to have been instituted. There must have been therefore a common
motive for both, which Livy does not see: and the circumstance that
the first censors are not found as consuls either in the Fasti or in
the _libri magistratum_, but only in one of the _libri lintei_, may
be accounted for by supposing that the censors were already elected
in conformity with the laws of the twelve tables; and that when the
patricians by their violent commotions were carrying every thing with
a high hand, these magistrates who were neither consuls nor military
tribunes,--a fact of which we have only a trace,--acted as consuls,
and thus concluded the peace with the Ardeates. Livy could not explain
this to himself, nor could Macer have done it. Strange indeed is what
Livy mentions, that the military tribunes had been obliged to abdicate
because of the _tabernaculum vitio captum_; and that T. Quinctius
as _Interrex_ (or rather, perhaps, as dictator) had chosen the two
consuls, L. Papirius Magillanus and L. Sempronius Atratinus, whose
names were not, however, recorded in the Fasti. Nevertheless he relates
the thing as certain. It is still more strange that in the following
year he says of these first censors, that in order to indemnify those
_quorum de consulatu dubitabatur, ut eo magistratu parum solidum
magistratum explerent_, they had been elected censors; as if in 312
there could have been any doubt as to what had happened in 311. In
the very same way, Livy in the second Punic war mistakes a certain
Heraclitus for the philosopher of that name.
As to the nature of these military tribunes, their magistracy is for
us a subject of considerable obscurity.[108] Livy says of them, _eos
juribus et insignibus consularibus usos esse_, and they are also
called _tribuni militares consulari potestate_; but Dio Cassius, that
acute observer, who himself had sat in the curule chair, says that
the military tribunes were inferior to the consuls, and that not one
of them had ever been granted a triumph, though many had performed
deeds which were worthy of it. This is in perfect accordance with
history. We also find that a consul was never appointed _Magister
Equitum_, but that the military tribunes certainly were. From this it
seems to be evident that the military tribunes were no _magistratus
curules_, that is to say, none of those magistrates, as Gellius
explains it, who were allowed to make use of a carriage (thus we have
_Juno Curulis_, whose image was carried on a car). The consuls drove
in carriages to the _Curia_; the full triumph was termed _triumphus
curulis_, according to the Monumentum Ancyranum on which the number
of the _triumphi curules_ of Augustus is given; different from this
is the _Ovatio_.[109]--Moreover, the military tribunes never had
any jurisdiction; but originally the censors, and afterwards the
_Præfectus Urbi_ had one, the latter probably holding likewise the
presidency in the senate. This magistracy also had been abolished by
the decemviral legislation; but it now again makes its appearance. The
consular power was weakened in this manner, and so it was afterwards
by the Licinian law; for when at that time the consulship was divided
between patricians and plebeians, the prætorship was separated from
it, and established as a distinct magistracy. We may understand how it
was, that the plebeians preferred the election of military tribunes,
even when they were not taken from their own order: their power was
at all events less. According to Livy’s account, it was the senate
which decided in every instance, whether consuls or military tribunes
were to be elected: it is more probable that it was the curies which
determined it. The mistake may have been occasioned by the ambiguous
word _patres_. The military tribunate is also of a wonderfully variable
character. Sometimes, but seldom, we find three tribunes; more
frequently, four; but from 347 or 348, regularly whenever they occur,
six; once, as many as eight, among whom, however, the two censors are
included. Of the four, one is generally _Præfectus Urbi_: so that in
reality there are after all only three. The claim of the plebeians to
be chosen among the military tribunes is never disputed; but after the
first election it is almost always eluded. How this could be done is
inconceivable; Livy’s explanation of it is silly. On the one hand, it
is quite possible that a compromise was made, and that the patricians
said, we consent to the weaker magistracy’s being established, but
then it must be filled up from our ranks only; or else in the earlier
times the preceding magistrate had the right of not accepting any votes
(_nomina non accipere_) in favour of those who from different reasons
were to be rejected; or again, if six military tribunes were elected,
the curies afterwards gave the _imperium_ to the patricians only, and
denied it to the plebeians. Yet it is incomprehensible in this last
case how the plebeians could have allowed it. Unfortunately Dionysius
fails us here, who, though he did not himself understand these
relations, nevertheless faithfully recorded the facts as he found them:
if we had him, the whole of this period would undoubtedly be clearer to
us. After the last change, when six military tribunes always occur, we
several times find the plebeians in a majority among them; and it is
evident that it was then a settled rule that the number of six should
always be full, and that without any further distinction between the
two orders. This looks very much as if in the change the election had
been transferred from the centuries to the tribes. It now depended only
upon the honesty of the president whether he received the votes or not.
That policy by which Italy became great in the fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries, that wretched ideal of states-craft, is now displayed in the
Roman history, especially in the division in the college of tribunes.
This is one of the causes, which for some time checked the progress of
Rome.
Times in which successful wars are carried on, as was now the case with
Rome until the Gallic invasion, are exceedingly apt to lead subjects
to acquiesce in what they otherwise would never have borne with. The
name of the state was surrounded with a halo of glory; a great deal
of booty was gained, and also many conquests; plebeians as well as
patricians felt comfortable; and although the power was not much liked,
matters were yet allowed to go on as they were. Rome recovered from
the decline into which she had fallen since the _Regifugium_. Moreover
the intermarriage allowed between the two orders, must have exercised
a powerful influence: the families on both sides became more closely
related; the patrician who, born of a plebeian mother, was in the
senate, stood on an equal footing with the plebeians.
A greater, a lasting magistracy, and according to all appearance the
first, the lustre of which far outshone that of the military tribunes,
was the censorship. If we admit that it was instituted by the twelve
tables, we can understand why Cicero also made the censors the first
magistrates. He may have copied this from the laws of the twelve
tables; only he must have left out something, as there they had yet a
greater number of attributes. The consuls are said to have formerly
had the functions of the censors; which is very probable from the
almost kingly power of the consuls, and it is only to be wondered how
they could have got through this immense amount of work. The Greek
states also had τιμηταί, Athens alone excepted, and the Siceliote and
Italiote towns had them as well; yet nowhere in Greece was their power
so extensive as at Rome. According to the Roman law, the censors had
to value and assess; accurate lists were kept of properties, of births
and deaths, of newly admitted citizens. Yet we are to distinguish
between two kinds of lists. The one was of persons, and was arranged
according to names; Q. Mucius, for instance, with all his family and
rateable property, stood under his name among the _Tribus Romilia_: his
sons wearing the _toga virilis_ may perhaps have had each a distinct
_caput_. The other list was topographical; in it the landed estates
were registered according to the districts, for instance, the _Tribus
Romilia_ in all its divisions. The ancients wrote on the whole much
more than is generally imagined; this was done with a prolixity which
was part of the forms of the state. In London, I saw a register of
lands belonging to an Indian province,--in the translation, of course,
as I do not understand a word of the Indian language,--which had a
copiousness of detail of which we can scarcely form an idea. And it
was the same among the ancients: the registers of mortgages at Athens
were very prolix; and so, even in later ages, were the contracts
before the curies at Rome. In the registers of the Roman censors,
the division of the hides was very accurately marked down; under the
_caput_ of every individual, his descent, tribe, station, property,
&c. were entered. Now the censors had also the power of transferring
people from one class to the other, as an honour or a disgrace; yet
what were the qualities for which they pronounced the _ignominia_, as
it is termed? Every one in Rome was to correspond to the definition
of his station; a plebeian was necessarily an agriculturist, either a
land-owner or a free day labourer. This rule was laid down positively;
and still more strictly in its negative bearing, as no one who
carried on a trade or business could be a plebeian. Whoever did so,
was forthwith struck out of the list of the tribe; consequently this
was not so much a personal _ignominia_, as a declaration that he
had passed from one side to the other. But he who badly cultivated
his field was likewise put out of the tribe, that is to say, he was
declared to be _de facto_ no husbandman; and so was the _eques_ who
kept his horse badly: this is the _notatio censoria_. Such a person
was placed among the burghers of the pale (_ærarii_), because he was
not worthy of holding his property. The ærarian, on the other hand,
who distinguished himself, who acquired landed property, was placed as
a mark of honour among the plebeians; the plebeian who distinguished
himself, was transferred into the centuries of the plebeian knights.
Foreigners, however, they could certainly not make citizens: for this
there were fixed rules, or else the popular assembly conferred the
right of citizenship by means of an extraordinary act. In a state, the
changeable elements of which were widely different,--where the _Plebes_
was not an exclusive order, but was allowed to recruit itself; and
where there existed among its ranks an aristocratic order of honour,
that of the knights, which was not bound to the census; there must be
some authority which assigns to every individual his station: for such
an order of honour cannot be exclusive and unchangeable, owing to its
very nature as an order of honour. One might say, that the decision
about it ought to have been left to the people; yet this was not only a
circuitous, but also a preposterous arrangement, as in all probability
the censors,--who were chosen from the most distinguished persons, and
who held their office under the fullest responsibility, whilst moreover
one colleague might even impugn the acts of the other,--would be much
fairer than the whole people, had it been called upon to make the
selection. The senate also needed a careful supervision to fill up its
vacancies, and to secure its respectability. It was indeed originally
an assembly of the clans, every one of which had its representative
senator; but when the clans began to dwindle away, there were taken
from the whole order three hundred,--an hundred from each tribe; so
that in consequence of the extinction of the clans, one clan might
often number several votes, and another become altogether weak or
degenerate. Afterwards the _lex Ovinia Tribunicia_[110] was passed,
in which it is enacted that from the whole order, without regard to
the _gentes_, the most worthy should be chosen. If it dates from
the first times of the censorship, it proves that in those days the
senate still consisted only of patricians, and that from all the three
tribes the most worthy were taken. The statement that by Brutus, or
Valerius Poplicola, plebeians had, under the name of _conscripti_,
been already introduced into the senate, is either a fable, or it
must be considered as quite a temporary arrangement. About the time
of the migration of the commonalty, and likewise at the actual period
itself, not a single plebeian could have been in the senate: towards
the middle of the fourth century we can trace it for the first time.
The senate now became a number of men chosen by the people, inasmuch as
the magistrates were granted the privilege of voting in the senate, and
the right of being elected into it on the publication of the new list;
a right which also extended to the quæstors. Now, when in the year 346
the quæstorship was thrown open to both orders, I see in this the first
occasion on which plebeians were admitted into the senate; and as from
henceforth eight quæstors were appointed every year, the arbitrary
sway of the censors must have been entirely put an end to. They might
indeed exclude the plebeians; but as the senate consisted of no more
than three hundred, and the censors, at the end of every _lustrum_,
always saw forty men before them who had a claim to be elected into the
senate, it is manifest that the senate could soon have become rather a
plebeian than a patrician assembly. The power of the censors therefore
declined in the course of time, like that of all the magistrates,
with the exception of the tribunes: at first, only a censor could
check the resolutions of his colleague; afterwards, the tribunes also
took upon themselves to interfere with the determinations of the
censors. It was formerly thought impossible that the censors should
have had such a power as was granted them by the Lex Ovinia, or it was
deemed detestable; yet they really had in the beginning an immense
discretionary power. But, as in after times it was no more the two
orders exclusively, but government and people who stood opposed against
each other, the people set limits to the government, and the censors
were also deprived of their arbitrary sway. To the patricians the
censorial power had no reference; nor, with the then existing notions
of the auspices, could any body become a patrician by adoption, though
indeed this was done in after times.
Here the question now arises, were the censors authorized to exercise
their power also with regard to morals? were they allowed to strike
a bad man from the lists with a _nota censoria_? This I formerly
denied, except it were perhaps in cases of downright infamy; yet in
the newly discovered _excerpta_ from Dionysius of Halicarnassus, a
passage was found, which undeniably speaks of the right of the censor
to take cognisance of any moral turpitude which could not be reached
by the law; as for instance, heartlessness to parents, wives, or
children, harshness towards slaves or neighbours. In fact, Dionysius
in his time no more knew the censorship in its ancient state; yet he
certainly gives us reason to believe that when he describes it, he
rather sets before us the censorship of bygone times, than that of
his own, which was generally known. It is therefore probable that the
power of the censor had this great extent, the limits of which are
still to be traced from the existing materials. The censorship of
Gellius and Lentulus in Cicero’s days, was somewhat irregular.[111]
Whether at that period already some tribes were _minus honestæ_, and
others _honestiores_, cannot be decided. That afterwards the _tribus
urbanæ_, particularly the _Esquilina_, were looked down upon, while the
_Crustumina_ stood high, is certain; yet it would be silly to suppose
that this was also the case in the earlier ages.
The censors were at first elected for five years (a _lustrum_);
and thus, in the true spirit of its system, it seems to have been
the object of the decemviral legislation with regard to all the
magistrates, to apply cooling remedies against the political fever, as
elections always excite the passions most. Whether Mam. Æmilius really
limited the censorial power to eighteen months, and was therefore
branded by his successor with the _ignominia_; or whether this is an
account contained in the books of the censors, which refers an existing
law to one particular person, cannot be decided: certain it is, that
such books of the censors existed.
In the year 315, a famine and terrible scarcity broke out in Rome. Many
Romans drowned themselves in the Tiber not to perish by hunger. On the
whole, the price of corn in those times was endlessly fluctuating,
just as in the middle ages; which gave rise to forestalling and
regrating, especially as in Italy grain may be kept for such a long
time under ground. The distress came quite unexpectedly, and therefore
a _præfectura annonæ_ was established, which seems to have been a
temporary magistracy. L. Minucius Augurinus was invested with this
office. He did all he could to bring down the prices; he ordered the
existing stores to be thrown open for sale at a compulsory rate, and
had purchases made among the neighbouring people; yet his purveyances
not only went on too slowly, but also the means which he employed
did not answer: real help was only afforded by a rich plebeian
knight, Sp. Mælius. This man had great quantities of grain bought
up on his own account in Etruria and the country of the Volscians,
and distributed it all among the poor. Any one who had done so much
good, might in the ancient republics easily be suspected of having
been actuated by questionable motives. Mælius therefore was charged
with having attempted to gain over the people, that by their aid he
might establish a tyranny. Minucius is said to have reported to the
senate that many plebeians assembled in Mælius’ house, and that arms
were conveyed thither. No one can now presume to decide whether this
charge was well founded or not; at all events, such a conspiracy would
have been madness in a man who was distinguished for nothing but his
wealth, and who must have had the tribunes against him as well as the
patricians. However this may be, he was looked upon as the head of a
party; and in order to crush him, the senate and the curies appointed
L. Quinctius Cincinnatus as dictator, who took Servilius Ahala for his
master of horse. Cincinnatus, having occupied during the night the
Capitol and the other strongholds, on the following morning set up
his curule throne in the Forum, and summoned Mælius by Ahala before
his tribunal. Mælius foresaw his fate: as no tribune could protect
him against the dictator, he refused to appear, and mingled with the
crowd of the plebeians. Then Servilius Ahala seized hold of him and
stabbed him. This act is much admired by the ancients; but its merit
is very problematical, as it may have been mere murder. The _Præfectus
Annonæ_, according to a very plausible account, is said to have
separated himself from the _Patres_, gone over to the _Plebes_, and
to have been appointed as the eleventh tribune; and then within a few
weeks to have entirely succeeded in bringing down the prices; which is
a proof that the distress was rather an artificial one. The corn from
the magazines of Sp. Mælius was confiscated, and distributed among the
people. Servilius Ahala, as we are told by Cicero, was impeached by
the _Plebes_ as a murderer, and withdrew into exile: whether he was
recalled afterwards, is unknown to us. This gives the whole affair an
ugly look. Mælius’ house was pulled down; the Æquimælium, the place
where it had stood, was under the walls of the Capitol, and is now
entirely buried in the rubbish which forms a mound at the foot of the
hill. This is a point of some importance for the understanding of Roman
topography.[112]
When the Valerian laws, as we have seen before, so far limited the old
right of the consuls to enforce obedience, that any one sentenced by
them to receive corporal punishment might appeal to his community,
they were yet to be allowed a certain sphere of jurisdiction without
appeal: otherwise their authority would have been reduced to a mere
nothing. That power extended to fines, the fixing of which is also
ascribed to Valerius. Yet this is not likely, as there is too positive
an evidence in the law of the consuls Tarpeius and Aternius, passed by
the centuries, in which the _multa_ was estimated in heads of cattle,
as Cicero _de Republica_ expressly tells us. This would not have been
possible, if the Valerian law had already fixed the limitation; or
else the rulers must afterwards again have seized upon the absolute
authority. On the whole, all that is mentioned of the Valerii is not to
be trusted, as Valerius Antias, who reckoned himself of the Valerian
house, invented a good deal about it, and the Valerii moreover were
rather vain of their popularity. That law fixed two sheep and thirty
oxen as the highest _multa_, with regard to which Gellius makes a very
heedless statement; for he says that sheep were at that time so rare,
that two of them were estimated as equal to thirty beeves, though he
himself immediately afterwards informs us that a sheep was worth ten,
and an ox a hundred _asses_. The explanation of the fact is simply
this,--that the consuls were obliged to increase the amount of the fine
only by degrees, that the way might always be left open for a return
to obedience: he who did not make his appearance on the first day, was
mulcted of a sheep; on the following day, of two; then of an ox; and so
on. We know from Cicero of another circumstance besides, which proves
to us how little other accounts are to be relied on. Only twenty-five
years later, the value of these payments was fixed in money, and that
at a moderate estimation. Cicero justly looks upon this as denoting a
progress of individual liberty.
The number of the treasurers or masters of the exchequer, whose
election was indeed formerly made by the king or the curies, but
afterwards assigned by Poplicola to the centuries, was raised from
two to four, to be taken alike from patricians and plebeians. At first
the patricians still hinder the carrying out of this clause; but at a
later period the plebeians make good their right. This progress was not
a mere point of honour, but it was a reality; it was closely connected
with the dearest interests of the _Plebes_, as they now shared in the
administration of the common exchequer, which was no more _Publicum_
but _Ærarium_. By this means, as we have already remarked, the senate
was now opened to the plebeians also, and they could be degraded from
it by the power of the censors only.
A further advance to freedom was this, that about twenty years after
the legislation of the decemvirs, the right of declaring war and peace
passed from the curies to the centuries. That the curies originally
had this right, we know from Dionysius; yet as the plebeians alone
were bound to serve on foot, and the patricians withheld the booty
from them, it was natural that the tribunes should have claimed for
their order the right of deciding whether they would have war or not;
and consequently the veto of the tribunes to a declaration of war is
nothing else but a reservation of the rights of the _Plebes_. If the
centuries had carried the resolution, the curies were of course obliged
to confirm it; yet this was certainly not always the case, as the
proposal originated with the senate, and it is not at all likely that
the senate and the curies should not have agreed.
The existence of plebeian senators is now as clear as daylight, and it
is expressly stated that P. Licinius Calvus sat in the senate. Whenever
therefore an interrex was to be elected, it was no longer the _decem
primi_ who met together,--for, they had lost their importance by the
admission of the plebeians,--but all the patricians in the whole of
the senate. This is what is meant by _Patricii coeunt ad Interregem
prodendum_, and it might have been based even on the laws of the Twelve
Tables. One can quite understand that the ancients might have known
the laws of the Twelve Tables by heart, and yet not have perceived,
that something different was written in them from what was afterwards
the rule.
Thus then we have seen, how from the legislation of the decemvirs down
to the conquest of the city by the Gauls, the development of free
institutions at home steadily kept pace with the expansion of the state
abroad; and hence it is manifest that the two were necessarily linked
together.
The history of the Italian nations we know almost exclusively through
the Romans; and yet that history would in fact be the only means for
correctly understanding the foreign relations of Rome, as the account
of these is very often not only defective, but altered moreover in
a lying spirit. The decline of the state after the expulsion of the
kings may have partly arisen from the fermentations at home, and partly
from the quarrel with the Latins. Afterwards, however, the spread of
the Etruscans in the prime of their strength from the North, and at
the same time that of the Sabines and their colonies, exercise their
influence. The Romans call the latter Sabellians; for _Sabellus_ is
the general adjective-termination corresponding with _Sabinus_, like
_Hispanus_ and _Hispellus_, _Græcus_ and _Græculus_, _Pœnus_ and
_Pœnulus_, _Romus_ and _Romulus_; at a later period only the ending
in _-lus_ had a diminutive meaning given it. _Sabellus_ is quite
synonymous with Sabinus, except that according to usage, the name of
Sabellians is given to the whole nation, and that of Sabines to the
inhabitants of the small district. The spread of those nations was
therefore the chief cause of the decline of Rome; otherwise the wars
of Porsena would not have happened. If the Etruscans had spread in any
other direction, and had not the Sabellians, inasmuch as they were
pushed on themselves, been obliged to push on others, the Ausonian
people also, particularly the Æquians, would not have been driven, as
they were, to make conquests.
The period of the greatness of the Etruscans coincides with the middle
of the third century of the city, according to a statement bearing the
authority of Cato, that the Etruscan colony of Capua or Vulturnum was
founded about the year 260, which falls within the time of that war in
which the Romans were so hard pressed by the Veientines. At that time,
the Etruscans, who by the Greeks are called Tyrrhenians, were the most
formidable conquerors; yet a reverse came upon them when the people of
Cumæ with the help of Hiero, towards the close of the third century
(280), destroyed their naval power. The general fact only of that
change can be asserted with certainty; the details of it are, alas!
entirely lost to us; a considerable event in the world’s history here
lies buried in darkness. About the same period also, their power on the
banks of the Tiber is broken. On the other hand, the Sabines in the
last half of the third century are often seen as enemies of the Romans;
the earlier accounts of victories gained over them by Valerius are
utterly apocryphal. Whether they were dangerous to the Romans, we will
not decide here: yet undoubtedly wars took place with the Sabines, as
well as with all the other people of the neighbourhood, though all the
details about them are either fiction or poetry. Towards the end of the
third century, however, the history becomes clearer and clearer, and we
may discern the traces of the old annals. The last Sabine war is that
which Valerius and Horatius victoriously carried on in the first year
of the restoration of the consulship; it is told too circumstantially
to be credited in all its parts; but certain it is, that from that
time, for nearly a hundred and fifty years until Curius, the Sabines
waged no war with the Romans. There must have been some very particular
reason for this, and I find one in a treaty of which no other trace
whatever is left, and in which isopolity was established between the
two peoples: that isopolity existed between them, is attested by
Servius on Virgil. About the year 310, we find a notice that the
people of the Campanians was formed; that is to say, that at Vulturnum
or Capua, the Etruscans received Samnites as ἔποικοι among them, and
shared with them their territory. This is to us a proof of the advance
of the Sabines in those parts, as the Samnites are a Sabine people. The
Æquians and Volscians relax in their attacks on Rome; the Sabine wars
are at an end; consequently we behold the period when the emigration of
the Sabines towards the South leaves off, and the Ausonian mountaineers
no more push forward. The Etruscans now at once stand still, which is
natural in an oligarchically governed nation: when such a people has
once settled down to rest, there is no example of its ever having been
aroused again and gained fresh life. Thus we may link together all the
facts which are confusedly told by the Romans.
During the time from 306 to 323, wars had almost entirely ceased. The
account of the insurrection at Ardea in which the Romans had been
called in, has something in it so strange, that we cannot build any
thing upon it: it is nothing but a repetition of the story of the
enemy’s army being surrounded by Cincinnatus. In the year 323, the war
first breaks out again in good earnest. With regard to the Antiates,
we do not know whether they took any share in it; as to the Ecetrans,
we cannot doubt but that they did. The latter at that time joined
the Æquians on the Algidus. Between Velitræ (which was Volscian),
Tusculum, and the Alban Mount, the Roman armies, sent against them,
lost a battle. A. Postumius Tubertus was therefore appointed dictator.
This war is now described in a perfectly historical and accurate
manner. Whether there be any truth in the tradition that A. Postumius
heightened the power of his _imperium_ on the minds of those who were
under his command by his ruthless treatment of his own son, we may
leave undiscussed. The more general opinion is this, that Manlius
followed his example; From the phrase _imperia Manliana_ no conclusion
can be drawn; Livy’s argument against it is at all events worth
nothing. Postumius led thither all the forces of the republic and the
allies, he gave one army to the consul, and took the other himself:
the former was posted on the road to Lanuvium, the latter, on that
to Tusculum, below the point at which the two highways crossed each
other. The Volscians and Æquians occupied separate camps: to the one
the consul, to the other the dictator was opposed, the two hosts being,
however, very near each other. The enemy during the night attacked the
camp of the consul; in the meanwhile, the dictator, who was prepared
for this, sent a detachment to seize the almost abandoned camp of the
Volscians, and he himself led the greater part of his army to the
help of the consul, and fell upon the enemy’s rear. These last were
completely routed, all but one body, which cut its way through under
the lead of the brave Vettius Messius.
This battle is one of those which are of importance in the world’s
history. It broke the power of the Volscians of Ecetræ, and of the
Æquians; the slaughter must have been frightful. The Æquians sued
at once for peace, and were granted it for eight years; from that
time, they were no more to be dreaded. After this, the Romans spread
more and more; the places also which had been taken from them in the
former wars by the Volscians and Æquians, were now recovered. Of these
there are expressly mentioned, Lavici,[113] formerly one of the great
Latin towns, Bolæ or Bola; Velitræ, Circeii, Anxur, Ferentinum, which
had formerly been Hernican, and must now have been restored to the
Hernicans, as it is always again met with among their places. Thus the
Romans had advanced to the frontiers of Latium proper, even as far
as under the kings. Moreover, at that time also, Setia, Norba, Cora,
Signia, must have been retaken; and, as the Romans and Latins were now
no more on an equal footing, they must likewise have come under the
rule of the Romans alone. In the country of the Æquians, the Romans
advanced as far as the lake Fucinus. The subjugation of the Volscians
made it possible for them to carry on the terrible Veientine war. As
in consequence of these conquests many indigent persons were provided
for, Roman colonies were founded at Lavici and Velitræ, and restored at
Circeii: in the latter place it was perhaps a Latin colony.
After a long interval, the agrarian law begins again to give rise to
serious discussions in the year 345; before that, in the years between
30 and 40, it is once spoken of, but only slightly. The cause of this
silence during the preceding years is not sufficiently explained.
Some assignments of colonies indeed take place; but always in common
with the Latins and Hernicans, and without any consequences for
those who did not wish to give up their Roman home and their rights
as citizens. The times of contentedness and discontent in history
do not by any means correspond with the growth of political rights,
but rather indeed with the stages of general prosperity: when things
are decidedly flourishing, man enjoys life without troubling himself
much about the state of political affairs. In Germany there was such
a period just before the thirty years’ war; every kind of property
improved in value, and matters at home went on very quietly: this
was also the case in France under Henry IV. Such on the whole was
then the condition of Rome; and hence we may perhaps best explain,
why it was that for so long a time no violent internal commotions
took place there. Yet when in such a state of things new energies
have developed themselves, new claims also spring up, which then at
once are fiercely urged. And thus it was now with the agrarian law.
Hitherto the patricians had with great cunning kept the plebeians out
of those honourable offices to which they had a right; often were
consuls elected instead of the military tribunes, and these last again
with less than their full number. But now decided claims began to be
insisted upon. Rome’s humiliation abroad, owing to the wars of the
Etruscans and Volscians, had ceased, the city had quickly risen by
its conquests to a very high position, and under these circumstances
the tribunes raised their voices for the men of their own order. The
first occasion for this, the consequences of which must have been much
more violent than Livy represents them, was afforded by the conquest
of Lavici: a colony was demanded there, but the Roman senate refused
it. The question is now no more about the _Lex Cassia_, but there is
a special _lex tribunicia agraria_ brought by the tribunes before the
tribes: it was demanded that a division of the _ager publicus_ should
be made, and a tax again imposed on the patrician demesne. The latter
clause was originally in all the agrarian laws; but the patricians had
succeeded in evading their obligations. These warnings had directly
no effect beyond this, that colonies of citizens were several times
founded: these were exclusively Roman, and therefore called _coloniæ
Romanæ_. After the conquest of Bolæ, an ill-fated military tribune,
M. Postumius, had caused all the booty to be sold by auction for the
benefit of the _publicum_ (_in publicum redigere_, for _publicum_ is
the separate exchequer of the curies). This excited such an outburst
of rage, that the soldiers rose against the quæstor and slew him.
The military tribune, who had to judge the case, drove them to such
despair, that they mutinied also against him, and stained their hands
with his blood; which is the only instance of the kind before the times
of Sylla. The senate chose to connive at a deed of which the guilt was
but too evident. The consequences of this outbreak must have been very
great, though Livy says nothing on the subject; for from that time only
it never happens that there are less than six military tribunes, and
the election seems to have been now transferred from the centuries to
the tribes, as otherwise it would have been very thoughtless in Livy to
have spoken of a _tribus prærogativa_. The curies conferred, as usual,
the _imperium_, after the election had been made.
Rome now turned her arms against Veii, which was about two German miles
and a half distant, and nearly one German mile in circumference: its
boundary must have reached as far as the Janiculum. This city was a
thorn in the side of Rome, and until she had overthrown this rival,
she could never be great. Fidenæ, which is called an Etruscan town,
but was a Tyrrhenian one, is represented from the earliest times, even
under Romulus already, as being involved in war with Rome: it lay one
German mile above Rome on the Tiber. It was either in 320 or 329, that
the Fidenates rose against the Roman _coloni_ and expelled them. Two
wars are related here, according to all appearances put in the wrong
place: the detailed account occurs at least once too much; probably it
belongs to the year 329. In 320, hostilities may likewise have taken
place; this is at all events the time fixed upon by Diodorus, whom we
may follow. We must look upon these _coloni_ as a garrison of settlers
who had their own hides of land. Three Roman ambassadors appeared at
Fidenæ; and the inhabitants were called upon to justify themselves, and
to reinstate the _coloni_. This seemed to them so unreasonable, that
they slew the ambassadors, and threw themselves into the arms of the
king of Veii, Lars Tolumnius; for all the Etruscan towns had a regal
government, the king being elected for life. Tolumnius came across the
Tiber to their assistance; and since the Romans, as the conquerors of
the Æquians and Volscians, were now formidable to the neighbours, the
Capenates and Faliscans, Oscan tribes, who had maintained themselves
in those parts against the Tyrrhenians, hastened likewise to help the
Fidenates. This host struck terror into the Romans; it lay one mile
from Rome, being separated from it by the Anio only. A dictator was
appointed, and he chose the military tribune A. Cornelius Cossus as
Magister Equitum. The battle was a lucky one, and Cornelius Cossus
slew the Veientine king Tolumnius, to whose charge, no doubt unjustly,
the murder of the ambassadors was laid. The emperor Augustus with
regard to it made the remark to Livy, that Cossus, on the strength of
these _spolia opima_, had taken upon himself consular dignity; for on
the armour he had called himself consul. This is a later addition in
Livy, which, however, is left quite detached, or otherwise he must
have placed the event seven years later. After this victory, Fidenæ
was taken and razed to the ground; the _ager Fidenas_ became _ager
publicus_. With the Veientines a truce was made, which was quite
seasonable for the Romans, as it enabled them to begin by completely
crushing the Æquians and Volscians. Towards the end of the armistice,
the Veientines sent to the other Etruscan peoples for aid against the
Romans. Yet it was refused them, inasmuch as from another side, on the
Apennines, a far more dangerous enemy had appeared, which like a horde
of invading Turks destroyed every thing before it, namely the Gauls.
The Etruscans advised the Veientines to try by all means to maintain
the peace with the Romans: the demands of the latter may, however,
have been too high,--perhaps they wanted the sovereignty over Veii, so
that the Veientines were obliged to choose war as unavoidable. If we
compare the account of the first Veientine war, seventy years before,
the Veientines were then supported by the whole power of the Etruscans;
but now their only remaining champions are the Capenates[114] and the
Faliscans: in one single campaign indeed the people of Tarquinii come
to their help. The Cærites were friends with the Romans, and therefore
kept neutral: the Etruscans, it is true, were in the ascendant there;
yet in the main the population may still have been Tyrrhenian. Rome
was obliged to make the strongest efforts when arming herself for this
struggle, and was supported in it by the Latins and Hernicans.
The derision with which Florus speaks of the _bella suburbana_, when
saying, _De Verulis et Bovillis pudet dicere, sed triumphavimus_, is
the sneer of a rhetorician, and we cannot find fault with him for
finding these events rather uninteresting. Wars indeed which were
fought within a narrow field, have not the same claims to our interest
as one like that of Hannibal; still it was in these that the powers of
Rome developed themselves. We will not treat this Veientine war with
contempt, nor yet will we describe it with as much prolixity as Livy
does; but we shall give a sketch of it in very brief outlines. To us,
the spirit is of importance with which the Romans began it; inasmuch
as they undertook it amid difficulties, which under the circumstances
were not less than those of the first Punic war, for instance, and it
was only by long perseverance that they could hope to bring matters
to an issue. A city like Veii, which lay so near, and was so strong,
could not be taken but by a blockade or a siege: when the Veientines
were too weak in the field, they withdrew within their walls, against
which the Romans could do nothing. One was now obliged, either to
invest the town and force it to yield by hunger, or if needs be, by
works, by mines; or else to try and reduce it by distress, fortifying
a place in the neighbourhood (ἐπιτείχισις), as Decelea near Athens,
and from thence devastating the country far and wide, and preventing
its cultivation, so that the enemy are brought into such a strait of
misery that they must strive by every possible means to get out of it.
But to do this, inasmuch as they had to fear the neighbouring places,
as Capena, Falerii, the Romans had to change their former mode of
war. They had until then only undertaken short expeditions during a
few of the summer months,--not unseldom but ten to twelve, nay even
five to six days, especially in the times of the republic: under the
kings it must have been different. There were from the earliest ages
certain months of war, in which they mutually ravaged each other’s
fields; thus it was among the Greeks, and so it is to this day among
the people of Asia. On the frontiers of Georgia, Russia and Persia
make war against each other for a couple of months every year; in the
laws of Charlemagne the period is fixed during which the people are
bound to service. During the intervals, the intercourse was more or
less free; the time of the festivals especially was quite free, as, for
instance, the common festivals of the Etruscans near the temple of the
Voltumna, or that of the Ausonian people near the temple of Feronia.
It was only for the stated period that the soldiers could be kept in
the field, and as soon as it was over, they dispersed. The means of
Rome for keeping up a large force were very much lessened since the
Etruscan and Volscian wars: in former times the army was paid from
the tithes which the possessors of the _ager publicus_ had to give.
But since the _ager publicus_ was lost, every one marched out to war
οἰκόσιτος, the men brought their stock of provisions from home, and
what they wanted besides they tried to get by foraging: if this could
not be done, the army had to return home again. It was owing to this
that so very few sieges took place. But as it was now intended to carry
on the war in right earnest, and not to lay down their arms until Veii
were conquered, the army was to receive pay. This decree was perhaps
connected also with a proposition for levying the tithes again from the
_ager publicus_, and thence defraying the expense of the pay. There is
some ground for the supposition, that in the earliest times already a
_stipendium_ was very generally paid, in a statement that in the census
of Servius Tullius the _equites_ received two thousand asses; without
doubt, therefore, the _pedites_ also got something. I suppose that it
was a hundred _asses_, whether the war lasted a longer or a shorter
time; and that for this sum, the soldier had to find himself in arms
and provisions. With such a system wars of conquest were incompatible,
as in these the soldier must be entirely kept by the state; and this
is the arrangement which was intended, when it is said that the Roman
soldiers now first received a _stipendium_. It would be incorrect to
take it for granted that formerly they had nothing given them; but
there is a very great difference, between their receiving a small sum
at once and their being paid by the day. It may be assumed, that the
ærarians, as they were not obliged to serve in war, had always had to
pay a war tax for the _pedites_, as the _orbi orbæque_ had for the
equites; for, the plebeian could not have been loaded with the double
burthen of serving with his body and with his goods.
The pay of the Romans was from of old a hundred _asses_ per month for
one man, which was in a fair proportion to his wants. Such a pay is
to be met with among the Athenians since Pericles’ days, but scarcely
ever before. The pay of a hoplite at Athens was immense; in Rome, where
the allies paid no contributions, it could not but be much less. The
sum of one hundred _asses_ continued to be paid also in later times;
when the _asses_ were made too light, they were calculated in silver at
the rate of ten to one. Every third day, the soldier got a _denarius_
(as much as one drachma), which is two obols daily. The stipendium was
considered as a unit; yet it was multiplied afterwards (_multiplex
stipendium_: _Domitian_ added a _quartum stipendium_). But this is
always to be understood of one month only. The excellent Radbod Hermann
Schele makes the mistake here of drawing from authorities which are not
worth any thing, the impossible conclusion that the _stipendia_ were
_annua_, which would have been to no purpose whatever: his practical
turn of mind failed him in this instance. The pay was only for the time
when one was really in the field; if the war lasted for one year, a
year’s pay was, of course, allowed. When Appius Claudius says in Livy,
_annua æra habes, annuam operam ede_, this is likewise an incorrect
opinion of Livy.
This innovation was of the utmost importance for the republic, as
without a national army Rome could never have become great. If the
money for the purpose could be supplied without entailing any fresh
tax, it answered perfectly; but if the patrician did not pay the tithe
from the _ager publicus_, or the revenue of the state was otherwise
insufficient, the war was exceedingly burthensome for the plebeian, as
the pay had to be defrayed by a property tax, and the service might
last for an unusually long period. This injustice was an unavoidable
necessity. That the plebeians had not been taxed before, was, very
likely, owing to their inability to pay; but for twenty years Rome had
been increasing in welfare, so that it now became possible, although
new distress was thus created, and prosperity blighted, until there
was even a return of the old system of oppression for debt. But, on
the other hand, it also became possible, to keep an army in the field
throughout the whole of the year.
About the same time, there was a change in the art of war. _Postquam
stipendiarii facti sunt_, says Livy, _scuta pro clupeis habebant_;
he seems to take it for granted that this alteration in the arms was
called forth by the introduction of pay. The first step towards it may
indeed have been already taken before the Gallic invasion.
The Romans entered upon the last Veientine war with the determination
to conquer Veii. The republic, which had extended itself as far as
Anxur, began to feel its own strength, as with the Sabines it was at
least on friendly terms, and it had conquered the Æquians. How far the
Latins took part in this war, is uncertain; their co-operation may
not perhaps have reached beyond the Tiber. According to a statement
which bears the appearance of truth, Circeii also was retaken by the
Romans soon after Anxur: on the outskirts of the mountains, however,
Privernum still maintained itself as a Volscian town. The weakness of
the Ausonian peoples arose from the spread of the Samnites, and must
have inclined them to make peace with the Romans. Thus Rome had leisure
for permanently enlarging its territory, which in all probability it
had no more to share with the Latins.
The last Veientine war had been followed by a twenty years’ truce. The
Etruscans, like very many other nations of antiquity, had the custom
of ending their wars only by armistices for a certain number of years,
which were years of ten months. This may be proved by the fact, that
in almost every instance hostilities break out again earlier than
might be expected from the fixed number of years of twelve months,
and never sooner than after the same number of years calculated at
ten months. The truce between Rome and Veii was concluded in 330, and
in 347 it had already run out (_induciæ exierant_, is the literal
expression). The use of these years of ten months is on the whole very
common among the Romans; such a year was reckoned for mourning, and
for all matters connected with money and interest. In sales of corn a
credit of ten months was an understood thing. Loans for a long term of
years there were none; but all business was done for short periods,
and on the security of personal credit, as debts on bills of exchange.
The Veientines, quite contrary to what they did in former times, try
to evade the war in every possible manner. Without doubt, Veii had
formerly been the chief of many Etrurian towns; probably from its
situation, as in the earlier wars the power of that city appears to
have been very great. Yet the irruption of the Gauls had this effect
with regard to the towns southward of the Apennines, as Arretium,
Fæsulæ, &c., that they were summoned to assist their countrymen on the
other side of the mountains. This assistance was fruitless. The loss
was great, and Etruria shed its lifeblood in the plains of Lombardy.
Tarquinii and Capena alone came to the help of Veii; and also the Æqui
Falisci, not indeed as an Etruscan people, but because they considered
Veii as their bulwark.
At first, the Romans thought that the war could be quickly brought
to an end; they built strong forts in the _Ager Veientanus_, (which
the Greeks call ἐπιτειχίζειν) as Agis did in the second half of the
Peloponnesian war; and from thence they hindered the Veientines from
tilling their fields, or they set fire to the ripe corn, so that famine
and distress soon made their appearance in the town. This system of
warfare is designated here by the term _obsessio_. Once only the Romans
undertook a siege in the simple fashion of that age. Between two
redoubts, and parallel with the wall of the town, a line of rubbish,
sand bags, and fascines was thrown up; wooden scaffoldings (_plutei_)
were then erected on both sides, in order to give the rubbish firmness;
and, what was the chief difficulty, they were pushed further and
further in advance. These wooden works were raised to about the height
of the wall; bridges and scaling ladders were laid on it (_aggerem
muro injungebant_); and then the machines were brought up, first
the battering rams, in aftertimes the catapults and ballistæ,--for
these, which in that age were yet unknown at Rome, were invented at
Syracuse for Dionysius. The people of the town tried on their side to
countermine. Yet the neighbouring nations defeated the Romans, and
destroyed their works. Since then, several years passed without any
camp being again pitched before Veii.
The war of Veii was for the ancients a parallel to that of Troy. They
pictured to themselves another ten years’ siege, and a conquest quite
as marvellous as that of Troy by the wooden horse. Yet not the whole of
the war is poetical fiction; but the old lays were linked to detached
historical points which they embellished, differing in this from the
epics of the earliest history. By the side of these, there is an old
annalistic narrative which is by no means incredible. The defeat of
the tribunes Virginius and Sergius is historical; but the particulars
concerning the Alban lake, and such like things, belong to the old
poem. Whether this was written in prose or in verse is all the same to
me. The account given was as follows.
After Rome had already for eight years worn herself out against
Veii, and the most perfect tranquility reigned with the Æquians and
Volscians, a _prodigium_ came to pass. The waters of the Alban lake,
which otherwise stood always below the brink of the old crater, now
began to swell, and threatened to overflow. This is the general tenor
of the old tradition: with regard to the details the accounts differ.
According to Dionysius of Halicarnassus, and Dio Cassius in Zonaras,
the stream ran straight from the lake into the sea; according to
others, it merely threatened to overflow its banks. The Romans did not
know what to do. They had stationed outposts before Veii, but when
there was no actual fighting, a sort of armistice was kept. On this,
an Etruscan haruspex laughed at the Romans for giving themselves so
much trouble to conquer Veii, saying, that, so long as they were not
masters of the Alban lake, they would not be able to take the town. A
Roman, bearing this in mind, sent for the haruspex under the pretext
of a _procuratio rei domesticæ_, who was then seized by the enemy, and
compelled to tell them, what was to be done. He answered that they
ought to drain the waters of the Alban lake, so that a stream from
thence might reach the sea by a neighbouring river. The same thing
was told by the Delphian god. The Romans now undertook the work and
executed it. When it was all but finished, the Veientines sent an
embassy to Rome, adjuring the Romans to receive them _in deditionem_.
But the Romans would not listen to any such prayer; for they knew that
the spell was broken. The Veientines said that this was true; yet that
it was also stated in their books, that, if Veii were destroyed, Rome
would likewise soon be taken by barbarians, and this the haruspex had
forborne to tell them. The Romans now ran this risk, and appointed
Camillus as dictator, who called upon all the people to share the
booty, and undertook the assault. The sacred matters having been
attended to, human wisdom was in requisition. He ran a gallery under
the Arx of Veii, and led from thence a passage to the temple of Juno;
as the fates had decreed, that he who made the offering in the Arx of
Veii should be victorious. The Romans rushed in by that passage, slew
the Etruscan king, and made the offering. Then the wall was scaled on
all sides.
If we now reflect upon the historical absurdity of this account, we
cannot doubt for one moment, the existence of a poetical fiction. There
are traces of the citadel of Veii to this very day. It is situated
on the Aqua rossa, is almost wholly surrounded by water, and rises
to a considerable height: it is a rock of tufa. The Romans must then
have had to dig a passage under the bed of the river, and to make the
gallery with such consummate art, that no one could observe any thing;
so that when all was done, they would only have quietly to raise the
last stone in the temple and to climb out, as from a trap door.
In all probability, this is what really happened. There were two
sorts of sieges. One was that described above, which only consisted
in heaping up rubbish against the wall. Or else, with huge toil they
undermined its foundations, and shoring it up with a framework of
strong beams, set fire to the timber, and burned it, so that the
masonry might come down with a crash. A positive mention of battering
rams does not occur before the Peloponnesian war; and among the
Romans even somewhat later. If Veii was really taken by means of a
_cuniculus_, it is to be explained by the second mode.
The draining of the Alban lake must surely belong to this period.
We cannot gainsay it, nor is there any reason for putting in here a
work of earlier date. It is likely that owing to some stoppage in the
channels by which it was drained, there was danger of the lake’s
overflowing the whole of Latium; and possibly they may have taken
advantage of the credulity of the people to stir them to this immense
undertaking, though I believe that, if the senate decided upon this
necessary work, it readily found obedience. It is to be supposed
that the Alban lake had a subterraneous outlet through clefts, like
the Fucinus and all lakes which have been formed in the craters of
volcanoes: these chasms may have been filled up by an earthquake. Livy,
somewhat further on, speaks of a severe winter when the Tiber was
covered with ice, and of a sickly summer which followed it. The newly
discovered _excerpta_ of Dionysius place the construction of the tunnel
in the year after that severe winter. Livy says that during that winter
the snow lay seven feet deep, and that the trees were killed by the
frost; a statement quite in the style of the annals, which, although
the old annals were lost at the Gallic invasion, is yet very credible,
as that winter must have survived in the memory of all. Just as severe
was the winter of 483, when the snow lay for forty days on the Forum.
The earlier Roman history shows traces of the average height of the
thermometer having been at that time much less than it is now.[115] In
Roman and Greek history, the periods of extraordinary appearances in
the weather are almost always the precursors of frightful earthquakes:
thus an eruption of Ætna happens at this time (354). Vesuvius was then
quiet; yet the earthquakes were awful. By one of these, the outlets of
the Alban lake may have been stopped: generally speaking, all lakes
which have no _emissarius_, exhibit wonderful periods of rise and
fall. The lake Copais even had artificial drains, which, however, were
afterwards choked up, and Bœotia during the Macedonian era was not
able to pay the cost of clearing them; the consequence of this was,
that the lake began to swell, and overflowed the country all about.
On the whole, as Aristotle has already remarked, Greece may have lost
in the supply of water. The lake Copais is at present merely a marsh,
which one cannot indeed any more call a lake, with stagnant pools, as
in our “turf-moors.”
The work which the Romans executed is wonderful. The tunnel is entire
to this day, and is in length 2,700 paces, half a German league:[116]
the water of the lake is diminished to an appropriate level. This
alone is a considerable advantage, although the country about is now
uncultivated, and has nothing but brushwood growing upon it. More
important, however, is the fact that drinkable water was gained by it;
as the campagna of Rome was much in want of water, and although that
of the lake is by no means good, yet it is better than what is found
in the wells thereabouts. The work is equal to the greatest Etruscan
ones: the entrance from the lake is a vault, executed in the grandest
style like the hall of a temple, and we see that Rome now built again
on as vast a scale as under the kings. This is characteristic of the
time of Camillus. The tunnel is most of it cut through a hard mass of
lava, a small portion only through _peperino_, which is more easily
worked; it is a gallery nine palms high, and five palms broad. By this
means the lake is kept, probably for ever, to a fixed level: moreover,
the _emissarius_ never needs to be repaired. The lake was at that time
about a hundred feet above the level to which it was let off. How such
a work was accomplished, is a very interesting question. If we consider
the imperfect state of the instruments of those days when the use of
the compass was not yet known, the task of finding the correct level
at a distance of half a mile is indeed immense; nay it would even now
be fraught with considerable difficulty, as one must know to a line,
how high one ought to build in order to have a gradually inclined way
for the water. It is known in the country, and stated in some books,
that from the lake to the lower point to which the water was to be led,
open shafts are everywhere seen to this day by which people even now
go down to clean the _emissarius_: these did not serve merely to carry
off the mud,--the lake is not muddy,--but also to calculate the depth,
and to allow the air to come in. By the salt-water of the shafts, they
were able accurately to calculate the line to its extremity. Now-a-days
people are so little practised in levelling, that to a very recent
period it was not known that the lake of Nemi lies higher than that
of Alba. By sinking shafts, it was also possible for a greater number
of people to work, and to bring the whole to a speedy completion:
from each of them two parties might proceed till they mutually met.
In this manner the tunnel was finished to the edge of the lake. The
entrance was no doubt effected by a stone bore of the size of the tube
of a tobacco pipe; for a wall of basalt needs not to be thicker than
two ells for it sufficiently to withstand the whole pressure of the
lake. An opening was made by which the lake sank gradually, so that
the workmen had still time to be raised by a windlass from the shafts;
when the water had discharged itself, the wall was pulled down, and the
break was built to keep off trees, &c.; then it was embellished, and
the magnificent portico and the entrance, similar to that of a temple,
were erected. This shames all the Egyptian works, which are strange and
useless; this, on the contrary, is purely rational.
That Veii was taken by storm, is certain. The nation was annihilated,
and the sack was carried on quite methodically. It is said that the
whole population of Rome was summoned thither to assist in the
plundering. This may have applied to all those who were bound to
military service; partly owing to the short distance of Rome from Veii,
and partly because in that long war all had actually served. The fate
of the inhabitants of the conquered town is the same which befell so
many of the nations of antiquity: those who did not fall by the sword,
were led away into bondage. The Romans took possession of an empty
town: it was, as we may well believe, finer than their own. Rome has a
magnificent situation; yet its picturesque character is fraught with
many disadvantages. The country about the city is liable to frequent
inundations; the communication within its walls, owing to the many
hills and valleys, was very inconvenient for carriages: Veii, on the
contrary, with the exception of its Arx, lay on a plain, and in all
likelihood had fine broad streets. It was therefore no wonder that the
Romans were loath to destroy such a beautiful town. Immediately after
its conquest, quarrels arose between the government and the _Plebes_;
for the latter demanded the division of the fields, and the former
claimed the whole for itself. But this was now no longer possible.
Another difficulty arose from the beauty of the town: it was thought
a pity that it should be left desolate. It is conceivable, that when
the proposal was made to divide the territory, it was also wished that
to those who were in want of dwellings, the houses of Veii might be
assigned. A tribune of the people proposed, that if the patricians
deemed the plebeians too vile, to have their abode in the same place
with them, the _Plebes_ with its magistrates might emigrate to
Veii:--that the proposal was, as Livy has it, that half of the senate
and people should settle at Veii, would be too absurd for belief. Yet
even the former one is very questionable: the plan would have been most
injudicious. The reasons which Livy adduces against any such splitting
of the population, are very weighty: a complete separation would have
been inevitable. And if the project was only to transplant a numerous
colony with a local government to Veii, even this was likewise very
dangerous. A compromise took place. Whilst the patricians received a
great part of the occupied land, the _Plebes_ also got a share; and
indeed not only were the seven _jugera forensia_ assigned to each as
his own lot, but the children were also taken into consideration.
According to Diodorus’ statement, every family gets twenty-eight
jugera; but in that case the size of the Veientine territory must have
been enormous. This assignation did not extend to the _ærarii_. Those
among them who were clients of patricians, got places on the estates of
their patrons.
The sequel shows that at that time in the territory of Veii and Capena,
as well as that of most of the Etruscan cities, there were great rural
districts with subjected towns which during the war threw themselves
into the arms of the Romans: these were no doubt the old inhabitants,
who looked upon them as their liberators.
The conquest of Veii was one of the leading events in history: it
freed Rome from the counterpoise which checked its progress. Now that
the east was entirely pacified, the Romans advanced with irresistible
might into Etruria; as the Etruscans had to concentrate the whole of
their force in the Apennines, in order to keep off the Gauls. The war
was, however, waged against the Faliscans also. These, to judge from
their name, were Volscians, and therefore Virgil calls them _Æqui
Falisci_; according to Strabo, they had ἰδίαν γλῶσσαν, and were ἕτερον
ἔθνος from the Etruscans. The war of Camillus against the Faliscans
is known to us from our earliest childhood, and how he moved them so
strongly by his magnanimity, that they embraced the friendly alliance
of the Romans. In this there is much which is improbable in itself.
The story of the schoolmaster, I will not discuss. Moreover, there was
war against the Vulsinians also: the Romans made conquests in their
territory, and concluded an advantageous peace. By that time, Rome had
already advanced beyond the boundary of the _silva Ciminia_, which
afterwards, in the great war of Fabius, appears to have been fraught
with such dreadful horrors. The line of demarcation then, does not yet
seem to have been very distinct: afterwards, the district may have been
purposely allowed to run wild, in order to form a boundary, just as
there is also a forest between Austrian and Turkish Dalmatia. Of Capena
there is no more mention; it disappears entirely. It was, therefore,
either destroyed by the Romans after the conquest of Veii, or by the
Gauls: certain it is, that after the invasion of the Gauls, all the
Capenates who were left became citizens.
After these victories, Camillus stood forth as the greatest general
of his age. But at this period it happened, that he was accused of
having appropriated to himself out of the spoils of Veii many articles
of great value, particularly the brazen doors of the temple of Juno;
and of having announced too late, that he had made a vow to offer the
tenth part of the booty to the Pythian Apollo. It would be a vain
disquisition to speculate here upon the guilt or innocence of Camillus;
only we must not forget, that every Roman general was justified in
selecting a portion of the booty for himself.[117] Whether Camillus
in this case took more than his share, we cannot decide; where one
man goes by a smaller scale, another employs a greater one. We must
not believe that Camillus did this in secret: he certainly had the
gates put on his own house; if he had intended to use them as metal,
they would long since have been melted down. The reason of the hatred
against Camillus was a political one. He stood at the head of the most
obstinate patrician party, even to the time of his death. The plebeians
were becoming more and more energetic and powerful; owing to the
tranquillity of prosperity, a certain taste for agitation had sprung
up. Camillus was impeached, because he had an influential party against
him; and he was fined the sum of fifteen thousand, according to others,
one hundred thousand, or even five hundred thousand asses. He then went
into exile, to Ardea. Livy says that, previous to his trial, he had
entreated his clients and fellow-tribesmen to make every exertion to
have him acquitted; which would prove, that he was proceeded against
before the centuries, as in this instance there cannot be any question
of the tribes;--that they had, however, declared, that they would pay
his fine, but not acquit him. This clearly proves his guilt. According
to Dionysius, his clansmen and clients really paid it, and he withdrew
from sheer disgust. I believe that the curies condemned him, as, when
he was recalled, they had again to be summoned to the Capitol, to
repeal the decree of banishment; for, it was only in Rome that the
curies could assemble. This would likewise prove that he was found
guilty, a thing not at all unusual in those times with regard to great
men.