We may readily believe that Sextus Tarquinius committed the outrage
against Lucretia, as indeed similar things happen even now in Turkey,
and are told in the middle ages, of the Italian princes down to Pietro
Luigi Farnese (in the sixteenth century), and in ancient history of
Demetrius Poliorcetes at Athens. Cicero is quite right when he says
that the misfortune was this, that the offence was committed against a
matron of one of the most powerful families. To all the other details
linked with it, from which the history derives its individuality, to
the connexion with the campaign against Ardea, not the slightest credit
is to be given. The king is said to have been in the camp before Ardea,
and a truce to have been concluded there for fifteen years. Yet Ardea
had already before been dependent upon Rome, and was one of those towns
in the name of which she concluded the alliance with Carthage. Nothing,
therefore, is likely to be true but the ill usage of Lucreia, and that
her death kindled into a blaze the fire which had long been smouldering.
We are in just as much perplexity with regard to the character of
Brutus. He is said to have feigned himself half-witted, concerning
which there exist several accounts. The mission to Delphi with the
sons of Tarquin, although such a one had already before been sent from
Agylla, seems to betray a later hand, the same which put in the stories
from Herodotus. It is said, moreover, that Tarquin, in order to render
harmless the dignity of tribune of the _Celeres_, which was second
only to that of the king, had conferred it upon Brutus. There is every
likelihood, however, that the story of the stupidity of Brutus was
merely derived from his name. Brutus is without doubt an Oscan word,
the same which is in the name of the Bruttians; it means a run-away
slave, a designation which the overbearing _factio regis_ gave the
leader of the rebels because he was a plebeian,--a case just like that
of the Gueux. Is it conceivable that an eminent king should have made
an utter fool (whom he might have put to death) tribune of the Celeres,
in order to bring the dignity into contempt? Tarquin was not the kind
of tyrant who was obliged to paralyze the state that he might rule
over it; he could allow it strength, and yet govern it by the superior
weight of his own personal qualities. Nor does the opinion which the
Romans had of him incline that way; his statue remained in the Capitol
together with those of the other kings.
A question which formerly much engaged my attention is this: How could
Brutus, a plebeian, be _Tribunus Celerum_, although the _Celeres_ were
the patrician knights? I think I have found the key to it. Writers
speak of him as if he had been the only tribune of the Celeres, whereas
there were several of them, as Dionysius already mentions in the
enumeration of the priestly offices in his account of Numa. The Celeres
were the horsemen; yet the plebeians also had their knights, and these
formed a fourth order. Now as each of the patrician tribes had its
tribune, is it not according to analogy that among the thirty tribunes
of the plebeians there was one who represented the plebeian Celeres
as opposed to the patricians? The _Magister Equitum_, whose office is
looked upon as a continuation of the dignity of the _Tribunus Celerum_,
was not necessarily a patrician: P. Licinius Crassus was elected to
it. This magistrate stood at the head of all the eighteen centuries of
the knights, in which the plebeians had the preponderance. As a fourth
estate the plebeians likewise appear in the remarkable adjustment of
the estates, in the year of the city 388, when to the three holidays,
which were kept at Rome corresponding to the three tribes, a fourth day
was added; certainly because the plebeians now as a body were placed on
an equal footing with the patricians, although not of such importance
in the eyes of the latter, that three days should also be set apart for
them.
To give the revolution the necessary sanction, it is said that
Collatinus brought Brutus with him, and Sp. Lucretius Valerius.
Now, we may positively assert, that Sp. Lucretius belonged to the
Ramnes; Valerius, to the Tities;[86] Collatinus, to the Luceres; and
as to Brutus, from what we have just seen, we may class him among
the plebeians. That Valerius belonged to the Tities was generally
acknowledged by the ancients: it is stated of him in Cicero, that he
was consul together with Lucretius, to whom he yielded the Fasces,
_quia minor natu erat_. Yet Cicero here confounds _gentes minores_
with _minor natu_, the less privileged tribe being called _minor_. We
know from Dionysius, that when the two first tribes were placed on an
equal footing, the third was called νεώτεροι (_minor_). Collatinus
was of the Gens of the Tarquinii, consequently a Lucer. Brutus is a
plebeian; Cicero’s belief in the descent of the Junii Bruti from our
L. Junius Brutus is beyond a doubt; and this is of greater weight than
the denial of those who wrote after the battle of Philippi. M. Brutus
was to be considered as a _homo insitivus_, as an outlaw. We already
perceive from Posidonius that the question of the descent of the
Bruti was mooted. Much may be said in support of the opinion of those
who take him to be a patrician; certainly many patrician clans have
survived in some plebeian families; a _transitio ad plebem_ was made
most frequently by unequal marriages, and although the cognomen was
then generally wont to be a plebeian one, yet it might be surmised that
such an illustrious name as that of Brutus had been retained. But as
long as the consulship was not open to the plebeians, no Junius occurs
among the consuls. In the earlier times of the republic a tribune
of the people, one L. Brutus, is mentioned, who plays a prominent
part as the framer of an important _plebiscitum_ in the trial of
Coriolanus (in Dionysius also, at the time of the _secessio_, which is
a falsification). This Brutus is a real person; but just like the whole
story of Coriolanus, he belongs to quite a different period.
If we reject from our account every thing which is purely dramatic, we
see after Tarquin’s downfall four Tribunes of the Celeres in possession
of the government, consequently a magistracy of four persons, Sp.
Lucretius being at the same time _Princeps Senatus_ and Valerius
_Præfectus Urbi_. In Livy all goes on as in a stage play; the necessary
historical development of the events is mistaken: some important hints
are, however, to be found in Dionysius. These four men had no authority
whatever to bring any resolution of their own before the citizens; the
patricians could not decree anything, unless there had previously been
a Senatus-Consultum as a προβούλευμα, as in all the Greek states, which
Dionysius points out in several instances. This was the case in the
curies as well as in the centuries: the first branch of the legislature
which had an initiative were the _Comitia Tributa_, and it was this
which made the _lex Publilia_ so exceedingly important. So long as the
senate could not take anything in hand but what was laid before it by
the consul, nor the popular assembly without a decree of the senate,
so long might the consuls stifle almost everything; they merely needed
to keep a stubborn silence. In the case in question, it appears that
the proposal for the abolition of the kingly dignity was not in a legal
manner brought by the Tribuni Celerum before the curies; Livy has,
however, for the sake of the composition, suppressed the old account
contained in the law books. The tribunes of the celeres assembled, and
resolved upon moving the abolition; the motion was by the _Princeps
Senatus_ brought to the senate; and the senate and the curies decide
upon it. This is the _lex curiata_. With the intention now to restore
the constitution of Servius in its integrity, the decision of the
curies was also laid before the centuries for their approval, the
order being a matter of little consequence. The way in which this is
represented, is that the army in the camp of Ardea had assented to the
resolution.
It is by no means certain that the consulship was instituted
immediately after the expulsion of the kings. Rome was perhaps at first
under the rule of the four Tribunes of the Celeres; perhaps also the
government was at once rid of its superfluous number of heads, and
they were reduced to two. This was certainly a deterioration; yet it
may have been so ordered in Servius’ constitution with the definite
purpose of securing the equalization of the commonalty, so that there
might be one consul from the patricians, and one from the plebeians. In
this case, of the first consuls Collatinus is the patrician and Brutus
the plebeian one, unless perhaps there should yet happen to be a prior
consulate of Sp. Lucretius and Valerius Poplicola.
The taking of Rome by the Gauls has not been fraught with more serious
consequences to the city itself than it has been to its history,
of which indeed all the sources have been obliterated by it. The
chronicles of many places in their early histories afford a parallel to
this. In Dittmarsch they begin about a hundred and fifty years before
the conquest of the country, after the great change when the clans
and the peasantry were formed into one organized body; an event which
they do not mention, but presuppose. In like manner the chronicle of
Cologne commences its notices long after that city was already great
and flourishing. There were every where in the middle ages earlier
written accounts; yet they were laid on the shelf, as they had no more
any positive interest, after the particulars of the tradition had been
buried in oblivion. Thus it was also with Roman history. They had it
from the times of the republic, not, however, from its beginning,
but only from about the period of the Secessio, merely with detached
notices of the earlier times; before it they had nothing besides the
peace with the Sabines during Sp. Cassius’ first consulate, and the
war with the Volscians. All those earlier histories were, as we have
already shown, restored in accordance with a numerical scheme.
I have already remarked that, when there were consuls of the two
orders, Brutus represented the plebeians, as Sextius Lateranus did
afterwards. It is very remarkable, that with regard to all these old
institutions, it must indeed be asserted that the Licinian laws were
in all essential points nothing else than restoration and re-enactment
of those of Servius. The consuls were first called _Prætores_,
στρατηγοί in Dionysius, until the Decemvirate, when their power was
curtailed; and then the title of consul seems to have been introduced
as being a somewhat more humble one. The derivation of this word has
greatly troubled the Roman etymologists; we class it with _præsul_ and
_exsul_. _Præsul_ means, he who is _before_ (above) others; _exsul_,
he who is _out_ of the town; _consul_, he who is _with_ another,
equal to _collega_, whence _consulere_ to be _together_ in order to
consult;--it has nothing to do with _salire_. Yet the being together
of a patrician with a plebeian was not of long duration. It is stated
that the expulsion of the Tarquinii was at first not at all followed
by an embittered hostility, although an oath had been taken not to
suffer kings any more to reign in Rome; so that it might almost
appear doubtful whether the outrage against Lucretia had been really
perpetrated. The ancients were often inconceivably mild with regard
to such matters. It is possible that the influence of the royal race
and of the third tribe were still so great, that they were obliged to
grant the Tarquins in lieu of the hereditary rule the eligibility for
the consulship. In Greek history also the royal races are dissolved
into γένη ἀρχικά: the Codrids become archons, even those elected for
ten years and certainly also at first those for one year were Codrids.
Yet this did not last long. Collatinus was obliged to resign, and the
whole of the Gens Tarquinia to leave the city. It may be that there
was at that time a Tribus Tarquinia also, the memory of which was
now obliterated. It seems shocking that Collatinus, the husband of
Lucretia, was banished; if there were children of Lucretia living and
they had to leave the country together with Collatinus, this was a
revolting cruelty. Yet Lucretia’s marriage with Collatinus belongs to
poetry only; _neque affirmare neque refellere in animo est_. She is the
daughter of Sp. Lucretius Tricipitinus, and this is dwelt upon with
much greater emphasis than her marriage. The intention of this probably
was, to palliate the fact that the Tarquins were not absolutely driven
out, and to explain the reason for which after all a cousin of the king
had been made consul; and this could not be effected more easily than
by connecting him with the legend of Lucretia.
The main point in the consulship was the limitation of the royal power
to one year, election supplying the place of hereditary right. It was
separated from the priestly functions, and received no τέμενος, what
Cicero calls the _agri lati uberesque regii_, large demesnes which
were cultivated by the clients for the kings. These _agri_ were now
divided among the commonalty in order that the restoration of the regal
dignity might become impossible, and also that the consuls might not
have the absolute sway of the kings. The power of these, like that
of the Frankish kings, lay in their retinue. Clovis was not allowed
to appropriate to himself any exclusive share in the booty, and yet
he ruled already as a despot, and still more so his successors. This
power he had merely by means of the _comitatus_. In the middle ages
the tenant of the king had less consequence than the common freeman
who had carefully preserved his independence. This state of things was
only changed in the thirteenth century. Such royal tenants were those
clients who cultivated the fields of the kings.
Was the consulate such that two patricians were to be elected, and
there was no further limitation; or was it confined to the two first
tribes, the Ramnes and Tities, to the exclusion of the Luceres, as
in some of the priestly colleges; or was it a representation of the
patricians and plebeians? These three probabilities lie before us. No
one, moreover, was allowed to stand for the consulship in the earliest
times: the candidates were proposed by the senate. The first of these
cases is out of the question: were it not that the two first tribes, or
the two estates were represented, a triumvirate would have much rather
been thought of. The idea of the triumvirate was first taken up at a
later period of the Roman history, a fact which was quite overlooked
until I discovered the trace of it in an insignificant author, Joannes
Lydus, who made use of excellent materials.
Of a plebeian consulship we find no more traces, down to the times of
Licinius. In the place of Collatinus Horatius was elected, as may be
proved from the treaty with Carthage, and by a passage of Pliny: in
the common tradition, Valerius Poplicola is named as the successor of
Collatinus. Thus we have these two statements placed side by side, one
of which gives the lie to the other, and therefore we may freely have
recourse to criticism, just as in the era of the kings. The events
which happened under the kings, inasmuch as they fall within larger
periods of time, could be extended or compressed; it is therefore
quite a natural illusion to consider as better authenticated the
subsequent times in which year by year is counted, and private persons
only appear as the actors. Yet the age of uncertainty reaches much
lower down. The poem, with which we have now to do, goes as far as the
battle at the Regillus; in the legend of Coriolanus there again begins
a distinct poem. In the Fasti there are the greatest discrepancies.
In the first thirty years, there are wanting in Livy three pairs of
consuls given by Dionysius. With regard to one of these, Livy seems
to have found a gap in the Fasti: those copies which have not these
gaps are interpolated. The two other pairs, Lartius and Herminius,
are nothing more than subordinate characters which are mentioned
along with the heroes. Men felt the necessity of enlarging the Fasti,
because they did not suffice for the number which had been calculated;
and so they forged consulships, not, however, laying hold of names at
pleasure, but taking them from extinct houses and from second-rate
heroes, and these they put in between the consulships of the Valerii,
in order to disguise the fact of their series being unbroken. We have
therefore free room for much conjecture upon other subjects also. Of
the Horatii, we know from Dionysius that they belonged to the _gentes
minores_, so that we have again one of the Luceres to supply the place
of Collatinus; it is therefore my conjecture that alternate pairs,
first one of the Ramnes and Tities, and then one of the Luceres and a
plebeian, were set to preside over the state. Yet we cannot investigate
this any further. Now if Valerius was not the colleague of Brutus,
all that is told of him falls to the ground. Valerius Poplicola, it
is stated, did not after the death of Brutus choose any successor at
first. He is said to have built a stone house on the Velia. The temple
of the Penates, falsely called the temple of Romulus, lies at the foot
of a steep hill, the Velia: on the top, where the temples of Venus
and of Roma and the arch of Titus stand, is _summa Velia_; the temple
of Romulus is _infima Velia_. The people, or rather, the sovereign
citizens, murmured at the building of that house of stone; on which
Valerius had it pulled down during the night, and summoning the people,
that is to say, the _concilium_ of the curies, made his appearance
accompanied by the lictors without the axes, and likewise had their
_fasces_ lowered before the _concio_. Hence the name _Poplicola_. Here
also the _populus_ is undoubtedly the patricians, the commonalty of the
old citizens, from whom the consular power was derived. Such an homage
before the plebeian commonalty would have been demagogical, and had
this been the case, he must have been called _Plebicola_. This fine
story cannot now be of any historical value for us; because according
to the documents we have, Valerius could not certainly have been the
only consul, tradition always mentioning Sp. Lucretius as his first
colleague. The reason why he did not at once fill up the consulship,
is said to have been his dread of the opposition of those who had
equal claims. Sp. Lucretius occurs in some Fasti in the third year as
consul instead of Horatius; but then there follows that unfortunate
accommodation by which, in order that the father of Lucretia might not
be passed over, his consulship is transferred from the third year into
the first.
The Valerian laws are genuine; and it is on the whole a settled fact
that the legislation of Servius was restored. The patricians, as Livy
says, tried to gain over the plebeians; and Sallust also tells us,
that as in the times immediately following the change the state had
been governed by just laws and fairly, so it had afterwards been quite
the reverse. The election of the consuls by the centuries is preserved
from the ritual books, and therefore it is not absolutely certain. That
the first law of the centuries was that Valerian one, by which to the
_Plebes_ was given the right of appeal to their commonalty, looks very
authentic, but is not so. Perhaps it may be that the first elections
were made by the Curies, as was unquestionably the case afterwards; yet
the explicit tradition that the original condition of the _Plebes_ was
far more favourable than the later one, pleads against it.
Tarquin is said in the story to have betaken himself to Cære, and
from thence to Tarquinii,--according to others, to Veii, to call
upon the Veientines for aid. The emigration to Cære is nothing else
but a personification of the “_jus Cæritum exulandi_,” this _jus
exulandi_ having always existed between Rome and those who were on
terms of isopolity. The _jus Cæritum_ is prominently mentioned in the
old law-books, the reason for which seems to have been the flight of
Tarquin. The version of the books is that he went to Cære; that of
poetry that he went to Veii, and led the Veientines against Rome. The
annalists finding both of these too mean, gave it out as most likely
that he might have bent his steps to Tarquinii, where forsooth he must
yet have had some relations. With regard to Cære, whither the royal
family is said to have gone, there is no mention whatever of its having
supported it in the war. Cicero, who had seen the genuine old Roman
history, knows nothing of the participation of the people of Tarquinii
in the Veientine war: he says in the Tusculan questions, that neither
the Veientines nor the Latins had been able to bring back Tarquin.
Purely mythical is the battle near the forest of Arsia, where Brutus
and Aruns fall fighting, and the god Sylvanus loudly shouts forth the
decision after 13,000 Etruscans, and one Roman less, had been stretched
dead on the field of battle. Now that cannot be any thing but poetry.
Lars, or Lar[87] Porsena is an heroic name, as Heracles among the
Greeks, Rustam among the Persians, Dietrich (Theodoric) of Berne, or
Etzel (Attila) in the German epic lay. The principal characters of the
heroic legends are blended with history, and their names are linked
to events which have really happened. The war of Porsena belonged to
those traditions which were most widely spread among the Romans, and
it is represented as the second attempt of the Tarquinii to recover
the throne: the Veientine war had not effected any thing, and after
the death of Brutus it is no more spoken of. Cicero surely looked upon
this war of Porsena in no other light than that of a Tuscan war of
conquest. And undoubtedly the Romans were at that time engaged in a
most destructive conflict with the Tuscans, in consequence of which
they sank as low as any people can sink. From republican vanity this
immediate result of an alteration in the constitution was thrown into
the shade:--the Gallic conquest was just as dishonestly covered over.
Of Porsena, the legend must have told a great deal. Thus a mausoleum
of his at Clusium is mentioned, which Pliny quite innocently describes
from Varro, who had it from Etruscan books. This account especially
shakes my belief in the trustworthiness of the old Etruscan books,
which to judge from this sample must have been tinged with an oriental
colouring. It is a marvellous work, such as never has existed, and
never could have existed,--like a fairy palace in the Arabian Nights.
Pyramids stand in a circle, and are connected at the top by a brazen
ring on which, of course in the intervals, other pyramids of huge base
are standing; and so on in several stories, a pyramid of pyramids,
which indeed could not have stood firm, but must needs have fallen
to the ground, furnished too with bells, and other things of the
same kind. It is inconceivable how Varro, and above all, how such a
practical man as Pliny could have believed in day dreams like these:
even a child may see that this is not possible. The impossibility is
yet more confirmed by the fact that neither of them beheld any more
traces of such a work, of which the ruins must have existed even to
this day, as in Babylon those of the temple of Belus. Quatremere de
Quincy has had the unfortunate idea of trying to restore this edifice
in an architectural elevation. There may have been a historical Porsena
who was made mythical, like our Siegfried, who was placed in quite a
different time from the true one; or _vice versa_ there was a mythical
Porsena who was brought into history. We may safely deny the historical
character of all that is told concerning this war: it has a thoroughly
poetical appearance. How much this was the case, becomes evident when
we view the tale in its simple form, stripped of the additions taken
from the annalists. It is peculiar to all these poems, that they do not
at all tally with other historical data.
According to the general tradition, the Etruscans are suddenly seen
on the Janiculum, and the Romans flee across the river. The poem does
not even speak of the conquest of the Janiculum; but the Etruscan
army appears at once on the banks of the Tiber, ready to pass the
_pons Sublicius_. Here three Roman heroes stand against them;
Horatius Cocles, Sp. Lartius and T. Herminius,--in all likelihood a
personification of the three tribes. These resist whilst the Romans
are breaking down the bridge; then two of the heroes, Lartius and
Herminius, go away, and the first, one of the Ramnes, alone withstands
the enemy. On this the story is told, how the Etruscans cross the
river, and the consuls enticed them into an ambush on the Gabinian
road. This tale is entirely borrowed from the Veientine war of 275, in
which the self-same thing happens. The annalists transferred it because
it did not seem to them satisfactory that the poem should not have
known any thing of the war beyond the defence of the bridge. The whole
account in Livy has a ridiculous exactness; the characters are the
ever recurring Valerius, Lartius, and Herminius. But we find Porsena
on the Janiculum; how then is it possible that Rome could have been
visited by a famine such as must be presupposed for the story of Mucius
Scævola, if the Etruscans lay only on that hill? The plunderers on that
side of the stream could easily be kept at bay. In Livy nothing more
is mentioned but that Porsena carries on the war alone; in Dionysius
he makes his appearance leagued with the Latins under Octavius
Mamilius,--evidently a device to account for Rome’s being beleaguered
and suffering from famine. Of the hostility of the Latins there is
no question at all until their grand war. In fact the Etruscans had
not occupied the Janiculum only; that the famine was raging, is
acknowledged by the Romans. In this distress, the poem makes Mucius
Scævola undertake to kill the king; but he stabbed instead of him his
secretary, as the latter was clothed in purple, a mistake which indeed
is inconceivable in real history, and only pardonable in poetry. He
then tells him that three hundred patrician youths (one of each gens)
were like himself resolved to slay him; whereupon Porsena concludes
peace, keeping the seven Veientine _pagi_, and leaving a garrison on
the Janiculum.
If we enquire into the details, whether a Mucius Scævola had existed at
all, we come to the question which Beaufort before now has correctly
stated; for on the whole this war of Porsena and the time of Camillus
are beautifully handled by him, and they seem to have been the chief
occasion, as well as the pith and substance, of his work. How is it
that Mucius is called in Livy and Dionysius a patrician, or _juvenis
nobilis_, when on the contrary the Scævolæ were plebeians? Probably
the family of the Mucii Scævolæ appropriated to themselves this
Mucius: in the old poems he was certainly called Caius. As late as in
the seventh century two names are mentioned, and afterwards Scævola
(the left-handed one); whereas the family of the Scævolæ had got this
cognomen from quite a different circumstance. Scævola in the latter
instance means an amulet. It is impossible to make out how much or how
little is true concerning the existence of the old Scævola. The story
as we have it is evidently poetical.
Beaufort has really struck a new light, by showing that the peace
of Porsena was quite a different thing from what the Romans would
have us believe. Pliny states explicitly, that by it the Romans
were bound to make no use of iron, except for agriculture. That
hostages were given is acknowledged even in the common account.
Thus we see Rome in a condition of utter subjection, _arma ademta,
obsides dati_, an expression which so often occurs with reference
to the conquest of states. Pliny has seen that treaty (_nominatim
comprehensum invenimus_); where, is uncertain,--a tablet probably did
not exist,--perhaps in Etruscan books. Just as positively does Tacitus,
in his account of the burning of the Capitol, speak of the Romans
having been most deeply humbled by Porsena, _sede Jovis optimi maximi
quam non Porsena dedita urbi neque Galli captor, temerare potuissent_;
and what _deditionem facere_ means is evident from the form which Livy
gives us when mentioning the submission of Collatia to Ancus Martius,
from which we see that it was a complete making over of people, state,
land and persons, similar to the _mancipatio_, or to the _in manum
conventio_ of women in the civil law. To this submission the notice in
the _Quæstiones Romanæ_ of Plutarch is to be referred, who was wont to
make a very uncritical use of good materials. He says that the Romans
had once paid tithes to the Etruscans, and that Hercules had freed
them from the obligation. Tithes, however, were paid by those who had
the usufruct of a field belonging to the state (_qui publici juris
factus erat_). The removal of the burthen by Hercules denotes their
having freed themselves by their own might: that they paid the tithes
was the consequence of their having given themselves and theirs into
the keeping of the Etruscans, which is the excellent German expression
for complete submission (_feuda oblata_); a man makes himself, as it
were, a minor, and becomes dependent upon another. A further, and much
more important proof of the misfortunes of that time, is the loss of
about one-third of the Roman territory; which is shown by the number of
Servius Tullius’ tribes being reduced from thirty to twenty, to which
afterwards, in the year 259, the _tribus Crustumina_ was added as the
twenty-first.[88] Among the Romans the custom was quite a common one,
when a state fell beneath their sway, _multandi tertiâ parte agri_: it
is therefore evident also in this instance, as tribes and districts
correspond with each other, and we find besides only twenty tribes out
of thirty left, that Rome in consequence of the _deditio_ about the
year 260 had lost a third of its territory. There are traces of it in
the _septem pagi agri Vejentium_, the surrender of which is already
mentioned. In order to conceal the conquest of the city, Porsena was
made the protector of the Tarquins; whereby this advantage was gained,
that it appeared as if the war had not ended after all so badly, since
its main object, the restoration of the Tarquins, had not been attained.
It is now stated besides that Porsena, after his return, had sent his
son Aruns with part of the army to Aricia, in order--as Livy says in
one of those passages in which he intentionally shuts his eyes to
the truth--to show, that his expedition had not been indeed quite
fruitless. Yet the expedition of Porsena against Aricia seems really
to have failed owing to the assistance of Cuma; for Cuman traditions
also spoke of it. Aricia was a very strong place. The Romans are said
to have now behaved generously to the flying Etruscans; and Porsena
being moved by it became their friend, abandoned the Tarquins and gave
back the seven Veientine pagi. After this Porsena is no more mentioned.
Here it is obvious that a poetical fiction has been awkwardly thrust
in. It was even at a very late period the custom at Rome, that before
every sale by auction the goods of king Porsena were symbolically
sold. Livy seems to have good sense enough to see that this does not
tally with the account of Porsena and Rome, having parted friends in
arms (δορύξενοι). The whole becomes quite clear if we assume that on
the defeat of the Etruscans before Aricia, the Romans made an effort
and freed themselves. By this the legend of Clœlia also has its right
meaning; as otherwise her flight together with the rest of the hostages
would have only been injurious. Connected with the great migration
of the Etruscans is the account that Tyrrhenians from the Adriatic,
together with Opicans and other people, had made their appearance
before Cuma; concerning which there is in the common chronology a
mistake of at least 15 to 20 years. The Tyrrhenians here are not the
Etruscans, but the old inhabitants of the country; perhaps those of
Picenum, who were pushed on by the advance of the Etruscans and threw
themselves upon Cuma. The conclusion come to is this. The Romans
carried on an unequal war against the Etruscans and their king Porsena,
in consequence of which they submitted themselves to him as their
master, lost one-third of their territory, and paid tithes of the rest.
The Etruscan power broke down before Aricia, whereupon the Romans took
courage and once more became free, yet without recovering that part of
their territory which lay beyond the Tiber; for, long afterwards, even
as late as the days of the decemvirate, the Tiber was their boundary
line, except that the Janiculum probably was Roman, as is evident
from the regulation concerning the sale of the slaves for debt _trans
Tiberim_. Now it is a question of great importance, whether the war of
Porsena is to be dated about the year in which it is generally placed;
or else one or two years after the consecration of the Capitol; or
from a later period. Livy and Dionysius contradict themselves in this
respect, and are completely at variance with every one else. It is
easy to see that the poem was interpolated by the annalists; since the
oldest annals do not mention it at all. In the same way, the poem of
the Nibelungen cannot be chronologically placed any where, and Johannes
Müller had to proceed very arbitrarily before he could fix upon any
chronological position for it. Such poems have nothing to do with
chronology. Valerius Poplicola is named in the battle at the Regillus,
and this gave occasion to assign this place to the legend. It is more
likely from other statements that the war happened ten years later than
is generally taken for granted, shortly before the hostilities against
the plebs began. This I conclude from the accounts of the numbering
of the people; for, I do not wholly reject them, though at the same
time I am far from maintaining that in their present form they are
authentic:--they are certainly a representation of the increase and
decrease of the numbers of the Roman citizens. He, who is the first
author of that statement, even if it should not be very ancient, had
formed a notion of Roman history, according to which in the times
mentioned the number of the citizens rose from 110,000 to 150,000, and
again fell to 110,000. If this increase or decrease had harmonized with
the history in the annals, it might have been said that some fabulist
had set forth his own views in these statistics. Yet such a man
would from vanity never have spoken of a decrease of numbers; on the
contrary, just in the times when in the census the numbers decrease,
there are in the annals victories and acquisitions. I believe therefore
that some account, older than the annals, was intended to show in a
statistical outline, how Rome and Latium were by unequal wars reduced
in population. That the numbers are correct, cannot be avouched; at all
events the statement independent of the annals. I therefore ascribe
the notice that Rome between the battle at the Regillus and the rising
of the Plebes, and for a long time afterwards, was bereft of one-third
of its inhabitants, to the fact that at that very period the war of
Porsena took place, and the loss of territory occasioned by it. The
decrease of population all but tallies with the diminution of the
territory by one-third; and it does not quite agree, perhaps for the
sole reason that the numbering included the plebeians only and not the
patricians, perhaps also because part of the inhabitants of the lost
districts emigrated and settled in Rome.
In the Roman history the same events very often recur again. As after
the Gallic conquest, the Latins and their allies separated from Rome;
thus also after the Etruscan calamity they broke the alliance which had
been brought about in the reign of Tarquin. The confederation of the
two states, which we find in the days of Servius Tullius, had under
Tarquin been changed into a union, which notwithstanding the obscurity
of all the details, is evident from the combination of the Roman and
Latin centuries into maniples. This combination is the more certain as
Livy mentions it in two different places, in his account of Tarquin the
Proud, and in the eighth book, wherein he describes the battle-array.
The sources from which he drew contained authorities quite independent
of each other, which he gives without understanding them; yet in such a
manner that we may gather from them the real views of the annalists. He
surely wrote the second passage without the least recollection of the
first. The relation in which the parties stood may have been this, that
Rome had the chief command, and the Latins received their share in the
booty; or the two people may have held the _imperium_ by turns. But in
the treaty with Carthage we see the supremacy vested in Rome, and the
Latins in the position of periœcians. The war, the only reminiscences
of which are an historical one, the conquest of Crustumeria, and a
poetical one, the battle at the Regillus, has this consequence that the
Latins pass from the condition of periœcians to that of inhabitants of
rural districts with equal rights: as in Gröningen the districts at
last were placed on the same footing with the town, and formed only one
province with it with regard to the foreigner. As the first cause of
the war Tarquin and his house are named. That he was not unconnected
with it, may easily be believed, as his alliance by marriage with
Mamilius Octavius of Tusculum has the appearance of history; but we
can by no means receive the battle at the lake Regillus as it is told.
It does not enter into my thoughts to deny that the Romans tried to
restore their rule by war; but it is altogether a different question,
whether at the Regillus a great battle was fought under the command
of the Dictator Postumius, in which the Latins were conquered and
reduced to their former position. No, if we may reason from effects to
causes, which is not as infallible in moral as in physical problems,
the Latins were by no means defeated; for, they attained, although
after a considerable time only, their object,--a completely free
alliance with Rome. One might draw the opposite conclusion from the
fact that Postumius, who is said to have been dictator or consul,
was called Regillensis; but the Claudii are also surnamed Regillani.
Cognomens borrowed from places are quite common among the patricians,
as e. g. the Sergii are called Fidenatus; Regillensis was likewise
derived from the town Regillus; and surnames of this kind are even
taken from quarters of Rome, as Esquilinus, Aventinus, and others. Such
_gentes_ stood to these places somewhat in the relation of patrons. The
appellation from victories occurs only very late: the greatest generals
prior to Scipio Africanus have received no surnames from the places
where they gained their victories, as Livy himself remarks at the
conclusion of his thirtieth book.
That the Romans looked upon the battle as a complete victory is proved
by the legend of the Dioscuri. At the Regillus, where the whole
adjacent country consists of volcanic tufa, there was shown in a stone
the impression of a horse’s hoof (as on the Rosstrappe in the Hartz
mountains), which was said to have been the foot print of a gigantic
horse of the Dioscuri,--a legend which even to Cicero’s times was in
the mouths of the people. After the battle they likewise made their
appearance still covered with dust and blood on the comitium; announced
the victory to the people; watered their horses at the well, and
vanished away. In every account which we have of this battle, there
is already the attempt to make it appear as history; nevertheless we
perceive that the poem distinctly shines through. In the description
of the fight there is much harmony between Livy and Dionysius, which
we seldom find elsewhere: in the latter, it is more in the form of
a bulletin; in Livy’s lively narrative it has quite the appearance
of a combat of heroes in Homer; the masses are entirely kept in the
background. The peace had been renounced already a year before, in
order that the many ties of friendship might be as gently severed as
possible, and the foreign wives be enabled to go home; Tarquin had
betaken himself to his son-in-law Mamilius Octavius; and all the Latins
were excited to hostility. The dictator leads the Romans against a
far superior force; Tarquin himself with his sons is in the enemy’s
host. In the fray all the chiefs encounter. The Roman dictator meets
Tarquin who leaves the field badly wounded; the Magister Equitum fights
Mamilius. T. Herminius and the legate M. Valerius fall; and P. Valerius
also, who endeavours to rescue the dead body. At last the Roman knights
gain the victory by alighting from their horses and fighting on foot.
The consul had offered a reward for the taking of the enemy’s camp by
storm; this was done forthwith at the first assault, in which the two
gigantic youths distinguished themselves.
With regard to M. and P. Valerius the ancients are in great perplexity;
for, Marcus soon afterwards appears again as dictator, and Publius was
already dead before it happened. Both of them are stated to have been
sons of Poplicola; yet this also is awkward, since a P. Valerius occurs
as his son once more in the Fasti. The poem takes no heed of Fasti and
annals, and the sons of Poplicola are not to be thought of: they are
the old heroes Maximus and Poplicola, who fight here, and meet with
their death. The tradition also certainly related that Tarquin and his
sons fell:--the reason why he was said to have been wounded only, is
that men had read in the annals, that he had died at Cuma. And surely
the dictator Postumius is likewise a mere interpolation; in the poem it
was Sp. Lartius, who could not have been left out, or M. Valerius. The
reward offered by the dictator refers to the legend of the Dioscuri,
as in the war against the Lucanians under Fabricius, in which a youth
brought the ladder and was no more seen afterwards, when the mural
crown had been awarded to him.
With this battle ends the lay of the Tarquins, as that of the
Nibelungen does with the doom of all the heroes. The old era is
concluded by it, and a new one is ushered in. There is no fixed date
for the battle: some assume 255, others 258; some make Postumius a
consul, others a dictator, and this is the very proof that the account
is not historical; if it were so, the Fasti must in any case have
marked such an event with some exactness. It is credible that in
259 the peace with the Latins was restored; if this notice be taken
literally, the victory at the Regillus is confirmed by it. We may well
believe that the Latins had been beaten at the Regillus, and had been
obliged to content themselves with the position which Tarquin had
assigned them, but that the senate had afterwards from other reasons
restored to them the constitution of Servius Tullius. However this
may be, there was peace already between the Romans and the Latins
before the secession of the Plebes. For years after the battle at
the Regillus, Livy has nothing to tell of the Latins; whilst, on the
other hand, Dionysius gives various accounts of exchanges, armistices,
&c., which, however, are invented at pleasure, until the first decree
of the people that their prisoners should be restored to them; yet
we know nothing of the whole affair, except that under Sp. Cassius
Rome concluded a treaty with the Latins by which isopolity, or _jus
municipii_, was granted them. The meaning of the term isopolity
changes in the course of ages, but in ancient times its nature was as
follows. There existed between Romans and Latins, and between Romans
and Cærites, this right, that whosoever wanted to emigrate into the
other state, might at once claim the privileges of citizenship therein.
This was called ἰσοπολιτεία, an expression which is first met with in
the days of Philip, when it became desirable to combine into larger
states. Even before the war, there were already definite relations
between Rome and Latium, which included _connubium_ and _commercium_:
the citizens of the one state enjoyed in the other the full right of
acquiring Quiritary property, and of carrying on in their own name,
without a patron, all their business and lawsuits. They were full
citizens, with the exception only of political rights. This might
co-exist with equality as well as with supremacy; the change now was,
that Rome acknowledged Latium as endowed with equal rights to her own.
The Hernicans also soon entered into this relation, so that the three
states formed one whole with regard to the foreigner. After the Gallic
war this union was broken. The league made by Sp. Cassius in 261 is not
to be looked upon as a treaty of peace, but as the beginning of a state
of mutual rights. It is incomprehensible how this compact of 261 could
have been so misunderstood, as it was even already by the ancients when
occasionally mentioning it. Dionysius gives this alliance in words
betokening an authenticity which we cannot doubt. He had not himself
seen the tablets on the Rostra any more; for, Cicero in his Oration for
Balbus speaks of having seen them, as of a thing which he recollects.
Yet many Roman writers, Macer and others, must have known them:
Cincius, who lived a hundred years earlier, knew them very well. Having
the Swiss confederation in mind, we may call that league an everlasting
one: it was to stand as long as heaven and earth should abide. But
before thirty years were ended, it had become obsolete owing to the
force of circumstances, and afterwards it was revived for a short time
only. It stipulated perfect equality between Romans and Latins, so that
they should alternately hold the chief command of the army; the party
in distress was to call in the other, and the latter was to give it
every support in its power; the booty was then to be divided.
Here we have the key of another political relation. About this time we
first behold the appearance of a dictator, which is properly a Latin
magistracy; for not only single towns, but also the whole of the Latin
people might have a dictator, as Cato informs us. It was natural that
the Romans likewise now elected a dictator who ruled alternately with
the Latin one, on which account the _imperium_ was granted for six
months only. Among the Tuscans the king of each town had a lictor. The
lictors of all the twelve towns, whenever they united, had to be in
attendance upon the common chief. Thus, of course, the twelve Latin
and the twelve Roman lictors were given to the common dictator: the
consuls together had had no more than twelve lictors, who waited upon
both by turns. A _magister populi_ also at Rome is now spoken of more
than once: whether he was from the beginning one and the same with the
dictator, or whether he was elected for Rome alone is uncertain. The
dictatorship had probably only reference to the league with Latium.
A consul might have been dictator without there necessarily being a
_magister populi_; yet if there was a _magister populi_, then must
a dictator likewise have been appointed for the foreigner, it being
contrary to usage that there should have been two names for the same
office. Very likely there was for some time a dictator every year, an
office which sometimes was conferred upon one of the consuls, and at
others upon some one specially chosen for it.
In the history which now follows, we find ourselves upon real
historical ground; we have distinct men, and distinct facts, although
now and then legends are still interpolated among the Fasti. That
errors have crept in, is merely the fate of all that is human; yet
we are to look upon this history as we would upon any other, and we
ought not to make it the subject of a silly display of scepticism. A
new war breaks out in which Cora and Pometia fall into the hands of
the Auruncians; they are afterwards said to have been retaken by the
Romans and Latins, which is highly problematical. This war occurs
twice in Livy; it has certainly happened, but whether in 251 or 258,
cannot matter much to us. Whenever in the annals of the Romans a
serious defeat was simply stated, their descendants found gratification
for their vanity in not leaving things as they were, but making the
calamity all right again by a bold lie. The most glaring, yet not the
only example of this in Roman history, is the deliverance of the city
by Camillus, the fictitiousness of which has been already shown by
Beaufort very ably. Polybius informs us, that the Gauls had retired
with their booty at the tidings of an inroad of the Venetians into
their country; yet it may have been, that in very early times indeed
an old Vates sang the tale in a poem on Camillus. In the Samnite
wars also, every defeat of consequence, which cannot be disguised,
is followed by a victory quite unconnected with any thing else; and
this is likewise the case in the wars with the Volscians and Æquians.
This is a common weakness of human nature, of which one has personal
experience in disastrous times. The Italians of the fifteenth century
wanted by every means to be genuine descendants of the ancient Romans,
and therefore Charlemagne is stated by Flavius Blondus to have driven
all the Lombards out of Italy. Thus, after the battle of Austerlitz,
a report was generally believed in Northern Germany, that the French
had indeed conquered in the early part of the day, but that in the
afternoon the most complete victory had been gained by the Austrians
and Russians. I have myself witnessed absurdities of the same kind in
1801 at Copenhagen. Greek history, even that of the middle ages, has
been remarkably free from such fabrications.--I now believe in the
invasion of the Auruncians: not only the thirty towns, the sanctuary
of which was the temple of Ferentina, but also the towns on the coast,
which had been Latin, and which, in the treaty with Carthage, are
acknowledged as subject to Rome, fell off from it, when it was bowed
beneath the Etruscan calamity. Antium therefore and Terracina, as
well as the towns properly Latin, likewise threw off Roman sway, and
expelled the _coloni_. There is no doubt but that Antium and Terracina
were afterwards Volscian, yet it is erroneous to suppose that they
were so originally;--they form no exception to the general Tyrrhenian
population on the coast. In an old Greek Ethnology, which was certainly
not an invention of Xenagoras, but derived from Italiote sources,
Antium is represented as being sprung from the same stock with Rome
and Ardea; Romus, Antias, and Ardeas are brothers. At a later period
only, Terracina acquires the Volscian name of Anxur. These places
became Volscian, either by conquest, or by voluntarily receiving, while
in want of support, ἔποικοι of the Volscians; or also, because after
having fallen off from Rome, they were obliged to throw themselves into
their arms.
The Volscians are an Ausonian people, identical with Auruncians. They
are said to have come from Campania; yet we know of the Auruncians in
Campania that they were Ausonians: _Aurunici_ and _Ausonici_ are the
same. Cora and Pometia, Latin colonies, are stated to have gone over
to them. They must in that case have driven out the Latin colonists,
or it was simply a conquest. This is a point which we cannot decide.
But certain it is that the Auruncians were in possession of Cora and
Pometia, and advanced as far as into Latium; perhaps they may have been
defeated there by the Romans.