BOOK I

Transcriber's note:

This book was published in two volumes, of which this is the first.

The second volume was released as Project Gutenberg ebook #44126,

available at https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44126.

Bold characters are enclosed in plus (+) signs.

Gesperrt text is enclosed in equal (=) signs.

THE HISTORIES OF POLYBIUS

[Illustration]

THE

HISTORIES OF POLYBIUS

TRANSLATED FROM THE TEXT OF F. HULTSCH

BY

EVELYN S. SHUCKBURGH, M.A.

LATE FELLOW OF EMMANUEL COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE

IN TWO VOLUMES

VOL. I

LONDON

MACMILLAN AND CO.

AND NEW YORK

1889

_All rights reserved_

TO

F. M. S.

IN GRATITUDE FOR MUCH PATIENT HELP

PREFACE

This is the first English translation of the complete works of Polybius

as far as they are now known. In attempting such a task I feel that I

ought to state distinctly the limits which I have proposed to myself

in carrying it out. I have desired to present to English readers a

faithful copy of what Polybius wrote, which should at the same time

be a readable English book. I have not been careful to follow the

Greek idiom; and have not hesitated to break up and curtail or enlarge

his sentences, when I thought that, by doing so, I could present his

meaning in more idiomatic English. Polybius is not an author likely

to be studied for the sake of his Greek, except by a few technical

scholars; and the modern complexion of much of his thought makes

such a plan of translation both possible and desirable. How far I

have succeeded I must leave my readers to decide. Again, I have not

undertaken to write a commentary on Polybius, nor to discuss at length

the many questions of interest which arise from his text. Such an

undertaking would have required much more space than I was able to

give: and happily, while my translation was passing through the press,

two books have appeared, which will supply English students with much

that I might have felt bound to endeavour to give—the Achaean league

by Mr. Capes, and the sumptuous Oxford edition of extracts by Mr.

Strachan-Davidson.

The translation is made from the text of Hultsch and follows his

arrangement of the fragments. If this causes some inconvenience to

those who use the older texts, I hope that such inconvenience will

be minimised by the full index which I have placed at the end of the

second volume.

I have not, I repeat, undertaken to write a commentary. I propose

rather to give the materials for commentary to those who, for various

reasons, do not care to use the Greek of Polybius. I have therefore in

the first five complete books left him to speak for himself, with the

minimum of notes which seemed necessary for the understanding of his

text. The case of the fragments was different. In giving a translation

of them I have tried, when possible, to indicate the part of the

history to which they belong, and to connect them by brief sketches of

intermediate events, with full references to those authors who supply

the missing links.

Imperfect as the performance of such a task must, I fear, be, it has

been one of no ordinary labour, and has occupied every hour that

could be spared during several years of a not unlaborious life. And

though I cannot hope to have escaped errors, either of ignorance or

human infirmity, I trust that I may have produced what will be found

of use to some historical students, in giving them a fairly faithful

representation of the works of an historian who is, in fact, our sole

authority for some most interesting portions of the world’s history.

It remains to give a brief account of the gradual formation of the text

of Polybius, as we now have it.

The revival of interest in the study of Polybius was due to Pope

Nicholas V (1447-1455), the founder of the Vatican Library. Soon after

his election he seems to have urged Cardinal Perotti to undertake a

Latin translation of the five books then known to exist. When Perotti

sent him his translation of the first book, the Pope thus acknowledges

it in a letter dated 28th August 1452:—[1]

“_Primus Polybii liber, quem ad nos misisti, nuper a te de Graeca

in Latinam translatus, gratissimus etiam fuit et jucundissimus:

quippe in ea translatione nobis cumulatissime satisfacis. Tanta

enim facilitate et eloquentia transfers, ut Historia ipsa nunquam

Graeca, sed prorsus Latina semper fuisse videatur. Optimum igitur

ingenium tuum valde commendamus atque probamus, teque hortamur ut

velis pro laude et gloria tua, et pro voluptate nimia singulare

opus inchoatum perficere, nec labori parcas. Nam et rem ingenio

et doctrina tua dignam, et nobis omnium gratissimam efficies; qui

laborum et studiorum tuorum aliquando memores erimus.... Tu vero,

si nobis rem gratam efficere cupis, nihil negligentiae committas

in hoc opere traducendo. Nihil enim nobis gratius efficere

poteris. Librum primum a vertice ad calcem legimus, in cujus

translatione voluntati nostrae amplissime satisfactum est._”

On the 3d of January 1454 the Pope writes again to Perotti thanking him

for the third book; and in a letter to Torelli, dated 13th November

1453, Perotti says that he had finished his translation of Polybius in

the preceding September. This translation was first printed in 1473.

The Greek text was not printed till 1530, when an edition of the first

five books in Greek, along with Perotti’s translation, was published at

the Hague, _opera Vincentii Obsopaei_, dedicated to George, Marquess of

Brandenburg. Perotti’s translation was again printed at Basle in 1549,

accompanied by a Latin translation of the fragments of books 6 to 17 by

Wolfgan Musculus, and reprinted at the Hague in 1598.

The chief fragments of Polybius fall into two classes; (1) those

made by some unknown epitomator, who Casaubon even supposed might be

Marcus Brutus, who, according to Plutarch, was engaged in this work

in his tent the night before the battle of Pharsalus. The printing of

these began with two insignificant fragments on the battle between

the Rhodians and Attalus against Philip, Paris, 1536; and another _de

re navali_, Basle, 1537. These fragments have continually accumulated

by fresh discoveries. (2) The other class of fragments are those

made by the order of Constantinus Porphyrogenitus (911-959), among

similar ones from other historians, which were to be digested under

fifty-three heads or tituli; one of which (the 27th) has come down

to us, discovered in the sixteenth century, containing the _selecta

de legationibus_; and another (the 50th) _de virtute et vitio_. The

printing of the first of these begins with the edition of Fulvius

Ursinus, published at Antwerp in 1582. This was supplemented in

1634 (Paris) by an edition by Valesius of _excerpta ex collectaneis

Constantini Augusti Porphyrogeneti_. The first edition of something

like a complete text of Polybius, containing the five entire books,

the _excerptae legationes_, and fragments of the other books, was

that of Isaac Casaubon, Paris, 1609, fo. It was accompanied by a new

and very brilliant Latin translation, and a preface which has been

famous among such works. It contains also a Latin translation of

Aeneas Tacticus. Altogether it is a splendid book. Some additional

_annotationes_ of Casaubon’s were published after his death in 1617,

Paris.[2] Other editions followed; that of Gronovius, Amsterdam, 1670:

of Ernesti, Leipsic, 1764, containing Casaubon’s translation more or

less emended, and additional fragments. But the next important step

in the bibliography of Polybius was the publication of the great

edition of Schweighaeuser, Leipsic, 1789-1795, in nine volumes, with

a new Latin translation,—founded, however, to a great extent on

Casaubon,—a new recension of the text, and still farther additions

to the fragments; accompanied also by an excellent Lexicon and

Onomasticon. This great work has been the foundation from which all

modern commentaries on Polybius must spring. Considerable additions

to the fragments, collected from MSS. in the Vatican by Cardinal Mai,

were published in 1827 at Rome. The chief modern texts are those of

Bekker, 1844; Duebner (with Latin translation), 1839 and 1865; Dindorf,

1866-1868, 1882 (Teubner). A new recension of the five books and all

the known fragments—founded on a collation of some twelve MSS. and all

previous editions, as well as all the numerous works of importance on

our Author that have appeared in Germany and elsewhere—was published

by F. Hultsch, Berlin, 1867-1872, in four volumes. This must now be

considered the standard text. A second edition of the first volume

appeared in 1888, but after that part of my translation had passed

through the press.

Of English translations the earliest was by Ch. Watson, 1568, of the

first five books. It is entitled _The Hystories of the most famous

Cronographer Polybios; Discoursing of the warres betwixt the Romanes

and Carthaginenses, a rich and goodly work, conteining holsome counsels

and wonderful devices against the inconstances of fickle Fortune.

Englished by C[hristopher] W[atson] whereunto is annexed an Abstract,

compendiously coarcted out of the life and worthy Acts perpetrate

by oure puissant Prince King Henry the fift. London, Imprinted by

Henry Byneman for Tho. Hacket, 1568_, 8vo. See Herbert’s _Ames_, p.

895. Another translation of the five books was published by Edward

Grimestone, London, 1634, of which a second and third edition appeared

in 1648 and 1673. A translation of the Mercenary War from the first

book was made by Sir Walter Raleigh, and published after his death

in 1647 (London, 4to). Next, a new translation of the five books was

published in London, 1693 (2 vols. 8vo), by Sir H[enry] S[hears],

with a preface by Dryden. In 1741 (London, 4to) appeared “A fragment

of the 6th book containing a dissertation on government, translated

from the Greek of Polybius, with notes, etc., by A Gentleman.” This

was followed by the first English translation, which contained any

part of the fragments, as well as the five books, by the Rev. James

Hampton, London, 4to, 1756-1761, which between that date and 1823

(2 vols., Oxford) went through at least seven editions. Lastly, a

translation of Polybius’s account of Hannibal’s passage of the Alps is

appended by Messrs. Church and Brodribb to their translation of Livy,

21-22. There is a German translation by A. Haakh and Kraz, Stuttgart,

1858-1875. And a French translation by J. A. C. Buchon, Paris, 1842,

Orléans, 1875. For the numerous German essays and dissertations on

the text, and particular questions arising from the history, I must

refer my readers to Engelmann’s _Bibliotheca_. In England such studies

are rare. Mr. Strachan-Davidson published an essay on Polybius in

Hellenica; and his edition of extracts of the text (Oxford, 1888)

contains several dissertations of value. Mr. Capes (London, 1888) has

published an edition of extracts referring to the Achaean league,

with an introductory essay on the author and his work. And a very

admirable article on Polybius appears in the recent edition of the

_Encyclopædia Britannica_ by Mr. H. F. Pelham. There is also a good

paper on Polybius in the _Quarterly Review_ for 1879, No. 296.

Criticisms on Polybius, and estimates of his value as an historian,

will be found in Thirlwall’s _History of Greece_, vol. viii.; Arnold’s

_History of Rome_; Mommsen’s _History of Rome_, book iv. c. xiii.;

Freeman’s _History of Federal Government_ and _Essays_; Bunbury’s

_Ancient Geography_, vol. ii. p. 16; Law’s _Alps of Hannibal_. For

the Roman side of his history, besides the works mentioned by Mr.

Strachan-Davidson, a good list of the literature on the 2d Punic war

is given by Mr. W. T. Arnold in his edition of Dr. Arnold’s history of

that period [London, Macmillan, 1886].

Finally, I have to express my warm thanks to Dr. Warre, Head Master of

Eton, for aiding me with his unique knowledge of ancient and modern

tactics in clearing up many points very puzzling to a civilian. To

Mr. W. Chawner, Fellow and Tutor of Emmanuel College, for reading

part of the translation in proof, and making valuable corrections and

suggestions. And to Professor Ridgway, of Queen’s College, Cork, for

corrections in the geographical fragments of book 34.

CONTENTS

PAGES

INTRODUCTION xvii-lx

BOOKS I TO IX 1-602

INTRODUCTION

I. POLYBIUS

Fortune cast the life of Polybius in stirring times. His special claim

to our admiration is that he understood the importance in the history

of the world of the changes which were passing under his eyes, and

exerted himself to trace the events which immediately preceded them,

and from which they sprang, while it was yet possible to see and

question surviving participators in them; to examine places, before

they had lost all marks of the great events of which they had been

the scene; and records or monuments before time had cast a doubt upon

their meaning or authenticity. Nor is this ordinary praise. Men are

apt to turn their eyes upon the past, as holding all that is worthy of

contemplation, while they fail to take note of history “in the making,”

or to grasp the importance of the transactions of their own day. But

as every year has its decisive influence on the years which succeed

it, the greatest benefactor of posterity is the man who understands

and records events as they pass with care and sincerity. Laborious

compilation, from the study and comparison of ancient records and

monuments, has its value: it may often be all that it is possible to

obtain; it may not unfrequently even serve to correct statements of

contemporaries which have been deformed by carelessness or coloured by

prejudice. But the best compilation is infinitely inferior in interest

and instructiveness to the barest report of a contemporary. And when

such a man is also an eye-witness of much that he relates; when he knew

and conversed with many of the chief actors in the great events which

he records; when again he tells us of transactions so remote in time,

that all written documents have necessarily perished, and those in more

durable bronze and stone all but followed in their train, then indeed

the interest rises to the highest pitch. Like Herodotus and Thucydides,

then, Polybius tells us of his own times, and of the generations

immediately preceding them. It is true that the part of his work which

has survived in a complete form deals with a period before his own

day, just as the greater part of the history of Herodotus does, but in

the larger part of the fragments he is writing with even more complete

personal knowledge than Thucydides. He had, again, neither the faculty

for story-telling possessed by Herodotus nor the literary and dramatic

force of Thucydides. The language which he spoke and wrote had lost

the magic of style; had lost the lucidity and grace of Sophocles, and

the rugged vigour and terseness of Thucydides. Nor had he apparently

acquired any of those artifices which, while they sometimes weary us

in the later rhetoricians, yet generally serve to make their writings

the easiest and pleasantest of reading. Equally remote again is his

style from the elaborate and involved manner of Plutarch, with its huge

compound words built up of intricate sentences, more like difficult

German than Greek. Polybius had no tricks of this sort;[3] but his

style lacks logical order and clearness. It seems rather the language

of a man of affairs, who had had neither leisure to study style, nor

taste to read widely with a view to literature as such. But after all

it is Greek, and Greek that still retained its marvellous adaptability

to every purpose, to every shade of thought, and every form of

literature. Nor is his style in the purely narrative parts of his work

wanting in a certain force, derived from singleness and directness of

purpose. He “speaks right on,” and turns neither to the right hand nor

the left. It is when he reflects and argues and moralises, that his

want of literary skill sometimes makes him difficult and involved;

and though the thought is essentially just, and his point of view

wonderfully modern, we continually feel the want of that nameless charm

which the Greeks called χάρις.

His bent for historical composition was fortunately encouraged by the

circumstances of his life, which gave Polybius special opportunities

of satisfying his curiosity and completing his knowledge. Not only was

he the son of a man who had held the highest office in the league, and

so must have heard the politics and history of Achaia discussed from

his earliest youth; not only from early manhood was he himself in the

thick of political business; but he knew the sovereigns of Egypt and

Pergamus, of Macedonia and Syria, and the Roman generals who conquered

the latter. He had visited a Roman camp and witnessed its practical

arrangements and discipline. And his enforced residence of sixteen

years in Italy and Rome was, by the good fortune of his introduction to

Aemilius Paullus and his sons, turned into an opportunity of unrivalled

advantage for studying the laws, military discipline, and character

of the imperial people whose world conquest he chronicles. Unlike his

fellow-exiles, he did not allow his depressing circumstances to numb

his faculties, exasperate his temper, or deaden his curiosity. He won

the confidence of the leading men at Rome; and seems, while pushing on

his inquiries with untiring vigour, to have used his influence for the

benefit of his countrymen, and of all Greek subjects of Rome.

But, like so many of the writers of antiquity, he has had no one to

perform for him the service he had done for others in rescuing their

achievements and the particulars of their career from oblivion. Of the

many _testimonia_ collected by Schweighaeuser and others from ancient

writers, scarcely one gives us any details or anecdotes of the writer,

whose work they briefly describe or praise. We are reduced as usual to

pick out from his own writings the scattered allusions or statements

which help us to picture his character and career.

[Sidenote: Birth of Polybius.]

Polybius of Megalopolis was the son of Lycortas, the friend and

partisan of Philopoemen, who had served the Achaean league in several

capacities: as ambassador to Rome in B.C. 189, along with Diophanes,

on the question of the war with Sparta,[4] and to Ptolemy Epiphanes

in B.C. 186,[5] and finally as Strategus in B.C. 184-183. Of the year

of his birth we cannot be certain. He tells us that he was elected

to go on embassy from the league to Ptolemy Epiphanes in the year of

the death of that monarch (B.C. 181), although he was below the legal

age.[6] But we do not know for certain what that age was; although

it seems likely that it was thirty, that apparently being the age at

which a member of the league exercised his full privileges.[7] But

assuming this, we do not know how much under that age he was. Two years

previously (B.C. 183) he had carried the urn at Philopoemen’s funeral.

This was an office usually performed by quite young men (νεανίσκοι)[8],

probably not much over twenty years old. As we know that he lived to

write a history of the Numantine war, which ended B.C. 133[9], and that

he was eighty-two at the time of his death[10], we shall not, I think,

be probably far wrong if we place his birth in B.C. 203 and his death

in B.C. 121 as Casaubon does, who notes that the latter is just sixteen

years before the birth of Cicero. But though this is a good working

hypothesis, it is very far from being a demonstrated fact.

Between B.C. 181-168 he was closely allied with his father in politics;

and if we wish to have any conception of what he was doing, it is

necessary to form some idea of the state of parties in the Peloponnese

at the time.

The crowning achievement of Philopoemen’s career had been the uniting

of Sparta to the Achaean league, after the murder of the tyrant Nabis

by the Aetolians who had come to Sparta as his allies (B.C. 192). In

B.C. 191 the Achaeans were allowed to add Messene and Elis to their

league, as a reward for their services to Rome in the war against

Antiochus. The Aetolian league, the chief enemy and opponent of Achaia,

was reduced to a state of humble dependence on Rome in B.C. 189, after

the defeat of Antiochus at Thermopylae (B.C. 191) and the Aetolian

war (B.C. 191-189). From B.C. 190 then begins the time during which

Polybius says that the “name of the Achaeans became the universal one

for all the inhabitants of the Peloponnese” (2, 42). But though Sparta

was included in the league she was always a restive and dissatisfied

member; and the people of Elis and Messene, who were not very willing

members either, were told by Flamininus that if they had any reason to

complain of the federal government they were to appeal to him.[11] Now,

by a treaty of alliance with Rome, decreed at Sikyon in B.C. 198, it

was provided that Rome should receive no envoys from separate states of

the league, but only from the league itself.[12] Flamininus, therefore,

if he said what Livy reports him to have said, was violating this

treaty. And this will be a good instance to illustrate the divisions

of parties existing during the period of Polybius’s active political

life (B.C. 181-169). We have seen that in B.C. 198 the Achaean league

became an ally of Rome as a complete and independent state; that this

state was consolidated by the addition of Sparta (192) and Elis and

Messene (191) so as to embrace the whole of the Peloponnese; that its

chief enemy in Greece, the Aetolian league, was rendered powerless

in B.C. 189. The Macedonian influence in the Peloponnese had been

abolished after the battle of Cynoscephalae (197) by the proclamation

of Greek freedom by Flamininus (196). But all this seeming liberty

and growth in power really depended upon the favour of Rome, and was

continually endangered not only by the appeals to the Senate from

separate states in the league, who conceived themselves wronged, but by

treasonable representations of her own envoys, who preferred a party

triumph to the welfare and independence of their country[13]. In these

circumstances, there were naturally differences of opinion as to the

proper attitude for the league government to assume towards a state,

which was nominally an equal ally, but really an absolute master. There

was one party who were for submissively carrying out the will of the

Roman officers who from time to time visited the Peloponnese; and for

conciliating the Senate by displaying a perpetual readiness to carry

out its wishes, without putting forward in any way the rights which

the treaty of 198 had secured to them. The leaders of this party, in

the time of Philopoemen, were Aristaenos and Diophanes. The other

party, headed till his death by Philopoemen, equally admitting that the

Roman government could not be safely defied, were yet for aiming at

preserving their country’s independence by strictly carrying out the

terms of the Roman alliance, and respectfully but firmly resisting any

encroachment upon those terms by the officers representing the Roman

government. On Philopoemen’s death (B.C. 183) Lycortas, who had been

his most devoted follower, took, along with Archon, the lead of the

party which were for carrying out his policy; while Callicrates became

the most prominent of the Romanising party. Lycortas was supported

by his son Polybius when about B.C. 181 he began to take part in

politics. Polybius seems always to have consistently maintained this

policy. His view seems to have been that Rome, having crushed Philip

and Antiochus, was necessarily the supreme power. The Greeks must

recognise facts; must avoid offending Rome; but must do so by keeping

to a position of strict legality, maintaining their rights, and neither

flattering nor defying the victorious Commonwealth. He believed that

the Romans meant fairly by Greece, and that Greek freedom was safe

in their hands[14]. But the straightforward policy of the Senate, if

it was ever sincere, was altered by the traitor Callicrates in B.C.

179; who, being sent to Rome to oppose what the league thought the

unconstitutional restitution of certain Spartan exiles, advised the

Senate to use the Romanising party in each state to secure a direct

control in Achaia[15]. Acting on this insidious advice, the Roman

government began to view with suspicion the legal and independent

attitude of the other party, and to believe or affect to believe

that they were enemies of the Roman supremacy. Lycortas, Archon,

and Polybius, finding themselves the objects of suspicion, not less

dangerous because undeserved, to the Roman government, appear to have

adopted an attitude of reserve, abstaining from taking an active or

prominent part in the business of the assemblies. This, however, did

not succeed in averting Roman jealousy; and the commissioners, Gaius

Popilius and Gnaeus Octavius, who visited the Peloponnese in B.C. 169,

gave out that those who held aloof were as displeasing to the Senate

as those who openly opposed it. They were said to have resolved on

formally impeaching the three statesmen before the Achaean assembly

as being enemies of Rome; but when the assembly met at Aegium, they

had failed to obtain any reasonable handle against them, and contented

themselves with a speech of general exhortation.[16] This was during

the war with Perseus, when the Romans kept a vigilant eye on all parts

of Greece, and closely inquired which politicians in the several

states ventured to display the least sympathy with the Macedonian

king, or were believed to secretly nourish any wish for his success.

It speaks strongly both for the independent spirit still surviving in

the league, as well as for the character of Archon and Polybius, that

they were elected, apparently in the same assembly, the one Strategus

and the other Hipparch for the year B.C. 169-168.[17] In this office

Polybius doubtless hoped to carry out the principles and discipline

of Philopoemen, under whom he had probably served in the cavalry, and

whose management of this branch of the service he had at any rate

minutely studied.[18] But there was little occasion for the use of the

Achaean cavalry in his year. Being sent on a mission to Q. Marcius

Philippus at Heracleia to offer the league’s assistance in the war

with Perseus, when their help was declined, he remained behind after

the other ambassadors had returned, to witness the campaign.[19] After

spending some time in the Roman camp, he was sent by Q. Marcius to

prevent the Achaeans from consenting to supply five thousand men to

Appius Claudius Cento in Epirus. This was a matter of considerable

delicacy. He had to choose between offending one or the other powerful

Roman. But he conducted the affair with prudence, and on the lines

he had always laid down, those, namely, of strict legality. He found

the Achaean assembly in session at Sicyon; and he carried his point

by representing that the demand of Appius Claudius did not bear on

the face of it the order of the Senate, without which they were

prohibited from supplying the requisitions of Roman commanders.[20] He

thus did not betray that he was acting on the instigation of Quintus

Marcius, and put himself and the league in an attitude of loyalty

toward the Senate.[21] In the same cautious spirit he avoided another

complication. Certain complimentary statues or inscriptions had been

put up in various cities of the league in honour of Eumenes, king of

Pergamus, and on some offence arising had been taken down. This seems

to have annoyed Eumenes exceedingly; and Polybius persuaded the people

that it had been ordered by Sosigenes and Diopeithes, as judges, from

feelings of personal spite, and without any act of Eumenes unfriendly

to the league. He carried his point, and thus avoided offending a

king who at that time was on very friendly terms with Rome.[22] But

while thus minded to avoid unnecessary offence, Polybius and his party

were in favour of strengthening the league by alliances which could

be entered upon with safety. Egypt at this time was under the joint

government of two Ptolemies, Philometor and Physcon, who were being

threatened with an invasion by Antiochus Epiphanes. The friendship

of the league with the kings of Egypt had been of long standing, as

far back as the time of Aratus; and though that friendship had been

afterwards interrupted by the Macedonian policy of Aratus, just before

his death the father of these kings had presented the league with ten

ships and a sum of money. The two kings now sent to beg for aid; and

asked that Lycortas should come as commander-in-chief, and Polybius

as hipparch. Lycortas and Polybius were in favour of supplying the

assistance asked.[23] But the measure was opposed by Callicrates and

his partisans, on the specious ground that their whole efforts should

be directed to aid the Romans against Perseus. Lycortas and Polybius

replied that the Romans did not require their help; and that they were

bound, by gratitude, as well as by treaty, to help the Ptolemies. They

carried with them the popular feeling: but Callicrates outwitted them

by obtaining a dispatch from Q. Marcius, urging the league to join the

senate in effecting a reconciliation between Antiochus and the kings

of Egypt. Polybius gave in, and advised compliance. Ambassadors were

appointed to aid in the pacification; and the envoys from Alexandria

were obliged to depart without effecting their object. They contented

themselves with handing in to the magistrates the Royal letters,

in which Lycortas and Polybius were invited by name to come to

Alexandria.[24]

[Sidenote: B.C. 167.]

Careful, however, as he had ever been to avoid giving just offence to

Rome, he and his party had long been marked by the Senate as opponents

of that more complete interference in the details of Achaean politics

which it wished to exercise. This was partly owing to the machinations

of Callicrates; but it was also the result of the deliberate policy of

the Senate: and it was doubtless helped by the report of every Roman

officer who had found himself thwarted by the appeal to legality,

under the influence of the party in the league with which Polybius was

connected.[25] Accordingly, soon after the final defeat of Perseus

by Aemilius Paulus in B.C. 168, and the consequent dismemberment of

Macedonia, the Senate proceeded to execute its vengeance upon those

citizens in every state in Greece who were believed to have been

opposed to the Roman interests. The commissioners entrusted with

the settlement and division of Macedonia were directed to hold an

inquiry into this matter also. From every city the extreme partisans

of Rome were summoned to assist them, men who were only too ready to

sacrifice their political opponents to the vengeance of the power to

which they had long been paying a servile and treacherous court. From

Boeotia came Mnasippus; from Acarnania, Chremes; from Epirus, Charops

and Nicias; from Aetolia, Lyciscus and Tisippus; and from Achaia,

Callicrates, Agesias, and Philippus.[26] Instigated by these advisers,

the commissioners ordered the supposed covert enemies of Rome in the

several states to proceed to Italy to take their trial. To Achaia

two commissioners, Gaius Claudius and Gnaeus Domitius, were sent. An

Achaean assembly being summoned to meet them, they announced that there

were certain men of influence in the league who had helped Perseus by

money and other support. They required that a vote should be passed

condemning them all to death; and said that, when that was done, they

would publish the names. Such a monstrous perversion of justice was

too much for the assembly, who refused to vote until they knew the

names. The commissioners then said that all the Strategi who had been

in office since the beginning of the war were involved. One of them,

Xeno, came forward, declared his innocence, and asserted that he was

ready to plead his cause before any tribunal, Achaean or Roman. Upon

this the commissioners required that all the accused persons should go

to Rome. A list of one thousand names was drawn up, under the guidance

of Callicrates, of those who were at once to proceed to Italy[27] (B.C.

167). The court of inquiry, before which they were to appear, was never

held. They were not allowed even to stay in Rome, but were quartered

in various cities of Italy, which were made responsible for their safe

custody: and there they remained until B.C. 151, when such of them as

were still alive, numbering then somewhat less than three hundred, were

contemptuously allowed to return.[28] Among these detenus was Polybius.

We do not hear that Lycortas was also one, from which it has been with

some probability supposed that he was dead. More fortunate than the

rest, Polybius was allowed to remain at Rome. He had made, it seems,

the acquaintance of Aemilius Paulus and his two sons in Macedonia, and

during the tour of Amelius through Greece after the Macedonian war.[29]

And on their return to Italy he was allowed by their influence to

remain in Rome; and, acting as tutor to the two boys,[30] became well

acquainted with all the best society in the city. The charming account

which he gives[31] of the mutual affection existing between him and

the younger son of Aemilius (by adoption now called Publius Scipio

Africanus Aemilianus) bears all the marks of sincerity, and is highly

to the credit of both. To it we may add the anecdote of Plutarch, that

“Scipio, in observance of the precept of Polybius, endeavoured never to

leave the forum without having made a close friend of some one he met

there.”

But much as he owed to the friendship of the sons of Aemilius, he

owed it also to his own energy and cheerful vigour that these sixteen

years of exile were not lost time in his life. He employed them, not

in fruitless indulgence in homesickness, or in gloomy brooding over

his wrongs, but in a careful and industrious study of the history and

institutions of the people among whom he was compelled to reside[32];

in ingratiating himself with those members of the Senate who he thought

might be useful to his countrymen; and in forming and maturing his

judgment as to the course of policy they ought to pursue. Nor was he

without means of gratifying lighter tastes. He was an active sportsman:

and the boar-hunting in the district of Laurentum not only diverted his

attention from the distressing circumstances of his exile, and kept

his body in vigorous health, but obtained for him the acquaintance of

many men of rank and influence. Thus for instance his intimacy with

the Syrian prince Demetrius, afterwards king Demetrius Soter, was made

in the hunting-field[33]: and the value which this young man attached

to his advice and support is some measure of the opinion entertained

generally of his wisdom, moderation, and good judgment. We have no

further details of his life in Rome; but we have what is better,—its

fruits, in the luminous account of its polity, the constitution of its

army, and the aims of its statesmen.

[Sidenote: B.C. 151. Release of the detenus.]

At last the time came when he was once more free to visit his own

country, or to extend his knowledge by visiting the countries which

he wished to describe. After repeated applications to the Senate

by embassies from Achaia, made without avail, in B.C. 151 Polybius

appeared in person to plead the cause before the Fathers. There was

now, it was thought, no reason for retaining these unfortunate men. The

original thousand had shrunk to less than three hundred; middle-aged

men had become in sixteen years old and decrepit; they had lost

connexions and influence in the Peloponnese; they had learnt by bitter

experience the impossibility of resisting the power of Rome, and were

no longer likely to venture on organising any opposition. Their longer

detention could only be a measure of vengeance, and useless vengeance.

Still the debate in the Senate was long and doubtful, until it was

brought to a conclusion by the contemptuous exclamation of Cato: “Are

we to sit here all day discussing whether some old Greek dotards are

to be buried by Italian or Achaean undertakers?” Polybius, elated by

a concession thus ungraciously accorded, wished to enter the Senate

once more with a further request for a restitution of their property in

Achaia. But Cato bluntly bade him “remember Ulysses, who wanted to go

back into the cave of the Cyclops to fetch his cap and belt.”[34]

[Sidenote: Coss. L. Marcius Censornius, Manius Manilius, B.C. 149.

Polybius sent for to Lilybaeum.]

Polybius seems to have returned to the Peloponnese at once, and to have

remained there until B.C. 149, when he was suddenly summoned to serve

the government whose enforced guest he had been so long. It was the

year in which the Senate had determined to commence their proceedings

against Carthage, which were not to be stayed until she was levelled

with the ground. In B.C. 150 the victory of Massanissa had restored the

oligarchs, who had been superseded by the popular anti-Roman party in

Carthage. These men hastened to make every possible offer of submission

to Rome. The Senate had made up its mind for war; and yet did not at

once say so. After demanding that full satisfaction should be made to

Massanissa, it next decreed that the Carthaginians must at once give

three hundred of their noblest youths as hostages to the Roman consuls

Manilius and Censorinus, who had sailed to Lilybaeum with secret orders

to let no concession induce them to stop the war until Carthage was

destroyed.[35] There was naturally some hesitation in obeying this

demand at Carthage; for the hostages were to be given to the Romans

absolutely without any terms, and without any security. They felt

that it was practically a surrender of their city. To overcome this

hesitation Manilius sent for Polybius, perhaps because he had known and

respected him at Rome, and believed that he could trust him; perhaps

because his well-known opinion, as to the safety in trusting the Roman

_fides_, might make him a useful agent. But also probably because he

was known to many influential Carthaginians, and perhaps spoke their

language.[36] He started for Lilybaeum at once. But when he reached

Corcyra he was met with the news that the hostages had been given up

to the consul: he thought, therefore, that the chance of war was at an

end, and he returned to the Peloponnese.[37]

He must soon have learnt his mistake. The Consul, in accordance with

his secret instructions,—first to secure the arms in Carthage, and

then to insist on the destruction of the town,—gradually let the

wretched people know the extent of the submission required of them.

These outrageous demands resulted in the Carthaginians taking the

desperate resolution of standing a siege. Censorinus and his colleague

accordingly began operations; but they were not capable of so great

an undertaking. The eyes of the whole army were turned upon Scipio

Aemilianus, who was serving as a military tribune. The siege lingered

through the summer of B.C. 148 without any result; and when in the

autumn Scipio left for Rome, to stand for the Aedileship, he started

amidst loud expressions of hope that he might return as Consul, though

below the legal age.[38]

The loss of so much of Polybius’s narrative at this point leaves us

uncertain when he arrived in Africa: but as he met and conversed with

Massanissa,[39] who died in B.C. 148, it seems likely that he did join

the army after all in B.C. 149. At any rate he was in Scipio’s train

in B.C. 147-146, when he was in chief command of the army, first as

consul, and then as proconsul; advised him on sundry points in the

formation of his siege works; stood by his side when Carthage was

burning; and heard him, as he watched the dreadful sight, utter with

tearful eyes the foreboding of what might one day befall Rome.[40]

Scipio is also said to have supplied him with ships for an exploring

expedition round the coast of Africa;[41] and it seems most likely that

this was in his year of consulship (147), as after the fall of Carthage

Polybius went home.

The destruction of Carthage took place in the spring of B.C. 146. When

Scipio went back to celebrate his triumph, Polybius seems to have

returned to the Peloponnese, there to witness another act of vengeance

on the part of Rome, and to do what he could to lighten the blow to his

countrymen, and to preserve the fragments of their shattered liberties.

[Sidenote: B.C. 148.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 147.]

Among the restored Achaean exiles were Diaeus, Damocritus, Alcamenes,

Theodectes, and Archicrates. They had returned with feelings embittered

by their exile; and without any of the experience of active life, which

might have taught them to subordinate their private thirst for revenge

to the safety of their country. Callicrates died in B.C. 148, and

Diaeus was Strategus in B.C. 149-148, 147-146. The appearance of the

pseudo-Philip (Andriscus) in Macedonia, and the continued resistance

of Carthage during his first year of office (148), encouraged him

perhaps to venture on a course, and to recommend the people to adopt

a policy, on which he would otherwise not have ventured. Troubles

arising out of a disgraceful money transaction between the Spartan

Menalchidas, Achaean Strategus, and the Oropians, who had bribed him

to aid them against the Athenians, had led to a violent quarrel with

Callicrates, who threatened to impeach him for treason to the league

in the course of an embassy to Rome. To save himself he gave half the

Oropian money to Diaeus, his successor as Strategus (B.C. 149-148).

This led to a popular clamour against Diaeus: who, to save himself,

falsely reported that the Senate had granted the Achaeans leave to try

and condemn certain Spartans for the offence of occupying a disputed

territory. Sparta was prepared to resist in arms, and a war seemed to

be on the point of breaking out. Callicrates and Diaeus, however, were

sent early in B.C. 148 to place the Achaean case before the Senate,

while the Spartans sent Menalchidas. Callicrates died on the road. The

Senate heard, therefore, the two sides from Diaeus and Menalchidas, and

answered that they would send commissioners to inquire into the case.

The commissioners, however, were slow in coming; so that both Diaeus

and Menalchidas had time to misrepresent the Senate’s answer to their

respective peoples. The Achaeans believed that they had full leave to

proceed according to the league law against the Spartans; the Spartans

believed that they had permission to break off from the league. Once

more, therefore, war was on the point of breaking out.[42] Just at

this time Q. Caecilius Metellus was in Macedonia with an army to crush

Andriscus. He was sending some commissioners to Asia, and ordered them

to visit the Peloponnese on their way and give a friendly warning. It

was neglected, and the Spartans sustained a defeat, which irritated

them without crushing their revolt. When Diaeus succeeded Damocritus as

Strategus in B.C. 147, he answered a second embassy from Metellus by

a promise not to take any hostile steps until the Roman commissioners

arrived. But he irritated the Spartans by putting garrisons into some

forts which commanded Laconia; and they actually elected Menalchidas as

a Strategus in opposition to Diaeus. But finding that he had no chance

of success Menalchidas poisoned himself.[43]

Then followed the riot at Corinth.[44] Marcus Aurelius Orestes at the

head of a commission arrived at last at Corinth, and there informed the

magistrates in council that the league must give up Argos, Corinth,

and Sparta. The magistrates hastily summoned an assembly and announced

the message from the Senate; a furious riot followed, every man in

Corinth suspected of being a Spartan was seized and thrown into prison;

the very residence of the Roman commissioners was not able to afford

such persons any protection, and even the persons of Orestes and his

colleagues were in imminent danger.

Some months afterwards a second commission arrived headed by Sextus

Julius Caesar, and demanded, without any express menace, that the

authors of the riot should be given up. The demand was evaded; and when

Caesar returned to Rome with his report, war was at once declared.

[Sidenote: B.C. 147-146.]

The new Strategus, elected in the autumn of B.C. 147, was Critolaus.

He was a bitter anti-Romanist like Diaeus: and these statesmen and

their party fancied that the Romans, having already two wars on hand,

at Carthage and in Spain, would make any sacrifice to keep peace with

Achaia. They had not indeed openly declined the demands of Sextus,

but, to use Polybius’s expressive phrase, “they accepted with the left

hand what the Romans offered with the right.”[45] While pretending to

be preparing to submit their case to the Senate, they were collecting

an army from the cities of the league. Inspired with an inexplicable

infatuation, which does not deserve the name of courage, Critolaus even

advanced northwards towards Thermopylae, as if he could with his petty

force bar the road to the Romans and free Greece. He was encouraged,

it was said, by a party at Thebes which had suffered from Rome for its

Macedonising policy. But, rash as the march was, it was managed with at

least equal imprudence. Instead of occupying Thermopylae, they stopped

short of it to besiege Trachinian Heracleia, an old Spartan colony,[46]

which refused to join the league. While engaged in this, Critolaus

heard that Metellus (who wished to anticipate his successor Mummius)

was on the march from Macedonia. He beat a hasty retreat to Scarpheia

in Locris,[47] which was on the road leading to Elateia and the south;

here he was overtaken and defeated with considerable slaughter.

Critolaus appears not to have fallen on the field; but he was never

seen again. He was either lost in some marshes over which he attempted

to escape, as Pausanias suggests, or poisoned himself, as Livy says.

Diaeus, as his predecessor, became Strategus, and was elected for the

following year also. Diaeus exerted himself to collect troops for

the defence of Corinth, nominally as being at war with Sparta. He

succeeded in getting as many as fourteen thousand infantry and six

hundred cavalry, consisting partly of citizens and partly of slaves;

and sent four thousand picked men under Alcamenes to hold Megara, while

he himself occupied Corinth. When Metellus approached, however, this

outpost at Megara hastily retreated into Corinth. Metellus took up his

position in the Isthmus, and offered the Achaeans the fairest terms.

Diaeus, however, induced them to reject all offers; and Metellus was

kept some time encamped before Corinth.

[Sidenote: B.C. 146. Arrival of Mummius.]

It was now late in the spring of B.C. 146, and the new Consul, Lucius

Mummius, arrived at the Roman camp. He at once sent Metellus back to

Macedonia, and quietly awaited the arrival of fresh troops, which he

had sent for from Crete and Pergamum, as well as from Italy.[48] He

eventually had an army of about thirty thousand men, nearly double

of the Greek army in Corinth. Nothing apparently was done till the

late summer, or autumn. But then the final catastrophe was rapid and

complete. The Roman officers regarded the Achaean force with such

contempt, that they did not take proper precautions, so that Diaeus

won a slight advantage against one of the Roman outposts. Flushed with

this success, he drew out for a pitched battle, in which he was totally

defeated. He made his way to Megalopolis, where, after killing his

wife, he poisoned himself.

[Sidenote: Polybius saves some statues of national interest.]

Thus by a series of imprudent measures, which Polybius denounces,

but was not at home to oppose, the Achaean league had drifted into

downright war with Rome; and, almost without a struggle, had fallen

helplessly at her feet, forced to accept whatever her mercy or contempt

might grant. Mercy, however, was to be preceded by stern punishment.

Corinth was given up to plunder and to fire, and Polybius returned

from Africa in time to witness it.[49] The destruction or deportation

of works of art, of pictures, statues, and costly furniture, he could

not prevent; but he spoke a successful word to preserve the statues of

Philopoemen in the various cities from destruction; and also begged

successfully for the restoration of some of the Eponymous hero Achaeus,

and of Philopoemen and Aratus, which had already been transported as

far as Acarnania on their way to Italy.[50] He also dissuaded his

friends from rushing to take their share in the plunder by purchasing

the confiscated goods of Diaeus, which were put to auction and could be

bought at low rates; and he refused to accept any of them himself.[51]

[Sidenote: The new settlement of the Peloponnese, B.C. 146-145.]

The settlement of the territories of the league was put into the hands

of a commission of ten men who were sent out after the sack of Corinth;

while Mummius, after seeing that such towns in the Peloponnese as had

joined in the war were deprived of their fortifications and arms, and

after inflicting punishment upon other towns in Greece which had shown

active sympathy with Perseus, especially Thebes and Chalcis, returned

home to celebrate his triumph, which was adorned with marble and bronze

statues and pictures from Corinth.[52] The commissioners who had been

sent out to make a final settlement of Greece, or Achaia, as it was

henceforth to be called in official language, settled the general

plan in conjunction with Mummius; but the commissioners continued

their labours for six months, at the end of which time they departed,

leaving Polybius to settle with each town the details of their local

legislation. The general principles which the commissioners laid down

were first, the entire abolition of all the leagues, and consequently

of the league assemblies; each town, with its surrounding district,

which had once formed a canton in the league, was to be separate and

independent: its magistrates, secondly, were to be selected according

to a fixed assessment of property, the old equality or democracy

being abolished: thirdly, no member of one canton might own property

in another: fourthly, the Boeotians were ordered to pay a heavy

compensation to the Heracleots and Euboeans, and the Achaeans to the

Spartans: lastly, a fixed tribute to Rome was imposed on all states

in Greece.[53] Some of these measures were in a few years’ time

relaxed, the fines were mitigated, the rule against inter-possession of

property was abolished, and the league assemblies were again allowed

for certain local purposes. But this was the end of the league as a

free federation. It is often said that “Greece was now reduced to the

form of a Roman province under the name of Achaia.” This is true in a

sense, and yet is misleading. Achaia did not become a province like

the other provinces, yearly allotted to a proconsul or propraetor or

legatus, until the time of Augustus. Such direct interference from a

Roman magistrate as was thought necessary was left to the governor of

Macedonia.[54] Yet in a certain sense Achaia was treated as a separate

entity, and had a “formula,” or constitution, founded on the separate

local laws which the commissioners found existing, or imposed, with the

help of Polybius, on the several states; it paid tribute like other

provinces, and was in fact, though called free, subject to Rome.

Polybius performed his task of visiting the various towns in the

Peloponnese, explaining when necessary the meaning of the new

arrangements, and advising them, when they had to make others for

themselves, so much to the satisfaction of every one, that there was

a universal feeling that he had been a benefactor to his country, and

had made the best of their situation that could be made. Statues of him

are mentioned by Pausanias in several places in the Peloponnese: in

Mantinea[55] and at Megalopolis,[56] with an inscription in elegiacs

to the effect that “he had travelled over every land and sea; was an

ally of the Romans, and mitigated their wrath against Greece.” Another

in the temple of Persephone, near Acacesium,[57] under which was a

legend stating that “Greece would not have erred at all if she had

obeyed Polybius; and that when she did err, he alone proved of any

help to her.” There were others also at Pallantium,[58] Tegea,[59] and

Olympia.[60]

In these services to his country Polybius was occupied in B.C. 145.

Of his life after that we have no detailed record. He is believed

to have visited Scipio while engaged on the siege of Numantia (B.C.

134-132), on which he wrote a separate treatise.[61] We know also

that he visited Alexandria in the reign of Ptolemy Physcon (B.C.

146-117), and expressed his contempt for the state of the people and

their rulers.[62] These years must have been also much occupied with

the extension of his history, which he originally intended should

end with the fall of the Macedonian kingdom (B.C. 168),[63] but

which was afterwards continued to the fall of Carthage and Greece

(B.C. 146);[64] for even if the history had been completed up to its

originally intended limit, and the notice of extension afterwards

inserted, there still was enough to do to occupy some years of a busy

life; especially as he seems to have carried out his principle that an

historian ought to be a traveller, visiting the localities of which

he speaks, and testing by personal inspection the possibility of the

military evolutions which he undertakes to describe. His travels appear

certainly to have embraced the greater part of Gaul, and it even seems

possible from one passage that he visited Britain.[65] His explorations

on the African coast were doubtless extensive, and he appears to have

visited Phoenicia, Cilicia, and Asia Minor. We hear of him at Sardis,

though we cannot fix the date of the visit.[66] Lastly, Lucian tells us

that, “returning from the country, he had a fall from his horse, the

effects of which he died at the age of eighty-two.” No place is given,

and no clue which may help us to be certain of the date.[67] Polybius,

besides the general history, had written a treatise on Tactics,[68] a

panegyric on Philopoemen,[69] a history of the Numantine war,[70] and

perhaps a treatise on public speaking (δημηγορία).[71]

§ 2.—THE SOURCES OF POLYBIUS’S HISTORY

Polybius always maintains that the study of documents is only one, and

not the most important, element in the equipment of an historian. The

best is personal experience and personal inquiry.

[Sidenote: Personal knowledge.]

Of the sources of his own history, then, the first and best may be set

down as knowledge acquired by being actually present at great events,

such as the destruction of Carthage and the sack of Corinth; visits to

the Roman army in camp; assisting at actual debates in his own country;

personal knowledge of and service under men of the first position

in Achaia; personal visits to famous localities; voyages and tours

undertaken for the definite object of inspection and inquiry; and,

lastly, seeing and questioning the survivors of great battles, or the

men who had played a leading part in conspicuous political transactions.

From his earliest youth Polybius had enjoyed some special advantages

in these respects. As he himself says, “the events in Greece fell

within his own generation, or that immediately preceding his own,—and

he therefore could relate what he had seen, or what he had heard from

eye-witnesses” (4, 2). And of the later period he “was not only an eye

witness, but in some cases an actor, and in others the chief actor”

(3, 4). When he was probably under twenty we hear of his being present

at an important interview between Philopoemen and Archon;[72] and his

election as hipparch in B.C. 169, soon after he reached the legal age,

was in consequence of his having thrown himself with vigour into the

practical working of the cavalry under Philopoemen. In regard to Roman

history and polity, we have Cicero’s testimony that he was _bonus

auctor in primis_,[73] and more particularly in regard to chronology,

_quo nemo fuit in exquirendis temporibus diligentius_.[74] Nor is

this praise undeserved, as is shown by his energy in pushing minute

and personal inquiries. Thus he learnt the details of the Hannibalic

war from some of the survivors of those actually engaged; visited the

localities, and made the pass of the Alps used by Hannibal;[75] studied

and transcribed the stele or bronze tablet placed by Hannibal on the

Lacinian promontory;[76] travelled through Libya, Spain, Gaul, and the

seas which washed their shores (perhaps even as far as Britain), in

order to give a true account of them.[77] Conversed with Massanissa

on the character of the Carthaginians, as well as with many of the

Carthaginians themselves.[78] Carefully observed Carthagena.[79]

Inspected the records at Rhodes,[80] and the Archives at Rome;[81]

and studied and transcribed the treaties preserved there.[82] Visited

Sardis,[83] Alexandria,[84] and Locri Epizephyrii.[85] To this, which

is by no means an exhaustive account of his travels and inquiries,

may be added the fact that his intimacy with the younger Africanus,

grandson by adoption and nephew by marriage of the elder Scipio,

must have placed at his disposal a considerable mass of information

contained in the family archives of the Scipios, as to the Hannibalian

war, and especially as to the campaigns in Spain.[86]

Such were some of the means by which Polybius was enabled to obtain

accurate and trustworthy information.

[Sidenote: Use of previous writers by Polybius.]

It remains to inquire how far Polybius availed himself of the writings

of others. He looks upon the study of books as an important part of

an historian’s work, but, as we have seen, not the most important.

His practice appears to have been conformable to his theory. The

greater part of his information he gained from personal observation

and personal inquiry. Nevertheless, some of his history must have been

learnt from books, and very little of it could have been entirely

independent of them. Still, as far as we have the means of judging from

the fragments of his work that have come down to us, his obligations

to his predecessors are not as extensive as that of most of those who

wrote after him; nor is the number of those to whom he refers great.[87]

[Sidenote: The Punic wars.]

Of his preliminary sketch contained in books 1 and 2, the first book,

containing the account of the first Punic war and the Mercenary war,

appears to have been derived mainly from the writings of Fabius Pictor

(b. circ. B.C. 260), and Philinus of Agrigentum (contemporary and

secretary of Hannibal). He complains that they were violent partisans,

the one of Rome, the other of Carthage.[88] But by comparing the two,

and checking both by documents and inscriptions at Rome, he, no doubt,

found sufficient material for his purpose.

[Sidenote: Illyrians and Gauls.]

[Sidenote: Achaia.]

The second book contains an account of the origin of the war between

Rome and Illyricum; of the Gallic or Celtic wars from the earliest

times; and a sketch of Achaean history to the end of the Cleomenic

war. The first two of these must have been compiled with great labour

from various public documents and family records, as well as in part

from Pictor. The sketch of Achaean history rested mainly, as far as

it depends on books, on the Memoirs of Aratus; while he studied only

to refute the writings of Phylarchus the panegyrist of Cleomenes. He

complains of the partiality of Phylarchus: but in this part of the

history it was perhaps inevitable that his own views should have been

coloured by the prejudices and prepossessions of a politician, and one

who had been closely connected from boyhood with the patriotic Achaean

party, led by Philopoemen, which was ever at enmity with all that

Cleomenes did his utmost to establish.

[Sidenote: Sicilian history.]

For his account of Sicilian affairs he had studied the works of Timaeus

of Tauromeniun. Although he accuses him bitterly, and at excessive

length,[89] of all the faults of which an historian can be guilty, he

yet confesses that he found in his books much that was of assistance to

him[90] in regard both to Magna Graecia and Sicily; for which he also

consulted the writings of Aristotle, especially it appears the now lost

works on Polities (πολιτείαι), and Founding of Cities (κτίσεις). The

severity of his criticism of Timaeus is supported by later authors.

He was nicknamed ἐπιτίμαιος, in allusion to the petulance of his

criticism of others;[91] and Plutarch attacks him for his perversion

of truth and his foolish and self-satisfied attempts to rival the best

of the ancient writers, and to diminish the credit of the most famous

philosophers.[92]

[Sidenote: Greek history.]

As far as we possess his writings, we find little trace in Polybius of

a reference to the earliest historians. Herodotus is not mentioned,

though there may be some indications of acquaintance with his work;[93]

nor the Sicilian Philistus who flourished about B.C. 430. Thucydides

is mentioned once, and Xenophon three times. Polybius was engaged in

the history of a definite period, and had not much occasion to refer to

earlier times; and perhaps the epitomator, in extracting what seemed

of value, chose those parts especially where he was the sole or best

authority.

[Sidenote: Macedonia.]

For the early history of Macedonia, he seems to have relied mostly on

two pupils of Isocrates, Ephorus of Cumae and Theopompus of Chios;

though the malignity of the latter deprived his authority of much

weight.[94] He also studied the work of Alexander’s friend and victim,

Callisthenes; and vehemently assailed his veracity, as others have

done. More important to him perhaps were the writings of his own

contemporaries, the Rhodians Antisthenes and Zeno; though he detects

them in some inaccuracies, which in the case of Zeno he took the

trouble to correct: and of Demetrius of Phalerum, whose writings he

seems to have greatly admired.

[Sidenote: Egypt and Syria.]

For the contemporary history of Egypt and Syria he seems to have

trusted principally to personal inquiry. He expressly (2, 37) declines

entering on the early history of Egypt on the ground of its having been

fully done by others (referring, perhaps, to Herodotus, Manetho, and

Ptolemy of Megalopolis). For the Seleucid dynasty of Syria he quotes no

authorities.

[Sidenote: Geography.]

On no subject does Polybius seem to have read so widely as on

geography: doubtless as preparing himself not only for writing, but for

being able to travel with the knowledge and intelligence necessary to

enable him to observe rightly. He had studied minutely and criticised

freely the writings of Dicaearchus, Pytheas, Eudoxus, and Eratosthenes.

He was quick to detect fallacies in these writers, and to reject their

dogmatising on the possibilities of nature; yet he does not seem to

have had in an eminent degree the topographical faculty, or the power

of giving a graphic picture of a locality. Modern research has tended

rather to strengthen than weaken our belief in the accuracy of his

descriptions, as in the case of Carthagena and the site of the battle

of Cannae; still it cannot be asserted that he is to be classed high in

the list of topographers, whether scientific or picturesque.

[Sidenote: General Literature.]

He appears to have been fairly well acquainted with the poets; but

his occasions for quoting them, as far as we have his work, are not

very frequent. He seems to have known his Homer, as every Greek was

bound to do. He quotes the Cypria of Stasinus, who, according to

tradition, was son-in-law of Homer; Hesiod, Simonides of Ceos, Pindar,

Euripides, and Epicharmus of Cos. He quotes or refers to Plato, whom

he appears chiefly to have studied for his political theories; and

certain technical writers, such as Aeneas Tacticus, and Cleoxenos and

Democlitus, inventors of a new system of telegraphy, if they wrote it

rather than taught it practically.

Even allowing for the loss of so great a part of his work, the list

of authors is not a long one: and it suggests the remark, which his

style as well as his own professions tend to confirm, that he was

not primarily a man of letters, but a man of affairs and action, who

loved the stir of political agitation, and unbent his mind by the

excitement of travel and the chase. Nothing moves his contempt more

than the idea of Timaeus living peaceably for fifty years at Athens,

holding aloof from all active life, and poring over the books in

the Athenian libraries as a preparation for writing history; which,

according to him, can only be worth reading when it springs, not from

rummaging Record offices, but from taking a personal share in the

political strife of the day; studying military tactics in the camp and

field; witnessing battles; questioning the actors in great events; and

visiting the sites of battles, the cities and lands which are to be

described.

§ 3. THE ACHAEAN LEAGUE[95]

To the student of politics the history of Greece is chiefly interesting

as offering examples of numerous small states enjoying complete local

autonomy, yet retaining a feeling of a larger nationality founded in a

community of blood, language, and religion; a community, that is, in

the sense that, fundamentally united in these three particulars, they

yet acknowledged variations even in them, which distinguished without

entirely separating them. From some points of view the experiment may

be regarded as having been successful. From others it was a signal

failure. Local jealousies and mutual provocations not only continually

set city against city, clan against clan, but perpetually suggested

invitations sent by one city, or even one party in a city, to foreign

potentates or peoples to interfere in their behalf against another city

or party, which they hated or feared, but were too weak to resist. Thus

we find the Persians, Macedonians, Syrians, and Romans successively

induced to interfere in Greek politics with the assurance that there

were always some states, or some party in each state, who would welcome

them. From time to time men of larger views had conceived the idea of

creating a united Empire of Hellas, which might present an unbroken

front to the foreigner. From time to time philosophers had preached the

impossibility of combining complete local independence with the idea of

a strong and vigorous nationality. But the true solution of the problem

had never been successfully hit upon: and after various abortive

attempts at combination, Greece was left, a helpless collection of

disjointed fragments, to fall under the intrigues of Macedonia and Rome.

The Achaean league was not the first attempt at such a formation;

though it was the first that ever arrived at anything like a complete

scheme of federalism (unless the Aetolian preceded it); and was in

many respects a fresh departure in Hellenic policy, and the first

experiment in federation which seemed to contain the elements of

success. From the earliest times certain Greek states had combined more

or less closely, or loosely, for certain specific purposes. Such were

the various Amphictyonies, and especially the Amphictyonic league of

Thermopylae and Delphi. The object of these was primarily religious:

the worship of a particular deity, the care of a particular temple; the

first condition of membership being therefore community of blood. But

though this was the origin of their being, there were elements in their

constitution which might have developed into some form of federalism,

had it not been for the centrifugal forces that always tended to keep

Greek states apart. Thus we can conceive the idea of the Pylagorae from

the various states gradually giving rise to the notion of a central

parliament of elected representatives; and the sphere of its activity

gradually extending to matters purely political, beginning with those

which were on the borderland of religion and politics. And, indeed,

the action of the great Amphictyonic league at times seemed to be

approaching this.[96]

But the forces tending to decentralisation were always the stronger:

and though the league continued to exist for many centuries, it became

less and less political, and less and less influential in Greece. So

too with other combinations in Greece. The community (τὸ κοινὸν) of the

Ionians, beginning with a common meeting for worship at the Panionium,

on one memorable occasion at least seemed for a brief space to promise

to develop into a federation for mutual succour and defence. In the

Ionian revolt in B.C. 500, the deputies (πρόβουλοι) of the Ionian

states met and determined to combine against the enemy; they even went

so far as to appoint a common general or admiral. But the instinct

of separation was too strong; at the first touch of difficulty and

hardship the union was resolved into its elements.[97]

The constitution of the Boeotian league was somewhat more regular and

permanent. The Boeotarchs appear to have met at regular intervals, and

now and again to have succeeded in mustering a national levy. There

were also four regularly constituted “Senates” to control them, though

we know nothing of their constitution.[98] But the league had come to

nothing; partly from the resistance of the towns to the overweening

pretensions of Thebes, and later from the severity of the treatment

experienced by it at the hands of Alexander and his successors.

Thessaly, again, was a loose confederacy of towns or cantons, in which

certain great families, such as the Aleuadae and Scopadae, held the

direction of their local affairs; or some tyrannus, as Alexander of

Pherae, obtained sovereign powers. Still, for certain purposes, a

connexion was acknowledged, and a Tagus of Thessaly was appointed, with

the power of summoning a general levy of men. For a short time prior

to the Roman conquest these officers appear to have gained additional

importance; but Thessaly never was united enough to be of importance,

in spite of its famous cavalry, even among Greek nations, far less to

be capable of presenting a firm front to the foreigner.

One other early attempt at forming something like a Panhellenic

union ought to be noticed. When the Persian invasion of B.C. 480 was

threatening, deputies (πρόβουλοι) met at the Isthmus, sat there in

council for some months, and endeavoured to unite Greece against the

foreigner.[99] But the one expedition which was sent solely by their

instigation proved a failure.[100] And when the danger was over,

principally by the combined exertion of Athens and Sparta, this council

seems to have died a natural death. Still for a time it acted as a

supreme parliament of Greece, and assumed the power to punish with fine

or death those Greeks who had medised.[101]

Besides these rudimentary leagues, which might, but did not, issue

in some form of Panhellenic government, there were periods in Greek

history in which the Hegemone of one state did something towards

presenting the appearance of union. Thus Polycrates of Samos seemed

at one time to be likely to succeed in forming a great Ionian Empire.

And in continental Greece, before the Persian wars, we find Sparta

occupying the position of an acknowledged court of reference in

international questions,[102]—a position in which she probably had been

preceded by Argos. And after those wars, by means of the confederacy

of Delos, formed at first for one specific purpose—that of keeping the

Aegean free of the Persians—Athens gradually rose to the position of

an imperial city, claiming active control over the external politics

of a considerable portion of Greece and nearly all the islands (B.C.

478-404). But this proved after all but a passing episode in Greek

history. Athens perhaps misused her power; and Sparta took up the

task with great professions, but in a spirit even less acceptable to

the Greek world than that of Athens; and by the peace of Antalcidas

(B.C. 387) the issue of the hundred years’ struggle with Persia left

one of the fairest portions of Hellas permanently separated from the

main body. Asiatic Greece never became Hellenic again. The fall of the

Persian empire before the invasion of Alexander for a while reunited it

to a semi-Greek power; but Alexander’s death left it a prey to warring

tyrants. It lost its prosperity and its commerce; and whatever else it

became, it was never independent, or really Hellenic again.

For a few years more Sparta and then Thebes assumed to be head of

Greece, but the Macedonian supremacy secured at Chaeronea (B.C.

338), still more fully after the abortive Lamian war (B.C. 323),

left Greece only a nominal freedom, again and again assured to it by

various Macedonian monarchs, but really held only on sufferance. The

country seemed to settle down without farther struggle into political

insignificance. The games and festivals went on, and there was still

some high talk of Hellenic glories. But one after another of the

towns submitted to receive Macedonian garrisons and governors; and

Athens, once the brilliant leader in national aspirations, practically

abandoned politics, and was content to enjoy a reputation partly

founded on her past, and partly on the fame of the philosophers who

still taught in her gardens and porches, and attracted young men from

all parts of the world to listen to their discourses, and to sharpen

their wits by the acute if not very useful discussions which they

promoted.[103] Sparta, far from retaining her old ascendency, had been

losing with it her ancient constitution, which had been the foundation

of her glory, as well perhaps as in some respects the source of her

weakness; and for good or evil had ceased to count for much in Hellenic

politics.

In the midst of this general collapse two portions of the Hellenic race

gradually formed or recovered some sort of united government, which

enabled them to play a conspicuous part in the later history of Greece,

and which was essentially different from any of the combinations of

earlier times of which I have been speaking. These were the Aetolians

and Achaeans.

[Sidenote: Aetolian league.]

With regard to the former our information is exceedingly scanty.

They were said to have been an emigration from Elis originally;[104]

but they were little known to the rest of Greece. Strange stories

were told of them, of their savage mode of life, their scarcely

intelligible language, their feeding on raw flesh, and their fierceness

as soldiers. They were said to live in open villages, widely removed

from each other, and without effective means of combination for

mutual protection. Their piracies, which were chiefly directed to the

coasts of Messenia, caused the Messenians to seize the opportunity

of Demosthenes being in their neighbourhood in B.C. 426, with a

considerable Athenian army, to persuade him to invade the Aetolians,

who were always on the look-out to attack Naupactus, a town which the

Athenians had held since B.C. 455,[105] and which was naturally an

object of envy to them as commanding the entrance to the Corinthian

gulf. But when Demosthenes attempted the invasion, he found to his

cost that the Aetolians knew how to combine, and he had to retire

beaten with severe loss.[106] The separate tribes in Aetolia seem soon

afterwards to have had, if they had not already, some form of central

government; for we find them negotiating with Agesilaus in B.C. 390,

with the same object of obtaining Naupactus,[107] when the Athenians

had lost it, and it had fallen into the hands of the Locrians.[108] The

Aetolians appear to have gradually increased in importance: for we find

Philip making terms with them and giving them the coveted Naupactus in

B.C. 341, which had at some time previous come into the possession of

the Achaeans.[109] But their most conspicuous achievement, which caused

them to take a position of importance in Greece, was their brilliant

defeat of the invading Gauls at Delphi in B.C. 279.[110] By this

time their federal constitution must in some shape have been formed.

The people elected a Strategus in a general meeting, usually held at

Thermus, at the autumn equinox, to which apparently all Aetolians

were at liberty to come, and at which questions of peace and war and

external politics generally were brought forward; though meanwhile the

Strategus appears to have had the right of declaring and carrying on

war as he chose. There was also a hipparch and a secretary (21, 32);

and a senate called Apocleti (20, 1); and a body called _Synedri_

(_C. I. G._ 2350), which seem to have been judicial, and another

called _Nomographi_ (13, 1, _C. I. G._ 3046), who were apparently an

occasional board for legislation. They produced some writers, but their

works are lost. Accordingly, as Professor Mahaffy observes, “we know

them entirely from their enemies.” Still the acknowledged principle on

which they acted, ἄγειν λάφυρον ἀπὸ λαφύρου[111]—that is, that where

spoils were going, whether from friend or foe, they were justified in

taking a part, speaks for itself, and is enough to stamp them as at

least dangerous and unpleasant neighbours.

[Sidenote: Achaean league.]

The Achaeans have a different and more interesting history.

The original Achaean league consisted of a federation of twelve

cities and their respective territory (μέρος): Pellene, Aegira,

Aegae, Bura, Helice, Aegium, Rhypes, Patrae, Pharae, Olenus, Dyme,

Tritaea.[112] This league was of great antiquity, but we know nothing

of its history, or how it differed from other leagues, such as I have

already mentioned, in adding political to religious unity. In B.C.

454 it submitted to Athens; but was restored to its original position

in the same year on the signing of the thirty years’ truce between

Sparta and Athens;[113] and though the Athenians demanded that their

authority over it should be restored to them in B.C. 425, when they

had caught the Spartan army at Sphacteria, no change appears to have

been made.[114] Thucydides certainly seems to speak of it, not as

entirely free, but as in some special manner subject to the supremacy

of Sparta. Polybius, however, claims for them, at an early period, a

peculiar and honourable place in Greek politics, as being distinguished

for probity and honour. Thus they were chosen as arbitrators in the

intestine of Magna Graecia (about B.C. 400-390); and again, after the

battle of Leuctra (B.C. 371) to mediate between Sparta and Thebes.[115]

They must therefore, between B.C. 425-390, have obtained a virtual

independence. They shared, however, in the universal decline of

Hellenic activity during the Macedonian period (B.C. 359 to about B.C.

285), and Polybius complains that they were systematically depressed

by the intrigues of Sparta and Macedonia; both which powers took care

to prevent any Achaean of promising ability from attaining influence

in the Peloponnese.[116] The same influence was exerted to estrange

the Achaean cities from each other. They were garrisoned by Macedonian

troops, or fell under the power of tyrants; and to all appearance the

league had fared as other such combinations had fared before, and had

been resolved into its original elements.

[Sidenote: Revival of the league, B.C. 284-280.]

But the tradition of the old union did not die out entirely. Eight

of the old cities still existed in a state of more or less vigour.

Olenus and Helice had long ago disappeared by encroachments of the sea

(before B.C. 371), and their places had not been filled up by others.

Two other towns, Rhypes and Aegae, had from various causes ceased to be

inhabited, and their places had been taken in the league (before the

dissolution) by Leontium and Caryneia. There were therefore ten cities

which had once known the advantages and disadvantages of some sort of

federal union; as well as the misfortunes which attached to disunion,

aggravated by constant interference from without.

[Sidenote: B.C. 284. First union of Dyme, Patrae, Tritaea, Pharae.]

[Sidenote: Adherence of Aegium, B.C. 279.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 279-255.]

[Sidenote: Margos of Caryneia first sole Strategus, B.C. 255.]

The first step in an attempt to resuscitate the league was taken in

the 124th Olympiad (B.C. 284-280). Macedonia was at the time weakened

by the troubles of a disputed succession: Pyrrhus was absorbed in

his futile Italian expedition: a change in the sovereign of Egypt

opened a way to a possible change of policy at Alexandria: and the

death of Lysimachus gave the monarchs something else to do than to

trouble themselves about the Peloponnese. At this period four of the

Achaean towns, Dyme, Patrae, Tritaea, and Pharae, formed a league

for mutual help. This proving, after a trial of five years, to have

some stability, it was joined by Aegium, from which the Macedonian

garrison was expelled. At intervals, of which we are not informed, this

was again joined by Bura and Caryneia. These seven cities continued

to constitute the entire league for twenty-five years; the federal

magistrates consisting of two Strategi, elected by each city in turns,

and a secretary. As to the doings of the league during this period

we are entirely in the dark. The next step that we hear of is the

abolition of the dual presidency and the election of Margos of Caryneia

as sole Strategus. We are not told the reasons of the change; but it

is clear that a divided command might often give room for delay, when

delay was fatal; and for the conflict of local interests, where the

interests of the community should be the paramount consideration. At

any rate the change was made: and Margos, who had been a loyal servant

of the league, was the first sole Strategus. His immediate successors

we do not know. The next fact in the history of the league was the

adherence of Sicyon, a powerful town and the first of any, not in the

number of the old Achaean federation, to join. This therefore was

a great step in the direction of extending the federation over the

Peloponnese; and it was the work of the man destined to do much in

moulding the league into the shape in which it attained its greatest

effectiveness, Aratus of Sicyon. He found it weak; its cities poor

and insignificant; with no aid from rich soil or good harbourage to

increase its wealth or property;[117] he left it, not indeed free

from serious dangers and difficulties,—in part the result of his own

policy in calling in the aid of the Macedonians, in part created by

the persistent hostility of Aetolia and Sparta,—but yet possessed of

great vitality, and fast becoming the most powerful and influential of

all the Greek governments; although at no time can it be spoken of as

Panhellenic without very considerable exaggeration. Aratus had been

brought up in exile at Argos, after the murder of his father Cleinias

(B.C. 271); and, when twenty years of age, by a gallant and romantic

adventure, had driven out the tyrant Nicocles from Sicyon (B.C. 251).

He became the chief magistrate of his native town, which he induced to

join the Achaean league, thus causing, as I have said, the league to

take its first step towards embracing all the Peloponnese. It seems

that for five years Aratus remained chief magistrate of Sicyon, but

a private citizen of the league. In B.C. 245 (though of the exact

year we have no positive information), he appears to have been first

elected Strategus of the league. But it was not until his second year

of office, B.C. 243-242, that he began putting in practice the policy

which he proposed to himself,—the expulsion of the Macedonian garrisons

and the despots from the cities of the Peloponnese, with the view of

their joining the league. He began with the Acrocorinthus. Corinth,

freed from the foreign garrison, joined the league, and was followed

soon after by Megara[118] (B.C. 240). From this time Aratus was

Strategus of the league in alternate years to the time of his death,

the federal law not allowing two consecutive years of office.[119]

[Sidenote: Cleomenic war, B.C. 227-221.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 226-221.]

The death of Antigonus Gonatas (B.C. 239) led to a new departure.

Hitherto the Aetolians had been in league with the Macedonians to

vex and harry the Achaeans. The two leagues now made peace, and

the Aetolians aided the Achaeans in their resistance to Gonatas’s

successor, Demetrius (B.C. 239-229). Still the despots in many of the

Peloponnesian towns held out, trusting to the support of Demetrius.

When he died (B.C. 229) there was a general movement among them to

abdicate and join their cities to the league. Lydiades of Megalopolis

had done so during Demetrius’s lifetime; and now Aristomachus of Argos,

Xeno of Hermione, and Cleonymus of Phlius did the same. The rapid

extension of the Achaean league, however, could not fail to excite the

jealousy of the Aetolians, to whose league belonged certain Arcadian

cities such as Mantinea, Tegea, and Orchomenus. These they imagined to

be threatened by the policy of Aratus, which was apt to proceed on the

line that even a forcible attachment of a Peloponnesian town to the

league was in reality a liberation of its people from a constraining

power. The Spartan jealousy was aroused by the same fear. And then, as

Polybius puts it, the Aetolians connived at the extension of Spartan

power, even at the expense of cities in league with themselves, in

order to strengthen Cleomenes in his attitude of opposition to the

Achaeans.[120] Aratus, however, resolved to wait for some definite act

of hostility before moving. This was supplied by Cleomenes building

a fort (the Athenaeum) at Belbina, in the territory of Megalopolis,

a league city. Upon this the league necessarily proclaimed war with

Sparta. Thus does Polybius, a warm friend of the league, state the case

in its behalf. The league, he argues, had been growing by the voluntary

adherence of independent towns: it had shown no sign of an intention

to attack Laconian territory, or towns in league with Aetolia: while

Cleomenes had committed an act of wanton aggression and provocation

by building a hostile fort in its territory. But what the other side

had to say may be gathered from Plutarch’s life of Cleomenes, founded

principally on the work of Phylarchus the panegyrist of Cleomenes.[121]

Here the case is put very differently. Aratus, according to him, had

made up his mind that a union of the Peloponnesus was the one thing

necessary for the safety of the league. In a great measure he had been

already successful; but the parts which still stood aloof were Elis,

Laconia, and the cities of Arcadia which were under the influence of

Sparta.[122] He therefore harassed these last by every means in his

power; and the erection or fortification of the Athenaeum at Belbina

by Cleomenes was in truth only a measure of necessary defence. Aratus,

indeed, held that some of these Arcadian cities had been unfairly

seized by Cleomenes, with the connivance of the Aetolians;[123] but to

this Cleomenes might reply that, if the league claimed the right of

extending its connexion with the assent, often extorted, of the various

cities annexed, the same right could not justly be denied to himself.

A series of military operations took place during the next five years,

in which Cleomenes nearly always got the better of Aratus; who, able

and courageous in plots and surprises, was timid and ineffective in

the field. The one important blow struck by Aratus, that of seizing

Mantinea, was afterwards nullified by a counter-occupation of it by

the Lacedaemonians; and in spite of troubles at home, caused by his

great scheme of reform, Cleomenes was by B.C. 224 in so superior a

position that he could with dignity propose terms to the league. He

asked to be elected Strategus, therefore.[124] At first sight this

seemed a means of effecting the desired union of the Peloponnese; and

as such the Achaeans were inclined to accept the proposal. Aratus,

however, exerted all his influence to defeat the measure: and, in

spite of all his failures, his services to the league enabled him to

convince his countrymen that they should reject the offer; and he was

himself elected Strategus for the twelfth time in the spring of B.C.

223. Aratus has been loudly condemned for allowing a selfish jealousy

to override his care for the true interests of his country, in thus

refusing a prospect of a united Achaia, in which some one besides

himself should be the leading man.[125] But I think there is something

to be said on the other side. What Aratus had been working for with a

passionate eagerness was a union of free democratic states. Cleomenes,

in spite of his liberal reforms at home, was a Spartan to the back

bone. Aratus would have no manner of doubt that a league, with Sparta

supreme in it, would inevitably become a Spartan kingdom. The forces

of Sparta would be used to crush dissenting cities; and soon to put

down the free institution which would always be disliked and feared

by the Spartan government. Security from Macedonian influence, if it

were really obtained,—and that was far from certain,—would be dearly

purchased at the price of submission to Spartan tyranny, which would

be more galling and oppressive in proportion as it was nearer and

more unremitting. With these views Aratus began to turn his eyes to

the Macedonian court, as the only possible means of resisting the

encroaching policy of Cleomenes. The character of Antigonus Doson, who

was then administering Macedonia, gave some encouragement to hope for

honest and honourable conduct on his part; and after some hesitation

Aratus took the final step of asking for his aid.[126] I do not expect

to carry the assent of many readers when I express the opinion that

he was right; and that the Greek policy towards Macedonia had been

from the first a grievous error,—fostered originally by the patriotic

eloquence of Demosthenes, and continued ever since by that ineradicable

sentiment for local autonomy which makes Greek history so interesting,

but inevitably tended to the political annihilation of Greece. Had some

_modus vivendi_ been found with the series of very able sovereigns who

ruled Macedonia, a strong Greek nation might have been the result,

with a central government able to hold its own even in the face of

the great “cloud in the West,” which was surely overshadowing Greek

freedom. But this was not to be. The taste for local freedom was too

strong; and showed itself by constant appeals to an outside power

against neighbours, which yet the very men who appealed to it would not

recognise or obey. The Greeks had to learn that nations cannot, any

more than individuals, eat their cake and have it too. Local autonomy,

and the complete liberty of every state to war with its neighbours as

it chooses, and of every one to speak and act as he pleases, have their

charms; but they are not compatible with a united resistance to a great

centralised and law-abiding power. And all the eloquence of all the

Greek orators rolled into one could not make up for the lack of unity,

or enable the distracted Greeks to raise an army which might stand

before a volley of Roman pila or a charge of Roman legionaries.

The help asked of Antigonus Doson was given with fatal readiness; but

it had to be purchased by the admission of a Macedonian garrison into

the Acrocorinthus, one of those “fetters of Greece,” the recovery of

which had been among Aratus’s earliest and most glorious triumphs.

The battle of Sellasia (B.C. 221) settled the question of Spartan

influence. Cleomenes fled to Alexandria and never returned. Sparta was

not enslaved by Antigonus; who on the contrary professed to restore her

ancient constitution,—probably meaning that the Ephoralty destroyed

by Cleomenes was to be reconstituted, and the exiles banished by him

recalled. Practically she was left a prey to a series of unscrupulous

tyrants who one after the other managed to obtain absolute power,

Lycurgus (B.C. 220-210), Machanidas, B.C. 210-207; Nabis, B.C. 207-192;

who, though differing in their home administrations, all agreed in

using the enmity of the Aetolians in order to harass and oppress the

Achaeans in every possible way.

[Sidenote: B.C. 213. Death of Aratus.]

Aratus died in B.C. 213. The last seven years of his life were

embittered by much ill success in his struggles with the Aetolians;

and by seeing Philip V., of whose presence in the Peloponnese he was

the main cause, after rendering some brilliant services to the league,

both in the Peloponnese and the invasion of Aetolia, develop some of

the worst vices of the tyrant; and he believed himself, whether rightly

or wrongly, to be poisoned by Philip’s order: “This is the reward,” he

said to an attendant when he felt himself dying, “of my friendship for

Philip.”[127]

The history of the league after his death followed the same course for

some years. The war with the Aetolians went on, sometimes slackly,

sometimes vigorously, as Philip V. was or was not diverted by

contests with his barbarian neighbours, or by schemes for joining the

Carthaginian assaults upon the Roman power.

[Sidenote: B.C. 208-183, Philopoemen.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 193.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 195-194.]

The next phase of vigorous action on the part of the league is that

which corresponds with the career of Philopoemen, who had already

shown his energy and skill at the battle of Sellasia. He was elected

Hipparch in B.C. 210, and Strategus in B.C. 209. In his first office

he did much to reorganise the Achaean cavalry and restore them to

some discipline,[128] and he extended this as Strategus to the whole

army.[129] His life’s work, however, was the defeating and either

killing or confining to their frontier the tyrants of Sparta. But while

he was absent from the country after B.C. 200 a new element appeared in

the Peloponnese. In 197 the battle of Cynoscephalae put an end for ever

to Macedonian influence, and Flamininus proclaimed the liberty of all

Greece in B.C. 195 at the Nemean festival. But Nabis was not deposed;

he was secured in his power by a treaty with Rome; and when Philopoemen

returned from Crete (B.C. 193), he found a fresh war on the point of

breaking out owing to intrigues between that tyrant and the Aetolians.

They suggested, and he eagerly undertook to make, an attempt to

recover the maritime towns of which he had been deprived by the Roman

settlement.[130][Sidenote: 193-192.] Nabis at once attacked Gythium:

and seemed on the point of taking it and the whole of the coast towns,

which would thus have been lost to the league. Philopoemen, now again

Strategus (B.C. 192), failed to relieve Gythium; but by a skilful

piece of generalship inflicted so severe a defeat on Nabis, as he was

returning to Sparta, that he did not venture on further movements

beyond Laconia; and shortly afterwards was assassinated by some

Aetolians whom he had summoned to his aid.

[Sidenote: 189-187.]

But the comparative peace in the Peloponnese was again broken in

B.C. 189 by the Spartans seizing a maritime town called Las; the

object being to relieve themselves of the restraint which shut them

from the sea, and the possible attacks of the exiles who had been

banished by Nabis, and who were always watching an opportunity to

effect their return. Philopoemen (Strategus both 189 and 188 B.C.)

led an army to the Laconian frontier in the spring of B.C. 188, and

after the execution of eighty Spartans, who had been surrendered on

account of the seizure of Las, and of the murder of thirty citizens

who were supposed to have Achaean proclivities—Sparta submitted to his

demand to raze the fortifications, dismiss the mercenaries, send away

the new citizens enrolled by the tyrants, and abolish the Lycurgean

laws, accepting the Achaean institutions instead. This was afterwards

supplemented by a demand for the restoration of the exiles banished by

the tyrants. Such of the new citizens (three thousand) as did not leave

the country by the day named were seized and sold as slaves.[131]

[Sidenote: B.C. 188.]

[Sidenote: 188-183.]

Sparta was now part of the Achaean league, which at this time reached

its highest point of power; and its alliance was solicited by the most

powerful princes of the east. It is this period which Polybius seems to

have in mind in his description of the league at its best, as embracing

the whole of the Peloponnese.[132][Sidenote: Lycortas Strategus, B.C.

184-182.] And it was in this third period of the existence of the

renewed league that his father Lycortas came to the front, and he

himself at an early age began taking part in politics.

[Sidenote: B.C. 179.]

But the terms imposed on Sparta were essentially violent and unjust,

and, as it turned out, impolitic. Cowed into submission, she proved

a thorn in the side of the league. The exiles continually appealed

to Rome; and after Philopoemen’s death (B.C. 183) the affairs of the

league began more and more to come before the Roman Senate. As usual,

traitors were at hand ready to sell their country for the sake of

the triumph of their party; and Callicrates, sent to Rome to plead

the cause of the league,[133] employed the opportunity to support

himself and his party by advising the Senate to give support to “the

Romanisers” in every state. This Polybius regards as the beginning of

the decline of the league. And the party of moderation, to which he and

his father Lycortas belonged, and which wished to assert the dignity

and legal rights of their country while offering no provocation to the

Romans, were eventually included under the sweeping decree which caused

them, to the number of a thousand, to be deported to Italy. We have

already seen, in tracing the life of Polybius, how the poor remnants of

these exiles returned in B.C. 151, embittered against Rome, and having

learnt nothing and forgotten nothing. And how the old quarrels were

renewed, until an armed interference of Rome was brought upon them; and

how the victory of Mummius at Corinth (B.C. 146), and the consequent

settlement of the commissioners, finally dissolved the league into

separate cantons, nominally autonomous, but really entirely subject to

Rome.[134]

The constitution of the league presents many points of interest to the

student of politics, and has been elaborately discussed by more than

one English scholar. I shall content myself here with pointing out some

of the main features as they are mentioned by Polybius.[135]

The league was a federation of free towns, all retaining full local

autonomy of some form or other of democracy, which for certain purposes

were under federal laws and federal magistrates, elected in a federal

assembly which all citizens of the league towns might if they chose

attend. All towns of the league also used the same standards in coinage

and weights and measures (2, 37). The assembly of the league (σύνοδος)

met for election of the chief magistrate in May of each year, at first

always at Aegium, but later at the other towns of the league in turn

(29, 23); and a second time in the autumn.[136] And besides these

annual meetings, the Strategus, acting with his council of magistrates,

could summon a meeting at any time for three days (_e.g._ at Sicyon,

23, 17); and on one occasion we find the assembly delegating its powers

to the armed levy of league troops, who for the nonce were to act as an

assembly (4, 7). Side by side with this general assembly was a council

(βουλή), the functions and powers of which we cannot clearly ascertain.

It seems to have acted as representing the general assembly in foreign

affairs (4, 26; 22, 12); and, being a working committee of the whole

assembly, it sometimes happened that when an assembly was summoned on

some subject which did not rouse popular interest, it practically was

the assembly (29, 24). Its numbers have been assumed to be one hundred

and twenty, from the fact that Eumenes offered them a present of one

hundred and twenty talents, the interest of which was to pay their

expenses. But this, after all, is not a certain deduction (22, 10).

The officers of the league were: First, a President or Strategus who

kept the seal of the league (4, 7), ordered the levy of federal troops,

and commanded it in the field. He also summoned the assemblies, and

brought the business to be done before them, which was in the form

of a proposal to be accepted or rejected, not amended. He was not

chairman of the assembly, but like an English minister or a Roman

consul brought on the proposals. He was assisted by a kind of cabinet

of ten magistrates from the several towns, who were called Demiurgi

(δημιουργοὶ 23, 5).[137] This was their technical name: but Polybius

also speaks of them under the more general appellation of οἱ ἄρχοντες

(5, 1), οἱ συνάρχοντες (23, 16), αἱ ἀρχαὶ (22, 13), αἱ συναρχίαι (27,

2). Whether the number ten had reference to the ten old towns of the

league or not, it was not increased with the number of the towns; and,

though we are not informed how they were elected, it seems reasonable

to suppose that they were freely selected without reference to the

towns from which they came, as the Strategus himself was. There was

also a vice-president, or hypo-strategus, whose position was, I think,

wholly military. He did not rule in absence of the Strategus, or

succeed him in case of death, that being reserved for the Strategus

of the previous year; but he took a certain command in war next the

Strategus (5, 94; 4, 59). Besides these we hear of a Hipparch to

command the league cavalry (5, 95; 7, 22), an office which seems to

have been regarded as stepping-stone to that of Strategus. This proved

a bad arrangement, as its holder was tempted to seek popularity by

winking at derelictions of duty among the cavalry who were voters.[138]

There was also a Navarch to command the regular squadron of federal

ships (5, 94), who does not seem to have been so important a person.

There are also mentioned certain judges (δίκασται) to administer the

federal law. We hear of them, however, performing duties closely

bordering on politics; for they decided whether certain honorary

inscriptions, statues, or other marks of respect to king Eumenes should

be allowed to remain in the Achaean cities (28, 7).

The Strategus, on the order of the assembly, raised the federal army

(4, 7). The number of men raised differed according to circumstances.

A fairly full levy seems to have been five thousand infantry and five

hundred cavalry (4, 15). But the league also used mercenaries to a

great extent. And we hear of one army which was to consist of eight

thousand mercenary infantry, with five hundred mercenary cavalry; and

in this case the Achaean levy was only to be three thousand infantry,

with three hundred cavalry (5, 91).

The pay of the mercenaries and other league expenses were provided for

by an εἰσφορά or contribution from all the states (5, 31, 91). The

contributing towns appear to have been able to recover their payments

as an indemnification for damage which the federal forces had failed to

avert (4, 60).

The regular federal squadron of ships for guarding the sea-coasts

appears to have consisted of ten triremes (2, 9; δεκαναία μακρῶν πλοίων

22, 10).

Such was the organisation of the Federal Government. It was in form

purely democratic, all members of thirty years old being eligible for

office, as well as possessing a vote in the assemblies. But a mass

assembly where the members are widely scattered inevitably becomes

oligarchic. Only the well-to-do and the energetic will be able or will

care to come a long journey to attend. And as the votes in the assembly

were given by towns, it must often have happened that the votes of many

towns were decided by a very small number of their citizens who were

there. No doubt, in times of great excitement, the attendance would be

large and the vote a popular one. But the general policy of the league

must have been directed by a small number of energetic men, who made

politics their profession and could afford to do so.

ROMAN CAMP FOR TWO LEGIONS

CONTAINING 4,068,289 SQUARE FEET

REAR (ἡ ὄπισθεν ἐπιφάνεια).

+---------------------------- -----------------------------+

| 200 Porta Praetoria. 200 |

| ft. ft. |

| +----+--------------+ +---------------+----+ |

| | | EP | | EP' | | |

| | V +--------------+ 50 +---------------+ V' | |

| | | EE | ft.| EE' | | |

| +----+--------------+ +---------------+----+ |

| 50 |

| +---+--+ +------+ +---+---+ ft. |

| |PE |PP| | | |PP'|PE'| |

| +---+--+ F | P* | Q +---+---+ |

|700 |PE |PP| | | |PP'|PE'| |

|ft. +---+--+ +------+ +---+---+ |

| ...... ...... |

| T-----------------------------------------------T' |

Porta Porta

Principalis 100 ft. Principalis

Dextra. Principia. Sinistra.

| +---+--+ +-+-+ +-+-+ +--+--+ +--+--+ +---+---+ |

| |PS |ES| |H|P| |T|E| |E'|T'| |P'|H'| |ES'|PS'| |

| +---+--+ +-+-+ +-+-+ +--+--+ +--+--+ +---+---+ |

| |PS |ES| |H|P| |T|E| |E'|T'| |P'|H'| |ES'|PS'| |

| +---+--+ +-+-+ +-+-+ +--+--+ +--+--+ +---+---+ |

|200 ft. |PS |ES| |H|P| |T|E| |E'|T'| |P'|H'| |ES'|PS'|200 ft.|

| +---+--+ +-+-+ +-+-+ +--+--+ +--+--+ +---+---+ |

| |PS |ES| |H|P| |T|E| |E'|T'| |P'|H'| |ES'|PS'| |

| +PS +ES+ +-+-+ +-+-+ +--+--+ +--+--+ +---+---+ |

| |PS |ES| |H|P| |T|E| |E'|T'| |P'|H'| |ES'|PS'| |

| +---+--+ +-+-+ +-+-+ +--+--+ +--+--+ +---+---+ |

| Via Quintana. 50 ft. |

| +---+--+ +-+-+ +-+-+ +--+--+ +--+--+ +---+---+ |

| |PS |ES| |H|P| |T|E| |E'|T'| |P'|H'| |ES'|PS'| |

| +---+--+ +-+-+ +-+-+ +--+--+ +--+--+ +---+---+ |

| |PS |ES| |H|P| |T|E| |E'|T'| |P'|H'| |ES'|PS'| |

| +---+--+ +-+-+ +-+-+ +--+--+ +--+--+ +---+---+ |

| |PS |ES| |H|P| |T|E| |E'|T'| |P'|H'| |ES'|PS'| |

| +---+--+ +-+-+ +-+-+ +--+--+ +--+--+ +---+---+ |

| |PS |ES| |H|P| |T|E| |E'|T'| |P'|H'| |ES'|PS'| |

| +---+--+ +-+-+ +-+-+ +--+--+ +--+--+ +---+---+ | 2017

| |PS |ES| |H|P| |T|E| |E'|T'| |P'|H'| |ES'|PS'| | ft.

| +---+--+ +-+-+ +-+-+ +--+--+ +--+--+ +---+---+ |

| 50ft. 50ft. 50ft. 50ft. 50ft. |

| 200 |

| ft. Porto Decumana. |

+---------------------------- -----------------------------+

2017 ft. FRONT (τὸ πρόσωπον).

P*. Praetorium.

T T'. Tents of the Tribuni Militum of two legions.

E E'. Equites of two legions.

P P'. Principes ” ”

H H'. Hastati ” ”

T T'. Triarii ” ”

ES ES'. Equites of Socii of two legions.

PS PS'. Pedites ” ” ”

PE PE'. Equites of the Praetorian Cohort of two legions.

PP PP'. Pedites ” ” ” ” ”

EP EP'. Pedites extraordinarii of two legions.

EE EE'. Equites ” ” ”

Q. Quaestorium.

F. Forum or market-place.

V V'. Foreigners or volunteers.

THE HISTORIES OF POLYBIUS

BOOK I

[Sidenote: Introduction. The importance and magnitude of the subject.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 219-167.]

+1.+ Had the praise of History been passed over by former Chroniclers

it would perhaps have been incumbent upon me to urge the choice and

special study of records of this sort, as the readiest means men can

have of correcting their knowledge of the past. But my predecessors

have not been sparing in this respect. They have all begun and ended,

so to speak, by enlarging on this theme: asserting again and again

that the study of History is in the truest sense an education, and a

training for political life; and that the most instructive, or rather

the only, method of learning to bear with dignity the vicissitudes

of fortune is to recall the catastrophes of others. It is evident,

therefore, that no one need think it his duty to repeat what has been

said by many, and said well. Least of all myself: for the surprising

nature of the events which I have undertaken to relate is in itself

sufficient to challenge and stimulate the attention of every one,

old or young, to the study of my work. Can any one be so indifferent

or idle as not to care to know by what means, and under what kind of

polity, almost the whole inhabited world was conquered and brought

under the dominion of the single city of Rome, and that too within

a period of not quite fifty-three years? Or who again can be so

completely absorbed in other subjects of contemplation or study, as to

think any of them superior in importance to the accurate understanding

of an event for which the past affords no precedent.

[Sidenote: Immensity of the Roman Empire shown by comparison with

Persia, Sparta, Macedonia. 1. Persia.]

[Sidenote: 2. Sparta. B.C. 405-394.]

[Sidenote: 3. Macedonia.]

+2.+ We shall best show how marvellous and vast our subject is by

comparing the most famous Empires which preceded, and which have

been the favourite themes of historians, and measuring them with the

superior greatness of Rome. There are but three that deserve even to

be so compared and measured: and they are these. The Persians for a

certain length of time were possessed of a great empire and dominion.

But every time they ventured beyond the limits of Asia, they found

not only their empire, but their own existence also in danger. The

Lacedaemonians, after contending for supremacy in Greece for many

generations, when they did get it, held it without dispute for barely

twelve years. The Macedonians obtained dominion in Europe from the

lands bordering on the Adriatic to the Danube,—which after all is but

a small fraction of this continent,—and, by the destruction of the

Persian Empire, they afterwards added to that the dominion of Asia. And

yet, though they had the credit of having made themselves masters of a

larger number of countries and states than any people had ever done,

they still left the greater half of the inhabited world in the hands of

others. They never so much as thought of attempting Sicily, Sardinia,

or Libya: and as to Europe, to speak the plain truth, they never even

knew of the most warlike tribes of the West. The Roman conquest, on

the other hand, was not partial. Nearly the whole inhabited world was

reduced by them to obedience: and they left behind them an empire not

to be paralleled in the past or rivalled in the future. Students will

gain from my narrative a clearer view of the whole story, and of the

numerous and important advantages which such exact record of events

offers.

[Sidenote: B.C. 220-217. The History starts from the 140th Olympiad,

when the tendency towards unity first shows itself.]

+3.+ My History begins in the 140th Olympiad. The events from which it

starts are these. In Greece, what is called the Social war: the first

waged by Philip, son of Demetrius and father of Perseus, in league with

the Achaeans against the Aetolians. In Asia, the war for the possession

of Coele-Syria which Antiochus and Ptolemy Philopator carried on

against each other. In Italy, Libya, and their neighbourhood, the

conflict between Rome and Carthage, generally called the Hannibalian

war. My work thus begins where that of Aratus of Sicyon leaves off. Now

up to this time the world’s history had been, so to speak, a series

of disconnected transactions, as widely separated in their origin

and results as in their localities. But from this time forth History

becomes a connected whole: the affairs of Italy and Libya are involved

with those of Asia and Greece, and the tendency of all is to unity.

This is why I have fixed upon this era as the starting-point of my

work. For it was their victory over the Carthaginians in this war, and

their conviction that thereby the most difficult and most essential

step towards universal empire had been taken, which encouraged the

Romans for the first time to stretch out their hands upon the rest, and

to cross with an army into Greece and Asia.

[Sidenote: A sketch of their previous history necessary to explain the

success of the Romans.]

Now, had the states that were rivals for universal empire been

familiarly known to us, no reference perhaps to their previous history

would have been necessary, to show the purpose and the forces with

which they approached an undertaking of this nature and magnitude.

But the fact is that the majority of the Greeks have no knowledge of

the previous constitution, power, or achievements either of Rome or

Carthage. I therefore concluded that it was necessary to prefix this

and the next book to my History. I was anxious that no one, when fairly

embarked upon my actual narrative, should feel at a loss, and have to

ask what were the designs entertained by the Romans, or the forces and

means at their disposal, that they entered upon those undertakings,

which did in fact lead to their becoming masters of land and sea

everywhere in our part of the world. I wished, on the contrary, that

these books of mine, and the prefatory sketch which they contained,

might make it clear that the resources they started with justified

their original idea, and sufficiently explained their final success in

grasping universal empire and dominion.

[Sidenote: The need of a comprehensive view of history as well as a

close study of an epoch.]

+4.+ There is this analogy between the plan of my History and the

marvellous spirit of the age with which I have to deal. Just as Fortune

made almost all the affairs of the world incline in one direction,

and forced them to converge upon one and the same point; so it is my

task as an historian to put before my readers a compendious view of

the part played by Fortune in bringing about the general catastrophe.

It was this peculiarity which originally challenged my attention, and

determined me on undertaking this work. And combined with this was the

fact that no writer of our time has undertaken a general history. Had

any one done so my ambition in this direction would have been much

diminished. But, in point of fact, I notice that by far the greater

number of historians concern themselves with isolated wars and the

incidents that accompany them: while as to a general and comprehensive

scheme of events, their date, origin, and catastrophe, no one as far

as I know has undertaken to examine it. I thought it, therefore,

distinctly my duty neither to pass by myself, nor allow any one else to

pass by, without full study, a characteristic specimen of the dealings

of Fortune at once brilliant and instructive in the highest degree. For

fruitful as Fortune is in change, and constantly as she is producing

dramas in the life of men, yet never assuredly before this did she work

such a marvel, or act such a drama, as that which we have witnessed.

And of this we cannot obtain a comprehensive view from writers of mere

episodes. It would be as absurd to expect to do so as for a man to

imagine that he has learnt the shape of the whole world, its entire

arrangement and order, because he has visited one after the other the

most famous cities in it; or perhaps merely examined them in separate

pictures. That would be indeed absurd: and it has always seemed to me

that men, who are persuaded that they get a competent view of universal

from episodical history, are very like persons who should see the limbs

of some body, which had once been living and beautiful, scattered

and remote; and should imagine that to be quite as good as actually

beholding the activity and beauty of the living creature itself. But

if some one could there and then reconstruct the animal once more, in

the perfection of its beauty and the charm of its vitality, and could

display it to the same people, they would beyond doubt confess that

they had been far from conceiving the truth, and had been little better

than dreamers. For indeed some idea of a whole may be got from a part,

but an accurate knowledge and clear comprehension cannot. Wherefore we

must conclude that episodical history contributes exceedingly little to

the familiar knowledge and secure grasp of universal history. While it

is only by the combination and comparison of the separate parts of the

whole,—by observing their likeness and their difference,—that a man can

attain his object: can obtain a view at once clear and complete; and

thus secure both the profit and the delight of History.

[Sidenote: B.C. 264-261. I begin my preliminary account in the 129th

Olympiad, and with the circumstances which took the Romans to Sicily.]

+5.+ I shall adopt as the starting-point of this book the first

occasion on which the Romans crossed the sea from Italy. This is just

where the History of Timaeus left off; and it falls in the 129th

Olympiad. I shall accordingly have to describe what the state of their

affairs in Italy was, how long that settlement had lasted, and on what

resources they reckoned, when they resolved to invade Sicily. For this

was the first place outside Italy in which they set foot. The precise

cause of their thus crossing I must state without comment; for if I let

one cause lead me back to another, my point of departure will always

elude my grasp, and I shall never arrive at the view of my subject

which I wish to present. As to dates, then, I must fix on some era

agreed upon and recognised by all: and as to events, one that admits

of distinctly separate treatment; even though I may be obliged to go

back some short way in point of time, and take a summary review of the

intermediate transactions. For if the facts with which one starts are

unknown, or even open to controversy, all that comes after will fail

of approval and belief. But opinion being once formed on that point,

and a general assent obtained, all the succeeding narrative becomes

intelligible.

[Sidenote: B.C. 387-386. The rise of the Roman dominion may be traced

from the retirement of the Gauls from the city. From that time one

nation after another in Italy fell into their hands.]

[Sidenote: The Latini.]

[Sidenote: The Etruscans, Gauls, and Samnites.]

[Sidenote: Pyrrhus, B.C. 280.]

[Sidenote: Southern Italy.]

[Sidenote: Pyrrhus finally quits Italy, B.C. 274.]

+6.+ It was in the nineteenth year after the sea-fight at Aegospotami,

and the sixteenth before the battle at Leuctra; the year in which the

Lacedaemonians made what is called the Peace of Antalcidas with the

King of Persia; the year in which the elder Dionysius was besieging

Rhegium after beating the Italian Greeks on the River Elleporus; and

in which the Gauls took Rome itself by storm and were occupying the

whole of it except the Capitol. With these Gauls the Romans made a

treaty and settlement which they were content to accept: and having

thus become beyond all expectation once more masters of their own

country, they made a start in their career of expansion; and in the

succeeding period engaged in various wars with their neighbours. First,

by dint of valour, and the good fortune which attended them in the

field, they mastered all the Latini; then they went to war with the

Etruscans; then with the Celts; and next with the Samnites, who lived

on the eastern and northern frontiers of Latium. Some time after this

the Tarentines insulted the ambassadors of Rome, and, in fear of the

consequences, invited and obtained the assistance of Pyrrhus. This

happened in the year before the Gauls invaded Greece, some of whom

perished near Delphi, while others crossed into Asia. Then it was that

the Romans—having reduced the Etruscans and Samnites to obedience,

and conquered the Italian Celts in many battles—attempted for the

first time the reduction of the rest of Italy. The nations for whose

possessions they were about to fight they affected to regard, not in

the light of foreigners, but as already for the most part belonging and

pertaining to themselves. The experience gained from their contests

with the Samnites and the Celts had served as a genuine training in the

art of war. Accordingly, they entered upon the war with spirit, drove

Pyrrhus from Italy, and then undertook to fight with and subdue those

who had taken part with him. They succeeded everywhere to a marvel, and

reduced to obedience all the tribes inhabiting Italy except the Celts;

after which they undertook to besiege some of their own citizens, who

at that time were occupying Rhegium.

[Sidenote: The story of the Mamertines at Messene, and the Roman

garrison at Rhegium, Dio. Cassius _fr._]

+7.+ For misfortunes befell Messene and Rhegium, the cities built on

either side of the Strait, peculiar in their nature and alike in their

circumstances.

[Sidenote: 1. Messene.]

[Sidenote: Agathocles died, B.C. 289]

Not long before the period we are now describing some Campanian

mercenaries of Agathocles, having for some time cast greedy eyes upon

Messene, owing to its beauty and wealth, no sooner got an opportunity

than they made a treacherous attempt upon that city. They entered the

town under guise of friendship, and, having once got possession of

it, they drove out some of the citizens and put others to the sword.

This done, they seized promiscuously the wives and children of the

dispossessed citizens, each keeping those which fortune had assigned

him at the very moment of the lawless deed. All other property and the

land they took possession of by a subsequent division and retained.

[Sidenote: 2. Rhegium, Livy Ep. 12.]

[Sidenote: Pyrrhus in Sicily, B.C. 278-275.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 271. C. Quintus Claudius, L. Genucius Clepsina, Coss.]

The speed with which they became masters of a fair territory and

city found ready imitators of their conduct. The people of Rhegium,

when Pyrrhus was crossing to Italy, felt a double anxiety. They

were dismayed at the thought of his approach, and at the same time

were afraid of the Carthaginians as being masters of the sea. They

accordingly asked and obtained a force from Rome to guard and support

them. The garrison, four thousand in number, under the command of a

Campanian named Decius Jubellius, entered the city, and for a time

preserved it, as well as their own faith. But at last, conceiving the

idea of imitating the Mamertines, and having at the same time obtained

their co-operation, they broke faith with the people of Rhegium,

enamoured of the pleasant site of the town and the private wealth of

the citizens, and seized the city after having, in imitation of the

Mamertines, first driven out some of the people and put others to the

sword. Now, though the Romans were much annoyed at this transaction,

they could take no active steps, because they were deeply engaged

in the wars I have mentioned above. But having got free from them

they invested and besieged the troops. They presently took the place

and killed the greater number in the assault,—for the men resisted

desperately, knowing what must follow,—but took more than three hundred

alive. These were sent to Rome, and there the Consuls brought them into

the forum, where they were scourged and beheaded according to custom:

for they wished as far as they could to vindicate their good faith in

the eyes of the allies. The territory and town they at once handed over

to the people of Rhegium.

[Sidenote: Effect of the fall of the rebellious garrison of Rhegium on

the Mamertines.]

+8.+ But the Mamertines (for this was the name which the Campanians

gave themselves after they became masters of Messene), as long as

they enjoyed the alliance of the Roman captors of Rhegium, not

only exercised absolute control over their own town and district

undisturbed, but about the neighbouring territory also gave no little

trouble to the Carthaginians and Syracusans, and levied tribute from

many parts of Sicily. But when they were deprived of this support,

the captors of Rhegium being now invested and besieged, they were

themselves promptly forced back into the town again by the Syracusans,

under circumstances which I will now detail.

[Sidenote: The rise of Hiero. He is elected General by the army, B.C.

275-274.]

Not long before this the military forces of the Syracusans had

quarrelled with the citizens, and while stationed near Merganè elected

commanders from their own body. These were Artemidorus and Hiero, the

latter of whom afterwards became King of Syracuse. At this time he was

quite a young man, but had a certain natural aptitude for kingcraft

and the politic conduct of affairs. Having taken over the command,

and having by means of some of his connexions made his way into the

city, he got his political opponents into his hands; but conducted

the government with such mildness, and in so lofty a spirit, that the

Syracusans, though by no means usually acquiescing in the election of

officers by the soldiers, did on this occasion unanimously approve

of Hiero as their general. His first step made it evident to close

observers that his hopes soared above the position of a mere general.

[Sidenote: Secures support of Leptines by marrying his daughter.]

[Sidenote: His device for getting rid of mutinous mercenaries.]

[Sidenote: Fiume Salso.]

[Sidenote: Hiero next attacks the Mamertines and defeats them near

Mylae, B.C. 268.]

+9.+ He noticed that among the Syracusans the despatch of troops,

and of magistrates in command of them, was always the signal for

revolutionary movements of some sort or another. He knew, too, that

of all the citizens Leptines enjoyed the highest position and credit,

and that among the common people especially he was by far the most

influential man existing. He accordingly contracted a relationship by

marriage with him, that he might have a representative of his interests

left at home at such times as he should be himself bound to go abroad

with the troops for a campaign. After marrying the daughter of this

man, his next step was in regard to the old mercenaries. He observed

that they were disaffected and mutinous: and he accordingly led out an

expedition, with the ostensible purpose of attacking the foreigners

who were in occupation of Messene. He pitched a camp against the enemy

near Centuripa, and drew up his line resting on the River Cyamosorus.

But the cavalry and infantry, which consisted of citizens, he kept

together under his personal command at some distance, on pretence of

intending to attack the enemy on another quarter: the mercenaries he

thrust to the front and allowed them to be completely cut to pieces by

the foreigners; while he seized the moment of their rout to affect a

safe retreat for himself and the citizens into Syracuse. This stroke of

policy was skilful and successful. He had got rid of the mutinous and

seditious element in the army; and after enlisting on his own account a

sufficient body of mercenaries, he thenceforth carried on the business

of the government in security. But seeing that the Mamertines were

encouraged by their success to greater confidence and recklessness in

their excursions, he fully armed and energetically drilled the citizen

levies, led them out, and engaged the enemy on the Mylaean plain near

the River Longanus. He inflicted a severe defeat upon them: took their

leaders prisoners: put a complete end to their audacious proceedings:

and on his return to Syracuse was himself greeted by all the allies

with the title of King.

[Sidenote: Some of the conquered Mamertines appeal to Rome for help.]

[Sidenote: The motives of the Romans in acceding to this

prayer,—jealousy of the growing power of Carthage.]

+10.+ Thus were the Mamertines first deprived of support from

Rhegium, and then subjected, from causes which I have just stated,

to a complete defeat on their own account. Thereupon some of them

betook themselves to the protection of the Carthaginians, and were

for putting themselves and their citadel into their hands; while

others set about sending an embassy to Rome to offer a surrender of

their city, and to beg assistance on the ground of the ties of race

which united them. The Romans were long in doubt. The inconsistency

of sending such aid seemed manifest. A little while ago they had put

some of their own citizens to death, with the extreme penalties of

the law, for having broken faith with the people of Rhegium: and now

so soon afterwards to assist the Mamertines, who had done precisely

the same to Messene as well as Rhegium, involved a breach of equity

very hard to justify. But while fully alive to these points, they yet

saw that Carthaginian aggrandisement was not confined to Libya, but

had embraced many districts in Iberia as well; and that Carthage was,

besides, mistress of all the islands in the Sardinian and Tyrrhenian

seas: they were beginning, therefore, to be exceedingly anxious lest,

if the Carthaginians became masters of Sicily also, they should find

them very dangerous and formidable neighbours, surrounding them as

they would on every side, and occupying a position which commanded all

the coasts of Italy. Now it was clear that, if the Mamertines did not

obtain the assistance they asked for, the Carthaginians would very

soon reduce Sicily. For should they avail themselves of the voluntary

offer of Messene and become masters of it, they were certain before

long to crush Syracuse also, since they were already lords of nearly

the whole of the rest of Sicily. The Romans saw all this, and felt

that it was absolutely necessary not to let Messene slip, or allow the

Carthaginians to secure what would be like a bridge to enable them to

cross into Italy.

[Sidenote: The Senate shirk the responsibility of decision. The people

vote for helping the Mamertines.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 264. Appius Claudius Caudex. M. Fulvius Flaccus, Coss.]

[Sidenote: Hiero joins Carthage in laying siege to the Mamertines in

Messene. Appius comes to the relief of the besieged, B.C. 264.]

[Sidenote: After vain attempts at negotiation, Appius determines to

attack Hiero.]

[Sidenote: Hiero is defeated, and returns to Syracuse.]

+11.+ In spite of protracted deliberations, the conflict of motives

proved too strong, after all, to allow of the Senate coming to any

decision; for the inconsistency of aiding the Messenians appeared to

them to be evenly balanced by the advantages to be gained by doing so.

The people, however, had suffered much from the previous wars, and

wanted some means of repairing the losses which they had sustained

in every department. Besides these national advantages to be gained

by the war, the military commanders suggested that individually they

would get manifest and important benefits from it. They accordingly

voted in favour of giving the aid. The decree having thus been passed

by the people, they elected one of the consuls, Appius Claudius, to

the command, and sent him out with instructions to cross to Messene

and relieve the Mamertines. These latter managed, between threats and

false representations, to oust the Carthaginian commander who was

already in possession of the citadel, invited Appius in, and offered

to deliver the city into his hands. The Carthaginians crucified their

commander for what they considered to be his cowardice and folly in

thus losing the citadel; stationed their fleet near Pelorus; their land

forces at a place called Synes; and laid vigorous siege to Messene.

Now at this juncture Hiero, thinking it a favourable opportunity for

totally expelling from Sicily the foreigners who were in occupation of

Messene, made a treaty with the Carthaginians. Having done this, he

started from Syracuse upon an expedition against that city. He pitched

his camp on the opposite side to the Carthaginians, near what was

called the Chalcidian Mount, whereby the garrison were cut off from

that way out as well as from the other. The Roman Consul Appius, for

his part, gallantly crossed the strait by night and got into Messene.

But he found that the enemy had completely surrounded the town and were

vigorously pressing on the attack; and he concluded on reflection that

the siege could bring him neither credit nor security so long as the

enemy commanded land as well as sea. He accordingly first endeavoured

to relieve the Mamertines from the contest altogether by sending

embassies to both of the attacking forces. Neither of them received

his proposals, and at last, from sheer necessity, he made up his mind

to hazard an engagement, and that he would begin with the Syracusans.

So he led out his forces and drew them up for the fight: nor was

the Syracusan backward in accepting the challenge, but descended

simultaneously to give him battle. After a prolonged struggle, Appius

got the better of the enemy, and chased the opposing forces right up

to their entrenchments. The result of this was that Appius, after

stripping the dead, retired into Messene again, while Hiero, with a

foreboding of the final result, only waited for nightfall to beat a

hasty retreat to Syracuse.

[Sidenote: Encouraged by this success, he attacks and drives off the

Carthaginians.]

+12.+ Next morning, when Appius was assured of their flight, his

confidence was strengthened, and he made up his mind to attack the

Carthaginians without delay. Accordingly, he issued orders to the

soldiers to despatch their preparations early, and at daybreak

commenced his sally. Having succeeded in engaging the enemy, he killed

a large number of them, and forced the rest to fly precipitately to

the neighbouring towns. These successes sufficed to raise the siege

of Messene: and thenceforth he scoured the territory of Syracuse and

her allies with impunity, and laid it waste without finding any one to

dispute the possession of the open country with him; and finally he sat

down before Syracuse itself and laid siege to it.

[Sidenote: Such preliminary sketches are necessary for clearness, and

my readers must not be surprised if I follow the same system in the

case of other towns.]

Such was the nature and motive of the first warlike expedition of

the Romans beyond the shores of Italy; and this was the period at

which it took place. I thought this expedition the most suitable

starting-point for my whole narrative, and accordingly adopted it as

a basis; though I have made a rapid survey of some anterior events,

that in setting forth its causes no point should be left obscure. I

thought it necessary, if we were to get an adequate and comprehensive

view of their present supreme position, to trace clearly how and when

the Romans, after the disaster which they sustained in the loss of

their own city, began their upward career; and how and when, once

more, after possessing themselves of Italy, they conceived the idea of

attempting conquests external to it. This must account in future parts

of my work for my taking, when treating of the most important states,

a preliminary survey of their previous history. In doing so my object

will be to secure such a vantage-ground as will enable us to see with

clearness from what origin, at what period, and in what circumstances

they severally started and arrived at their present position. This is

exactly what I have just done with regard to the Romans.

[Sidenote: Subjects of the two first books of the Histories. 1. War

in Sicily or first Punic War, B.C. 264-241. 2. The Mercenary or

“inexpiable” war, B.C. 240-237. 3. Carthaginian movements in Spain,

B.C. 241-218. 4. Illyrian war, B.C. 229-228. 5. Gallic war, B.C.

225-221. 6. Cleomenic war, B.C. 227-221.]

+13.+ It is time to have done with these explanations, and to come to

my subject, after a brief and summary statement of the events of which

my introductory books are to treat. Of these the first in order of

time are those which befell the Romans and Carthaginians in their war

for the possession of Sicily. Next comes the Libyan or Mercenary war;

immediately following on which are the Carthaginian achievements in

Spain, first under Hamilcar, and then under Hasdrubal. In the course

of these events, again, occurred the first expedition of the Romans

into Illyria and the Greek side of Europe; and, besides that, their

struggles within Italy with the Celts. In Greece at the same time the

war called after Cleomenes was in full action. With this war I design

to conclude my prefatory sketch and my second book.

[Sidenote: The first Punic war deserves more detailed treatment,

as furnishing a better basis for comparing Rome and Carthage than

subsequent wars.]

To enter into minute details of these events is unnecessary, and would

be of no advantage to my readers. It is not part of my plan to write a

history of them: my sole object is to recapitulate them in a summary

manner by way of introduction to the narrative I have in hand. I will,

therefore, touch lightly upon the leading events of this period in a

comprehensive sketch, and will endeavour to make the end of it dovetail

with the commencement of my main history. In this way the narrative

will acquire a continuity; and I shall be shown to have had good reason

for touching on points already treated by others: while by such an

arrangement the studiously inclined will find the approach to the story

which has to be told made intelligible and easy for them. I shall,

however, endeavour to describe with somewhat more care the first war

which arose between the Romans and Carthaginians for the possession of

Sicily. For it would not be easy to mention any war that lasted longer

than this one; nor one in which the preparations made were on a larger

scale, or the efforts made more sustained, or the actual engagements

more numerous, or the reverses sustained on either side more signal.

Moreover, the two states themselves were at the precise period of

their history when their institutions were as yet in their original

integrity, their fortunes still at a moderate level, and their forces

on an equal footing. So that those who wish to gain a fair view of the

national characteristics and resources of the two had better base their

comparison upon this war rather than upon those which came after.

[Sidenote: This is rendered more necessary by the partisan

misrepresentations of Philinus and Fabius Pictor.]

+14.+ But it was not these considerations only which induced me to

undertake the history of this war. I was influenced quite as much

by the fact that Philinus and Fabius, who have the reputation of

writing with the most complete knowledge about it, have given us an

inadequate representation of the truth. Now, judging from their lives

and principles, I do not suppose that these writers have intentionally

stated what was false; but I think that they are much in the same

state of mind as men in love. Partisanship and complete prepossession

made Philinus think that all the actions of the Carthaginians were

characterised by wisdom, honour, and courage: those of the Romans by

the reverse. Fabius thought the exact opposite. Now in other relations

of life one would hesitate to exclude such warmth of sentiment: for a

good man ought to be loyal to his friends and patriotic to his country;

ought to be at one with his friends in their hatreds and likings. But

directly a man assumes the moral attitude of an historian he ought to

forget all considerations of that kind. There will be many occasions on

which he will be bound to speak well of his enemies, and even to praise

them in the highest terms if the facts demand it: and on the other hand

many occasions on which it will be his duty to criticise and denounce

his own side, however dear to him, if their errors of conduct suggest

that course. For as a living creature is rendered wholly useless if

deprived of its eyes, so if you take truth from History what is left is

but an idle unprofitable tale. Therefore, one must not shrink either

from blaming one’s friends or praising one’s enemies; nor be afraid

of finding fault with and commending the same persons at different

times. For it is impossible that men engaged in public affairs should

always be right, and unlikely that they should always be wrong. Holding

ourselves, therefore, entirely aloof from the actors, we must as

historians make statements and pronounce judgment in accordance with

the actions themselves.

[Sidenote: Philinus’s misrepresentations.]

+15.+ The writers whom I have named exemplify the truth of these

remarks. Philinus, for instance, commencing the narrative with his

second book, says that the “Carthaginians and Syracusans engaged in

the war and sat down before Messene; that the Romans arriving by

sea entered the town, and immediately sallied out from it to attack

the Syracusans; but that after suffering severely in the engagement

they retired into Messene; and that on a second occasion, having

issued forth to attack the Carthaginians, they not only suffered

severely but lost a considerable number of their men captured by

the enemy.” But while making this statement, he represents Hiero as

so destitute of sense as, after this engagement, not only to have

promptly burnt his stockade and tents and fled under cover of night

to Syracuse, but to have abandoned all the forts which had been

established to overawe the Messenian territory. Similarly he asserts

that “the Carthaginians immediately after their battle evacuated their

entrenchment and dispersed into various towns, without venturing any

longer even to dispute the possession of the open country; and that,

accordingly, their leaders seeing that their troops were utterly

demoralised determined in consideration not to risk a battle: that the

Romans followed them, and not only laid waste the territory of the

Carthaginians and Syracusans, but actually sat down before Syracuse

itself and began to lay siege to it.” These statements appear to me to

be full of glaring inconsistency, and to call for no refutation at all.

The very men whom he describes to begin with as besieging Messene, and

as victorious in the engagements, he afterwards represents as running

away, abandoning the open country, and utterly demoralised: while those

whom he starts by saying were defeated and besieged, he concludes by

describing as engaging in a pursuit, as promptly seizing the open

places, and finally as besieging Syracuse. Nothing can reconcile

these statements. It is impossible. Either his initial statement,

or his account of the subsequent events, must be false. In point of

fact the latter part of his story is the true one. The Syracusans and

Carthaginians _did_ abandon the open country, and the Romans _did_

immediately afterwards commence a siege of Syracuse and of Echetla,

which lies in the district between the Syracusan and Carthaginian

pales. For the rest it must necessarily be acknowledged that the

first part of his account is false; and that whereas the Romans were

victorious in the engagements under Messene, they have been represented

by this historian as defeated. Through the whole of this work we shall

find Philinus acting in a similar spirit: and much the same may be said

of Fabius, as I shall show when the several points arise.

I have now said what was proper on the subject of this digression.

Returning to the matter in hand I will endeavour by a continuous

narrative of moderate dimensions to guide my readers to a true

knowledge of this war.

[Sidenote: B.C. 264.]

[Sidenote: (Continuing from chap. xii.), B.C. 263, Manius Valerius

Maximus, Manius Otacilius Crassus, Coss. The Consuls with four legions

are sent to Sicily. A general move of the Sicilian cities to join them.

Hiero submits.]

+16.+ When news came to Rome of the successes of Appius and his

legions, the people elected Manius Otacilius and Manius Valerius

Consuls, and despatched their whole army to Sicily, and both Consuls

in command. Now the Romans have in all, as distinct from allies, four

legions of Roman citizens, which they enrol every year, each of which

consists of four thousand infantry and three hundred cavalry: and

on their arrival most of the cities revolted from Syracuse as well

as from Carthage, and joined the Romans. And when he saw the terror

and dismay of the Sicilians, and compared with them the number and

crushing strength of the legions of Rome, Hiero began, from a review

of all these points, to conclude that the prospects of the Romans

were brighter than those of the Carthaginians. Inclining therefore

from these considerations to the side of the former, he began sending

messages to the Consuls, proposing peace and friendship with them. The

Romans accepted his offer, their chief motive being the consideration

of provisions: for as the Carthaginians had command of the sea, they

were afraid of being cut off at every point from their supplies, warned

by the fact that the legions which had previously crossed had run very

short in that respect. They therefore gladly accepted Hiero’s offers

of friendship, supposing that he would be of signal service to them

in this particular. The king engaged to restore his prisoners without

ransom, and to pay besides an indemnity of a hundred talents of silver.

The treaty being arranged on these terms, the Romans thenceforth

regarded the Syracusans as friends and allies: while King Hiero, having

thus placed himself under the protection of the Romans, never failed

to supply their needs in times of difficulty; and for the rest of his

life reigned securely in Syracuse, devoting his energies to gaining

the gratitude and good opinion of the Greeks. And in point of fact no

monarch ever acquired a greater reputation, or enjoyed for a longer

period the fruits of his prudent policy in private as well as in public

affairs.

[Sidenote: The Carthaginians alarmed at Hiero’s defection make great

efforts to increase their army in Sicily.]

[Sidenote: They select Agrigentum as their headquarters.]

+17.+ When the text of this treaty reached Rome, and the people had

approved and confirmed the terms made with Hiero, the Roman government

thereupon decided not to send all their forces, as they had intended

doing, but only two legions. For they thought that the gravity of the

war was lessened by the adhesion of the king, and at the same time

that the army would thus be better off for provisions. But when the

Carthaginian government saw that Hiero had become their enemy, and that

the Romans were taking a more decided part in Sicilian politics, they

conceived that they must have a more formidable force to enable them

to confront their enemy and maintain their own interests in Sicily.

Accordingly, they enlisted mercenaries from over sea—a large number

of Ligurians and Celts, and a still larger number of Iberians—and

despatched them to Sicily. And perceiving that Agrigentum possessed

the greatest natural advantages as a place of arms, and was the most

powerful city in their province, they collected their supplies and

their forces into it, deciding to use this city as their headquarters

for the war.

[Sidenote: B.C. 262.]

[Sidenote: The new Consuls, Lucius Postumius Megellus and Quintus

Mamilius Vitulus, determined to lay siege to Agrigentum.]

[Sidenote: The Carthaginians make an unsuccessful sally.]

On the Roman side a change of commanders had now taken place. The

Consuls who made the treaty with Hiero had gone home, and their

successors, Lucius Postumius and Quintus Mamilius, were come to Sicily

with their legions. Observing the measure which the Carthaginians were

taking, and the forces they were concentrating at Agrigentum, they made

up their minds to take that matter in hand and strike a bold blow.

Accordingly they suspended every other department of the war, and

bearing down upon Agrigentum itself with their whole army, attacked it

in force; pitched their camp within a distance of eight stades from

the city; and confined the Carthaginians within the walls. Now it was

just harvest-time, and the siege was evidently destined to be a long

one: the soldiers, therefore, went out to collect the corn with greater

hardihood than they ought to have done. Accordingly the Carthaginians,

seeing the enemy scattered about the fields, sallied out and attacked

the harvesting-parties. They easily routed these; and then one portion

of them made a rush to destroy the Roman entrenchment, the other to

attack the pickets. But the peculiarity of their institutions saved the

Roman fortunes, as it had often done before. Among them it is death for

a man to desert his post, or to fly from his station on any pretext

whatever. Accordingly on this, as on other occasions, they gallantly

held their ground against opponents many times their own number; and

though they lost many of their own men, they killed still more of the

enemy, and at last outflanked the foes just as they were on the point

of demolishing the palisade of the camp. Some they put to the sword,

and the rest they pursued with slaughter into the city.

+18.+ The result was that thenceforth the Carthaginians were somewhat

less forward in making such attacks, and the Romans more cautious in

foraging.

[Sidenote: The Romans form two strongly-entrenched camps.]

[Sidenote: A relief comes from Carthage to Agrigentum.]

[Sidenote: Hanno seizes Herbesus.]

[Sidenote: The Romans faithfully supported by Hiero.]

Finding that the Carthaginians would not come out to meet them at close

quarters any more, the Roman generals divided their forces: with one

division they occupied the ground round the temple of Asclepius outside

the town; with the other they encamped in the outskirts of the city on

the side which looks towards Heracleia. The space between the camps on

either side of the city they secured by two trenches,—the inner one

to protect themselves against sallies from the city, the outer as a

precaution against attacks from without, and to intercept those persons

or supplies which always make their way surreptitiously into cities

that are sustaining a siege. The spaces between the trenches uniting

the camps they secured by pickets, taking care in their disposition

to strengthen the several accessible points. As for food and other

war material, the other allied cities all joined in collecting and

bringing these to Herbesus for them: and thus they supplied themselves

in abundance with necessaries, by continually getting provisions living

and dead from this town, which was conveniently near. For about five

months then they remained in the same position, without being able to

obtain any decided advantage over each other beyond the casualties

which occurred in the skirmishes. But the Carthaginians were beginning

to be hard pressed by hunger, owing to the number of men shut up in the

city, who amounted to no less than fifty thousand: and Hannibal, who

had been appointed commander of the besieged forces, beginning by this

time to be seriously alarmed at the state of things, kept perpetually

sending messages to Carthage explaining their critical state, and

begging for assistance. Thereupon the Carthaginian government put on

board ship the fresh troops and elephants which they had collected,

and despatched them to Sicily, with orders to join the other commander

Hanno. This officer collected all his war material and forces into

Heracleia, and as a first step possessed himself by a stratagem of

Herbesus, thus depriving the enemy of their provisions and supply of

necessaries. The result of this was that the Romans found themselves in

the position of besieged as much as in that of besiegers; for they were

reduced by short supplies of food and scarcity of necessaries to such a

condition that they more than once contemplated raising the siege. And

they would have done so at last had not Hiero, by using every effort

and contrivance imaginable, succeeded in keeping them supplied with

what satisfied, to a tolerable extent, their most pressing wants. This

was Hanno’s first step. His next was as follows.

[Sidenote: Hanno tempts the Roman cavalry out and defeats them.]

[Sidenote: After two months, Hanno is forced to try to relieve

Agrigentum,]

[Sidenote: but is defeated in a pitched battle, and his army cut to

pieces.]

[Sidenote: Hannibal escapes by night; and the Romans enter and plunder

Agrigentum.]

+19.+ He saw that the Romans were reduced by disease and want, owing

to an epidemic that had broken out among them, and he believed that

his own forces were strong enough to give them battle: he accordingly

collected his elephants, of which he had about fifty, and the whole

of the rest of his army, and advanced at a rapid pace from Heracleia;

having previously issued orders to the Numidian cavalry to precede

him, and to endeavour, when they came near the enemies’ stockade,

to provoke them and draw their cavalry out; and, having done so,

to wheel round and retire until they met him. The Numidians did as

they were ordered, and advanced up to one of the camps. Immediately

the Roman cavalry poured out and boldly charged the Numidians: the

Libyans retired, according to their orders, until they reached Hanno’s

division: then they wheeled round; surrounded, and repeatedly charged

the enemy; killed a great number of them, and chased the rest up to

their stockade. After this affair Hanno’s force encamped over against

the Romans, having seized the hill called Torus, at a distance of

about a mile and a quarter from their opponents. For two months they

remained in position without any decisive action, though skirmishes

took place daily. But as Hannibal all this time kept signalling and

sending messages from the town to Hanno,—telling him that his men were

impatient of the famine, and that many were even deserting to the enemy

owing to the distress for food,—the Carthaginian general determined to

risk a battle, the Romans being equally ready, for the reasons I have

mentioned. So both parties advanced into the space between the camps

and engaged. The battle lasted a long time, but at last the Romans

turned the advanced guard of Carthaginian mercenaries. The latter fell

back upon the elephants and the other divisions posted in their rear;

and thus the whole Punic army was thrown into confusion. The retreat

became general: the larger number of the men were killed, while some

effected their escape into Heracleia; and the Romans became masters

of most of the elephants and all the baggage. Now night came on, and

the victors, partly from joy at their success, partly from fatigue,

kept their watches somewhat more carelessly than usual; accordingly

Hannibal, having given up hope of holding out, made up his mind that

this state of things afforded him a good opportunity of escape. He

started about midnight from the town with his mercenary troops, and

having choked up the trenches with baskets stuffed full of chaff, led

off his force in safety, without being detected by the enemy. When

day dawned the Romans discovered what had happened, and indeed for a

short time were engaged with Hannibal’s rear; but eventually they all

made for the town gates. There they found no one to oppose them: they

therefore threw themselves into the town, plundered it, and secured

a large number of captives, besides a great booty of every sort and

description.

[Sidenote: This success inspires the Senate with the idea of expelling

the Carthaginians from Sicily.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 261.]

+20.+ Great was the joy of the Roman Senate when the news of what had

taken place at Agrigentum arrived. Their ideas too were so raised that

they no longer confined themselves to their original designs. They were

not content with having saved the Mamertines, nor with the advantages

gained in the course of the war; but conceived the idea that it was

possible to expel the Carthaginians entirely from the island, and that

if that were done their own power would receive a great increase: they

accordingly engaged in this policy and directed their whole thoughts to

this subject. As to their land forces they saw that things were going

on as well as they could wish. For the Consuls elected in succession to

those who had besieged Agrigentum, Lucius Valerius Flaccus and Titus

Otacilius Crassus, appeared to be managing the Sicilian business as

well as circumstances admitted. Yet so long as the Carthaginians were

in undisturbed command of the sea, the balance of success could not

incline decisively in their favour. For instance, in the period which

followed, though they were now in possession of Agrigentum, and though

consequently many of the inland towns joined the Romans from dread of

their land forces, yet a still larger number of seaboard towns held

aloof from them in terror of the Carthaginian fleet. Seeing therefore

that it was ever more and more the case that the balance of success

oscillated from one side to the other from these causes; and, moreover,

that while Italy was repeatedly ravaged by the naval force, Libya

remained permanently uninjured; they became eager to get upon the sea

and meet the Carthaginians there.

It was this branch of the subject that more than anything else induced

me to give an account of this war at somewhat greater length than I

otherwise should have done. I was unwilling that a first step of this

kind should be unknown,—namely how, and when, and why the Romans first

started a navy.

[Sidenote: The Romans boldly determine to build ships and meet the

Carthaginians at sea.]

[Sidenote: A Carthaginian ship used as a model.]

It was, then, because they saw that the war they had undertaken

lingered to a weary length, that they first thought of getting a fleet

built, consisting of a hundred quinqueremes and twenty triremes. But

one part of their undertaking caused them much difficulty. Their

shipbuilders were entirely unacquainted with the construction of

quinqueremes, because no one in Italy had at that time employed vessels

of that description. There could be no more signal proof of the

courage, or rather the extraordinary audacity of the Roman enterprise.

Not only had they no resources for it of reasonable sufficiency;

but without any resources for it at all, and without having ever

entertained an idea of naval war,—for it was the first time they had

thought of it,—they nevertheless handled the enterprise with such

extraordinary audacity, that, without so much as a preliminary trial,

they took upon themselves there and then to meet the Carthaginians

at sea, on which they had for generations held undisputed supremacy.

Proof of what I say, and of their surprising audacity, may be found in

this. When they first took in hand to send troops across to Messene

they not only had no decked vessels but no war-ships at all, not so

much as a single galley: but they borrowed quinqueremes and triremes

from Tarentum and Locri, and even from Elea and Neapolis; and having

thus collected a fleet, boldly sent their men across upon it. It was on

this occasion that, the Carthaginians having put to sea in the Strait

to attack them, a decked vessel of theirs charged so furiously that it

ran aground, and falling into the hands of the Romans served them as a

model on which they constructed their whole fleet. And if this had not

happened it is clear that they would have been completely hindered from

carrying out their design by want of constructive knowledge.

[Sidenote: B.C. 260. Cn. Cornelius Scipio Asina, C. Duilius, Coss.]

[Sidenote: Cornelius captured with the loss of his ships.]

[Sidenote: The rest of the Roman fleet arrive and nearly capture

Hannibal.]

+21.+ Meanwhile, however, those who were charged with the shipbuilding

were busied with the construction of the vessels; while others

collected crews and were engaged in teaching them to row on dry land:

which they contrived to do in the following manner. They made the men

sit on rower’s benches on dry land, in the same order as they would sit

on the benches in actual vessels: in the midst of them they stationed

the Celeustes, and trained them to get back and draw in their hands all

together in time, and then to swing forward and throw them out again,

and to begin and cease these movements at the word of the Celeustes.

By the time these preparations were completed the ships were built.

They therefore launched them, and, after a brief preliminary practice

of real sea-rowing, started on their coasting voyage along the shore

of Italy, in accordance with the Consul’s order. For Gnaeus Cornelius

Scipio, who had been appointed by the Roman people a few days before

to command the fleet, after giving the ship captains orders that as

soon as they had fitted out the fleet they should sail to the Straits,

had put to sea himself with seventeen ships and sailed in advance to

Messene; for he was very eager to secure all pressing necessaries for

the naval force. While there some negotiation was suggested to him for

the surrender of the town of Lipara. Snatching at the prospect somewhat

too eagerly, he sailed with the above-mentioned ships and anchored

off the town. But having been informed in Panormus of what had taken

place, the Carthaginian general Hannibal despatched Boōdes, a member

of the Senate, with a squadron of twenty ships. He accomplished the

voyage at night and shut up Gnaeus and his men within the harbour.

When day dawned the crews made for the shore and ran away, while

Gnaeus, in utter dismay, and not knowing in the least what to do,

eventually surrendered to the enemy. The Carthaginians having thus

possessed themselves of the ships as well as the commander of their

enemies, started to rejoin Hannibal. Yet a few days afterwards, though

the disaster of Gnaeus was so signal and recent, Hannibal himself was

within an ace of falling into the same glaring mistake. For having

been informed that the Roman fleet in its voyage along the coast of

Italy was close at hand, he conceived a wish to get a clear view of

the enemy’s number and disposition. He accordingly set sail with fifty

ships, and just as he was rounding the “Italian Headland” he fell in

with the enemy, who were sailing in good order and disposition. He

lost most of his ships, and with the rest effected his own escape in a

manner beyond hope or expectation.

[Sidenote: The “corvi” or “crows” for boarding.]

+22.+ When the Romans had neared the coasts of Sicily and learnt the

disaster which had befallen Gnaeus, their first step was to send for

Gaius Duilius, who was in command of the land forces. Until he should

come they stayed where they were; but at the same time, hearing that

the enemy’s fleet was no great way off, they busied themselves with

preparations for a sea-fight. Now their ships were badly fitted out

and not easy to manage, and so some one suggested to them as likely to

serve their turn in a fight the construction of what were afterwards

called “crows.” Their mechanism was this. A round pole was placed in

the prow, about twenty-four feet high, and with a diameter of four

palms. The pole itself had a pulley on the top, and a gangway made

with cross planks nailed together, four feet wide and thirty-six feet

long, was made to swing round it. Now the hole in the gangway was

oval shaped, and went round the pole twelve feet from one end of the

gangway, which had also a wooden railing running down each side of it

to the height of a man’s knee. At the extremity of this gangway was

fastened an iron spike like a miller’s pestle, sharpened at its lower

end and fitted with a ring at its upper end. The whole thing looked

like the machines for braising corn. To this ring the rope was fastened

with which, when the ships collided, they hauled up the “crows,” by

means of the pulley at the top of the pole, and dropped them down

upon the deck of the enemy’s ship, sometimes over the prow, sometimes

swinging them round when the ships collided broadsides. And as soon

as the “crows” were fixed in the planks of the decks and grappled the

ships together, if the ships were alongside of each other, the men

leaped on board anywhere along the side, but if they were prow to prow,

they used the “crow” itself for boarding, and advanced over it two

abreast. The first two protected their front by holding up before them

their shields, while those who came after them secured their sides by

placing the rims of their shields upon the top of the railing. Such

were the preparations which they made; and having completed them they

watched an opportunity of engaging at sea.

[Sidenote: Victory of Duilius at Mylae, B.C. 260.]

+23.+ As for Gaius Duilius, he no sooner heard of the disaster which

had befallen the commander of the navy than handing over his legions

to the military Tribunes he transferred himself to the fleet. There

he learnt that the enemy was plundering the territory of Mylae, and

at once sailed to attack him with the whole fleet. No sooner did the

Carthaginians sight him than with joy and alacrity they put to sea

with a hundred and thirty sail, feeling supreme contempt for the Roman

ignorance of seamanship. Accordingly they all sailed with their prows

directed straight at their enemy: they did not think the engagement

worth even the trouble of ranging their ships in any order, but

advanced as though to seize a booty exposed for their acceptance. Their

commander was that same Hannibal who had withdrawn his forces from

Agrigentum by a secret night movement, and he was on board a galley

with seven banks of oars which had once belonged to King Pyrrhus. When

they neared the enemy, and saw the “crows” raised aloft on the prows

of the several ships, the Carthaginians were for a time in a state of

perplexity; for they were quite strangers to such contrivances as these

engines. Feeling, however, a complete contempt for their opponents,

those on board the ships that were in the van of the squadron charged

without flinching. But as soon as they came to close quarters their

ships were invariably tightly grappled by these machines; the enemy

boarded by means of the “crows,” and engaged them on their decks;

and in the end some of the Carthaginians were cut down, while others

surrendered in bewildered terror at the battle in which they found

themselves engaged, which eventually became exactly like a land fight.

The result was that they lost the first thirty ships engaged, crews and

all. Among them was captured the commander’s ship also, though Hannibal

himself by an unexpected piece of luck and an act of great daring

effected his escape in the ship’s boat. The rest of the Carthaginian

squadron were sailing up with the view of charging; but as they were

coming near they saw what had happened to the ships which were sailing

in the front, and accordingly sheered off and avoided the blows of the

engines. Yet trusting to their speed, they managed by a manœuvre to

sail round and charge the enemy, some on their broadside and others on

their stern, expecting by that method to avoid danger. But the engines

swung round to meet them in every direction, and dropped down upon them

so infallibly, that no ships could come to close quarters without being

grappled. Eventually the Carthaginians turned and fled, bewildered at

the novelty of the occurrence, and with a loss of fifty ships.

[Sidenote: Further operations in Sicily.]

[Sidenote: Hamilcar.]

[Sidenote: Segesta and Macella.]

[Sidenote: Hannibal in Sardinia.]

+24.+ Having in this unlooked-for manner made good their maritime hopes

the Romans were doubly encouraged in their enthusiasm for the war. For

the present they put in upon the coast of Sicily, raised the siege of

Segesta when it was reduced to the last extremity, and on their way

back from Segesta carried the town Macella by assault. But Hamilcar,

the commander of the Carthaginian land forces happened, after the

naval battle, to be informed as he lay encamped near Panormus that the

allies were engaged in a dispute with the Romans about the post of

honour in the battles: and ascertaining that the allies were encamped

by themselves between Paropus and Himeraean Thermae, he made a sudden

attack in force as they were in the act of moving camp and killed

almost four thousand of them. After this action Hannibal sailed across

to Carthage with such ships as he had left; and thence before very long

crossed to Sardinia, with a reinforcement of ships, and accompanied

by some of those whose reputation as naval commanders stood high. But

before very long he was blockaded in a certain harbour by the Romans,

and lost a large number of ships; and was thereupon summarily arrested

by the surviving Carthaginians and crucified. This came about because

the first thing the Romans did upon getting a navy was to try to become

masters of Sardinia.

[Sidenote: B.C. 259.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 258. Coss. A. Atilius Calatinus, C. Sulpicius,

Paterculus.]

[Sidenote: Hippana and Myttistratum.]

[Sidenote: Camarina.]

During the next year the Roman legions in Sicily did nothing worthy

of mention. In the next, after the arrival of the new Consuls, Aulus

Atilius and Gaius Sulpicius, they started to attack Panormus because

the Carthaginian forces were wintering there. The Consuls advanced

close up to the city with their whole force, and drew up in order of

battle. But the enemy refusing to come out to meet them, they marched

away and attacked the town of Hippana. This they carried by assault:

but though they also took Myttistratum it was only after it had stood a

lengthened siege owing to the strength of its situation. It was at this

time, too, that they recovered Camarina, which had revolted a short

time previously. They threw up works against it, and captured it after

making a breach in its walls. They treated Henna, and sundry other

strong places which had been in the hands of the Carthaginians, in the

same way; and when they had finished these operations they undertook to

lay siege to Lipara.

[Sidenote: Fighting off Tyndaris.]

[Sidenote: Coss. C. Atilius Regulus, Cn. Cornelius, Blasio II. B.C.

257.]

+25.+ Next year Gaius Atilius, the Consul, happened to be at anchor

off Tyndaris, when he observed the Carthaginian fleet sailing by

in a straggling manner. He passed the word to the crews of his own

ships to follow the advanced squadron, and started himself before the

rest with ten ships of equal sailing powers. When the Carthaginians

became aware that while some of the enemy were still embarking, others

were already putting out to sea, and that the advanced squadron were

considerably ahead of the rest, they stood round and went to meet them.

They succeeded in surrounding and destroying all of them except the

Consul’s ship, and that they all but captured with its crew. This last,

however, by the perfection of its rowers and its consequent speed,

effected a desperate escape. Meanwhile the remaining ships of the

Romans were sailing up and gradually drawing close together. Having got

into line, they charged the enemy, took ten ships with their crews, and

sunk eight. The rest of the Carthaginian ships retired to the Liparean

Islands.

[Sidenote: Winter of B.C. 257-256.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 256. Coss. L. Manlius, Vulso Longus, M. Atilius Regulus

II. (Suff.).]

The result of this battle was that both sides concluded that they were

now fairly matched, and accordingly made more systematic efforts to

secure a naval force, and to dispute the supremacy at sea. While these

things were going on, the land forces effected nothing worth recording;

but wasted all their time in such petty operations as chance threw in

their way. Therefore, after making the preparations I have mentioned

for the approaching summer, the Romans, with three hundred and thirty

decked ships of war, touched at Messene; thence put to sea, keeping

Sicily on their right; and after doubling the headland Pachynus passed

on to Ecnomus, because the land force was also in that district. The

Carthaginians on their part put to sea again with three hundred and

fifty decked ships, touched at Lilybaeum, and thence dropped anchor at

Heracleia Minoa.

[Sidenote: Preparations for the Battle of Ecnomus.]

[Sidenote: Roman forces. 330 ships, with average of 420 men (300 rowers

+ 120 marines) = 138,600 men.]

[Sidenote: Carthaginian numbers, 150,000 men.]

+26.+ Now it was the purpose of the Romans to sail across to Libya and

transfer the war there, in order that the Carthaginians might find the

danger affecting themselves and their own country rather than Sicily.

But the Carthaginians were determined to prevent this. They knew that

Libya was easily invaded, and that the invaders if they once effected

a landing would meet with little resistance from the inhabitants; and

they therefore made up their minds not to allow it, and were eager

rather to bring the matter to a decisive issue by a battle at sea. The

one side was determined to cross, the other to prevent their crossing;

and their enthusiastic rivalry gave promise of a desperate struggle.

The preparations of the Romans were made to suit either contingency, an

engagement at sea or a disembarkation on the enemy’s soil. Accordingly

they picked out the best hands from the land army and divided the

whole force which they meant to take on board into four divisions.

Each division had alternative titles; the first was called the “First

Legion” or the “First Squadron,”—and so on with the others. The fourth

had a third title besides. They were called “Triarii,” on the analogy

of land armies. The total number of men thus making up the naval force

amounted to nearly one hundred and forty thousand, reckoning each ship

as carrying three hundred rowers and one hundred and twenty soldiers.

The Carthaginians, on the other hand, made their preparations almost

exclusively with a view to a naval engagement. Their numbers, if we

reckon by the number of their ships, were over one hundred and fifty

thousand men. The mere recital of these figures must, I should imagine,

strike any one with astonishment at the magnitude of the struggle, and

the vast resources of the contending states. An actual view of them

itself could hardly be more impressive than the bare statement of the

number of men and ships.

[Sidenote: The Roman order at Ecnomus.]

Now the Romans had two facts to consider: First, that circumstances

compelled them to face the open sea; and, secondly, that their enemies

had the advantage of fast sailing vessels. They therefore took every

precaution for keeping their line unbroken and difficult to attack.

They had only two ships with six banks of oars, those, namely, on

which the Consuls Marcus Atilius and Lucius Manlius respectively were

sailing. These they stationed side by side in front and in a line with

each other. Behind each of these they stationed ships one behind the

other in single file—the first squadron behind the one, and the second

squadron behind the other. These were so arranged that, as each ship

came to its place, the two files diverged farther and farther from

each other; the vessels being also stationed one behind the other with

their prows inclining outwards. Having thus arranged the first and

second squadrons in single file so as to form a wedge, they stationed

the third division in a single line at its base; so that the whole

finally presented the appearance of a triangle. Behind this base they

stationed the horse-transports, attaching them by towing-ropes to the

ships of the third squadron. And to the rear of them they placed the

fourth squadron, called the Triarii, in a single line, so extended as

to overlap the line in front of them at both extremities. When these

dispositions were complete the general appearance was that of a beak

or wedge, the apex of which was open, the base compact and strong;

while the whole was easy to work and serviceable, and at the same time

difficult to break up.

[Sidenote: The disposition of the Carthaginian fleet.]

[Sidenote: ch. 19.]

[Sidenote: ch. 25.]

[Sidenote: The battle.]

+27.+ Meanwhile the Carthaginian commanders had briefly addressed their

men. They pointed out to them that victory in this battle would ensure

the war in the future being confined to the question of the possession

of Sicily; while if they were beaten they would have hereafter to fight

for their native land and for all that they held dear. With these words

they passed the word to embark. The order was obeyed with universal

enthusiasm, for what had been said brought home to them the issues at

stake; and they put to sea in the full fervour of excited gallantry,

which might well have struck terror into all who saw it. When their

commanders saw the arrangement of the enemies’ ships they adapted their

own to match it. Three-fourths of their force they posted in a single

line, extending their right wing towards the open sea with a view of

outflanking their opponents, and placing their ships with prows facing

the enemy; while the other fourth part was posted to form a left wing

of the whole, the vessels being at right angles to the others and

close to the shore. The two Carthaginian commanders were Hanno and

Hamilcar. The former was the general who had been defeated in the

engagement at Agrigentum. He now commanded the right wing, supported

by beaked vessels for charging, and the fastest sailing quinqueremes

for outflanking, the enemy. The latter, who had been in the engagement

off Tyndaris, had charge of the left wing. This officer, occupying

the central position of the entire line, on this occasion employed a

stratagem which I will now describe. The battle began by the Romans

charging the centre of the Carthaginians, because they observed that it

was weakened by their great extension. The ships in the Carthaginian

centre, in accordance with their orders, at once turned and fled with

a view of breaking up the Roman close order. They began to retire

with all speed, and the Romans pursued them with exultation. The

consequence was that, while the first and second Roman squadrons were

pressing the flying enemy, the third and fourth “legions” had become

detached and were left behind,—the former because they had to tow the

horse-transports, and the “Triarii” because they kept their station

with them and helped them to form a reserve. But when the Carthaginians

thought that they had drawn the first and second squadron a sufficient

distance from the main body a signal was hoisted on board Hamilcar’s

ship, and they all simultaneously swung their ships round and engaged

their pursuers. The contest was a severe one. The Carthaginians had

a great superiority in the rapidity with which they manœuvred their

ships. They darted out from their line and rowed round the enemy: they

approached them with ease, and retired with despatch. But the Romans,

no less than the Carthaginians, had their reasons for entertaining

hopes of victory: for when the vessels got locked together the contest

became one of sheer strength: their engines, the “crows,” grappled all

that once came to close quarters: and, finally, both the Consuls were

present in person and were witnesses of their behaviour in battle.

+28.+ This was the state of affairs on the centre. But meanwhile Hanno

with the right wing, which had held aloof when the first encounter

took place, crossing the open sea, charged the ships of the Triarii

and caused them great difficulty and embarrassment: while those of the

Carthaginians who had been posted near the land manœuvred into line,

and getting their ships straight, charged the men who were towing the

horse-transports. These latter let go the towing-ropes, grappled with

the enemy, and kept up a desperate struggle.

[Sidenote: Three separate battles.]

[Sidenote: First with Hamilcar’s squadron.]

[Sidenote: Second squadron under Regulus.]

So that the engagement was in three separate divisions, or rather there

were three sea-fights going on at wide intervals from each other. Now

in these three engagements the opposing parties were in each case

fairly matched, thanks to the original disposition of the ships, and

therefore the victory was in each case closely contested. However the

result in the several cases was very much what was to be expected where

forces were so equal. The first to engage were the first to separate:

for Hamilcar’s division at last were overpowered and fled. But while

Lucius was engaged in securing his prizes, Marcus observing the

struggle in which the Triarii and horse-transports were involved, went

with all speed to their assistance, taking with him all the ships of

the second squadron which were undamaged. As soon as he had reached and

engaged Hanno’s division, the Triarii quickly picked up courage, though

they were then getting much the worst of it, and returned with renewed

spirits to the fight. It was now the turn for the Carthaginians to be

in difficulties. They were charged in front and on the rear, and found

to their surprise that they were being surrounded by the relieving

squadron. They at once gave way and retreated in the direction of the

open sea.

[Sidenote: Third squadron relieved by Regulus and Manlius.]

While this was going on, Lucius, who was sailing back to rejoin his

colleague, observed that the third squadron had got wedged in by the

Carthaginians close in shore. Accordingly he and Marcus, who had by

this time secured the safety of the transports and Triarii, started

together to relieve their imperilled comrades, who were now sustaining

something very like a blockade. And the fact is that they would long

before this have been utterly destroyed had not the Carthaginians been

afraid of the “crows,” and confined themselves to surrounding and

penning them in close to land, without attempting to charge for fear

of being caught by the grappling-irons. The Consuls came up rapidly,

and surrounding the Carthaginians captured fifty of their ships with

their crews, while some few of them managed to slip away and escape by

keeping close to the shore.

[Sidenote: General result.]

Such was the result of the separate engagements. But the general upshot

of the whole battle was in favour of the Romans. Twenty-four of their

vessels were destroyed; over thirty of the Carthaginians. Not a single

Roman ship was captured with its crew; sixty-four of the Carthaginians

were so taken.

[Sidenote: Siege of Aspis. (Clupea.)]

+29.+ After the battle the Romans took in a fresh supply of victual,

repaired and refitted the ships they had captured, bestowed upon the

crews the attention which they had deserved by their victory, and

then put to sea with a view of continuing their voyage to Libya.

Their leading ships made the shore just under the headland called

the Hermaeum, which is the extreme point on the east of the Gulf of

Carthage, and runs out into the open sea in the direction of Sicily.

There they waited for the rest of the ships to come up, and having

got the entire fleet together coasted along until they came to the

city called Aspis. Here they disembarked, beached their ships, dug a

trench, and constructed a stockade round them; and on the inhabitants

of the city refusing to submit without compulsion, they set to work to

besiege the town. Presently those of the Carthaginians who had survived

the sea-fight came to land also; and feeling sure that the enemy, in

the flush of their victory, intended to sail straight against Carthage

itself, they began by keeping a chain of advanced guards at outlying

points to protect the capital with their military and naval forces.

But when they ascertained that the Romans had disembarked without

resistance and were engaged in besieging Aspis, they gave up the idea

of watching for the descent of the fleet; but concentrated their

forces, and devoted themselves to the protection of the capital and its

environs.

[Sidenote: Aspis taken.]

[Sidenote: M. Atilius Regulus remains in Africa, winter of B.C.

256-255.]

Meanwhile the Romans had taken Aspis, had placed in it a garrison

to hold it and its territory, and had besides sent home to Rome to

announce the events which had taken place and to ask for instructions

as to the future,—what they were to do, and what arrangements they

were to make. Having done this they made active preparations for a

general advance and set about plundering the country. They met with

no opposition in this: they destroyed numerous dwelling houses of

remarkably fine construction, possessed themselves of a great number

of cattle; and captured more than twenty thousand slaves whom they

took to their ships. In the midst of these proceedings the messengers

arrived from Rome with orders that one Consul was to remain with an

adequate force, the other was to bring the fleet to Rome. Accordingly

Marcus was left behind with forty ships, fifteen thousand infantry, and

five hundred cavalry; while Lucius put the crowd of captives on board,

and having embarked his men, sailed along the coast of Sicily without

encountering any danger, and reached Rome.

+30.+ The Carthaginians now saw that their enemies contemplated a

lengthened occupation of the country. They therefore proceeded first

of all to elect two of their own citizens, Hasdrubal son of Hanno,

and Bostarus, to the office of general; and next sent to Heracleia a

pressing summons to Hamilcar. He obeyed immediately, and arrived at

Carthage with five hundred cavalry and five thousand infantry. He was

forthwith appointed general in conjunction with the other two, and

entered into consultation with Hasdrubal and his colleague as to the

measures necessary to be taken in the present crisis. They decided

to defend the country and not to allow it to be devastated without

resistance.

[Sidenote: B.C. 256-255. The operations of Regulus in Libya.]

[Sidenote: Defeat of the Carthaginians near Adys.]

A few days afterwards Marcus sallied forth on one of his marauding

expeditions. Such towns as were unwalled he carried by assault and

plundered, and such as were walled he besieged. Among others he came to

the considerable town of Adys, and having placed his troops round it

was beginning with all speed to raise siege works. The Carthaginians

were both eager to relieve the town and determined to dispute the

possession of the open country. They therefore led out their army;

but their operations were not skilfully conducted. They indeed seized

and encamped upon a piece of rising ground which commanded the enemy;

but it was unsuitable to themselves. Their best hopes rested on their

cavalry and their elephants, and yet they abandoned the level plain

and cooped themselves up in a position at once steep and difficult of

access. The enemy, as might have been expected, were not slow to take

advantage of this mistake. The Roman commanders were skilful enough to

understand that the best and most formidable part of the forces opposed

to them was rendered useless by the nature of the ground. They did not

therefore wait for them to come down to the plain and offer battle, but

choosing the time which suited themselves, began at daybreak a forward

movement on both sides of the hill. In the battle which followed the

Carthaginians could not use their cavalry or elephants at all; but

their mercenary troops made a really gallant and spirited sally. They

even forced the first division of the Romans to give way and fly: but

they advanced too far, and were surrounded and routed by the division

which was advancing from the other direction. This was immediately

followed by the whole force being dislodged from their encampment.

The elephants and cavalry as soon as they gained level ground made

good their retreat without loss; but the infantry were pursued by

the Romans. The latter however soon desisted from the pursuit. They

presently returned, dismantled the enemy’s entrenchment, and destroyed

the stockade; and from thenceforth overran the whole country-side and

sacked the towns without opposition.

[Sidenote: Tunes.]

Among others they seized the town called Tunes. This place had many

natural advantages for expeditions such as those in which they were

engaged, and was so situated as to form a convenient base of operations

against the capital and its immediate neighbourhood. They accordingly

fixed their headquarters in it.

[Sidenote: Distress at Carthage, which is heightened by an inroad of

Numidians.]

[Sidenote: Spring of B.C. 255. Regulus proposes harsh terms.]

[Sidenote: The terms rejected.]

+31.+ The Carthaginians were now indeed in evil case. It was not long

since they had sustained a disaster at sea: and now they had met with

one on land, not from any failure of courage on the part of their

soldiers, but from the incompetency of their commanders. Simultaneously

with these misfortunes, they were suffering from an inroad of the

Numidians, who were doing even more damage to the country than the

Romans. The terror which they inspired drove the country folk to flock

for safety into the city; and the city itself had to face a serious

famine as well as a panic, the former from the numbers that crowded

into it, the latter from the hourly expectation of a siege. But Regulus

had different views. The double defeat sustained by the Carthaginians,

by land as well as by sea, convinced him that the capture of Carthage

was a question of a very short time; and he was in a state of great

anxiety lest his successor in the Consulship should arrive from Rome

in time to rob him of the glory of the achievement. He therefore

invited the Carthaginians to make terms. They were only too glad of

the proposal, and sent their leading citizens to meet him. The meeting

took place: but the commissioners could not bring their minds to

entertain his proposals; they were so severe that it was almost more

than they could bear to listen to them at all. Regulus regarded himself

as practically master of the city, and considered that they ought to

regard any concession on his part as a matter of favour and pure grace.

The Carthaginians on the other hand concluded that nothing worse could

be imposed on them if they suffered capture than was now enjoined.

They therefore returned home without accepting the offers of Regulus,

and extremely exasperated by his unreasonable harshness. When the

Carthaginian Senate heard the conditions offered by the Roman general,

though they had almost relinquished every hope of safety, they came to

the gallant and noble resolution that they would brave anything, that

they would try every possible means and endure every extremity, rather

than submit to terms so dishonourable and so unworthy of their past

history.

[Sidenote: Arrival of the Spartan Xanthippus in Carthage.]

+32.+ Now it happened that just about this time one of their recruiting

agents, who had some time before been despatched to Greece, arrived

home. He brought a large number of men with him, and among them a

certain Lacedaemonian named Xanthippus, a man trained in the Spartan

discipline, and of large experience in war. When this man was informed

of their defeat, and of how it had taken place, and when he had

reviewed the military resources still left to the Carthaginians, and

the number of their cavalry and elephants, he did not take long to

come to a decided conclusion. He expressed his opinion to his friends

that the Carthaginians had owed their defeat, not to the superiority

of the Romans, but to the unskilfulness of their own commanders. The

dangerous state of their affairs caused the words of Xanthippus to get

abroad quickly among the people and to reach the ears of the generals;

and the men in authority determined to summon and question him. He

appeared, and laid his views before the magistrates; in which he showed

to what they owed their present disasters, and that if they would

take his advice and keep to the flat parts of the country alike in

marching, encamping, and giving battle, they would be able with perfect

ease to secure safety for themselves and to defeat their opponents in

the field. The generals accepted the suggestion, resolved to follow

his advice, and there and then put their forces at his command. Among

the multitude the observation of Xanthippus was passed from mouth to

mouth, and gave rise, as was to be expected, to a good deal of popular

rumour and sanguine talk. This was confirmed when he had once handled

the troops. The way in which he got them into order when he had led

them outside the town; the skill with which he manœuvred the separate

detachments, and passed the word of command down the ranks in due

conformity to the rules of tactics, at once impressed every one with

the contrast to the blundering of their former generals. The multitude

expressed their approbation by loud cheers, and were for engaging

the enemy without delay, convinced that no harm could happen to them

as long as Xanthippus was their leader. The generals took advantage

of this circumstance, and of the extraordinary recovery which they

saw had taken place in the spirits of the people. They addressed

them some exhortations befitting the occasion, and after a few days’

delay got their forces on foot and started. Their army consisted of

twelve thousand infantry, four thousand cavalry, and nearly a hundred

elephants.

[Sidenote: The new strategy of the Carthaginians.]

[Sidenote: The dispositions for the battle.]

+33.+ The Romans at once noticed a change. They saw that the

Carthaginians chose level country for their line of march, and flat

places for their encampments. This novelty puzzled and rather alarmed

them, yet their prevailing feeling was an eager desire to come to

close quarters with the enemy. They therefore advanced to a position

about ten stades from them and employed the first day in pitching a

camp there. Next day, while the chief officers of the Carthaginians

were discussing in a council of war what dispositions were called for,

and what line of strategy they were to adopt, the common soldiers, in

their eagerness for the engagement, collected in groups, shouted out

the name of Xanthippus, and showed that their opinion was in favour of

an immediate forward movement. Influenced by the evident enthusiasm

and eagerness of the army, and by the appeals of Xanthippus that they

should not let the opportunity slip, the generals gave orders to the

men to get ready, and resigned to Xanthippus the entire direction of

affairs, with full authority to act as he thought most advantageous.

He at once acted upon this authority. He ordered out the elephants,

and placed them in a single line in front of the whole army. The heavy

phalanx of the Carthaginians he stationed at a moderate interval in

the rear of these. He divided the mercenaries into three corps. One

he stationed on the right wing; while the other two, which consisted

of the most active, he placed with the cavalry on both wings. When

the Romans saw that the enemy were drawn up to offer them battle

they readily advanced to accept it. They were however alarmed at

the elephants, and made special arrangements with a view to resist

their charge. They stationed the velites in the van, and behind them

the legionaries, many maniples deep, while they divided the cavalry

between the two wings. Their line of battle was thus less extended

than usual, but deeper. And though they had thereby made a sufficient

provision against the elephants, yet being far out-numbered in cavalry,

their provision in that part of the field was altogether inadequate.

At length both sides had made their dispositions according to their

respective plans of operation, and had placed their several men in the

posts assigned to them: and now they were standing drawn up in order,

and were each of them watching for the right moment for beginning the

attack.

[Sidenote: The battle.]

[Sidenote: The Romans are beaten and annihilated.]

[Sidenote: Regulus made prisoner.]

+34.+ No sooner had Xanthippus given the order to the men on the

elephants to advance and disperse the lines in front of them, and to

his cavalry to outflank both wings and charge the enemy, than the Roman

army—clashing their shields and spears together after their usual

custom, and simultaneously raising their battle-cry—charged the enemy.

The Roman cavalry being far out-numbered by the Carthaginians were soon

in full retreat on both wings. But the fortune of the several divisions

of the infantry was various. Those stationed on the left wing—partly

because they could avoid the elephants and partly because they thought

contemptuously of the mercenaries—charged the right wing of the

Carthaginians, succeeded in driving them from their ground, and pursued

them as far as their entrenchment. Those stationed in front of the

elephants were less fortunate. The maniples in front were thrown into

utter confusion by the crushing weight of the animals: knocked down and

trampled upon by them they perished in heaps upon the field; yet owing

to its great depth the main body remained for a time unbroken. But it

was not for long. The maniples on the rear found themselves outflanked

by the cavalry, and were forced to face round and resist them: those on

the other hand who forced their way to the front through the elephants,

and had now those beasts on their rear, found themselves confronted

by the phalanx of Carthaginians, which had not yet been in action and

was still in close unbroken order, and so were cut to pieces. This was

followed by a general rout. Most of the Romans were trampled to death

by the enormous weight of the elephants; the rest were shot down in

their ranks by the numerous cavalry: and there were only a very few who

attempted to save themselves by flight. But the flatness of the country

was unfavourable to escape in this manner. Some of the fugitives were

destroyed by the elephants and cavalry; while only those who fled with

the general Regulus, amounting perhaps to five hundred, were after a

short pursuit made prisoners with him to a man.

On the Carthaginian side there fell about eight hundred of the

mercenaries, those namely who had been stationed opposite the left wing

of the Romans. On the part of the Romans about two thousand survived.

These were those whom I have already described as having chased the

Carthaginian right wing to their entrenchment, and who were thus not

involved in the general engagement. The rest were entirely destroyed

with the exception of those who fled with Regulus. The surviving

maniples escaped with considerable difficulty to the town of Aspis. The

Carthaginians stripped the dead, and taking with them the Roman general

and the rest of their prisoners, returned to the capital in a high

state of exultation at the turn their affairs had now taken.

[Sidenote: Eurip. fr.]

+35.+ This event conveys many useful lessons to a thoughtful observer.

Above all, the disaster of Regulus gives the clearest possible warning

that no one should feel too confident of the favours of Fortune,

especially in the hour of success. Here we see one, who a short time

before refused all pity or consideration to the fallen, brought

incontinently to beg them for his own life. Again, we are taught the

truth of that saying of Euripides—

One wise man’s skill is worth a world in arms.

For it was one man, one brain, that defeated the numbers which were

believed to be invincible and able to accomplish anything; and restored

to confidence a whole city that was unmistakably and utterly ruined,

and the spirits of its army which had sunk to the lowest depths of

despair. I record these things in the hope of benefiting my readers.

There are two roads to reformation for mankind—one through misfortunes

of their own, the other through those of others: the former is the most

unmistakable, the latter the less painful. One should never therefore

voluntarily choose the former, for it makes reformation a matter of

great difficulty and danger; but we should always look out for the

latter, for thereby we can without hurt to ourselves gain a clear view

of the best course to pursue. It is this which forces us to consider

that the knowledge gained from the study of true history is the best

of all educations for practical life. For it is history, and history

alone, which, without involving us in actual danger, will mature our

judgment and prepare us to take right views, whatever may be the crisis

or the posture of affairs.

[Sidenote: Xanthippus quits Carthage.]

+36.+ To return to our narrative. Having obtained this complete success

the Carthaginians indulged in every sign of exultation. Thanksgivings

were poured out to God, and joyful congratulations interchanged among

themselves. But Xanthippus, by whose means such a happy change had

been brought about and such an impulse been given to the fortunes of

Carthage, did not remain there long, but took ship for home again. In

this he showed his wisdom and discernment. For it is the nature of

extraordinary and conspicuous achievements to exasperate jealousies

and envenom slander; against which a native may perhaps stand with the

support of kinsfolk and friends, but a foreigner when exposed to one

or the other of them is inevitably overpowered before long and put

in danger. There is however another account sometimes given of the

departure of Xanthippus, which I will endeavour at a more suitable

opportunity to set forth.

[Sidenote: The Romans prepare a fleet to relieve their beaten army.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 255. Coss. Ser. Fulvius Paetinus Nobilior, M. Aemilius

Paullus.]

Upon this unlooked-for catastrophe in the Libyan campaign, the Roman

government at once set to work to fit out a fleet to take off the men

who were still surviving there; while the Carthaginians followed up

their success by sitting down before Aspis, and besieging it, being

anxious to get the survivors of the battle into their hands. But

failing to capture the place, owing to the gallantry and determined

courage of these men, they eventually raised the siege. When they

heard that the Romans were preparing their fleet, and were intending

to sail once more against Libya, they set about shipbuilding also,

partly repairing old vessels and partly constructing new. Before very

long they had manned and launched two hundred ships, and were on the

watch for the coming of their enemies. By the beginning of the summer

the Romans had launched three hundred and fifty vessels. They put them

under the command of the Consuls Marcus Aemilius and Servius Fulvius,

and despatched them. This fleet coasted along Sicily; made for Libya;

and having fallen in with the Carthaginian squadron off Hermaeum, at

once charged and easily turned them to flight; captured a hundred and

fourteen with their crews, and having taken on board their men who had

maintained themselves in Libya, started from Aspis on their return

voyage to Sicily.

[Sidenote: The fleet is lost in a storm.]

[Sidenote: Between June 28 and July 26.]

+37.+ The passage was effected in safety, and the coast of Camarina

was reached: but there they experienced so terrible a storm, and

suffered so dreadfully, as almost to beggar description. The disaster

was indeed extreme: for out of their three hundred and sixty-four

vessels eighty only remained. The rest were either swamped or driven

by the surf upon the rocks and headlands, where they went to pieces

and filled all the seaboard with corpses and wreckage. No greater

catastrophe is to be found in all history as befalling a fleet at one

time. And for this Fortune was not so much to blame as the commanders

themselves. They had been warned again and again by the pilots not to

steer along the southern coast of Sicily facing the Libyan sea, because

it was exposed and yielded no safe anchorage; and because, of the two

dangerous constellations, one had not yet set and the other was on the

point of rising (for their voyage fell between the rising of Orion and

that of the Dog Star). Yet they attended to none of these warnings;

but, intoxicated by their recent success, were anxious to capture

certain cities as they coasted along, and in pursuance of this idea

thoughtlessly exposed themselves to the full fury of the open sea. As

far as these particular men were concerned, the disaster which they

brought upon themselves in the pursuit of trivial advantages convinced

them of the folly of their conduct. But it is a peculiarity of the

Roman people as a whole to treat everything as a question of main

strength; to consider that they must of course accomplish whatever they

have proposed to themselves; and that nothing is impossible that they

have once determined upon. The result of such self-confidence is that

in many things they do succeed, while in some few they conspicuously

fail, and especially at sea. On land it is against men only and their

works that they have to direct their efforts: and as the forces against

which they exert their strength do not differ intrinsically from

their own, as a general rule they succeed; while their failures are

exceptional and rare. But to contend with the sea and sky is to fight

against a force immeasurably superior to their own: and when they trust

to an exertion of sheer strength in such a contest the disasters which

they meet with are signal. This is what they experienced on the present

occasion: they have often experienced it since; and will continue to do

so, as long as they maintain their headstrong and foolhardy notion that

any season of the year admits of sailing as well as marching.

[Sidenote: The Carthaginians renew operations in Sicily.]

+38.+ When the Carthaginians heard of the destruction which had

befallen the Roman fleet, they made up their minds that as their late

victory had made them a match for their enemy on land, so now the

Roman catastrophe had made them a match for him at sea. Accordingly

they devoted themselves with still greater eagerness than before to

their naval and military preparations. And first, they lost no time in

despatching Hasdrubal to Sicily, and with him not only the soldiers

that they had already collected, but those also whom they had recalled

from Heracleia; and along with them they sent also a hundred and forty

elephants. And next, after despatching him, they began fitting out two

hundred ships and making all other preparations necessary for a naval

expedition. Hasdrubal reached Lilybaeum safely, and immediately set to

work to train his elephants and drill his men, and showed his intention

of striking a blow for the possession of the open country.

[Sidenote: B.C. 254. Coss. Gn. Cornelius Scipio Asina II., Aulus

Atilius, Calatinus II.]

The Roman government, when they heard of this from the survivors of the

wreck on their arrival home, felt it to be a grievous misfortune; but

being absolutely resolved not to give in, they determined once more

to put two hundred and twenty vessels on the stocks and build afresh.

These were finished in three months, an almost incredibly short time,

and the new Consuls Aulus Atilius and Gnaeus Cornelius fitted out the

fleet and put to sea. As they passed through the straits they took up

from Messene those of the vessels which had been saved from the wreck;

and having thus arrived with three hundred ships off Panormus, which

is the strongest town of all the Carthaginian province in Sicily, they

began to besiege it. They threw up works in two distinct places, and

after other necessary preparations brought up their battering rams. The

tower next the sea was destroyed with ease, and the soldiers forced

their way in through the breach: and so what is called the New Town was

carried by assault; while what is called the Old Town being placed by

this event in imminent danger, its inhabitants made haste to surrender

it. Having thus made themselves masters of the place, the army sailed

back to Rome, leaving a garrison in the town.

[Sidenote: B.C. 253. Coss. Gn. Servilius Caepio, G. Sempronius Blaesus.]

+39.+ But next summer the new Consuls Gnaeus Servilius and Gaius

Sempronius put again to sea with their full strength, and after

touching at Sicily started thence for Libya. There, as they coasted

along the shore, they made a great number of descents upon the country

without accomplishing anything of importance in any of them. At length

they came to the island of the Lotophagi called Mēnix, which is not

far from the Lesser Syrtis. There, from ignorance of the waters, they

ran upon some shallows; the tide receded, their ships went aground,

and they were in extreme peril. However, after a while the tide

unexpectedly flowed back again, and by dint of throwing overboard all

their heavy goods they just managed to float the ships. After this

their return voyage was more like a flight than anything else. When

they reached Sicily and had made the promontory of Lilybaeum they cast

anchor at Panormus. Thence they weighed anchor for Rome, and rashly

ventured upon the open sea-line as the shortest; but while on their

voyage they once more encountered so terrible a storm that they lost

more than a hundred and fifty ships.

[Sidenote: B.C. 252.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 251. Coss. Lucius Caecilius Metellus, G. Furius

Pacilus.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 252-251.]

[Sidenote: B.C. 250.]

The Romans after this misfortune, though they are eminently persistent

in carrying out their undertakings, yet owing to the severity and

frequency of their disasters, now yielded to the force of circumstances

and refrained from constructing another fleet. All the hopes still left

to them they rested upon their land forces: and, accordingly, they

despatched the Consuls Lucius Caecilius and Gaius Furius with their

legions to Sicily; but they only manned sixty ships to carry provisions

for the legions. The fortunes of the Carthaginians had in their turn

considerably improved owing to the catastrophes I have described. They

now commanded the sea without let or hindrance, since the Romans had

abandoned it; while in their land forces their hopes were high. Nor

was it unreasonable that it should be so. The account of the battle

of Libya had reached the ears of the Romans: they had heard that the

elephants had broken their ranks and had killed the large part of those

that fell: and they were in such terror of them, that though during

two years running after that time they had on many occasions, in the

territory either of Lilybaeum or Selinus, found themselves in order of

battle within five or six stades of the enemy, they never plucked up

courage to begin an attack, or in fact to come down upon level ground

at all, all because of their fear of an elephant charge. And in these

two seasons all they did was to reduce Therma and Lipara by siege,

keeping close all the while to mountainous districts and such as were

difficult to cross. The timidity and want of confidence thus displayed

by their land forces induced the Roman government to change their minds

and once more to attempt success at sea. Accordingly, in the second

consulship of Caius Atilius and Lucius Manlius, we find them ordering

fifty ships to be built, enrolling sailors and energetically collecting

a naval armament.

[Sidenote: B.C. 251.]

[Sidenote: Skirmishing at Panormus.]

+40.+ Meanwhile Hasdrubal noticed the terror displayed by the Romans

whenever they had lately found themselves in the presence of the

enemy. He learnt also that one of the Consuls had departed and gone

to Italy, and that Caecilius was lingering in Panormus with the other

half of the army, with the view of protecting the corn-crops of the

allies just then ripe for the harvest. He therefore got his troops in

motion, marched out, and encamped on the frontier of the territory

of Panormus. Caecilius saw well enough that the enemy had become

supremely confident, and he was anxious to draw him on; he therefore

kept his men within the walls. Hasdrubal imagined that Caecilius

dared not come out to give him battle. Elated with this idea, he

pushed boldly forward with his whole army and marched over the pass

into the territory of Panormus. But though he was destroying all the

standing crops up to the very walls of the town, Caecilius was not

shaken from his resolution, but kept persistently to it, until he had

induced him to cross the river which lay between him and the town. But

no sooner had the Carthaginians got their elephants and men across,

than Caecilius commenced sending out his light-armed troops to harass

them, until he had forced them to get their whole army into fighting

order. When he saw that everything was happening as he designed it,

he placed some of his light troops to line the wall and moat, with

instructions that if the elephants came within range they should pour

volleys of their missiles upon them; but that whenever they found

themselves being forced from their ground by them, they should retreat

into the moat, rush out of it again, and hurl darts at the elephants

which happened to be nearest. At the same time he gave orders to the

armourers in the market-place to carry the missiles and heap them up

outside at the foot of the wall. Meanwhile he took up his own position

with his maniples at the gate which was opposite the enemy’s left

wing, and kept despatching detachment after detachment to reinforce

his skirmishers. The engagement commenced by them becoming more and

more general, a feeling of emulation took possession of the officers

in charge of the elephants. They wished to distinguish themselves in

the eyes of Hasdrubal, and they desired that the credit of the victory

should be theirs: they therefore, with one accord, charged the advanced

skirmishing parties of the enemy, routed them with ease, and pursued

them up to the moat. But no sooner did the elephants thus come to

close quarters than they were wounded by the archers on the wall, and

overwhelmed with volleys of pila and javelins which poured thick and

fast upon them from the men stationed on the outer edge of the moat,

and who had not yet been engaged,—and thus, studded all over with

darts, and wounded past all bearing, they soon got beyond control. They

turned and bore down upon their own masters, trampling men to death,

and throwing their own lines into utter disorder and confusion. When

Caecilius saw this he led out his men with promptitude. His troops were

fresh; the enemy were in disorder; and he charged them diagonally on

the flank: the result was that he inflicted a severe defeat upon them,

killed a large number, and forced the rest into precipitate flight. Of

the elephants he captured ten along with their Indian riders: the rest

which had thrown their Indians he managed to drive into a herd after

the battle, and secured every one of them. This achievement gained him

the credit on all hands of having substantially benefited the Roman

cause, by once more restoring confidence to the army, and giving them

the command of the open country.

[Sidenote: B.C. 250. C. Caecilius Regulus II., L. Manlius Vulso II.]

+41.+ The announcement of this success at Rome was received with

extreme delight; not so much at the blow inflicted on the enemy by

the loss of their elephants, as at the confidence inspired in their

own troops by a victory over these animals. With their confidence

thus restored, the Roman government recurred to their original plan

of sending out the Consuls upon this service with a fleet and naval

forces; for they were eager, by all means in their power, to put a

period to the war. Accordingly, in the fourteenth year of the war,

the supplies necessary for the despatch of the expedition were got

ready, and the Consuls set sail for Sicily with two hundred ships.

They dropped anchor at Lilybaeum; and the army having met them there,

they began to besiege it by sea and land. Their view was that if they

could obtain possession of this town they would have no difficulty in

transferring the seat of war to Libya. The Carthaginian leaders were

of the same opinion, and entirely agreed with the Roman view of the

value of the place. They accordingly subordinated everything else to

this; devoted themselves to the relief of the place at all hazards; and

resolved to retain this town at any sacrifice: for now that the Romans

were masters of all the rest of Sicily, except Drepana, it was the only

foothold they had left in the island.

To understand my story a knowledge of the topography of the district

is necessary. I will therefore endeavour in a few words to convey

a comprehension to my readers of its geographical position and its

peculiar advantages.