FROM THE CAPTURE OF ROME BY THE GAULS TO THE FINAL UNION OF THE TWO
ORDERS. B.C. 390-367.
The Gauls or Celts were in ancient times spread over the greater part of
Western Europe. They inhabited Gaul and the British isles, and had in
the time of the Tarquins crossed the Alps and taken possession of
Northern Italy. But they now spread farther south, crossed the
Apennines, and laid waste with fire and sword the provinces of Central
Italy. Rome fell before them, and was reduced to ashes; but the details
of its capture are clearly legendary. The common story runs as follows:
The Senones, a tribe of the Gauls, led by their chief Brennus, laid
siege to Clusium, the powerful Etruscan city over which Lars Porsena
once reigned. Such reputation had Rome gained through her conquests in
Etruria, that Clusium applied to her for aid (B.C. 391). The Senate sent
three embassadors, sons of the chief pontiff, Fabius Ambustus, to warn
the barbarians not to touch an ally of Rome. But the Gauls treated their
message with scorn; and the embassadors, forgetting their sacred
character, fought in the Clusine ranks. One of the Fabii slew with his
own hands a Gallic chieftain, and was recognized while stripping off his
armor. Brennus therefore sent to Rome to demand satisfaction. The Roman
people not only refused to give it, but elected the three Fabii as
Military Tribunes for the following year. On hearing of this insult, the
Gauls broke up the siege of Clusium, and hastened southward toward Rome.
All the inhabitants fled before them into the towns. They pursued their
course without injuring any one, crying to the guards upon the walls of
the towns they passed, "Our way lies for Rome." On the news of their
approach the Roman army hurried out of the city, and on the 16th of July
(B.C. 300), a day ever after regarded as disastrous, they met the Gauls
on the Allia, a small river which flows into the Tiber, on its left
bank, about eleven miles from Rome. Brennus attacked the Romans on the
flank, and threw them into confusion. A general panic seized them: they
turned and fled. Some escaped across the Tiber to Veii, and a few
reached Rome, but the greater number were slain by the Gauls.
The loss at the Allia had been so great that enough men were not left to
guard the walls of the city. It was therefore resolved that those in the
vigor of their age should withdraw to the Capitol, taking with them all
the provisions in the city; that the priests and Vestal Virgins should
convey the objects of religious reverence to Cæré; and that the rest of
the population should disperse among the neighboring towns. But the aged
senators, who had been Consuls or Censors, seeing that their lives were
no longer of any service to the state, sat down in the forum on their
curule thrones awaiting death. When the Gauls entered the city they
found it desolate and deathlike. They marched on, without seeing a human
being till they came to the forum. Here they beheld the aged senators
sitting immovable, like beings of another world. For some time they
gazed in awe at this strange sight, till at length one of the Gauls
ventured to go up to M. Papirius and stroke his white beard. The old man
struck him on the head with his ivory sceptre; whereupon the barbarian
slew him, and all the rest were massacred. The Gauls now began
plundering the city; fires broke out in several quarters; and with the
exception of a few houses on the Palatine, which the chiefs kept for
their own residence, the whole city was burnt to the ground.
The Capitol was the next object of attack. There was only one steep way
leading up to it, and all the assaults of the besiegers were easily
repelled. They thereupon turned the siege into a blockade, and for seven
months were encamped amid the ruins of Rome. But their numbers were soon
thinned by disease, for they had entered Rome in the most unhealthy time
of the year, when fevers have always prevailed. The failure of
provisions obliged them to ravage the neighboring countries, the people
of which began to combine for defense against the marauders. Meantime
the scattered Romans took courage. They collected at Veii, and here
resolved to recall Camillus from banishment, and appoint him Dictator.
In order to obtain the consent of the Senate, a daring youth, named
Pontius Cominius, offered to swim across the Tiber and climb the
Capitol. He reached the top unperceived by the enemy, obtained the
approval of the Senate to the appointment of Camillus, and returned
safely to Veii. But next day some Gauls observed the traces of his
steps, and in the dead of night they climbed up the same way. The
foremost of them had already reached the top, unnoticed by the sentinels
and the dogs, when the cries of some geese roused M. Manlius from sleep.
These geese were sacred to Juno, and had been spared notwithstanding the
gnawings of hunger; and the Romans were now rewarded for their piety. M.
Manlius thrust down the Gaul who had clambered up, and gave the alarm.
The Capitol was thus saved; and down to latest times M. Manlius was
honored as one of the greatest heroes of the early Republic.
Still no help came, and the Gauls remained before the Capitol. The
Romans suffered from famine, and at length agreed to pay the barbarians
1000 pounds of gold, on condition of their quitting the city and its
territory. Brennus brought false weights, and, when the Romans exclaimed
against this injustice, the Gallic chief threw his sword also into the
scale, crying, "Woe to the vanquished!" But at this very moment Camillus
marched into the forum, ordered the gold to be taken away, and drove the
Gauls out of the city. Another battle was fought on the road to Gabii,
in which the Gauls were completely destroyed, and their leader Brennus
taken prisoner. This tale, however, is an invention of Roman vanity. We
learn from other sources that the Gauls retreated because their
settlements in Northern Italy were attacked by the Venetians; and there
can be little doubt that their departure was hastened by a present of
Roman gold. The Gauls frequently repeated their inroads, and for many
years to come were the constant dread of the Romans.
When the Romans returned to the heap of ruins which was once their city
their hearts sank within them. The people shrank from the expense and
toil of rebuilding their houses, and loudly demanded that they should
all remove to Veii, where the private dwellings and public buildings
were still standing. But Camillus and the Patricians strongly urged them
not to abandon the homes of their fathers, and they were at length
persuaded to remain. The state granted bricks, and stones were fetched
from Veii. Within a year the city rose from its ashes; but the streets
were narrow and crooked; the houses were frequently built over the
sewers; and the city continued to show, down to the great fire of Nero,
evident traces of the haste and irregularity with which it had been
rebuilt. Rome was now deprived of almost all her subjects, and her
territory was reduced to nearly its original limits. The Latins and
Hernicans dissolved the League with the Romans, and wars broke out on
every side. In these difficulties and dangers Camillus was the soul of
the Republic. Again and again he led the Roman legions against their
enemies, and always with success. The rapidity with which the Romans
recovered their power after so terrible a disaster would seem
unaccountable but for the fact that the other nations had also suffered
greatly from the inroads of the Gauls, who still continued to ravage
Central Italy. Two of their invasions of the Roman territory are
commemorated by celebrated legends, which may be related here, though
they belong to a later period.
In B.C. 361 the Gauls and Romans were encamped on either bank of the
Arno. A gigantic Gaul stepped forth from the ranks and insultingly
challenged a Roman knight. T. Manlius, a Roman youth, obtained
permission from his general to accept the challenge, slew the giant, and
took from the dead body the golden chain (_torques_) which the barbarian
wore around his neck. His comrades gave him the surname of Torquatus,
which he handed down to his descendants.
In B.C. 349 another distinguished Roman family earned its surname from a
single combat with a Gaul. Here again a Gallic warrior of gigantic size
challenged any one of the Romans to single combat. His challenge was
accepted by M. Valerius, upon whose helmet a raven perched; and as they
fought, the bird flew into the face of the Gaul, striking at him with
its beak and flapping his wings. Thus Valerius slew the Gaul, and was
called in consequence "Corvus," or the "Raven."
It is now necessary to revert to the internal history of Rome. Great
suffering and discontent prevailed. Returning to ruined homes and
ravaged lands, the poor citizens had been obliged to borrow money to
rebuild their houses and cultivate their farms. The law of debtor and
creditor at Rome, as we have already seen, was very severe, and many
unfortunate debtors were carried away to bondage. Under these
circumstances, M. Manlius, the preserver of the Capitol, came forward as
the patron of the poor. This distinguished man had been bitterly
disappointed in his claims to honor and gratitude. While Camillus, his
personal enemy, who had shared in none of the dangers of the siege, was
repeatedly raised to the highest honors of the state, he, who had saved
the Capitol, was left to languish in a private station. Neglected by his
own order, Manlius turned to the Plebeians. One day he recognized in the
forum a soldier who had served with him in the field, and whom a
creditor was carrying away in fetters. Manlius paid his debt upon the
spot, and swore that, as long as he had a single pound, he would not
allow any Roman to be imprisoned for debt. He sold a large part of his
property, and applied the proceeds to the liberation of his
fellow-citizens from bondage. Supported now by the Plebeians, he came
forward as the accuser of his own order, and charged them with
appropriating to their own use the gold which had been raised to ransom
the city from the Gauls. The Patricians in return accused him, as they
had accused Sp. Cassius, of aspiring to the tyranny. When he was brought
to trial before the Comitia of the Centuries in the Campus Martius, he
proudly showed the spoils of thirty warriors whom he had slain, the
forty military distinctions which he had won in battle, and the
innumerable scars upon his breast, and then turning toward the Capitol
he prayed the immortal gods to remember the man who had saved their
temples from destruction. After such an appeal, his condemnation was
impossible, and his enemies therefore contrived to break up the
assembly. Shortly afterward he was arraigned on the same charges before
the Comitia of the Curies in the Peteline Grove. Here he was at once
condemned, and was hurled from the Tarpeian Rock. His house, which was
on the Capitol, was razed to the ground (B.C. 384).
The death of Manlius, however, was only a temporary check to the
Plebeian cause. A few years afterward the contest came to a crisis. In
B.C. 376 C. Licinius Stolo and his kinsman L. Sextius, being Tribunes of
the Plebs, determined to give the Plebeians an equal share in the
political power, to deprive the Patricians of the exclusive use of the
public land, and to remove the present distress of the Plebeians. For
this purpose they brought forward three laws, which are celebrated in
history under the name of THE LICINIAN ROGATIONS.[20] These were:
I. That in future Consuls, and not Military Tribunes, should be
appointed, and that one of the two Consuls _must_ be a Plebeian.
II. That no citizen should possess more than 500 jugera[21] of the
public land, nor should feed upon the public pastures more than 100 head
of large and 500 of small cattle, under penalty of a heavy fine.
III. That the interest already paid for borrowed money should be
deducted from the principal, and that the remainder should be repaid in
three yearly instalments.
These great reforms naturally excited the most violent opposition, and
the Patricians induced some of the Plebeians to put their veto upon the
measures of their colleagues. But Licinius and Sextius were not to be
baffled in this way, and they exercised their veto by preventing the
Comitia of the Centuries from electing any magistrates for the next
year. Hence no Consuls, Military Tribunes, Censors, or Quæstors could be
appointed; and the Tribunes of the Plebs and the Ædiles, who were
elected by the Comitia of the Tribes, were the only magistrates in the
state. For five years did this state of things continue. C. Licinius and
L. Sextius were re-elected annually, and prevented the Comitia of the
Centuries from appointing any magistrates. At the end of this time they
allowed Military Tribunes to be chosen in consequence of a war with the
Latins; but so far were they from yielding any of their demands, that to
their former Rogations they now added another: That the care of the
Sibylline books, instead of being intrusted to two men (duumviri), both
Patricians, should be given to ten men (decemviri), half of whom should
be Plebeians.
Five years more did the struggle last; but the firmness of the Tribunes
at length prevailed. In B.C. 367 the Licinian Rogations were passed, and
L. Sextius was elected the first Plebeian Consul for the next year. But
the Patricians made one last effort to evade the law. By the Roman
constitution, the Consuls, after being elected by the Comitia
Centuriata, received the Imperium, or sovereign power, from the Comitia
Curiata. The Patricians thus had it in their power to nullify the
election of the Centuries by refusing the Imperium. This they did when
L. Sextius was elected Consul; and they made Camillus, the great
champion of their order, Dictator, to support them in their new
struggle. But the old hero saw that it was too late, and determined to
bring about a reconciliation between the two orders. A compromise was
effected. The Imperium was conferred upon L. Sextius; but the judicial
duties were taken away from the Consuls, and given to a new magistrate
called _Prætor_. Camillus vowed to the goddess Concord a temple for his
success.
The long struggle between the Patricians and Plebeians was thus brought
to a virtual close. The Patricians still clung obstinately to the
exclusive privileges which they still possessed; but when the Plebeians
had once obtained a share in the Consulship, it was evident that their
participation in the other offices of the state could not be much longer
delayed. We may therefore anticipate the course of events by narrating
in this place that the first Plebeian Dictator was C. Marcius Rutilus in
B.C. 356; that the same man was the first Plebeian Censor five years
afterward (B.C. 351); that the Prætorship was thrown open to the
Plebeians in B.C. 336; and that the Lex Ogulnia in B.C. 300, which
increased the number of the Pontiffs from four to eight, and that of the
Augurs from four to nine, also enacted that four of the Pontiffs and
five of the Augurs should be taken from the Plebeians.
About thirty years after the Licinian Rogations, another important
reform, which abridged still farther the privileges of the Patricians,
was effected by the PUBLILIAN LAWS, proposed by the Dictator Q.
Publilius Philo in B.C. 339. These were:
I. That the Resolutions of the Plebs should be binding on all the
Quirites,[22] thus giving to the Plebiscita passed at the Comitia of the
Tribes the same force as the Laws passed at the Comitia of the
Centuries.
II. That all laws passed at the Comitia of the Centuries should receive
previously the sanction of the Curies; so that the Curies were now
deprived of all power over the Centuries.
III. That one of the Censors must be a Plebeian.
The first of these laws seems to be little move than a re-enactment of
one of the Valerian and Horatian laws, passed after the expulsion of the
Decemvirs;[23] but it is probable that the latter had never been really
carried into effect. Even the Publilian Law upon this subject seems to
have been evaded; and it was accordingly enacted again by the Dictator
Q. Hortensius in B.C. 286. In this year the last Secession of the
Plebeians took place, and the LEX HORTENSIA is always mentioned as the
law which gave to Plebiscita passed at the Comitia of the Tribes the
full power of laws binding upon the whole nation. From this time we hear
of no more civil dissensions till the times of the Gracchi, a hundred
and fifty years afterward, and the Lex Hortensia may therefore be
regarded as the termination of the long struggle between the two orders.
[Footnote 20: _A Rogatio_ differed from a _Lex_, as a _Bill_ from an
_Act_ of Parliament. A Rogatio was a law submitted to the assembly of
the people, and only became a Lex when enacted by them.]
[Footnote 21: A _Jugerum_ was rather more than half an acre.]
[Footnote 22: _Ut plebiscita omnes Quirites tenerent._]
[Footnote 23: See p. 40. (The end of Chapter V.--Transcriber)]
[Illustration: Ruins at Capua.]