
retracing a part of the road by which they had come. (_See Plate 4. _)
Cæsar sent his cavalry after them; all who were overtaken were cut to
pieces; the rest attempted to swim across the river, or sought safety in
boats. Among the latter was Ariovistus, who threw himself into a
boat[235] he found attached to the bank. According to Plutarch and
Appian,[236] 80,000 men perished in the combat and during the pursuit.
Two of the wives of the German king experienced the same fate; one was a
Sueve, the other a Norician. Of his two daughters, one was killed and
the other taken prisoner. Cæsar says that, as he himself pursued the
enemy with his cavalry, he experienced a pleasure equal to that given by
victory when he recovered, first Procillus, loaded with a triple chain,
and who had thrice seen the barbarians draw lots whether he should be
burnt alive or not, and, subsequently, M. Mettius, both of whom, as we
have seen, had been sent by him as messengers to Ariovistus.
The report of this glorious exploit having spread beyond the Rhine, the
Suevi, who had come to its banks, returned home. The Ubii, who dwelt
near the river, pursued their terrified bands, and slew a considerable
number of the fugitives.
Cæsar, having concluded two great wars in one single campaign, placed
his army in winter quarters among the Sequani rather sooner than the
season required--at the beginning of September--and left them under the
command of Labienus. He then left, and went to hold the assemblies in
Cisalpine Gaul. [237]
[Sidenote: Observations. ]
IX. There are several things worthy of remark in this campaign:--
1. The resolution taken by Cæsar to gain possession of Besançon, and
thus to anticipate Ariovistus. We see the importance which he attaches
to that military position as a point of support and of supply.
2. The facility with which a whole legion transforms itself into
cavalry.
3. The judicious use which Cæsar makes of his light troops (_alarii_),
by assembling them in mass, so that the enemy should believe in a
greater number of legions.
4. Lastly, this singular circumstance, that the third line, which serves
as reserve and decides the fate of the battle, receives from young P.
Crassus, and not from the general-in-chief, the order to attack.
The dates of the principal events of this year may be indicated in the
following manner:--
Rendezvous of the Helvetii on the
banks of the Rhone (the day of the
equinox) March 24.
Cæsar refuses them a passage through
the province April 8.
Arrival at the confluence of the Rhone
and the Saône of the legions from
Italy and Illyria June 7.
Defeat of the Tigurini on the Saône June 10.
Passage of the Saône by Cæsar June 12.
About fifteen days’ march (_De Bello
Gallico_, I. 15) From June 13 to June 27.
Manœuvre of Labienus to surprise the
Helvetii June 28.
Battle of Bibracte June 29.
Cæsar remains three days interring the
dead; marches on the fourth; employs
six days in his march from
the field of battle to the country of
the Lingones, and there overtakes
the Helvetii in their retreat,
From June 30 to July 8.
Negotiations with Ariovistus (a month),
From July 8 to August 8.
Departure of Cæsar (from Tonnerre,
to meet Ariovistus) August 10.
Arrival of Cæsar at Besançon August 16.
Abode of Cæsar at Besançon,
From August 16 to August 22.
Departure from Besançon (“the harvest
is ripe,” _De Bello Gallico_, I. 40) August 22.
March of seven days from Besançon
to the Rhine From August 22 to August 28.
Interview (five days afterwards) September 2.
Manœuvres (about eight days),
From September 3 to September 10.
Battle of the Thur (fought before the
new moon, which took place on the
18th of September) September 10.
CHAPTER V.
WAR AGAINST THE BELGÆ.
(Year of Rome 697. )
(BOOK II. OF THE “COMMENTARIES. ”)
[Sidenote: League of the Belgæ. Cæsar advances from Besançon to the
Aisne. ]
I. The brilliant successes gained by Cæsar over the Helvetii and the
Germans had delivered the Republic from an immense danger, but at the
same time they had roused the distrust and jealousy of most of the
nations of Gaul. These conceived fears for their independence, which
were further increased by the presence of the Roman army in Sequania.
The irritation was very great among the Belgæ. They feared that their
turn to be attacked would come when Celtic Gaul was once reduced to
peace. Besides, they were excited by influential men who understood
that, under Roman domination, they would have less chance of obtaining
possession of the supreme power. The different tribes of Belgic Gaul
entered into a formidable league, and reciprocally exchanged hostages.
Cæsar learnt these events in the Cisalpine province, through public
rumour and the letters of Labienus. Alarmed at the news, he raised two
legions in Italy, the 13th and 14th, and, in the beginning of
spring,[238] sent them into Gaul, under the command of the lieutenant
Q. Pedius. [239] It is probable that these troops, to reach Sequania
promptly, crossed the Great St. Bernard, for Strabo relates that one of
the three routes which led from Italy into Gaul passed by Mount
Pœrinus (_Great St. Bernard_), after having traversed the country of
the Salassi (_Valley of Aosta_), and that this latter people offered at
first to assist Cæsar’s troops in their passage by levelling the roads
and throwing bridges across the torrents; but that, suddenly changing
their tone, they had rolled masses of rock down upon them and pillaged
their baggage. It was no doubt in the sequel of this defection that,
towards the end of the year 697, Cæsar, as we shall see farther on, sent
Galba into the Valais, to take vengeance on the mountaineers for their
perfidious conduct and to open a safe communication with Italy. [240]
As soon as forage was abundant, he rejoined his legions in person,
probably at Besançon, since, as we have seen, they had been placed in
winter quarters in Sequania. He charged the Senones and the other Celts
who bordered upon Belgic Gaul to watch what was doing there and inform
him of it. Their reports were unanimous: troops were being raised, and
an army was assembling. Cæsar then decided upon immediately entering
into campaign.
His army consisted of eight legions: they bore the numbers 7, 8, 9, 10,
11, 12, 13, and 14. As their effective force, in consequence of marches
and previous combats, cannot have been complete, we may admit a mean of
5,000 men to the legion, which would make 40,000 men of infantry. Adding
to these one-third of auxiliaries, Cretan archers, slingers, and
Numidians, the total of infantry would have been 53,000 men. There was,
in addition to these, 5,000 cavalry and a body of Æduan troops under the
command of Divitiacus. Thus the army of Cæsar amounted to at least
60,000 soldiers, without reckoning the servants for the machines,
drivers, and valets, who, according to the instance cited by Orosius,
amounted to a very considerable number. [241]
After securing provisions, Cæsar started from Besançon, probably in the
second fortnight in May, passed the Saône at Seveux (_see Plate 4_),
crossed the country of the Lingones in the direction of Langres, at
Bar-sur-Aube, and entered, towards Vitry-le-François, on the territory
of the Remi, having marched in about a fortnight 230 kilomètres, the
distance from Besançon to Vitry-le-François. [242]
The Remi were the first Belgic people he encountered in his road (_qui
proximi Galliæ ex Belgis sunt_). Astonished at his sudden appearance,
they sent two deputies, Iccius and Adecumborius, the first personages of
their country, to make their submission, and offer provisions and every
kind of succour. They informed Cæsar that all the Belgæ were in arms,
and that the Germans on that side of the Rhine had joined the coalition;
for themselves, they had refused to take any part in it, but the
excitement was so great that they had not been able to dissuade from
their warlike projects the Suessiones themselves, who were united with
them by community of origin, laws, and interests. “The Belgæ,” they
added, “proud of having been formerly the only people of Gaul who
preserved their territory from the invasion of the Teutones and Cimbri,
had the loftiest idea of their own valour. In their general assembly,
each people had engaged to furnish the following contingents:--The
Bellovaci, the most warlike, could send into the field 100,000 men; they
have promised 60,000 picked troops, and claim the supreme direction of
the war. The Suessiones, their neighbours, masters of a vast and fertile
territory, in which are reckoned twelve towns, furnish 50,000 men; they
have for their king Galba, who has been invested, by the consent of the
allies, with the chief command. The Nervii, the most distant of all, and
the most barbarous among these peoples, furnish the same number; the
Atrebates, 15,000; the Ambiani, 10,000; the Morini, 25,000; the Menapii,
7000; the Caletes, 10,000; the Veliocasses and the Veromandui, 10,000;
the Aduatuci, 19,000; lastly, the Condrusi, Eburones, Cæresi, and
Pæmani, comprised under the general name of Germans, are to send 40,000;
in all, about 296,000 men. ”[243]
[Sidenote: Cæsar’s Camp at Berry-au-Bac. ]
II. Cæsar could judge, from this information, the formidable character
of the league which he had now to combat. His first care was to try to
divide the hostile forces, and, with this view, he induced Divitiacus,
in spite of the friendly relations which had long united the Ædui with
the Bellovaci, to invade and ravage the territory of the latter with the
Æduan troops. He then required the senate of the Remi to repair to his
presence, and the children of the _principes_ to be brought to him as
hostages; and then, on information that Galba was marching to meet him,
he resolved to move to the other side of the Aisne, which crossed the
extremity of the territory of the Remi (_quod est in extremis Remorum
finibus_),[244] and encamp there in a strong position, to await the
enemy’s attack. The road he had hitherto followed led straight to the
Aisne, and crossed it by a bridge at the spot where now stands the
village of Berry-au-Bac. (_See Plate 7. _) He marched in great haste
towards this bridge, led his army across it, and fixed his camp on the
right side of the road, on the hill situated between the Aisne and the
Miette, a small stream with marshy banks, which makes a bend in that
river between Berry-au-Bac and Pontavert. (_See Plate 8. _) This hill,
called Mauchamp, is of small elevation (about 25 mètres) above the
valley of the Aisne, and in its length, from east to west, it presents
sufficient space for the Roman army to deploy. Laterally, it sinks to
the level of the surrounding ground by slight undulations, and the side
which looks upon the Miette descends by a gentle slope towards the banks
of the stream. This position offered several advantages: the Aisne
defended one side of the camp; the rear of the army was protected, and
the transports of provisions could arrive in safety through the
countries of the Remi and other friendly peoples. Cæsar ordered a work
to be constructed on the right bank of the Aisne, at the extremity of
the bridge, where he established a post (_see Plates 8 and 9_),[245] and
he left on the other side of the river the lieutenant Q. Titurius
Sabinus with six cohorts. The camp was surrounded by a retrenchment
twelve feet high, and by a fosse eighteen feet wide. [246]
Meanwhile the Belgæ, after having concentrated their forces in the
country of the Suessiones, to the north of the Aisne, had invaded the
territory of the Remi. On their road, and at eight miles from the Roman
camp (_see Plate 7_), was a town of the Remi called Bibrax
(_Vieux-Laon_). [247] The Belgæ attacked it vigorously, and it was
defended with difficulty all day. These peoples, like the Celts,
attacked fortresses by surrounding them with a crowd of combatants,
throwing from every side a great quantity of stones, to drive the
defenders away from the walls; then, forming the tortoise, they advanced
against the gates and sapped the walls. When night had put a stop to the
attack, Iccius, who commanded in the town, sent information to Cæsar
that he could hold out no longer, unless he received prompt succour.
Towards midnight the latter sent him Numidians, Cretan archers, and
Balearic slingers, who had the messengers of Iccius for their guides.
This re-enforcement raised the courage of the besieged, and deprived the
enemy of the hope of taking the town; and after remaining some time
round Bibrax, laying waste the land and burning the hamlets and houses,
they marched towards Cæsar, and halted at less than two miles from his
camp. Their fires, kindled on the right bank of the Miette, indicated a
front of more than 8,000 paces (twelve kilomètres).
The great numbers of the enemy, and their high renown for bravery, led
the proconsul to resolve to postpone the battle. If his legions had in
his eyes an incontestible superiority, he wished, nevertheless, to
ascertain what he could expect from his cavalry, which was composed of
Gauls. For this purpose, and to try, at the same time, the courage of
the Belgæ, he engaged them every day in cavalry combats in the undulated
plain to the north of the camp. Once certain that his troops did not
yield in valour to those of the enemy, he resolved to draw them into a
general action. In front of the entrenchments was an extensive tract of
ground, advantageous for ranging an army in order of battle. This
commanding position was covered in front and on the left by the marshes
of the Miette. The right only remained unsupported, and the Belgæ might
have taken the Romans in flank in the space between the camp and the
stream, or turned them by passing between the camp and the Aisne. To
meet this danger, Cæsar made, on each of the two slopes of the hill, a
fosse, perpendicular to the line of battle, about 400 paces (600 mètres)
in length, the first reaching from the camp to the Miette, the second
joining it to the Aisne. At the extremity of these fosses he established
redoubts, in which were placed military machines. [248]
[Sidenote: Battle on the Aisne. ]
III. Having made these dispositions, and having left in the camp his two
newly-raised legions to serve as a reserve in case of need, Cæsar placed
the six others in array of battle, the right resting on the
retrenchments. The enemy also drew out his troops and deployed them in
face of the Romans. The two armies remained in observation, each waiting
till the other passed the marsh of the Miette, as the favourable moment
for attack. Meanwhile, as they remained thus stationary, the cavalry
were fighting on both sides. After a successful charge, Cæsar,
perceiving that the enemies persisted in not entering the marshes,
withdrew his legions. The Belgæ immediately left their position to move
towards the Aisne, below the point where the Miette entered it. Their
object was to cross the river between Gernicourt and Pontavert, where
there were fords, with part of their troops, to carry, if they could,
the redoubt commanded by the lieutenant Q. Titurius Sabinus, and to cut
the bridge, or, at least, to intercept the convoys of provisions, and
ravage the country of the Remi, to the south of the Aisne, whence the
Romans drew their supplies.
The barbarians were already approaching the river, when Sabinus
perceived them from the heights of Berry-au-Bac;[249] he immediately
gave information to Cæsar, who, with all his cavalry, the light-armed
Numidians, the slingers, and the archers, passed the bridge, and,
descending the left bank, marched to meet the enemies towards the place
threatened. When he arrived there, some of them had already passed the
Aisne. An obstinate struggle takes place. Surprised in their passage,
the Belgæ, after having experienced considerable loss, advance
intrepidly over the corpses to cross the river, but are repulsed by a
shower of missiles; those who had reached the left bank are surrounded
by the cavalry and massacred. [250]
[Sidenote: Retreat of the Belgæ. ]
IV. The Belgæ having failed in taking the _oppidum_ of Bibrax, in
drawing the Romans upon disadvantageous ground, in crossing the river,
and suffering, also, from want of provisions, decided on returning home,
to be ready to assemble again to succour the country which might be
first invaded by the Roman army. The principal cause of this decision
was the news of the threatened invasion of the country of the Bellovaci
by Divitiacus and the Ædui: the Bellovaci refused to lose a single
instant in hurrying to the defence of their hearths. Towards ten o’clock
in the evening, the Belgæ withdrew in such disorder that their departure
resembled a flight. Cæsar was informed immediately by his spies, but,
fearing that this retreat might conceal a snare, he retained his
legions, and even his cavalry, in the camp. At break of day, better
informed by his scouts, he sent all his cavalry, under the orders of the
lieutenants Q. Pedius and L. Aurunculeius Cotta,[251] and ordered
Labienus, with three legions, to follow them. These troops fell upon the
fugitives, and slew as many as the length of the day would permit. At
sunset they gave up the pursuit, and, in obedience to the orders they
had received, returned to the camp. [252]
The coalition of the Belgæ, so renowned for their valour, was thus
dissolved. Nevertheless, it was of importance to the Roman general, in
order to secure the pacification of the country, to go and reduce to
subjection in their homes the peoples who had dared to enter into league
against him. The nearest were the Suessiones, whose territory bordered
upon that of the Remi.
[Sidenote: Capture of Noviodunum and Bratuspantium. ]
V. The day after the flight of the enemy, before they had recovered from
their fright, Cæsar broke up his camp, crossed the Aisne, descended its
left bank, invaded the country of the Suessiones, arrived after a long
day’s march (45 kilomètres) before Noviodunum (_Soissons_) (_see Plate
7_), and, informed that this town had a weak garrison, he attempted the
same day to carry it by assault; he failed, through the breadth of the
fosses and the height of the walls. He then retrenched his camp, ordered
covered galleries to be advanced (_vineas agere_),[253] and all things
necessary for a siege to be collected. Nevertheless, the crowd of
fugitive Suessiones threw themselves into the town during the following
night. The galleries having been pushed rapidly towards the walls, the
foundations of a terrace[254] to pass the fosse (_aggere jacto_) were
established, and towers were constructed. The Gauls, astonished at the
greatness and novelty of these works, so promptly executed, offered to
surrender. They obtained safety of life at the prayer of the Remi.
Cæsar received as hostages the principal chiefs of the country, and even
the two sons of King Galba, exacted the surrender of all their arms, and
accepted the submission of the Suessiones. He then conducted his army
into the country of the Bellovaci, who had shut themselves up, with all
they possessed, in the _oppidum_ of Bratuspantium (_Breteuil_). [255] The
army was only at about five miles’ distance from it, when all the aged
men, issuing from the town, came, with extended hands, to implore the
generosity of the Roman general; when he had arrived under the walls of
the place, and while he was establishing his camp, he saw the women and
children also demanding peace as suppliants from the top of the walls.
Divitiacus, in the name of the Ædui, interceded in their favour. After
the retreat of the Belgæ and the disbanding of his troops, he had
returned to the presence of Cæsar. The latter, who had, at the prayer
of the Remi, just shown himself clement towards the Suessiones,
displayed, at the solicitation of the Ædui, the same indulgence towards
the Bellovaci. Thus obeying the same political idea of increasing among
the Belgæ the influence of the peoples allied to Rome, he pardoned them;
but, as their nation was the most powerful in Belgic Gaul, he required
from them all their arms and 600 hostages. The Bellovaci declared that
the promoters of the war, seeing the misfortune they had drawn upon
their country, had fled into the isle of Britain.
It is curious to remark the relations which existed at this epoch
between part of Gaul and England. We know, in fact, from the
“Commentaries,” that a certain Divitiacus, an Æduan chieftain, the most
powerful in all Gaul, had formerly extended his power into the isle of
Britain, and we have just seen that the chiefs in the last struggle
against the Romans had found a refuge in the British isles.
Cæsar next marched from Bratuspantium against the Ambiani, who
surrendered without resistance. [256]
[Sidenote: March against the Nervii. ]
VI. The Roman army was now to encounter more formidable adversaries. The
Nervii occupied a vast territory, one extremity of which touched upon
that of the Ambiani. This wild and intrepid people bitterly reproached
the other Belgæ for having submitted to foreigners and abjured the
virtues of their fathers. They had resolved not to send deputies, nor to
accept peace on any condition. Foreseeing the approaching invasion of
the Roman army, the Nervii had drawn into alliance with them two
neighbouring peoples, the Atrebates and the Veromandui, whom they had
persuaded to risk with them the fortune of war: the Aduatuci, also, were
already on the way to join the coalition. The women, and all those whose
age rendered them unfit for fighting, had been placed in safety, in a
spot defended by a marsh, and inaccessible to an army, no doubt at
Mons. [257]
After the submission of the Ambiani, Cæsar left Amiens to proceed to the
country of the Nervii; and after three days’ march on their territory,
he arrived probably at Bavay (_Bagacum_), which is considered to have
been their principal town. There he learnt by prisoners that he was no
more than ten miles (fifteen kilomètres) distant from the Sambre, and
that the enemy awaited him posted on the opposite bank of the
river. [258] He thus found himself on the left bank, and the Nervii were
assembled on the right bank. [259] (_See Plate 7. _)
In accordance with the informations he had received, Cæsar sent out a
reconnoitring party of scouts and centurions, charged with the selection
of a spot favourable for the establishment of a camp. A certain number
of the Belgæ, who had recently submitted, and other Gauls, followed him,
and accompanied him in his march. Some of them, as was known
subsequently by the prisoners, having observed during the preceding days
the usual order of march of the army, deserted during the night to the
Nervii, and informed them that behind each of the legions there was a
long column of baggage; that the legion which arrived first at the camp
being separated by a great space from the others, it would be easy to
attack the soldiers, still charged with their bundles (_sarcinæ_); that
this legion once routed and its baggage captured, the others would not
dare to offer any resistance. This plan of attack was the more readily
embraced by the Belgæ, as the nature of the locality favoured its
execution. The Nervii, in fact, always weak in cavalry (their whole
force was composed of infantry), were accustomed, in order to impede
more easily the cavalry of their neighbours, to notch and bend
horizontally young trees, the numerous branches of which, interlaced and
mingled with brambles and brushwood, formed thick hedges, a veritable
wall which nothing could pass through, impenetrable even to the
eye. [260] As this kind of obstacle was very embarrassing to the march of
the Roman army, the Nervii resolved to hide themselves in the woods
which then covered the heights of Haumont, to watch there the moment
when it would debouch on the opposite heights of the Sambre, to wait
till they perceived the file of baggage, and then immediately to rush
upon the troops which preceded. [261] (_See Plate 10. _)
[Sidenote: Battle on the Sambre. ]
VII. The centurions sent to reconnoitre had selected for the
establishment of the camp the heights of Neuf-Mesnil. These descend in a
uniform slope to the very banks of the river. Those of Boussières, to
which they join, end, on the contrary, at the Sambre, in sufficiently
bold escarpments, the elevation of which varies from five to fifteen
mètres, and which, inaccessible near Boussières, may be climbed a little
lower, opposite the wood of Quesnoy. The Sambre, in all this extent, was
no more than about three feet deep. On the right bank, the heights of
Haumont, opposite those of Neuf-Mesnil, descend on all sides in gentle
and regular slopes to the level of the river. In the lower part, they
were bare for a breadth of about 200 Roman paces (300 mètres), reckoning
from the Sambre; and then the woods began, which covered the upper
parts. It was in these woods, impenetrable to the sight, that the Belgæ
remained concealed. They were there drawn up in order of battle: on the
right, the Atrebates; in the centre, the Veromandui; on the left, the
Nervii; these latter facing the escarpments of the Sambre. On the open
part, along the river, they had placed some posts of cavalry. (_See
Plate 10. _)
Cæsar, ignorant of the exact position where the Belgæ were encamped,
directed his march towards the heights of Neuf-Mesnil.
His cavalry
preceded him, but the order of march was different from that which had
been communicated to the Nervii by the deserters; as he approached the
enemy, he had, according to his custom, united six legions, and placed
the baggage in the tail of the column, under the guard of the two
legions recently raised, who closed the march.
The cavalry, slingers, and archers passed the Sambre and engaged the
cavalry of the enemy, who at one moment took refuge in the woods, and at
another resumed the offensive, nor were ever pursued beyond the open
ground. Meanwhile, the six legions debouched. Arrived on the place
chosen for the camp, they began to retrench, and shared the labour among
them. Some proceeded to dig the fosses, while others spread themselves
over the country in search of timber and turf. They had hardly begun
their work, when the Belgæ, perceiving the first portion of the baggage
(which was the moment fixed for the attack), suddenly issue from the
forest with all their forces, in the order of battle they had adopted,
rush upon the cavalry and put it to rout, and run towards the Sambre
with such incredible rapidity that they seem to be everywhere at
once--at the edge of the wood, in the river, and in the midst of the
Roman troops; then, with the same celerity, climbing the hill, they rush
towards the camp, where the soldiers are at work at the retrenchments.
The Roman army is taken off its guard.
Cæsar had to provide against everything at the same time. It was
necessary to raise the purple standard as the signal for hastening to
arms,[262] to sound the trumpets to recall the soldiers employed in the
works, to bring in those who were at a distance, form the lines,
harangue the troops, give the word of order. [263] In this critical
situation, the experience of the soldiers, acquired in so many combats,
and the presence of the lieutenants with each legion, helped to supply
the place of the general, and to enable each to take, by his own
impulse, the dispositions he thought best. The impetuosity of the enemy
is such that the soldiers have time neither to put on the ensigns,[264]
nor to take the covering from their bucklers, nor even to put on their
helmets. Each, abandoning his labours, runs to range himself in the
utmost haste under the first standard which presents itself.
The army, constrained by necessity, was drawn up on the slope of the
hill, much more in obedience to the nature of the ground and the
exigencies of the moment than according to military rules. The legions,
separated from one another by thick hedges, which intercepted their
view, could not lend each other mutual succour; they formed an irregular
and interrupted line: the 9th and 10th legions were placed on the left
of the camp, the 8th and 11th in the centre, the 7th and 12th on the
right. In this general confusion, in which it became as difficult to
carry succour to the points threatened as to obey one single command,
everything was ruled by accident.
Cæsar, after taking the measures most urgent, rushes towards the troops
which chance presents first to him, takes them as he finds them in his
way, harangues them, and, when he comes to the 10th legion, he recalls
to its memory, in a few words, its ancient valour. As the enemy was
already within reach of the missiles, he orders the attack; then,
proceeding towards another point to encourage his troops, he finds them
already engaged.
The soldiers of the 9th and 10th legions throw the _pilum_, and fall,
sword in hand, upon the Atrebates, who, fatigued by their rapid advance,
out of breath, and pierced with wounds, are soon driven back from the
hill they have just climbed. These two legions, led no doubt by
Labienus, drive them into the Sambre, slay a great number, cross the
river at their heels, and pursue them up the slopes of the right bank.
The enemy, then thinking to take advantage of the commanding position,
form again, and renew the combat; but the Romans repulse them anew, and,
continuing their victorious march, take possession of the Gaulish camp.
In the centre, the 8th and 11th legions, attacked by the Veromandui, had
driven them back upon the banks of the Sambre, to the foot of the
heights, where the combat still continued.
While on the left and in the centre victory declared for the Romans, on
the right wing, the 7th and 12th legions were in danger of being
overwhelmed under the efforts of the whole army of the Nervii, composed
of 60,000 men. These intrepid warriors, led by their chief, Boduognatus,
had dashed across the Sambre in face of the escarpments of the left
bank; they had boldly climbed these, and thrown themselves, in close
rank, upon the two legions of the right wing. These legions were placed
in a position the more critical, as the victorious movements of the left
and centre, by stripping almost entirely of troops that part of the
field of battle, had left them without support. The Nervii take
advantage of these circumstances: some move towards the summit of the
heights to seize the camp, others outflank the two legions on the right
wing (_aperto latere_).
As chance would have it, at this same moment, the cavalry and
light-armed foot, who had been repulsed at the first attack, regained
pell-mell the camp; finding themselves unexpectedly in face of the
enemy, they are confounded, and take to flight again in another
direction. The valets of the army, who, from the Decuman gate and the
summit of the hill, had seen the Romans cross the river victoriously,
and had issued forth in hope of plunder, look back; perceiving the
Nervii in the camp, they fly precipitately. The tumult is further
increased by the cries of the baggage-drivers, who rush about in terror.
Among the auxiliaries in the Roman army, there was a body of Treviran
cavalry, who enjoyed among the Gauls a reputation for valour. When they
saw the camp invaded, the legions pressed and almost surrounded, the
valets, the cavalry, the slingers, the Numidians, separated, dispersed,
and flying on all sides, they believed that all was lost, took the road
for their own country, and proclaimed everywhere in their march that the
Roman army was destroyed.
Cæsar had repaired from the left wing to the other points of the line.
When he arrived at the right wing, he had found the 7th and 12th legions
hotly engaged, the ensigns of the cohorts of the 12th legion collected
on the same point, the soldiers pressed together and mutually
embarrassing each other, all the centurions of the 4th cohort and the
standard-bearer killed; the standard lost; in the other cohorts most of
the centurions were either killed or wounded, and among the latter was
the primipilus Sextius Baculus, a man of rare bravery, who was destined
soon afterwards to save the legion of Galba in the Valais. The soldiers
who still resisted were exhausted, and those of the last ranks were
quitting the ranks to avoid the missiles; new troops of enemies
continually climbed the hill, some advancing to the front against the
Romans, the others turning them on the two wings. In this extreme
danger, Cæsar judges that he can hope for succour only from himself:
having arrived without buckler, he seizes that of a legionary of the
last ranks and rushes to the first line; there, calling the centurions
by their names and exciting the soldiers, he draws the 12th legion
forward, and causes more interval to be made between the files of the
companies in order to facilitate the handling of their swords. His
example and encouraging words restore hope to the combatants and revive
their courage. Each man, under the eyes of their general, shows new
energy, and this heroic devotedness begins to cool the impetuosity of
the enemy. Not far thence, the 7th legion was pressed by a multitude of
assailants. Cæsar orders the tribunes gradually to bring the two legions
back to back, so that each presented its front to the enemy in opposite
directions. Fearing no longer to be taken in the rear, they resist with
firmness, and fight with new ardour. While Cæsar is thus occupied, the
two legions of the rear-guard, which formed the escort of the baggage
(the 13th and 14th), informed of what was taking place, arrive in haste,
and appear in view of the enemy at the top of the hill. On his part, T.
Labienus, who, at the head of the 9th and 10th legions, had made himself
master of the enemy’s camp on the heights of Haumont, discovers what is
passing in the Roman camp. He judges, by the flight of the cavalry and
servants, the greatness of the danger with which Cæsar is threatened,
and sends the 10th legion to his succour, which, re-passing the Sambre,
and climbing the slopes of Neuf-Mesnil, runs in haste to fall upon the
rear of the Nervii.
On the arrival of these re-enforcements, the whole aspect of things
changes: the wounded raise themselves, and support themselves on their
bucklers in order to take part in the action; the valets, seeing the
terror of the enemy, throw themselves unarmed upon men who are armed;
and the cavalry,[265] to efface the disgrace of their flight, seek to
outdo the legionaries in the combat. Meanwhile the Nervii fight with the
courage of despair. When those of the first ranks fall, the nearest take
their places, and mount upon their bodies; they are slain in their turn;
the dead form heaps; the survivors throw, from the top of this mountain
of corpses, their missiles upon the Romans, and send them back their own
_pila_. “How can we, then, be astonished,” says Cæsar, “that such men
dared to cross a broad river, climb its precipitous banks, and overcome
the difficulties of the ground, since nothing appeared too much for
their courage? ” They met death to the last man, and 60,000 corpses
covered the field of battle so desperately fought, in which the fortune
of Cæsar had narrowly escaped wreck.
After this struggle, in which, according to the “Commentaries,” the race
and name of the Nervii were nearly annihilated, the old men, women, and
children, who had sought refuge in the middle of the marshes, finding no
hopes of safety, surrendered. [266] In dwelling on the misfortune of
their country, they said that, of 600 senators, there remained only
three; and that, of 60,000 combatants, hardly 500 had survived. Cæsar,
to show his clemency towards the unfortunate who implored it, treated
these remains of the Nervii with kindness; he left them their lands and
towns, and enjoined the neighbouring peoples not only not to molest
them, but even to protect them from all outrage and violence. [267]
[Sidenote: Siege of the _Oppidum_ of the Aduatuci. ]
VIII. This victory was gained, no doubt, towards the end of July. Cæsar
detached the 7th legion, under the orders of young P. Crassus, to reduce
the maritime peoples of the shores of the ocean: the Veneti, the Unelli,
the Osismii, the Curiosolitæ, the Essuvii, the Aulerci, and the Redones.
He proceeded in person, with the seven other legions, following the
course of the Sambre, to meet the Aduatuci, who, as we have seen above,
were marching to join the Nervii. They were the descendants of those
Cimbri and Teutones who, in their descent upon the Roman province and
Italy in the year 652, had left on this side the Rhine 6,000 men in
charge of as much of the baggage as was too heavy to be carried with
them. After the defeat of their companions by Marius, and many
vicissitudes, these Germans had established themselves towards the
confluence of the Sambre and the Meuse, and had there formed a state.
As soon as the Aduatuci were informed of the disaster of the Nervii,
they returned to their own country, abandoned their towns and forts, and
retired, with all they possessed, into one _oppidum_, remarkably
fortified by nature. Surrounded in every direction by precipitous rocks
of great elevation, it was accessible only on one side by a gentle
slope, at most 100 feet wide, defended by a fosse and double wall of
great height, on which they placed enormous masses of rock and pointed
beams. The mountain on which the citadel of Namur is situated[268]
answers sufficiently to this description. (_See Plate 11. _)
On the arrival of the army, they made at first frequent sorties, and
engaged in battles on a small scale. Later, when the place was
surrounded by a countervallation of twelve feet high in a circuit of
15,000 feet,[269] with numerous redoubts, they kept close in their
_oppidum_. The Romans pushed forward their covered galleries, raised a
terrace under shelter of these galleries, and constructed a tower of
timber, intended to be pushed against the wall. At the sight of these
preparations, the Aduatuci, who, like most of the Gauls, despised the
Romans on account of their small stature, addressed the besiegers
ironically from their walls, not understanding how a great machine,
placed at a great distance, could be put in motion by men so diminutive.
But when they saw this tower move and approach the walls, struck with a
sight so strange and so new to them, they sent to implore peace,
demanding, as the only condition, that they should be left in possession
of their arms. Cæsar refused this condition, but declared that, if they
surrendered before the ram had struck their wall, they should be placed,
like the Nervii, under the protection of the Roman people, and preserved
from all violence. The besieged thereupon threw such a quantity of arms
into the fosses that they filled them almost to the height of the wall
and the terrace; yet, as was afterwards discovered, they had retained
about one-third. They threw open their gates, and that day remained
quiet.
The Romans had occupied the town; towards evening, Cæsar ordered them to
leave it, fearing the violences which the soldiers might commit on the
inhabitants during the night. But these, believing that after the
surrender of the place the posts of the countervallation would be
guarded with less care, resume the arms they had concealed, furnish
themselves with bucklers of bark of trees, or wicker, covered hastily
with skins, and, at midnight, attack the part of the works which seems
most easy of access. Fires, prepared by Cæsar, soon announce the attack.
The soldiers rush to the spot from the nearest redoubts; and, though the
enemies fight with the obstinacy of despair, the missiles thrown from
the entrenchments and the towers disperse them, and they are driven back
into the town with a loss of 4,000 men. Next day the gates were broken
in without resistance, and, the town once taken, the inhabitants were
sold publicly to the number of 53,000. [270]
[Sidenote: Subjugation of Armorica by P. Crassus]
IX. Towards the time of the conclusion of this siege (the first days of
September), Cæsar received letters from P. Crassus. This lieutenant
announced that the maritime peoples on the coasts of the ocean, from the
Loire to the Seine, had submitted. On the arrival of this news at Rome,
the Senate decreed fifteen days of thanksgivings. [271]
These successful exploits, and Gaul entirely pacified, gave to the
barbarian peoples so high an opinion of the Roman power, that the
nations beyond the Rhine, particularly the Ubii, sent deputies to Cæsar,
offering hostages and obedience to his orders. Anxious to proceed to
Italy and Illyria, he commanded the deputies to return to him at the
commencement of the following spring, and placed his legions, with the
exception of the 12th, in winter quarters, in the countries of the
Carnutes, the Andes, and the Turones, neighbouring upon the localities
where Crassus had been making war. [272] They were probably _échelonnés_
in the valley of the Loire, between Orleans and Angers.
[Sidenote: Expedition of Galba into the Valais. ]
X. Before he departed for Italy, Cæsar sent Servius Galba, with a part
of the cavalry and the 12th legion, into the country of the Nantuates,
the Veragri, and the Seduni (_peoples of Chablais and Lower and Upper
Valais_), whose territory extended from the country of the Allobroges,
Lake Léman, and the Rhone, to the summit of the Alps. His object was to
open an easy communication with Italy by way of these mountains, that
is, by the Simplon and the St. Bernard, where travellers were
continually subject to exactions and vexations. Galba, after some
successful battles, by which all these peoples were subdued, obtained
hostages, placed two cohorts among the Nantuates, and the rest of his
legions in a town of the Veragri called Octodurus (_Martigny_). This
town, situated in a little plain at the bottom of a glen surrounded by
high mountains, was divided into two parts by a river (_the Drance_).
Galba left one bank to the Gauls, and established his troops on the
other, which he fortified with a fosse and rampart.
Several day had passed in the greatest tranquillity, when Galba learnt
suddenly that the Gauls had during the night evacuated the part of the
town which they occupied, and that the Veragri and the Seduni were
appearing in great numbers on the surrounding mountains. The situation
was most critical; for not only could Galba reckon on no succour, but he
had not even finished his retrenchments, or gathered in his provisions
in sufficient quantity. He called together a council, in which it was
decided, in spite of the opinions of some chiefs, who proposed to
abandon the baggage and fight their way out, that they should defend the
camp; but the enemies hardly gave the Romans time to make the necessary
dispositions. Suddenly they rush from all sides towards the
retrenchments, and throw a shower of darts and javelins (_gæsa_). Having
to defend themselves against forces which are continually renewed, they
are obliged to fight all at once, and to move incessantly to the point
that are most threatened. The men who are fatigued, and even the
wounded, cannot quit the place. The combat had lasted six hours: the
Romans were exhausted with fatigue. Already they began to be short of
missiles; already the Gauls, with increasing audacity, were filling up
the fosse and tearing down the palisades; already the Romans were
reduced to the last extremity, when the primipilus, P. Sextius Baculus,
the same who had shown so much energy in the battle of the Sambre, and
C. Volusenus, tribune of the soldiers, advise Galba that the only hope
which remained was in a sally. The suggestion is adopted. At the command
of the centurions, the soldiers confine themselves to parrying the
missiles, and take breath; then, when the signal is given, rushing on
all sides to the gates, they fall upon the enemy, put him to rout, and
make an immense slaughter. Of 30,000 Gauls, about 10,000 were slain. [273]
In spite of this, Galba, not believing himself in safety in so difficult
a country, in the midst of hostile populations, brought back the 12th
legion into the country of the Allobroges, where it wintered. [273]
CHAPTER VI.
(Year of Rome 698. )
(BOOK III. OF THE “COMMENTARIES. ”)
WAR OF THE VENETI--VICTORY OVER THE UNELLI--SUBMISSION OF
AQUITAINE--MARCH AGAINST THE MORINI AND THE MENAPII.
[Sidenote: Insurrection of the Maritime Peoples. ]
I. While Cæsar was visiting Illyria and the different towns of the
Cisalpine, such as Ravenna and Lucca, war broke out anew in Gaul. The
cause was this. Young P. Crassus was in winter quarters with the 7th
legion among the Andes, near the ocean; as he fell short of wheat, he
sent several prefects and military tribunes to ask for provisions from
the neighbouring peoples. T. Terrasidius was deputed to the Unelli,[274]
M. Trebius Gallus to the Curiosolitæ, and Quintus Velanius, with T.
Silius, to the Veneti. This last people was the most powerful on the
whole coast through its commerce and its navy. Its numerous ships served
to carry on a traffic with the isle of Britain. Possessed of consummate
skill in the art of navigation, it ruled over this part of the ocean.
The Veneti first seized Silius and Velanius, in the hope of obtaining in
exchange for them the return of the hostages given to Crassus. Their
example was soon followed. The Unelli and the Curiosolitæ seized, with
the same design, Trebius and Terrasidius; they entered into an
engagement with the Veneti, through their chiefs, to run the same
fortune, excited the rest of the neighbouring maritime peoples to
recover their liberty, and all together intimated to Crassus that he
must send back the hostages if he wished his tribunes and prefects to be
restored.
Cæsar, then very far distant from the scene of these events, learnt them
from Crassus. He immediately ordered galleys to be constructed on the
Loire, rowers to be fetched from the coast of the Mediterranean, and
sailors and pilots to be procured. These measures having been promptly
executed, he repaired to the army as soon as the season permitted. At
the news of his approach, the Veneti and their allies, conscious that
they had been guilty of throwing into fetters envoys invested with a
character which is inviolable, made preparations proportionate to the
danger with which they saw they were threatened. Above all, they set to
work making their ships ready for action. Their confidence was great:
they knew that the tides would intercept the roads on the sea-coast;
they reckoned on the difficulty of the navigation in those unknown
latitudes, where the ports are few, and on the want of provisions, which
would not permit the Romans to make a long stay in their country.
Their determination once taken, they fortified their _oppida_, and
transported to them the wheat from their fields. Persuaded that the
country of the Veneti would be the first attacked, they gathered
together all their ships, no doubt in the vast estuary formed by the
river Auray in the Bay of Quiberon. (_See Plate 12. _) They allied
themselves with the maritime peoples of the coast, from the mouth of the
Loire to that of the Scheldt,[275] and demanded succour from the isle of
Britain. [276]
In spite of the difficulties of this war, Cæsar undertook it without
hesitation. He was influenced by grave motives: the violation of the
right of nations, the rebellion after submission, the coalition of so
many peoples; above all, by the fear that their impunity would be an
encouragement to others. If we believe Strabo, Cæsar, as well as the
Veneti, had other reasons to desire this war: on one side, the latter,
possessed of the commerce of Britain, already suspected the design of
the Roman general to pass into that island, and they sought to deprive
him of the means; and, on the other, Cæsar could not attempt the
dangerous enterprise of a descent on England till after he had destroyed
the fleet of the Veneti, the sole masters of the ocean. [277]
[Sidenote: War against the Veneti. ]
II. Be this as it may, in order to prevent new risings, Cæsar divided
his army so as to occupy the country militarily. The lieutenant T.
Labienus, at the head of a part of the cavalry, was sent to the Treviri,
with the mission to visit the Remi and other peoples of Belgic Gaul, to
maintain them in their duty, and to oppose the passage of the Rhine by
the Germans, who were said to have been invited by the Belgæ. P. Crassus
was ordered, with twelve legionary cohorts, and a numerous body of
cavalry, to repair into Aquitaine, to prevent the inhabitants of that
province from swelling the forces of the insurrection. The lieutenant Q.
Titurius Sabinus was detached with three legions to restrain the Unelli,
the Curiosolitæ, and the Lexovii. The young D. Brutus,[278] who had
arrived from the Mediterranean with the galleys,[279] received the
command of the fleet, which was increased by the Gaulish ships borrowed
from the Pictones, the Santones, and other peoples who had submitted.
His instructions enjoined him to sail as soon as possible for the
country of the Veneti. As to Cæsar, he proceeded thither with the rest
of the land army.
The eight legions of the Roman army were then distributed thus: to the
north of the Loire, three legions; in Aquitaine, with Crassus, a legion
and two cohorts; one legion, no doubt, on the fleet; and two legions and
eight cohorts with the general-in-chief, to undertake the war against
the Veneti. [280]
We may admit that Cæsar started from the neighbourhood of Nantes, and
directed his march to the Roche-Bernard, where he crossed the Vilaine.
Having arrived in the country of the Veneti, he resolved to profit by
the time which must pass before the arrival of his fleet to obtain
possession of the principal _oppida_ where the inhabitants took refuge.
Most of these petty fortresses on the coast of the Veneti were situated
at the extremities of tongues of land or promontories; at high tide they
could not be reached by land, while at low tide the approach was
inaccessible to ships, which remained dry on the flats; a double
obstacle to a siege.
The Romans attacked them in the following manner: they constructed on
the land, at low tide, two parallel dykes, at the same time serving for
terraces (_aggere ac molibus_), and forming approaches towards the
place. During the course of construction, the space comprised between
these two dykes continued to be inundated with water at every high tide;
but as soon as they had succeeded in joining them up to the _oppidum_,
this space, where the sea could no longer penetrate, remained finally
dry, and then presented to the besiegers a sort of place of arms useful
in the attack. [281]
With the aid of these long and laborious works, in which the height of
the dykes finished by equalling that of the walls, the Romans succeeded
in taking several of these _oppida_. But all their labours were thrown
away; for, as soon as the Veneti thought themselves no longer safe, they
evacuated the _oppidum_, embarked with all their goods on board their
numerous vessels, and withdrew to the neighbouring _oppida_, the
situations of which offered the same advantages for a new resistance.
The greater part of the fine season had passed away in this manner.
Cæsar, convinced at length that the assistance of his ships was
indispensable, came to the resolution of suspending these laborious and
fruitless operations until the arrival of his fleet; and, that he might
be near at hand to receive it, he encamped to the south of the Bay of
Quiberon, near the coast, on the heights of Saint-Gildas. (_See Plate
12. _)
The vessels of the fleet, held back by contrary winds, had not yet been
able to assemble at the mouth of the Loire. As the Veneti had foreseen,
they navigated with difficulty on this vast sea, subject to high tides,
and almost entirely unfurnished with ports. The inexperience of the
sailors, and even the form of the ships, added to their difficulties.
The enemy’s ships, on the contrary, were built and rigged in a manner to
enable them to wrestle with all obstacles; flatter than those of the
Romans, they had less to fear from the shallows and low tide. Built of
oak, they supported the most violent shocks; the front and back, very
lofty, were beyond the reach of the strongest missiles. The beams
(_transtra_), made of pieces of timber a foot thick, were fixed with
iron nails, an inch in bigness; and the anchors were held by iron chains
instead of cables; soft skins, made very thin, served for sails, either
because those peoples were nearly or entirely unacquainted with linen,
or because they regarded the ordinary sails as insufficient to support,
with such heavy ships, the impetuosity of the winds of the ocean. The
Roman ships were superior to them only in agility and the impulse of the
oars. In everything else, those of the Veneti were better adapted to the
nature of the localities and to the heavy seas. By the solidity of their
construction they resisted the ships’ beaks, and by their elevation they
were secure from the missiles, and were difficult to seize with the
grappling-irons (_copulæ_). [282]
[Sidenote: Naval Combat against the Veneti. ]
III. The Roman fleet, thanks to a wind from the east or north-east, was
at length enabled to set sail. [283] It quitted the Loire, and directed
its course towards the Bay of Quiberon and Point Saint-Jaques. (_See
Plate 12. _) As soon as the Veneti perceived it, they sent out from the
port formed by the river Auray 220 ships well armed and well equipped,
which advanced to encounter it. During this time, the Roman fleet
reached Point Saint-Jaques, where it formed in order of battle near the
shore. That of the Veneti drew up in front of it. The battle took place
under the very eyes of Cæsar and his troops, who occupied the heights on
the shore.
It was the first time that a Roman fleet appeared on the ocean.
Everything conspired to disconcert Brutus, as well as the tribunes of
the soldiers and the centurions who commanded each vessel: the impotence
of the beaks against the Gaulish ships; the height of the enemy’s poops,
which overlooked even the high towers of the Roman vessels; and lastly,
the inefficiency of the missiles thrown upwards. The military chiefs
were hesitating, and had already experienced some loss,[284] when, to
remedy this disadvantage, they imagined a method having some analogy
with that to which Duillius owed his victory over the Carthaginians in
492: they tried to disable the Gaulish vessels by the aid of hooks
(_falces_) similar to those which were used in attacks on fortresses
(_non absimili forma muralium falcium_). [285] The _falx_ was an iron
with a point and sharpened hook, fixed at the end of long poles, which,
suspended to the masts by ropes, received an impulsion similar to that
of the ram. One or more ships approached a Gaulish vessel, and, as soon
as the crew had succeeded in catching with one of these hooks the ropes
which attached the yards to the masts, the sailors rowed away with all
their strength, so as to break or cut the cords. The yards fell; the
disabled vessel was immediately surrounded by the Romans, who boarded
it; and then all depended on mere valour. This manœuvre was
completely successful. The soldiers of the fleet, knowing that no act of
courage could pass unperceived by Cæsar and the land troops, emulated
one another in zeal, and captured several of the enemy’s vessels. The
Gauls prepared to seek their safety in flight. They had already swerved
their ships to the wind, when suddenly there came on a dead calm. This
unexpected occurrence decided the victory. Left without the possibility
of moving, the heavy Gaulish vessels were captured one after another; a
very small number succeeded in gaining the coast under favour of the
night.
The battle, which began at ten o’clock in the morning, had lasted till
sunset. It terminated the war with the Veneti and the other maritime
peoples of the ocean. They lost in it, at one blow, all their youth, all
their principal citizens, and all their fleet; without refuge, without
the means of defending any longer their _oppida_, they surrendered
themselves, bodies and goods. Cæsar, wishing to compel the Gauls in
future to respect the rights of nations, caused the whole Senate to be
put to death and the rest of the inhabitants to be sold for slaves.
Cæsar has been justly reproached with this cruel chastisement; yet this
great man gave such frequent proofs of his clemency towards the
vanquished, that he must have yielded to very powerful political motives
to order an execution so contrary to his habits and temper. Moreover, it
was a sad effect of the war to expose incessantly the chiefs of the
Gallic states to the resentments of the conquerors and the fury of the
mob.
of the Romans had the advantage over the long swords of the
Germans. [232] Nevertheless, according to Appian, the legions owed their
victory chiefly to the superiority of their tactics and the steadiness
with which they kept their ranks. [233] Ariovistus’s left did not resist
long; but while it was driven back and put to flight, the right, forming
in deep masses, pressed the Romans hard. Young P. Crassus, commander of
the cavalry placed at a distance from the thick of the battle, and
better placed to judge of its incidents, perceived this, sent the third
line to the succour of the wavering legions, and restored the combat.
Soon Ariovistus’s right was obliged to give way in its turn; the rout
then became general, and the Germans desisted from flight only when they
reached the Rhine, fifty miles from the field of battle. [234] They
descended, no doubt, the valley of the Ill as far as Rhinau, thus
retracing a part of the road by which they had come. (_See Plate 4. _)
Cæsar sent his cavalry after them; all who were overtaken were cut to
pieces; the rest attempted to swim across the river, or sought safety in
boats. Among the latter was Ariovistus, who threw himself into a
boat[235] he found attached to the bank. According to Plutarch and
Appian,[236] 80,000 men perished in the combat and during the pursuit.
Two of the wives of the German king experienced the same fate; one was a
Sueve, the other a Norician. Of his two daughters, one was killed and
the other taken prisoner. Cæsar says that, as he himself pursued the
enemy with his cavalry, he experienced a pleasure equal to that given by
victory when he recovered, first Procillus, loaded with a triple chain,
and who had thrice seen the barbarians draw lots whether he should be
burnt alive or not, and, subsequently, M. Mettius, both of whom, as we
have seen, had been sent by him as messengers to Ariovistus.
The report of this glorious exploit having spread beyond the Rhine, the
Suevi, who had come to its banks, returned home. The Ubii, who dwelt
near the river, pursued their terrified bands, and slew a considerable
number of the fugitives.
Cæsar, having concluded two great wars in one single campaign, placed
his army in winter quarters among the Sequani rather sooner than the
season required--at the beginning of September--and left them under the
command of Labienus. He then left, and went to hold the assemblies in
Cisalpine Gaul. [237]
[Sidenote: Observations. ]
IX. There are several things worthy of remark in this campaign:--
1. The resolution taken by Cæsar to gain possession of Besançon, and
thus to anticipate Ariovistus. We see the importance which he attaches
to that military position as a point of support and of supply.
2. The facility with which a whole legion transforms itself into
cavalry.
3. The judicious use which Cæsar makes of his light troops (_alarii_),
by assembling them in mass, so that the enemy should believe in a
greater number of legions.
4. Lastly, this singular circumstance, that the third line, which serves
as reserve and decides the fate of the battle, receives from young P.
Crassus, and not from the general-in-chief, the order to attack.
The dates of the principal events of this year may be indicated in the
following manner:--
Rendezvous of the Helvetii on the
banks of the Rhone (the day of the
equinox) March 24.
Cæsar refuses them a passage through
the province April 8.
Arrival at the confluence of the Rhone
and the Saône of the legions from
Italy and Illyria June 7.
Defeat of the Tigurini on the Saône June 10.
Passage of the Saône by Cæsar June 12.
About fifteen days’ march (_De Bello
Gallico_, I. 15) From June 13 to June 27.
Manœuvre of Labienus to surprise the
Helvetii June 28.
Battle of Bibracte June 29.
Cæsar remains three days interring the
dead; marches on the fourth; employs
six days in his march from
the field of battle to the country of
the Lingones, and there overtakes
the Helvetii in their retreat,
From June 30 to July 8.
Negotiations with Ariovistus (a month),
From July 8 to August 8.
Departure of Cæsar (from Tonnerre,
to meet Ariovistus) August 10.
Arrival of Cæsar at Besançon August 16.
Abode of Cæsar at Besançon,
From August 16 to August 22.
Departure from Besançon (“the harvest
is ripe,” _De Bello Gallico_, I. 40) August 22.
March of seven days from Besançon
to the Rhine From August 22 to August 28.
Interview (five days afterwards) September 2.
Manœuvres (about eight days),
From September 3 to September 10.
Battle of the Thur (fought before the
new moon, which took place on the
18th of September) September 10.
CHAPTER V.
WAR AGAINST THE BELGÆ.
(Year of Rome 697. )
(BOOK II. OF THE “COMMENTARIES. ”)
[Sidenote: League of the Belgæ. Cæsar advances from Besançon to the
Aisne. ]
I. The brilliant successes gained by Cæsar over the Helvetii and the
Germans had delivered the Republic from an immense danger, but at the
same time they had roused the distrust and jealousy of most of the
nations of Gaul. These conceived fears for their independence, which
were further increased by the presence of the Roman army in Sequania.
The irritation was very great among the Belgæ. They feared that their
turn to be attacked would come when Celtic Gaul was once reduced to
peace. Besides, they were excited by influential men who understood
that, under Roman domination, they would have less chance of obtaining
possession of the supreme power. The different tribes of Belgic Gaul
entered into a formidable league, and reciprocally exchanged hostages.
Cæsar learnt these events in the Cisalpine province, through public
rumour and the letters of Labienus. Alarmed at the news, he raised two
legions in Italy, the 13th and 14th, and, in the beginning of
spring,[238] sent them into Gaul, under the command of the lieutenant
Q. Pedius. [239] It is probable that these troops, to reach Sequania
promptly, crossed the Great St. Bernard, for Strabo relates that one of
the three routes which led from Italy into Gaul passed by Mount
Pœrinus (_Great St. Bernard_), after having traversed the country of
the Salassi (_Valley of Aosta_), and that this latter people offered at
first to assist Cæsar’s troops in their passage by levelling the roads
and throwing bridges across the torrents; but that, suddenly changing
their tone, they had rolled masses of rock down upon them and pillaged
their baggage. It was no doubt in the sequel of this defection that,
towards the end of the year 697, Cæsar, as we shall see farther on, sent
Galba into the Valais, to take vengeance on the mountaineers for their
perfidious conduct and to open a safe communication with Italy. [240]
As soon as forage was abundant, he rejoined his legions in person,
probably at Besançon, since, as we have seen, they had been placed in
winter quarters in Sequania. He charged the Senones and the other Celts
who bordered upon Belgic Gaul to watch what was doing there and inform
him of it. Their reports were unanimous: troops were being raised, and
an army was assembling. Cæsar then decided upon immediately entering
into campaign.
His army consisted of eight legions: they bore the numbers 7, 8, 9, 10,
11, 12, 13, and 14. As their effective force, in consequence of marches
and previous combats, cannot have been complete, we may admit a mean of
5,000 men to the legion, which would make 40,000 men of infantry. Adding
to these one-third of auxiliaries, Cretan archers, slingers, and
Numidians, the total of infantry would have been 53,000 men. There was,
in addition to these, 5,000 cavalry and a body of Æduan troops under the
command of Divitiacus. Thus the army of Cæsar amounted to at least
60,000 soldiers, without reckoning the servants for the machines,
drivers, and valets, who, according to the instance cited by Orosius,
amounted to a very considerable number. [241]
After securing provisions, Cæsar started from Besançon, probably in the
second fortnight in May, passed the Saône at Seveux (_see Plate 4_),
crossed the country of the Lingones in the direction of Langres, at
Bar-sur-Aube, and entered, towards Vitry-le-François, on the territory
of the Remi, having marched in about a fortnight 230 kilomètres, the
distance from Besançon to Vitry-le-François. [242]
The Remi were the first Belgic people he encountered in his road (_qui
proximi Galliæ ex Belgis sunt_). Astonished at his sudden appearance,
they sent two deputies, Iccius and Adecumborius, the first personages of
their country, to make their submission, and offer provisions and every
kind of succour. They informed Cæsar that all the Belgæ were in arms,
and that the Germans on that side of the Rhine had joined the coalition;
for themselves, they had refused to take any part in it, but the
excitement was so great that they had not been able to dissuade from
their warlike projects the Suessiones themselves, who were united with
them by community of origin, laws, and interests. “The Belgæ,” they
added, “proud of having been formerly the only people of Gaul who
preserved their territory from the invasion of the Teutones and Cimbri,
had the loftiest idea of their own valour. In their general assembly,
each people had engaged to furnish the following contingents:--The
Bellovaci, the most warlike, could send into the field 100,000 men; they
have promised 60,000 picked troops, and claim the supreme direction of
the war. The Suessiones, their neighbours, masters of a vast and fertile
territory, in which are reckoned twelve towns, furnish 50,000 men; they
have for their king Galba, who has been invested, by the consent of the
allies, with the chief command. The Nervii, the most distant of all, and
the most barbarous among these peoples, furnish the same number; the
Atrebates, 15,000; the Ambiani, 10,000; the Morini, 25,000; the Menapii,
7000; the Caletes, 10,000; the Veliocasses and the Veromandui, 10,000;
the Aduatuci, 19,000; lastly, the Condrusi, Eburones, Cæresi, and
Pæmani, comprised under the general name of Germans, are to send 40,000;
in all, about 296,000 men. ”[243]
[Sidenote: Cæsar’s Camp at Berry-au-Bac. ]
II. Cæsar could judge, from this information, the formidable character
of the league which he had now to combat. His first care was to try to
divide the hostile forces, and, with this view, he induced Divitiacus,
in spite of the friendly relations which had long united the Ædui with
the Bellovaci, to invade and ravage the territory of the latter with the
Æduan troops. He then required the senate of the Remi to repair to his
presence, and the children of the _principes_ to be brought to him as
hostages; and then, on information that Galba was marching to meet him,
he resolved to move to the other side of the Aisne, which crossed the
extremity of the territory of the Remi (_quod est in extremis Remorum
finibus_),[244] and encamp there in a strong position, to await the
enemy’s attack. The road he had hitherto followed led straight to the
Aisne, and crossed it by a bridge at the spot where now stands the
village of Berry-au-Bac. (_See Plate 7. _) He marched in great haste
towards this bridge, led his army across it, and fixed his camp on the
right side of the road, on the hill situated between the Aisne and the
Miette, a small stream with marshy banks, which makes a bend in that
river between Berry-au-Bac and Pontavert. (_See Plate 8. _) This hill,
called Mauchamp, is of small elevation (about 25 mètres) above the
valley of the Aisne, and in its length, from east to west, it presents
sufficient space for the Roman army to deploy. Laterally, it sinks to
the level of the surrounding ground by slight undulations, and the side
which looks upon the Miette descends by a gentle slope towards the banks
of the stream. This position offered several advantages: the Aisne
defended one side of the camp; the rear of the army was protected, and
the transports of provisions could arrive in safety through the
countries of the Remi and other friendly peoples. Cæsar ordered a work
to be constructed on the right bank of the Aisne, at the extremity of
the bridge, where he established a post (_see Plates 8 and 9_),[245] and
he left on the other side of the river the lieutenant Q. Titurius
Sabinus with six cohorts. The camp was surrounded by a retrenchment
twelve feet high, and by a fosse eighteen feet wide. [246]
Meanwhile the Belgæ, after having concentrated their forces in the
country of the Suessiones, to the north of the Aisne, had invaded the
territory of the Remi. On their road, and at eight miles from the Roman
camp (_see Plate 7_), was a town of the Remi called Bibrax
(_Vieux-Laon_). [247] The Belgæ attacked it vigorously, and it was
defended with difficulty all day. These peoples, like the Celts,
attacked fortresses by surrounding them with a crowd of combatants,
throwing from every side a great quantity of stones, to drive the
defenders away from the walls; then, forming the tortoise, they advanced
against the gates and sapped the walls. When night had put a stop to the
attack, Iccius, who commanded in the town, sent information to Cæsar
that he could hold out no longer, unless he received prompt succour.
Towards midnight the latter sent him Numidians, Cretan archers, and
Balearic slingers, who had the messengers of Iccius for their guides.
This re-enforcement raised the courage of the besieged, and deprived the
enemy of the hope of taking the town; and after remaining some time
round Bibrax, laying waste the land and burning the hamlets and houses,
they marched towards Cæsar, and halted at less than two miles from his
camp. Their fires, kindled on the right bank of the Miette, indicated a
front of more than 8,000 paces (twelve kilomètres).
The great numbers of the enemy, and their high renown for bravery, led
the proconsul to resolve to postpone the battle. If his legions had in
his eyes an incontestible superiority, he wished, nevertheless, to
ascertain what he could expect from his cavalry, which was composed of
Gauls. For this purpose, and to try, at the same time, the courage of
the Belgæ, he engaged them every day in cavalry combats in the undulated
plain to the north of the camp. Once certain that his troops did not
yield in valour to those of the enemy, he resolved to draw them into a
general action. In front of the entrenchments was an extensive tract of
ground, advantageous for ranging an army in order of battle. This
commanding position was covered in front and on the left by the marshes
of the Miette. The right only remained unsupported, and the Belgæ might
have taken the Romans in flank in the space between the camp and the
stream, or turned them by passing between the camp and the Aisne. To
meet this danger, Cæsar made, on each of the two slopes of the hill, a
fosse, perpendicular to the line of battle, about 400 paces (600 mètres)
in length, the first reaching from the camp to the Miette, the second
joining it to the Aisne. At the extremity of these fosses he established
redoubts, in which were placed military machines. [248]
[Sidenote: Battle on the Aisne. ]
III. Having made these dispositions, and having left in the camp his two
newly-raised legions to serve as a reserve in case of need, Cæsar placed
the six others in array of battle, the right resting on the
retrenchments. The enemy also drew out his troops and deployed them in
face of the Romans. The two armies remained in observation, each waiting
till the other passed the marsh of the Miette, as the favourable moment
for attack. Meanwhile, as they remained thus stationary, the cavalry
were fighting on both sides. After a successful charge, Cæsar,
perceiving that the enemies persisted in not entering the marshes,
withdrew his legions. The Belgæ immediately left their position to move
towards the Aisne, below the point where the Miette entered it. Their
object was to cross the river between Gernicourt and Pontavert, where
there were fords, with part of their troops, to carry, if they could,
the redoubt commanded by the lieutenant Q. Titurius Sabinus, and to cut
the bridge, or, at least, to intercept the convoys of provisions, and
ravage the country of the Remi, to the south of the Aisne, whence the
Romans drew their supplies.
The barbarians were already approaching the river, when Sabinus
perceived them from the heights of Berry-au-Bac;[249] he immediately
gave information to Cæsar, who, with all his cavalry, the light-armed
Numidians, the slingers, and the archers, passed the bridge, and,
descending the left bank, marched to meet the enemies towards the place
threatened. When he arrived there, some of them had already passed the
Aisne. An obstinate struggle takes place. Surprised in their passage,
the Belgæ, after having experienced considerable loss, advance
intrepidly over the corpses to cross the river, but are repulsed by a
shower of missiles; those who had reached the left bank are surrounded
by the cavalry and massacred. [250]
[Sidenote: Retreat of the Belgæ. ]
IV. The Belgæ having failed in taking the _oppidum_ of Bibrax, in
drawing the Romans upon disadvantageous ground, in crossing the river,
and suffering, also, from want of provisions, decided on returning home,
to be ready to assemble again to succour the country which might be
first invaded by the Roman army. The principal cause of this decision
was the news of the threatened invasion of the country of the Bellovaci
by Divitiacus and the Ædui: the Bellovaci refused to lose a single
instant in hurrying to the defence of their hearths. Towards ten o’clock
in the evening, the Belgæ withdrew in such disorder that their departure
resembled a flight. Cæsar was informed immediately by his spies, but,
fearing that this retreat might conceal a snare, he retained his
legions, and even his cavalry, in the camp. At break of day, better
informed by his scouts, he sent all his cavalry, under the orders of the
lieutenants Q. Pedius and L. Aurunculeius Cotta,[251] and ordered
Labienus, with three legions, to follow them. These troops fell upon the
fugitives, and slew as many as the length of the day would permit. At
sunset they gave up the pursuit, and, in obedience to the orders they
had received, returned to the camp. [252]
The coalition of the Belgæ, so renowned for their valour, was thus
dissolved. Nevertheless, it was of importance to the Roman general, in
order to secure the pacification of the country, to go and reduce to
subjection in their homes the peoples who had dared to enter into league
against him. The nearest were the Suessiones, whose territory bordered
upon that of the Remi.
[Sidenote: Capture of Noviodunum and Bratuspantium. ]
V. The day after the flight of the enemy, before they had recovered from
their fright, Cæsar broke up his camp, crossed the Aisne, descended its
left bank, invaded the country of the Suessiones, arrived after a long
day’s march (45 kilomètres) before Noviodunum (_Soissons_) (_see Plate
7_), and, informed that this town had a weak garrison, he attempted the
same day to carry it by assault; he failed, through the breadth of the
fosses and the height of the walls. He then retrenched his camp, ordered
covered galleries to be advanced (_vineas agere_),[253] and all things
necessary for a siege to be collected. Nevertheless, the crowd of
fugitive Suessiones threw themselves into the town during the following
night. The galleries having been pushed rapidly towards the walls, the
foundations of a terrace[254] to pass the fosse (_aggere jacto_) were
established, and towers were constructed. The Gauls, astonished at the
greatness and novelty of these works, so promptly executed, offered to
surrender. They obtained safety of life at the prayer of the Remi.
Cæsar received as hostages the principal chiefs of the country, and even
the two sons of King Galba, exacted the surrender of all their arms, and
accepted the submission of the Suessiones. He then conducted his army
into the country of the Bellovaci, who had shut themselves up, with all
they possessed, in the _oppidum_ of Bratuspantium (_Breteuil_). [255] The
army was only at about five miles’ distance from it, when all the aged
men, issuing from the town, came, with extended hands, to implore the
generosity of the Roman general; when he had arrived under the walls of
the place, and while he was establishing his camp, he saw the women and
children also demanding peace as suppliants from the top of the walls.
Divitiacus, in the name of the Ædui, interceded in their favour. After
the retreat of the Belgæ and the disbanding of his troops, he had
returned to the presence of Cæsar. The latter, who had, at the prayer
of the Remi, just shown himself clement towards the Suessiones,
displayed, at the solicitation of the Ædui, the same indulgence towards
the Bellovaci. Thus obeying the same political idea of increasing among
the Belgæ the influence of the peoples allied to Rome, he pardoned them;
but, as their nation was the most powerful in Belgic Gaul, he required
from them all their arms and 600 hostages. The Bellovaci declared that
the promoters of the war, seeing the misfortune they had drawn upon
their country, had fled into the isle of Britain.
It is curious to remark the relations which existed at this epoch
between part of Gaul and England. We know, in fact, from the
“Commentaries,” that a certain Divitiacus, an Æduan chieftain, the most
powerful in all Gaul, had formerly extended his power into the isle of
Britain, and we have just seen that the chiefs in the last struggle
against the Romans had found a refuge in the British isles.
Cæsar next marched from Bratuspantium against the Ambiani, who
surrendered without resistance. [256]
[Sidenote: March against the Nervii. ]
VI. The Roman army was now to encounter more formidable adversaries. The
Nervii occupied a vast territory, one extremity of which touched upon
that of the Ambiani. This wild and intrepid people bitterly reproached
the other Belgæ for having submitted to foreigners and abjured the
virtues of their fathers. They had resolved not to send deputies, nor to
accept peace on any condition. Foreseeing the approaching invasion of
the Roman army, the Nervii had drawn into alliance with them two
neighbouring peoples, the Atrebates and the Veromandui, whom they had
persuaded to risk with them the fortune of war: the Aduatuci, also, were
already on the way to join the coalition. The women, and all those whose
age rendered them unfit for fighting, had been placed in safety, in a
spot defended by a marsh, and inaccessible to an army, no doubt at
Mons. [257]
After the submission of the Ambiani, Cæsar left Amiens to proceed to the
country of the Nervii; and after three days’ march on their territory,
he arrived probably at Bavay (_Bagacum_), which is considered to have
been their principal town. There he learnt by prisoners that he was no
more than ten miles (fifteen kilomètres) distant from the Sambre, and
that the enemy awaited him posted on the opposite bank of the
river. [258] He thus found himself on the left bank, and the Nervii were
assembled on the right bank. [259] (_See Plate 7. _)
In accordance with the informations he had received, Cæsar sent out a
reconnoitring party of scouts and centurions, charged with the selection
of a spot favourable for the establishment of a camp. A certain number
of the Belgæ, who had recently submitted, and other Gauls, followed him,
and accompanied him in his march. Some of them, as was known
subsequently by the prisoners, having observed during the preceding days
the usual order of march of the army, deserted during the night to the
Nervii, and informed them that behind each of the legions there was a
long column of baggage; that the legion which arrived first at the camp
being separated by a great space from the others, it would be easy to
attack the soldiers, still charged with their bundles (_sarcinæ_); that
this legion once routed and its baggage captured, the others would not
dare to offer any resistance. This plan of attack was the more readily
embraced by the Belgæ, as the nature of the locality favoured its
execution. The Nervii, in fact, always weak in cavalry (their whole
force was composed of infantry), were accustomed, in order to impede
more easily the cavalry of their neighbours, to notch and bend
horizontally young trees, the numerous branches of which, interlaced and
mingled with brambles and brushwood, formed thick hedges, a veritable
wall which nothing could pass through, impenetrable even to the
eye. [260] As this kind of obstacle was very embarrassing to the march of
the Roman army, the Nervii resolved to hide themselves in the woods
which then covered the heights of Haumont, to watch there the moment
when it would debouch on the opposite heights of the Sambre, to wait
till they perceived the file of baggage, and then immediately to rush
upon the troops which preceded. [261] (_See Plate 10. _)
[Sidenote: Battle on the Sambre. ]
VII. The centurions sent to reconnoitre had selected for the
establishment of the camp the heights of Neuf-Mesnil. These descend in a
uniform slope to the very banks of the river. Those of Boussières, to
which they join, end, on the contrary, at the Sambre, in sufficiently
bold escarpments, the elevation of which varies from five to fifteen
mètres, and which, inaccessible near Boussières, may be climbed a little
lower, opposite the wood of Quesnoy. The Sambre, in all this extent, was
no more than about three feet deep. On the right bank, the heights of
Haumont, opposite those of Neuf-Mesnil, descend on all sides in gentle
and regular slopes to the level of the river. In the lower part, they
were bare for a breadth of about 200 Roman paces (300 mètres), reckoning
from the Sambre; and then the woods began, which covered the upper
parts. It was in these woods, impenetrable to the sight, that the Belgæ
remained concealed. They were there drawn up in order of battle: on the
right, the Atrebates; in the centre, the Veromandui; on the left, the
Nervii; these latter facing the escarpments of the Sambre. On the open
part, along the river, they had placed some posts of cavalry. (_See
Plate 10. _)
Cæsar, ignorant of the exact position where the Belgæ were encamped,
directed his march towards the heights of Neuf-Mesnil.
His cavalry
preceded him, but the order of march was different from that which had
been communicated to the Nervii by the deserters; as he approached the
enemy, he had, according to his custom, united six legions, and placed
the baggage in the tail of the column, under the guard of the two
legions recently raised, who closed the march.
The cavalry, slingers, and archers passed the Sambre and engaged the
cavalry of the enemy, who at one moment took refuge in the woods, and at
another resumed the offensive, nor were ever pursued beyond the open
ground. Meanwhile, the six legions debouched. Arrived on the place
chosen for the camp, they began to retrench, and shared the labour among
them. Some proceeded to dig the fosses, while others spread themselves
over the country in search of timber and turf. They had hardly begun
their work, when the Belgæ, perceiving the first portion of the baggage
(which was the moment fixed for the attack), suddenly issue from the
forest with all their forces, in the order of battle they had adopted,
rush upon the cavalry and put it to rout, and run towards the Sambre
with such incredible rapidity that they seem to be everywhere at
once--at the edge of the wood, in the river, and in the midst of the
Roman troops; then, with the same celerity, climbing the hill, they rush
towards the camp, where the soldiers are at work at the retrenchments.
The Roman army is taken off its guard.
Cæsar had to provide against everything at the same time. It was
necessary to raise the purple standard as the signal for hastening to
arms,[262] to sound the trumpets to recall the soldiers employed in the
works, to bring in those who were at a distance, form the lines,
harangue the troops, give the word of order. [263] In this critical
situation, the experience of the soldiers, acquired in so many combats,
and the presence of the lieutenants with each legion, helped to supply
the place of the general, and to enable each to take, by his own
impulse, the dispositions he thought best. The impetuosity of the enemy
is such that the soldiers have time neither to put on the ensigns,[264]
nor to take the covering from their bucklers, nor even to put on their
helmets. Each, abandoning his labours, runs to range himself in the
utmost haste under the first standard which presents itself.
The army, constrained by necessity, was drawn up on the slope of the
hill, much more in obedience to the nature of the ground and the
exigencies of the moment than according to military rules. The legions,
separated from one another by thick hedges, which intercepted their
view, could not lend each other mutual succour; they formed an irregular
and interrupted line: the 9th and 10th legions were placed on the left
of the camp, the 8th and 11th in the centre, the 7th and 12th on the
right. In this general confusion, in which it became as difficult to
carry succour to the points threatened as to obey one single command,
everything was ruled by accident.
Cæsar, after taking the measures most urgent, rushes towards the troops
which chance presents first to him, takes them as he finds them in his
way, harangues them, and, when he comes to the 10th legion, he recalls
to its memory, in a few words, its ancient valour. As the enemy was
already within reach of the missiles, he orders the attack; then,
proceeding towards another point to encourage his troops, he finds them
already engaged.
The soldiers of the 9th and 10th legions throw the _pilum_, and fall,
sword in hand, upon the Atrebates, who, fatigued by their rapid advance,
out of breath, and pierced with wounds, are soon driven back from the
hill they have just climbed. These two legions, led no doubt by
Labienus, drive them into the Sambre, slay a great number, cross the
river at their heels, and pursue them up the slopes of the right bank.
The enemy, then thinking to take advantage of the commanding position,
form again, and renew the combat; but the Romans repulse them anew, and,
continuing their victorious march, take possession of the Gaulish camp.
In the centre, the 8th and 11th legions, attacked by the Veromandui, had
driven them back upon the banks of the Sambre, to the foot of the
heights, where the combat still continued.
While on the left and in the centre victory declared for the Romans, on
the right wing, the 7th and 12th legions were in danger of being
overwhelmed under the efforts of the whole army of the Nervii, composed
of 60,000 men. These intrepid warriors, led by their chief, Boduognatus,
had dashed across the Sambre in face of the escarpments of the left
bank; they had boldly climbed these, and thrown themselves, in close
rank, upon the two legions of the right wing. These legions were placed
in a position the more critical, as the victorious movements of the left
and centre, by stripping almost entirely of troops that part of the
field of battle, had left them without support. The Nervii take
advantage of these circumstances: some move towards the summit of the
heights to seize the camp, others outflank the two legions on the right
wing (_aperto latere_).
As chance would have it, at this same moment, the cavalry and
light-armed foot, who had been repulsed at the first attack, regained
pell-mell the camp; finding themselves unexpectedly in face of the
enemy, they are confounded, and take to flight again in another
direction. The valets of the army, who, from the Decuman gate and the
summit of the hill, had seen the Romans cross the river victoriously,
and had issued forth in hope of plunder, look back; perceiving the
Nervii in the camp, they fly precipitately. The tumult is further
increased by the cries of the baggage-drivers, who rush about in terror.
Among the auxiliaries in the Roman army, there was a body of Treviran
cavalry, who enjoyed among the Gauls a reputation for valour. When they
saw the camp invaded, the legions pressed and almost surrounded, the
valets, the cavalry, the slingers, the Numidians, separated, dispersed,
and flying on all sides, they believed that all was lost, took the road
for their own country, and proclaimed everywhere in their march that the
Roman army was destroyed.
Cæsar had repaired from the left wing to the other points of the line.
When he arrived at the right wing, he had found the 7th and 12th legions
hotly engaged, the ensigns of the cohorts of the 12th legion collected
on the same point, the soldiers pressed together and mutually
embarrassing each other, all the centurions of the 4th cohort and the
standard-bearer killed; the standard lost; in the other cohorts most of
the centurions were either killed or wounded, and among the latter was
the primipilus Sextius Baculus, a man of rare bravery, who was destined
soon afterwards to save the legion of Galba in the Valais. The soldiers
who still resisted were exhausted, and those of the last ranks were
quitting the ranks to avoid the missiles; new troops of enemies
continually climbed the hill, some advancing to the front against the
Romans, the others turning them on the two wings. In this extreme
danger, Cæsar judges that he can hope for succour only from himself:
having arrived without buckler, he seizes that of a legionary of the
last ranks and rushes to the first line; there, calling the centurions
by their names and exciting the soldiers, he draws the 12th legion
forward, and causes more interval to be made between the files of the
companies in order to facilitate the handling of their swords. His
example and encouraging words restore hope to the combatants and revive
their courage. Each man, under the eyes of their general, shows new
energy, and this heroic devotedness begins to cool the impetuosity of
the enemy. Not far thence, the 7th legion was pressed by a multitude of
assailants. Cæsar orders the tribunes gradually to bring the two legions
back to back, so that each presented its front to the enemy in opposite
directions. Fearing no longer to be taken in the rear, they resist with
firmness, and fight with new ardour. While Cæsar is thus occupied, the
two legions of the rear-guard, which formed the escort of the baggage
(the 13th and 14th), informed of what was taking place, arrive in haste,
and appear in view of the enemy at the top of the hill. On his part, T.
Labienus, who, at the head of the 9th and 10th legions, had made himself
master of the enemy’s camp on the heights of Haumont, discovers what is
passing in the Roman camp. He judges, by the flight of the cavalry and
servants, the greatness of the danger with which Cæsar is threatened,
and sends the 10th legion to his succour, which, re-passing the Sambre,
and climbing the slopes of Neuf-Mesnil, runs in haste to fall upon the
rear of the Nervii.
On the arrival of these re-enforcements, the whole aspect of things
changes: the wounded raise themselves, and support themselves on their
bucklers in order to take part in the action; the valets, seeing the
terror of the enemy, throw themselves unarmed upon men who are armed;
and the cavalry,[265] to efface the disgrace of their flight, seek to
outdo the legionaries in the combat. Meanwhile the Nervii fight with the
courage of despair. When those of the first ranks fall, the nearest take
their places, and mount upon their bodies; they are slain in their turn;
the dead form heaps; the survivors throw, from the top of this mountain
of corpses, their missiles upon the Romans, and send them back their own
_pila_. “How can we, then, be astonished,” says Cæsar, “that such men
dared to cross a broad river, climb its precipitous banks, and overcome
the difficulties of the ground, since nothing appeared too much for
their courage? ” They met death to the last man, and 60,000 corpses
covered the field of battle so desperately fought, in which the fortune
of Cæsar had narrowly escaped wreck.
After this struggle, in which, according to the “Commentaries,” the race
and name of the Nervii were nearly annihilated, the old men, women, and
children, who had sought refuge in the middle of the marshes, finding no
hopes of safety, surrendered. [266] In dwelling on the misfortune of
their country, they said that, of 600 senators, there remained only
three; and that, of 60,000 combatants, hardly 500 had survived. Cæsar,
to show his clemency towards the unfortunate who implored it, treated
these remains of the Nervii with kindness; he left them their lands and
towns, and enjoined the neighbouring peoples not only not to molest
them, but even to protect them from all outrage and violence. [267]
[Sidenote: Siege of the _Oppidum_ of the Aduatuci. ]
VIII. This victory was gained, no doubt, towards the end of July. Cæsar
detached the 7th legion, under the orders of young P. Crassus, to reduce
the maritime peoples of the shores of the ocean: the Veneti, the Unelli,
the Osismii, the Curiosolitæ, the Essuvii, the Aulerci, and the Redones.
He proceeded in person, with the seven other legions, following the
course of the Sambre, to meet the Aduatuci, who, as we have seen above,
were marching to join the Nervii. They were the descendants of those
Cimbri and Teutones who, in their descent upon the Roman province and
Italy in the year 652, had left on this side the Rhine 6,000 men in
charge of as much of the baggage as was too heavy to be carried with
them. After the defeat of their companions by Marius, and many
vicissitudes, these Germans had established themselves towards the
confluence of the Sambre and the Meuse, and had there formed a state.
As soon as the Aduatuci were informed of the disaster of the Nervii,
they returned to their own country, abandoned their towns and forts, and
retired, with all they possessed, into one _oppidum_, remarkably
fortified by nature. Surrounded in every direction by precipitous rocks
of great elevation, it was accessible only on one side by a gentle
slope, at most 100 feet wide, defended by a fosse and double wall of
great height, on which they placed enormous masses of rock and pointed
beams. The mountain on which the citadel of Namur is situated[268]
answers sufficiently to this description. (_See Plate 11. _)
On the arrival of the army, they made at first frequent sorties, and
engaged in battles on a small scale. Later, when the place was
surrounded by a countervallation of twelve feet high in a circuit of
15,000 feet,[269] with numerous redoubts, they kept close in their
_oppidum_. The Romans pushed forward their covered galleries, raised a
terrace under shelter of these galleries, and constructed a tower of
timber, intended to be pushed against the wall. At the sight of these
preparations, the Aduatuci, who, like most of the Gauls, despised the
Romans on account of their small stature, addressed the besiegers
ironically from their walls, not understanding how a great machine,
placed at a great distance, could be put in motion by men so diminutive.
But when they saw this tower move and approach the walls, struck with a
sight so strange and so new to them, they sent to implore peace,
demanding, as the only condition, that they should be left in possession
of their arms. Cæsar refused this condition, but declared that, if they
surrendered before the ram had struck their wall, they should be placed,
like the Nervii, under the protection of the Roman people, and preserved
from all violence. The besieged thereupon threw such a quantity of arms
into the fosses that they filled them almost to the height of the wall
and the terrace; yet, as was afterwards discovered, they had retained
about one-third. They threw open their gates, and that day remained
quiet.
The Romans had occupied the town; towards evening, Cæsar ordered them to
leave it, fearing the violences which the soldiers might commit on the
inhabitants during the night. But these, believing that after the
surrender of the place the posts of the countervallation would be
guarded with less care, resume the arms they had concealed, furnish
themselves with bucklers of bark of trees, or wicker, covered hastily
with skins, and, at midnight, attack the part of the works which seems
most easy of access. Fires, prepared by Cæsar, soon announce the attack.
The soldiers rush to the spot from the nearest redoubts; and, though the
enemies fight with the obstinacy of despair, the missiles thrown from
the entrenchments and the towers disperse them, and they are driven back
into the town with a loss of 4,000 men. Next day the gates were broken
in without resistance, and, the town once taken, the inhabitants were
sold publicly to the number of 53,000. [270]
[Sidenote: Subjugation of Armorica by P. Crassus]
IX. Towards the time of the conclusion of this siege (the first days of
September), Cæsar received letters from P. Crassus. This lieutenant
announced that the maritime peoples on the coasts of the ocean, from the
Loire to the Seine, had submitted. On the arrival of this news at Rome,
the Senate decreed fifteen days of thanksgivings. [271]
These successful exploits, and Gaul entirely pacified, gave to the
barbarian peoples so high an opinion of the Roman power, that the
nations beyond the Rhine, particularly the Ubii, sent deputies to Cæsar,
offering hostages and obedience to his orders. Anxious to proceed to
Italy and Illyria, he commanded the deputies to return to him at the
commencement of the following spring, and placed his legions, with the
exception of the 12th, in winter quarters, in the countries of the
Carnutes, the Andes, and the Turones, neighbouring upon the localities
where Crassus had been making war. [272] They were probably _échelonnés_
in the valley of the Loire, between Orleans and Angers.
[Sidenote: Expedition of Galba into the Valais. ]
X. Before he departed for Italy, Cæsar sent Servius Galba, with a part
of the cavalry and the 12th legion, into the country of the Nantuates,
the Veragri, and the Seduni (_peoples of Chablais and Lower and Upper
Valais_), whose territory extended from the country of the Allobroges,
Lake Léman, and the Rhone, to the summit of the Alps. His object was to
open an easy communication with Italy by way of these mountains, that
is, by the Simplon and the St. Bernard, where travellers were
continually subject to exactions and vexations. Galba, after some
successful battles, by which all these peoples were subdued, obtained
hostages, placed two cohorts among the Nantuates, and the rest of his
legions in a town of the Veragri called Octodurus (_Martigny_). This
town, situated in a little plain at the bottom of a glen surrounded by
high mountains, was divided into two parts by a river (_the Drance_).
Galba left one bank to the Gauls, and established his troops on the
other, which he fortified with a fosse and rampart.
Several day had passed in the greatest tranquillity, when Galba learnt
suddenly that the Gauls had during the night evacuated the part of the
town which they occupied, and that the Veragri and the Seduni were
appearing in great numbers on the surrounding mountains. The situation
was most critical; for not only could Galba reckon on no succour, but he
had not even finished his retrenchments, or gathered in his provisions
in sufficient quantity. He called together a council, in which it was
decided, in spite of the opinions of some chiefs, who proposed to
abandon the baggage and fight their way out, that they should defend the
camp; but the enemies hardly gave the Romans time to make the necessary
dispositions. Suddenly they rush from all sides towards the
retrenchments, and throw a shower of darts and javelins (_gæsa_). Having
to defend themselves against forces which are continually renewed, they
are obliged to fight all at once, and to move incessantly to the point
that are most threatened. The men who are fatigued, and even the
wounded, cannot quit the place. The combat had lasted six hours: the
Romans were exhausted with fatigue. Already they began to be short of
missiles; already the Gauls, with increasing audacity, were filling up
the fosse and tearing down the palisades; already the Romans were
reduced to the last extremity, when the primipilus, P. Sextius Baculus,
the same who had shown so much energy in the battle of the Sambre, and
C. Volusenus, tribune of the soldiers, advise Galba that the only hope
which remained was in a sally. The suggestion is adopted. At the command
of the centurions, the soldiers confine themselves to parrying the
missiles, and take breath; then, when the signal is given, rushing on
all sides to the gates, they fall upon the enemy, put him to rout, and
make an immense slaughter. Of 30,000 Gauls, about 10,000 were slain. [273]
In spite of this, Galba, not believing himself in safety in so difficult
a country, in the midst of hostile populations, brought back the 12th
legion into the country of the Allobroges, where it wintered. [273]
CHAPTER VI.
(Year of Rome 698. )
(BOOK III. OF THE “COMMENTARIES. ”)
WAR OF THE VENETI--VICTORY OVER THE UNELLI--SUBMISSION OF
AQUITAINE--MARCH AGAINST THE MORINI AND THE MENAPII.
[Sidenote: Insurrection of the Maritime Peoples. ]
I. While Cæsar was visiting Illyria and the different towns of the
Cisalpine, such as Ravenna and Lucca, war broke out anew in Gaul. The
cause was this. Young P. Crassus was in winter quarters with the 7th
legion among the Andes, near the ocean; as he fell short of wheat, he
sent several prefects and military tribunes to ask for provisions from
the neighbouring peoples. T. Terrasidius was deputed to the Unelli,[274]
M. Trebius Gallus to the Curiosolitæ, and Quintus Velanius, with T.
Silius, to the Veneti. This last people was the most powerful on the
whole coast through its commerce and its navy. Its numerous ships served
to carry on a traffic with the isle of Britain. Possessed of consummate
skill in the art of navigation, it ruled over this part of the ocean.
The Veneti first seized Silius and Velanius, in the hope of obtaining in
exchange for them the return of the hostages given to Crassus. Their
example was soon followed. The Unelli and the Curiosolitæ seized, with
the same design, Trebius and Terrasidius; they entered into an
engagement with the Veneti, through their chiefs, to run the same
fortune, excited the rest of the neighbouring maritime peoples to
recover their liberty, and all together intimated to Crassus that he
must send back the hostages if he wished his tribunes and prefects to be
restored.
Cæsar, then very far distant from the scene of these events, learnt them
from Crassus. He immediately ordered galleys to be constructed on the
Loire, rowers to be fetched from the coast of the Mediterranean, and
sailors and pilots to be procured. These measures having been promptly
executed, he repaired to the army as soon as the season permitted. At
the news of his approach, the Veneti and their allies, conscious that
they had been guilty of throwing into fetters envoys invested with a
character which is inviolable, made preparations proportionate to the
danger with which they saw they were threatened. Above all, they set to
work making their ships ready for action. Their confidence was great:
they knew that the tides would intercept the roads on the sea-coast;
they reckoned on the difficulty of the navigation in those unknown
latitudes, where the ports are few, and on the want of provisions, which
would not permit the Romans to make a long stay in their country.
Their determination once taken, they fortified their _oppida_, and
transported to them the wheat from their fields. Persuaded that the
country of the Veneti would be the first attacked, they gathered
together all their ships, no doubt in the vast estuary formed by the
river Auray in the Bay of Quiberon. (_See Plate 12. _) They allied
themselves with the maritime peoples of the coast, from the mouth of the
Loire to that of the Scheldt,[275] and demanded succour from the isle of
Britain. [276]
In spite of the difficulties of this war, Cæsar undertook it without
hesitation. He was influenced by grave motives: the violation of the
right of nations, the rebellion after submission, the coalition of so
many peoples; above all, by the fear that their impunity would be an
encouragement to others. If we believe Strabo, Cæsar, as well as the
Veneti, had other reasons to desire this war: on one side, the latter,
possessed of the commerce of Britain, already suspected the design of
the Roman general to pass into that island, and they sought to deprive
him of the means; and, on the other, Cæsar could not attempt the
dangerous enterprise of a descent on England till after he had destroyed
the fleet of the Veneti, the sole masters of the ocean. [277]
[Sidenote: War against the Veneti. ]
II. Be this as it may, in order to prevent new risings, Cæsar divided
his army so as to occupy the country militarily. The lieutenant T.
Labienus, at the head of a part of the cavalry, was sent to the Treviri,
with the mission to visit the Remi and other peoples of Belgic Gaul, to
maintain them in their duty, and to oppose the passage of the Rhine by
the Germans, who were said to have been invited by the Belgæ. P. Crassus
was ordered, with twelve legionary cohorts, and a numerous body of
cavalry, to repair into Aquitaine, to prevent the inhabitants of that
province from swelling the forces of the insurrection. The lieutenant Q.
Titurius Sabinus was detached with three legions to restrain the Unelli,
the Curiosolitæ, and the Lexovii. The young D. Brutus,[278] who had
arrived from the Mediterranean with the galleys,[279] received the
command of the fleet, which was increased by the Gaulish ships borrowed
from the Pictones, the Santones, and other peoples who had submitted.
His instructions enjoined him to sail as soon as possible for the
country of the Veneti. As to Cæsar, he proceeded thither with the rest
of the land army.
The eight legions of the Roman army were then distributed thus: to the
north of the Loire, three legions; in Aquitaine, with Crassus, a legion
and two cohorts; one legion, no doubt, on the fleet; and two legions and
eight cohorts with the general-in-chief, to undertake the war against
the Veneti. [280]
We may admit that Cæsar started from the neighbourhood of Nantes, and
directed his march to the Roche-Bernard, where he crossed the Vilaine.
Having arrived in the country of the Veneti, he resolved to profit by
the time which must pass before the arrival of his fleet to obtain
possession of the principal _oppida_ where the inhabitants took refuge.
Most of these petty fortresses on the coast of the Veneti were situated
at the extremities of tongues of land or promontories; at high tide they
could not be reached by land, while at low tide the approach was
inaccessible to ships, which remained dry on the flats; a double
obstacle to a siege.
The Romans attacked them in the following manner: they constructed on
the land, at low tide, two parallel dykes, at the same time serving for
terraces (_aggere ac molibus_), and forming approaches towards the
place. During the course of construction, the space comprised between
these two dykes continued to be inundated with water at every high tide;
but as soon as they had succeeded in joining them up to the _oppidum_,
this space, where the sea could no longer penetrate, remained finally
dry, and then presented to the besiegers a sort of place of arms useful
in the attack. [281]
With the aid of these long and laborious works, in which the height of
the dykes finished by equalling that of the walls, the Romans succeeded
in taking several of these _oppida_. But all their labours were thrown
away; for, as soon as the Veneti thought themselves no longer safe, they
evacuated the _oppidum_, embarked with all their goods on board their
numerous vessels, and withdrew to the neighbouring _oppida_, the
situations of which offered the same advantages for a new resistance.
The greater part of the fine season had passed away in this manner.
Cæsar, convinced at length that the assistance of his ships was
indispensable, came to the resolution of suspending these laborious and
fruitless operations until the arrival of his fleet; and, that he might
be near at hand to receive it, he encamped to the south of the Bay of
Quiberon, near the coast, on the heights of Saint-Gildas. (_See Plate
12. _)
The vessels of the fleet, held back by contrary winds, had not yet been
able to assemble at the mouth of the Loire. As the Veneti had foreseen,
they navigated with difficulty on this vast sea, subject to high tides,
and almost entirely unfurnished with ports. The inexperience of the
sailors, and even the form of the ships, added to their difficulties.
The enemy’s ships, on the contrary, were built and rigged in a manner to
enable them to wrestle with all obstacles; flatter than those of the
Romans, they had less to fear from the shallows and low tide. Built of
oak, they supported the most violent shocks; the front and back, very
lofty, were beyond the reach of the strongest missiles. The beams
(_transtra_), made of pieces of timber a foot thick, were fixed with
iron nails, an inch in bigness; and the anchors were held by iron chains
instead of cables; soft skins, made very thin, served for sails, either
because those peoples were nearly or entirely unacquainted with linen,
or because they regarded the ordinary sails as insufficient to support,
with such heavy ships, the impetuosity of the winds of the ocean. The
Roman ships were superior to them only in agility and the impulse of the
oars. In everything else, those of the Veneti were better adapted to the
nature of the localities and to the heavy seas. By the solidity of their
construction they resisted the ships’ beaks, and by their elevation they
were secure from the missiles, and were difficult to seize with the
grappling-irons (_copulæ_). [282]
[Sidenote: Naval Combat against the Veneti. ]
III. The Roman fleet, thanks to a wind from the east or north-east, was
at length enabled to set sail. [283] It quitted the Loire, and directed
its course towards the Bay of Quiberon and Point Saint-Jaques. (_See
Plate 12. _) As soon as the Veneti perceived it, they sent out from the
port formed by the river Auray 220 ships well armed and well equipped,
which advanced to encounter it. During this time, the Roman fleet
reached Point Saint-Jaques, where it formed in order of battle near the
shore. That of the Veneti drew up in front of it. The battle took place
under the very eyes of Cæsar and his troops, who occupied the heights on
the shore.
It was the first time that a Roman fleet appeared on the ocean.
Everything conspired to disconcert Brutus, as well as the tribunes of
the soldiers and the centurions who commanded each vessel: the impotence
of the beaks against the Gaulish ships; the height of the enemy’s poops,
which overlooked even the high towers of the Roman vessels; and lastly,
the inefficiency of the missiles thrown upwards. The military chiefs
were hesitating, and had already experienced some loss,[284] when, to
remedy this disadvantage, they imagined a method having some analogy
with that to which Duillius owed his victory over the Carthaginians in
492: they tried to disable the Gaulish vessels by the aid of hooks
(_falces_) similar to those which were used in attacks on fortresses
(_non absimili forma muralium falcium_). [285] The _falx_ was an iron
with a point and sharpened hook, fixed at the end of long poles, which,
suspended to the masts by ropes, received an impulsion similar to that
of the ram. One or more ships approached a Gaulish vessel, and, as soon
as the crew had succeeded in catching with one of these hooks the ropes
which attached the yards to the masts, the sailors rowed away with all
their strength, so as to break or cut the cords. The yards fell; the
disabled vessel was immediately surrounded by the Romans, who boarded
it; and then all depended on mere valour. This manœuvre was
completely successful. The soldiers of the fleet, knowing that no act of
courage could pass unperceived by Cæsar and the land troops, emulated
one another in zeal, and captured several of the enemy’s vessels. The
Gauls prepared to seek their safety in flight. They had already swerved
their ships to the wind, when suddenly there came on a dead calm. This
unexpected occurrence decided the victory. Left without the possibility
of moving, the heavy Gaulish vessels were captured one after another; a
very small number succeeded in gaining the coast under favour of the
night.
The battle, which began at ten o’clock in the morning, had lasted till
sunset. It terminated the war with the Veneti and the other maritime
peoples of the ocean. They lost in it, at one blow, all their youth, all
their principal citizens, and all their fleet; without refuge, without
the means of defending any longer their _oppida_, they surrendered
themselves, bodies and goods. Cæsar, wishing to compel the Gauls in
future to respect the rights of nations, caused the whole Senate to be
put to death and the rest of the inhabitants to be sold for slaves.
Cæsar has been justly reproached with this cruel chastisement; yet this
great man gave such frequent proofs of his clemency towards the
vanquished, that he must have yielded to very powerful political motives
to order an execution so contrary to his habits and temper. Moreover, it
was a sad effect of the war to expose incessantly the chiefs of the
Gallic states to the resentments of the conquerors and the fury of the
mob.
