a digression in his description of Delphi, the Gauls invaded Greece
under the leadership of a certain Brennus, the same name, it will be
observed, as that borne by the conqueror of Rome (the word _Brennus_
has been said to mean "king"; but Celtic scholars are not agreed upon
the point). His forces are said to have amounted to 150,000 infantry,
a figure on which the authorities are fairly unanimous, and cavalry
variously estimated at from 60,000 to 10,000.[31] The Greeks, though
in a very depressed condition, roused themselves to resist. It was not
a choice, as it had been two centuries before, between freedom and
servitude; it was a question of life or death. The barbarians spared
no one, and if they could not be checked in their advance, Greece
would be turned into a desert. The stand was to be made, as of old,
at Thermopylæ. The comparison between the forces led by Leonidas and
those now assembled is interesting. The most numerous contingent was
from a nation which scarcely appears in the history of Greece at its
best days, the Ætolians. "Very numerous and including every arm," says
Pausanias. Their heavy-armed infantry numbered 9,000. The other figures
he does not give, or they have disappeared from his text. The whole
force may have amounted to between thirty and forty thousand.
A battle that was fought in the Pass ended greatly to the advantage of
the Greeks. The Gauls with their long and unwieldy swords and cumbrous
shields were no match for their antagonists, though they fought with
desperate valour. Their cavalry, the strongest arm they possessed,
could not act on account of the nature of the ground. The result was
that they were driven back with very heavy loss, while the Greeks had
but forty killed.
Brennus, who seems to have had some military ability, seems to have
become aware that the Ætolians made up the most numerous and effective
part of the Greek army. He conceived the idea of detaching them by
sending a force under his second-in-command to ravage Ætolia. The
stratagem succeeded. The Ætolians, on hearing of the movement, hastened
to march to the defence of their country. They were too late to save
two of their frontier towns, which were stormed and sacked in the most
brutal manner. But they were in time to exact a heavy vengeance from
the barbarians. Of the fifty thousand who had been detached on this
expedition, less than half returned to the camp at Thermopylæ.
The incidents that followed bear a curious resemblance to the history
of the first defence of Thermopylæ. The path by which the Persians,
through the treachery of Ephialtes, were able to take the defenders of
the pass in the rear was again used for the same purpose. The Phocian
pickets were surprised as before, being hindered by the mist from
seeing the Gauls till these were close upon them. But there was no
obstinate determination among the Greeks to die upon the ground. They
were carried off by the Athenian fleet, which from the first had been
in attendance, keeping as close as possible to the shore.
The object which now roused the cupidity of the barbarians was the
shrine of Delphi with its treasury, still rich in the offerings of many
generations of worshippers and inquirers, though it had not altogether
escaped the hand of the spoiler.[32] As in the Persian war, the
terrified inhabitants inquired of the god whether they should remove
or conceal the sacred treasure. Again, as before, the answer was that
the god would take care of his own. "I will provide, and with me the
Maidens veiled in white," were the words of the oracle. The greater
part of the army mustered at Thermopylæ had gone home; but there were
some thousands who remained to protect Delphi. The god did not disdain
to use their services, though the most effective protection came--so
runs the story--from his own interference. The ground on which the
Gauls had pitched their camp was shaken throughout the day by repeated
shocks of earthquake, while overhead the thunder rolled and the
lightning flashed incessantly. Through the darkened atmosphere might
be seen the flashing arms of warriors who were more than mortal--one
of them, it was said, the hero Pyrrhus, son of Achilles, who had met
his death at Delphi many centuries before, and had ever since been
worshipped as a local hero. That day, however, the Gauls held their
own; many of the Phocians, in particular, were slain. But the night
that followed was one of terrible suffering. A sharp frost set in, and
following the frost came a heavy fall of snow. The snow symbolised
"the maidens vested in white"--such, at least, was the rationalistic
explanation given in after years. Nor was this all: great masses of
stone from Parnassus, and rolling into the camp of the barbarians
crushed as many as twenty or thirty by a single blow. The next day the
Greek garrison at Delphi advanced against the invaders, the main body
making a front attack, the Phocians, who were well acquainted with
the country, assailing the rear. The Gauls did not lack in courage or
firmness. Suffering though they did intensely from the cold, they made
a resolute stand, and did not retreat till their leader was severely
wounded and carried fainting off the field. Again the night was more
fatal than the day. After dark a panic fear fell upon the camp. The
barbarians seemed to see and hear enemies everywhere, and turned their
arms upon each other. After this their destruction was certain. To a
host without discipline a retreat is fatal. The Gauls were without
stores, for they reckoned to be supported by the countries through
which they passed. But now the victorious enemy hung upon their rear,
and cut off any stragglers that ventured to leave the main army. Famine
and the incessant attacks of the pursuers reduced their numbers till
there was but a scanty remnant of the great host that a few weeks
before had descended on Northern Greece. Brennus, it is said, poisoned
himself, unable to face his people at home after so disastrous a
campaign.
Pausanias tells us that not one of the invading Gauls quitted Greece
alive. It is hardly probable that this is true; and other writers gave
a different account. What is certain is that one great division of the
swarm that had descended from Northern into Southern Europe met with a
very different fortune from that which overtook Brennus. This took a
more easterly route, and plundering and destroying as it went reached
the shores of the Hellespont. (This seems to have happened in 278 B.C.,
the year after that in which Delphi had been attacked.) The Gauls cast
covetous glances on the rich territories of Asia, now separated from
them by only a narrow stretch of water, and in one or another contrived
to reach them. One division seized a few small vessels and boats, and,
as no sort of opposition was attempted, ferried themselves across; the
other was actually transported by an Asiatic Greek prince, who was
contending with his brother for the kingdom of Bithynia. They secured
the victory for him, but Bithynia, and indeed the whole of Western
Asia Minor, paid a heavy price for their help. Their history during
the next few years is very obscure, but we may gather that they roamed
from province to province, laying waste all the countries which they
traversed. The unwarlike inhabitants of Asia Minor were quite powerless
to check them. After some twelve years Antiochus, King of Syria, son
of one of the great generals trained by Alexander, undertook the task,
and accomplished it with such success that he earned the surname of
_Soter_, "the Saviour." He could not indeed expel them; in fact, so far
was their power from being broken that in 261 Antiochus lost his life
in a battle with them. But the general result of the war was that the
invaders were glad to settle down in a definite region which was ceded
to them, and which was known by the name of Galatia, or Gallo-pæcia.
The Galatians afterwards played an important part in history. But with
this we are not now concerned.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 31: Pausanias says that every trooper had two mounted
attendants, themselves practised warriors and ready to supply him with
a fresh horse, or even to take his place in the ranks. They must have
had therefore much mobility, a phrase with which we have lately become
very familiar.]
[Footnote 32: The treasury was robbed by the Phocians in 346, in what
was called the Second Sacred War. The Phocians were condemned to make
restitution by paying a fine of 10,000 talents (£2,500,000), but it is
certain that they were never able to pay this amount. We may be sure,
on the other hand, that many offerings had been made in the intervening
time, and that as the treasury had remained intact for twenty years, it
probably contained considerable wealth.]
II.
THE SWARM FROM THE NORTH
For a century and a half after the events recorded in my last chapter,
no important southward movement of the northern nations took place.
The destruction of one great host of Gaul and the permanent settlement
of another in Western Asia must have diminished the population of the
region beyond the Alps, and lightened the pressure on the means of
living. Rome was not called upon to meet any powerful army of invaders;
a fortunate circumstance, when we consider the exhaustion that must
have followed the terrible struggle of the Second Punic War. After the
wars of the first half of the second century B.C., which practically
reduced the successors of Alexander to insignificance, Rome even began
to advance her frontiers northward.
Curiously enough these successes had the effect of bringing down on
the Republic a more formidable attack, the invasion led by Brennus
not excepted, than she ever had had to meet before. For some years
previous to the year 113 B.C., a homeless people called Cimbri, a
word variously translated by friends and enemies as "champions" or
"robbers," had been wandering about in the regions north of the Danube.
The word suggests the well-known name of _Cymri_, but the resemblance
of sound is deceptive. The Cimbri were really of the Germanic stock.
In fact a remnant of the tribe preserved the name for many years
afterwards in what seems to have been its original habitation, the
peninsula of Denmark. What cause drove them southward cannot be stated
with certainty. An ancient writer records one account that had come
to his ears, that large tracts of land occupied by the tribe on the
shores of the Baltic had been overflowed by the sea, and that its
inhabitants were compelled to migrate or to starve. The story seemed
incredible to the writer who preserved it. To us, who can easily find a
parallel in the history of the great migrations of mankind, it appears
not improbable. And this, in the absence of evidence, which indeed is
not likely to be forthcoming, is all that we can say. For some time
the Celtic tribes that occupied the banks of the Danube had kept the
Cimbri from reaching that river. But when the Celts had been seriously
weakened by the armies of Rome, they were no longer able, or, it may
be, no longer willing to continue this resistance. It is quite likely
indeed that they welcomed as allies the people which they had been
accustomed to regard as enemies. One thing is certain, that either
then, or during their previous wanderings, the Cimbri had added to
their hosts many Celtic comrades. The Celts were better armed, more
advanced in the military art, and--a most important consideration--more
familiar with the Roman methods of warfare. Hence we are not surprised
to find among the leaders of the invading host, Germanic as it was in
the main, some unquestionably Celtic names.
The movement was on a scale and of a kind new to Roman experience.
It was no expedition of warriors. The whole nation had come. The
Cimbri had a vast array of waggons with them, containing their wives,
their children, and all that belonged to them. There was a curious
resemblance between them--something of the same kind may be seen to-day
in a shipload of Scandinavian emigrants--for all were huge of stature,
the women falling little short of the men, and all fair-haired. For
weapons they had a javelin and a long sword; every man carried a long
narrow shield, and the chiefs among them were also protected by coats
of mail.
The first relation between the Romans and the Cimbri was not other than
friendly. Papirius Carbo, the Consul in command of the Roman army,
required them to abstain from interfering with the Taurisci, a Celtic
tribe inhabiting the northern bank of the Danube, on the ground of
being in alliance with Rome. The Cimbri did not refuse obedience. Then
Carbo was guilty of a shameful act of treachery, which, as we shall
see, met with its due reward. He offered the strangers guides, who were
to lead them to a region which they might occupy without hindrance.
These guides had in fact instructions to lead the Cimbri into an ambush
which had been carefully prepared for them. The plot succeeded in a
way, but the result was very different from what Carbo had expected.
The Cimbri turned upon their betrayers, inflicted upon them a heavy
loss, and, but for the opportune breaking of a great storm over the
battlefield, would have entirely destroyed them.
The conquerors did not move southwards, as might have been expected,
but marching west through Northern Switzerland and South-eastern Gaul,
remained quiet for a while. They were, however, still in need of land
which they could call their own, and they asked the help of the Roman
general who was in command at the frontier to help them in obtaining
it. His own reply was to attack them, with no better result than a
terrible slaughter among his troops and the loss of his camp. The
Cimbri sent an embassy to Rome, repeating the request that they made to
the Consul, and while they waited for the reply employed themselves in
subjugating their Celtic neighbours.
Eight years had now passed since the defeat of Carbo, and the
unexpected reprieve which Rome had enjoyed was at an end. The Cimbri,
disappointed at receiving no reply to their demands from Rome, and
recognising that it would be more profitable to invade Italy than
to fight for less desirable regions in Gaul, marched to the Rhone
under the command of their king Boiorix. The Romans had no less
than three armies on the spot. The weakest of the three, commanded
by the ex-Consul Æmilius Scaurus, was the first to be attacked. It
was routed, and its commander taken prisoner. Brought before King
Boiorix, Scaurus warned the invader not to venture on invading Italy,
and was put to death for what was judged to be presumption. The two
remaining armies were concentrated at Arausio, on the left bank of the
Rhone. Unhappily the two officers in command were enemies. They would
not occupy a common camp, nor would they deliberate on the plan of
campaign that was to be followed. The result was a frightful disaster.
It is possible that a conflict might have been avoided altogether.
Even after the defeat of Scaurus the two consular armies presented so
formidable an appearance that Boiorix expressed himself willing to
treat. Negotiations were actually in progress when Cæpio, an ex-Consul,
who was inferior in rank to the Consul Maximus, committed an act of
surprising folly. Fearing that his colleague might gain all the credit
if the negotiations with the Cimbri were successful, he attacked
the enemy with the force under his immediate command. The battle of
Arausio, fought on October 6, 105, was not less fatal than Allia and
Cannæ, followed as it was by the defeat of the other army. Eighty
thousand soldiers are said to have been slain on the field, or to have
perished in the retreat.
At Rome the result was something like a revolution. The political
history of the time is outside my province. It will be enough,
therefore, to say that the most renowned general of the time, C.
Marius, was put in supreme command. He was made Consul, in spite of the
law that forbade especial election to this office, and he was continued
in command for five years in succession.
The Cimbri had not actually carried out their intention of invading
Italy. They had turned aside to plunder South-western Gaul, and even to
cross the Pyrenees into Spain. Marius made use of the delay, which it
is scarcely too much to say was the salvation of Rome, to strengthen
the defences of Northern Italy, to recall the wavering tribes of
Cisalpine Gaul to their allegiances, and to find auxiliaries among
the peoples which had as much reason as had Rome herself to dread the
success of the Cimbri.
This people had now received considerable reinforcements. They had been
joined by some Helvetian tribes, and by the Teutones, old neighbours
in Northern Europe, and now, by a curious chance, associated with
them in their invasion of the south. The first intention of the
allies was to force their way into Italy in one vast army. This was
given up, probably on account of the mechanical difficulty connected
with transport. It was finally arranged that the Teutones, with the
Helvetian tribe of the Amburones and a Cimbrian contingent, were to
invade Italy by the western passes of the Alps, and that the Cimbri,
also reinforced by some Helvetians, should try the passes to the east.
It is with the former of these two divisions that I am first concerned.
Marius had taken up his position in a strongly fortified camp at the
junction of the Rhone and the Isère. Here he resolutely refused to risk
the chances of a battle. It was no question, he represented to the
impatient spirits in his army, of victories and of triumphs, but of the
safety of Rome, which would be lost if her last army were defeated. To
the soldiers, who were not less impatient, he used different arguments,
appealing, for instance, to their superstition. He affirmed that he
was in possession of oracles which promised Rome a decisive victory,
which was to be won, however, at a certain place and time. There was
a prophetess in his camp, a Syrian, very possibly a Jewess by birth,
whom he professed to consult, and who, we may reasonably suppose,
accommodated her answers to his ideas of the military necessities
of the time. The barbarians were encouraged by the inaction of the
Romans to make an attack on the camp. They were easily repulsed, and
speedily abandoned the attempt, marching forward as if the Roman force
might safely be neglected. For six days, so vast was their array of
fighting-men and baggage, they filed past the camp, uttering insulting
cries as they went. When they had passed, Marius broke up his camp and
followed them. He never relaxed, however, his precautions. He chose
every night a strong position for his camp, and fortified it to resist
an attack. At Aquæ Sextiæ (Aix)[33] he determined to bring the enemy to
an engagement.
The story ran that he deliberately chose a position for his camp where
the supply of water was short, and that when the soldiers complained he
pointed to the river that ran close to the position of the barbarians,
saying, "There is drink, but you must buy it with blood." "Let us go
then," cried the soldiers, "while our blood still flows in our veins."
Marius insisted upon their first fortifying the camp. The legion was
too well disciplined not to obey him, but there were others less
amenable to discipline, and a collision with the enemy took place
before the day was out. The camp followers, who had no water for their
beasts, or even for themselves, flocked down to the river, having
armed themselves as well as they could. Here they came into collision
with the Amburones, who, taken at first by surprise, soon recovered
their courage, and raising their warcry with what is described as
a terrific volume of sound, advanced to repel the new-comers. The
light-armed Ligurians on the Roman side came to the help of their
comrades, and these again were supported by some of the regular troops.
The affair was a skirmish on a very large scale rather than a battle.
The Romans had much the best of it, but they were far from feeling the
security of conquerors. They spent the night under arms, expecting from
hour to hour an assault upon their camp.
The barbarians, however, were less confident than Marius supposed. For
two days they remained inactive, and even then it was not they who
challenged the conflict. Marius, who had great gifts as a general, had
observed a convenient place in the rear of the enemy's position where
an ambush might be conveniently laid. Here he posted three thousand
men under the command of Marcellus. In the battle that followed the
unexpected onslaught of this force on the barbarian rear did much to
decide the issue of the day. Attacked both in front and in rear the
Teutones gave way. To give way under such circumstances meant utter
destruction. What the numbers of the slain and the captured may have
been it is impossible to say. Levy says that 200,000 were slain,
180,000 taken prisoners. Other authorities reduce the number of the
slain by a half. One thing, however, is certain, that the Teutones
ceased to exist. Those who did not fall on the field or in the rout
put an end to their own lives. The women also killed themselves rather
than fall into the hands of the enemy. It is curious that the name of
the tribe was preserved by the remnant left behind in its original
seat when the great host migrated southward, and that it is now used
to designate one of the great families of the human race. Marius was
just about to set fire to a huge pile of the spoils of the dead when
messengers from Rome reached the field, announcing that he had been
elected for the fifth time to the Consulship.
But Rome was not yet out of danger, for the Cimbri were yet to be
accounted for. They had forced their way into Italy, Lutatius Catulus,
the colleague of Marius in the Consulship, finding himself unable to
stop them. His original intention had been to defend the passes of
the Tyrol, but he relinquished the idea and took up a strong position
on the Athesis (_Adige_). Even here he did not feel safe. His troops
indeed were so terrified by the report of the barbarians' advance that
they refused to remain, and Catulus, making a merit of necessity,
putting himself at their head, retreated to the southern side of the
Po, leaving the richest plains of Northern Italy to the mercy of the
foe.
When news of the threatening position of affairs reached Rome Marius
was summoned to the capital to advise on the course to be pursued. As
soon as he arrived the people, with whom he was in the very highest
favour, offered him a triumph for his victory over the Teutones. He
refused to accept the honour so long as the Cimbri remained on Roman
soil. He at once went northwards, and summoning to him the _élite_ of
his legions, marched to reinforce Catulus. He effected a junction with
this general near Vercellæ (_Vercelli_). The Cimbri had not heard, it
seems, of the disaster which had overtaken the Teutones, and put off
fighting in the hope of being joined by them. They even sent envoys to
the Roman generals, demanding an allotment of land for themselves and
their kinsmen. "We have given your kinsmen their portion, and they are
not likely to be disturbed in it," replied Marius with grim humour.
"You shall pay dearly for your jest," they replied and prepared to
depart. "Nay," said the Roman, "you must not depart without saluting
your relatives," and he ordered the captive kings of the Teutones who
had been captured in an attempt to cross the Alps to be produced. After
this nothing remained but to fight with as little delay as possible.
[Illustration: Defeat of the Cimbri in the Battle at the Waggons.]