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THE HISTORIANS’ HISTORY OF THE WORLD
[Illustration: LIVY]
THE HISTORIANS’
HISTORY
OF THE WORLD
A comprehensive narrative of the rise and development of nations
as recorded by over two thousand of the great writers of all ages:
edited, with the assistance of a distinguished board of advisers
and contributors, by
HENRY SMITH WILLIAMS, LL.D.
[Illustration]
IN TWENTY-FIVE VOLUMES
VOLUME V--THE ROMAN REPUBLIC
The Outlook Company
New York
The History Association
London
1904
COPYRIGHT, 1904,
BY HENRY SMITH WILLIAMS.
_All rights reserved._
Contributors, and Editorial Revisers.
Prof. Adolf Erman, University of Berlin.
Prof. Joseph Halévy, College of France.
Prof. Thomas K. Cheyne, Oxford University.
Prof. Andrew C. McLaughlin, University of Michigan.
Prof. David H. Müller, University of Vienna.
Prof. Alfred Rambaud, University of Paris.
Prof. Eduard Meyer, University of Berlin.
Dr. James T. Shotwell, Columbia University.
Prof. Theodor Nöldeke, University of Strasburg.
Prof. Albert B. Hart, Harvard University.
Dr. Paul Brönnle, Royal Asiatic Society.
Dr. James Gairdner, C.B., London.
Prof. Ulrich von Wilamowitz Möllendorff, University of Berlin.
Prof. H. Marnali, University of Budapest.
Dr. G. W. Botsford, Columbia University.
Prof. Julius Wellhausen, University of Göttingen.
Prof. Franz R. von Krones, University of Graz.
Prof. Wilhelm Soltau, Zabern University.
Prof. R. W. Rogers, Drew Theological Seminary.
Prof. A. Vambéry, University of Budapest.
Prof. Otto Hirschfeld, University of Berlin.
Baron Bernardo di San Severino Quaranta, London.
Prof. F. York Powell, Oxford University.
Dr. John P. Peters, New York.
Dr. S. Rappoport, School of Oriental Languages, Paris.
Prof. Hermann Diels, University of Berlin.
Prof. C. W. C. Oman, Oxford University.
Prof. I. Goldziher, University of Vienna.
Prof. W. L. Fleming, University of West Virginia.
Prof. R. Koser, University of Berlin.
CONTENTS
VOLUME V
ROME
PAGE
INTRODUCTORY ESSAYS
THE WORLD INFLUENCE OF EARLY ROME. By Dr. Eduard Meyer 1
THE SCOPE AND DEVELOPMENT OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY. By Dr. Wilhelm
Soltau 11
BOOK I.--EARLY ROMAN HISTORY TO THE FALL OF THE REPUBLIC
INTRODUCTION 25
CHAPTER I
LAND AND PEOPLE 43
The land of Italy, 44. Early population of Italy, 48.
Beginnings of Rome and the primitive Roman commonwealth, 51.
CHAPTER II
EARLY LEGENDS OF ROME--ÆNEAS AND ROMULUS (_ca._ 753-716 B.C.) 58
The Æneas legend, 59. The Ascanius legend, 60. The legend of
Romulus and Remus, 61. The rape of the Sabines, 63. A critical
study of the legends, 66. Explanation of the Æneas legend, 69.
The Romulus legend examined, 70.
CHAPTER III
LEGENDARY HISTORY OF THE KINGS (_ca._ 716-510 B.C.) 75
Numa Pompilius, 75. Tullus Hostilius, 76. The combat of the
Horatii and the Curiatii, 77. Ancus Marcius, 79. L. Tarquinius
Priscus, 80. Servius Tullius, 82. Lucius Tarquinius the Tyrant,
83.
CHAPTER IV
THE BANISHMENT OF THE KINGS--CRITICISMS OF MONARCHIAL HISTORY
(_ca._ 510 B.C.) 85
Tarquinius consults the oracle, 85. The rape of Lucretia,
86. Niebuhr on the story of Lucretia, 87. The banishment of
Tarquinius, 88. Porsenna’s war upon the Romans; the story of
Horatius at the bridge, as told by Dionysius, 90. Caius Mucius
and King Porsenna, 92. Battle of Lake Regillus, 93. The myths
of the Roman kings critically examined, 95. The historical
value of the myths, 100.
CHAPTER V
CIVILISATION OF THE REGAL PERIOD (_ca._ 753-510 B.C.) 103
Organisation of the state, 103. The status of the monarchy,
105. Religion, 107. Constitution, 107. The organisation of the
army, 111. Classes of foot soldiers, 112. Popular institutions,
113. The wealth of the Romans and its sources, 115. Roman
education, 117. Morals and politics of the age, 118. The fine
arts, 119.
CHAPTER VI
THE FIRST CENTURY OF THE REPUBLIC (510-391 B.C.) 121
Plebeians and patricians, 123. Spurius Cassius and the first
Agrarian Law, 129. The institution of the decemvirate, 131.
The story of Virginia told by Dionysius, 132. Fall of the
decemvirate, 138. The Canuleian Law, 140. External wars, 142.
Legends of the Volscian and Æquian wars, 145. Coriolanus and
the Volscians, 145. Critical examination of the story of
Coriolanus, 148. Cincinnatus and the Æquians, 149. Critical
examination of the story of Cincinnatus, 151. The Fabian Gens
and the Veientines, 152.
CHAPTER VII
THE INVASION OF THE GAULS AND ITS SEQUEL (391-351 B.C.) 154
The Gauls, 155. Livy’s account of the Gauls in Rome, 156. Other
accounts of the departure of the Gauls, 165. Niebuhr on the
conduct of the Romans, 166. Sequel of the Gallic War, 167. The
Licinian rogations, 170. Equalisation of the two orders, 172.
External affairs, 175.
CHAPTER VIII
THE CONQUEST OF CENTRAL ITALY (423-280 B.C.) 178
The Samnites, 178. The First Samnite War, 180. The Latin
War, 183. The Second Samnite War, 186. The Third Samnite and
Etruscan wars, 194. Lucanian, Gallic, and Etruscan wars, 199.
CHAPTER IX
THE COMPLETION OF THE ITALIAN CONQUEST (281-265 B.C.) 201
Pyrrhus in Italy, 203. The final reduction of Italy, 209.
Government of the acquired territory, 210. Prefectures;
municipalities, 211. Colonies; free and confederate states, 212.
CHAPTER X
THE FIRST PUNIC WAR (326-218 B.C.) 215
Causes of the First Punic War, 217. The war begins, 219. First
period, 219. Second period, 221. Polybius’ account of Roman
affairs, 224. Third period, 230. Events between the First and
Second Punic wars, 233. Hamilcar and Hannibal, 237.
CHAPTER XI
FIRST HALF OF THE SECOND PUNIC WAR (218-211 B.C.) 241
First period, 241. Polybius’ account of the crossing of the
Alps, 244. Hannibal in Italy, 249. Second period, 260.
CHAPTER XII
CLOSE OF THE SECOND PUNIC WAR (210-202 B.C.) 269
Third period, 269. The death of Hasdrubal described by
Polybius, 276. Rejoicing at Rome; Nero’s inhumanity and
triumph, 277. The fourth and last period of the war, 278.
The character of Scipio, 278. Scipio in Spain, 279. Scipio
returns to Rome, 283. Scipio invades Africa, 284. The battle of
Zama described by Polybius, 287. Terms dictated to Carthage;
Scipio’s triumph, 292. An estimate of Hannibal, 294.
CHAPTER XIII
THE MACEDONIAN AND SYRIAC WARS AND THE THIRD PUNIC WAR
(200-131 B.C.) 296
The Macedonian War; war with Antiochus III, 296. Affairs of
Carthage, 304. Outbreak of the Third Punic War, 305. Appian’s
account of the destruction of Carthage, 310. The oration of
Hasdrubal’s wife; Scipio’s moralising, 312. Plundering the
city, 313. Sacrifices and the triumph, 314. The Achæan War,
314. Spanish wars: fall of Numantia, 317. Florus on the fall of
Numantia, 321. First Slave War in Sicily, 322. The war against
the slaves, 325.
CHAPTER XIV
CIVILISATION AT THE END OF THE PERIOD OF CONQUEST 327
Organisation of the government, 327. The army, 329. Polybius
on Greek and Roman battle-orders, 329. The senate, 332. The
centuriate assembly, 334. The assembly of the tribes, 334.
Justice, 337. Provincial government, 337. Taxation, 338.
Social conditions: the aristocracy and the people, 340. Slaves
and freemen, 343. The Roman family: women and marriage, 346.
Religion, 350. Treatment of other nations, 355. The fine arts,
355. Literature, 358.
CHAPTER XV
THE GRACCHI AND THEIR REFORMS (137-121 B.C.) 359
Tiberius Gracchus, 359. Return and death of Scipio the Younger,
366. Caius Gracchus and his times, 371.
CHAPTER XVI
THE JUGURTHINE AND OTHER WARS (123-101 B.C.) 381
The Jugurthine War, 383. Sallust’s account of Jugurtha at Rome,
385. A war of bribery, 387. Metellus in command, 388. Marius
appears as commander, 389. Plutarch on Jugurtha’s death, 391.
The Cimbrians and the Teutons, 392. The Second Slave War, 399.
CHAPTER XVII
THE BEGINNING OF CIVIL STRIFE (102-88 B.C.) 401
The sixth consulate of Marius, 402. Claims of the Latins and
Italians to the civitas, 405. The Social War, 413. Marius
assumes the command, 415.
CHAPTER XVIII
MARIUS AND SULLA (92-82 B.C.) 420
The First Mithridatic War, 421. The First Civil War, 422.
Ihne’s estimate of Marius, 431. Sulla in Greece, 432.
The return of Sulla; and the Second Civil War, 434. The
proscriptions, 438.
CHAPTER XIX
THE DICTATORSHIP OF SULLA (81-79 B.C.) 442
Sulla’s legislation, 446. Abdication of Sulla, 446. Rome’s debt
to Sulla, 448. The Roman provinces, 450. The career of Verres,
454.
CHAPTER XX
THE RISE OF POMPEY (78-61 B.C.) 457
Lepidus and Sertorius, 457. The war of the Gladiators, 460.
The consulship of Pompey and Crassus, 461. Pompey subdues the
Cilician pirates, 464. The Second and Third Mithridatic wars,
467. The Armenian War, 469. The end of Mithridates, 473. Pompey
in Jerusalem, 474.
CHAPTER XXI
THE CONSPIRACY OF CATILINE (67-61 B.C.) 475
Marcus Porcius Cato, 475. Caius Julius Cæsar, 477. L. Sergius
Catilina and his times, 480. The conspiracy, 483. Cæsar and the
conspiracy, 488. The rise of Julius Cæsar, 494. The return of
Pompey, 497.
CHAPTER XXII
CÆSAR AND POMPEY (60-50 B.C.) 501
The first triumvirate, 501. Clodius exiles Cicero, 504. The
recall of Cicero, 506. Second consulate of Pompey and Crassus,
508. The Parthian War of Crassus, 509. Anarchy at Rome, 511.
Pompey sole consul, 513. The Gallic wars, 514. The battle
with the Nervii, 516. The sea fight with the Veneti, 520. The
massacre of the Germans, 522. The Roman army meets the Britons,
523.
CHAPTER XXIII
CÆSAR AT WAR AGAINST POMPEY (60-48 B.C.) 528
The war between Cæsar and Pompey, 529. Cæsar crosses the
Rubicon, 532. Cæsar’s serious position, 534. Cæsar lord from
Rome to Spain, 535. Cæsar in Greece, 536. Appian describes the
battle of Dyrrhachium, 537. Pharsalia, 541.
CHAPTER XXIV
FROM PHARSALIA TO THE DEATH OF CATO (48-46 B.C.) 544
Cæsar in Egypt, 544. The war with Pharnaces, 551. Cæsar returns
to Rome, 552. The African War, 554. Sallust’s comparison of
Cæsar and Cato, 558.
CHAPTER XXV
THE CLOSING SCENES OF CÆSAR’S LIFE (46-44 B.C.) 560
The end of the African war, 560. The return to Rome, 562.
Cæsar’s triumphs, 563. The last campaign, 566. The last
triumph, 569. Cæsar’s reforms, 572. Cæsar’s life in Rome, 575.
Events leading to the conspiracy, 578. The conspiracy, 579. The
assassination, 581. Appian’s account of Cæsar’s last days, 583.
CHAPTER XXVI
THE PERSONALITY AND CHARACTER OF CÆSAR 588
Appian compares Cæsar with Alexander, 599. Mommsen’s estimate
of Cæsar’s character, 602. Mommsen’s estimate of Cæsar’s work,
607.
CHAPTER XXVII
THE LAST DAYS OF THE REPUBLIC (44-29 B.C.) 609
Cæsar’s will and funeral, 610. The acts of the young Octavius,
611. The proscription, 617. Death of Cicero, 619. Brutus and
Cassius, 621. Philippi, 622. Antony and Cleopatra, 624. Antony
meets with reverses, 625. Octavian against Antony; the battle
of Actium, 630. Death of Antony and Cleopatra, 631. An estimate
of the personality of Antony, 633.
CHAPTER XXVIII
THE STATE OF ROME AT THE END OF THE REPUBLIC 637
A retrospective view of the republican constitution, 637.
Literature, 643. The drama, 645. Poetry, 647. The fine arts,
651. Social conditions; religion, 652.
BRIEF REFERENCE-LIST OF AUTHORITIES BY CHAPTERS 655
PART X
THE HISTORY OF ROME FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES
TO THE YEAR 476 A.D.
BASED CHIEFLY UPON THE FOLLOWING AUTHORITIES
AMMIANUS, APPIAN, THOMAS ARNOLD, BARTHÉLEMY AUBE, AUGUSTAN HISTORY,
C. JULIUS CÆSAR, HENRY FYNES CLINTON, CICERO, DION CASSIUS,
DIONYSIUS OF HALICARNASSUS, EUTROPIUS, FLORUS, VICTOR
GARDTHAUSEN, EDWARD GIBBON, OTTO GILBERT, ADOLF
HARNACK, G. F. HERTZBERG, HERODIAN, OTTO
HIRSCHFELD, THOMAS HODGKIN, KARL HOECK,
WILHELM IHNE, JORDANES (JORNANDES),
JOSEPHUS, GEORGE CORNEWALL LEWIS,
H. G. LIDDELL, LIVY, JOACHIM MARQUARDT, CHARLES MERIVALE, EDUARD
MEYER, THEODOR MOMMSEN, MONUMENTUM ANCYRANUM, CORNELIUS
NEPOS, B. G. NIEBUHR, PLINY THE ELDER, PLINY THE
YOUNGER, PLUTARCH, POLYBIUS, L. VON RANKE,
SALLUST, WILHELM SOLTAU, STRABO,
SUETONIUS, TACITUS, TILLEMONT,
VELLEIUS, GEORG WEBER,
ZOSIMUS
TOGETHER WITH A CHARACTERISATION OF
THE WORLD INFLUENCE OF EARLY ROME
BY
EDUARD MEYER
A STUDY OF
THE SCOPE AND DEVELOPMENT OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY
BY
WILHELM SOLTAU
A SKETCH OF
THE EARLY ROMAN EMPIRE
BY
OTTO HIRSCHFELD
AND A SUMMARY OF
THE RELATIONS OF THE ROMAN STATE AND THE EARLY CHRISTIAN CHURCH
BY
ADOLF HARNACK
WITH ADDITIONAL CITATIONS FROM
J. J. AMPÈRE, FRIEDRICH BLUHME, GEORGE W. BOTSFORD, A. BOUCHE-LECLERCQ,
KURT BREYSIG, R. W. BROWN, R. BURN, DION CHRYSOSTOM, JACQUES
FRANÇOIS DENIS, JEAN VICTOR DURUY, T. H. DYER, EPICTETUS,
A. ESMEIN, E. A. FREEMAN, G. C. FISKE, GABRIEL H.
GAILLARD, OLIVER GOLDSMITH, ALBERT GUELDENPENNING,
OSCAR JÄGER, JULIAN, THOMAS KEIGHTLEY,
GEORGE LONG, J. N. MADVIG,
MARCUS AURELIUS, VALERIUS MAXIMUS, ARTHUR MURPHY, PHILON, S. REINHARDT,
J. ERNEST RENAN, JOHANN HEINRICH KARL FRIEDRICH HERMANN SCHILLER,
K. W. F. VON SCHLEGEL, F. C. SCHLOSSER, ALBERT SCHWEGLER, L.
ANNÆUS SENECA, M. ANNÆUS SENECA, J. Y. SHEPPARD, JAMES
SIME, H. W. STÖLL, H. TAINE, AMÉDÉE THIERRY, VIRGIL,
L. WIEGANDT, EDUARD VOX WIETERSHEIM, H. S.
WILLIAMS, R. H. WRIGHTSON, XIPHILINUS,
K. S. ZACHARIÆ VON LINGENTHAL
[Illustration]
THE WORLD INFLUENCE OF EARLY ROME
WRITTEN SPECIALLY FOR THE PRESENT WORK
BY DR. EDUARD MEYER
Professor of Ancient History in the University of Berlin.
It might have been supposed that with the death of Alexander the
political connection between the eastern and western halves of the
Mediterranean, which had subsisted throughout the whole course of Greek
history, was severed except for such occasional and superficial points of
contact as, in the nature of things, had never been wholly lacking. As a
matter of fact, the West was left to its own devices. But it presently
became evident that the development which there took place, untroubled by
interference from without, was fraught with consequences of the utmost
moment to the Hellenistic political system. By abstaining from peremptory
interference while such interference was yet possible, the Macedonian
kingdoms permitted a power to arise in Italy so strong that in a very
short time it proceeded to aim a fatal blow at their own existence.
This new power did not take its rise among those who had hitherto been
the most formidable foes of Greece--the Sabello-Oscan tribes, whom Plato
dreaded. These last were a race of warlike mountaineers living under
a free system of tribal government, something like the Swiss of the
later Middle Ages, except that cavalry, as well as infantry, played an
important part in their armies. Like the Swiss, they strove to extend
their borders on every side beyond the narrow limits of their native
land. But they lacked what the Swiss of the Four Cantons gained by their
league with Berne and Zurich--a steady political aim; tribe jostled
tribe, the remoter endeavouring to wrest from the nearer what the latter
had won. Thus, though they might subjugate cities of Greece, they were
incapable of creating a great homogeneous state. The Caraceni, Pentri,
Caudini, and Hirpini, the four tribes of the mountain tract about
the sources of the Volturnus and its tributaries, were the only ones
which constituted a compact federation. After the middle of the fourth
century these tribes began to press forward in every direction, against
the Apulians to the east, the Lucanians to the south, the Campanians,
Sidicinians, and Volscians to the west. But there they were confronted by
a power which was destined to prove greater than they.
As early as the sixth century, during the Etruscan period, the city
of Rome on the Tiber had grown into a large and important community.
After the overthrow of foreign dominion and the fall of the monarchy,
it maintained its supremacy over at least the majority of the country
townships of the little Latin nation, which laboriously warded off the
attacks of its neighbours under Roman hegemony. Not till about the year
400 did it succeed in driving the Æqui and Volscians back into their
mountain fastnesses; and in 388 it took the neighbouring Etruscan city
of Veii. The great Celtic invasion brought it to the verge of ruin; but
having survived this peril it maintained its former predominance after
the withdrawal of the enemy. With the Greeks it was on friendly terms;
from of old, Greek civilisation had found almost as ready acceptance
among the Latins as among the Etruscans, and in the struggle with the
latter people Latins and Greeks had fought side by side. The middle
of the fourth century witnessed a great expansion of Roman power; the
Romans conquered the Volscians and several refractory Latin cities, and
vanquished their Etruscan neighbours, and in the year 350 the Etruscan
city of Cære joined the Roman confederacy. At the same time Rome extended
her dominion in the valley of the Liris and towards the coast; and in
the latter quarter the great city of Capua (together with Cumæ, now an
Oscan city, and many others) threw themselves into the arms of Rome for
protection against the Samnites. Soon after, in 336-334, Capua and the
Latin towns, which had revolted, were completely subjugated, and most of
them incorporated into the Roman body politic. Peace had been maintained
up to this time with the Samnites, to whom the south of the Campania and
the valley of the upper Liris had been abandoned; but when, in 325, Rome
gained a footing in Fregellæ and took the Greeks of Naples under her
protection, an open conflict broke out between the two states, each of
which was doing its utmost to extend its borders in Italy.
In spite of the higher level of civilisation to which it had risen, the
state of Rome, like that of the Samnites, was a state of farmers. But
it possessed what the Samnite tribal organisation lacked, a superior
political system, which gave it the advantage of the municipal form of
government, on exactly the same lines as the municipal republics of
Greece. But with this municipal organisation it combined (and therein
lay the secret of its success) a capacity for expansion and an ever
increasing extension of civil rights which offers the strongest contrast
to the churlish spirit of the Greek cities. In the latter, purity of
descent and the exclusion of all foreigners from civil rights was an
axiom of political life, to which radical democracies, like Athens,
clung even more tenaciously than the rest; and the consequence was that
every success abroad led to the subjugation of the vanquished under the
yoke of the ruling city. Rome, on the contrary, for all her conquests,
made no subjects in Italy. In her own vicinity, and in Latium first of
all, conquered communities were usually admitted to the Roman political
confederacy on equal terms, and allowed to retain local autonomy (as
_municipia_) under Roman supervision. She extended the same system far
into middle Italy; the franchise and the right of voting in the Roman
popular assemblies (_comitia_) being withheld only from communities of
alien language, like the Etruscan Cærites, and the Campanians of Capua.
In other cases, when Rome had vanquished a foe she took possession of a
portion of the public lands, and established citizens there as settlers
to cultivate the soil; the rest of the citizens retained complete
liberty and political autonomy (Rome, however, altering the system of
government according to her own good pleasure and taking care that the
administration fell into the hands of her own adherents), but were
pledged by an everlasting covenant to follow the Roman standards as
free allies. Moreover, Rome had founded colonies in the heart of the
enemy’s country, daughter-cities organised as independent municipalities,
which occupied the same position towards her as formerly (before 336)
the cities of the Latin League, and were consequently known as Latin
colonies. By this organisation Rome not only maintained possession, in
every instance, of the territory she had won, but made provision for a
constant supply of sound and capable peasantry, from whose ranks the
army was recruited. While retaining, in her political administration,
the form of a city, she had in effect far outgrown its limitations
and become a great state, with all its forces at the disposal of the
government unconditionally. To this circumstance it is due that while
the constitution recognised the absolute sovereignty of the people (the
abolition of the whole body of aristocratic privilege belongs to this
very period)[1] the government remained vested in the hands of the great
families of patrician and plebeian descent, and the dignity of office,
which was degraded to a mere phantom in the Greek democracies, remained
virtually undiminished in Rome. The interests of the farming class and
of the dominant families went hand in hand; the former profited by the
agrarian policy of expansion on which the latter insisted, and every
success abroad, no matter at what cost, consolidated and increased the
strength of the community, and led a step farther on the road to supreme
dominion.
In numbers, military capacity, and martial ardour, the Samnites were at
least a match for the Romans, their generals were possibly superior to
those of Rome in ability; the Samnites won more victories than their
adversaries in the open field. The Samnites’ farming communities perished
through the defects of their political organisation; they could not
make a breach in the solid fabric of the might of Rome, nor master the
Roman fortresses, even though they might capture one now and again;
while, thanks to her superior civilisation and the supplies of money,
provisions, and war material furnished by the various cities within her
territory, Rome was able to carry on war much more continuously than the
Samnite farmer, whose armies could not remain in the field for more than
a few weeks at a time, because, like the Peloponnesians in the war with
Athens, their stock of provisions was exhausted and they were obliged to
return home to till their land. In addition to this disadvantage, all
their neighbouring tribes, the clans in the Abruzzi, the Apulians, and
for a while even the Lucanians, took the part of Rome.
In spite of all their successes in the field the Samnites realised that
they could not permanently withstand the Romans single-handed; they
endeavoured to drag the other nations of Italy into the contest, and thus
the long conflict took on the character of a decisive struggle for the
sovereignty of Italy. Twice the Samnites succeeded in bringing about a
great coalition; in 308 the Etruscans flung themselves upon Rome, in 295
the Samnite troops joined the hordes of the Celts in Umbria, while the
Etruscans flew to arms once more. The Romans remained victors on both
occasions, and the great battle of Sentinum in 295 decided the fate of
Italy. When the war ended, in the year 290, Rome was the dominant power
in Italy, and the submission of such portions of the country as still
retained their independence was merely a matter of time. It was too late
then for Tarentum to step into the breach and invoke the aid of Pyrrhus,
king of Epirus, too late for the latter to resume the strife in the old
spirit of the struggle of Greece against the Italians and Carthaginians.
The particularist temper of the Greeks brought his successes to nought
as soon as they were won; for all his superior ability as a commander,
and though he defeated the Romans, he could not but recognise at once the
superiority of their military system. Though he advanced to the frontiers
of Latium and from afar saw the enemy’s capital at his feet, he could not
shatter the framework of the Roman state, and he ultimately succumbed to
the Romans on the battle-field of Beneventum (275).
Rome had now completed the conquest of Italy up to the margin of the
valley of the Po, and had everywhere inaugurated the system sketched
in broad outline above. How firmly she had welded it was proved by the
fiery test of the war of Hannibal. There was no lack of the particularist
spirit even in Italy, and the numerous nationalities which inhabited
the peninsula, none of whom understood the language of the others, had
no such common bond as knit the various tribes of Greece together. In
the territory over which Rome ruled in 264, no less than six different
languages were spoken, without counting the Ligurians, Celts, and
Veneti. But Rome, by repressing all open insubordination with inflexible
energy while at the same time pursuing a liberal policy with regard to
the interests of the dependent communities and leaving scope for local
autonomy as long as it was not dangerous to herself, did more than create
a political entity; from this germ begins to grow a sentiment of Italian
nationality that reaches beyond racial differences, and the new nation of
the Italians or toga-wearers (_togati_) has come to the birth.
The mainspring of Roman success was the policy of agrarian expansion, and
the farmers were the first to profit by it. This fact rendered impossible
the development of a municipal democracy after the Greek model (such
as Appius Claudius had attempted to set up in 308) based upon capital,
trade, and handicraft, and the masses of the urban population, with an
all-powerful demagogue at its head.
From that time forward the urban population, restricted as it was to four
districts, was practically overridden, as far as political rights were
concerned, in the _comitia tributa_ (with which ordinary legislation
rested) by the thirty-one districts of the agricultural class. But as
the state grew into a great power and its chief town into a metropolis,
the urban elements could not fail to acquire increasing influence,
especially the wealthy capitalists (consisting largely of freedmen and
the descendants of freedmen) who managed all matters of public finance.
In the _comitia centuriata_ which were organised on the basis of a
property qualification, and whose functions included the election of
magistrates and the settlement of peace and war, these circles exercised
very great influence, and the wealthiest found a compact organisation in
the eighteen centuries of knights.
The interests of the agricultural class did not extend beyond Italy; the
late wars had provided plenty of land for distribution, and if more were
wanted it could be found in the territory of the Celts on the Po, the
southern portion of which had been conquered as early as 282 but not yet
divided. The interests of the urban elements, the capitalists, on the
contrary, extended beyond the sea. To them the most pressing business
of the moment was to vindicate the preponderance of the state to the
outside world, to adjust their relations abroad as best suited their own
interests, and to deliver Italy from foreign competition, and, above all,
from Carthage; and not a few of the great ruling families were allured,
like the Claudii, by the tempting prospect.
Carthage and Rome had come dangerously near together during the last few
decades. As long before as the year 306 the two had concluded a compact
by which Rome was not to intervene in Sicily nor Carthage in Italy. The
rival states had indeed united against Pyrrhus, but without ever laying
aside their mutual distrust; each feared that the other might effect
a lodgment within its sphere of influence. And now, in the year 264,
the Oscan community of the Mamertines in Messana (whilom mercenaries
of Agathocles, who had exterminated the Greek inhabitants of the city)
appealed to both Carthage and Rome for aid against Hiero, the ruler of
Syracuse.
Rome was thus brought face to face with the most momentous decision in
her whole history. The Romans were not untroubled by moral scruples nor
blind to the fact that to accede to the petition would necessarily lead
to war with Carthage, since Carthage had promptly taken the city under
her protection and occupied it with her troops; but the opportunity was
too tempting, and if it were allowed to pass, the whole of the rich
island would undoubtedly fall under the sovereignty of Carthage for
evermore, and her power, formidable already, would be correspondingly
increased. The senate hesitated, but the consul Appius Claudius brought
the matter before the comitia centuriata, and they decided in favour of
rendering assistance, and thereby in favour of war.
It was a step that could never be retraced, a step of the same
incalculable consequence to Rome as the occupation of Silesia was to
Prussia, or the war with Spain and the occupation of Cuba and the
Philippines to the United States of America. Its immediate consequences
were a struggle of twenty-four years’ duration with Carthage for the
possession of Sicily, and the creation of a Roman sea power which was
not merely a match for that of Carthage, but actually annihilated it;
its ultimate result was the acquisition of a dominion beyond sea in
which Rome for the first time bore rule over tributary subjects governed
by Roman magnates and exploited by Italian capitalists. A further
consequence was that the Romans took advantage of the difficulties in
which Carthage was involved by a mutiny of mercenaries in 237 to wrest
Sardinia and Corsica from her and at the same time once more exact a huge
indemnity.
In other directions, too, Rome became more and more deeply involved in
the affairs of the outside world, and consequently with the political
system of Hellenic states. As in the old conflict with the Etruscans
and the recent war with Carthage, so a decade later she solved in
the Levant a problem which had been propounded to Greece and for the
solution of which she had not been strong enough. When the pirate state
of the Illyrians of Scodra extended to the coasts of Italy the ravages
it had inflicted upon the Greeks, Rome took vigorous action, used her
lately acquired sea power for the speedy overthrow of the pirate state
(229) and planted her foot firmly on the coast of the Balkan peninsula;
thereby encroaching on the sphere of influence of Macedonia, which was
constrained to be a helpless spectator.
On the other hand the close amity with the court of Alexandria, which had
been inaugurated after the war with Pyrrhus, was cemented; there were
no grounds for antagonism between the first maritime power of the East
and the first land power of the West, while, as far as their rivals were
concerned, the interests of the two in both spheres went hand in hand.
One result of this development was the ever readier acceptance of Greek
civilisation at Rome. After the conclusion of the First Punic War the
Greek drama, which formed the climax of the festivals of the Hellenic
world, was adopted in the popular festivals of Rome, and a Greek prisoner
of war from Tarentum, Livius Andronicus by name, who translated the Greek
plays into Latin, likewise introduced Greek scholarship into Rome and
translated the _Odyssey_, the Greek reading-book. There is no need to
tell how with this the development of Latin literature begins, or how
Nævius the Latin, who himself had fought in the First Punic War, takes
his place beside the Greek author as a Roman national poet.
In other respects, however, Rome returned to her ancient Italian policy.
After the year 236 she entered upon hostilities with the Ligurians
north of the Arno; in 232 the border country taken from the Gauls was
partitioned and settled by Caius Flaminius. This led to another great war
with the Celts (225-222), the outcome of which was the conquest of the
valley of the Po--involving the acquisition of another vast region for
partition and colonisation. In this war the Veneti and the Celtic tribe
of the Cenomani (between the Adige and the Addua) had voluntarily allied
themselves with Rome, and her dominion therefore extended everywhere to
the foot of the Alps.
But meanwhile a formidable adversary had arisen. At Carthage the Roman
attack and the loss of the position maintained for centuries in the
islands, as well as the loss of sea power, had no doubt been keenly
felt by all classes of the population. But the government, _i.e._, the
merchant aristocracy, had accepted the arbitrament of war as final. They
could not bring themselves to make the sacrifices which another campaign
against Rome must cost, especially as they clearly foresaw that even if
victory were won after a fiercer contest than before, it would certainly
bring their own fall and the establishment of the rule of the victorious
general in its train. They accordingly resigned themselves to the new
state of things, and endeavoured, in spite of all changes, to maintain
amicable relations with Rome, since only thus could trade and industry
continue to flourish, and Carthage, despite the loss of her supremacy
at sea, remain, as before, the first commercial city of the western
Mediterranean.
But side by side with the government a military party had come into
being, and its leader, Hamilcar Barca, who had held his ground
unconquered to the last moment in Sicily and who afterwards (in concert
with Hanno the Great, the general of the aristocratic party) quelled the
mutiny of the mercenaries, was burning with eagerness to take vengeance
on Carthage’s autocratic and perfidious adversary. The power was in
his hands and he was determined to use it to make every preparation
for a fresh and decisive campaign. At the end of the year 237,
immediately after the suppression of the mutiny, he proceeded on his own
responsibility to Spain, and there conquered a new province for Carthage,
larger than the possessions she had lost to Rome.
By allying himself with the popular party in Carthage, and giving his
daughter in marriage to Hasdrubal, their leader, Barca gained a strong
following in the capital; and even the dominant aristocracy, in spite of
the suspicion with which they regarded the self-willed general--and not
without good reason--could not but welcome gladly the revenues of the
new province out of which they could defray the war indemnity to Rome.
Hamilcar fell in 229; Hasdrubal, who took over his command, postponed the
war against Rome and entered into an agreement with the latter, who was
suspiciously watching developments in Spain, by which he pledged himself
not to cross the Ebro. This made it possible for Rome to bring the
Celtic War to an end and conquer the valley of the Po while Hasdrubal was
organising the government of Spain. But when, after the assassination of
Hasdrubal in 221, his youthful brother-in-law, Hannibal, then twenty-four
years of age, took over the command, he promptly revived his father’s
projects.
In the year 219, by picking a quarrel with Saguntum, which had put
itself under the protection of Rome, and attacking the city, which he
took at the beginning of 218, he brought about a conflict which forced
both Rome and the reluctant government of Carthage into hostilities.
The declaration of war was brought to Carthage by a Roman embassy in
the spring of 218. While Rome was making preparations for an attack on
Spain and Africa simultaneously, Hannibal advanced by forced marches
upon Italy by land, succeeded in evading the Roman army under Publius
Scipio which had been landed at Massilia, and reached Italian soil before
the beginning of winter. Rome was thereby foiled in her intention of
taking the offensive. At the end of 218 and the beginning of 217 he had
annihilated by a series of tremendous blows the Roman armies opposed to
him, and, reinforced by hordes of Celts from the valley of the Po, had
opened a way for himself into the heart of Italy.
Hannibal conceived of the war as a struggle against a state of
overwhelming strength which by its mere existence made free action
impossible for any other. He was perfectly well aware that he alone, with
the army of twenty thousand seasoned veterans absolutely devoted to him,
and the six thousand cavalry, which he had led into Italy, might defeat
Rome in the field but could never overthrow her; in spite of any number
of victories no attack on the capital could end otherwise than as the
march of Pyrrhus on Latium had ended.
The Celts of the Po valley served to swell the ranks of his army but
were of no consequence to the ultimate issue. Hannibal sacrificed them
ruthlessly in every battle in order to save the flower of his troops
for the decisive stroke. He made attempts again and again to break up
the Italian confederacy, and after Cannæ, the greater part of the south
of Italy, at least as far as Capua, went over to his side; but middle
Italy, the heart of the country, stood by Rome with unfaltering loyalty.
Carthage itself could do little, and its government would not do much;
the Second Punic War is the war of Hannibal against Rome; Carthage
took part in it only because and so far as she was ordered to do it.
The fleets which Carthage sent against Italy could do nothing in face
of Rome’s superiority at sea; no serious naval engagement was fought
throughout the whole war.
A more conclusive result might perhaps have been arrived at if Hannibal
had been able to keep open his communication with Spain, and if his
brother Hasdrubal could have followed him immediately, so making it
possible for them to sweep down upon Rome from both sides. It was a point
of cardinal importance, and one which from the outset paved the way for
the ultimate victory of Rome, that when the consul Publius Scipio found
himself unable to overtake Hannibal on the Rhone in the August of 218,
he hastened in person to Italy, where there were troops enough to set
army after army in array against Hannibal; but by a stroke of genius he
despatched his legions to Spain and thereby forced Hasdrubal to fight
for the possession of that country instead of proceeding to Italy. By
the time that Hasdrubal, having lost almost the whole of the peninsula
to Publius Scipio the Younger, resolved in 207 to abandon the remainder
of the Carthaginian possessions and march into Italy with his army, it
was too late; he succumbed before the Romans at the Metaurus. Complete
success could only have been attained if Hannibal had succeeded in
drawing the other states of the world into the war and carrying them with
him in a decisive attack upon Rome.
The situation was in itself not unfavourable for such an undertaking. The
Lagid empire, under the rule of Ptolemy II, surnamed Euergetes (247-221),
had grown supine during that monarch’s latter years; the king felt his
tenure of power secure and no longer thought it necessary to devote the
same close attention to general politics or intervene with the same
energy that his father had displayed. The fact that in the year 221 he
left Cleomenes of Sparta to succumb in the struggle with Antigonus II
of Macedonia and the Achæans, by withdrawing the subsidies which alone
enabled him to keep his army together, is striking evidence of the
ominous change which had taken place in the policy of the Lagidæ.
Ptolemy IV, surnamed Philopator, the son of Euergetes, was a monarch of
the type of Louis XV, not destitute of ability but wholly abandoned to
voluptuous living, who let matters go as they would. Accordingly in Asia
the youthful Antiochus III, surnamed “the great” (221-187) was able to
restore the ancient glories of the Seleucid empire, and although when he
attacked Phœnicia and Palestine, he suffered a decisive defeat at Raphia
in the year 217, Ptolemy IV made no attempt to reap the advantage of his
victory. In Europe Philip V maintained his supremacy over Greece and kept
the Achæans fast in the trammels of Macedonia.
Thus there was a very fair possibility that both kings might enter upon
an alliance with Hannibal and a war with Rome. Philip V, a very able
monarch, fully realised the importance of the crisis; we still have an
edict dated 214, addressed by him to the city of Larissa, which shows
that he rightly recognised the basis of Rome’s greatness, the liberality
of her policy in the matter of civil rights and the continuous increase
of national strength and territory which that policy rendered possible.
But he could not extricate himself from the petty quarrels amidst
which he had grown up; after a futile attempt to wrest their Illyrian
possessions from the Romans he took no further part in the war, while
Rome was able promptly to enter into an alliance with the Ætolians and
Attalus of Pergamus and to take the offensive in Greece. Antiochus III,
on the other hand, obviously failed altogether to grasp the political
situation; to him the affairs of the west lay in the dim distance, and
instead of taking action there he turned eastwards, to carry his arms
once again to the Hindu Kush and the Indus.
The issue of the war was thus decided. From the moment when Rome
determined not to give Hannibal a chance of another pitched battle but
to confine herself to defensive measures and guerilla warfare, the
latter could gain no further success. The fact that by this time he had
won a great stretch of territory and was bound to defend it, hampered
the mobility to which his successes had hitherto been due; the zenith
of his victorious career was passed, he too was obliged to stand on the
defensive, and could not avoid being steadily forced from one position
after another. And now for the first time the vast strength of the Roman
state stood forth in all its imposing majesty; for while defending itself
against Hannibal in Italy it was able to take the offensive with absolute
success in every other theatre of war, Spain, Sicily, and Greece.
How there arose on the Roman side a statesman and commander of genius
in the person of Publius Scipio the Younger, who, after the conquest of
Spain carried the war into Africa and there extorted peace, need not be
recounted in this place. Rome had gained a complete victory, and with
it the dominion over the western half of the Mediterranean; thenceforth
there was no power in the world that could oppose her successfully in
anything she chose to undertake. The war of Hannibal against Rome is
the climax of ancient history; if up to that time the development of
the ancient world and of the Christian Teutonic nations of modern times
have run substantially on parallel lines, here we come to the parting
of the ways. In modern history every attempt made since the sixteenth
century to establish the universal dominion of a single nation has come
to naught; the several peoples have maintained their independence, and in
the struggle political conglomerates have grown into states of distinct
nationality, holding the full powers of their dominions at their own
disposal to the same extent as was done by Rome only in antique times. On
this balance of power among the various states and the nations of which
they are composed, and upon the incessant rivalry in every department
of politics and culture, which requires them at each crisis to strain
every nerve to the utmost if they are to hold their own in the struggle,
depends the modern condition of the world and the fact that the universal
civilisation of modern times keeps its ground and (at present at least)
advances steadily, while the leadership in the perpetual contest passes
from nation to nation.
In ancient times, on the contrary, the attempt to establish a balance
of power came to naught in the war of Hannibal; and from that time
forward there is but one power of any account in the world, that of
the Roman government, and for that very reason this moment marks first
the stagnation, and then the decline, of culture. The ultimate result
which grows out of this state of things in the course of the following
centuries is a single vast civilised state in which all differences of
nationality are abolished. But this involves the abolition of political
rivalry and of the conditions vital to civilisation; the stimulus to
advance, to outstrip competitors, is lacking; all that remains to be done
is to keep what has already been gained, and, here as everywhere, that
implies the decline and death of civilisation.
Rome herself, and with her the whole of Italy, was destined while
endeavouring to secure the fruits of victory to experience to the full
its disastrous consequences. She was dragged into a world-policy from
which there was no escape, however much she might desire it; a return to
the old Italian policy, with its circumscribed agrarian tendencies, had
become impossible. Thus it comes about that the havoc wrought in Italy
by the war of Hannibal has never been made good to this day, that the
wounds it inflicted on the life of the nation have never been healed or
obliterated. The state of Italy and the embryo Italian nation never came
to perfection because the levelling universal empire of Rome sprang up
and checked them.
There is no need to tell here how the preponderance of Rome made itself
felt in political matters throughout the world immediately after the war
with Hannibal, or how within little over thirty years all the states of
the civilised world were subject to her sway. It is only necessary to
point out that the ultimate result, the world-wide dominion of Rome,
ensued inevitably from this preponderance of a single state, and was
by no means consciously aimed at by Rome herself. All she desired was
to shape the affairs of her neighbours as best consorted with her own
interests and to obviate betimes the recurrence of such dangers as had
menaced her in the case of Hannibal. Her ambition went no further;
above all (though she kept Spain because there was no one to whom she
could hand it over) she exhibited an anxious and well-grounded dread
of conquests beyond sea. But she did not realise that by reducing all
neighbouring states to helplessness and impotence she deprived them of
the faculty of exercising the proper functions of a state. Thenceforth
they existed only by the good will of Rome; they found themselves
constrained to appeal to Roman arbitration in every question, and
involved Rome perpetually in fresh complications, while at the same time
they felt most bitterly their dependence on the will of an alien and
imperious power.
Thus Rome found herself at last under the necessity of putting an end
to this state of things, first in one quarter and then in another, and
undertaking the administration herself. In so doing she proceeded on no
definite plan, but acted as chance or the occasion determined, letting
other portions of her dominions get on as best they could, until matters
had come to a crisis fraught with the utmost peril to Rome, and the only
solution lay in a great war. For Rome, as for the world in general, it
would have been far better if she had embarked on a career of systematic
conquest.
Finally, let us briefly point out the effects of the policy of Rome on
the development of civilisation. Rome and Italy assimilate more and more
of the culture of Greece, and the latter, in its Latin garb, ultimately
gains dominion over the entire West. Simultaneously, on the other hand,
in the East a retrograde movement sets in. Rome strives by every means in
her power to weaken the Seleucid empire, her perfidious policy foments
every rebellion against it and places obstacles of all kinds in the way
of its lawful sovereign. Thus, after a struggle of more than thirty
years’ duration, all the East on the hither side of the Euphrates is
lost to that empire. And although the Arsacid empire which succeeded
it was neither nationalist nor hostile in principle to Hellenism, yet
the mere fact that its centre was no longer on the Mediterranean but
Babylonia, and that the connection of the Greek cities of the East with
the mother-country was severed from that time forth, put an end to the
spread of Hellenism and paved the way for the retrograde movement. It had
already gained a firm footing in the Mediterranean; the support given
by Antiochus IV, surnamed Epiphanes, to the Hellenising tendencies of
certain Jews had driven the nationalist and religious party in Judea into
revolt, and the disintegration of the empire by Roman intrigues gave them
a fair field and enabled them to maintain their independent position. In
the Lagid empire, about the same time, Ptolemy VII, surnamed Euergetes
II, finally abandoned the old paths and the maxims of an earlier day,
broke away from the Greeks, expelled the scholars of Alexandria, and
sought to rely upon the Egyptian nationalist element among his subjects.
I shall not here trace beyond this point the broad outlines of the
development of the ancient world. How the general situation reacted
destructively upon the dominant nation; how the attempt to create afresh
the farming class, which had been the backbone of Italy’s military
prowess and consequently the foundation of her supremacy, resulted in the
Roman revolution; how in that catastrophe, and the fearful convulsions
that accompanied it, the embryo world-wide empire sought its appropriate
form, and ultimately found in it the principate; and how the constitution
was gradually transformed from a modified revival of the old Roman
Republic to a denationalised and absolute universal monarchy--are all
matters which must be left to another occasion for treatment.
FOOTNOTES
[1] Not to the earlier date of 366, as is commonly supposed. The decisive
political conflicts out of which the later system of Roman government was
evolved fall within the period of the wars of the Latins and Samnites and
come to a final end with the Lex Hortensia, in the year 287.
[Illustration]
THE SCOPE AND DEVELOPMENT OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY
WRITTEN SPECIALLY FOR THE PRESENT WORK
BY DR. WILHELM SOLTAU
Professor of Ancient History in Zabern.
The early centuries of the history of Rome are closely bound up with the
history of the rest of Italy. We must therefore briefly touch upon the
development of the whole country.
About the middle of the second millennium B.C. certain Italic tribes made
their way from the north into the Apennine peninsula, which up to that
time had been inhabited first by an Iberian and then by a Ligurian race.
The settlement of the Balkan Peninsula was due, to a great extent, to
successive immigrations of kindred tribes, who in most cases found a
population of their own race in possession. In Italy it was not so. In
the east we find the Messapians, a tribe akin to the Illyrians, settled
for the most part in Apulia and Calabria. Tuscany and the valley of the
Po received from the valleys of the Alps a population of Etruscans, a
race whose origin and affinities are an enigma to students to this day.
Their language is certainly not Indo-Germanic, their earliest settlements
were the pile-dwellings of the Po valley, their later abode the natural
fortresses of the Tuscan mountain peaks. Hence they cannot have come into
the country by way of the sea. Nevertheless in Egyptian monuments of the
thirteenth century B.C. we find mention of the auxiliary troops of the
“Turisha.” They appear early to have won a certain reputation as pirates
and soldiers in foreign service. Again, the Greeks believed that the
Etruscans were akin to the Tyrrhenians of Asia Minor, and inscriptions in
a language resembling Etruscan have been found in Lemnos, which seem to
confirm this view. Whatever their origin, they represent a very ancient
civilisation on Italian soil, and the Indo-Germanic tribes of Italy have
been strongly influenced by them.
After the Etruscan immigration two other great tribes, this time of Aryan
descent, pressed southward from the valley of the Po. Of these the first
to come were probably the Siculi, a tribe which subsequently spread over
Sicily and all the southwestern part of the mainland. The Ausonians of
Campania belonged to this race, as did the dwellers in the “lowland”
south of the Tiber, _i.e._, in Latium.
The last to come was probably the Sabello-Umbrian race, which entered the
country from the north by way of the Apennine valleys. For a long while
it kept chiefly to the mountainous tracts of middle Italy, though some
members of the tribe pushed forward, like advanced posts, to the west
coast. The Umbrian settlement north of the Apennines was the only one
which grew to large dimensions.
If we reflect that, besides these immigrations, a steady stream of Greek
colonists had been occupying the coast of southern Italy ever since the
eighth century B.C., their first settlements dating from two centuries
earlier, and that, since the fifth century B.C. at latest, Gauls had been
crossing the Alps to the valley of the Po, we can readily understand
that Italy inevitably became the scene of violent conflicts. Yet she
did not wholly miss the salutary effects of peaceful rivalry between
the various racial elements. The population of southern Italy adopted
the language, manners, and customs of the Greeks, and in the north the
Etruscans served both as exponents of their own peculiar civilisation and
as intermediaries between the Greeks and the mountain tribes.
Such were the conditions and influences under which Rome came into
being. For centuries the Latins had fixed settlements in their mountain
and woodland towns among the Alban Mountains. But the desire to secure
themselves against Etruscan invasion on the one hand, and the growth
of peaceful intercourse on the other, led them to found a colony on
the Palatine “mount,” the last spur of a range of hills along the
Tiber. The extremely advantageous situation of this new settlement led
to the establishment of others in its vicinity, and ultimately to the
conjunction which gave birth to the City of the Seven Hills. The Aventine
and Cœlian hills did not as yet belong to it, but it included the Subura
and the Velia, in addition to the Palatine mount, the Capitoline mount,
the Esquiline mount, and the Quirinal and Viminal hills; and thus
was even then one of the most considerable cities in Italy, with its
fortified capitol, and its market-place or Forum between Mount Palatine
and the “hill-town” (Collina) on the east. The colony soon threw Alba
Longa, the mother-city, into the shade. Rome became the chief city of
the Latin league. The capital of the confederate towns of Latium, the
mistress of a small domain south of the lower Tiber, such is the aspect
Rome bears when she emerges into history from the twilight of legend.
The purity of the Latin language proves that she did not originate from
a mixture of Latin, Sabine, and Etruscan elements as later inventions
would have us believe. On the other hand there can be no question that
Rome adopted many details of her civilisation and municipal organisation
from her Sabine and Etruscan neighbours. A more important point is that
she early received an influx of foreign immigrants, especially Tuscans,
who in the capacity of handicraftsmen and masons, exercised a salutary
influence upon the advance of civilisation among the Latin farmers.
Rome was at that time ruled by kings, assisted by a council of the
elders of the city (the hundred senators). In important affairs they had
to obtain the assent of the popular assembly (_comitia curiata_) which
voted in thirty curiæ, according to the number of the thirty places of
sacrifice in the city. For the rest, the kings had a tolerably free hand
in the appointment of magistrates and priests.
From the legendary details of the history of the monarchy one thing
only is clear, to wit, that in the sixth century B.C. Rome was ruled by
monarchs of Etruscan descent and was to some extent a dependency of the
Etruscan rulers of the period.
In the seventh and sixth centuries B.C. the Etruscans had both vigorously
repulsed the invasions of the Sabellians and taken the offensive on their
own account. They had not only maintained and increased their dominion
in the valley of the Po, but had established the Tuscan League of the
Twelve Cities in Umbria, and thus put an end to Umbrian independence. At
this time their sway extended southwards as far as Campania. A Tuscan
stronghold (Tusculum) was built on the Alban hills. Etruscan sources of
information, and first and foremost the pictures in Tuscan sepulchral
chambers, leave no room to doubt that the Etruscan descent of the last
three kings of Rome, the Tarquins and Servius Tullius, is a historic
fact. Rome was therefore involved in the military operations of Etruscan
commanders “_Lucumones_,” who fortified the city, adorned it with temples
and useful buildings (among others the famous _cloaca maxima_, the
first monument of vaulted architecture on Roman soil), and reorganised
the army by the introduction of the Servian system of centuries, which
afterwards became the foundation-stone of the Roman constitution. The
whole body of the people was divided into four urban and sixteen rural
recruiting districts (_tribus_), and all freeholders (_assidui_) were
laid under the obligation of military service on the basis of a property
qualification. Classes I to III served as heavy-armed soldiers, classes
IV and V as light-armed. The whole number together constituted a body
of 170 companies (170 × 100), divided into two legions on the active
list and two in reserve, each 4200 strong, or 193 centuries inclusive of
the centuries of mounted troops. From the establishment of the republic
onwards this army was called together to elect consuls and vote upon laws
under the title of the comitia centuriata.
The municipal comitia curiata ceased to be politically effective first
under the military despotism of foreign rulers and then by reason of the
expansion of the state till it included an area of nearly a thousand
square kilometres. From that time forward the _tribus_ became the basis
of all political organisation, and remained so to the end.
But the army thus reorganised was a two-edged weapon. The tyrannical
license of the last Tarquin roused the love of liberty in the breasts of
the Romans. The army renounced its allegiance; through years of conflict
and in sanguinary battles Rome, and all Latium with her, won back its
independence of foreign Tuscan rulers.
The wars waged by Rome in the century after the expulsion of the kings
are hardly worthy to be recorded on the roll of history. After valiantly
repulsing the Etruscan commanders who endeavoured to restore Tarquin (496
B.C., battle of Lake Regillus), Rome entered into a permanent alliance
with the Latin confederacy, an alliance that was not only strong enough
to protect her against the constant attacks of mountain tribes (Æquians
and Sabines on the northeast and Volscians on the southeast) but enabled
her gradually to push forwards and conquer the south Etruscan cities of
Veii and Fidenæ. Fidenæ fell in the year 428 B.C., Veii the emporium
of southern Etruria, was reduced in 396, after a siege of ten years’
duration.
An attempt to intermeddle in the affairs of northern Etruria resulted
in a catastrophe that threatened Rome with final annihilation. Some
time earlier hordes of Gauls had penetrated into northern Italy through
the passes of the Alps. At the beginning of the fourth century B.C. the
Senonian Gauls effected a permanent settlement in the valley of the Po
and from thence invaded Etruria. When they attacked Clusium (Chiusi) in
middle Etruria the Romans made an attempt at diplomatic intervention,
but only succeeded in diverting the wrath of the enemy to themselves.
The Gauls made a rapid advance, succeeded in routing the Roman forces
at the little river Allia, only a few miles from Rome, and occupied the
city itself. The citadel alone held out, but more than six months elapsed
before the flood of barbarians subsided, and Rome was forced to purchase
peace by humiliating concessions.
Rome arose after her fall with an energy that commands admiration, and
she had soon won a position in middle Italy more important than that
which she had held before the Gallic invasion. By partitioning southern
Etruria among Roman citizens and founding colonies which at the same time
served as fortresses and substantial bases for the advance of the Roman
army she became a power of such consequence that she not only compelled
the Æquians and Volscians by degrees to acknowledge her suzerainty but
was able to assume the offensive in middle Etruria and the land of the
Sabines.
When the Senonian Gauls returned to the attack, as they did two or three
times a generation later (360, 349, and 330 B.C.), they found themselves
confronted by the forces of the Latin league in such numbers that they
declined to join issue in a pitched battle, presently retreated, and
finally concluded a truce for thirty years (329-299 B.C.).
The increased strength of the Roman community within its own borders
after the catastrophe of the Gauls is vouched for by the multiplication
of municipal districts in spite of heavy losses in the field, the number
and importance of the colonies, the gradual expansion of commerce and
augmentation of the mercantile marine, the introduction of coined money
(about 360 B.C.) in place of the clumsy bars of copper, and lastly,
the increasingly active relations of Rome with foreign powers. About
the year 360 B.C. the Romans sent votive offerings to Delphi, and made
efforts both before and after to introduce Greek cults into their own
country. But the strongest evidence of the extension of Roman trade and
the esteem in which Rome was held as the contract-making capital of the
commercial cities of middle Italy is furnished by her treaties with
Carthage (probably 348 and 343 B.C.). The provisions (the text of which
has come down to us) that Roman vessels should not sail westwards beyond
a certain line in north Africa or in Spain, prove conclusively that the
Carthaginians thought Italico-Roman competition a thing worth taking into
account.
The internal development of the Roman state during this period (509-367
B.C.) is a matter of greater moment than many wars and military
successes. The constitutional struggles which took place in an inland
town in Italy are in themselves of small account in the history of the
world. But the forms into which civil life and civil law were cast
in Rome were subsequently (though in a much modified form) of great
consequence to the whole Roman Empire. The division into _curiæ_ obtained
not only in Rome itself but in the remotest colonies of the empire in
its day. The _tribus_, _i.e._, the districts occupied by Roman citizens
enjoying full civil rights, afterward included all the citizens of the
empire. Moreover, a particular interest attaches to the history of civil
and private law among the Romans from the fact that its evolution has
exercised a controlling influence on the juridical systems of the most
diverse civilised peoples to this day.
The legal and constitutional changes which took place at Rome during
this period were rendered imperatively necessary (in spite of the
conservative character of the Roman people) by the changed status of the
city. During the earlier half of the monarchy all civil institutions
had been arranged with an eye to municipal conditions. But the Rome of
the Tarquins (in the sixth century B.C.) had hardly become the capital
of a domain of nearly a thousand square kilometres before she found
herself under the necessity of admitting her new citizens, first into
the companies (_centuriæ_) of the army, and presently (after 509 B.C.)
into the popular assemblies which voted by centuries. The old sacral
ordinances, which were unsuited to any but municipal conditions, were
superseded by the _jus Quiritium_, or Law of the Spearman, an ordinance
of civil law.
It was no longer necessary to secure the assistance of the pontiff and
the assent of the popular assembly voting by _curiæ_ in order to make
a will or regulate other points of family law. The civil testament and
corresponding civil institutions took the place of the old system.
But the Roman state did not escape grievous internal troubles. After
the expulsion of the kings the patrician aristocracy strove to get all
power into their own hands. The senators were drawn exclusively from
their ranks, civil and military office became the prerogative of a class.
All priestly offices were occupied by members of patrician families.
The patricians were supposed to be the only exponents of human and
divine law. And it was an additional evil that the aristocratic comitia
centuriata, which actually excluded the poorer citizens, were wholly
deficient in initiative.
The Roman _plebs_ suffered even more from the lack of legal security
under an unwritten law arbitrarily administered by patrician judges than
from the lack of political rights. In the famous bloodless revolution
of 494 B.C. the plebs won the right of choosing guardians of their
own, in the person of the tribunes of the people, who had the right
of intervention even against the consuls, and soon gained a decisive
influence in all public affairs. By decades of strife the hardy champions
of civil liberty succeeded in securing first a written code of common law
and then a share for the plebeians in public office and honours. From
443 B.C. onward there were special rating-officers (censors) independent
of the consul, whose business it was to settle the place of individual
citizens on the register of recruiting and citizenship, and to regulate
taxation and public burdens.
But the most important triumph was that the assemblies of the plebs
succeeded by degrees in securing official recognition for the resolutions
they passed on legal, judicial, and political questions. After the year
287 B.C. the _plebiscita_ had the same force as laws (_leges_) passed by
the whole body of the people.
Although the subject classes had thus won a satisfactory measure of
civil rights and liberties, they never forgot--and this is the most
significant feature of the whole struggle for liberty--that none but a
strong government and magistracy can successfully meet ordinary demands
or rise to extraordinary emergencies. At Rome the individual magistrate
found his liberty of action restrained in many ways by his colleagues and
superiors. But within the scope of his jurisdiction, his _provincia_, he
enjoyed a considerable amount of independence.
The senate was the only power which ultimately contrived to impose limits
upon this independence. In that body the effective authority of the
government was concentrated by gradual degrees. In face of the constant
augmentation in the number of magistrates it frequently succeeded in
getting its own way without much trouble. In the bosom of its members
reposed the _arcana imperii_, the secrets of a policy which had known how
to make Rome great. Selfishness, consistency, perfidy, perseverance--such
were the motives, some noble, and some base, which shaped its
resolutions. Yet we cannot deny that there is a certain grandeur in the
political aims represented by the senate. Nor did it fail of success;
indeed, its achievements were marvellous.
In the year 390 B.C. the city of Rome was in the hands of the Gauls, and
the Roman body politic had to all appearance perished. Exactly a hundred
years later, at the end of the Second Samnite War, Rome was mistress of
nearly the whole of Italy. A few years more, and she occupied Tarentum
(272) and Rhegium (270). What is the explanation of this prodigious
change?
It would be unjust not to assign its due share in the matter to the
admirable temper of the Roman people. The self-sacrificing patriotism
they invariably displayed, their stubborn endurance in perilous times,
their manly readiness to hazard everything, even their very lives, if the
welfare of the city so required--these qualities marked the Romans of
that age, and they are capable of accomplishing great things. By them the
admirable military system of Rome was first fitted for the great part it
had to play in the history of the world, and became a weapon which never
turned back before the most formidable of foes, and gave the assurance of
lasting success.
In process of time the ancient Servian phalanx had been superseded by an
admirably organised and mobile disposition of the troops in maniples of
160 men each. Ranged in three files, with lateral spaces between, these
bodies relieved one another during the fight, and thus were able to quell
the most vehement onslaught of the enemy by constantly bringing forward
fresh troops, which first hurled their long javelins and then charged
with their short swords.
It became more and more the practice of the Roman state to extend to the
lower classes the obligation of military service, which in all other
parts of Italy was a privilege of the _assidui_ or freeholders. Large
numbers of landless men and freedmen were enrolled in the recruiting
districts (_tribus_) in war times by the famous censor Appius Claudius
Cæcus.
Opportune political changes favoured the development of Roman supremacy
in Italy. The Etruscan dominion had fallen into utter decay during the
course of the fifth century. Rome’s victorious struggle for liberty,
the advance of the Samnites in southern Italy, and the immigration of
the Gauls into northern Italy, had reduced Etruria to a second-class
power. In the south the power of the wealthy Greek cities had been broken
by Dionysius of Syracuse. Step by step Roman colonists made their way
into lower Italy. Where the sword was of no avail Rome had recourse to
road-making, the occupation and cultivation of waste land, and fresh
settlements. Above all, the Latin colonies which she established in
concert with the Latin league were of the utmost importance in securing
the supremacy of Rome in middle Italy. These colonies served as
fortresses, the colonists were a garrison always ready to stand on the
defensive. The colonies themselves were established in such a way as to
obstruct the coalition of the various races of Italy. They spread abroad
Latin law and the Latin language among foreigners. They once more united
the Romans and Latins in a common work of civilisation, after the two
peoples had so hotly fought against each other in what is known as the
Great Latin War (340-338 B.C.).
The skilful diplomatic negotiations and settlements by which Rome
contrived either to gain over her former adversaries or reduce them to
neutrality before she engaged in the struggle with the Samnites for
the hegemony of Italy (342-340 and 326-304) are particularly worthy of
note. She protected her rear by concluding armistices for many years
with the Etruscans (351-311) and Gauls (329-299). She entered into
friendly relations with the Greek cities, and won over many communities
in Campania and Lucania which had put themselves under the protection
of the Samnites. Nay, she did not shrink from purchasing the friendship
of Carthage by allowing her to take and plunder the seaboard cities of
middle Italy which had revolted against Roman dominion. And she further
displayed remarkable skill in securing her tenure of the possessions won
in the Samnite wars. Only a small part of them was incorporated with
Roman territory. Many cities received an accession of Latin colonists and
so retained their municipal autonomy under new conditions. On the other
hand the connection between the recalcitrant cantons of the Sabellian,
Etruscan, and Middle Italian tribes was completely broken. Isolated and
deprived of the right of intercourse (_commercium_) the various small
cities and communities ceased to be of any importance either economically
or politically.
The Romans had hardly completed the conquest of Etruria and the Samnite
confederacy in the Third Samnite War (298-290 B.C.), and subjugated the
kindred districts of Lucania and Bruttium when they found themselves
involved in the struggles which then agitated the Greek world.
After 301 the several parts of the empire of Alexander the Great had
become independent kingdoms. But the quarrels among the various diadochi
went on and ultimately led to the expulsion of Demetrius Poliorcetes from
Macedonia and the fall of Lysimachus of Thrace.
The unsettled state of these kingdoms inspired hordes of Gauls, athirst
for plunder, with the idea of crossing the Alps and conquering both the
Apennine and Balkan peninsulas. Italy owed her salvation to the vigorous
defence made by the Romans at the Vadimonian Lake (283 B.C.); but
Macedonia was occupied for several years and the swarms of Gauls spread
as far as Delphi, and finally settled in Asia Minor under the name of
Galatians.
Even before the Gallic invasion, Pyrrhus of Epirus, who had taken
possession of Macedonia for a while, had withdrawn to his own home, and
he and his army of mercenaries turned their eyes westward, eager for
action. The wished-for opportunity of there regaining the influence
and reputation he had lost in the west was not slow to present itself.
Tarentum, the last independent city of any importance in Italy, had
provoked Rome to hostilities and was endeavouring to enlist mercenaries
for the war. Pyrrhus went to the help of the Tarentines, even as
Alexander of Epirus, a cousin of Alexander the Great, had gone before him
(334 B.C.). After some initial successes the latter had lost his life in
battle against the Lucanians (331 B.C.). His nephew did not fare much
better. The generalship of Roman mayors, elected afresh every year, was
at first no match for that of Pyrrhus, who had great military successes
to look back upon. Up to this time the Macedonian phalanx had invariably
proved the instrument of victory, especially in the opening encounters of
a campaign, and even the men of Rome gave ground before the elephants,
the “heavy artillery” of the Epirots. But the second victory which the
king gained over the Romans was a “Pyrrhic victory,” for his gains did
not compensate his losses. On this occasion Rome owed the victory mainly
to the inflexible courage of her statesmen. The blind Appius Claudius,
who thirty years before had borne an honourable part in the successful
struggle with the Samnites, caused himself to be led into the senate and
by his arguments induced the Romans inflexibly to refuse all offers of
peace on less than favourable terms. “Never have the Romans concluded
peace with a victorious foe.” These proud words contain the secret of the
ultimate success of Rome in all her wars of that century.
Fortunately for the Romans, at that very time the Greeks of Sicily
urgently craved the aid of the king of Epirus. They had been defeated
by the Carthaginians and their independence was menaced. Pyrrhus
accordingly departed from Italy for more than two years, to gain some
initial successes in Sicily and end in failure. When he returned to Italy
it was too late. The Romans had established their dominion over the
Italian rebels and were once more harassing Tarentum. Pyrrhus suffered
a disastrous defeat at Beneventum in Samnium (275 B.C.), and Tarentum
submitted soon after (272 B.C.). Pyrrhus himself was slain in Greece
about the same time.
The subjugation of Italy was now complete. After Rhegium, the
southernmost city in Italy, had been wrested from the hands of mutinous
mercenaries (270 B.C.), Rome likewise took upon herself the economic
administration of Italy by introducing a silver coinage (269 B.C.).
The war with Pyrrhus had clearly shown that Rome could not stop and rest
content with the successes she had already gained, but would presently
be forced into a struggle for all the countries about the Mediterranean,
that is to say, for the dominion of the world as then known.
She contrived, it is true, very quickly to resume friendly relations with
the Greek cities of Italy, whose sympathies had in some cases been on the
other side in the war with Tarentum. The autonomous administration she
allowed them to enjoy on condition of furnishing her with ships, and the
protection which they, for their part, received from the leading power
in Italy, could not but dispose them favourably to a continuance of her
suzerainty.
With Carthage the case was different. Down to the time of the war with
Pyrrhus the interests of Rome and Carthage had gone hand in hand to a
great extent, or at worst had led to compromises in the three treaties
of alliance (348, 343, and 306 B.C.). But in the wars against Pyrrhus
it was in the interests of Carthage that Pyrrhus should be kept busy in
Italy, while the Romans had contrived to turn his energies against the
Carthaginians. And when the Romans were preparing to occupy Tarentum,
a Carthaginian fleet hove in sight and manifested a desire to seize
upon that city, the most important port of southern Italy. A power
which had one foot in Rhegium, as Rome had, was bound presently to set
the other down in Messana, and that would be a _casus belli_ under any
circumstances. How could the Carthaginians endure to see the island for
the possession of which they had striven for two hundred years pass into
the hands of the Romans?
The actual pretext for the war is too dramatic to be passed over. The
mutinous mercenaries of Agathocles (317-289 B.C.) had taken possession of
the city of Messana. They were attacked by Hiero of Syracuse with such
success that they appealed alternately to the Carthaginians and Romans
for help. The Carthaginians came to the rescue first and put a garrison
in the citadel of Messana. But the commander was so foolish as to enter
into negotiations with the Roman legate, who had crossed the straits of
Messana with a small body of troops, and in the course of them was taken
prisoner--through his own perfidious treachery it must be acknowledged.
Thus the key of Sicily fell into Roman hands, and war was declared. The
history of the next hundred and twenty years is wholly occupied with the
great struggle between these two cities, till at length, in 146 B.C.,
Carthage was laid level with the ground.
Thus the state of Rome, which had won for itself a leading position
in Italy in the Wars of Liberation waged with the Etruscans and
Sabellians, and had then been forced by the Samnites into a contest
for the sovereignty of Italy, found itself driven almost involuntarily
into a decisive struggle for dominion over all the coasts of the
Mediterranean. The perseverance with which Rome strove towards the goal
of ever higher ambitions commands our admiration, and we admire no less
the government of the many-headed senate which kept one constant aim in
view and consistently pursued it; which, moreover, steered the ship of
state safely through all dangers, when the incompetency of its annually
elected chief magistrates resulted in the gravest catastrophes. There
lay the weakness of the Roman commonwealth. How could Roman consuls,
elected annually by the people, usually on political grounds, acquire the
capacity to command armies, to master the art of strategy, or to lead
troops and fleets in regions to which they themselves were strangers? To
the ill effects of this preposterous system Rome owed the severe reverses
of the First Punic War (264-241 B.C.) and the beginning of the Second.
The situation began to improve when two capable leaders, Marcellus and
the Scipios, were left in command for several consecutive years.
Nevertheless, the Roman armies were frequently led by gallant and
judicious men, and won some lasting successes even in the First Punic
War, one of the most protracted and sanguinary wars of ancient times.
Hiero, king of Syracuse, was defeated at the outset, and compelled to
conclude an alliance with Rome, which he loyally observed till his death
in 216. Agrigentum and many other Sicilian towns fell into the hands of
Roman generals. The famous victory (Mylæ, 260) won by the Romans with
their first real navy over the most famous sea power of ancient times
is absolutely astonishing. But Rome could be conquered only in Italy,
Carthage only in Africa, and the Romans therefore proceeded to cross
over to Africa after another brilliant naval victory near Ecnomus in
the south of Sicily (256 B.C.). Fortune favoured them in their first
engagements. The position of Carthage itself became grave. But after one
of the consuls (Manlius) had gone home at the conclusion of his year of
office and the Carthaginians had enlisted a sufficient number of Greek
mercenaries and Numidian horsemen, the Roman army was annihilated, and
its commander, Regulus, taken prisoner. The Roman fleet, which had been
created afresh within the space of a few months, did indeed succeed in
destroying that of Carthage off the headland of Mercury (Cape Bon), and
taking the remnant of the defeated army on board, only to be wrecked
itself by tempest off Camarina on the south coast of Sicily (255 B.C.). A
like fate befell many another Roman fleet in the years 253 and 249 B.C.
The Romans were neither sufficiently versed in the periodic recurrence
of storms--a knowledge indispensable to a maritime nation--nor familiar
enough with the character of the coast, and the rocks and shallows, to
anticipate lasting success in naval warfare with any confidence. The
taking of Panormus (Palermo) in the year 254 B.C., and the great victory
won by Metellus over a large army of the enemy under the walls of the
city in 250, did not suffice to compensate for the naval disasters. In
the year 249 B.C. the severe defeat of Publius Claudius Pulcher and his
fleet at Drepanum (in the west of Sicily) and the wreck of another fleet
forced the Romans definitively to abandon hostilities at sea. Once more
the fleets of Carthage swept the Mediterranean, plundered the coasts
of Italy, and even endangered Rome’s hold upon Sicily. In the west of
the island Hamilcar Barca, the ablest of Carthaginian generals, had
established himself upon Mount Eryx. From that base he made successful
raids into Roman Sicily. The war dragged on until it was ended at
length by a fleet which the Romans built by voluntary contributions.
By a brilliant naval victory in the Ægatian Islands, Lutatius Catulus
destroyed the last considerable Punic fleet; and so forced the
Carthaginians to come to terms. Sicily was ceded to Rome and a moderate
war-indemnity exacted from the vanquished city. But the twenty-four years
of hostilities in which she had strained her financial capacity to the
utmost had exhausted the resources of Carthage, and she could no longer
pay her mercenaries. The result was a formidable mutiny, which proclaimed
to the world the bankruptcy of the whole body politic. Rome took
advantage of her adversary’s embarrassment in a most perfidious fashion.
In spite of the fact that peace had been restored she made a compact with
the mutineers and prevailed upon them to hand Corsica and Sardinia over
to her.
Generally speaking, indeed, the interval between the First Punic War
(264-241) and the Second (218-201) can only be regarded as an armed
truce. Both parties were fully aware that the decisive struggle was
yet to come and must be fought out at no distant period. We stand
amazed at the genius, energy, and success of Hamilcar Barca, who, after
successfully suppressing the mutiny of the mercenaries, won for his
country, even in the hour of her profoundest humiliation, new provinces,
new resources, and new armies in Spain. But the Romans, on their part,
likewise made good use of the time. In the Illyrian War (229-228) they
assumed the character of patrons of the Greek cities and of Greek
commerce, they insured maritime traffic against molestation in the
Adriatic and curbed the power of the Illyrian pirate state to the best
of their ability. They endeavoured energetically to repel the Celts in
Picenum and Umbria (236 and 232). But the Cisalpine Gauls poured in
countless hordes through the passes of the Alps to the aid of their
fellow-tribesmen, and forced Rome into one of the most sanguinary wars
Italy has ever witnessed (225-222 B.C.). Rome endeavoured to enlist all
Italians in her defence. Her register of Italians capable of bearing
arms amounted to a grand total of seven hundred thousand foot and
seventy thousand horse. The Gauls, defeated in Etruria on the Po, and at
Milan, sued for peace, although their territory north of the Po was yet
unconquered. The military colonies of Placentia (Piacenza) and Cremona
(established in 218) made some attempt at least to secure for the Romans
part of the territory they had won. But when Hannibal, after taking
Saguntum, pressed forward across the Pyrenees and the Alps and summoned
the Gauls to revolt, the whole valley of the Po was lost once more. In
the Second Punic War (218-201 B.C.) the genius and energy of Hannibal
brought Rome to the verge of ruin, and we know not which to admire most,
the force of character that enabled the son of Hamilcar Barca to win the
personal devotion of an army composed of the most incongruous elements
and so to inspire them with enthusiasm for the cause of Carthage, or
the generalship which, in the most critical situations, invariably made
choice of the best expedient and carried it out in the best possible
manner. In all the fifteen years which he spent in Italy (218-203 B.C.)
Hannibal was never once defeated, nor did his army ever rebel against
the measures he took, and his deadliest enemies could lay nothing to his
charge unless it were his “more than Punic perfidy” (_plus quam Punica
perfidia_)--a brilliant testimony not only to his constant superiority
in state-craft but also to his personal integrity. And yet the stubborn
perseverance and self-sacrificing patriotism of the Romans was even
more worthy of admiration and more fruitful of consequences, than the
amazing energy of this greatest general of ancient times. By this time,
too, the bond which united the Latin league of middle Italy had attained
a firmness beyond the power of Hannibal’s armies or diplomatic arts to
unknit. The national spirit of the race set bounds which his genius could
not overpass.
At the beginning of the campaign the weakness of the Carthaginian naval
forces had decided Rome to attempt to transfer the theatre of war to
Africa and remain on the defensive on the Ebro. By crossing the Alps--a
possibility which had never entered into Roman calculations--Hannibal
made Italy the scene of the decisive struggle. After a victorious cavalry
engagement not far from the Ticinus he enticed the Roman army posted at
Placentia to cross the Trebia and then defeated it; only the smaller half
of it made its way back to the fortress. He eluded the consul Sempronius,
who was posted at Ariminum, crossed the Apennines into Etruria and
destroyed the army of Flaminius in the narrow defiles on the shores of
Lake Trasimene. Fabius Cunctator (the Dilatory) now persistently avoided
joining issue with him, but when Hannibal marched through the provinces
of middle Italy, pillaging as he went, the Romans ventured once more upon
a pitched battle. At Cannæ, in Apulia, he found himself face to face
with a force of eighty thousand men, and by a master-stroke succeeded in
not merely defeating but positively annihilating the Roman troops in the
open field with a force of only half their number (216 B.C.). It was the
signal for the desertion of most of the allies (exclusive of the Latin
colonies). Capua, Samnium, Lucania, Bruttium, and Apulia took the lead,
and presently the whole of south and middle Italy went over to Hannibal,
including even Tarentum. Syracuse revolted, and thus Sicily seemed lost;
and Philip of Macedonia declared war against Rome (215 B.C.). But the
policy of Rome was equal to the emergency. She contrived to win the Greek
states of the second and third rank over to her interests. The Ætolians
and Illyrians, Pergamus and Rhodes, kept Philip employed and prevented
him from rendering Hannibal active assistance. Rome’s fleet ruled the sea
and successfully hindered any coalition between the hostile powers, and
thus the Carthaginians could neither save Syracuse, nor send adequate
reinforcements to Hannibal, nor effect a junction with Philip’s fleet.
Doughty commanders like Marcellus, the conqueror of Syracuse, contrived
to exhaust his troops by frequent attacks.
The cause of the war in Italy presently began to stagnate more and more,
especially after Capua and Tarentum had been retaken (in 211 and 209).
Once, and once only, did the Carthaginians venture again to play for
high stakes. Hasdrubal had skilfully evaded the Romans in Spain and had
reached north Italy by way of the Pyrenees and Alps, intending there
to join hands with his brother Hannibal (early in 207 B.C.). It was a
critical moment, for both the consuls of the year 208 had fallen in
battle. The speedy succour which the newly elected consul, Claudius Nero,
despatched to his colleague, Livius, decided the victory in favour of the
Romans. Hasdrubal lost both his army and his life (at Sinigaglia) on the
banks of the Metaurus.
In the meantime the Romans had succeeded in wresting Spain from the
Carthaginians. The two elder Scipios, Publius and Cneius, who, after
fighting with varying fortune, had advanced as far as the Guadalquivir,
both lost their lives in 211 B.C. But Publius Scipio the Younger,
afterwards known as Africanus, a man of Hannibal’s own temper, had taken
New Carthage (209 B.C.), defeated the Carthaginian armies at Bæcula (208)
and Silpia (207), and occupied Gades, the southernmost city of Spain, in
206.
Carthage, nevertheless, could only be conquered in Africa. This view had
little to commend it in the eyes of many a prudent member of the senate
so long as Hannibal remained in Italy. For all that, Scipio succeeded in
transferring the theatre of war in 204 from his own province of Sicily
to northern Africa. Allying himself with the Numidian prince, Masinissa,
he defeated the Carthaginians and their ally, Syphax of Mauretania, in
the year 203 B.C., and brought the war to a close by the decisive victory
of Zama (202 B.C.), in which he routed Hannibal, who had returned from
Italy, and the flower of his troops.
Carthage lost not only her fleet and foreign provinces, but her
sovereignty itself; she was not allowed to go to war without the
permission of Rome, while an irksome sentinel was set over her in the
person of her adversary, Masinissa, who had been enriched with Punic
territory.
Even after this catastrophe the Carthaginians did not utterly lose heart.
Their commerce soon revived and prospered, and Hannibal did all he
could to restore the prestige of his native city as long as the Romans
tolerated his presence there, and to raise up fresh enemies to Rome after
he had been driven into exile.
Rome was not long left to the tranquil enjoyment of her victory. Peace
had been concluded. Not the citizens of Rome alone, but all Italy,
yearned for a lasting peace. And yet the Roman senate, in defiance of
popular feeling, was constrained to embark promptly on the adventures of
a new and perilous war or to be false to the whole tenor of its policy up
to that time.
Rome’s success in dealing with Macedonia was due, as has already been
stated, to the fact that she extended her protection to the smaller Greek
states and thus gained a base from which she could hold the larger states
of Greece, Macedonia first and foremost, in check. This policy obliged
the Romans in the year 200 B.C. to go to the help of Egypt, which was
hard pressed by the combined forces of Macedonia and Syria. Ever since
the accession of the youthful Ptolemy Epiphanes in 205 B.C., Macedonia
and Syria had united with a view to dividing the Egyptian empire and its
dependencies between themselves.
Syria’s share was to be Egypt and Cyprus, Macedonia’s Cyrene, Ionia, and
the islands of the Ægean Sea. Rome was the less able to be an indifferent
spectator of the initial successes of these two great powers since they
were won at the expense of the states of Pergamus, Rhodes, and Miletus,
which were among her allies. In the case of Syria the Romans attained
their object by the embassy of Marcus Æmilius Lepidus. Antiochus the
Great evacuated Egypt. Philip, however, would not stay his hand, and thus
the Macedonian War broke out, to be decided in favour of the Romans,
after many years of indifferent success, by the advance of Flaminius into
Thessaly and his victory at Cynoscephalæ (197 B.C.). At the Isthmian
games Flaminius proclaimed that all Greeks were free, but the real
effect of the proclamation was to reduce all Greek states to a common
level of impotence and to give none of them any lasting satisfaction.
The Ætolians, who had been the allies of Rome in the Macedonian War, and
took no small credit to themselves for the result, were now the most
bitterly enraged against her. Antiochus the Great, of Syria, profited by
the prevailing sentiment to press forward in Asia Minor. Hannibal, who
had been driven from Carthage, appeared at his court and endeavoured,
though without success, to induce him to take the offensive against
Italy. War was nevertheless inevitable. Antiochus had command of the sea,
and crossed to Eubœa and Thessaly. The Ætolians rose in rebellion. The
Romans, however, took up the quarrel with no lack of spirit. After the
flower of Antiochus’ forces had been vanquished at Thermopylæ, and the
Syrian fleet, under the command of Hannibal, had twice suffered defeat,
the Scipios crossed over into Asia Minor and destroyed the main army of
Syria at Magnesia. A sanguinary conflict ended in the conquest of the
mountain cantons of Ætolia (191-189) and the subjugation of the Galatian
hordes (188). Antiochus was forced to resign his pretensions to Asia
Minor.
That the Romans did not, at this time and during the ensuing decades,
take advantage of their success to incorporate fresh provinces into their
empire was partly due to their just appreciation of the fact that the
conquest of the Greek world could be better and more easily achieved
by breaking it up into isolated and impotent states, and partly to
their melancholy experiences in the case of their latest acquisitions.
For nearly seventy years after the Second Punic War Roman armies were
fighting to maintain Rome’s supremacy over her Spanish provinces, and
even then the north and west remained free. From 151 to 133 a fierce
rebellion was rampant in southern Spain and Lusitania (Portugal). The
feats of the patriotic Viriathus and the desperate defence of Numantia
showed the Romans to what extremities valiant races--however well
disposed towards them in the first instance--could be driven by their
execrable provincial administration. Moreover they were compelled to
fight year after year, sometimes against Gauls and Ligurians, sometimes
against Illyrians and Dalmatians. Nor was the strength of the Hellenic
congeries of states by any means broken. The wretched empire of Syria
alone, ruled by worthless monarchs and torn by internal dissensions, was
fast falling into utter decay. A word from a Roman ambassador was enough
to reduce the cowardly Antiochus Epiphanes to obedience and cure him of
his inclination to join the enemies of Rome. But Macedonia was gaining
strength under Philip and Perseus, and the latter actually succeeded in
bringing about a great coalition of the states of the Balkan peninsula
against Rome. In the Third Macedonian War the empire of Alexander was
finally destroyed after the victory of Pydna (168 B.C.). Even then Rome
refrained from dividing Macedonia and Greece into provinces; nor did she
alter her policy until after repeated sanguinary revolts in Macedonia,
headed by the pretender Andriscus, and the rebellion of the Achæan League
(141-146). After that the turn of the west of Asia Minor soon came, and
it received the name of the province of Asia in 133 B.C.
The keystone of the fabric of Roman sovereignty over the coasts of the
Mediterranean was, however, still lacking. Carthage had once more risen
to prosperity. Her commerce and wealth--insignificant by themselves--were
only likely to become formidable if Rome were constrained, as in the year
150, to face hostile powers in both Spain and the East. Consequently
Rome could not rest until she had swept the rival of her greatness from
the face of the earth. After frequent quarrels with Masinissa, and after
threats and humiliating demands of every sort, the Carthaginians in
despair took up arms for their last fight for liberty. Scipio Æmilianus
took Carthage in the year 146 B.C. Well might the victor shed tears at
the sight of the city delivered over to the flames; reflecting that a
like fate would some day befall his own birthplace. For with the fall of
her last foe abroad the dominion of Rome began to crumble from internal
decay. Sanguinary revolts of slaves (140-133 B.C.), the corruption of the
aristocracy, the decay of the classes of free citizens and free peasants,
were enemies which inflicted far worse wounds on the Roman Empire than
the sword of its foes abroad.
Her sturdy peasantry and the moral worth of her citizens were the forces
that had made Rome great. Her expansion by conquest had enabled her to
ameliorate the condition of the poorer citizens by founding colonies and
partitioning public lands, and thus to augment the numbers of a capable
agricultural population. In proportion as the system of plantations
worked by slave labour took the place of this healthy development the
masses of the urban proletariat increased, while their fitness for
military service diminished, and the ancient Roman _virtus_ speedily
became a thing of the past. We know too well how little such civilising
influences as the Etruscans, and after them the Greeks of south Italy,
brought to bear upon Roman life, could offer in the way of compensation.
Many forms and usages of religious worship, many games and theatrical
performances imitated from Greek models, found acceptance at Rome. Under
the influence of Greek teachers a school of poetry and an elaborate style
of Latin prose developed. With admirable readiness the self-contained
Romans familiarised themselves, not only with the Greek language, but
with many aspects of Greek philosophy and rhetoric.
But the dark side of the picture almost counterbalanced the brightness
of this advance in culture. With the Greek philosophers came Greek
soothsayers and charlatans, with the Greek drama the airs and
abominations of the Greek world; with the Greek tutor the cook, the
barber, and the courtesan came to Rome from the East and freely exercised
their corrupting influence. The proceedings against the Bacchanalia in
186 B.C., in which thousands of guilty members of the secret society of
Bacchus were condemned to death, show how rapid was the decline of the
severity of Roman morals.
The forces which had made Rome great and won her a high place in
the civilisation of the human race were spent. The rigid moral code
of a well-regulated family life, the strict military discipline and
organisation of the sturdy Italian peasantry, had become very rare, if
they had not passed away altogether. Outwardly the development of Roman
law and the Roman constitution maintained the appearance of freedom, but
the selfishness of the ruling and moneyed classes threatened to destroy
even this palladium of Roman _libertas_. With the fall of Carthage we
reach the eve of the revolution which led to the repeated conquest of
the capital by its own citizens, to the unchaining of mob violence,
to a prætorian administration, and so to the rule of the Cæsars. “The
beasts of the forest,” as Tiberius Gracchus cried to the Romans of his
day, “have their dens and burrows, but the lords of the world have no
place where they can lay their heads.” Such is the reverse of the medal
of which the obverse reads: Foundation of the universal empire of Rome,
after Corinth and Numantia, Macedonia and Carthage, were laid in the dust.
[Illustration]
BOOK I
EARLY ROMAN HISTORY TO THE FALL OF THE REPUBLIC
_INTRODUCTION_
THE SOURCES AND THE CHRONOLOGY OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY
A GLANCE AT THE EARLY SOURCES
Monumental remains, casting more or less light directly or by inference
upon Roman history, are numerous. The Romans were great practical
builders, and wherever they went--even into distant Britain--they
left architectural remains, of which traces at least are still in
existence. In Rome itself, such monumental structures as the Colosseum,
the Pantheon, Trajan’s Pillar, and the ruins of the Forum, still bear
testimony to the character of the ancient civilisation.
Even more interesting in some respects is the record brought to light
through the exhumation of the buried cities of Herculaneum and of
Pompeii. At Pompeii, in particular, the visitor of to-day finds himself
in the midst of surroundings that give a most vivid impression of a Roman
city of the golden age. The streets are flanked by the walls of buildings
still intact as to their main structure; the road-beds themselves are
paved with stones which still show deep channels made by the wheels of
chariots that conveyed Romans of the time when Rome was mistress of the
world. The broken pillars of the forums; the terraced seats of the great
amphitheatres; the structure and contents of the private dwellings,
unite to tell the story of the social life of a remote epoch with a
vividness which no words can equal. And turning to details, the supply of
interesting implements and utensils of every-day use which the lava and
ashes of Vesuvius have preserved for us is almost inexhaustible.
Up to this point, the ruins of the buried Roman cities strongly suggest
the ruins of Nineveh and Nippur, and those of the old Greek cities
at Hissarlik. The parallel with the Mesopotamian cities holds even
further, for there are numerous treasures of art preserved at Pompeii.
But unfortunately, no such inexhaustible literary treasures as rewarded
the explorer in Babylonia and Assyria have been discovered in the ruins
of the Roman cities. A few most interesting tablets have been found;
such tablets as both the Grecians and the Romans used constantly, but
of which, owing to their perishable material, no examples whatever have
been preserved, except in these buried cities and in Egypt. Then, too, a
single collection of books was found in the small library of a private
dwelling at Herculaneum. This collection, comprising several hundred
papyrus rolls, gave promise of great things, if only the parched bundles
could be unrolled and their contents deciphered. But when, with infinite
patience, this end was effected, in a large number of instances the
result was most disappointing; for contrary to expectation no important
lost works of antiquity--no works throwing new light on any phase of
ancient history--were found. Many of the manuscripts were injured beyond
repair, and others have not yet been unrolled; but enough has been done
to prove the general character of the collection and to dissipate the
hopes of the antiquarian.
Of inscriptions on various monuments and on coins and medals there is no
dearth. But these are by no means so comprehensive in their scope as were
some of the inscriptions of the early Egyptian and Assyrian monarchs;
and speaking broadly, it may be said that the entire epigraphic and
numismatic testimony as to the history of Rome--particularly for the
earlier period--amounts to no more than incidental references, and would
leave us with but a vague knowledge of the subject, were it unsupported
by more extensive records.
The more extensive records in question are, of course, the manuscripts
of books. From a rather early day there was no dearth of writers in
Rome, and among these the historians, or, as they more generally termed
themselves, the annalists, were fully represented. Indeed, this class
of writers appears to have held almost complete possession of the field
in the early day. In the later Augustan age, though votaries of polite
literature had fuller representation, yet the historians, with Livy at
their head, still took front rank among writers of prose. No original
manuscripts of any of these writers have come down to us; indeed, no
manuscripts of the classical period whatever have been preserved,
except a few fragments in Egypt and the collection at Herculaneum just
mentioned. Our copies of the Roman historians date from the Middle
Ages, and few of them are intact. The works of the early annalists
and chroniclers have disappeared almost entirely. Doubtless they were
regarded as having little utility after such great master-builders as
Dionysius and Livy had used them in the construction of their great
works. Many of the writers of a later period fared not much better; and
even the greatest of all have come down to us in a damaged condition.
Livy himself is represented among extant manuscripts by only about
one-fifth of his original history--to say nothing of his other writings,
which have perished altogether. Dionysius has been no more fortunate, as
only the earliest portion of his work is preserved.
Dionysius himself has left us a list of the early authorities upon whom
he drew. His comment on his predecessors is interesting; after noting
that “no accurate history of the Romans, written in the Greek language,
has hitherto appeared, but only small accounts and short epitomes,” he
criticises these synopses as follows:
“Hieronymus Cardianus (the first author I know of upon this subject) has
given a cursory account of the Roman antiquities in his history of the
Epigoni. After him, Timæus, the Sicilian, treated of antiquities in his
universal history, and placed in a separate work the wars of the Romans
with Pyrrhus of Epirus. Besides these, Antigonus, Polybius, Silenus,
and innumerable other authors have attempted this same subject, though
in a different manner; each of whom has written some things concerning
the Romans, which they have compiled from common reports without any
diligence or accuracy. Like to these in all respects are the histories,
which some Romans also have published in Greek, concerning the ancient
transactions of their own nation; of whom the most ancient are Quintus
Fabius, and Lucius Cincius, who both flourished during the Punic wars:
each of these has related the actions, at which he himself was present,
with great exactness, as being well acquainted with them, but has given
a summary account of those early events that happened soon after the
building of the city.”
[Illustration: TREACHERY OF TARPEIA (SIXTH YEAR OF ROME)
(See p. 65)]
It was to supply the deficiency thus noted, Dionysius alleged, that
he undertook his work, being determined, he says, “not to pass over
that beautiful part of the Roman history, which the ancient authors
had disregarded.” But “lest some one should entertain the opinion that
in introducing matter not found in the authors already mentioned, he
resorted to invention,” Dionysius thinks it well to explain how he came
by the materials for his history. He says:
“I came into Italy immediately after Augustus Cæsar had put an end to the
civil war, in the middle of the hundred and eighty-seventh Olympiad; and
having from that time to this present, that is, twenty-two years, lived
at Rome, learned the Roman language and acquainted myself with their
writings, I employed all that interval in preparing materials for this
work; and some things I received from men of the greatest consideration
among them for learning, whose conversation I used; and others I
gathered from histories, written by the most approved Roman authors; such
as Porcius Cato, Fabius Maximus, Valerius Antias, Licinius Macer, the
Ælii, Gellii, and Calpurnii, and several others of good note. Supported,
therefore, by the authority of these histories, which are like the Greek
annals, I undertook this work.”
Livy, our other great source for the early traditional history of Rome,
unlike Dionysius, does not specifically enlighten us as to the sources of
his information; but doubtless they were much the same as those employed
by his great contemporary.
There was indeed a large company of early annalists and chroniclers, as
the note of Dionysius indicates. Among others these names have come down
to us: Q. Fabius Pictor and L. Cincius Alimentus, who lived in the time
of the Second Punic War and wrote in Greek; the poet Ennius, who wrote
annals from the earliest time to his own day; and A. Postumius Albinus
and C. Acilius who wrote annals in Greek at about the same period. The
original works of all of these, like those of many later historians, have
been lost.
It appears that the Roman historians were accustomed to call their
writings annals if they referred to ancient times, and histories if
they described contemporary events. It will be recalled that Tacitus
wrote both annals and histories. Necessarily, the works dealing with the
early history of Rome were annals. Dionysius, however, termed his work
_Archæologia_ instead of annals. Dionysius lived in the latter half of
the first century B.C., but he did not attempt to bring his historical
records further down than the year 264 B.C.; his intention being to
bridge the gap in Roman history preceding the time at which the work of
Polybius begins. Livy’s scope was far more comprehensive, as his work
covered the period to his own time. In other words it was, using the
Roman terminology, annals and history combined. It is curious to note his
own estimate of the relative values of these two portions of his work. He
says:
“Whether in tracing the series of the Roman history, from the foundation
of the city, I shall employ my time to good purpose, is a question which
I cannot positively determine; nor, were it possible, would I venture
to pronounce such determination; for I am aware that the matter is of
high antiquity, and has been already treated by many others; the latest
writers always supposing themselves capable, either of throwing some
new light on the subject, or, by the superiority of their talents for
composition, of excelling the more inelegant writers who preceded them.
However that may be, I shall, at all events, derive no small satisfaction
from the reflection that my best endeavours have been exerted in
transmitting to posterity the achievements of the greatest people in the
world; and if, amidst such a multitude of writers, my name should not
emerge from obscurity, I shall console myself by attributing it to the
eminent merit of those who stand in my way in the pursuit of fame. It may
be further observed, that such a subject must require a work of immense
extent, as our researches must be carried back through a space of more
than seven hundred years; that the state has, from very small beginnings,
gradually increased to such a magnitude, that it is now distressed by
its own bulk; and that there is every reason to apprehend that the
generality of readers will receive but little pleasure from the accounts
of its first origin, or of the times immediately succeeding, but will be
impatient to arrive at that period, in which the powers of this overgrown
state have been long employed in working their own destruction.”
Obviously then, Livy regarded the portion of his history which dealt with
remote antiquity as relatively unimportant. But posterity did not give
suffrage to this view; for successive generations of copyists preserved
the early portion of the work entire, while allowing the latter part to
be lost, except for occasional fragments.
[Illustration: HORATIUS CONDEMNED
(See p. 79)]
Livy’s preface continues: “On the other hand, this much will be derived
from my labour, that, so long at least as I shall have my thoughts
totally occupied in investigating the transactions of such distant ages,
without being embarrassed by any of these unpleasing considerations,
in respect of later days, which, though they might not have power to
warp a writer’s mind from the truth, would yet be sufficient to create
uneasiness, I shall withdraw myself from the sight of the many evils to
which our eyes have been so long accustomed.
“As to the relations which have been handed down of events prior to the
founding of the city, or to the circumstances that gave occasion to its
being founded, and which bear the semblance rather of poetic fictions
than of authentic records of history--these, I have no intention either
to maintain or refute. Antiquity is always indulged with the privilege of
rendering the origin of cities more venerable, by intermixing divine with
human agency; and if any nation may claim the privilege of being allowed
to consider its original as sacred, and to attribute it to the operations
of the gods, surely the Roman people, who rank so high in military fame,
may well expect, that, while they choose to represent Mars as their own
parent, and that of their founder, the other nations of the world may
acquiesce in this, with the same deference with which they acknowledge
their sovereignty. But what degree of attention or credit may be given to
these and such like matters I shall not consider as very material.”
Particular attention should be called to the remarks of Livy, just
quoted; which seem clearly enough to show that he was by no means so
credulous regarding the traditions of early Rome as his manner of
relating these traditions might lead one to suppose. It is probable that
the judgment of later generations usually goes astray when attempting
to estimate the exact level of credulity of any anterior generation.
Doubtless the Romans as a class gave far more credence to the hero tales
than we are disposed to give them now. We shall have abundant evidence
that even in the golden period of the empire superstitions as to miracles
and the like were not altogether repudiated, even by such writers as
Tacitus; but, on the other hand, we may well believe that writers of such
capacity as Livy allowed a desire for artistic presentation of a theme
to conceal a scepticism which he would not otherwise have hesitated to
avow. Be that as it may, posterity has all along clung to the myths of
early Rome, and we of to-day cannot ignore them, whatever estimate we put
upon their authenticity. It is through the pages of Dionysius and Livy,
chiefly, that these fascinating tales have been preserved to us.
Coming down the centuries we find no great name until we reach the period
when Rome, having firmly established her power in Italy, began to look
out beyond the bounds of the peninsula and dream of foreign conquests.
This great culminating epoch of Roman history found a great transcriber
in Polybius. His work was avowedly written to describe and explain
the events by which Rome “in the short period of fifty-three years,”
conquered the world. Polybius was himself a Greek, born in Megalopolis.
He was a practical statesman, and the personal friend of Aratus, the
leader of the Achæan League. We have noted in a previous volume that
Polybius was one of the thousand Greeks sent as hostages to Rome. He
spent the greater part of the remainder of his life in Italy; became the
personal friend of Scipio the Younger, and was present with that leader
when Carthage was finally destroyed. Belonging thus to the later epoch
of Grecian history, when the spirit of the age was philosophical rather
than artistic, Polybius wrote such a work as might be expected of a man
of genius of his time. His point of view is utterly different from that
of his great predecessor Herodotus, though not altogether dissimilar to
that of Thucydides. He himself tells us over and over--in fact he never
tires of repeating--that his intention is to instruct rather than to
entertain; to teach the causes of Rome’s success; to point the moral of
her victories. Being a man of affairs, he not unnaturally holds that only
men of affairs are competent to become reliable historians. He points out
that there are two ways of gaining knowledge: “one derived from reading
books, and the other from interrogating men;” he inveighs with some
asperity against those historians, taking Timæus as a type, who confine
themselves to the former method.
“The knowledge that is acquired by reading,” he says, “is gained without
any danger or any kind of toil. If a man will only fix his residence in
the neighbourhood of a library, or in a city that abounds with written
memoirs, he may make his researches with perfect ease; and, reposing
himself with full tranquillity, may compare the accounts and detect the
errors of former writers. But the knowledge which is drawn from personal
examination and inquiry, is attended with great fatigue and great
expense. It is this, however, which is the most important, and which
gives indeed the chief value to history. Historians themselves are ready
to acknowledge this truth. For Ephorus says, that if it were possible for
the writers of history to be present at all transactions, such knowledge
would be preferable to any other. To the same purpose is that passage of
Theopompus: that the experience which is gained in battles renders a man
a consummate general; that practice in pleading causes forms the perfect
orator; and that the same observation is just with respect to the arts of
navigation and of medicine.
“It was said by Plato,” Polybius continues, “that human affairs would
be well administered when philosophers should be kings, or kings
philosophers. In the same manner I would say: that history would be
well composed if those who are engaged in great affairs would undertake
to write it; not in a slight and negligent manner, like some of the
present age; but regarding such a work as one of the noblest and most
necessary of their duties, and pursuing it with unremitted application,
as the chief business of their lives; or if those, on the other hand,
who attempt to write, would think it necessary also to be conversant in
the practice of affairs. Till this shall happen, there will be no end of
mistakes in history.”
[Illustration: SCIPIO AND POLYBIUS
(From an old print)]
But while thus speaking for men of affairs, Polybius has in mind also
philosophers, for he declares that it is impossible to make a clear
judgment of the victorious or vanquished by a bare account of events. We
must know, he says, the laws and customs of the people, and the passions
and circumstances which prevail among them with regard to public and
private ends. With regard to the Romans in particular, he hopes by due
attention to these things to present such a picture that the people
of his own age will be able to discern “whether they ought to shun or
choose subjection to the Romans; and posterity to judge whether the
Roman government was worthy of praise and imitation or should rather be
rejected as vicious and blamable;” for in this, he believes, must consist
the utility of his history for his own and future ages.
All this is highly admirable; nor is it in dispute that Polybius attained
a large measure of success along the lines he had laid down for his
work. Only five of his forty books have come down to us entire, but
these sufficiently illustrate his method and its results. It has been
said of them that no student of the period can ignore them, but that
no one else would willingly read them. This criticism, like most other
epigrammatic verdicts, is unjust. There is much in the work of Polybius
that anyone who cares at all for historical writings may read with full
interest. His descriptions of the major events are by no means so bald
and unimaginative as some critics would contend. They do indeed eschew
the marvellous and attempt to avoid exaggeration; but this surely is
no fault; nor do these limitations exclude picturesqueness. But the
really vital fault of Polybius is his method of construction. He uses
virtually the plan which Diodorus adopted later of attempting to keep the
narrative of events in different countries in the closest chronological
sequence. This necessitates a constant interruption of his narrative,
through shifting the scene of action from one country to another, until
all sense of continuity is lost. Add to this an ineradicable propensity
to be forever moralising,--interrupting the narrative of some startling
event to explain in detail how startling events should be treated by the
historian,--and the reasons are sufficiently manifest why Polybius is
hard to read. It is a great pity that he did not, like Trogus Pompeius,
find a Justin to epitomise his work; for by common consent he was one
of the most dependable historians of antiquity; and he is recognised as
the standard source for all periods of which his extant works treat.
Indirectly his influence is even more extensive, since Livy made use of
him as his authority for the events of the Second and Third Punic wars,
and since Appian drew on him freely.
There is no great name among the Roman historians for about a century
and a half after Polybius. Then comes Sallust, the historian of the
Jugurthine War and the Catiline conspiracy; and Julius Cæsar, who has
left us that remarkable record of his own exploits. Contemporary with
Cæsar were Diodorus and Livy, the former of whom lived till about 7
B.C. and the latter till 17 A.D. Livy’s account of his own time, as
has already been mentioned, has most unfortunately perished. The chief
record of these times that has been preserved, is the work of Appian,
an Alexandrian Greek who lived in the time of Trajan, Hadrian, and
Antoninus Pius; that is to say, in the early part of the second century
A.D. His work is the sole authority--overlooking certain epitomes and
fragments--for some periods of the civil wars. It was written in Greek,
and is notable for the plan of its construction; which, departing
radically from the method of Polybius, treated each important subject by
itself. In other words his work is virtually a collection of monographs;
the subject of each being one of the important wars of Rome. Appian has
been charged with the opposite literary vice to that of Polybius; he is
said to have thought more of manner than of matter. Nevertheless, he
necessarily used the older writers for his facts, and if he sometimes
used them carelessly and uncritically, these are faults of his time. In
the main he shows a fair degree of accuracy. Accurate or otherwise, he
is, as has been said, our sole source for certain important periods of
the later time of the republic.
If to the writers just named we add Dion Cassius; the general historian
Trogus Pompeius (in Justin’s celebrated epitome); and of the biographers
Plutarch and Cornelius Nepos; and supplement our list with the names
of the so-called epitomators, Eutropius, Velleius, Florus, Aurelius
Victor, Zonaras, Festus Rufus, and Orosius (writers who made brief but
more or less valuable epitomes based on the authorities), we shall have
named practically all the important historians of Rome to the end of the
republic whose works are now available in anything like their original
form.
The modern historian gains incidental aid from various other fields:
from the orations of Cicero, and the chance references of poets; from
inscriptions on monuments and medals, and from the débris of ancient
structures. Yet when all these have been examined, it is to the
manuscripts that we must turn for the main incidents of the story.
Of the modern historians of Rome whose works have had much to do with the
earliest period, it is sufficient here to mention the names of Niebuhr,
Arnold, and Mommsen. More detailed notices of both ancient and recent
authorities will be given from time to time as we proceed.
THE CHRONOLOGY OF EARLY ROMAN HISTORY
A PRELIMINARY SURVEY, GIVING A CURSORY VIEW OF THE SWEEP OF EVENTS
FIRST (LEGENDARY) PERIOD OF THE KINGS (TO ABOUT 510 B.C.)
(All dates for this period are approximate.)
753-716. =Romulus=, a mythical king. Rape of the Sabine women, and war
with the Sabines. Through the treachery of Tarpeia, the fortress on
the Capitol taken by the Sabellian king Titus Tatius. Formation of the
double state of the Romans and Sabines under the rule of Romulus and
Tatius. Disappearance of Romulus during a thunder storm; he is known and
worshipped from now on as the god Quirinus. 715-673. =Numa Pompilius=, of
Cures, appointed king by the Romans after a year’s interregnum. Founds
the religion of the Romans. Building of the temple of Janus. 672-641.
=Tullus Hostilius.= War with Alba Longa. After a contest between the
Horatii and Curatii, Alba submits to a decision in favour of Rome. Alba
Longa destroyed and its population transferred to Rome. 641-616. =Ancus
Marcius.= Formation of the Fetiales. After the conquest of four Latin
cities their inhabitants are transferred and settled on the Aventine
Hill. Fortification of Janiculum. Building of the “pons Sublicius”
and foundation of Ostia. 615-578. =Tarquinius Priscus.= Building of
the temple of Jupiter on Capitoline Hill begun. The city divided into
four districts, and a new military system introduced. Increase of the
senate to three hundred members and doubling of the number of equites.
Successful campaigns against the Sabines, Latins, and Etruscans.
Tarquinius is assassinated by the sons of Ancus. 578-534. =Servius
Tullius.= The son of a slave woman, Ocrisia, and a god; he becomes the
son-in-law of Tarquinius. Formation of the four “tribes.” Changes in the
army, begun by Tarquinius, completed; distribution of all landholders
into tribes, classes, and centuries. Wars with Veii. Rome joins the
Latin league. Building of the walls of Rome. Assassination of Servius
Tullius by his son-in-law. 534-510. =Tarquinius Superbus.= The Capitoline
temple of Jupiter is completed. Subjugation of the Latin league. Suessa
Pometia is conquered. Through the treachery of his son Sextus, Tarquinius
captures the city of Gabii. Rape of Lucretia by Sextus the king’s son,
whereupon the indignant Romans rise in revolt. L. Junius Brutus heads the
insurrection, and Tarquin is deposed. Rome besieged by Lars Porsenna,
prince of Clusium; he grants honourable terms of peace and withdraws.
Battle of Lake Regillus. Tarquin seeks revenge at Cumæ. Overthrow of the
monarchy.
THE EARLY DAYS OF THE REPUBLIC (510-451 B.C.)
510. Rise of the Republic. 509. Consuls for the first year are L. Junius
Brutus and L. Tarquinius Collatinus. Collatinus, being a descendant of
Tarquin, is compelled by a decree of the senate to give up his office.
He is replaced by P. Valerius Publicola. According to Polybius, L.
Junius Brutus and Marcus Horatius were consuls for the first year.
The first dictator is Titus Lartius. Unsuccessful attempts to restore
the Tarquinians. Execution of Brutus’ son. Commercial treaty between
Rome and Carthage. 508. The Romans are defeated by the Etruscan king
Porsenna of Clusium, are forced to disarm and surrender certain lands.
Alliance of thirty Latin cities under the dictatorship of Octavius with
the object of restoring the Tarquinians to the sovereignty of Rome.
Death of Valerius Publicola. 497. The Latins declare war against Rome.
Aulus Postumius is appointed dictator at Rome. Tradition credits the
Romans with a great victory over the Latins at Lake Regillus. The Latin
cities make peace with Rome, and agree to banish Tarquinius. 494. The
plebeians secede to the Sacred Hill, and compel the patricians to make
important concessions, among which is the abrogation of oppressive
debts. Establishment of the tribunate and the plebeian ædileship. 493.
The eternal alliance between Rome and the Latin league is renewed
under the consulate of Spurius Cassius on the basis of equality. Rome
gradually regains hegemony over the Latins. The tribunate is the cause
of anarchy, and leads to further disputes between the patricians and
plebeians. Attempts to abolish the tribunate. 491. Marcius Coriolanus.
During a famine he suggests granting, at the expense of the state, grain
to the plebeians, on condition that they relinquish their claim to
the tribunate. He is summoned before the tribal assembly but fails to
appear, and according to Livy is banished, goes over to the Volscians,
and leads their troops against Rome; at the rebuke of Veturia his
mother, and the entreaties of his wife Volumnia, he abandons the war
against his native city. 487. The consul Aquilius defeats the Hernici
who invade Roman territory. 486. Spurius Cassius Viscellinus consul for
the third time. He again defeats the Hernici, after which they join the
Latin league. He introduces the first agrarian law, and proposes that
a portion of the public lands be divided between the needy plebeians
and Latins; the remainder to be leased for the benefit of the state. He
is attacked by the patricians and wealthy plebeians on account of this
measure, and the poorer plebeians, being opposed to the granting of lands
to the Latins, abandon him. At the expiration of his consulship he is
condemned and executed. 479. Withdrawal of the Fabian gens. 477. The
Etruscans destroy the Fabian gens at the Cremera. Genucius, the people’s
tribune, assassinated for inquiring into the acts of two consuls. 472.
Publilius Volero effects law that the tribal assembly henceforth shall
elect plebeian magistrates. 468. Conquest of Antium from the Volscians;
a Roman colony is sent thither. 463. Rome and all Italy visited by a
terrible plague. Volscians and Æquians ravage the country up to the walls
of Rome. The safety of the city secured by the Latin Hernicans, not by
the Romans. 462. C. Terentilius Harsa introduces a bill to secure the
plebeians a better footing in the state, and to reduce the laws to a
written code. The patricians violently oppose the measure. 460. A band of
Sabines and exiled Romans under Herdonius seize the Capitol; civil strife
is renewed. 457. To meet the desire of the plebeians, the number of the
tribunes of the people is raised from five to ten. 456. Aventine Hill is
divided into building lots and distributed among the poorer citizens.
The dictatorship of L. Quinctius Cincinnatus. 454. Three ambassadors
appointed to visit Greece and secure copies of the Solonian laws to
be used as the groundwork of a new code of laws. 452. The ambassadors
return. Rome free from domestic strife.
FROM THE DECEMVIRS TO THE GALLIC INVASION (451-390 B.C.)
451. The decemvirs or consuls of ten appointed from the patricians with
Appius Claudius and T. Genucius consuls for the first year, at their
head. The code of the ten tables posted in the Forum and becomes law.
450. Appointment of the decemvirs. Appius Claudius the only one of the
old decemvirs to be re-elected. Three plebeians are also elected. Two new
tables are added to the code of laws. 449. The decemvirs under Appius
Claudius, who have become more despotic than the early kings, remain in
office during this year. Under the Valerii and Horatii an attempt on the
part of the moderate aristocracy to compel the decemvirs to abdicate
proves unsuccessful. Renewal of the border wars. The Sabines on the north
and the Æquians on the northeast invade Roman territory. Two armies are
sent to oppose them and both are defeated. Siccius Dentatus, a former
tribune of the people, is murdered at the instigation of the decemvirs.
Virginia, the betrothed of L. Icilius, the tribune who succeeded in
allotting the Aventine Hill to the plebeians, is outraged by Appius
Claudius. Her father Virginius stabs her in the Forum. These acts bring
about a revolt against the decemvirs who abdicate. Appius Claudius is
thrown into prison and commits suicide. Spurius Oppius, chief of the
plebeian decemvirs, is accused by Numitorius and executed. 448. The new
laws of Valerius Horatius. 445. A law making marriage legal between
patricians and plebeians is passed by C. Canuleius. 444. Formation of
military tribunes with consular authority. Plebeians and patricians
both eligible. 443. A new office is created to which two patricians are
elected and known as censors. 439. A wealthy plebeian Spurius Mælius
charged with seeking regal power is assassinated by C. Servilius Ahala.
434. L. Æmilius Mamercus appointed dictator to conduct the war in lower
Etruria. 431. Rome threatened by a combined attack of the Æquians and
Volscians. They are defeated. 405-396. Siege of Veii. Dictator M. Furius
Camillus captures and destroys Veii. 394. Camillus marches against
Falerii, the chief city of the Falisci, who surrender. 391. Camillus is
accused of unfairly dividing the booty at Veii, is impeached, and goes
into exile. 390. The Gauls invade Rome and the senate accedes to their
demand that the three Roman ambassadors who aided the Etruscans against
the Gauls should be delivered to them, but the citizens reject the
measure. Battle of the Allia in which the Romans are completely routed
and their city left defenceless. Rome captured, plundered, and burned.
The Gauls attack the Capitol but are repulsed and content themselves with
a blockade. After a siege of seven months the Gauls agree to quit Rome on
receiving one thousand pounds’ weight of gold. Rebuilding of the city.
THE CONQUEST OF ITALY (376-264 B.C.)
376. New laws are proposed by C. Licinius and Lucius Sextius. 367.
Licinian laws are passed. 366. L. Sextius Lateranus first plebeian
consul. 367-349. Wars with the Gauls in upper Italy. 362-358. War with
the Hernicans and the insurgent Latin cities. A new alliance formed of
Latins, Romans, and Hernicans. 358-351. War with Tarquinii and other
Etruscan cities. Southern Etruria acknowledges Roman supremacy. 350-345.
Wars with the Volscians and Aurunci, who are completely subjugated. 348.
Renewal of the commercial treaty with Carthage. 343. First Samnite War.
340-338. The great Latin War. Subjugation of Latium. 337-326. Revolt
of Cales. Treaty with Alexander of Molossia. Siege and destruction of
Palæopolis. 326. The Second Samnite War begins. 321. The great defeat
of the Roman army at Caudine Forks. 319. L. Papirius Cursor conquers
Luceria. 312. The Etruscans, on the expiration of the forty years’ peace,
join in the war against Rome. 309. L. Papirius Cursor utterly defeats the
Samnites. 305. The Romans capture Bovianum, the Samnite capital. 304.
End of the war. 299. The Third Samnite War. 295. The battle of Sentinum,
in which the Romans prove victorious. 294. The allied Romans dissolve.
293. Defeat of the Samnites at Aquilonia. 290. The conclusion of peace.
285-282. War against the new league of Italian cities. 282. Opening of
the war with Tarentum. 280. Pyrrhus lands in Italy. Battle of Heraclea.
279. Battle of Asculum. 275. Battle of Beneventum. Pyrrhus withdraws from
Italy. 274-264. Final settlement of Italy.
FIRST PERIOD OF FOREIGN CONQUEST (264-132 B.C.)
264. First Punic War. The Carthaginians besiege Messana. 263. Invasion
of Sicily by the Romans. The Syracusan king Hiero joins the Romans. 262.
The Romans defeat Hanno and capture Agrigentum [Acragas]. 260. The Romans
send a fleet under Cornelius Scipio against Lipara, which is defeated
by the Carthaginians. Battle of Mylæ in which the Roman navy proves
victorious. Sea fight off Ecnomus; defeat of the Carthaginian fleet. The
Romans invade Africa. 255. Carthaginians under Xanthippus defeat the
Romans under Regulus. Loss of the Roman fleet on homeward voyage. 254.
Roman victory at Panormus. 251. Hasdrubal defeated at Panormus. 249.
Carthaginian victory over the Romans at Drepanum. 248-243. Success of the
Carthaginians under Hamilcar Barca on the Italian coast and in Sicily.
242. Romans defeat the Carthaginian fleet off Ægatian islands. 241.
Hamilcar Barca concludes peace. The Carthaginians agree to pay indemnity
and leave Sicily. 229-228. War with the Illyrians. 225-222. Annihilation
of the Cisalpine Gauls. 218. The Second Punic War begins. The Roman army
sent to Africa. Hasdrubal opposes Scipio in Spain. Hannibal crosses
the Alps. 217. Hannibal defeats the Romans at Lake Trasimene. 216.
The Romans annihilated at Cannæ. 215. First Macedonian War. Philip of
Macedon joins Carthage. Hannibal is defeated in the battle of Nola. 214.
Carthaginians land in Sicily. 212. Romans recover their position in
Sicily. Carthaginian success in Spain. 211. The Romans besiege Capua.
Hannibal at the gate of Rome. Hannibal’s retreat from Rome. Fall of
Capua. Defeat of Hasdrubal at Bæcula. 209. Hasdrubal crosses the Pyrenees
and Gaul, and appears in the north of Italy. 207. Hasdrubal defeated
and slain at the battle of Metaurus. 206. Carthaginians expelled from
Spain. Macedonian War concluded. 204. Scipio in Africa. 203. Scipio
defeats the Carthaginians. Hannibal recalled to Carthage. 202. Scipio
defeats Hannibal in the battle of Zama. 201. Treaty of peace concluded.
200. Second Macedonian War. 200-197. Subjugation of upper Italy.
197. Second Macedonian War concluded. 192-189. War with Syria. 190.
Battle of Magnesia. 171. Third Macedonian War. 168. Overthrow of the
Macedonian monarchy. 149. Third Punic War begins. Siege of Carthage.
Viriathus successful in Lusitania. 146. Carthage taken and destroyed;
her territories become Roman provinces and are organised as such. Achæan
War. Battle of Leucopetra. Corinth surrenders peacefully. Destruction
of Corinth. 143-141. Numantine War against the rebellious Celtiberians.
Viriathus maintains himself against the Romans, and finally concludes a
peace unfavourable to them. 140. The Romans violate the peace and renew
the war. 139. Viriathus is murdered at Roman instigation. The Lusitanians
renew the war but are defeated and disarmed. This is their last rebellion
on a formidable scale. 133. Numantia taken and destroyed by Scipio
Africanus the younger. Having resisted successive Roman generals since
the year 143 it is now subdued after fifteen months’ close investment.
Its fall signalises the subjection of northern Spain to Rome. 135-132.
First Servile War in Sicily. The slave Eunus leads an insurrection of
the slaves and assumes the title of King Antiochus. A regular government
is established, and in the war with Rome which follows the rebels are
at first successful. When finally subdued they are punished by numerous
executions. The consul Rupilius reorganises the administration of Sicily.
REFORMS OF THE GRACCHI (138-111 B.C.)
133. Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus elected tribune. He proposes the
resumption of “common lands” held by unauthorised persons and the revival
of the Licinian law limiting the amount of such land to be occupied by
one individual. By this means he hoped to mitigate the evils resulting
from the concentration of these estates in the possession of a few
persons. Tiberius obtains the illegal removal from office of the tribune
Caius Octavius, who had vetoed the passing of the new (Sempronian) law,
and that law is then passed by the popular assembly. Tiberius Gracchus,
his brother Caius, and his father-in-law Appius Claudius appointed to
carry out the decree. Attalus III king of Pergamus dies, making the
Romans his heirs. Tiberius Gracchus proposes that the money shall be
employed to start the new settlers on the resumed lands and that the
kingdom of Attalus (the new province of Asia) shall be governed by
the people instead of by the senate, who were legally entitled to the
disposal of both land and money. Tiberius prepares other reforms, and
in order to preserve and continue his work becomes a candidate for
re-election as tribune, in defiance of the law forbidding re-election.
He opposes the aristocratic resistance by force and is killed with
many of his adherents in the ensuing riot. 131. C. Carbo, the tribune,
obtains a law permitting secret voting for the ratification of laws by
the popular vote. Scipio Africanus Minor obtains the defeat of Carbo’s
measure to legalise the re-election of tribunes. 129. Aristonicus, a
natural son of Attalus III of Pergamus, executed for making war against
the Romans in assertion of his rights to his father’s kingdom. C. Carbo,
Gracchus, and Marcus Fulvius Flaccus triumvirs for the execution of the
Sempronian law; Scipio contrives to obtain a limitation of their powers,
which virtually suspends the law. 125. Fulvius Flavius becomes consul. He
raises the question of admitting the Latins to the Roman citizenship, and
is then sent to Transalpine Gaul to aid the Massiliots against the Gauls.
Fregellæ revolts against the Romans and is destroyed. 124. Aquæ Sextiæ
(Aix) founded in Gaul. 123. Caius Gracchus clears himself from the charge
of instigating the revolt of Fregellæ. He succeeds in driving into exile
Popilius Lænas, the survivor of the consuls of 132. Finding himself
confronted by a powerful opposition, Caius endeavours to conciliate the
people by means of the _lex frumentarii_, a law providing for the regular
distribution of corn at the expense of the state. He originates the idea
of provincial colonies. The _lex judiciaria_ transfers judicial functions
from the senate to the order of _equites_, the moneyed, as distinguished
from the aristocratic class. This measure weakens the power of the
senate but does not render the administration of justice less corrupt.
By the _lex de provincia Asia_, C. Gracchus places that province at the
disposal of the equites. Caius Gracchus re-elected tribune for a second
year. 122. C. Gracchus goes to establish the colony of Junonia on the
site of Carthage. In his absence M. Livius Drusus proposes the foundation
of twelve colonies in Italy, a popular measure intended to divert the
people’s favour from Gracchus. C. Gracchus attempts to extend the rights
of citizenship to the Latins but is defeated by the united efforts of
the senate and the mob. War with the Allobroges and Arverni and Roman
victory of Vindalum. 121. Death of Caius Gracchus. This is the result of
a riot originating in a murder committed by a partisan of Gracchus. The
latter with his adherents takes possession of the Aventine, from which
they were driven by the aristocratic party. 120. Agrarian law forbidding
the sale of lands allotted to the peasants, repealed. Popilius Lænas
recalled. 118. Common lands secured to those in possession on payment of
a fixed tax. Narbo, afterwards the capital of the Narbonensis, founded.
113. Invasion of the Cimbrians. They defeat the consul Cn. Papirius Carbo
at Noreia, and pass into Helvetia and Gaul. 111. Common lands in Italy
declared to be the private property of those in possession. This date
marks the final failure of the reforms of the Gracchi.
THE JUGURTHINE AND OTHER WARS (111-100 B.C.)
111. Outbreak of the Jugurthine War. This war was occasioned by the
quarrel between the two kings of Numidia, Jugurtha and Adherbal. The
latter appealed to Rome, and a commission appointed by the senate made
a regular division of the kingdom between the two claimants. War again
broke out between them, and Adherbal was besieged in his capital Cirta.
It was taken and Adherbal put to death. Whereupon Rome declared war
against Jugurtha. The consul Calpurnius concludes a treaty with Jugurtha
which the senate refuses to sanction. 110. Aulus Albinus capitulates
to Jugurtha with his whole army. 109. Battle of the Muthul; Metellus
defeats Jugurtha. M. Junius Silanus defeated by the Cimbri in Gaul. 107.
L. Cassius Longinus defeated by the Cimbri on the Garonne. Metellus
defeats Jugurtha, who takes refuge in the desert. Bocchus, king of
Mauretania, makes alliance with Jugurtha. C. Marius succeeds Metellus.
He defeats Jugurtha near Cirta and takes Capsa and other towns. 106. L.
Cornelius Sulla joins Marius. Jugurtha repulsed at Cirta. 105. Sulla
induces Bocchus to betray Jugurtha. Numidia divided between Bocchus and
Jugurtha’s half-brother Gauda. The Cimbri defeat the Romans at Arausio
(Orange). 104. Marius elected consul. Preparations for defence of Italy
against the barbarians. The Cimbri cross into Spain. Marius reorganises
the Roman army. 103. Marius again consul. Second Servile insurrection in
Sicily under Tryphon, who assumes the title of king. 102. The Cimbrians,
Teutones, and Helvetians approach Italy in two bands. Battle of Aquæ
Sextiæ. Marius defeats the Teutones and Ambrones. Catulus abandons the
country north of the Po to the Cimbri. 101. Battle of Vercellæ (Campi
Raudii). Marius destroys the army of the Cimbri and thus saves Italy from
the barbarians. Athenion, the successor of Tryphon, defeated and slain by
the consul Manius Aquilius. The fugitives taken and killed to the number
of thirty thousand.
CIVIL STRIFE: TIME OF MARIUS (100-86 B.C.)
100. Marius chosen consul for the sixth time. Saturninus coerces the
assembly of the tribes into accepting a measure for distributing
conquered lands among the soldiers of Marius, and containing a clause
obliging the senate to confirm the law. Q. Metellus alone refuses to do
so and goes into banishment. The popular party endeavour to secure the
consulship for 99 to Glaucia. His supporters kill the rival candidate in
the Forum. Marius interferes in the cause of order, attacks the rioters
and captures Saturninus and Glaucia. While awaiting trial the popular
leaders with many of their adherents are put to death by the aristocratic
party. 99. Q. Metellus recalled. 98. Marius retires to Asia. 95. Rutilius
Rufus falsely accused of extortion while legatus in Asia Minor and sent
into banishment. This unjust sentence reveals the abuse of the judicial
power in the hands of the equites. 92. Sulla as prætor in Cilicia
restores the king of Cappadocia who had been expelled at the instigation
of Mithridates, king of Pontus. 91. Marcus Livius Drusus tribune. He
introduces laws: (a) taking the judicial power from the equites and
restoring it to the senate, and (b) providing for a redistribution of
lands. These laws, passed by the popular assembly, are declared invalid
by the senate. Drusus proceeds to execute them and to introduce a measure
for admitting Italians to the citizenship. Drusus dies suddenly. 90.
Trials and banishment of the supporters of the Italians. The Social War
(90-88). The Italians revolt from Rome and form a republic with Corfinium
as its capital. They attack the Latin colonies. Venusia and several other
cities fall into their hands before the Romans can take the field. Lucius
Julius Cæsar, the consul, twice defeated by the Italians. Campania and
Apulia fall into their hands. The consul Rutilius defeated and slain on
the Tolenus. Marius fails to distinguish himself. Cn. Pompeius Strabo
defeated and besieged in Firmum, from whence he attacks and routs the
Italians. The year closes with the Italians on the whole successful and
with news of disturbances in the provinces. Rome conciliates the Latins
and the loyal Italians by granting them citizen rights. 89. The Romans
repeatedly defeat the Italians. The _lex Plautia-Papiria_ confers Roman
citizenship on all Italians desiring it. They are enrolled in eight of
the tribes. 88. Mithridates, king of Pontus, makes war on the king of
Bithynia and defeats the Roman armies supporting the latter. The Greek
cities of Asia join Mithridates and put to death all Italians found in
them. Sulla appointed to command in the Mithridatic War. P. Sulpicius,
a partisan of Marius, proposes to enrol Italians in all the thirty-five
tribes. Sulla opposes the measure. The popular assembly transfers the
command in the Mithridatic War to Marius. Sulla joins his army in
Campania and marches on Rome. Marius makes a fruitless attempt to defend
the city, but fails and has to flee to Africa. Sulla deprives the popular
assembly of the right to vote on measures not previously sanctioned by
the senate. 87. Sulla proceeds to the war against Mithridates, lands in
Epirus, drives Mithridates’ generals from Bœotia, and besieges Athens,
which had declared for the king of Pontus. Meantime the consul L.
Cornelius Cinna endeavours forcibly to revive the laws of Sulpicius.
He is expelled by the aristocratic party. In conjunction with Marius
he raises an army in Campania and occupies Rome. Five days spent in
slaughter and pillage. Cinna interferes and orders the bands of Marius to
be cut to pieces. 86. Marius a seventh time consul. Death of Marius. His
colleague Cinna continues his tyrannical government.
TIME OF SULLA (86-78 B.C.)
86. Athens taken by Sulla. Battle of Chæronea won by Sulla. 85. Battle
of Orchomenos won by Sulla. Sulla proceeds to Asia by way of Macedonia
and Thrace. Another Roman army under the auspices of the democratic party
wins successes against Mithridates, its leader, Fimbria, conducting the
war in a savage fashion. 85. Sulla concludes a peace with Mithridates, by
which the king surrenders all his conquests. Fimbria’s army goes over to
Sulla. 83. Sulla returns and lands at Brundusium with a large force. He
is joined by the young Cn. Pompeius (Pompey the Great). He guarantees the
Italians the rights previously secured them, including that of voting in
the thirty-five tribes. Battle of Mount Tifata. Sulla defeats the consul
C. Norbanus. The army of the consul L. Scipio goes over to Sulla. In this
year the second Mithridatic War began. It lasted till 81, and was carried
on by the proprætor Murena, who invaded Pontus, and was there defeated by
Mithridates. 82. The younger Marius and Papirius Carbo consuls. Battle
of Sacriportus. Marius is defeated by Sulla and retires to Præneste,
where he is besieged. The democratic leaders flee from Rome. Sulla
enters Rome without opposition. Battle of the Colline Gate. The Samnites
attack Rome and are repulsed with great slaughter. Many of the prisoners
are massacred. Præneste falls. Suicide of Marius. Sulla displays great
cruelty towards the conquered cities of Italy. He becomes dictator for
an indefinite period, to reorganise the government. Proscription lists
are published, the proscribed butchered, and their property confiscated.
Senate reorganised and its privileges increased. The power of the
tribunes reduced. 80. Sertorius, a distinguished member of the democratic
party who had made himself an independent ruler in Lusitania, maintains
himself against Fufidius and Q. Metellus. 79. Sulla abdicates his power.
78. Death of Sulla.
TIME OF POMPEY (78-60 B.C.)
78. M. Æmilius Lepidus and Marcus Junius Brutus attempt to overthrow
Sulla’s constitution. Lepidus is twice defeated. 77. Brutus defeated
and put to death by Pompey. 76. Sertorius defeats Pompey in Spain. 75.
Isauria, Pamphylia, and Pisidia occupied for Rome in consequence of a
war against the Mediterranean pirates. 74. Bithynia bequeathed to Rome
by Nicomedes III. Third Mithridatic War. Mithridates occupies Bithynia.
Battle of Chalcedon. Mithridates defeats the Roman general Cotta.
Lucullus relieves Chalcedon and Cyzicus. 73. Lucullus drives Mithridates
from his kingdom. Third Servile War. Gladiators, who had escaped from
a school at Capua, place themselves under the command of Spartacus, a
Thracian captive, and being joined by numbers of slaves, ravage Italy.
72. Sertorius murdered by Perperna. Pompey defeats and executes Perperna.
71. Spartacus defeated and slain by M. Licinius Crassus. Pompey destroys
the fugitives. 72-70. Lucullus reduces the cities on the Pontic coast
and invades Armenia. 70. Privileges of the tribunes restored. 69. Battle
of Tigranocerta. Lucullus defeats Tigranes, king of Armenia, and (68)
advances across the Euphrates, but is compelled to retreat owing to
a mutiny. 67. Mithridates defeats the Roman general Triarius at Zela.
Lucullus retreats. Mithridates reconquers Pontus and invades Bithynia
and Cappadocia. Pompey receives supreme command of the Mediterranean and
the disposal of all the resources of the Roman provinces and dependent
states. In three months he succeeds in completely extirpating piracy,
which had scourged the sea for many years. Pompey supersedes Lucullus and
recovers Pontus. 66. Battle on the Lycus. Pompey defeats Mithridates.
65. Pompey makes an expedition against the Caucasian tribes. He goes
to Syria. 64. Pompey proceeds to organise the provinces in Asia Minor.
Catiline conspiracy. The united parties of the democrats under M. Crassus
and C. Julius Cæsar and the anarchists under L. Sergius Catilina conspire
to secure the consulship for Catiline and C. Antonius. Antonius and M.
Tullius Cicero elected. Antonius deserts his supporters. 63. Plan of
Catiline to murder his rivals for the consulship of 63 and seize the
power by force. Cicero discovers and defeats the plot. 62. Battle of
Pistoria. Catiline defeated and slain. 61. Cæsar proprætor in Farther
Spain. Pompey returns to Italy. The senate refuses to ratify his
dispositions in Asia and to fulfil his request respecting lands for his
veterans.
THE FIRST TRIUMVIRATE (60-49 B.C.)
60. First triumvirate: a league between Pompey, Cæsar, and Crassus.
59. Cæsar’s consulship. Pompey’s dispositions in Asia ratified and a
decree for the distribution of lands obtained from the popular assembly.
The government of Gallia Cisalpina, Illyricum, and Gallia Narbonensis
conferred on Cæsar for five years with extraordinary powers. 58. Cato
appointed to take possession of Cyprus. Cicero driven into exile. The
Helvetians invade Gaul and are crushed by Cæsar at Bibracte (Autun).
Suevi under Ariovistus repulsed at Vesontio (Besançon). 57. Belgic tribes
subjugated by Cæsar. Cicero and Cato return to Rome. 56. Veneti in
Armorica subdued by Cæsar and the Aquitani by his lieutenant. Pompey and
Crassus coerce the assembly into electing them as consuls for 55. Cæsar’s
command extended for another five years. 55. Cæsar crosses the Rhine and
penetrates into Germany. Cæsar makes his first expedition to Britain. 54.
Pompey delegates to his representatives the government of Spain, which
had been conferred on him for five years. Crassus takes over the command
of Syria. Cæsar makes a second expedition to Britain and encounters
Cassivelaunus. 53. Battle of Carrhæ. Crassus defeated by the Parthians,
and subsequently slain. Cæsar suppresses the revolt of the Eburones and
other Gallic tribes. 52. P. Clodius, the partisan of the triumvirate,
killed in a quarrel with T. Annius Milo. Consequent tumults. Pompey
appointed sole consul to restore quiet. Vercingetorix leads a general
revolt of the Gauls, which is suppressed by Cæsar after a hard contest.
Breach between Cæsar and Pompey. 51. Cæsar completes the subjection and
pacification of Gaul. 50. Cæsar’s recall decreed by the senate.
DOMINATION OF JULIUS CÆSAR (49-44 B.C.)
49. Cæsar crosses the Rubicon. Pompey flees to Brundusium. Cæsar marches
through Italy, compels Domitius to surrender at Corfinium and besieges
Brundusium. Pompey passes over into Greece with his troops. Cæsar
subdues Pompey’s representatives in Spain. Curio subdues Sicily for
Cæsar, wins the victory of Utica in Africa, and is defeated and slain at
the Bagradas by the king of Numidia. Cæsar is proclaimed dictator at
Rome, but abdicates and is appointed consul for 48. 48. Cæsar goes to
Greece and is defeated by Pompey at Dyrrhachium. Cæsar defeats Pompey
in the battle of Pharsalia, who flees to Egypt, where he is murdered.
Cæsar lands in Egypt and interferes in the disputes for the throne.
The people of Alexandria rise against Cæsar. Egyptian fleet burned by
Cæsar’s order. The great library perishes in the flames. Cæsar defeats
the Egyptian army and establishes Cleopatra and her brother under Roman
supremacy. 47. War with Pharnaces, son of Mithridates. Cæsar victorious
in a five days’ campaign. 46. Battle of Thapsus. Cæsar defeats and
slaughters Pompey’s adherents in Africa. Part of Numidia annexed to
Africa. Death of Cato. Cæsar returns to Rome and is made dictator for
ten years. Reform of the calendar. 45. Battle of Munda in Spain. Defeat
and subsequent death of Pompey’s eldest son. Final triumph of Cæsar.
Cæsar now proceeds to various measures for organising public affairs. He
extends the franchise, enlarges the senate, and makes appointments to
it himself. He plants new colonies abroad, arranges for a survey of the
empire, and plans a codification of the law. He makes various schemes
for the construction and improvement of public works. He arrogates to
himself the final decision in judicial cases. He abolishes the system of
farming the taxes, institutes military reforms, and takes measures to
curb the abuse of power by the provincial governors. The extensive powers
which he possesses are exercised by right of the numerous offices and
titles conferred on him. 44. Cæsar refuses the crown offered him at the
Lupercalia. Murder of Cæsar by M. Junius Brutus, Decimus Brutus, Cassius,
_etc._ Mark Antony incites the people against the conspirators. They take
to flight. Mark Antony supreme in Rome. Mark Antony besieges Decimus
Brutus in Mutina.
THE SECOND TRIUMVIRATE (44-30 B.C.)
43. The consuls and Cæsar’s nephew, Caius Julius Cæsar Octavianus, sent
against Antony by the senate. Battle of Mutina. Antony defeated. Octavian
obtains the consulship and the condemnation of the conspirators. Decimus
Brutus taken and put to death. The second triumvirate. Antony, Octavian,
and Lepidus assume the supreme power. Proscriptions and confiscations.
Murder of Cicero. 42. Battle of Philippi. Defeat and death of Brutus and
Cassius. Antony meets Cleopatra at Tarsus. 41. War of Perusia between
Octavian and the brother and wife of Antony respecting the distribution
of lands to the veterans. Octavian makes himself supreme in Italy. 40.
The triumvirs divide the empire between them. 39. Treaty of Misenum.
The triumvirs grant Sicily, Sardinia, and Peloponnesus to Sextus, the
surviving son of Pompey. Antony goes to Egypt. 38. Sicilian War between
the triumvirs and Sextus Pompeius. 36. Battle of Naulochus. Defeat and
flight of Sextus. Unsuccessful campaign of Antony against the Parthians.
34. Artavasdes, king of Armenia, defeated and captured by Antony. 31.
Battle of Actium. Octavian defeats the fleet of Antony and Cleopatra. 30.
Suicide of Antony and Cleopatra. Egypt made a Roman province. =Octavian=
sole ruler of the Roman dominions.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER I. LAND AND PEOPLE
The fundamental peculiarity of Roman history is the fact that it is the
history, not of a country or, in the proper sense, of a nation, but of a
city. In Egypt, Thebes was at one time dominant, and Memphis at another;
the supreme centre of Mesopotamia shifted between Babylon and Nineveh;
whilst in Greece, Athens and Sparta long contested the supremacy. But
in all these cases, with the possible exception of the Babylonian, the
country as a whole gave its name to the people, and the city was, at
best, only the heart of the civilisation; whereas Rome came into power as
an isolated community within a little city, the very environs of which
were at first hostile territory.
This city chanced to be located in Italy, but for some centuries the
names “Roman” and “Italian” were in no sense synonymous. Indeed at an
early date the main part of Italy was inhabited by people who were not at
all under Roman dominion, and when the legions of Rome issued forth to
conquer the territories and the little peninsula, the wars that led to
this result had all the significance of foreign conquest. And when these
conquests had spread beyond the bounds of Italy proper until, finally,
they took in practically all of the civilised world that was worth
conquering, except the Parthian kingdom in the far East, it was still the
single city on the Tiber which was regarded as constituting the essence
of the vast dominion; and the citizen who had come to share in the full
rights and privileges of this vast domain needed no other specific
designation than the single word “Roman.”
From the point of view of the ethnologist, Greeks and Romans had strong
points of difference. The Greeks were dominated by a temperament perhaps
more acute and sensitive than that of any other nation of the ancient
world. They developed the fine arts in all their main branches--pottery,
sculpture, architecture, grammar, and philosophy--to a height which has
never been excelled by any subsequent people. But they paid the penalty
of their sensibility and their versatility by an instability of purpose,
a lack of civic discipline, which speedily worked their downfall.
The Romans developed comparatively little culture. Almost all the lasting
monuments of the Romans were partly inspired by intercourse with the
Greeks. On the other hand, as might have been expected of a people whose
home was within the walls of a city, they were as eminent in the framing
of laws, and in the art of government, as the Greeks were in the fine
arts. The versatility and levity of the Greek, and his undisciplined
life of individual freedom, ruined the nation of the noblest promise in
all history. The virile stability of the Roman, and his conception of
freedom as subordinate to the duties of patriotism, made him master of
the civilised world for many centuries.
To these two nations the world owes, perhaps, an equal debt. The peoples
of modern Europe arose from the ruins of the Roman empire, and inherited
from it the soundest laws and the best examples of government; which, in
some respects, they have been able to improve upon; and, when they had
progressed far enough in civilisation, they discovered the culture of the
Greeks and developed it, each nation in accordance with its genius and
its needs, into the civilisation of the later centuries.
The testimony of language has been accepted as proving that the Romans
were Aryans, but that term itself has come to have a somewhat doubtful
meaning, as we have already seen. The affinity of their language seems
to make it clear that the Romans were more closely allied to the Greeks
than to any other of their known contemporaries, and it has been assumed
as proven that the ancestors of these two peoples remained in contact
with each other long after their separation from the primitive Aryan
swarm. But the problem in its entirety deals with many questions that are
obscure in the extreme: just when or just how these supposititious Aryans
migrated into Italy; what manner of people--what race even--they found
there; to what extent they commingled ethnically with the races which
they there met and conquered; these are all questions to which authentic
history can give but the vaguest answers.[a]
THE LAND OF ITALY
It is difficult in attempting a geographical sketch for the purpose of
elucidating Roman history, to determine where we ought to begin and where
to end. For during a long period we are hardly carried out of sight
of the Capitol; and at the close of that period we are hurried with
startling rapidity into the heart of every country, from the Atlantic to
the mountains of Asia Minor, from the ridges of the Alps to the plains
that lie beneath Mount Atlas. But since the origin and composition of the
people we call Roman depend upon the early state and population of Italy
at large, and since in course of time all Italians became Romans, it will
be well to follow the usual custom, and begin with a geographical sketch
of the Italian peninsula.
This peninsula, the central one of the three which stretch boldly forward
from the southern coasts of Europe, lies nearly between the parallels
of north latitude 38° and 46°. Its length, therefore, measured along a
meridian arc, ought to be about 550 miles. But since, unlike the other
two Mediterranean peninsulas, it runs in a direction nearly diagonal to
the lines of latitude and longitude, its real length, measured from Mont
Blanc to Cape Spartivento, is somewhat more than seven hundred miles.
To estimate the breadth of this long and singularly shaped peninsula, it
may conveniently be divided into two parts by a line drawn across from
the mouths of the Po to the northern point of Etruria. Below this line
the average breadth of the leg of Italy does not much exceed one hundred
miles. Above this line both coasts trend rapidly outwards, so that the
upper portion forms an irregularly shaped figure, which lies across the
top of the leg, being bounded on the north and west by the Alpine range
from Illyria to the mouth of the Var, on the south by the imaginary line
before drawn, and on the east by the head of the Adriatic Sea. The length
of this figure from east to west is not less than 350 miles; while from
north to south it measures, on the average, about 120 miles.
The surface of the whole peninsula, including both the leg of Italy and
the irregular figure at the top, is estimated at about ninety thousand
square miles, or an area nearly equal to the surface of Great Britain and
Ireland. But a very large proportion of this surface is unproductive, and
a great part even incapable of tillage.
The geographical features are simple. No deep gulfs and inlets are to be
expected; for these are only found when mountain chains jut out into the
sea, and maintain themselves as headlands, while the lower land between
is eaten and washed away by the ceaseless action of the waves. Such
phenomena are presented by Greece, and by the western coasts of Scotland,
Wales, and Ireland. But in Italy there is but one uniform mountain chain.
On the northern or Adriatic slope of the Apennines, indeed, a number of
gorges open to the sea in a direction transverse to the main line of
the mountains. But the projecting spurs which form these gorges are not
considerable in height; and on the southern or Mediterranean side the
main range sinks towards the sea in subordinate or secondary ranges,
more or less parallel to the principal chain, and therefore seldom
admitting of abrupt headlands with deep embrasures between. There is,
however, one exception. At the foot of Italy the central range forks off
into two great branches, one running towards the toe of the peninsula,
the other forming the heel. The low lands between these two ranges have
been scooped out by the waves, and here has been formed the great Gulf
of Tarentum, a vast expanse of sea, measuring from point to point no
less than eighty miles. But except this great gulf, the coasts of the
peninsula are indented by comparatively gentle curves. On the northern
side the single inequality is presented by the projecting mass of Mount
Garganus, which forms with the lower coast what is now called the Bay
of Manfredonia. On the sole of the foot, below the Gulf of Tarentum, we
find the Bay of Squillace (Sinus Scylacius). After passing the Straits of
Messina, first occurs the Bay of St. Eufemia (Sinus Vibonensis), which is
separated from that of Squillace by a mass of granitic rocks less than
twenty miles in breadth. A little higher up we come to a wide sweep in
the coast, known by the name of the Bay of Policastro.
That part of the southern coast which is most irregular deserves
particular attention from the student of Roman history. Between the
point where ancient Lucania borders on Campania, and that at which
Latium begins, a distance of about 120 miles, the coast-line is broken
into three fine bays, the Bay of Pæstum or Salerno on the south, the Bay
of Gaeta on the north, and between them the smallest but most famous
and most beautiful of the three--the Bay of Cumæ or Naples. From Cape
Circello (Circeii), which forms the northern horn of the Bay of Gaeta,
the coast-line runs onward to Genoa, unbroken save by the headlands of
Argentaro and Piombino in Tuscany. But these do not project far enough
to form any recess worthy to be named. Nor is the little Bay of Spezzia,
just north of Tuscany, deserving of mention as a geographical feature.
The same circumstance which prevents Italy from abounding in deep bays
and bold headlands also prevents its coasts from being studded with
islands, which are but relics of projecting mountain chains. If we omit
Sicily, which is in fact a continuation of the peninsula separated by
a channel of two or three miles broad, and the Lipari islands, which
are due to the volcanic action still at work beneath Etna and Vesuvius,
the islands of Italy are insignificant. Capreæ (Capri) on the one hand,
Prochyta (Procida) and Ischia on the other, are but fragments of the two
headlands that form the Bay of Naples. Igilium (Giglio) and Ilva (Elba)
stand in a similar relation to the headlands of Argentaro and Piombino.
Besides these may be named Pontiæ (Ponza), Pandataria, with a few more
barren rocks off the Bay of Gaeta, and a few even less important on the
coast of Tuscany.
Except in northern Italy, which abounds in noble rivers, the narrowness
of the peninsula forbids the existence of really large streams. Yet, the
Apennine range, which forms on its southern side long parallel valleys,
enables numerous torrents and rills which descend towards the south
to swell into rivers of not inconsiderable size. Such especially are
the Arno and the Tiber. Their waters are separated by the hills which
terminate in the headlands of Argentaro and Piombino, so that the Arno
flows northward, and enters the sea on the northern frontier of Tuscany,
after a course of about 120 miles; while the Tiber runs in a southerly
direction receiving the waters of the Clanis from the west, and those of
the Nar (Nera) and Velinus from the east, till its course is abruptly
turned by the Sabine hills. The entire length of its channel is about 180
miles. These two well-known rivers, with their affluents, drain the whole
of Etruria, the Sabine country, and the Campagna of Rome.
Similar in their course, but on a smaller scale, are the Anio (Teverone)
and the Liris. They both rise in the Æquian hills, the Anio flowing
northward to swell the stream of the Tiber a little above Rome; the
Liris, joined by the Trerus (Sacco) from the west, running southward so
as to drain southern Latium and northern Campania, till it turns abruptly
towards the sea, and enters it about the middle of the Bay of Gaeta,
after a course of about eighty miles.
The Vulturnus and the Calor run down opposite valleys from the north
and south of the Samnite territory, till they join their streams on
the frontier of Campania, and fall into the Bay of Gaeta only a short
distance below the Liris. Both of these streams measure from their
sources to their united mouth not less than one hundred miles.
The only other notable river on the western coast is the Silarus (Sele),
which descends by a channel of about sixty miles from the central
Apennines of Lucania into the Bay of Pæstum or Salerno. In the foot of
Italy the mountains come down so close to the sea that from the mouth
of the Silarus to the lower angle of the Gulf of Tarentum, the streams
are but short and rapid torrents. Of these it is said that no fewer than
eighty may be enumerated between Pæstum and the Straits of Messina.
The Gulf of Tarentum receives some streams of importance. The Bradanus
and Casuentus (Basento) enter the gulf within four miles of each other
after a course of about sixty miles. The Aciris (Agri) is to the south
of these. The Siris (Sinno), notable as the scene of the first battle
between Pyrrhus and the Romans, is a mere torrent, as is the Galesus upon
which Tarentum stands.
The northern or Adriatic coast is almost devoid of lateral valleys, such
as are found on the other coast, and therefore has few considerable
streams. The Aufidus (Ofanto) in Apulia, renowned in Roman history from
the fact that the fatal battle of Cannæ took place upon its banks, rises
on the opposite side of the same range from which the Calor flows, and
runs a course of about eighty miles. The Sagrus (Sangro) stands in the
same relation to the Vulturnus as the Aufidus does to the Calor, and
conveys the waters of the Fucine Lake from the Æquian hills through
Samnium, by a nearly similar length of channel. But the largest river of
this side is the Aternus, which finds its way from the Sabine hills into
a valley parallel to the main range, and thus prolongs its course. It is
joined by a number of smaller streams, and attains a considerable volume
of water before it reaches the sea at the point where the Marrucinian
coast abuts on that of Picenum.
The whole coast from Mount Garganus northward is ploughed by numberless
torrents which descend in rapid course down steep mountain gorges. Of
these we need but name the Æsis between Picenum and Umbria; the Metaurus
in Umbria, famous for the defeat of Hasdrubal; the Rubicon, which formed
the boundary of Roman Italy on the northern side, as did the Macra
(Magra) on the opposite coast.
The limestone mountain tract that occupies the whole narrow peninsula
from the great valley of the Po downwards is often too steep, bare, and
rugged to be capable of cultivation. There are, however, many rich plains
of limited extent, among which Campania ranks first; and many narrow
but fertile valleys, in which nature rewards the smallest labour with
bountiful returns.
[Illustration: ANCIENT ROMAN TOWER NEAR ROME]
In speaking of lakes, we must resume our twofold division of the
peninsula. On the Alpine slopes of the great valley of the Po, the
granitic and ancient limestone rocks break into vast chasms at right
angles to their general direction, in which the waters of the rivers
that flow downwards to join the Po accumulate and form those lakes so
well known to all lovers of natural beauty. Such are Lake Benacus (Lago
di Garda) formed by the waters of the Mincius; Larius (Lago di Como) by
those of the Adda; Verbanus (Lago Maggiore) by those of the Ticino; not
to mention the lakes of Lugano, Orta, and others, smaller, indeed, but
hardly less beautiful.
But Apennine Italy, considering the great extent of its mountain
districts, does not present many considerable lakes. Nor are these formed
by the accumulated waters of rivers flowing through them, like the lakes
of northern Italy or Switzerland. For the most part, like the lakes of
Greece, they have no visible outlet, but lose their waters partly by
evaporation, partly by underground fissures and channels. The Fucine Lake
in the Æquian hills feeds the Sangro, and Lake Bradanus in the south
feeds the river of the same name. But the celebrated Lake Trasimene in
Etruria, and the lakes of the volcanic district, as the “great Volsinian
Mere,” the lakes of Alba, Nemi, Amsanctus, and others, have no visible
outlet. These, in fact, are the craters of extinct volcanoes. Roman
history contains legends which relate to the artificial tapping of these
cauldrons; and some of the tunnels cut through their rocky basins still
remain.
The abundance of water which is poured over the hills is apt to
accumulate in marshy swamps in the low districts towards the sea. Such
is the case along the lower course of the Po, on the coast lands of
Tuscany, and in the lower part of the Campagna of Rome. Mantua, which
stands a little above the junction of the Mincio with the Po, is
surrounded by marshes; and the whole coast between Venice and Ravenna is
a swamp.
To keep the Po and its tributaries within their channels, the Lombards
of the Middle Ages raised embankments on either side of the stream. But
these embankments cause the rivers to deposit the whole of the mud with
which they are charged within their channels, and the quantity thus
deposited is so great that it is necessary to raise the embankments
continually. Hence, in the course of centuries, the bottoms of the rivers
have been elevated considerably above the plains; so that the streams of
Lombardy in their lower course are in fact carried along huge earthen
aqueducts. In time, human industry will not be equal to raise these
embankments in sufficient strength, and a deluge will ensue more fearful
than those which the poet of Mantua seems to have witnessed.
EARLY POPULATION OF ITALY
It is a common remark that mountains are the chief boundaries of
countries, and that races of men are found in their purest state when
they are separated by these barriers from admixture with other tribes.
Italy forms an exception to this rule. It was not so much the “fatal
gift of beauty,” of which the poet speaks, as the richness of its
northern plain, that attracted successive tribes of invaders over the
Alps. From the earliest dawn of historic knowledge, we hear of one tribe
after another sweeping like waves over the peninsula, each forcing its
predecessor onward, till there arose a power strong enough to drive back
the current, and bar aggression for many an age. This power was the Roman
Empire, which forced the Gauls to remain on the northern side of the
Apennines, and preserved Italy untouched by the foot of the foreigner for
centuries. No sooner was this power weakened, than the incursions again
began.
But if the northern barriers of the peninsula failed to check the lust of
invaders, its long straggling shape, intersected by mountains from top to
bottom, materially assisted in breaking it up into a number of different
nations. Except during the strength of the Roman Empire, Italy has always
been parcelled out into a number of small states. In the earliest times
it was shared among a number of tribes differing in race and language.
Great pains have been taken to investigate the origin and character of
these primeval nations. But the success has not been great, and it is not
our purpose to dwell on intricate questions of this kind. We shall here
only give results so far as they seem to be established.
It is well known that it was not till the close of the republic, or
rather the beginning of the empire, that the name of Italy was employed,
as we now employ it, to designate the whole peninsula, from the Alps
to the Straits of Messina. The term Italia, borrowed from the name of
a primeval tribe which occupied the southern portion of the land, was
gradually adopted as a generic title in the same obscure manner in which
most of the countries of Europe, or (we may say) the continents of the
world have received their appellations. In the remotest times the name
only included lower Calabria; from these narrow limits it gradually
spread upwards, till about the time of the Punic Wars its northern
boundary ascended the little river Rubicon (between Umbria and Cisalpine
Gaul), then followed the ridge of the Apennines westward to the source
of the Macra, and was carried down the bed of that small stream to the
Gulf of Genoa.
But under Roman rule even this narrower Italy wanted that unity of race
and language which, in spite of political severance, we are accustomed to
attribute to the name. Within the boundaries just indicated there were at
least six distinct races, some no doubt more widely separated, but all
marked by strong national characteristics. These were the Pelasgians, the
Oscans, the Sabellians, the Umbrians, the Etruscans, and the Greeks.
It is certain that in primitive times the coasts and lower valleys of
Italy were peopled by tribes that had crossed over from the opposite
shores of Greece and Epirus. These tribes belonged to that ancient stock
called the Pelasgian, of which so much has been written and so little is
known. The names that remained in southern Italy were practically all of
a half-Hellenic character. Such were, in the heel of Italy, the Daunians
and Peucetians (reputed to be of Arcadian origin), the Messapians and
Salentines; to the south of the Gulf of Tarentum, the Chaonians (who are
also found in Epirus); and in the toe the Œnotrians, who once gave name
to all southern Italy. Such also were the Siculians and other tribes
along the coast from Etruria to Campania, who were driven out by the
invading Oscan and Sabellian nations.
The Oscan or Opican race was at one time very widely spread over the
south. The Auruncans of lower Latium belonged to this race, as also the
Ausonians, who once gave name to central Italy, and probably also the
Volscians and the Æquians. In Campania the Oscan language was preserved
to a late period in Roman history, and inscriptions still remain which
can be interpreted by those familiar with Latin.
The Umbrians at one time possessed dominion over great part of central
Italy. Inscriptions in their language also remain, and manifestly show
that they spoke a tongue not alien to the Latin. The irruption of the
Sabellian and of the Etruscan nations was probably the cause which broke
the power of the Umbrians, and drove them back to a scanty territory
between the Æsis, the Rubicon, and the Tiber.
The greatest of the Italian nations was the Sabellian. Under this name
we include the Sabines, who are said by tradition to have been the
progenitors of the whole race, the Samnites, the Picenians, Vestinians,
Marsians, Marrucinians, Pelignians, and Frentanians. This race seems
to have been naturally given to a pastoral life, and therefore fixed
its early settlements in the upland valleys of the Apennines. Pushing
gradually along this central range, the mountaineers penetrated downwards
towards the Gulf of Tarentum; and as their population became too dense to
find support in their native hills, bands of warrior youths issued forth
to settle in the richer plains below. Thus they mingled with the Opican
and Hellenic races of the south, and formed new tribes, known by the
names of Apulians, Lucanians, and Campanians. These more recent tribes,
in turn, threatened the great Greek colonies on the coast, of which we
shall speak presently.
We now come to the Etruscans, the most singular people of the peninsula.
This people called themselves Rasena, or Rasenna--a name that reminds us
of the Etruscan surnames Porsenna, Vibenna, Sisenna. At one time they
possessed not only the country known to the Romans as Etruria (that
is, the country bounded by the Macra, the central Apennine ridge, and
the Tiber), but also occupied a large portion of Liguria and Cisalpine
Gaul; and perhaps they had settlements in Campania. In early times they
possessed a powerful navy, and in the primitive Greek legends they are
represented as infesting the Mediterranean with their piratical galleys.
They seem to have been driven out of their trans-Apennine possession
by early invasions of the Gauls; and their naval power never recovered
the blow which it received in the year 480 B.C., when Gelo, tyrant of
Syracuse, defeated their navy, combined with that of Carthage, on the
same day on which the battle of Salamis crippled the power of Persia.[2]
But who this people were, or whence they came, baffles conjecture. It may
be assumed as certain, that Hellenic settlers came in by sea from the
western coasts of Epirus, which are distant from Italy less than fifty
miles; and that the Opican, Umbrian, and Sabellian races came in from
the north by land. But with respect to the Etruscans all is doubtful.
One well-known legend represents them as Lydians, who fled by sea from
Asia Minor to avoid the terrible presence of famine. Another indicates
that they came down over the Alps, and the origin of their name Rasena is
traced in Rætia. On the former supposition, Etruria was their earliest
settlement, and, pushing northward, they conquered the plain of the Po;
on the latter, they first took possession of this fertile plain, and then
spread southward over the Apennines.
Their language, if it could be interpreted, might help to solve the
riddle. But though characters in which their inscriptions are written
bear close affinity to the Greek and Roman alphabets, the tongue of this
remarkable people has as yet baffled the deftest efforts of philology.
Of the Greek settlements that studded the coast of lower Italy, and gave
to that district the name of Magna Græcia, little need here be said. They
were not planted till after the foundation of Rome. Many of them, indeed,
attained to great power and splendour; and the native Osco-Pelasgian
population of the south became their subjects or their serfs. Sybaris
alone, in the course of two centuries, is said to have become mistress
of four nations and twenty-five towns, and to have been able to raise a
civic force of 300,000 men. Croton, her rival, was even larger. Greek
cities appear as far north as Campania, where Naples still preserves in a
corrupt form her Hellenic name, Neapolis. The Greek remains discovered at
Canusium (Canosi) in the heart of Apulia, attest the extent of Hellenic
dominion. But the Greeks seem to have held aloof from mixture with
the native Italians, whom they considered as barbarians. Rome is not
mentioned by any Greek writer before the time of Aristotle (about 340
B.C.).
From the foregoing sketch it will appear that Latium formed a kind of
focus, in which all the different races that in past centuries had been
thronging into Italy converged. The Etruscans bordered on Latium to the
west; the Sabines, with the Umbrians behind them, to the north; the
Æquians and Volscians, Oscan tribes, to the northeast and east; while
Hellenic communities are to be traced upon the coast lands. We should
then expect beforehand to meet with a people formed by a commixture of
divers tribes; and this expectation is confirmed.
Tradition tells us that the aborigines of Latium mingled in early times
with a people calling themselves Siculians; that these Siculians, being
conquered and partly expelled from Italy, took refuge in the island,
which was afterwards called Sicily from them, but was at that time
peopled by a tribe named Sicanians; that the conquering people were named
Sacranians, and had themselves been forced down from the Sabine valleys
in the neighbourhood of Reate by Sabellian invaders; and that from this
mixture of aborigines, Siculians, and Sacranians arose the people known
afterwards by the name of Latins. Where all is uncertain, conjecture is
easy. But all conjectures bear witness to the compound nature of the
Latin nation.[b]
BEGINNINGS OF ROME AND THE PRIMITIVE ROMAN COMMONWEALTH
About fourteen miles upstream from the mouth of the river Tiber, and on
either bank of the latter, rise gentle slopes, the higher on the right,
the lower on the left; to the latter for at least two and a half thousand
years the name of the Romans has been affixed. It cannot, of course, be
positively declared how and when it arose, it is only certain that in
the oldest form of the name known to us, the inhabitants of the province
were not called Romans but--with a change of pronunciation natural enough
in the more ancient stages of a language but not continued in the Latin
known to us--Ramnians or Ramnes; an eloquent witness to the immemorial
antiquity of this name. The exact derivation cannot be determined; it is
possible that the Ramnes are the people of the stream. But they did not
dwell alone on the bank of the Tiber. In the oldest classification of the
Roman citizens, we find traces showing that the nation derived its origin
from the fusion into a single commonwealth of three once apparently
independent tribes, the Ramnes, the Tities, and the Luceres: that is,
from a _synoikismos_ like that whence Athens arose in Attica.[3]
Again, after the union, each of these three ancient communities, which
had now become demes, owned a third of the common lands, and was
similarly represented in the militia as well as in the council of the
elders, whilst in the religious organisation the numbers of the six
vestal virgins, the three high priests of Jupiter, Mars, and Quirinus,
are apparently to be referred to this threefold division.
The most wanton absurdities have been founded on the existence of the
three elements into which the ancient Roman commonwealth was divided;
the irrational idea that the Roman nation was a mixed race is connected
with it, and its supporters labour in various ways to represent the three
great Italian races as the component elements of ancient Rome, and to
transform the people which developed its speech, its government, and its
religion with a purity and national spirit attained by few others, into
a confused mass of Etruscan, Sabine, Hellenic, and, still worse, even
Pelasgic elements. Setting aside the sometimes contradictory, sometimes
groundless hypotheses, all that can be said concerning the nationality of
the various elements of the ancient Roman commonwealth may be summed up
in a few words. That the Ramnes were of Latin origin cannot be doubted,
since they gave their name to the new Roman commonwealth and maintained
the chief place amongst the three tribes, so that they must have decided
the nationality of the united community.
As to the descent of the Luceres, nothing can be said except that there
is no obstacle to their being regarded as a Latin tribe like the Ramnes.
On the other hand the second of these tribes is unanimously derived
from that of the Sabines, doubtless on the authority of a respectable
and authentic tradition of the “Titian brotherhood” which claimed to
have been founded on the admission of the tribe to the confederacy
for the preservation of its peculiar national ritual. Traces of such
an aboriginal Sabine worship are in fact to be found in Rome; as for
instance the honouring of Maurs or Mars and of Semo Sancus, side by
side with the corresponding Latin Dius Fidius. It was at a very remote
period, when the Latin and Sabine tribes were yet unquestionably far less
distinctly unlike in language and customs than were the Roman and the
Samnite later, that a Sabellian community entered into a Latin tribal
union; exactly in the same way that some centuries afterwards the Sabine
clan of Attus Clanzus, or Appius Claudius, and his clients emigrated to
Rome, obtained a grant of land on the right bank of the Anio and was soon
completely absorbed into the Roman community.
[Illustration: DEATH OF REMUS
(From a picture by Mirys)]
A fusion of various nationalities did of course take place; but we are
not therefore justified in counting the Romans amongst mixed peoples.
With the exception of isolated national institutions transplanted into
the ritual, the existence of Sabellian elements is never manifested in
Rome, and in especial the Latin tongue affords no support to such an
hypothesis. It would indeed be more than surprising if the addition to
the Latin nation of a single tribe from one of the races nearest allied
to the Latin, had affected its nationality in perceptible fashion;
and in addition it must by no means be forgotten that, at the time
when the Tities settled near the Romans, the Latin nationality had its
headquarters at Latium, not at Rome. The new threefold Roman commonwealth
was, in spite of its quickly assimilated Sabellian element, just what the
tribe of the Ramnes had been--a part of the Latin nation.
Long before an urban settlement rose on the Tiber, those Ramnes, Tities,
and Luceres may have had their township on the Roman hills and tilled
their fields from the surrounding villages, at first separately and
afterwards in concert. The festival of the wolf, _lupercalia_, which the
family of Quinctii celebrated on the Palatine Hill, may be a tradition
of this earliest time; it was a festival of peasants and shepherds which
preserves the homely sports of patriarchal simplicity in a way equalled
by none other, and remarkably enough was the one of all the heathen
festivals which survived for a time in Christian Rome.
From these settlements, then, sprang the later Rome. Of the actual
foundation of the town as the legend relates it, we cannot of course
in any sense speak; Rome was not built in a day. It is, however, well
worth considering by what means Rome could have attained to her eminent
political position in Latium, when the nature of the locality would
rather lead us to an opposite expectation. The site on which Rome stands
is less healthy and less fertile than that of most old Latin towns.
The vine and the fig tree do not thrive in the immediate neighbourhood
of Rome, and there is a lack of bountiful springs--for neither the
excellent fount of Camenæ before the Porta Capena, nor the Capitoline
well, afterwards enclosed in the Tullianum, yields much water. To all
this was added the frequent overflowing of the river, which, owing to
its very slight incline, was unable during the rainy season to carry
seaward the copious influx from the mountain streams with speed enough
to prevent its flooding the valleys and low tracts of land which opened
between the hills, and reducing them to a mere marsh. The place is by
no means alluring to the settler and even in ancient times it was said
that it could not have been its fitness for colonisation which attracted
the first immigrant farmers to that unhealthy and infertile spot in a
favoured district; but that necessity, or rather some other very special
reason, must have prompted the building of the town.
The strangeness of the choice is acknowledged even in the legend;
the tale of the foundation of Rome by refugees from Alba, under the
leadership of the Albanian princes Romulus and Remus, is nothing but a
naïve attempt of early quasi-history to explain the strangeness of the
establishment of the city on so unfavourable a site, and at the same
time to connect the origin of Rome with the common metropolis of Latium.
It is especially from such fairy tales which purport to be history
and are nothing but inventions made on the spur of the moment and not
particularly clever, that serious history has to disencumber itself; but
perhaps it is permissible to go a step further, and after considering
the special features of the neighbourhood, to advance a positive theory,
not as to the origin of the place, but as to the cause of its swift and
astonishing prosperity and of its peculiar position in Latium.
Let us look first at the ancient boundaries of the Roman territory. To
the east the towns of Antemnæ, Fidenæ, Cænina, Collatia, and Gabii lie
in the near neighbourhood, some of them not five miles distant from the
gates of Servian Rome; the boundary of the province must consequently
have been hard by the city gates. Fourteen miles to the south we come
on the powerful communities of Tusculum and Alba, and here the Roman
territory seems not to have extended farther than to the Fossa Cluilia,
five miles from Rome. Similarly, in the southwesterly direction, the
boundary between Rome and Lavinium was already encountered at the sixth
milestone.
Whilst on the land side the Roman province was everywhere confined to the
narrowest possible limits, on the other hand, from the earliest times it
stretched uninterruptedly along both banks of the Tiber in the direction
of the sea; and no place representing an ancient provincial centre nor
any sort of trace of an ancient provincial border is encountered between
Rome and the coast. It is true that legend, which can assign an origin
for everything, is here also able to inform us that the Roman possessions
on the right bank of the Tiber, the “seven hamlets” (_septem pagi_),
and the important salt-works at its mouth were taken by King Romulus
from the Veientes, and that King Ancus fortified the _tête de pont_,
the “Mount of Janus” (_Janiculum_), on the right bank of the Tiber, and
on the left laid the foundation of the Roman Piræus, the harbour town
at the “mouth” (_ostia_) of the river. But on the other hand the fact
that the possessions on the Etruscan bank must have belonged to the very
earliest Roman territory is attested by a better witness, namely by the
grove of the creative goddess (_Dea Dia_) which stood in this very place,
at the fourth milestone of the road subsequently made to the harbour,
and was the original high place of the Roman Arval festival and Arval
brotherhood. Indeed, from time immemorial, the clan of the Romilii,
probably the most distinguished among all the Roman clans, had its seat
here; the Janiculum was a part of the town itself and Ostia a citizen
colony, that is, a suburb. This cannot have been mere chance. The Tiber
was the natural highway of Latium, and its mouth, on a coast so poorly
provided with harbours, was the necessary place of anchorage for ships.
Moreover, the Tiber formed, from the earliest times, the frontier defence
of the Latin stock against their northern neighbours. No place is better
qualified than Rome to be both the _entrepôt_ of the Latin river and sea
commerce and the frontier fortress of Latium. She combined the advantages
of a strong position and the immediate neighbourhood of the river; she
commanded both banks of the stream down to its mouth; she was equally
convenient for the river-ships descending the Tiber or the Anio or, in
those days of moderate-sized vessels, for those designed for the sea;
and she afforded better protection against pirates than the towns lying
immediately on the coast. That it was to these commercial and strategical
advantages that Rome owed, if not her origin, at least her importance,
numerous proofs are forthcoming, which are of far greater importance than
the data furnished by historical romances. With these are connected her
early relations with Cære, which was to Etruria what Rome was to Latium,
and consequently became the city’s closest neighbour and commercial ally;
thence came the extraordinary importance of the bridges over the Tiber,
and of bridge building generally in the Roman commonwealth, and hence the
galley in the city arms.
This was also the origin of the ancient Roman harbour dues, which were
originally imposed only on goods for sale (_promercale_), and not on
those which passed to and from Ostia for the shipper’s own use, and
thus were really a tax on trade. And hence, to anticipate, arose the
relatively early appearance of coined money in Rome and the commercial
treaties with states over-sea. Thus, from this point of view at any rate,
Rome may be regarded as the legend implies, rather as a created than
a gradually developed town and rather as the youngest than the oldest
of the Latin towns. Doubtless the land had been already to some extent
brought under cultivation and towns planted on the Alban hills as well
as many other heights of the surrounding country when the Latin frontier
emporium rose on the Tiber.
Whether it was a decree of the Latin confederacy, or the genius and
insight of some unknown founder, or the natural development of commerce,
which called the city of Rome into existence, we have not even grounds
to conjecture. But there is another point to be observed in connection
with the position of Rome as the emporium of Latium. When history begins
to dawn upon us Rome stands in contrast to the league of the Latin
communities as a single enclosed city. The Latin custom of dwelling in
open villages and only using the common town as a fortress and place
of assembly or in time of need, was, in all probability, far sooner
restricted in the Roman province than anywhere else in Latium. Not that
the Roman had ceased to manage his farm himself, or to regard it as his
real home; but already the unhealthiness of the country air had had the
effect of inducing him to fix his abode on the more airy and healthy
heights of the town; and with the farmers a numerous non-agricultural
population of foreigners and natives must have been established there for
a long time. This to some extent accounts for the dense population of the
Roman territory, which at most can only be reckoned as extending over 115
square miles of soil, part of it marsh and sand, and yet, according to
the city’s oldest constitution, furnished a city militia of thirty-three
hundred freemen, and therefore must have counted at least ten thousand
free inhabitants.
But there is something more. Everyone acquainted with the Romans
and their history is aware that the peculiarity of their public and
private existence lies in their municipal and commercial life, and that
the distinction between them and other Latins, and Italian nations
generally, is before all the distinction between the citizen and the
farmer. It is true that Rome was not a mercantile city like Corinth or
Carthage; for Latium is an essentially agricultural district and Rome
was, and remained, above everything a Latin town. But the distinction
of Rome above the crowd of other Latin towns must still be referred
to her commercial position and to the influence of that position upon
the character of her citizens. If Rome was the emporium of the Latin
district, it is easy to understand that here, over and above the Latin
husbandry, a vigorous municipal life quickly developed itself and so
laid the foundation of her pre-eminence. The tracing of the course
of this mercantile and strategic development of the city of Rome is
far more important and far easier than the thankless task of making a
chemical analysis of the insignificant and very similar communities
of antiquity; we can follow this development to some extent in the
traditions concerning these successive walls and fortifications of Rome,
whose erection must have gone hand in hand with the advance of the Roman
commonwealth to importance as a city.
Both in former and recent times many attempts have been made to give an
historical character to the legend that the three different communities
which composed the ancient Roman nation once dwelt within separate walls
on the Seven Hills; but the scientific inquirer is obliged to banish it
to the same regions as the battle of the Palatine and the graceful story
of Tarpeia.
There exists, it is true, a real and very decided distinction between
the fortification of the Capitol and the erection of the town walls. The
Capitol is in name and fact the Acra of Rome, the town with one gate
and a town fountain, the carefully fenced “spring house” (tullianum).
That this fortification dates far back to a time when as yet there was
no settlement at all in this neighbourhood, is shown by a custom which
was scrupulously observed down to a late period, and according to which
private houses did not and perhaps were not allowed to stand on the twin
peaks of the Capitol.
On the other hand the town contained a treasure chamber with the
archives, the prison, and the oldest place of assembly for the
councillors as well as the citizens. The space between the two peaks of
the Capitoline Hill, the sanctuary of the angry Jupiter (_Vediovis_) or
as it was called in the later hellenising period, the Asylum, was covered
with a wood and evidently originally intended to shelter the peasants and
their flocks when flood or war drove them from the plain.
In Rome, as everywhere else, the urban settlement must have begun not
within but below the citadel; when it was considerable enough to call
for the protection of a wall and moat, the town proper first came into
being outside the Capitol, and to this, again, suburbs were added, and as
these also prospered and required to be defended, new walls were added
and in the marshes a new dike, until a whole series of such separate
circumvallations surrounded the citadel. It was the memory of this which
was preserved in the “festival of the Seven Hills” (_Septimontium_),
whose celebration was continued long after the ancient fortifications had
ceased to exist.
The “seven circles” are the Palatine; the Cermalus, a branch of the
Palatine extending towards the swamp (Velabrum) which in early days
stretched between it and the Capitol; the Velia, the ridge which
connected the Palatine with the Esquiline and afterwards almost
completely disappeared owing to the constructions erected under the
empire; the three summits of the Esquiline, Oppius, Cispius, and Fagutal;
and finally the Secusa or Subura, an ingenious stronghold on the low
ground between the Capitol, the Esquiline, and the Palatine. It is
obvious that these walls did not spring up all at once. According to
credible witnesses the oldest constructions only embrace the Palatine
or the primitive Rome, called at a later period “the square” (_Roma
quadrata_) from the shape of the Palatine Hill which was that of an
irregular square. The gates and walls of this ancient urban circle
remained visible down to the time of the empire; the position of two
of them, namely the Porta Romana, near S. Giorgio in Velabro, and the
Porta Mugionis at the arch of Titus, are still known to us, and the
wall encircling the Palatine is even described by Tacitus from his own
observation, at least on the side facing the Aventine and the Cælian.
Although, of course, the earliest seat of the trade of the community
was not here but at the citadel, still there are sufficient indications
to show that this was the centre and the original seat of the urban
settlers. On the Palatine was to be found its holy symbol, the so-called
“outfit vault” (_mundus_) in which they had deposited all the requisites
of a household and added a handful of their beloved native earth. Here
too stood the building in which the curiæ assembled, each at its own
altar, for religious and other purposes (_curiæ veteres_). Here too was
the sanctuary of “the wolves” (_lupercal_), the house of assembly for
“the leapers” (_curia saliorum_), and the dwelling of Jupiter’s priest.
It was on and round this hill that the legend of the founding of the city
was principally localised, and the believer was shown the straw-covered
house of Romulus, the shepherd’s hut of his foster-father Faustulus, the
holy fig tree on to which the coffer containing the twins was driven, and
other similar relics.
The Palatine was, and remained, the most aristocratic quarter of the city
and therefore subsequently gave its name to the first Servian district.
The oldest offshoots may have been the settlement on the branch of the
Cermalus and the Velian heights, both of which were immediately connected
with the Palatine and, under the Servian division of the town, were
apparently included in the Palatine quarter. The position of the suburb
on the Cermalus, between the town wall and that of the citadel, as well
as the designation of the principal street by the name of “the Tuscan,”
seems to indicate that this settlement was not voluntary but reserved for
the custody of colonists of foreign race.
Beyond this there was a settlement on the Carinæ, the farthest summit of
the Esquiline, with the fortress for defence against the Sabines in the
valley of the Subura; this afterwards became the second Servian quarter.
At that time the Esquiliæ (which did not properly speaking include the
Carinæ) formed, as the name signifies, a suburb (_exquiliæ_, the same
as _inquilinus_). That the town should have extended itself in this
direction is explained by the simple fact that the people remained on the
heights, especially on the Palatine and the Velian, avoiding both the
isolated hills and the swampy and wholly defenceless valleys which lay
between. At a later time the suburb was included in the town, and under
the Servian division it became the third quarter.
The “bridge of piles” (_pons sublicius_) thrown across that natural pier,
the island in the Tiber, and the _tête de pont_ on the Etruscan shore,
the citadel of the Janiculum, remained outside the fortifications of the
“Seven Hills.” And as, for military reasons, it was necessary to be able
to break down or burn the bridge at the shortest notice, there arose a
fixed rule which down to a very late period was observed as a traditional
religious law, that no iron could be used in the construction of the
bridge, but only wood. Thus a town came into being, but nevertheless
the real and complete amalgamation of the various bodies which formed
the settlement was not yet effected. As there was no common city altar,
but the separate altars of the different curies merely stood side by
side in the same neighbourhood, so not only did the distinction between
citadel and town continue, but the seven circles themselves were rather
a collection of urban settlements than a united town until the gigantic
defensive works, ascribed to King Servius Tullius, surrounded the inner
and outer city and the open suburbs with a single great wall. But before
these strong works were set in hand, the position of Rome in relation to
the surrounding district had doubtless entirely changed.
As the primitive uncommercial and inactive epoch of the Latin stock
corresponds to the period in which the husbandman drove the plough
on the Palatine as well as over the other hills of Latium, and the
place of refuge on the Capitol, which in ordinary times stood empty,
presented only the commencement of a fortified settlement; and as later
the flourishing settlement on the Palatine and within the seven circles
coincides with the occupation of the estuary of the Tiber by a Roman
community and generally with the progress of the Latins to a free and
active intercourse, and urban civilisation especially in Rome, and indeed
to a firmer political consolidation both of the separate states and of
the confederacy; so does the establishment of a single great city by
means of the Servian rampart belong to that epoch in which the city of
Rome was enabled to contend for the supremacy of the Latin confederacy
and finally to get the upper hand.[c]
FOOTNOTES
[2] [The decisive overthrow of the Etruscans was achieved by Hiero, his
successor, in a battle fought off Cumæ in 474.]
[3] [Meyer[d] thinks it probable that the Roman (like the four Ionic)
tribes were an artificial division patterned after a pre-existing ethnic
scheme.]
[Illustration]
[Illustration]