THE EMPEROR AUGUSTUS, HIS CHARACTER AND AIMS, HIS WORK AND FRIENDS
_Hic vir hic est, tibi quem_
_promitti sæpius audis._
[Sidenote: The early career and change of character.]
When a great piece of work has been done in the world it is not difficult
to find fault with it. A man seldom if ever sees the bearing and ultimate
results of his own actions, or carries out all that he intended to do.
Even when he seems to have done so, time reveals faults, miscalculations,
failures. At an age when among us a boy is just leaving school, Augustus
found himself the heir of a great policy and a great name amidst the
ruins of a constitution and the _disjecta membra_ of a great Empire.
A comparatively small city state had conquered the greater part of
the known world, and proposed to govern it by the machinery which had
sufficed when its territory was insignificant, not extending at any rate
beyond the shores of Italy. A close corporation, greedy and licentious,
had divided amongst its members the vast profits from the gradually
extending dominions. The central authority which should have restrained
the rulers of distant provinces and the collection of their revenues
was composed to a great extent of those most deeply interested in the
corruptions which it was their duty to judge and condemn. Loyalty to this
central authority grew weaker and weaker, party spirit grew stronger
and less scrupulous. In the desperate struggle for wealth and luxury men
stuck at nothing. Bloodshed bred bloodshed, violence provoked violence,
till good citizens and honourable men (and there were always such) found
themselves helpless; and the constitution which had rested on the loyalty
of magistrates and citizens was ready to fall at the first touch of
resolute disobedience. Then a great man appeared. Iulius Cæsar had not
been free from the vices or corruption of his contemporaries; but party
connections at home led him to sympathise with the people, and the ten
years of war and government in Gaul, during which his enemies at home
were constantly threatening and thwarting him, had convinced him that
the existing constitution was doomed. He was resolved to attempt its
reconstruction, even at the risk of civil war. But civil war is a sea
of unknown extent. Conqueror though he was in all its battles, it left
him only a few months to elaborate reforms. In those he did some great
things; but his revival of the Sullan Dictatorship was too crude a return
to monarchy, while the exigencies of civil war forced him to employ
inferior agents. The aristocratic clique saw themselves about to lose
their cherished privilege of tyranny and extortion, and they killed him.
When Octavian came home to take up his inheritance, he would naturally
have joined Antony, and taken immediate vengeance on the guilty clique.
But he found him intent upon the consolidation of his own position,
and not inclined to admit his claim to the inheritance or to any share
of power. He therefore outwardly joined the leaders of the party which
he detested in order to get rid of Antony and forestall his bid for
autocracy. The vicissitudes of the struggle which followed, ending in
the triumvirate and the division of the Roman world, infected him with
the poison of civil strife—the cruelty which treats honourable enemies
as outlaws, and regards personal triumph as the only end of political
exertion. This period in his career and in the development of his
character ends with the victory over Sextus Pompeius, in B.C. 36, and the
additional security gained by the successes of Agrippa in Gaul during the
two preceding years. From that time he began to regard himself as the
champion of law and order, as the defender of Italy, and the guarantee of
peace in the Western Provinces.
Then came a great danger—the danger of a separation of East and West.
Under the influence of his passion for Cleopatra, Antony was building
up a new empire of subordinate kings, it is true, but subordinate to
Alexandria not Rome: and Alexandria was being adorned with the spoils
of Asiatic temples to make it a worthy capital of the Eastern world.
How far this was really to involve a diminution of the Roman Empire
was probably not clear to Antony himself. The old provinces were not
formally separated, but they were pared and diminished to round off the
new kingdoms for his and Cleopatra’s children. At Rome the danger was
looked upon as a real one; and once more Augustus felt that if he was to
have a free hand in the renovation of the Empire which he contemplated,
Antony must disappear. No doubt every artifice was employed to discredit
his opponent, and to convince the Roman people that their dominion in
the East was slipping from them. But, however Machiavellian his tactics,
there was a solid basis of fact beneath them; a real danger of separation
had existed. The victory of Actium settled that question; and when
the few severities which followed it were over, we are happily called
thenceforth to contemplate the legislator and reformer, the administrator
of, on the whole, a peaceful Empire. There were no more civil wars, and
no serious conspiracies. With rare exceptions—perhaps only the Arabian
expedition—the wars in which Augustus was henceforth engaged were the
necessary consequences of a long frontier. War was often prevented by
diplomacy, and such wars as were undertaken were always successful,
with the exception of those with the Germans, and even in their case
immediate danger was averted.
The moral problem presented by the change from ruthless cruelty to wise
and persistent clemency has exercised the minds of philosophers and
historians ever since. “It was not clemency,” says Seneca, “but a surfeit
of cruelty.” But this explains nothing. If Augustus had ever been cruel
for cruelty’s sake, the increased opportunities of exercising it would
have whetted his appetite for blood as it did in some of his successors.
It was circumstances that had changed, not altogether the man. Still, no
doubt, success softened (it does not always) Augustus’s character. His
ministers were humane men and in favour of milder methods; his wife was
a high-minded woman, and always ready to succour distress, as she shewed
during the proscriptions, and afterwards in her son’s reign. He had among
his immediate friends philosophers and men of letters, whose influence,
so far as it went, was humanising. And lastly such opposition as still
existed was no longer of irreconcilables who had known “liberty”; a
new generation had grown up which on the whole acquiesced in the peace
and security of a benevolent despotism. It was a new era, and Augustus
became a new man. Full of honours and possessed with irresistible powers,
feeling the responsibility heavily, and often in vain desiring rest, he
had no farther personal object to gain beyond the credit of having served
his country and saved the Empire. The apologia of the _index rerum_,
brief and bald as it is, was intended to shew that he had done this.
[Sidenote: The value of his work.]
In estimating the value of his work we are met with this difficulty at
the very threshold of the inquiry, that his object was to avoid quick and
conspicuous changes. Instead of discussing some heroic measure we have
to examine a multitude of details. In every department of political and
social life we trace his hand. Working day and night, he was scheming
to alter what he thought bad, and to introduce what he thought good.
The reconstruction and embellishment of the city, the restoration of
religion, the rehabilitation of marriage, measures necessary for the
security of Rome and Italy, for the better government and material
prosperity of the provinces, for the solvency of the exchequer, and for
the protection of commerce—all these continually occupied his time and
his thoughts. Of this steady industry this or that result may be open to
criticism, but, on the whole, it seems certain that it increased the good
order and prosperity of the Empire, and therefore added to the comfort
and happiness of innumerable lives.
[Sidenote: Advantages and disadvantages of the autocracy.]
But of course the upshot of it all was the establishment of a monarchy;
and it still remains to be considered how far its benefits were
counterbalanced by evils arising from the loss of freedom. It might be
argued that tyrants always appeal to their right use of power however
irregularly obtained, but that the plea is beside the question. Freedom
is the only guarantee of the _continuance_ of good government. The
beneficent tyrant may any day be succeeded by a bad one. The policy of
Augustus had led the people on step by step to forfeit this freedom,
and lose even the taste for it, lulled to sleep by the charms of safety
and luxury. When the glamour had faded from some eyes, it was too late.
The generation which had known freedom had disappeared; the experience
necessary for working the old machinery no longer existed. The few who
still remembered with regret the old constitution, under which they had
hoped to take an independent share of political activity, had nothing
left to them but sullen submission.
[Sidenote: In the provinces.]
In the provinces, indeed, this consideration did not apply. The despotism
there added to the sum of happiness and took nothing away. They had lost
their independence long ago. They were already under a master, a master
who was changed at short intervals, whom it was very difficult to bring
to an account if he were oppressive, in whose selection they had had
absolutely no share, and whose character they had no means of calculating
beforehand. They might one year be enjoying all the benefits of an able
and disinterested ruler, the next they might find themselves in the power
of a tyrannical extortioner, selfish, cynical, cruel. The old republican
names and ideals were nothing to them; or rather they suggested organised
oppression and a conspiracy to refuse redress. The change to one master,
who had everything to gain by their prosperity, and was at the same
time master of their old oppressors, must have seemed in every respect
a blessing. If there was any drawback it was that nationality and the
desire for self-government were killed by kindness. In all difficulties
and disasters they looked to the Emperor for aid and seldom looked in
vain. In the East especially this was probably not wholesome; yet the
immediate effects in producing prosperity and comfort were marked enough
to put aside for the present all such scruples.
[Sidenote: In Italy.]
But for the governing nation itself, while some of the benefits were
no less manifest, the mischievous results were more easy to point out.
Material prosperity was much increased. The city was made a pleasant
and attractive place of residence. Italy was partially repeopled with
an industrious class. Commerce was encouraged and protected, literature
and the fine arts were fostered, and the Palace on the whole set a good
example of simplicity of living. But, on the other hand, the rule of a
single person stifled political life. By the system of _curæ_ or special
commissions all administrative work was transferred to nominees of the
Emperor, who were often his intimate friends, or even his freedmen,
bound to him by the closest ties of subordination. The old magistracies
became unattractive, not only because they no longer led as a matter of
course to profitable employment abroad, but because their holders had
little of interest to do. The Senate, though treated with respect and
retaining some importance as a high court of justice, was practically no
longer a governing body. It was wholly at the beck of the Emperor, and
such work of consequence as it still performed was often transacted by
small committees, the main body merely assenting. In spite, therefore,
of the dignity of the Senator’s position, it ceased to attract the best
men. The higher classes turned away from a political career, and gave
themselves up more and more to luxurious idleness. The rise of the
freedman—practically the rule of favourites—was clearly foreshadowed,
though owing to the industry of Augustus, and his genius for detail, it
did not become prominent in his time. As the upper classes were thus to
a certain extent demoralised by the Principate, so the city proletariat
was pampered and made still more effete. The city was made only too
attractive to them, and they were to be kept in good humour by an endless
series of games and shows. There was a good deal of truth in the retort
of the player Pylades, when reproved by Augustus for his feud with
Bathyllus, that it was for the Emperor’s advantage that the people should
have their attention fixed on the playhouse rather than on politics.
But they soon began not only to regard these amusements as their right:
they expected also to be fed at the cost of the government, whether by
direct gifts of money, or by the distribution of cheap or even gratuitous
corn. Nor can it be said that the amusements provided for them were of
an elevating nature. Augustus boasts in the _Index_ (c. 20), that he
gave seven shows of gladiators in his own name or that of his sons, in
which about 10,000 men in all had fought;[317] and besides other games
twenty-six _venationes_ of “African beasts,” _i.e._, mostly elephants, in
which about 3,500 were killed. The mob of Rome needed little brutalising,
but they got it in abundance.
With such drawbacks, however, it still must be owned that the
administration of Augustus largely increased the sum of human happiness
by the mitigation of oppression in the provinces, and by the suppression
of disorder in Rome and Italy. The finances were placed on a sound
footing, property was rendered secure, and men felt everywhere that they
might pursue their business with every chance of enjoying the fruits of
their labours. This was something after a century of revolution more or
less acute, and twenty years of downright civil war. It is worth while to
attempt to picture to ourselves the man who was the author of these good
and bad results.
[Sidenote: The personal appearance and character of Augustus.]
Augustus was a short man (just under five feet seven inches), but so well
proportioned that the defect in height was not noticed unless he was
standing by much taller men. He was remarkably handsome at all periods of
his life, with an expression of calm dignity, whether silent or speaking,
which involuntarily inspired respect. His eyes were grey, and so bright
and keen that it was not easy to meet their gaze. If he had a personal
vanity it was in regard to them. He liked to think that they dazzled
those on whom he looked, and he was pleased at the answer of the Roman
eques, who, when asked why he turned away, replied, “Because I could not
bear the lightning of your eyes.” Vergil gratified this vanity of his
patron when in the description of the battle of Actium (_Æn._, viii. 650)
he pictures him,
_Stans celsa in puppi; geminas cui tempora flammas_
_Læta vomunt._
And the Emperor Iulian, in “The Banquet of the Emperors,” laughs not
unkindly at the same weakness when he introduces him, “changing colour
like a chameleon, and wishing that the beams darting from his eyes
should be like those of the mighty sun.” The busts, statues, and coins
of Augustus fully confirm this statement as to his beauty; and in the
triumphal statue found in Livia’s villa at Prima Porta, the artist has
succeeded in suggesting the brightness and keenness of his eyes. He was
usually clean shaven, but from his uncle’s death to B.C. 38, according
to Dio (48, 34), he grew his beard as a sign of mourning; though coins
showed him with a slight whisker till about B.C. 36. These portraits
are full of life and character. The clear-cut features, the firm mouth
and chin, the steady eyes, the carelessly ordered hair, the lines on
forehead and cheeks, suggest a man who had suffered and laboured, who was
yet self-controlled, calm, and clear-headed. It is a face not without
some tenderness, but capable of firing up into hot indignation and even
cruelty. There is an air of suffering but of determined victory over
pain; altogether a face of a man who had done a great work and risen
to a high place in the world and knew it; who had confidence, lastly,
in his star. On taking leave of Gaius Cæsar, it is said, he wished him
“the integrity of Pompey, the courage of Alexander, and his own good
fortune.” On some of his coins beneath the head crowned with the crown
of twelve rays, is the Iulian star, first observed at the funeral of
Iulius Cæsar, and which he adopted as the sign of his own high fortunes:
on others the Sphinx, which he at first adopted as his signet—emblem
perhaps of a purpose unbetrayed. Augustus was accomplished in the
subjects recognised in the education of his time, though he neither wrote
nor spoke Greek with ease. He had studied and practised rhetoric, and
had a good and correct taste in style, avoiding the use of far-fetched
or obsolete words and expressions, or affected conceits. He ridiculed
Antony for his “Asiatic” style of oratory, full of flowers of speech and
flamboyant sentences; and writing to his granddaughter, Agrippina, while
praising her abilities he warns her against pedantic expressions whether
in conversation or writing. Without being an orator, he spoke clearly
and to the point, assisted by a pleasant voice, which he took pains to
preserve and improve. In the Senate, the camp, and private conferences,
he preferred to read his speeches, though he could also speak well on
the spur of the moment. In domestic life, though somewhat strict, he
was generally simple and charming. He lived much with wife and children,
associating himself with their employments, and even joining in the games
of the latter. He personally superintended the education of his adopted
sons, taught them his own method of shorthand, and interested himself in
their reading. He had old-fashioned ideas about the proper employment of
the women in his family. They were expected to busy themselves in weaving
for the use of the household, to visit and receive visits only with his
approval, and not to converse on subjects that could not with propriety
be entered on the day’s journal. Though his daughter and granddaughters
were well educated, and had a taste for literature, it may well be
that a home thus conducted was so dull as partly to account for their
aberrations in the fuller liberty of married life.
His attachments were warm and constant, and he was not illiberal to
his friends or disinclined to give them his full confidence. But he
was always his own master. No friend or freedman gained control over
him or rose to the odious position of “favourite.” He allowed and even
liked freedom of speech, but it was always without loss of dignity. He
was not a man with whom liberties were taken even by the most intimate.
He was quick tempered, but knew it, and was ready to admit of caution
and advice, as in the well-known story of Mæcenas, watching him in
court about to condemn a number of prisoners (probably in the civil
war times), and throwing across to him a note with the words, _Surge
tandem carnifex!_ “Tis time to rise, hangman!” Or when he received with
complaisance the advice of Athenodorus (hero of the covered sedan) that
when he was angry he should say over the letters of the alphabet before
coming to a decision.
[Sidenote: His ultra-Roman views.]
In later times he was always looked back upon by his successors as the
true founder of the Empire, and the best model for their guidance;
yet it is doubtful how far he had wide and far-reaching views. He was
a statesman who dealt with facts as he found them and did the best
he could. He was deeply impressed with the difficulty of his task.
Commenting on the fact of Alexander the Great having accomplished his
conquests by the age of 32, and then feeling at a loss what to do for the
rest of his life, he remarked that he “was surprised that Alexander did
not regard the right ordering of the empire he possessed a heavier task
than winning it.” But in one important respect at least he was wrong in
his idea of what he had done. He never conceived of an empire filled with
citizens enjoying equal rights, or in which Rome could possibly occupy a
secondary place. He was ultra-Roman in his views; and worked and schemed
to maintain the supremacy of the Eternal City. That supremacy may indeed
be said to have remained to this day in the region of spiritual affairs.
But it was destined to disappear politically, except in name, before many
generations had passed away, and as a logical consequence of much that
he had himself done. A new Rome and a new Empire—though always resting
on the old title and theory—were to arise, in which Italy would be a
province like the rest, and old Rome but the shadow of a mighty name.
[Sidenote: The court circle.]
Among those who exercised a permanent influence on Augustus, the first
place must be given to LIVIA (B.C. 54-A.D. 29). The writers on Augustus
comment on the romantic revolution of her fortunes. After the affair of
Perusia she fled with her husband, Nero, and her little son, Tiberius,
from Augustus, who was to be her husband, and was to be succeeded by her
son. Her divorce and prompt marriage to Augustus, while within a few
months of being again a mother, is not only a thing revolting to our
ideas, it was strictly against Roman principles and habits, and required
all her new husband’s commanding influence to be admitted as legal. Yet
Suetonius says, and says truly, that he continued “to love and honour her
exclusively to the end” (_dilexit et probavit unice et perseveranter_).
The same writer gives an account of the Emperor’s intrigues with other
women. To our ideas the two statements are contradictory, but Suetonius
would not have thought so. Conjugal love was not _amor_; the latter was
thought even inconsistent with, or at least undesirable in, conjugal
affection. He means that throughout his life Augustus continued to
regard her with affection, to respect her character, and give weight to
her opinion. For my own part, I believe that something more might be
said, and that much of what has come down to us as to the conduct of the
Emperor may be dismissed as malignant gossip. But however that may be,
the influence of Livia over him seems never to have failed, and it was
exercised on the side of clemency and generosity. She set an excellent
example of pure and dignified conduct to Roman society, and, though
abstaining from interference generally in political matters, was ready to
give advice when called upon. She seems usually to have accompanied him,
when possible, on his foreign progresses or residences away from Rome.
When Herod visited Augustus at Aquileia in B.C. 14, she appears to have
shared her husband’s liking for that strange medley of magnificence and
cruelty, and sent him costly gifts for the festivity which accompanied
the completion of the new city of Cæsarea Sebaste in B.C. 13. The usual
allegation against her is that she worked for the succession of her
sons, Tiberius and Drusus, as against the Iulian family, represented
by the son of Octavia and the children of Iulia. To secure this object
she was accused in popular rumour of compassing the deaths successively
of Marcellus, of Gaius and Lucius Cæsar, of Agrippa Postumus, and,
finally, of having even hastened the end of Augustus himself. This last
is not mentioned by Suetonius, and is only related by Dio as a report,
for which he gives no evidence, and which he does not appear to have
believed. Tacitus records the criticism of her as a _gravis noverca_ to
the family of the Cæsars, and seems to accept her guilt in regard to
Gaius and Iulius (_Ann._ 4, 71). But he is also constrained to admit that
she exercised a humanising influence over Tiberius, that his victims
constantly found refuge and protection in her palace, and that she was
benevolent and charitable to the poor—maintaining a large number of
orphan boys and girls by her bounty. The most suspicious case against
her is the execution of Agrippa Postumus immediately after the death
of Augustus—“the first crime of the new reign.” It will never be known
whether the order for that cruel deed issued from her or her crafty
son. The death of Marcellus was in no way suspicious, as it occurred in
a season of exceptional unhealthiness, when large numbers were dying
at Rome of malarial fever. As to the deaths of Gaius and Lucius, no
suspicion seems to have occurred to Augustus, and he was keenly anxious
for their survival. The poisoned fig supposed to have been given to
himself is a familiar feature in the stories of great men’s death of
every age in Italy. Tacitus in the famous summing up of her character,
while acknowledging the purity of her domestic conduct, yet declares that
her social manners were more free than was considered becoming among
women of an earlier time; that as a mother she was extravagantly fond, as
a wife too complaisant; and that her character was a combination of her
husband’s adroitness and her son’s insincerity. He by no means intends to
draw a pleasing portrait. He seldom does. But what we may take for true
is that she was beautiful, loyal to her husband, open-handed and generous
to the distressed, merciful and kind to the unfortunate. To those who
think such qualities likely to belong to a poisoner and murderess, her
condemnation must be left. It is curious that neither Vergil, Horace, nor
Propertius mention or allude to Livia; nor does Ovid do so until after
the death of Augustus—for the _consolatio ad Liviam_ on the death of
Drusus is not his. On some of the inscriptions of a later period in the
reign her name appears among the imperial family as wife of the Princeps.
That was itself an innovation, and it seems as if the poets abstained
from mentioning her under orders. It was improper for a matron of high
rank to be made public property in this way. Horace, for instance, only
once alludes to the wife of Mæcenas, and then under a feigned name.
Of those who influenced the earlier policy of Augustus, and supported
him in the first twenty years of the Principate, the first place must be
given to Agrippa and Mæcenas.
M. VIPSANIUS AGRIPPA (B.C. 63-13), differed widely from Mæcenas, but
was like him in constant attachment and fidelity to Augustus. He was
with him in Apollonia, and on the news of the murder of Iulius advised
an appeal to the army. Even before this he had accompanied him to Spain
when he went to join his uncle in B.C. 45, and ever afterwards served him
with unswerving fidelity and conspicuous success. In the war with Sextus
Pompeius, at Perusia, in Gaul, Spain and Illyria, in the organisation of
the East, and on the Bosporus, it was his energy and ability that decided
the contest in favour of his master, or secured the settlement that he
desired. He was the organiser of the Roman navy, and though his great
work at the Lucrine lake proved to be only temporary, the squadrons that
guarded the seas at Misenum, Ravenna and Forum Iulii were the result
of his activity and foresight. His acts of splendid liberality in Rome
have been already noticed. He shewed the same magnificence in Gaul and
elsewhere, and seems also to have largely assisted in the great survey
of the empire instituted by Augustus. Not only did he support all the
plans and ideas of his master, he was ready to take any position and make
any personal sacrifice to further his views. After his first marriage
to Pomponia, by whom he was the father of Vipsania, he was married to
Marcella, the Emperor’s niece. To support his master’s plans for the
succession he submitted to divorce her and marry Iulia, after having
previously made way for the rise of Marcellus by accepting a command in
the East. The Emperor shewed his confidence in him on every occasion. In
B.C. 23 when he thought himself dying he placed his seal in his hands,
in B.C. 18 he caused him to be admitted to share his tribunician power
for five years, which was renewed again in B.C. 13; so that though his
two sons were adopted by Augustus, the succession would almost certainly
have fallen to him had the Emperor died in their minority. This elevation
however did not give him rest: the last years of his life were spent
in the East, on the Bosporus and in Pannonia, from which last he only
returned to die. This faithful service had been rendered in spite of
the fact that he had advised against the acceptance of the principate.
He had urged the financial difficulties, the irreconcilable nature of
the opposition, the impossibility of drawing back, and Octavian’s own
weak health. But when his master preferred the advice of Mæcenas, he
took his part in the undertaking without faltering and with splendid
loyalty. Though Augustus owed much of his success to his own cautious
statesmanship, he owed even more to the man who failed in nothing that he
undertook, and would claim no honour for himself in return. The Emperor
delivered the funeral oration over this loyal servant, and, deposited his
ashes in the Mausoleum which he had built for his own family.
[Illustration: MÆCENAS.
_Photographed from the Head in the Palazzo dei Conservatori, Rome, by
Edne. Alinari._
_To face page 279._
P. VERGILIUS MARO.
_Photographed from the Bust in the Capitoline Museum, Rome, by Edne.
Alinari._
_Page 284._]
C. CILNIUS MÆCENAS (_circ._ B.C. 65-B.C. 8), was probably a few years
older than Augustus, but near enough to his age to have been one of
his companions at Apollonia. His influence was maintained till about
B.C. 16. It is most conspicuous from the time immediately following the
Perusian war. He negotiated the marriage with Scribonia, the peace of
Brundisium with Antony (B.C. 40), and the subsequent reconciliation of
B.C. 38. In the war against Sextus Pompeius (B.C. 38-36), he was partly
with Augustus, but partly at Rome, with full powers to act for him and
even to alter his despatches and letters as seemed necessary, having
the triumvir’s private seal entrusted to him for that purpose. This
was possible from the fact of such letters being written by amanuenses
and being therefore only recognisable by the seal. Thus Cicero often
commissions Atticus to write formal letters to his friends for him.
This position—it was no definite office, or perhaps was more like being
_legatus_ to Octavian than anything else—he seems to have retained
till after the battle of Actium, at which he probably was not present,
though that has been disputed. He detected the conspiracy of the younger
Lepidus, and sent him to Octavian to be judged. In B.C. 29, on Octavian’s
return from the East, he recommended the establishment of a despotism,
as a republic was no longer possible. The speech preserved by Dio (52,
14-40) may very well be genuine, in view of the habit of the day, and
of Augustus himself, of reading addresses even in comparatively private
conferences on matters of importance.[318] Even if it is not the genuine
speech, it correctly represents many of the principles on which Augustus
did act, and as to which he doubtless consulted Mæcenas. It counsels him
to keep in his hands legislation, foreign affairs, elections, executive
appointments and the courts of law, and to hear cases of appeal himself:
exactly what Augustus did under various disguises. It argues that it
was necessary both for his own safety and that of the state that he
should remain in power, the glory being well worth the risk. Other
recommendations are a reform of Senate and equites, the maintenance of
the old republican magistrates for home service, the establishment of a
_præfectus urbi_, the exercise by himself of censorial functions, the
subordination of provincial governors to the Emperor, and their payment
by a fixed salary, with the appointment of procurators to superintend
the finances of the provinces. A system of education for the equites
is also suggested, which does not seem to have been carried out; but
many of the financial proposals were adopted, as well as the idea of
keeping the people amused by games and shows. The advice to abolish the
_comitia_ Augustus could not follow consistently with his policy of
compromise. They remained and were the causes of more than one trouble
and disturbance, but their freedom of election was gradually but surely
destroyed, and one of the first measures of Tiberius was to abolish them
as no longer a reality. The reform of the Senate was, as we have seen,
carried out. As for the judicia, the Senate became a high court for cases
of treason (_maiestas_), before which alone Senators could be tried;
the _decuriæ iudicum_ were reformed, and Augustus himself performed
the functions of a court of appeal in various ways, sometimes by his
tribunician power of “interceding” against the sentences of magistrates
or Senate, and sometimes by hearing cases from the provinces of citizens
who disputed the competence of provincial courts and claimed to be
heard at Rome. Mæcenas holding no office never became a Senator; but he
represented the Emperor in his absence, unless Agrippa was appointed to
do so instead. In this capacity he really exercised a greater power than
any definite office would have given him, and the whole business of the
Empire passed through his hands.[319]
But it was not only as the ostensible representative of the Emperor that
he worked for his support. In the comparative retirement of his palace on
the Esquiline he contributed to that object by gathering round him the
best intellects and first men of letters of the day, whom he induced to
devote their talents not only to glorify the Emperor personally, but to
popularise his policy and magnify his service to the state. How far this
may have been effectual by making it the fashion to accept and admire the
principate may perhaps be questioned, but that he should have secured
such writers as Vergil, Horace, and Propertius on his side says much for
his insight and literary taste. One of the weaknesses of the position
of Iulius had been that he had the literary class mostly against him.
The present reputation and future fame of Augustus were to be better
safeguarded. Personally Mæcenas was luxurious and effeminate, always a
valetudinarian, and in his later years afflicted with almost constant
insomnia. This accounts well enough for the retirement from public
business during the last eight years of his life without those other
causes of the Emperor’s displeasure which have been already discussed.
His wife was a beauty, much younger than himself, wilful and wayward;
and if it is true that she intrigued with Augustus, it seems also true
that her husband repaid her in kind. There were frequent quarrels and
reconciliations, so that Seneca says that he married her “a thousand
times;” and once at any rate the family trouble found its way into the
law courts, where, however, the _bona fides_ of the divorce which she
was alleged to have made was questioned.[320] In spite of some coldness
between them in later years, and the physical infirmities which removed
him from public business, Augustus sincerely mourned his loss, as of a
counsellor who never betrayed his confidence or spoke idle words. He had
no real successor. From the time of his death the Emperor seems more and
more to have become his own prime minister, or to have looked to his own
family for assistance as well as for a successor. Tacitus (_Ann._ 3, 30)
says that his place was taken by Sallustius Crispus, great-nephew of
the historian; but Augustus does not seem to have thought highly of his
ability, and the part he took in affairs was not prominent enough to have
secured mention by either Suetonius or Dio. Mæcenas wrote himself both
in prose and verse, but in an affected and obscure style, which Augustus
playfully ridiculed. The stoic Seneca is particularly severe on a poem
in which he declares that he clings to life in spite of all physical
sufferings however painful:—
“Though racked with gout in hand and foot,
Though cancer deep should strike its root,
Though palsy shake my feeble thighs,
Though hideous hump on shoulders rise,
From flaccid gum teeth drop away;
Yet all is well if life but stay.
Give me but life, and e’en the pain
Of sharpest cross shall count as gain.”
[Sidenote: Augustus and the poets.]
The chief writers of the Mæcenas circle, who either became intimate
with Augustus himself, or were induced by Mæcenas to join in the chorus
of praise, were Vergil, Varius, Horace, Propertius. Of the epics of L.
Varius Rufus (_circ._ B.C. 64-14) on Iulius Cæsar and Augustus, we have
only a few fragments. The historian, Livy, (B.C. 59-A.D. 16) was also on
friendly terms with Augustus, and seems to have had some hand in teaching
Claudius, son of Drusus, the future emperor. But his great work—from
the foundation of Rome to the death of Drusus (B.C. 9) was afterwards
regarded as being too republican, and even Augustus used laughingly to
call him the Pompeian. It was the poets who made Augustus and his policy
the subject of their praises, and who employed their genius to support
his views.
[Sidenote: Vergil.]
The first to do this was P. Vergilius Maro (B.C. 70-17). The earliest
of his writings, the _Eclogues_, composed between B.C. 42-37, do not
show any close connection with Augustus. The first indeed celebrates the
restoration of his farm after a personal interview with Octavian, on the
suggestion of Pollio and Mæcenas, and the poet declares that never will
there fade from his heart the gracious look of the young prince. But the
chief object of praise in the _Eclogues_, so far as there is one, is
Pollio, who had been left in charge of the distribution of lands by the
Triumvirs in B.C. 42. In the _Georgics_, however, finished after B.C. 30,
we find that he has fallen in with the new _régime_. They are dedicated
to the minister Mæcenas, they celebrate Augustus’s triple triumph of
B.C. 29, and they were composed partly, at any rate, at the wish of
Mæcenas, who with Augustus was anxious to make country life and pursuits
seem desirable. No doubt the theme itself was congenial to Vergil, who
preferred a country life at Nola, or near Tarentum, to the bustle of
Rome; but it also happened to chime in with the views of Augustus, who
all his life believed in the influence of literature and wished to have
the poets on his side. Accordingly, soon after his return from the East
in B.C. 29 he seems to have suggested to Vergil to compose a poem that
would inspire men with a feeling of national pride and an enthusiasm
for the greatness of Rome’s mission. The plan and form were no doubt
wholly Vergil’s, but the spirit and purpose, like those of Horace’s more
patriotic odes of about the same time, were those which the Emperor
desired. He was not satisfied with mere suggestion, he was eager for
the appearance of the poem. While in Gaul and Spain from B.C. 27-24 he
frequently wrote to the poet urging the completion of the work. A part of
one of Vergil’s answers has been preserved:
“As to my Æneas, upon my honour if I had anything written worth your
listening to, I would gladly send it. But the subject thus begun is so
vast, that I almost think I must have been beside myself when I undertook
a work of this magnitude; especially considering that—as you are aware—I
am also devoting part of my time to different and much more important
studies.”
The _Æneid_ was thus undertaken at the solicitation of Augustus. The
legend on which it turns—perhaps a late one—of the landing of Æneas
in Italy and the foundation of Rome by his descendant, is with great
skill interwoven with a fanciful descent of the _gens Iulia_ from his
son Iulus, to magnify Rome and her divine mission, and at the same
time to point to Augustus as the man of destiny, and as representing
in his own person and career the majesty of the Roman people. In such
a poem detailed allusions cannot be expected as in the occasional odes
of Horace. Yet, besides the fine passage in the eighth book describing
the victory of Actium and the discomfiture of Cleopatra, and that in
the sixth announcing the victorious career of Augustus, we have, more
or less, direct references to the restoration of religious worship in
the _vici_, to the return of the standards by the Parthians, and the
death of the young Marcellus. In form, the _Æneid_ follows the model of
Homer, the supreme epic. But in substance it is original, in that it
does not take for its theme one of the old myths—as the Alexandrine poets
always did—but while teeming with all kinds of mythological allusions it
finds its chief inspiration in the greatness of Rome, measured by the
elemental strife preceding the accomplishment of the divine purpose:
_tantæ molis erat Romanam condere gentem_—“So vast the task to found the
Roman race,” is the keynote of the whole. It is original as the epic of
Milton was original who, with details borrowed from every quarter, took
for his theme the foundation of a world and the strife in heaven that
preceded it. Vergil’s epic is Roman history on the highest plane, and has
crystallised for ever a view of that history which has done more than
arms and laws to commend it to the imagination of mankind. Augustus had a
true intuition when he forbade the poet’s executors to obey his will and
burn the rolls containing this great national epic.
[Sidenote: Horace.]
Q. HORATIUS FLACCUS (B.C. 65-B.C. 8) is not perhaps so great a poet as
Vergil, but he possessed the charm which keeps such work as his alive.
His connection with Augustus is a remarkable phenomenon in literary
history. Having fought on the side of his enemies at Philippi, and having
shared in the amnesty granted to the bulk of the troops, he returned home
to find his paternal property confiscated. Poverty drove him to poetry,
poetry gained him the friendship of Varius and Vergil, who introduced
him to Mæcenas, who saw his merit, relieved him from the uncongenial
employment of a clerk, and eventually introduced him to Augustus. The
Emperor, in his turn, was not long in recognising his charm. He writes to
Mæcenas:
“In old times I was vigorous enough to write my friends’ letters for
them. Nowadays being overwhelmed with business and weak in health, I am
very anxious to entice Horace away from you. He shall therefore quit your
table of parasites and come to my table of kings and assist me in writing
letters.”
The refusal of Horace—prudent no doubt in view of his tastes and
habits—did not lose him the Emperor’s favour. He twice received
substantial marks of it, and some extracts of letters to him from
Augustus have been preserved which exhibit the latter in his most
gracious mood:
“Consider yourself a privileged person in my house, as though an habitual
guest at my table. You will be quite within your rights and will always
be sure of a welcome; for it is my wish that our intimacy should be on
that footing if your state or health permits it.”
And again:
“What a warm recollection I retain of you, you will be able to learn from
Septimius among others, as I happened to be talking about you in his
presence the other day. For you need not suppose, because you were so
high and mighty as to reject my friendship, that I am on the high horse
too to pay you back.”
Augustus, in fact, had a great opinion of Horace, and predicted his
immortality. He selected him to write the ode for the secular games,
pressed him later in life to immortalise the achievements of Tiberius and
Drusus, and was desirous of his own name appearing as the recipient of
one of his Satires or Epistles.
“I am quite angry, let me tell you, that you don’t give me the preference
as a person to address in your writings of that kind. Are you afraid
that an appearance of intimacy with me will damage your reputation with
posterity?”
Horace made the Emperor a return in full for such condescension. How far
the genius of a poet is warmed or chilled by patronage it is not easy to
decide. So far as he is tempted away from his natural bent, or confined
in the free expression of thought, he suffers: so far as he is saved
from sordid cares, he is a gainer. Horace, in early youth, sympathised
with the republican party in whose ranks he had served, and probably in
later life still felt a theoretical preference for it, and could speak
of the _nobile letum_ and _atrox animus_ of Cato with a true note of
admiration, But he was a man of his time. The policy of Octavian had made
the supremacy of Augustus inevitable, and it at least secured peace and
safety. The patronage and liberality of Mæcenas assuredly helped to turn
the scale, but I see no reason to doubt that the poet was convinced,
though, perhaps, without enthusiasm, that the new _régime_ was one to
be supported by reasonable men. The kindness of the Emperor naturally
enhanced the effect of his commanding personality, but it would be
difficult for a poet so placed to write with greater dignity and less
fulsomeness than Horace does in the first epistle of the second book,
addressed to Augustus at his own request. But it is in the _Odes_ that we
must trace the unbroken sympathy with the career and policy of Augustus.
If they are closely examined, with an eye to chronological arrangement,
the ingenuity with which these imitations of Greek models are framed to
support and recommend the purposes or celebrate the successes of the
Emperor, will stand revealed in a striking manner. The _Epodes_ and the
first three books of the _Odes_ were apparently written between B.C. 35
and B.C. 25. Dropped in among a number of poems of fancy, or passion, or
mere literary _tours de force_, are compositions that follow not only the
actual achievements of Augustus, but his ideals, his intentions, and his
aspirations, from the years just before Actium to his return from Spain
in B.C. 25. We begin with the Second Epode, which refers with regret to
the abandoned intention of invading Britain in B.C. 35, and expresses
his alarm at the prospect of a renewed civil war. In the Sixteenth Epode
this terror has become a reality; the civil war has begun, and the poet,
foreseeing the downfall of the state, turns longing eyes to the peace and
calm of the fabled islands of the West. From Italy and all its horrors
they must at any rate depart. In the Ninth Epode the relief has come; the
shameful servitude of a Roman imperator and Roman soldiers to a foreign
queen is over; Antony and Cleopatra are in full flight (B.C. 31). In
another year it is known that Antony has fallen by his own hand, and that
Cleopatra has saved herself the indignity of the triumphal procession by
the adder’s aid (_Od._ i. 39). The discharge of the legions follows, and
their settlement in Italian and Sicilian lands (2 _Sat._, 6, 54). In the
other odes of the first book the devotion to Augustus proceeds apace.
The Iulian star is in the ascendant (1, 2, 20); Augustus is _pater_
and _princeps_, anticipating the future titles (1, 2, 20); he is again
contemplating the invasion of Britain (1, 35, 29); the Arabian expedition
is being planned with all its futile hopes of wealth (1, 29; 1, 35). In
the second book of the _Odes_, beginning with reflections on the evils
of civil war (2, 1), the poet notices one after the other the triumphs
of Augustus or his generals in B.C. 27-24. The Cantabrian war (2, 6, 2;
2, 11, 1); the triumphal arch at Susa (2, 9, 19); the success of his
diplomacy in Scythia, Armenia, and Parthia (_ib._) In the third book the
embassy of British chiefs is treated as though the island were annexed
(3, 5, 2); the Cantabrians are regarded as conquered after the expedition
of Augustus (3, 8, 22; 3, 14). Then succeeds a period of statesmanship
and reform. The Emperor’s Roman policy, and his determination to keep
Rome the centre of government, are warmly supported (3, 3); the moral
evils, the extravagance and debauchery of the age must be cured, and
Horace proceeds to support the abortive legislation of B.C. 27, and to
foreshadow the censorial acts, and the legislation of B.C. 18. There
is a protest against the magnificence and extent of country houses (2,
15); against the effeminacy of youth (iii. 2); against the immorality
of women and the licentiousness that led to civil strife (3, 24). The
_Carmen sæculare_ speaks of the legislation as effected, and foretells
its success (20); while in the fourth book he asserts that, at any rate
while Augustus is with them, that success has been secured (4, 5), and
that he has not only given them peace, but a great moral reform (4, 15).
The policy of the Emperor in regard to the bugbear of the East, the
Parthian power, is also followed step by step. They are the dangerous
enemy whose subjection will make Augustus divine (3, 5, 1-4), and whose
threatened invasions keep his ministers in constant anxiety (3, 29, 27).
This is before B.C. 20; but in B.C. 19 they have made submission and
restored the standards and prisoners (_Epist._ i. 18, 56), and this is
one of the triumphs of Augustus that requires a master hand to record
(_Epist._ ii. 1, 255); it is the glory of the Augustan age (_Od._ 4,
15, 6), and as long as Augustus is safe, no one will fear them more (4,
5, 25). Finally, at the Emperor’s request, he celebrated the victories
of Drusus and Tiberius over the Vindelici and Rhæti (4, 4 and 14), and
especially the defeat of the Sugambri who had routed Lollius (4, 2, 34;
4, 14, 51), with a compliment to Augustus himself for having gone to
Gaul to support Tiberius and Drusus with reinforcements and advice (4,
14, 33), and for having at length closed the door of Ianus (4, 15, 9).
The lyrical career of Horace, therefore, corresponds remarkably with the
activities of Augustus. His genius presented those activities to his
fellow citizens (and Horace’s verses were soon read in schools) exactly
in the light in which the Emperor wished them to be viewed. If we lay
aside some expressions of overstrained compliment, which favoured the
growing fashion of paying the Emperor divine honours, it cannot be said
that the language is fulsome or degrading to the poet. The “parasitic
table” of Mæcenas may, as M. Beulé asserts, have been a misfortune to
the poets, and attenuated their vein of inspiration: but a man must have
something in practical life on which to pin his faith; and Horace might
have done worse than devote his genius to promote loyalty to the great
statesman who had saved Roman society and given peace and prosperity to
an empire. Just as Vergil, if he had followed his own impulse, might have
perhaps produced a fine poem on the Epicurean cosmogony, but not one that
lives and breathes with the noble glow of patriotism.
[Sidenote: Propertius.]
Sextus Propertius (_circ._ B.C. 45-_circ._ B.C. 15) was another of the
Mæcenas circle of poets who did something to glorify Augustus. He is
not (but that is a personal opinion) on anything like the same level as
either Vergil or Horace as an artist. He is said to have died young,
perhaps at thirty years of age, and there is no evidence of personal
intimacy with Augustus, but there is some indication of his having been
on bad terms with Horace. His elegies also are nearly all poems of
passion. Politics and emperors are mere episodes, and were introduced
in deference to Mæcenas. Still many points in the career of Augustus
are referred to in the same spirit as that of Horace. The siege of
Perusia—described in tones of horror, which would scarcely have been
acceptable—precedes his conversion (1, 21), and the failure of the
marriage law of B.C. 27 is only referred to with relief (2, 7, 1). In
more complimentary terms he speaks of the victory of Actium (3, 7, 44),
and of the downfall of Antony and Cleopatra (4, 8, 56; 4, 10, 32, _sqq._;
4, 7, 56); and the end of the civil wars is attributed to Augustus (_illa
qua vicit condidit arma manu_, 3, 8, 41). Then came the intended invasion
of Britain (3, 23, 5); the Arabian expedition and the Indian envoys (3,
1, 15; 4, 3 1); the opening and description of the Palatine Library—the
best extant (3, 29); the raids of the Sugambri and their suppression (5,
6, 77); while he has the Parthians frequently on his lips, though rather
as predicting what is to be done with them than as recording the return
of the standards.[321] In the fifth book there are signs of a beginning
of a _Fasti_ like that of Ovid as a record of events in Roman history;
and it is possible that this was in obedience to a wish of Augustus,
who, on his death, transferred the task to Ovid. Thus his voice also was
secured, in part at least, in support of the imperial _régime_.
[Sidenote: Ovid.]
Publius Ovidius Naso (B.C. 43-A.D. 18) belongs to the last part of the
reign. He had only seen Vergil, and though he had heard Horace recite,
he does not profess to have known him. He was quite young when Augustus
was winning his position and reforming the constitution, and there
are no signs of his coming forward as a court poet till Mæcenas and
his circle had disappeared, and if he had attracted the attention of
Augustus at all, it was probably not altogether in a favourable manner.
His earliest poems—the _Amores_ and _Heroidum Epistulæ_—do not touch
on public affairs; they are poems of passion—the former personal, the
latter dramatic. In the _Ars Amatoria_ (about B.C. 2-A.D. 2) for the
first time we detect the court poet from a complimentary allusion to the
approaching mission of Gaius Cæsar to Syria and Armenia, with his title
of _princeps iuventutis_ and that of Augustus as _pater patriæ_, as also
to the _naumachia_ or representation of the battle of Salamis given by
Augustus in the flooded _nemus Cæsarum_ in B.C. 2 (_A. A._, 1, 171-2).
The _Metamorphoses_ had been composed before his exile in A.D. 9, but
after the death of Augustus he apparently introduced the Epilogue (xv.
745 _sq._) containing an eulogy on Tiberius, and on the now finished
career of Augustus. It is the _Fasti_—the Calendar of events in Roman
history—that probably was undertaken in obedience to a wish of the
Emperor, and in which accordingly we find points in his career touched
upon. It was dedicated to Germanicus, and contains an allusion to his
own exile, and was therefore, partly at least, composed between B.C.
2 and A.D. 10. His allusions to Augustus are not those of an intimate
acquaintance, but of an admiring subject—real or feigned. He mentions the
battle of Mutina (iv. 627); the bestowal of the title Augustus (i. 589);
the recovery of the standards from the Parthians as a triumph of the
Emperor (vi. 467). He alludes to Augustus becoming Pontifex Maximus (iii.
415); to the laurels on his palace front (iv. 957); to the demolition of
the house of Vedius Pollio as connected with the reforms and the laws
of B.C. 18 (vi. 637); to the division of the city into _vici_, and the
worship of the Lares Augusti (v. 145); to the Forum Augusti and the
temple of Mars dedicated in B.C. 2. (v. 551, _sqq._). Ovid afterwards
protested that his books had been read with pleasure by Augustus, and
assumed to have some knowledge of the private chambers of the palace
(Trist., 1, 5, 2; 2, 520), but there is nothing in the allusions to
matters which he knew that Augustus wished to have recorded that has the
air of close or intimate relations. They are the conventional expressions
of the outside, and perhaps humble, panegyrist, not those of a friend
and supporter, like Horace. The abject expressions in the Tristia and
the letters from Pontus need not be taken into account. They are merely
bids for a recall, and they often express in the crudest form the growing
fashion of worshipping the Emperor or his genius. Perhaps the most
subtle of these appeals is that in which he explains why he had spent
his youth in writing frivolous poetry instead of celebrating the glories
of the Emperor—he was not a good enough poet, and would have dishonoured
a subject above his reach (Tr., ii. 335-340). This was using a weapon
forged by the Emperor himself, who had always let it be known that he
disliked being the subject of inferior artists. The melancholy and
feebleness of these later poems of Ovid seem to bear a sort of analogy
with the cloud that descended on the later years of Augustus. Vergil and
Horace have the freshness of the morning or the vigour of noon, Ovid the
gathering sadness of the evening.
AUGUSTUS’S ACCOUNT OF HIS REIGN (FROM THE INSCRIPTION IN THE TEMPLE OF
ROME AND AUGUSTUS AT ANGORA)
1. When I was nineteen I collected an army on my own account and at my
own expense, by the help of which I restored the republic to liberty,
which had been enslaved by the tyranny of a faction; for which services
the Senate, in complimentary decrees, added my name to the roll of
their House in the consulship of Gaius Pansa and Aulus Hirtius [B.C.
43], giving me at the same time consular precedence in voting; and gave
me imperium. It ordered me as proprætor “to see along with the consuls
that the republic suffered no damage.” Moreover, in the same year, both
consuls having fallen, the people elected me consul and a triumvir for
revising the constitution.
2. Those who killed my father I drove into exile, after a legal trial,
in punishment of their crime, and afterwards when these same men rose in
arms against the republic I conquered them twice in a pitched battle.
3. I had to undertake wars by land and sea, civil and foreign, all over
the world, and when victorious I spared surviving citizens. Those foreign
nations, who could safely be pardoned, I preferred to preserve rather
than exterminate. About 500,000 Roman citizens took the military oath to
me. Of these I settled out in colonies or sent back to their own towns,
after their terms of service were over, considerably more than 300,000;
and to them all I assigned lands purchased by myself or money in lieu
of lands. I captured 600 ships, not counting those below the rating of
triremes.
4. I twice celebrated an ovation, three times curule triumphs, and was
twenty-one times greeted as imperator. Though the Senate afterwards voted
me several triumphs I declined them. I frequently also deposited laurels
in the Capitol after performing the vows which I had taken in each war.
For successful operations performed by myself or by my legates under
my auspices by land and sea, the Senate fifty-three times decreed a
supplication to the immortal gods. The number of days during which, in
accordance with a decree of the Senate, supplication was offered amounted
to 890. In my triumphs there were led before my chariot nine kings or
sons of kings. I had been consul thirteen times at the writing of this,
and am in the course of the thirty-seventh year of my tribunician power
[A.D. 13-14].
5. The Dictatorship offered me in my presence and absence by the
Senate and people in the consulship of Marcus Marcellus and Lucius
Arruntius [B.C. 22] I declined to accept. I did not refuse at a time
of very great scarcity of corn the commissionership of corn supply,
which I administered in such a way that within a few days I freed the
whole people from fear and danger. The consulship—either yearly or for
life—then offered to me I declined to accept.
6. In the consulship of M. Vinicius and Q. Lucretius [B.C. 19], of P. and
Cn. Lentulus [B.C. 18], and of Paullus Fabius Maximus and Q. Tubero [B.C.
11], when the Senate and people of Rome unanimously agreed that I should
be elected overseer of the laws and morals, with unlimited powers and
without a colleague, I refused every office offered me which was contrary
to the customs of our ancestors. But what the Senate at that time wished
me to manage, I carried out in virtue of my tribunician power, and in
this office I five times received at my own request a colleague from the
Senate.
7. I was one of the triumvirate for the re-establishment of the
constitution for ten consecutive years. I have been _princeps senatus_ up
to the day on which I write this for forty years. I am Pontifex Maximus,
Augur, one of the fifteen commissioners for religion, one of the seven
for sacred feasts, an Arval brother, a _sodalis Titius_, a fetial.
8. In my fifth consulship [B.C. 29] I increased the number of the
patricians by order of people and Senate. I three times made up the roll
of the Senate, and in my sixth consulship [B.C. 28] I took a census of
the people with M. Agrippa as my colleague. I performed the _lustrum_
after an interval of forty-one years; in which the number of Roman
citizens entered on the census roll was 4,063,000. A second time with
consular imperium I took the census by myself in the consulship of Gaius
Censorinus and Gaius Asinius [B.C. 8], in which the number of Roman
citizens entered on the roll was 4,223,000. I took a third census with
consular imperium, my son Tiberius Cæsar acting as my colleague, in the
consulship of Sextus Pompeius and Sextus Appuleius [A.D. 14], in which
the number of Roman citizens entered on the census roll was 4,937,000. By
new laws passed I recalled numerous customs of our ancestors that were
falling into desuetude in our time, and myself set precedents in many
particulars for the imitation of posterity.
9. The Senate decreed that vows should be offered for my health by
consuls and priests every fifth year. In fulfilment of these vows the
four chief colleges of priests or the consuls often gave games in my
lifetime. Also individually and by townships the people at large always
offered sacrifices at all the temples for my health.
10. By a decree of the Senate my name was included in the ritual of the
Salii; and it was ordained by a law that my person should be sacred and
that I should have the tribunician power for the term of my natural life.
I refused to become Pontifex Maximus in succession to my colleague during
his life, though the people offered me that sacred office formerly held
by my father. Some years later I accepted that sacred office on the death
of the man who had availed himself of the civil disturbance to secure
it; such a multitude flocking to my election from all parts of Italy as
is never recorded to have come to Rome before, in the consulship of P.
Sulpicius and C. Valgius [6 March, B.C. 12].
11. The Senate consecrated an altar to Fortuna Redux, near the temple
of Honour and Virtue, by the Porta Capena, for my return, on which it
ordered the Vestal Virgins to offer a yearly sacrifice on the day on
which in the consulship of Q. Lucretius and M. Vinicius [B.C. 19] I
returned to the city from Syria, and gave that day the name _Augustalia_
from my cognomen [15 Dec.].
12. By a decree of the Senate at the same time part of the prætors and
tribunes of the plebs, along with the consul Q. Lucretius and leading
nobles, were despatched into Campania to meet me—an honour that up to
this time has been decreed to no one else. When I returned to Rome from
Spain and Gaul after successful operations in those provinces, in the
consulship of Tiberius Nero and Publius Quintilius [B.C. 13], the Senate
voted that an altar to Pax Augusta should be consecrated for my return on
the Campus Martius, upon which it ordered the magistrates and priests and
Vestal Virgins to offer an annual sacrifice [30 Jan.].
13. Whereas the Ianus Quirinus, which our ancestors ordered to be closed
when peace throughout the whole dominions of the Roman people by land and
sea had been obtained by victories, is recorded to have been only twice
shut before my birth since the foundation of the city, the Senate three
times voted its closure during my principate.
14. My sons Gaius and Lucius Cæsar, whom fortune snatched from me in
their early manhood, in compliment to me, the Senate and Roman people
designated consuls in their fifteenth year with a proviso that they
should enter on that office after an interval of five years. From the day
of their assuming the _toga virilis_ the Senate decreed that they should
take part in public business. Moreover, the Roman equites in a body gave
each of them the title of _Princeps Iuventutis_, and presented them with
silver shields and spears.
15. To the Roman plebs I paid 300 sesterces per head in virtue of
my father’s will; and in my own name I gave 400 apiece in my fifth
consulship [B.C. 29] from the sale of spoils of war; and a second time
in my tenth consulship [B.C. 24] out of my own private property I paid
a bounty of 400 sesterces per man, and in my eleventh consulship [B.C.
23] I measured out twelve distributions of corn, having purchased the
grain from my own resources. In the twelfth year of my tribunician power
[B.C. 11], I for the third time gave a bounty of 400 sesterces a head.
These largesses of mine affected never less than 50,200 persons. In
the eighteenth year of my tribunician power and my twelfth consulship
[B.C. 5] I gave 320,000 of the urban plebs sixty denarii a head. In the
colonies of my soldiers, in my fifth consulship [B.C. 29] I gave from the
sale of spoils of war 1,000 sesterces a head; and among such settlers
the number who received that triumphal largess amounted to about 120,000
men. In my thirteenth consulship [B.C. 2] I gave 60 denarii apiece to the
plebeians then in receipt of public corn; they amounted to somewhat more
than 200,000 persons.
16. The money for the lands, which in my fourth consulship [B.C. 30], and
afterwards in the consulship of M. Crassus and Cn. Lentulus the augur
[B.C. 14], I assigned to the soldiers, I paid to the municipal towns. The
amount was about 600,000,000 sesterces, which I paid for lands in Italy,
and about 260,000,000 which I disbursed for lands in the provinces.
I was the first and only one within the memory of my own generation to
do this of all who settled colonies in Italy and the provinces. And
afterwards in the consulship of Tib. Nero and Cn. Piso [B.C. 7], and
again in the consulship of C. Antistius and D. Lælius [B.C. 6], and of C.
Calvisius and L. Pasienus [B.C. 4], and of L. Lentulus and M. Messalla
[B.C. 3], and of L. Caninius and Q. Fabricius [B.C. 2], to the soldiers,
whom after their terms of service I sent back to their own towns, I paid
good service allowances in ready money; on which I expended 400,000,000
sesterces as an act of grace.
17. I four times subsidised the _ærarium_ from my own money, the sums
which I thus paid over to the commissioners of the treasury amounting
to 150,000,000 sesterces. And in the consulship of M. Lepidus and L.
Arruntius [A.D. 6], to the military treasury, which was established on
my initiative for the payment of their good service allowance, to the
soldiers who had served twenty years or more, I contributed from my own
patrimony 170,000,000 sesterces.[322]
18. From and after the year of the consulship of Gnæus and Publius
Lentulus [B.C. 18], whenever the payment of the revenues were in arrear,
I paid into the treasury from my own patrimony the taxes, whether due in
corn or money, sometimes of 100,000 persons, sometimes of more.
19. I built the curia and Chalcidicum adjoining it, and the temples of
Apollo on the Palatine with its colonnades, the temple of the divine
Iulius, the Lupercal, the colonnade at the Flaminian circus, which I
allowed to be called Octavia, from the name of the builder of the earlier
one on the same site, the state box at the Circus Maximus, the temples
of Jupiter Feretrius and of Jupiter Tonans on the Capitol, the temple of
Quirinus, the temples of Minerva and of Juno the Queen, and of Jupiter
Liberalis on the Aventine, the temple of the Lares at the head of the
_via Sacra_, the temple of the divine Penates in the Velia, the temple of
Youth, the temple of the Mater Magna on the Palatine.
20. The Capitolium and the Pompeian theatre—both very costly works—I
restored without any inscription of my own name. Water-conduits in many
places that were decaying from age I repaired; and I doubled the aqueduct
called the Aqua Marcia, by turning a new spring into its channel.
The Forum Iulium and the basilica, which was between the temple of Castor
and the temple of Saturn, works begun and far advanced by my father, I
completed; and when the same basilica was destroyed by fire, I began its
reconstruction on an extended plan, to be inscribed with the names of my
sons, and in case I do not live to complete it I have ordered it to be
completed by my heirs.
In my sixth consulship [B.C. 28], I repaired eighty-two temples of
the gods in the city in accordance with a decree of the Senate, none
being omitted which at that time stood in need of repair. In my seventh
consulship [B.C. 27] I constructed the Flaminian road from the city to
Ariminum, and all the bridges except the Mulvian and Minucian.
21. On ground belonging to myself I built a temple to Mars Ultor and
the Forum Augustum, with money arising from sale of war spoils. I built
a theatre adjoining the temple of Apollo, on ground for the most part
purchased from private owners, to be under the name of my son-in-law
Marcus Marcellus. Offerings from money raised by sale of war-spoil I
consecrated in the temple of Apollo, and in the temple of Vesta, and in
the temple of Mars Ultor, which cost me about 100,000,000 sesterces.
Thirty-five thousand pounds of gold,[323] crown money contributed by
the municipia and colonies of Italy for my triumphs, I refunded in my
fifth consulship [B.C. 29], and subsequently, as often as I was greeted
Imperator, I refused to receive crown money, though the municipia and
colonies had decreed it with as much warmth as before.
22. I three times gave a show of gladiators in my own name, and five
times in the name of my sons and grandsons; in which shows about 10,000
men contended. I twice gave the people a show of athletes collected from
all parts of the world in my own name, and a third time in the name of my
grandson. I gave games in my own name four times, as representing other
magistrates twenty-three times. In behalf of the quindecimviri, and as
master of the college, with M. Agrippa as colleague, I gave the Secular
games in the consulship of C. Furnius and C. Silanus [B.C. 17]. In my
thirteenth consulship [B.C. 2], I gave for the first time the games of
Mars which, since that time, the consuls have given in successive years.
I gave the people wild-beast hunts, of African animals, in my own name
and that of my sons and grandsons, in the circus and forum, and the
amphitheatres twenty-six times, in which about 3,500 animals were killed.
23. I gave the people the spectacle of a naval battle on the other side
of the Tiber, in the spot where now is the grove of the Cæsars, the
ground having been hollowed out to a length of 1,800 feet, and a breadth
of 1,200 feet, in which thirty beaked ships, triremes or biremes, and
a still larger number of smaller vessels contended. In these fleets,
besides the rowers, there fought about three thousand men.
24. In the temples of all the states of the province of Asia, I replaced
the ornaments after my victory, which he with whom I had fought had taken
into his private possession from the spoliation of the temples. There
were about eighty silver statues of me, some on foot, some equestrian,
some in chariots, in various parts of the city. These I removed, and from
the money thus obtained I placed golden offerings in the temple of Apollo
in my own name and in that of those who had honoured me by the statues.
25. I cleared the sea of pirates. In that war I captured about 30,000
slaves, who had run away from their masters, and had borne arms against
the republic, and handed them back to their owners to be punished. The
whole of Italy took the oath to me spontaneously, and demanded that I
should be the leader in the war in which I won the victory off Actium.
The provinces of the Gauls, the Spains, Africa, Sicily, Sardinia, took
the same oath. Among those who fought under my standards were more than
seven hundred Senators, eighty-three of whom had been, or have since
been, consuls up to the time of my writing this, 170 members of the
sacred colleges.
26. I extended the frontiers of all the provinces of the Roman people,
which were bordered by tribes that had not submitted to our Empire. The
provinces of the Gauls, and Spains and Germany, bounded by the Ocean from
Gades to the mouth of the river Elbe, I reduced to a peaceful state. The
Alps, from the district near the Adriatic to the Tuscan sea, I forced to
remain peaceful without waging unprovoked war with any tribe. My fleet
sailed through the Ocean from the mouth of the Rhine towards the rising
sun, up to the territories of the Cimbri, to which point no Roman had
penetrated, up to that time, either by land or sea. The Cimbri, and
Charydes, and Semnones and other peoples of the Germans, belonging to
the same tract of country, sent ambassadors to ask for the friendship
of myself and the Roman people. By my command and under my auspices,
two armies were marched into Æthiopia and Arabia, called Felix, nearly
simultaneously, and large hostile forces of both these nations were cut
to pieces in battle, and a large number of towns were captured. Æthiopia
was penetrated as far as the town Nabata, next to Meroe. Into Arabia the
army advanced into the territories of the Sabæi as far as the town Mariba.
27. I added Egypt to the Empire of the Roman people. When I might have
made the Greater Armenia a province after the assassination of its king
Artaxes, I preferred, on the precedent of our ancestors, to hand over
that kingdom to Tigranes, son of King Artavasdes, grandson of King
Tigranes, by the hands of Tiberius Nero, who was then my stepson. The
same nation being afterwards in a state of revolt and rebellion, I handed
over to the government of King Ariobarzanes, son of Artabazus, king of
the Medes, after it had been reduced by my son Gaius; and after his death
to his son Artavasdes, upon whose assassination I sent Tigranes, a member
of the royal family of the Armenians, into that kingdom. I recovered all
the provinces on the other side of the Adriatic towards the East and
Cyrenæ, which were by this time for the most part held by various kings,
and before them Sicily and Sardinia which had been overrun by an army of
slaves.
28. I settled colonies of soldiers in Africa, Sicily, Macedonia, both
the Spains, Achaia, Asia, Syria, Gallia Narbonensis, Pisidia. Italy has
twenty-eight colonies established under my auspices, which have in my
lifetime become very densely inhabited and places of great resort.
29. A large number of military standards, which had been lost under other
commanders, I recovered, after defeating the enemy, from Spain and Gaul
and the Dalmatians. I compelled the Parthians to restore the spoils and
standards of three Roman armies, and to seek as suppliants the friendship
of the Roman people. These standards I laid up in the inner shrine
belonging to the temple of Mars Ultor.
30. The tribes of the Pannonii, which before I was _princeps_ an army of
the Roman people never reached, having been subdued by Tiberius Nero,
who was then my stepson and legate [B.C. 11], I added to the Empire of
the Roman people, and I extended the frontier of Illyricum to the bank
of the river Danube. And when an army of the Daci crossed to the south
of that river it was conquered and put to flight under my auspices; and
subsequently my army, being led across the Danube, forced the tribes of
the Daci to submit to the orders of the Roman people.
31. To me there were often sent embassies of kings from India, who had
never before been seen in the camp of any Roman general. By embassadors
the Bastarnæ and the Scythians and the kings of the Sarmatians, who live
on both sides of the river Don, and the king of the Albani and of the
Hiberi and of the Medes, sought our friendship.
32. Kings of the Parthians—Tiridates, and afterwards Phrates, son of
King Phrates—fled to me for refuge; of the Medes Artavasdes; of the
Adiabeni Artaxares; of the Britons Dumnobellaunus and Tim ...;[324] of
the Marcomanni and Suebi....[324] Phrates, king of the Parthians, son of
Orodes, sent all his sons and grandsons to me in Italy, not because he
had been overcome in war, but seeking our friendship by means of his own
sons as pledges. And a very large number of other nations experienced the
good faith of the Roman people while I was _princeps_, with whom before
that time there had been no diplomatic or friendly intercourse.
33. The nations of the Parthians and the chief men of the Medes by means
of embassies sought and accepted from me kings of those peoples—the
Parthians Vonones, son of King Phrates, grandson of King Orodes; the
Medes Ariobarzanes, son of King Artavasdes, grandson of King Ariobarzanes.
34. In my sixth and seventh consulships [B.C. 28, 27], when I had
extinguished the flames of civil war, having by universal consent become
possessed of the sole direction of affairs, I transferred the republic
from my power to the will of the Senate and people of Rome. For which
good service on my part I was by decree of the Senate called by the name
of Augustus, and the door-posts of my house were covered with laurels
in the name of the state, and a civic crown was fixed up over my door,
and a golden shield was placed in the Curia Iulia, which it was declared
by its inscription the Senate and people of Rome gave me in recognition
of valour, clemency, justice, piety. After that time I took precedence
of all in rank, but of power I had nothing more than those who were my
colleagues in the several magistracies.
35. While I was administering my thirteenth consulship [B.C. 2], the
Senate and equestrian order and the Roman people with one consent greeted
me as FATHER OF MY COUNTRY, and decreed that it should be inscribed in
the vestibule of my house, and in the Senate house, and in the Forum
Augustum, and under the chariot which was there placed in my honour in
accordance with a senatorial decree.
When I wrote this I was in my seventy-sixth year [A.D. 13-14].
FOOTNOTES
[1] _Ad capita bubula._ Lanciani (_Remains of Ancient Rome_, p. 139) says
that this was the name of a lane at the eastern corner of the Palatine.
Others have thought it to be the name of the house, as the _ad malum
Punicum_ in which Domitian was born (Suet., _Dom._ 1). So later we hear
of a house at Rome _quæ est ad Palmam_ (_Codex Theod._, p. 3). The house
may have had its name from a frieze with ox-heads on it, like the tomb of
Metella, which came to be called _Capo-di-bove_. It seems less easy to
account for a lane being so called. See also p. 205.
[2] C. I. L., vol. i. p. 279.
[3] Cicero, _ad Q. Fr._ 1, 1, 21; 1, 2, 7. Velleius Pat., 2, 59; Sueton.,
_Aug._ 3.
[4] The plebeian Atii Balbi do not seem to have been important. M. Atius
Balbus was prætor in B.C. 62 (with Cæsar), governor of Sardinia B.C.
61-60, and in B.C. 59 was one of the XX viri under the Julian land law
(Cic., _ad Att._ ii. 4).
[5] These and other stories will be found in Sueton., _Aug._ 94, and Dio,
45, 2. Vergil makes skilful use of them in _Æn._, vi. 797, _sqq._
[6] Antony, when he wished to depreciate Augustus, asserted that his
great-grandfather had a rope-walk at Thurii; and some such connection of
his ancestors with that place may account for the cognomen, which would
naturally be dropped afterwards (Suet., _Aug._ 7).
[7] The marriage could not have taken place earlier than the middle of
B.C. 57, for when Atia’s first husband died Philippus was in Syria. He
was succeeded by Gabinius in B.C. 57, and reached Italy in time to stand
for the consulship, the elections that year being at the ordinary time,
_i.e._, July (Cic., _ad Att._ 4, 2).
[8] L. Marcius Philippus was the son of the famous orator, and was a warm
supporter of Cicero. With his colleague as consul-designate he proposed
the prosecution of Clodius (Cic., _ad Q. Fr._ ii. 1). When the civil
war was beginning he was allowed by Cæsar to remain neutral (Cic., _ad
Att._ ix. 15; x. 4). But Cicero found him tiresome company, for he was
garrulous and prosy (_ad Att._ xii. 9, 16, 18); and in the troublous
times following the assassination of Cæsar he set little store by his
opinion (_ad Att._ xvi. 14; _ad Brut._ i. 17).
[9] The law of B.C. 52 allowed Cæsar to be “elected in his absence”
(_absentis rationem haberi_), but said nothing of his being in possession
of a province. By long prescription the Senate had the right of deciding
when a provincial governor should be “succeeded.” But then Cæsar’s term
of provincial government had been fixed by a _lex_, which was superior
to a _Senatus-consultum_; and he might also argue that if it was
unconstitutional for a man to be elected consul while holding a province,
the Senate had violated the constitution in allowing Pompey to be consul
in B.C. 52.
[10] The Senate did not insist on the _professio_, from which Cæsar had
been exempted by name in Pompey’s law. But its contention was that it
still retained the right of naming the date at which a man was to leave
his province, and of deciding in regard to an election whether a man was
a legal candidate, which might depend on other things besides the making
or not making a _professio_.
[11] The difficulty was that both consuls were absent. There was no
one therefore capable of holding a consular election. But as the other
curule magistrates still existed, “the _auspicia_ had not returned to
the Fathers,” who could not therefore name an interrex. The Prætor
Lepidus—though willing—could not “create” a _maius imperium_. The only
way out of it was to name a Dictator (_com. hab. causa_); but one of
the consuls, according to tradition, could alone do that. Eventually
Lepidus, by a special vote of the people was authorised to name Cæsar
as Dictator—which had precedents in the cases of Fabius Maximus and
Sulla—and Cæsar, as Dictator, held the consular elections. Cæs., b. c.
ii, 21; Dio, 41, 36.
[12] Nicolas (ch. 4) says that he took the _toga virilis_ about fourteen
(περὶ ἔτη μάλιστα γεγονὼς τεσσαρακαίδεκα). But Suetonius (_Aug._ 8) says
that he spoke the _laudatio_ of his grandmother in his twelfth year, and
“four years afterwards” took the _toga virilis_.
[13] Octavius was _sui iuris_, his father being dead; his adoption
therefore required the formal passing of a _lex curiata_. Now the
opposition, supported by Antony, against this formality being carried out
was one of the grounds of Octavian’s quarrel with him in B.C. 44-3, and
the completion of it was one of the first things secured by Octavian on
his entrance into Rome in August, B.C. 43 [Appian, b. c. iii. 94; Dio,
45, 5]. This seems conclusive against the theory that Iulius adopted
him in his lifetime. Moreover all authorities speak of the adoption as
made by _Will_. Livy, _Ep._ 116, _testamento in nomen adoptatus est_;
Velleius, ii. 59, _testamentum apertum est, quo C. Octavium nepotem
sororis suæ Iuliæ adoptabat_. See also Appian, b. c. iii. 11; Dio, 45, 3;
Plutarch, _Brut._ 22. It is true that Nicolas—speaking of the triumph of
B.C. 46—(§ 8) says υἱὸν ἤδη πεποιημἐνος. But if he means anything more
than “regarding him as a son,” he twice afterwards contradicts himself:
See § 17 ἀπήγγελλον τά τε ἄλλα καὶ ὡς ἐν ταῖς διαθήκαις ὡς υἱὸς εἴη
Καίσαρι ἐγγεγραμμένος. _Cf._ § 13.
[14] Cicero, _ad Att._ xii. 48, 49; Nicholas, § 14; Valer. Max., 1, 15,
2. For the subsequent fate of the man see Cicero, _ad Att._ xiv. 6, 7, 8;
App., b. c. iii. 2-3.
[15] The patrician _gentes_ were dying out, and it was thought good
to replenish their numbers, thus gradually forming a class of nobles
distinct from these ennobled by office. In making the Octavii patricians,
the initiative was taken by the Senate; in later times, however, the
power of creating _patricii_ was conferred on the imperator. Iulius seems
also to have done it on his own authority. (Dio, 43, 47; Suet., _Aug._ 2.)
[16] He took with him Apollodorus of Pergamus, a well-known author of a
system of rhetoric (Suet., _Aug._ 89; Strabo, 13, 4, 3; Quinct., 3, 1,
17). Other teachers of his, whether at Apollonia or elsewhere, are Areius
of Alexandria, Alexander of Pergamus, Athenodorus of Tarsus (Suet. _l.
c._; Dio, 51, 4; Plutarch, _Ant._ 11; Nicol. Dam., § 17; Zonaras, 10, 38).
[17] Suet., _Aug._ 65; Vell. Paterc., 2, 59, 64; App., b. c. 5, 66; Dio,
48, 33. The other instance of a friend who fell into disfavour and ruin
quoted by Suetonius is Cornelius Gallus. But he does not seem to have
been at Apollonia. He was nearly three years older than Augustus, and in
B.C. 44-3 was perhaps with Pollio in Bætica. See Cic., _ad Fam._ x. 32.
[18] Nicolas, § 16; App., b. c. iii. 9-10.
[19] Dolabella consul for the last half of B.C. 44 with Antony; Pansa and
Hirtius, B.C. 43; Plancus and Dec. Brutus B.C. 42. Probably M. Brutus and
C. Cassius (or certainly the former) B.C. 41 [Plut., _Cæs._ 62; Cic., _ad
Fam._ xii. 2]. For B.C. 43 prætors and other magistrates were named, but
for the next years only consuls and tribunes.
[20] Dio, 43, 47, καὶ ἔς γε τὰ ἔθνη ἀκληρωτὶ ἐξεπέμφθησαν.
[21] M. Brutus, C. Cassius, Dec. Brutus, L. Cimber, C. Trebonius.
[22] Cic., _ad Att._ xiv. 9; Cæs., b. c. ii. 22; Plut., _Ant._ xi.
[23] Dio, 46, 60.
[24] Cæsar had auxiliaries in Spain from Aquitania B.C. 49; Cæs., b. c.
i. 39.
[25] Cicero, _ad Att._ xiv. 5, 8, 9.
[26] Livy, _Ep._ 62. Appian says that Metellus did not fight, but was
received as a friend, wintered at Salonæ, and then went home and claimed
a triumph (_Illyr._ xi.).
[27] Eutrop., v. 4.
[28] _Id._ vi. 4; Oros., v. 23.
[29] Cæs., b. c. iii. 5, 9.
[30] Livy, _Ep._ 110; App., b. c. ii. 47.
[31] _Id._, b. c. ii. 59.
[32] Cæs., _b. Alex._ 42-3.
[33] _Id._, 34-6.
[34] Cic., _ad Fam._ v. 10 (_a_), 10, 11.
[35] App., _Illyr._ 13.
[36] App., b. c. iv. 75; Dio, 47, 21. Vatinius was ill, and his late
reverses had lost him the confidence of his men, who insisted on being
transferred to Brutus.
[37] Dio, 43, 42; Horace, _Odes_, iii. 1, 13.
[38] Cæs., _b. Alex._ 48-64; _Hisp._ 7, 12.
[39] App., b. c. ii. 107.
[40] Wrongly called Aulus Albinus by Appian, b. c. ii. 48; see Klein,
_die Verwaltungsbeamten der Provinzen_, p. 83.
[41] Cic., _ad Fam._ xiii. 30, 36, 50, 78, 79; Cæs., _b. Afr._ 2, 26, 34.
[42] Cic., _ad Fam._ vi. 16, 17.
[43] Dio, 48, 17, 19; Livy, _Ep._ 123; Appian, b. c. iv. 84. A certain
M. Casinius was nominated to Sicily for B.C. 43, but did not go there,
perhaps owing to the order of the Senate (meant to support Dec. Brutus)
made on the 20th of December, B.C. 44, that all governors should retain
their provinces till farther orders (Cic., _ad Fam._ xii. 22, 25).
[44] App., b. c. ii. 48.
[45] Cic., _ad Att._ xv. 7; xvi. 3.
[46] App., b. c. iv. 2; Dio, 46, 55.
[47] Sueton., _Aug._ 47. This probably means after his accession to sole
power. According to Nicolas, § 11-12, he visited Africa with Cæsar in
B.C. 45. See p. 13. There is no record, however, of his ever having been
to Sardinia.
[48] App., b. c. v. 67. The hold of Sext. Pompeius on Sardinia was
recognised in the “treaty” of Misenum made in B.C. 39 (Dio, 48, 36; App.,
b. c. v. 72).
[49] See Note 2, p. 24.
[50] Cicero, _3 Phil._ § 26; _ad Fam._ xii. 22, 23, 30.
[51] Appian, b. c. iii. 85, 91.
[52] Appian, b. c. iv. 36, 53-56; v. 26; Dio, 48, 21-23. It seems
impossible to reconcile Appian and Dio. The course of events here
indicated agrees chiefly with Dio, whose account appears on the whole the
more reasonable.
[53] Cæs., b. c. iii., 102.
[54] _Id._, _b. Alex._ 42.
[55] Drawn up by the commissioners after the fall of Corinth, B.C. 146.
[56] Cicero, _ad Att._ xi. 15; Cæsar, b. c. ii. 56, 106; Dio, 42, 14.
[57] Servius had fought against Cæsar at Pharsalia, though his son was
with Cæsar. After the battle he retired to Samos and refused to continue
the war. See Cicero, _ad Fam._ iv. 3, 4, 11, 12; vi. 6; xiii. 17, 19, 23,
25, 28.
[58] App., b. c. v. 72.
[59] Cicero, _ad Fam._ vi. 12; App., b. c. iii. 2.
[60] See Cicero, _13 Phil._ 23 (Antony’s letter).
[61] P. Cornelius Lentulus Spinther. See his letter to Cicero, _ad Fam._
xii. 14, 15.
[62] Cæs., _b. Alex._ 66: _rebus omnibus provinciæ et finitimarum
civitatum constitutis_ is all that we are told.
[63] Dio, 47, 26. Appian gives two accounts of Bassus. In the first he
represents him as the real commander of the legions, while Sext. Iulius
was the nominal chief. He, however, gives an alternative account more in
accordance with that of Dio. See App., b. c. iii. 77; iv. 58, _sq._
[64] Cicero, _ad Att._ xiv. 9.
[65] _Id._, _ad Fam._ xii. 11 (Cassius to Cicero); xii. 12.
[66] Cicero, _ad Att._ vi. 5; Valer. Max., vi. 1, 15.
[67] Cyrene with four other cities—Apollonia, Ptolemais, Arsinoe,
Berenice—formed a Pentapolis. (Livy, _Epit._ 70.)
[68] App., b. c. I. iii. _sq._; Sall., _hist. fr._ ii. 39.
[69] Vell. Pat., ii. 34; Dio, 36, 2; Iust. 39, 5; Livy, _Epit._ 100. The
laws of Crete were left in force (Cic., _Mur._ § 74; _pro Flacc._ § 30).
[70] App., b. c. iii. 12, 16, 36; iv. 57; Dio, 47, 21.
[71] Cicero, _2 Phil._ § 97.
[72] The possibility of these legions crossing to Italy had caused no
little anxiety at Rome; Cicero, _ad Att._ xiv. 16.
[73] Cicero, _ad Att._ xv. 21.
[74] Suetonius (_Iul._ 83) says, “three-fourths”; so also does Nicolas
Dam. 17 (τρία μέρη τῶν χρημάτων). But Livy (_Ep._ 116) says “one-half”
(_ex semisse_). It is possible Livy may refer to the amount left when
the legacy of 300 sesterces to each citizen was deducted. Nicolas seems
to think, however, that this legacy was charged on the remaining fourth.
Octavian certainly undertook to pay it, but then Pinarius and Pedius
handed over their shares to him.
[75] Appian (b. c. ii. 147) says that the body itself was not seen during
Antony’s _laudatio_, but that a wax figure was displayed which by some
mechanical contrivance was made to revolve and show all the wounds.
[76] Nicolas (§ 17) would seem to send them straight to Antium. But
from Cicero’s letters it is clear that Brutus at any rate went first to
Lanuvium, _ad Att._ xiv. 10, 21; xv. 9. They seem to have gone to Antium
towards the end of May or beginning of June.
[77] Suet., _Aug._ 25.
[78] The last being the adjectival form of his original name, in
accordance with the usual custom in cases of adoption.
[79] Cicero, _ad Att._ xiv. 5, 10, 11, 12.
[80] Cicero, _ad Att._ xiv. 20, 21. Dio (45, 6) says that the introducing
tribune was Tib. Canutius. But it seems probable that this refers to a
second speech.
[81] Cic., _ad Att._ xv. 2. There is a singularly manly and frank letter
from Matius to Cicero (_ad Fam._ xi. 28), defending his attachment to
Cæsar and his services to Octavian.
[82] Appian, b. c. 3, 20, τῶν προσόδων ἐξ οὗ παρῆλθεν ἐπὶ τὴν ἀρχὴν ἐς
αὐτὸν ἀντὶ τοῦ ταμιείου συμφερομένων. The sole management of the Treasury
had been committed to Cæsar in B.C. 45 (Dio, 43, 44, τἁ δημόσια χρήματα
μόνον διοικεῖν). He had taken it out of the hands of the _quæstors_ and
appointed two _præfecti_ to manage it: but it does not seem that they had
anything to do with the money in the temple of Ops, as to which there was
some doubt as to its being “public money” in the ordinary sense.
[83] Cicero, _1 Phil._ § 17; _2 Phil._ § 93.
[84] Cicero, in _2 Phil._ § 93, seems to assume that Antony had taken the
money all at once. But from Cicero’s own letters it would seem that the
process of despoiling the temple of Ops was a gradual one, and that the
use made of the money by Antony was more or less a matter of conjecture.
On the 27th of April he writes: “You mention plundering going on at the
temple of Ops. I, too, was a witness to that at the time” (_ad Att._
xiv. 14). On the 7th of May he says that Dolabella had a great share
of it (_ad Att._ xiv. 18). In November he says that his nephew Quintus
knew all about it, and meant to reveal it to the public (_ad Att._ xvi.
14). Appian (b. c. iii. 20) makes Antony say to Octavian: “The money
transferred to my house was not so large a sum as you conjecture, nor is
any part of it in my custody now. The men in power—except Dolabella and
my brothers—divided up the whole of it as the property of a tyrant.”
[85] Cic., _ad Att._ xvi. 8.
[86] Dio, 45, 6; this seems a different case from that mentioned by App.,
b. c. iii. 47, and referred to by Cicero, _ad Att._ xvi. 15, as happening
later in this same year.
[87] See _ante_ p. 14: Dio, 45, 2; Sueton., _Aug._ 2, 10; Tac., _Ann._
xi. 25.
[88] Dio, 45, 4; Cicero, _ad Att._ xv. 3.
[89] Cicero, _2 Phil._ § 100; _ad Att._ xiv. 20, 21.
[90] _Id._, _ad Att._ xiv. 3 (9th April); xv. 4 (24th May); _2 Phil._
§ 108; Appian, b. c. iii. 5. The Senate had been induced to vote him a
bodyguard. See the letter of Brutus and Cassius to Antony in Cicero, _ad
Fam._ xi. 2.
[91] Dio, 45, 10; Cic., _ad Att._ xvi. 1. The negotiation after all
fell through on the question of Sextus’s recovering the actual house
and property of his father, much of which was in Antony’s hands (Cic.,
_ad Att._ xvi. 4; Dio, 45, 9). He refused to accept a mere money
compensation. Eventually, when the Senate had broken with Antony, it made
terms with Sextus, appointing him commander of the naval forces of the
Republic. Consequently he was proscribed by the Triumvirs. App., b. c.
iii. 4.
[92] Cic., _ad Att._ xv. 10, 11.
[93] Cicero (_2 Phil._ § 109) declares that Antony’s bodyguard was
stationed round the Senate—some of them being foreign mercenaries—and
that his opponents therefore did not venture to enter the house.
[94] Appian, b. c. iii. 29-30. But Appian in regard to the order of
events here is very confused and often wrong.
[95] Cicero, _ad Att._ xvi. 4, 5.
[96] _Id._, _1 Phil._ § 14; _ad Att._ xvi. 7; _ad Fam._ xii. 2.
[97] Nicolas (§ 30), Appian (b. c. iii. 39), Plutarch (_Ant._ 16), acquit
Augustus. The two writers who adopt Cicero’s view of the truth of the
accusation are Seneca (_de Clement._ 1, 9, 1) and Suetonius (_Aug._ 10).
See Cicero, _ad Fam._ xii. 23.
[98] _ad Att._ xv. 12.
[99] See _ante_, p. 3.
[100] He had the title _Imperator_ inherited from Cæsar (Dio, 43, 44);
but this was a mere honorary title, and could not be held to give
_imperium_. He was careful to use it however, as in the inscription
recording the formation of the triumvirate.... EMILIVS M. ANTONIVS. IMP.
CÆSAR. III VIR R.P.C. A.D. IV KAL. DEC. AD. PRID. KAL. IAN. SEXT....
[101] _Monum. Ancyr._ I, annos undeviginti natus exercitum privato
consilio et privata impensa comparavi: per quem rem publicam _dominatione
factionis oppressam in libertatem vindicavi_. Compare Cæsar, _b. civ._ 1,
22, ut se et Populum Romanum _factione paucorum oppressum in libertatem
vindicaret_.
[102] Cicero, _ad Att._ xvi. 8 and 9.
[103] _Id._, _ad Fam._ xii. 23.
[104] App., b. c. iii. 43-45; Cic., _3 Phil._ § 10; Dio, 45, 13.
[105] Cic., _ad Att._ xvi. 10, 13 a, 13 b, 14.
[106] _Id._, _3 Phil._ § 19.
[107] _pestifera_, _13 Phil._ § 19.
[108] Cicero, _3 Phil._ §§ 19-27; _5 Phil._ § 23; _13 Phil._ § 19; App.,
b. c. iii. 45.
[109] Cic., _ad Att._ xvi. 11.
[110] _Id._ xvi. 14.
[111] _Id._ xvi. 15. It seems from Appian (b. c. iii. 31) that Octavian
was not a candidate, but he was generally supposed to wish it, and that
therefore many were going to vote for him. He ostensibly supported
another candidate—Flaminius. Antony stopped the election on the ground
that there was no need to fill up a vacancy so late in the year. This
settled the question. But it is doubtful whether this does not refer to
an earlier occasion.
[112] Cicero, _ad Att._ xvi. 15, 3.
[113] _Id._, _ad Fam._ xi. 6; _3 Phil._ §§ 37-39.
[114] The passages are Cicero, _5 Phil._ §§ 45-47; _11 Phil._ § 20; _13
Phil._ § 39; _Monum. Ancyr._ § 3; Livy, _Ep._ 118; C. I. L. x. 8375;
Suet., _Aug._ 10, 26. Dio (40, 29) says that he was in the Senate ἐν
τοῖς τεταμιευκόσι—_inter quæstorios_. This may be a misunderstanding of
Cicero’s proposal that for _purposes of election_ he was to count as
having been quæstor. The rank of proprætor was necessary for his command
in the army, not for his entrance into the Senate.
[115] Pollio in Bætica, Lepidus in Gallia Narbonensis and Hispania
Citerior, and Plancus in Northern Gaul.
[116] _Laudandum, ornandum, tollendum_ (Cic., _ad Fam._ xi. 20, 21). This
epigram seems to have been inspired by the exultant hopes roused by the
news of the battle of Forum Gallorum.
[117] _Monum. Ancyr._ § 1, respublica ne quid detrimenti caperet me
pro prætore cum consulibus providere iussit. This was a general order,
neither Antony nor any particular _hostis_ being named.
[118] Octavian first assumed the _fasces_ (symbol of imperium) on the 7th
of January (C. I. L. x. 8375.)
[119] Cicero, _8 Phil._ §§ 25-28.
[120] The letter is preserved in the 13th Philippic, with Cicero’s
bitter comments. It dwells on the favours and honours voted to the chief
assassins, as well as the abolition of many of Cæsar’s _acta_. Antony
also asserts that Lepidus and Plancus are on his side and warns Octavian
that Cicero is playing him false.
[121] The country is very flat, but was intersected by drains and
watercourses, making military evolutions difficult, if not impossible, in
the rainy season. (App., b. c. 3, 65.)
[122] Such as the cavalry engagement between Pontius Aquila and Tib.
Munatius Plancus at Pollentia (Dio, 46, 38). Octavian also suffered some
loss by the desertion of some Gallic cavalry (_ib._ 37).
[123] Cic., _ad Brutum_, ii. 2.
[124] In enrolling legions Bassus was probably justified by the _SCtum
ultimum_, which included the prætors. He was known to be a supporter of
Antony, and might be thought capable of occupying Rome in his interest.
We shall see afterwards that he joined him in Cisalpine Gaul. Some rumour
of his being likely to act in this way had been rife before January 1st,
when he was only prætor-designate. (See Cic., _ad Att._ xvi. 1; _ad
Brut._ i. 3.)
[125] Cicero says of Octavian that he _secundum proelium fecit_ because
he _castra multarum legionum paucis cohortibus tutatus est_ (_14 Phil._ §
28). The attack on the camp is not mentioned elsewhere (_ib._ § 37). For
his being greeted as Imperator see C. I. L. ix. 8375.
[126] Cic., _ad Brut._ 1, 3, 5.
[127] Suet., _Aug._ 11; Cic., _ad Brut._ i. 6.
[128] Cic., _ad Fam._ xi. 21.
[129] Dio, 46, 41; Livy, _Ep._ 118.
[130] Cic., _ad Brut._ i. 15.
[131] _Id._, _ad Fam._ xi. 20, 21, see _ante_ p. 52.
[132] _Id._, _ad Brut._ i. 4; App., b. c. iii. 82; Dio, 46, 42; Plut.,
_Cic._ 46. There was evidently some rumour of Cicero intending to be
consul, though he speaks with rather affected indignation of Octavian
wishing to be elected also (_ad Brut._ i. 10).
[133] Cic., _ad Brut._ 1, 3.
[134] _Id._ § 4.
[135] Cic., _ad Fam._ xi. 10.
[136] He was perhaps deceived by the report that Octavian’s legions had
taken an oath not to fight against any that had served under Iulius
Cæsar. This applied to some men at present with Antony. But Dio implies
that the oath was at the secret instigation of Octavian himself (Dio, 46,
42).
[137] Cic., _ad Fam._ xi. 13.
[138] _Id._ xi. 19.
[139] _Id._ xi. 20.
[140] _Id._ xi. 14.
[141] Cic., _ad Fam._ x. 23.
[142] _Id._ x. 24.
[143] _Id._ xi. 12 and 14.
[144] Cic., _ad Fam._ x. 16.
[145] _Id._ x. 35; xii. 35.
[146] _Id._ xi. 26, _cp._ xi. 13.
[147] _Id._, _ad. Brut._ i. 10.
[148] A similar technical difficulty had occurred in B.C. 49 (both
consuls being absent, and unwilling, of course, to name a dictator), and
had been got over by the nomination of a dictator by the prætor under a
special law. See p. 8; Cic., _ad Fam._ x. 26; _ad M. Brut._ i. 5.
[149] Plancus (Cic., _ad Fam._ x. 29) expresses surprise that Cæsar
wished to give up the glory of defeating Antony for the sake of “a two
months’ consulship.” But this only shows that Plancus did not understand
Octavian’s object or policy.
[150] Suet., _Aug._ 26; Dio, 46, 43; Plut., _Pomp._ 58. Appian (b. c. 3,
82), without alluding to this scene, regards the application itself as
the result of a secret intrigue with Cicero, and Cicero’s exclamation, if
made, may have been intended as encouraging and not sarcastic.
[151] The number given by Appian (b. c. iii. 88). Octavian had five
legions when he went to Gaul: two raised in Campania of veterans, one of
_tirones_, the Martia and Quarta (App., b. c. iii. 47). The other three
must have been made up from the armies of Pansa and Hirtius. None of
the veteran legions in these two armies would consent to follow Decimus
Brutus (Cic., _ad Fam._ xi. 19).
[152] Cic., _ad Brut._ 1, 18.
[153] _Ib._ and App., b. c. iii. 90.
[154] The panic had been increased by some damage done by his soldier on
the march to properties of known anti-Cæsareans.
[155] Confiscation of property and the forbidding of “fire and water”
followed as a matter of course. One of the assassins—P. Servilius
Casca—was tribune, and as such could not legally be condemned, but he
vacated his tribuneship by flying from Rome and was condemned with the
rest.
[156] The Senate had nothing to do with this _quæstio_, which was
established by a _lex_, but its attitude to Octavian amounted to a
condonation if not an active approval.
[157] According to Appian (b. c. iii. 97), Pollio for some time declined
to join Antony and Lepidus. He seems to have done so when their outlawry
was removed.
[158] Decimus Brutus first tried to reach Ravenna, hoping to sail
to Macedonia and join M. Brutus. Headed back by Cæsar’s advance, he
recrossed the Alps (being gradually deserted by his men) and trusted
himself to a Gaul, who had received favours from him of old. But his host
communicated with Antony, and by his orders put him to death. There were
other versions of his death. Perhaps neither Antony nor Cæsar cared to
ask questions so long as he was dead. (App., b. c. iii. 97-98; Dio, 46,
53; Velleius Pat., ii. 64; Livy, _Ep._ 120.)
[159] Plancus did not accompany Antony into Italy; he stayed in Gaul,
busying himself with the foundation of Lugdunum, and apparently
suppressing some movements in the Eastern Alps, for at the end of the
year coming home to enter on his consulship, he celebrated a triumph _ex
Rhætis_ [Inscrip. Neap., 4089; Fast. Capitol. 29 Dec. A. V. 711.] Pollio,
who had presently to assent to the proscription of his father-in-law, L.
Quintius, was left in charge of Transpadane Gaul, to arrange for lands
for the veterans. It was in this business that he came across Vergil and
his farm.
[160] Daughter of Fulvia by her first husband, P. Clodius.
[161] Plut., _Ant._ 19; App., b. c. iv. 6; Dio, 46, 44.
[162] The usual interval (_tres nundinæ_) for _promulgatio_ was dispensed
with.
[163] Appian, b. c. iv. 5; Livy, _Ep._ 120. Of the 69 names given by
Appian, he records the escape of 31. This tallies roughly with the
discrepancy between his and Livy’s reckoning.
[164] Appian, b. c. iv. 36.
[165] Suet., _Aug._ 27.
[166] Dio, 47, 14.
[167] _Id._ 47, 16-17.
[168] App., b. c. 4, 34.
[169] _Lassam crudelitatem_, Sen. _de Clem._ 1, 9, 2. The other opinions
referred to are Velleius, ii. 66; App., b. c. iv. 42, 45; Plut., _Ant._
21; Dio, 47, 7; Sueton., _Aug._ 27. For Toranius, see Nic. Dam. 2.
[170] Sueton., _Aug._ 61; Dio, 47, 17; [Tacit.] _de orat._ 29.
[171] Cicero, _13 Phil._ §§ 8-12, 50; Velleius, ii. 73. The decree was
passed on the 20th of March, B.C. 43.
[172] Dio, 48, 17 _sq._; Livy, _Ep._ 123.
[173] App., b. c. iv. 85; Dio, 47, 36; Livy, _Ep._ 123.
[174] Dio, 51, 2; Suet., _Aug._ 13.
[175] At any rate the head never reached Rome, but was lost at sea. App.,
b. c. iv. 135; Dio, 47, 49; Plut., _Ant._, 22; _Brut._ 53; Sueton.,
_Aug._ 13.
[176] Ulpian (dig. 48, 24) quotes this lost autobiography; see _Mon.
Ancyr._ § 3.
[177] The first meeting of Antony and Cleopatra, when the queen was rowed
up the Cydnus in her barge, dressed as Venus with attendant cupids, seems
to have been in the autumn of B.C. 42 (Plut., _Anton._ 25-6.). He had
seen her once before in B.C. 56 when he accompanied Gabinius to restore
her father. But she must have been a mere child then.
[178] These legions had behaved badly at Placentia, demanding a sum of
money from the inhabitants. Calenus and Ventidius may have justified
their action on this score (Dio, 48, 10).
[179] From _caliga_, “a soldier’s boot.”
[180] Dio, 48, 12.
[181] Appian, b. c. 4, 30; Dio, 48, 31. Livy, however (_Ep._ 121), says
_M. Lepido fuso_, as though he had resisted and had been beaten.
[182] Livy, _Ep._ 126; Velleius, ii. 74; App., b. c. v. 48-49; Dio, 48,
14; Seneca, _de Clem._ 1, 11, 1. The uncertainty of historical testimony
is illustrated by the fact that both Dio and Appian name C. Canutius (Tr.
Pl. B.C. 44) among the victims at Perusia, while Velleius (ii. 64) says
that he was the first to suffer under the proscription in B.C. 43.
[183] C. I. L., i. 697.
[184] This was to safeguard Cn. Domitius Ahenobarbus. There is some
doubt, however, as to his having been an assassin. Cocceius denied it
(App., b. c. v. 62). Suetonius (Nero 3) does the same. But Cicero (_2
Phil._ §§ 27, 30) says that he was; and Appian himself does the same (b.
c. v. 59). Dio thrice speaks of him as a σφαγεύς (48, 7, 29, 54). At
any rate he was condemned by the _lex Pedia_, as though he had been an
assassin. He may have been one of those who joined the assassins on the
Capitol _after_ the murder.
[185] Appian, b. c. v. 65. It has been doubted whether this or the
meeting of B.C. 37 was the one to which Horace accompanied his patron
Mæcenas. In favour of this one is the mention of Cocceius Nerva by Horace
(_Sat._ 1 v. 28, 50), against it is the way in which he is mentioned
with Mæcenas as aversos _soliti_ componere amicos, as if he had been so
engaged before. But though in the second meeting he is not mentioned by
Appian, he may have been there. Something has been made of the mention
of the croaking frogs (l. 14), as this meeting could hardly have been
earlier than July, when the Italian frogs are said to be silent. For the
Ovations see C. I. L., i. p. 461.
[186] This was one of the chief grievances. Hor., _Ep._ ix. 9, _minatus
urbi vincla, que detraxerat servis amicus perfidis_.
[187] Hor., _Od._ ii. 1, 15-16; Dio, 48, 41; C. I. L., i. p. 461. Pollio
after this withdrew from active political life and devoted himself to
literature. He seems to have taken no part in the subsequent quarrels
between Antony and Augustus.
[188] Dio, 48, 19, 48; Hor., _Epod._ 9, 17.
[189] The first period ended on the last day of B.C. 38; but neither
Antony nor Cæsar had laid down their imperium of office. They now assumed
that it went on from the first day of B.C. 37, the want of legal sanction
during the intervening months being ignored. There is no certain trace of
this second triumvirate having been confirmed by a _lex_; yet one would
think that they would have taken care to have that formality observed.
See p. 143.
[190] Cicero, _ad Fam._ xi. 9; Cicero himself calls him _levissimus_, _ad
Brut._ 1, 15, § 9.
[191] In B.C. 52 Cicero had wished to give his daughter Tullia in
marriage to Tiberius Claudius Nero (Cic., _Att._ 6, 6.).
[192] He was quæstor in B.C. 48, and therefore was not born later than
B.C. 78. Livia was born B.C. 58.
[193] Even Suetonius, not much inclined to speak good of Augustus, admits
that he _dilexit et probavit unice ac perseveranter_.
[194] Suetonius (c. 22) says that he had two ovations—after Philippi and
after the bellum Siculum. But if an ovation was decreed after Philippi,
it was not celebrated till B.C. 40, upon the reconciliation with Antony.
The second was this. Another had been voted in B.C. 43 after Mutina, but
not celebrated (C. I. L. i. p. 461). See also p. 100.
[195] Appian (b. c. v. 132) says that they elected him perpetual tribune
(αὐτὸν ... εἕλοντο δήμαρχον ἐς ἀεί). Dio (49, 15) only says that they
gave him the personal sacredness of the tribunes and the right of sitting
on their bench. Orosius (6, 18, 34) says that the Senate voted _ut in
perpetuum tribuniciæ potestatis esset_. We shall have to discuss this
later on, but it must be said at once that Augustus was never tribune,
and that it seems doubtful whether the _tribunicia potestas_ was given in
its full sense at this time.
[196] Dio, 49, 14; Strabo, x. 4, 9.
[197] Dio, 49, 34.
[198] App., b. c. v. 132; Suet., _Aug._ 32.
[199] Or, as they were also called Vetus, and Nova Africa. The former was
the old province formed of the territory of Carthage, the latter the new
province formed after the battle of Thapsus (B.C. 46) of which the first
governor was the historian Sallust. See pp. 23-4.
[200] Appian, _Illyr._ 17; Dio, 49, 34, 38.
[201] Appian, _Illyr._ 18-21; Dio, 49, 37. The Iapydes (a wild tribe) had
first been attacked in B.C. 129 by C. Sempronius and subdued after some
disasters. (Livy, _Ep._ 59.)
[202] Pliny, _N. H._ 36 § 121.
[203] The Porticus Octaviæ, of which an arch remains, was a rectangular
cloister enclosing the temples of Jupiter Stator and Iuno Regina.
[204] Dio, 49, 15; Sueton., _Aug._ 72.
[205] Horace, _Epod._ ix. ii.; _cp._ Ov., _Met._ 15, 826.
[206] An anecdote has been preserved illustrating the policy of “sitting
on the hedge,” which must have prevailed among many while the contest
between the two leaders was still undecided. After Actium, when Cæsar
landed (the time and place are charmingly vague), a man offered a
_cornix_ which had been taught to say, “Ave, Cæsar, imperator et victor.”
He bought the bird at a large price, whereat the man’s partner, being
jealous, urged that he should be forced to bring another bird, which
when brought repeated as it had been taught, “_Ave, Antoni, imperator et
victor_.”
[207] Dio, 50, 5; but Suetonius, _Aug._ 17, says that he was declared a
_hostis_.
[208] Dio, 50, 5. Thus Horace, on hearing the rumours of Antony’s defeat,
exclaims (somewhat prematurely), _Epod._ ix. 27:
“_Terra marique victus hostis punico,_
_lugubre mutavit sagum._”
[209] Bocchus of Mauretania, Tarchondemus of Cilicia Aspera, Archilaus of
Cappadocia, Amyntas of Lycaonia and Galatia, Philadelphus of Paphlagonia,
Malchus of Arabia, Herod of Judæa, Sadalas of Thrace, Polemon of Pontus.
(Plut., _Ant._ 61.)
[210] Dio, 50, 14-23.
[211] Dio, 50-31, says, ὑετός τε ἐν τούτῳ λαβρὸς καὶ ζάλη πολλή. But
Plutarch, _Ant._ 65, says that after four days of stormy weather on the
day of battle νηνεμίας καὶ γαλὴνης γενομένης συνῄεσαν.
[212] Suet., _Aug._ 17.
[213] The earlier writers, Horace (_Od._ i. 37, 27) and Velleius (2, 87),
seem to have no doubt about the snake story. Livy (as we have him) says
nothing either way except that she died by suicide (_Ep._ 133). It is the
later writers who express the doubt, Suet., _Aug._ 17; Plut., _Ant._ 86;
Dio, 51, 14.
[214] This word—one of the financial terms borrowed from Sicily (lit. “a
basket”)—was perhaps not commonly used in the restricted sense in the
time of Augustus, though the thing existed. Into the emperor’s _fisc_
went the revenues of the imperial provinces; but the balance in the case
of most was not large. Cicero indeed (_pro lege Manil_, § 14) says that
none of the provinces except Asia did much more than pay its expenses.
This was probably an exaggeration, but not a very great one.
[215] This, it should be remembered, was exclusive of the legions
regularly raised for certain provinces and stationed in them.
[216] _Mon. Ancyr._ 3, 16.
[217] Traces of the work of Augustus in provincial towns may still be
seen, as at Nismes and other towns in South-eastern France.
[218] Horace, _Odes_ iii. 3.