Cinna and Sulla
Ferment in Italy
This state of suspense and uncertainty existing in Italy when
Sulla took his departure for Greece in the beginning of 667 has been
already described: the half-suppressed insurrection, the principal
army under the more than half-usurped command of a general whose
politics were very doubtful, the confusion and the manifold
activity of intrigue in the capital. The victory of the oligarchy
by force of arms had, in spite or because of its moderation,
engendered manifold discontent. The capitalists, painfully
affected by the blows of the most severe financial crisis which
Rome had yet witnessed, were indignant at the government on account
of the law which it had issued as to interest, and on account
of the Italian and Asiatic wars which it had not prevented.
The insurgents, so far as they had laid down their arms, bewailed
not only the disappointment of their proud hopes of obtaining equal
rights with the ruling burgesses, but also the forfeiture of their
venerable treaties, and their new position as subjects utterly
destitute of rights. The communities between the Alps and the Po
were likewise discontented with the partial concessions made to
them, and the new burgesses and freedmen were exasperated by
the cancelling of the Sulpician laws. The populace of the city
suffered amid the general distress, and found it intolerable that
the government of the sabre was no longer disposed to acquiesce in
the constitutional rule of the bludgeon. The adherents, resident
in the capital, of those outlawed after the Sulpician revolution--
adherents who remained very numerous in consequence of the
remarkable moderation of Sulla--laboured zealously to procure
permission for the outlaws to return home; and in particular some
ladies of wealth and distinction spared for this purpose neither
trouble nor money. None of these grounds of ill-humour were such
as to furnish any immediate prospect of a fresh violent collision
between the parties; they were in great part of an aimless and
temporary nature; but they all fed the general discontent, and had
already been more or less concerned in producing the murder of
Rufus, the repeated attempts to assassinate Sulla, the issue
of the consular and tribunician elections for 667 partly in
favour of the opposition.
Cinna
Carbo
Sertorius
The name of the man whom the discontented had summoned to the head
of the state, Lucius Cornelius Cinna, had been hitherto scarcely
heard of, except so far as he had borne himself well as an officer
in the Social war. We have less information regarding the
personality and the original designs of Cinna than regarding those
of any other party leader in the Roman revolution. The reason is,
to all appearance, simply that this man, altogether vulgar and
guided by the lowest selfishness, had from the first no ulterior
political plans whatever. It was asserted at his very first
appearance that he had sold himself for a round sum of money to
the new burgesses and the coterie of Marius, and the charge looks
very credible; but even were it false, it remains nevertheless
significant that a suspicion of the sort, such as was never
expressed against Saturninus and Sulpicius, attached to Cinna.
In fact the movement, at the head of which he put himself, has
altogether the appearance of worthlessness both as to motives and
as to aims. It proceeded not so much from a party as from a number
of malcontents without proper political aims or notable support,
who had mainly undertaken to effect the recall of the exiles by
legal or illegal means. Cinna seems to have been admitted into the
conspiracy only by an afterthought and merely because the intrigue,
which in consequence of the restriction of the tribunician powers
needed a consul to bring forward its proposals, saw in him among
the consular candidates for 667 its fittest instrument and so
pushed him forward as consul. Among the leaders appearing in the
second rank of the movement were some abler heads; such was the
tribune of the people Gnaeus Papirius Carbo, who had made himself
a name by his impetuous popular eloquence, and above all Quintus
Sertorius, one of the most talented of Roman officers and a man
in every respect excellent, who since his candidature for the
tribunate of the people had been a personal enemy to Sulla and had
been led by this quarrel into the ranks of the disaffected to which
he did not at all by nature belong. The proconsul Strabo, although
at variance with the government, was yet far from going along
with this faction.
Outbreak of the Cinnan Revolution
Victory of the Government
So long as Sulla was in Italy, the confederates for good reasons
remained quiet. But when the dreaded proconsul, yielding not to
the exhortations of the consul Cinna but to the urgent state of
matters in the east, had embarked, Cinna, supported by the majority
of the college of tribunes, immediately submitted the projects
of law which had been concerted as a partial reaction against
the Sullan restoration of 666. They embraced the political
equalization of the new burgesses and the freedmen, as Sulpicius
had proposed it, and the restitution of those who had been banished
in consequence of the Sulpician revolution to their former status.
The new burgesses flocked en masse to the capital, that along with
the freedmen they might terrify, and in case of need force, their
opponents into compliance. But the government party was determined
not to yield, consul stood against consul, Gnaeus Octavius against
Lucius Cinna, and tribune against tribune; both sides appeared in
great part armed on the day and at the place of voting. The
tribunes of the senatorial party interposed their veto; when swords
were drawn against them even on the rostra, Octavius employed force
against force. His compact bands of armed men not only cleared the
Via Sacra and the Forum, but also, disregarding the commands of
their more gentle-minded leader, exercised horrible atrocities
against the assembled multitude. The Forum swam with blood on this
"Octavius' day," as it never did before or afterwards--the number
of corpses was estimated at ten thousand. Cinna called on the
slaves to purchase freedom for themselves by sharing in the
struggle; but his appeal was as unsuccessful as the like appeal of
Marius in the previous year, and no course was left to the leaders
of the movement but to take flight. The constitution supplied no
means of proceeding farther against the chiefs of the conspiracy,
so long as their year of office lasted. But a prophet presumably
more loyal than pious had announced that the banishment of the
consul Cinna and of the six tribunes of the people adhering to
him would restore peace and tranquillity to the country; and,
in conformity not with the constitution but with this counsel of
the gods fortunately laid hold of by the custodiers of oracles,
the consul Cinna was by decree of the senate deprived of his office,
Lucius Cornelius Merula was chosen in his stead, and outlawry was
pronounced against the chiefs who had fled. It seemed as if the
whole crisis were about to end in a few additions to the number
of the men who were exiles in Numidia.
The Cinnans in Italy
Landing of Marius
Beyond doubt nothing further would have come of the movement, had
not the senate on the one hand with its usual remissness omitted to
compel the fugitives at least rapidly to quit Italy, and had the
latter on the other hand been, as champions of the emancipation of
the new burgesses, in a position to renew to some extent in their
own favour the revolt of the Italians. Without obstruction they
appeared in Tibur, in Praeneste, in all the important communities
of new burgesses in Latium and Campania, and asked and obtained
everywhere money and men for the furtherance of the common cause.
Thus supported, they made their appearance at the army besieging
Nola, The armies of this period were democratic and revolutionary
in their views, wherever the general did not attach them to himself
by the weight of his personal influence; the speeches of the
fugitive magistrates, some of whom, especially Cinna and Sertorius,
were favourably remembered by the soldiers in connection with the
last campaigns, made a deep impression; the unconstitutional
deposition of the popular consul and the interference of the senate
with the rights of the sovereign people told on the common soldier,
and the gold of the consul or rather of the new burgesses made the
breach of the constitution clear to the officers. The Campanian
army recognized Cinna as consul and swore the oath of fidelity to
him man by man; it became a nucleus for the bands that flocked in
from the new burgesses and even from the allied communities; a
considerable army, though consisting mostly of recruits, soon moved
from Campania towards the capital. Other bands approached it from
the north. On the invitation of Cinna those who had been banished
in the previous year had landed at Telamon on the Etruscan coast.
There were not more than some 500 armed men, for the most part
slaves of the refugees and enlisted Numidian horsemen; but, as
Gaius Marius had in the previous year been willing to fraternize
with the rabble of the capital, so he now ordered the -ergastula-
in which the landholders of this region shut up their field-
labourers during the night to be broken open, and the arms which
he offered to these for the purpose of achieving their freedom were
not despised. Reinforced by these men and the contingents of the
new burgesses, as well as by the exiles who flocked to him with
their partisans from all sides, he soon numbered 6000 men under his
eagles and was able to man forty ships, which took their station
before the mouth of the Tiber and gave chase to the corn-ships
sailing towards Rome. With these he placed himself at the disposal
of the "consul" Cinna. The leaders of the Campanian army
hesitated; the more sagacious, Sertorius in particular, seriously
pointed out the danger of too closely connecting themselves with
a man whose name would necessarily place him at the head of
the movement, and who yet was notoriously incapable of any
statesmanlike action and haunted by an insane thirst for revenge;
but Cinna disregarded these scruples, and confirmed Marius in the
supreme command in Etruria and at sea with proconsular powers.
Dubious Attitude of Strabo
The Cinnans around Rome
Thus the storm gathered around the capital, and the government
could no longer delay bringing forward their troops to protect
it.(1) But the forces of Metellus were detained by the Italians
in Samnium and before Nola; Strabo alone was in a position to hasten
to the help of the capital. He appeared and pitched his camp at
the Colline gate: with his numerous and experienced army he might
doubtless have rapidly and totally annihilated the still weak bands
of insurgents; but this seemed to be no part of his design. On the
contrary he allowed Rome to be actually invested by the insurgents.
Cinna with his corps and that of Carbo took post on the right bank
of the Tiber opposite to the Janiculum, Sertorius on the left bank
confronting Pompeius over against the Servian wall. Marius with
his band which had gradually increased to three legions, and in
possession of a number of war-vessels, occupied one place on the
coast after another till at length even Ostia fell into his hands
through treachery, and, by way of prelude as it were to the
approaching reign of terror, was abandoned by the general to
the savage band for massacre and pillage. The capital was placed,
even by the mere obstruction of traffic, in great danger; by command
of the senate the walls and gates were put in a state of defence and
the burgess-levy was ordered to the Janiculum. The inaction of
Strabo excited among all classes alike surprise and indignation.
The suspicion that he was negotiating secretly with Cinna was
natural, but was probably without foundation. A serious conflict
in which he engaged the band of Sertorius, and the support which
he gave to the consul Octavius when Marius had by an understanding
with one of the officers of the garrison penetrated into the
Janiculum, and by which in fact the insurgents were successfully
beaten off again with much loss, showed that he was far from
intending to unite with, or rather to place himself under, the
leaders of the insurgents. It seems rather to have been his design
to sell his assistance in subduing the insurrection to the alarmed
government and citizens of the capital at the price of the
consulship for the next year, and thereby to get the reins
of government into his own hands.
Negotiations of Parties with the Italians
Death of Strabo
The senate was not, however, inclined to throw itself into the
arms of one usurper in order to escape from another, and sought
help elsewhere. The franchise was by decree of the senate
supplementarily conferred on all the Italian communities involved
in the Social war, which had laid down their arms and had in
consequence thereof forfeited their old alliance.(2) It seemed as
it were their intention officially to demonstrate that Rome in the
war against the Italians had staked her existence for the sake not
of a great object but of her own vanity: in the first momentary
embarrassment, for the purpose of bringing into the field an
additional thousand or two of soldiers, she sacrificed everything
which had been gained at so terribly dear a cost in the Social war.
In fact, troops arrived from the communities who were benefited by
this concession; but instead of the many legions promised, their
contingent on the whole amounted to not more than, at most, ten
thousand men. It would have been of more moment that an agreement
should be come to with the Samnites and Nolans, so that the troops
of the thoroughly trustworthy Metellus might be employed for the
protection of the capital. But the Samnites made demands which
recalled the yoke of Caudium--restitution of the spoil taken from
the Samnites and of their prisoners and deserters, renunciation of
the booty wrested by the Samnites from the Romans, the bestowal of
the franchise on the Samnites themselves as well as on the Romans
who had passed over to them. The senate rejected even in this
emergency terms of peace so disgraceful, but instructed Metellus to
leave behind a small division and to lead in person all the troops
that could at all be dispensed with in southern Italy as quickly as
possible to Rome. He obeyed. But the consequence was, that the
Samnites attacked and defeated Plautius the legate left behind by
Metellus and his weak band; that the garrison of Nola marched out
and set on fire the neighbouring town of Abella in alliance with
Rome; that Cinna and Marius, moreover, granted to the Samnites
everything they asked--what mattered Roman honour to them!--and a
Samnite contingent reinforced the ranks of the insurgents. It was
a severe loss also, when after a combat unfavourable to the troops
of the government Ariminum was occupied by the insurgents and thus
the important communication between Rome and the valley of the Po,
whence men and supplies were expected, was interrupted. Scarcity
and famine set in. The large populous city numerously garrisoned
with troops was but inadequately supplied with provisions; and
Marius in particular took care to cut off its supplies more and
more. He had already blocked up the Tiber by a bridge of ships;
now by the capture of Antium, Lanuvium, Aricia, and other townships
he gained control over the means of land communication still open,
and at the same time appeased temporarily his revenge by causing
all the citizens, wherever resistance was offered, to be put to
the sword with the exception of those who had possibly betrayed
to him the town. Contagious diseases followed on the distress and
committed dreadful ravages among the masses of soldiers densely
crowded round the capital; of Strabo's veteran army 11,000, and of
the troops of Octavius 6000 are said to have fallen victims to
them. Yet the government did not despair; and the sudden death of
Strabo was a fortunate event for it. He died of the pestilence;(3)
the masses, exasperated on many grounds against him, tore his
corpse from the bier and dragged it through the streets.
The remnant of his troops was incorporated by the consul
Octavius with his army.
Vacillation of the Government
Rome Capitulates
After the arrival of Metellus and the decease of Strabo the army
of the government was again at least a match for its antagonists,
and was able to array itself for battle against the insurgents at
the Alban Mount. But the minds of the soldiers of the government
were deeply agitated; when Cinna appeared in front of them, they
received him with acclamation as if he were still their general and
consul; Metellus deemed it advisable not to allow the battle to
come on, but to lead back the troops to their camp. The Optimates
themselves wavered, and fell at variance with each other. While
one party, with the honourable but stubborn and shortsighted consul
Octavius at their head, perseveringly opposed all concession,
Metellus more experienced in war and more judicious attempted to
bring about a compromise; but his conference with Cinna excited
the wrath of the extreme men on both sides: Cinna was called by
Marius a weakling, Metellus was called by Octavius a traitor.
The soldiers, unsettled otherwise and not without cause distrusting
the leadership of the untried Octavius, suggested to Metellus that
he should assume the chief command, and, when he refused, began
in crowds to throw away their arms or even to desert to the enemy.
The temper of the burgesses became daily more depressed and
troublesome. On the proclamation of the heralds of Cinna
guaranteeing freedom to the slaves who should desert, these flocked
in troops from the capital to the enemy's camp. But the proposal
that the senate should guarantee freedom to the slaves willing to
enter the army was decidedly resisted by Octavius. The government
could not conceal from itself that it was defeated, and that
nothing remained but to come to terms if possible with the leaders
of the band, as the overpowered traveller comes to terms with
the captain of banditti. Envoys went to Cinna; but, while they
foolishly made difficulties as to recognizing him as consul, and
Cinna in the interval thus prolonged transferred his camp close to
the city-gates, the desertion spread to so great an extent that it
was no longer possible to settle any terms. The senate submitted
itself unconditionally to the outlawed consul, adding only a
request that he would refrain from bloodshed, Cinna promised this,
but refused to ratify his promise by an oath; Marius, who kept by
his side during the negotiations, maintained a sullen silence.
Marian Reign of Terror
The gates of the capital were opened. The consul marched in with
his legions; but Marius, scoffingly recalling the law of outlawry,
refused to set foot in the city until the law allowed him to do
so and the burgesses hastily assembled in the Forum to pass the
annulling decree. He then entered, and with him the reign of
terror. It was determined not to select individual victims, but
to have all the notable men of the Optimate party put to death and
to confiscate their property. The gates were closed; for five days
and five nights the slaughter continued without interruption; even
afterwards the execution of individuals who had escaped or been
overlooked was of daily occurrence, and for months the bloody
persecution went on throughout Italy. The consul Gnaeus Octavius
was the first victim. True to his often-expressed principle, that
he would rather suffer death than make the smallest concession to
men acting illegally, he refused even now to take flight, and in
his consular robes awaited at the Janiculum the assassin, who was
not slow to appear. Among the slain were Lucius Caesar (consul in
664) the celebrated victor of Acerrae;(4) his brother Gaius, whose
unseasonable ambition had provoked the Sulpician tumult,(5) well
known as an orator and poet and as an amiable companion; Marcus
Antonius (consul in 655), after the death of Lucius Crassus beyond
dispute the first pleader of his time; Publius Crassus (consul
in 657) who had commanded with distinction in the Spanish and in
the Social wars and also during the siege of Rome; and a multitude
of the most considerable men of the government party, among whom
the wealthy were traced out with especial zeal by the greedy
executioners. Peculiarly sad seemed the death of Lucius Merula,
who very much against his own wish had become Cinna's successor,
and who now, when criminally impeached on that account and cited
before the comitia, in order to anticipate the inevitable
condemnation opened his veins, and at the altar of the Supreme
Jupiter whose priest he was, after laying aside the priestly
headband as the religious duty of the dying Flamen required,
breathed his last; and still more the death of Quintus Catulus
(consul in 652), once in better days the associate of the most
glorious victory and triumph of that same Marius who now had no
other answer for the suppliant relatives of his aged colleague
than the monosyllabic order, "He must die."
The Last Days of Marius
The originator of all these outrages was Gaius Marius.
He designated the victims and the executioners--only in exceptional
cases, as in those of Merula and Catulus, was any form of law
observed; not unfrequently a glance or the silence with which he
received those who saluted him formed the sentence of death, which
was always executed at once. His revenge was not satisfied even
with the death of his victim; he forbade the burial of the dead
bodies: he gave orders--anticipated, it is true, in this respect
by Sulla--that the heads of the senators slain should be fixed to
the rostra in the Forum; he ordered particular corpses to be dragged
through the Forum, and that of Gaius Caesar to be stabbed afresh
at the tomb of Quintus Varius, whom Caesar presumably had once
impeached;(6) he publicly embraced the man who delivered to him
as he sat at table the head of Antonius, whom he had been with
difficulty restrained from seeking out in his hiding-place,
an slaying with his own hand. His legions of slaves, and in
particular a division of Ardyaeans,(7) chiefly served as his
executioners, and did not neglect, amidst these Saturnalia of
their new freedom, to plunder the houses of their former masters
and to dishonour and murder all whom they met with there. His own
associates were in despair at this insane fury; Sertorius adjured
the consul to put a stop to it at any price, and even Cinna was
alarmed. But in times such as these were, madness itself becomes
a power; man hurls himself into the abyss, to save himself from
giddiness. It was not easy to restrain the furious old man and
his band, and least of all had Cinna the courage to do so; on the
contrary, he chose Marius as his colleague in the consulship for
the next year. The reign of terror alarmed the more moderate of
the victors not much less than the defeated party; the capitalists
alone were not displeased to see that another hand lent itself to
the work of thoroughly humbling for once the haughty oligarchs,
and that at the same time, in consequence of the extensive
confiscations and auctions, the best part of the spoil came to
themselves--in these times of terror they acquired from the people
the surname of the "hoarders."
Death of Marius
Fate had thus granted to the author of this reign of terror,
the old Gaius Marius, his two chief wishes. He had taken vengeance
on the whole genteel pack that had embittered his victories and
envenomed his defeats; he had been enabled to retaliate for every
sarcasm by a stroke of the dagger. Moreover he entered on the new
year once more as consul; the vision of a seventh consulate, which
the oracle had promised him, and which he had sought for thirteen
years to grasp, had now been realized. The gods had granted to him
what he wished; but now too, as in the old legendary period, they
practised the fatal irony of destroying man by the fulfilment of
his wishes. In his early consulates the pride, in his sixth the
laughing-stock, of his fellow-citizens, he was now in his seventh
loaded with the execration of all parties, with the hatred of the
whole nation; he, the originally upright, capable, gallant man, was
branded as the crackbrained chief of a reckless band of robbers.
He himself seemed to feel it. His days were passed as in delirium,
and by night his couch denied him rest, so that he grasped the
wine-cup in order merely to drown thought. A burning fever seized
him; after being stretched for seven days on a sick bed, in the
wild fancies of which he was fighting on the fields of Asia Minor
the battles of which the laurels were destined for Sulla, he
expired on the 13th Jan. 668. He died, more than seventy years
old, in full possession of what he called power and honour, and in
his bed; but Nemesis assumes various shapes, and does not always
expiate blood with blood. Was there no sort of retaliation in the
fact, that Rome and Italy now breathed more freely on the news of
the death of the famous saviour of the people than at the tidings
of the battle on the Raudine plain?
Even after his death individual incidents no doubt occurred, which
recalled that time of terror; Gaius Fimbria, for instance, who more
than any other during the Marian butcheries had dipped his hand in
blood, made an attempt at the very funeral of Marius to kill the
universally revered -pontifex maximus- Quintus Scaevola (consul in
659) who had been spared even by Marius, and then, when Scaevola
recovered from the wound he had received, indicted him criminally
on account of the offence, as Fimbria jestingly expressed it, of
having not been willing to let himself be murdered. But the orgies
of murder at any rate were over. Sertorius called together the
Marian bandits, under pretext of giving them their pay, surrounded
them with his trusty Celtic troops, and caused them to be cut down
en masse to the number, according to the lowest estimate, of 4000.
Government of Cinna
Along with the reign of terror came the -tyrannis-. Cinna not
only stood at the head of the state for four years in succession
(667-670) as consul, but he regularly nominated himself and his
colleagues without consulting the people; it seemed as if these
democrats set aside the sovereign popular assembly with intentional
contempt. No other chief of the popular party, before or
afterwards, possessed so perfectly absolute a power in Italy
and in the greater part of the provinces for so long a time almost
undisturbed, as Cinna; but no one can be named, whose government
was so utterly worthless and aimless. The law proposed by
Sulpicius and thereafter by Cinna himself, which promised to
the new burgesses and the freedmen equality of suffrage with the
old burgesses, was naturally revived; and it was formally confirmed
by a decree of the senate as valid in law (670). Censors were
nominated (668) for the purpose of distributing all the Italians,
in accordance with it, into the thirty-five burgess-districts--by a
singular conjuncture, in consequence of a want of qualified
candidates for the censorship the same Philippus, who when consul
in 663 had chiefly occasioned the miscarriage of the plan of Drusus
for bestowing the franchise on the Italians,(8) was now selected
as censor to inscribe them in the burgess-rolls. The reactionary
institutions established by Sulla in 666 were of course overthrown.
Some steps were taken to please the proletariate--for instance,
the restrictions on the distribution of grain introduced some years
ago,(9) were probably now once more removed; the design of Gaius
Gracchus to found a colony at Capua was in reality carried out
in the spring of 671 on the proposal of the tribune of the people,
Marcus Junius Brutus; Lucius Valerius Flaccus the younger
introduced a law as to debt, which reduced every private claim to
the fourth part of its nominal amount and cancelled three fourths
in favour of the debtors. But these measures, the only positive
ones during the whole Cinnan government, were without exception the
dictates of the moment; they were based--and this is perhaps the
most shocking feature in this whole catastrophe--not on a plan
possibly erroneous, but on no political plan at all. The populace
were caressed, and at the same time offended in a very unnecessary
way by a meaningless disregard of the constitutional arrangements
for election. The capitalist party might have furnished a support,
but it was injured in the most sensitive point by the law as to
debt. The true mainstay of the government was--wholly without
any cooperation on its part--the new burgesses; their assistance
was acquiesced in, but nothing was done to regulate the strange
position of the Samnites, who were now nominally Roman citizens,
but evidently regarded their country's independence as practically
the real object and prize of the struggle and remained in arms
to defend it against all and sundry. Illustrious senators were
struck down like mad dogs; but not the smallest step was taken to
reorganize the senate in the interest of the government, or even
permanently to terrify it; so that the government was by no means
sure of its aid. Gaius Gracchus had not understood the fall of the
oligarchy as implying that the new master might conduct himself on
his self-created throne, as legitimate cipher-kings think proper to
do. But this Cinna had been elevated to power not by his will, but
by pure accident; was there any wonder that he remained where the
storm-wave of revolution had washed him up, till a second wave came
to sweep him away again?
Cinna and Sulla
Italy and the Provinces in Favour of the Government
The same union of the mightiest plenitude of power with the most
utter impotence and incapacity in those who held it, was apparent
in the warfare waged by the revolutionary government against the
oligarchy--a warfare on which withal its existence primarily
depended. In Italy it ruled with absolute sway. Of the old
burgesses a very large portion were on principle favourable to
democratic views; and the still greater mass of quiet people, while
disapproving the Marian horrors, saw in an oligarchic restoration
simply the commencement of a second reign of terror by the opposite
party. The impression of the outrages of 667 on the nation at
large had been comparatively slight, as they had chiefly affected
the mere aristocracy of the capital; and it was moreover somewhat
effaced by the three years of tolerably peaceful government that
ensued. Lastly the whole mass of the new burgesses--three-fifths
perhaps of the Italians--were decidedly, if not favourable to the
present government, yet opposed to the oligarchy.
Like Italy, most of the provinces adhered to the oligarchy--
Sicily, Sardinia, the two Gauls, the two Spains. In Africa
Quintus Metellus, who had fortunately escaped the murderers, made
an attempt to hold that province for the Optimates; Marcus Crassus,
the youngest son of the Publius Crassus who had perished in the
Marian massacre, resorted to him from Spain, and reinforced him
by a band which he had collected there. But on their quarrelling
with each other they were obliged to yield to Gaius Fabius Hadrianus,
the governor appointed by the revolutionary government. Asia
was in the hands of Mithradates; consequently the province of
Macedonia, so far as it was in the power of Sulla, remained the
only asylum of the exiled oligarchy. Sulla's wife and children
who had with difficulty escaped death, and not a few senators
who had made their escape, sought refuge there, so that a sort
of senate was soon formed at his head-quarters.
Measures against Sulla
The government did not fail to issue decrees against the oligarchic
proconsul. Sulla was deprived by the comitia of his command and of
his other honours and dignities and outlawed, as was also the case
with Metellus, Appius Claudius, and other refugees of note; his
house in Rome was razed, his country estates were laid waste.
But such proceedings did not settle the matter. Had Gaius Marius
lived longer, he would doubtless have marched in person against Sulla
to those fields whither the fevered visions of his death-bed drew him;
the measures which the government took after his death have been
stated already. Lucius Valerius Flaccus the younger,(10) who after
Marius' death was invested with the consulship and the command in
the east (668), was neither soldier nor officer; Gaius Fimbria who
accompanied him was not without ability, but insubordinate; the
army assigned to them was even in numbers three times weaker than
the army of Sulla. Tidings successively arrived, that Flaccus, in
order not to be crushed by Sulla, had marched past him onward to
Asia (668); that Fimbria had set him aside and installed himself
in his room (beg. of 669); that Sulla had concluded peace with
Mithradates (669-670). Hitherto Sulla had been silent so far as
the authorities ruling in the capital were concerned. Now a letter
from him reached the senate, in which he reported the termination
of the war and announced his return to Italy; he stated that he
would respect the rights conferred on the new burgesses, and that,
while penal measures were inevitable, they would light not on the
masses, but on the authors of the mischief. This announcement
frightened Cinna out of his inaction: while he had hitherto taken
no step against Sulla except the placing some men under arms and
collecting a number of vessels in the Adriatic, he now resolved to
cross in all haste to Greece.
Attempts at a Compromise
Death of Cinna
Carbo and the New Burgesses Arm against Sulla
On the other hand Sulla's letter, which in the circumstances might
be called extremely moderate, awakened in the middle-party hopes
of a peaceful adjustment. The majority of the senate resolved,
on the proposal of the elder Flaccus, to set on foot an attempt
at reconciliation, and with that view to summon Sulla to come under
the guarantee of a safe-conduct to Italy, and to suggest to the
consuls Cinna and Carbo that they should suspend their preparations
till the arrival of Sulla's answer. Sulla did not absolutely
reject the proposals. Of course he did not come in person, but
he sent a message that he asked nothing but the restoration of
the banished to their former status and the judicial punishment of
the crimes that had been perpetrated, and moreover that he did not
desire security to be provided for himself, but proposed to bring
it to those who were at home. His envoys found the state of things
in Italy essentially altered. Cinna had, without concerning
himself further about that decree of the senate, immediately after
the termination of its sitting proceeded to the army and urged
it embarkation. The summons to trust themselves to the sea at
that unfavourable season of the year provoked among the already
dissatisfied troops in the head-quarters at Ancona a mutiny, to
which Cinna fell a victim (beg. of 670); whereupon his colleague
Carbo found himself compelled to bring back the divisions that had
already crossed and, abandoning the idea of taking up the war in
Greece, to enter into winter-quarters in Ariminum. But Sulla's
offers met no better reception on that account; the senate rejected
his proposals without even allowing the envoys to enter Rome, and
enjoined him summarily to lay down arms. It was not the coterie of
the Marians which primarily brought about this resolute attitude.
That faction was obliged to abandon its hitherto usurped occupation
of the supreme magistracy at the very time when it was of moment,
and again to institute consular elections for the decisive year
671. The suffrages on this occasion were united not in favour
of the former consul Carbo or of any of the able officers of the
hitherto ruling clique, such as Quintus Sertorius or Gaius Marius
the younger, but in favour of Lucius Scipio and Gaius Norbanus,
two incapables, neither of whom knew how to fight and Scipio not
even how to speak; the former of these recommended himself to the
multitude only as the great-grandson of the conqueror of Antiochus,
and the latter as a political opponent of the oligarchy.(11) The
Marians were not so much abhorred for their misdeeds as despised
for their incapacity; but if the nation would have nothing to do
with these, the great majority of it would have still less to do
with Sulla and an oligarchic restoration. Earnest measures of
self-defence were contemplated. While Sulla crossed to Asia and
induced such defection in the army of Fimbria that its leader
fell by his own hand, the government in Italy employed the further
interval of a year granted to it by these steps of Sulla in
energetic preparations; it is said that at Sulla's landing 100,000
men, and afterwards even double that number of troops, were arrayed
in arms against him.
Difficult Position of Sulla
Against this Italian force Sulla had nothing to place in the scale
except his five legions, which, even including some contingents
levied in Macedonia and the Peloponnesus, probably amounted to
scarce 40,000 men. It is true that this army had been, during
its seven years' conflicts in Italy, Greece, and Asia, weaned from
politics, and adhered to its general--who pardoned everything in
his soldiers, debauchery, brutality, even mutiny against their
officers, required nothing but valour and fidelity towards their
general, and set before them the prospect of the most extravagant
rewards in the event of victory--with all that soldierly
enthusiasm, which is the more powerful that the noblest and the
meanest passions often combine to produce it in the same breast.
The soldiers of Sulla voluntarily according to the Roman custom
swore mutual oaths that they would stand firmly by each other, and
each voluntarily brought to the general his savings as a contribution
to the costs of the war. But considerable as was the weight
of this solid and select body of troops in comparison with the
masses of the enemy, Sulla saw very well that Italy could not
be subdued with five legions if it remained united in resolute
resistance. To settle accounts with the popular party and their
incapable autocrats would not have been difficult; but he saw
opposed to him and united with that party the whole mass of those
who desired no oligarchic restoration with its terrors, and above
all the whole body of new burgesses--both those who had been
withheld by the Julian law from taking part in the insurrection,
and those whose revolt a few years before had brought Rome to
the brink of ruin.
His Moderation
Sulla fully surveyed the situation of affairs, and was far
removed from the blind exasperation and the obstinate rigour which
characterized the majority of his party. While the edifice of the
state was in flames, while his friends were being murdered, his
houses destroyed, his family driven into exile, he had remained
undisturbed at his post till the public foe was conquered and the
Roman frontier was secured. He now treated Italian affairs in the
same spirit of patriotic and judicious moderation, and did whatever
he could to pacify the moderate party and the new burgesses, and
to prevent the civil war from assuming the far more dangerous form
of a fresh war between the Old Romans and the Italian allies.
The first letter which Sulla addressed to the senate had asked
nothing but what was right and just, and had expressly disclaimed
a reign of terror. In harmony with its terms, he now presented
the prospect of unconditional pardon to all those who should even
now break off from the revolutionary government, and caused his
soldiers man by man to swear that they would meet the Italians
thoroughly as friends and fellow-citizens. The most binding
declarations secured to the new burgesses the political rights
which they had acquired; so that Carbo, for that reason, wished
hostages to be furnished to him by every civic community in Italy,
but the proposal broke down under general indignation and under the
opposition of the senate. The chief difficulty in the position of
Sulla really consisted in the fact, that in consequence of the
faithlessness and perfidy which prevailed the new burgesses had
every reason, if not to suspect his personal designs, to doubt at
any rate whether he would be able to induce his party to keep their
word after the victory.
Sulla Lands in Italy
And Is Reinforced by Partisans and Deserters
In the spring of 671 Sulla landed with his legions in the port
of Brundisium. The senate, on receiving the news, declared the
commonwealth in danger, and committed to the consuls unlimited
powers; but these incapable leaders had not looked before them,
and were surprised by a landing which had nevertheless been
foreseen for years. The army was still at Ariminum, the ports
were not garrisoned, and--what is almost incredible--there was
not a man under arms at all along the whole south-eastern coast.
The consequences were soon apparent Brundisium itself, a considerable
community of new burgesses, at once opened its gates without
resistance to the oligarchic general, and all Messapia and Apulia
followed its example. The army marched through these regions as
through a friendly country, and mindful of its oath uniformly
maintained the strictest discipline. From all sides the scattered
remnant of the Optimate party flocked to the camp of Sulla.
Quintus Metellus came from the mountain ravines of Liguria, whither
he had made his escape from Africa, and resumed, as colleague of
Sulla, the proconsular command committed to him in 667,(12) and
withdrawn from him by the revolution. Marcus Crassus in like
manner appeared from Africa with a small band of armed men. Most
of the Optimates, indeed, came as emigrants of quality with great
pretensions and small desire for fighting, so that they had to
listen to bitter language from Sulla himself regarding the noble
lords who wished to have themselves preserved for the good of the
state and could not even be brought to arm their slaves. It was of
more importance, that deserters already made their appearance from
the democratic camp--for instance, the refined and respected Lucius
Philippus, who was, along with one or two notoriously incapable
persons, the only consular that had come to terms with the
revolutionary government and accepted offices under it He met with
the most gracious reception from Sulla, and obtained the honourable
and easy charge of occupying for him the province of Sardinia.
Quintus Lucretius Ofella and other serviceable officers were
likewise received and at once employed; even Publius Cethegus,
one of the senators banished after the Sulpician -emeute- by Sulla,
obtained pardon and a position in the army.
Pompeius
Still more important than these individual accessions was the gain
of the district of Picenum, which was substantially due to the son
of Strabo, the young Gnaeus Pompeius. The latter, like his father
originally no adherent of the oligarchy, had acknowledged the
revolutionary government and even taken service in Cinna's army;
but in his case the fact was not forgotten, that his father had
borne arms against the revolution; he found himself assailed in
various forms and even threatened with the loss of his very
considerable wealth by an indictment charging him to give up
the booty which was, or was alleged to have been, embezzled by his
father after the capture of Asculum. The protection of the consul
Carbo, who was personally attached to him, still more than the
eloquence of the consular Lucius Philippus and of the young
Quintus Hortensius, averted from him financial ruin; but the
dissatisfaction remained. On the news of Sulla's landing he
went to Picenum, where he had extensive possessions and the best
municipal connections derived from his father and the Social war,
and set up the standard of the Optimate party in Auximum (Osimo).
The district, which was mostly inhabited by old burgesses, joined
him; the young men, many of whom had served with him under his
father, readily ranged themselves under the courageous leader who,
not yet twenty-three years of age, was as much soldier as general,
sprang to the front of his cavalry in combat, and vigorously
assailed the enemy along with them. The corps of Picenian
volunteers soon grew to three legions; divisions under Cloelius,
Gaius Carrinas, Lucius Junius Brutus Damasippus,(13) were
despatched from the capital to put down the Picenian insurrection,
but the extemporized general, dexterously taking advantage of the
dissensions that arose among them, had the skill to evade them or
to beat them in detail and to effect his junction with the main
army of Sulla, apparently in Apulia. Sulla saluted him as
-imperator-, that is, as an officer commanding in his own name
and not subordinate but co-ordinate, and distinguished the youth
by marks of honour such as he showed to none of his noble
clients--presumably not without the collateral design of thereby
administering an indirect rebuke to the lack of energetic character
among his own partisans.
Sulla in Campania Opposed by Norbanus and Scipio
Sulla Gains a Victory over Norbanus at Mount Tifata
Defection of Scipio's Army
Reinforced thus considerably both in a moral and material point
of view, Sulla and Metellus marched from Apulia through the still
insurgent Samnite districts towards Campania. The main force of
the enemy also proceeded thither, and it seemed as if the matter
could not but there be brought to a decision. The army of the
consul Gaius Norbanus was already at Capua, where the new colony
had just established itself with all democratic pomp; the second
consular army was likewise advancing along the Appian road. But,
before it arrived, Sulla was in front of Norbanus. A last attempt
at mediation, which Sulla made, led only to the arrest of his
envoys. With fresh indignation his veteran troops threw themselves
on the enemy; their vehement charge down from Mount Tifata at the
first onset broke the enemy drawn up in the plain; with the remnant
of his force Norbanus threw himself into the revolutionary colony
of Capua and the new-burgess town of Neapolis, and allowed himself
to be blockaded there. Sulla's troops, hitherto not without
apprehension as they compared their weak numbers with the masses
of the enemy, had by this victory gained a full conviction of their
military superiority, instead of pausing to besiege the remains of
the defeated army, Sulla left the towns where they took shelter to
be invested, and advanced along the Appian highway against Teanum,
where Scipio was posted. To him also, before beginning battle,
he made fresh proposals for peace; apparently in good earnest.
Scipio, weak as he was, entered into them; an armistice was
concluded; between Cales and Teanum the two generals, both members
of the same noble -gens-, both men of culture and refinement
and for many years colleagues in the senate, met in personal
conference; they entered upon the several questions; they had
already made such progress, that Scipio despatched a messenger
to Capua to procure the opinion of his colleague. Meanwhile the
soldiers of the two camps mingled; the Sullans, copiously furnished
with money by their general, had no great difficulty in persuading
the recruits--not too eager for warfare--over their cups that it
was better to have them as comrades than as foes; in vain Sertorius
warned the general to put a stop to this dangerous intercourse.
The agreement, which had seemed so near, was not effected; it was
Scipio who denounced the armistice. But Sulla maintained that it
was too late and that the agreement had been already concluded;
whereupon Scipio's soldiers, under the pretext that their general
had wrongfully denounced the armistice, passed over en masse to the
ranks of the enemy. The scene closed with an universal embracing,
at which the commanding officers of the revolutionary army had to
look on. Sulla gave orders that the consul should be summoned to
resign his office--which he did--and should along with his staff be
escorted by his cavalry to whatever point they desired; but Scipio
was hardly set at liberty when he resumed the insignia of his
dignity and began afresh to collect troops, without however
executing anything further of moment. Sulla and Metellus took
up winter-quarters in Campania and, after the failure of a second
attempt to come to terms with Norbanus, maintained the blockade
of Capua during the winter.
Preparations on Either Side
The results of the first campaign in favour of Sulla were the
submission of Apulia, Picenum, and Campania, the dissolution of
the one, and the vanquishing and blockading of the other, consular
army. The Italian communities, compelled severally to choose
between their twofold oppressors, already in numerous instances
entered into negotiations with him, and caused the political
rights, which had been won from the opposition party, to be
guaranteed to them by formal separate treaties on the part
of the general of the oligarchy. Sulla cherished the distinct
expectation, and intentionally made boast of it, that he would
overthrow the revolutionary government in the next campaign and
again march into Rome.
But despair seemed to furnish the revolution with fresh energies.
The consulship was committed to two of its most decided leaders,
to Carbo for the third time and to Gaius Marius the younger; the
circumstance that the latter, who was just twenty years of age,
could not legally be invested with the consulship, was as little
heeded as any other point of the constitution. Quintus Sertorius,
who in this and other matters proved an inconvenient critic, was
ordered to proceed to Etruria with a view to procure new levies,
and thence to his province Hither Spain. To replenish the
treasury, the senate was obliged to decree the melting down of
the gold and silver vessels of the temples in the capital; how
considerable the produce was, is clear from the fact that after
several months' warfare there was still on hand nearly 600,000
pounds (14,000 pounds of gold and 6000 pounds of silver). In the
considerable portion of Italy, which still voluntarily or under
compulsion adhered to the revolution, warlike preparations were
prosecuted with vigour. Newly-formed divisions of some strength
came from Etruria, where the communities of new burgesses were very
numerous, and from the region of the Po. The veterans of Marius
in great numbers ranged themselves under the standards at the call
of his son. But nowhere were preparations made for the struggle
against Sulla with such eagerness as in the insurgent Samnium and
some districts of Lucania. It was owing to anything but devotion
towards the revolutionary Roman government, that numerous
contingents from the Oscan districts reinforced their armies;
but it was well understood there that an oligarchy restored by
Sulla would not acquiesce, like the lax Cinnan government, in
the independence of these lands as now de facto subsisting; and
therefore the primitive rivalry between the Sabellians and
the Latins was roused afresh in the struggle against Sulla.
For Samnium and Latium this war was as much a national struggle
as the wars of the fifth century; they strove not for a greater
or less amount of political rights, but for the purpose of appeasing
long-suppressed hate by the annihilation of their antagonist.
It was no wonder, therefore, that the war in this region bore
a character altogether different from the conflicts elsewhere,
that no compromise was attempted there, that no quarter was given
or taken, and that the pursuit was continued to the very uttermost.
Thus the campaign of 672 was begun on both sides with augmented
military resources and increased animosity. The revolution in
particular threw away the scabbard: at the suggestion of Carbo
the Roman comitia outlawed all the senators that should be found
in Sulla's camp. Sulla was silent; he probably thought that
they were pronouncing sentence beforehand on themselves.
Sulla Proceeds to Latium to Oppose the Younger Marius
His Victory at Sacriportus
Democratic Massacres in Rome
The army of the Optimates was divided. The proconsul Metellus
undertook, resting on the support of the Picenian insurrection, to
advance to Upper Italy, while Sulla marched from Campania straight
against the capital. Carbo threw himself in the way of the former;
Marius would encounter the main army of the enemy in Latium.
Advancing along the Via Latina, Sulla fell in with the enemy not
far from Signia; they retired before him as far as the so-called
"Port of Sacer," between Signia and the chief stronghold of the
Marians, the strong Praeneste. There Marius drew up his force for
battle. His army was about 40,000 strong, and he was in savage
fury and personal bravery the true son of his father; but his
troops were not the well trained bands with which the latter had
fought his battles, and still less might this inexperienced young
man bear comparison with the old master of war. His troops soon
gave way; the defection of a division even during the battle
accelerated the defeat. More than the half of the Marians were
dead or prisoners; the remnant, unable either to keep the field or
to gain the other bank of the Tiber, was compelled to seek
protection in the neighbouring fortresses; the capital, which they
had neglected to provision, was irrecoverably lost. In consequence
of this Marius gave orders to Lucius Brutus Damasippus, the praetor
commanding there, to evacuate it, but before doing so to put to
death all the esteemed men, hitherto spared, of the opposite party.
This injunction, by which the son even outdid the proscriptions of
his father, was carried into effect; Damasippus made a pretext for
convoking the senate, and the marked men were struck down partly in
the sitting itself, partly on their flight from the senate-house.
Notwithstanding the thorough clearance previously effected, there
were still found several victims of note. Such were the former
aedile Publius Antistius, the father-in-law of Gnaeus Pompeius,
and the former praetor Gaius Carbo, son of the well-known friend
and subsequent opponent of the Gracchi,(14) since the death of
so many men of more distinguished talent the two best orators in
the judicial courts of the desolated Forum; the consular Lucius
Domitius, and above all the venerable -pontifex maximus- Quintus
Scaevola, who had escaped the dagger of Fimbria only to bleed to
death during these last throes of the revolution in the vestibule
of the temple of Vesta entrusted to his guardianship. With
speechlesshorror the multitude saw the corpses of these last
victims of the reign of terror dragged through the streets,
and thrown into the river.
Siege of Praeneste
Occupation of Rome
The broken bands of Marius threw themselves into the neighbouring
and strong cities of new burgesses Norba and Praeneste: Marius in
person with the treasure and the greater part of the fugitives
entered the latter. Sulla left an able officer, Quintus Ofella,
before Praeneste just as he had done in the previous year before
Capua, with instructions not to expend his strength in the siege
of the strong town, but to enclose it with an extended line of
blockade and starve it into surrender. He himself advanced from
different sides upon the capital, which as well as the whole
surrounding district he found abandoned by the enemy, and occupied
without resistance. He barely took time to compose the minds of
the people by an address and to make the most necessary arrangements,
and immediately passed on to Etruria, that in concert with Metellus
he might dislodge his antagonists from Northern Italy.
Metellus against Carbo in Northern Italy
Carbo Assailed on Three Sides of Etruria
Metellus had meanwhile encountered and defeated Carbo's lieutenant
Carrinas at the river Aesis (Esino between Ancona and Sinigaglia),
which separated the district of Picenum from the Gallic province;
when Carbo in person came up with his superior army, Metellus had
been obliged to abstain from any farther advance. But on the news
of the battle at Sacriportus, Carbo, anxious about his communications,
had retreated to the Flaminian road, with a view to take up his
headquarters at the meeting-point of Ariminum, and from that point
to hold the passes of the Apennines on the one hand and the valley
of the Po on the other. In this retrograde movement different
divisions fell into the hands of the enemy, and not only so,
but Sena Gallica was stormed and Carbo's rearguard was broken
in a brilliant cavalry engagement by Pompeius; nevertheless Carbo
attained on the whole his object. The consular Norbanus took
the command in the valley of the Po; Carbo himself proceeded to
Etruria. But the march of Sulla with his victorious legions to
Etruria altered the position of affairs; soon three Sullan armies
from Gaul, Umbria, and Rome established communications with each
other. Metellus with the fleet went past Ariminum to Ravenna, and
at Faventia cut off the communication between Ariminum and the
valley of the Po, into which he sent forward a division along the
great road to Placentia under Marcus Lucullus, the quaestor of
Sulla and brother of his admiral in the Mithradatic war. The young
Pompeius and his contemporary and rival Crassus penetrated from
Picenum by mountain-paths into Umbria and gained the Flaminian road
at Spoletium, where they defeated Carbo's legate Carrinas and shut
him up in the town; he succeeded, however, in escaping from it on
a rainy night and making his way, though not without loss, to the
army of Carbo. Sulla himself marched from Rome into Etruria with
his army in two divisions, one of which advancing along the coast
defeated the corps opposed to it at Saturnia (between the rivers
Ombrone and Albegna); the second led by Sulla in person fell in
with the army of Carbo in the valley of the Clanis, and sustained
a successful conflict with his Spanish cavalry. But the pitched
battle which was fought between Carbo and Sulla in the region of
Chiusi, although it ended without being properly decisive, was
so far at any rate in favour of Carbo that Sulla's victorious
advance was checked.
Conflicts about Praeneste
In the vicinity of Rome also events appeared to assume a more
favourable turn for the revolutionary party, and the war seemed
as if it would again be drawn chiefly towards this region.
For, while the oligarchic party were concentrating all their
energies on Etruria, the democracy everywhere put forth the utmost
efforts to break the blockade of Praeneste. Even the governor of
Sicily Marcus Perpenna set out for that purpose; it does not appear,
however, that he reached Praeneste. Nor was the very considerable
corps under Marcius, detached by Carbo, more successful in this;
assailed and defeated by the troops of the enemy which were at
Spoletium, demoralized by disorder, want of supplies, and mutiny,
one portion went back to Carbo, another to Ariminum; the rest
dispersed. Help in earnest on the other hand came from Southern
Italy. There the Samnites under Pontius of Telesia, and the
Lucanians under their experienced general Marcus Lamponius, set
out without its being possible to prevent their departure, were
joined in Campania where Capua still held out by a division of
the garrison under Gutta, and thus to the number, it was said, of
70,000 marched upon Praeneste. Thereupon Sulla himself, leaving
behind a corps against Carbo, returned to Latium and took up a
well-chosen position in the defiles in front of Praeneste, where
he barred the route of the relieving army.(15) In vain the garrison
attempted to break through the lines of Ofella, in vain the
relieving army attempted to dislodge Sulla; both remained
immoveable in their strong positions, even after Damasippus,
sent by Carbo, had reinforced the relieving army with two legions.
Successes of the Sullans in Upper Italy
Etruria Occupied by the Sullans
But while the war stood still in Etruria and in Latium, matters
came to a decision in the valley of the Po. There the general of
the democracy, Gaius Norbanus, had hitherto maintained the upper
hand, had attacked Marcus Lucullus the legate of Metellus with
superior force and compelled him to shut himself up in Placentia,
and had at length turned against Metellus in person. He encountered
the latter at Faventia, and immediately made his attack late in
the afternoon with his troops fatigued by their march; the consequence
was a complete defeat and the total breaking up of his corps, of which
only about 1000 men returned to Etruria. On the news of this battle
Lucullus sallied from Placentia, and defeated the division left behind
to oppose him at Fidentia (between Piacenza and Parma). The Lucanian
troops of Albinovanus deserted in a body: their leader made up
for his hesitation at first by inviting the chief officers of
the revolutionary army to banquet with him and causing them to be
put to death; in general every one, who at all could, now concluded
his peace. Ariminum with all its stores and treasures fell into the
power of Metellus; Norbanus embarked for Rhodes; the whole land between
the Alps and Apennines acknowledged the government of the Optimates.
The troops hitherto employed there were enabled to turn to the attack
of Etruria, the last province where their antagonists still kept
the field. When Carbo received this news in the camp at Clusium,
he lost his self-command; although he had still a considerable body
of troops under his orders, he secretly escaped from his headquarters
and embarked for Africa. Part of his abandoned troops followed the
example which their general had set, and went home; part of them were
destroyed by Pompeius: Carrinas gathered together the remainder and
led them to Latium to join the army of Praeneste. There no change
had in the meanwhile taken place; and the final decision drew nigh.
The troops of Carrinas were not numerous enough to shake Sulla's
position; the vanguard of the army of the oligarchic party,
hitherto employed in Etruria, was approaching under Pompeius;
in a few days the net would be drawn tight around the army of
the democrats and the Samnites.
The Samnites and Democrats Attack Rome
Battle at the Colline Gate
Slaughter of the Prisoners
Its leaders then determined to desist from the relief of Praeneste
and to throw themselves with all their united strength on Rome,
which was only a good day's march distant. By so doing they were,
in a military point of view, ruined; their line of retreat, the
Latin road, would by such a movement fall into Sulla's hands;
and even if they got possession of Rome, they would be infallibly
crushed there, enclosed within a city by no means fitted for
defence, and wedged in between the far superior armies of Metellus
and Sulla. Safety, however, was no longer thought of; revenge
alone dictated this march to Rome, the last outbreak of fury in
the passionate revolutionists and especially in the despairing
Sabellian nation. Pontius of Telesia was in earnest, when he
called out to his followers that, in order to get rid of the wolves
which had robbed Italy of freedom, the forest in which they
harboured must be destroyed. Never was Rome in a more fearful
peril than on the 1st November 672, when Pontius, Lamponius,
Carrinas, Damasippus advanced along the Latin road towards Rome,
and encamped about a mile from the Colline gate. It was threatened
with a day like the 20th July 365 u. c. or the 15th June 455 a. d.--
the days of the Celts and the Vandals. The time was gone by when
a coup de main against Rome was a foolish enterprise, and the
assailants could have no want of connections in the capital.
The band of volunteers which sallied from the city, mostly youths
of quality, was scattered like chaff before the immense superiority
of force. The only hope of safety rested on Sulla. The latter,
on receiving accounts of the departure of the Samnite army in
the direction of Rome, had likewise set out in all haste to the
assistance of the capital. The appearance of his foremost horsemen
under Balbus in the course of the morning revived the sinking
courage of the citizens; about midday he appeared in person with
his main force, and immediately drew up his ranks for battle at
the temple of the Erycine Aphrodite before the Colline gate (not
far from Porta Pia). His lieutenants adjured him not to send the
troops exhausted by the forced march at once into action; but Sulla
took into consideration what the night might bring on Rome, and,
late as it was in the afternoon, ordered the attack. The battle
was obstinately contested and bloody. The left wing of Sulla,
which he led in person, gave way as far as the city wall, so that
it became necessary to close the city gates; stragglers even
brought accounts to Ofella that the battle was lost. But on the
right wing Marcus Crassus overthrew the enemy and pursued him as
far as Antemnae; this somewhat relieved the left wing also, and an
hour after sunset it in turn began to advance. The fight continued
the whole night and even on the following morning; it was only the
defection of a division of 3000 men, who immediately turned their
arms against their former comrades, that put an end to the
struggle. Rome was saved. The army of the insurgents, for which
there was no retreat, was completely extirpated. The prisoners
taken in the battle--between 3000 and 4000 in number, including the
generals Damasippus, Carrinas, and the severely-wounded Pontius--
were by Sulla's orders on the third day after the battle brought to
the Villa Publica in the Campus Martius and there massacred to the
last man, so that the clatter of arms and the groans of the dying
were distinctly heard in the neighbouring temple of Bellona, where
Sulla was just holding a meeting of the senate. It was a ghastly
execution, and it ought not to be excused; but it is not right to
forget that those very men who perished there had fallen like a
band of robbers on the capital and the burgesses, and, had they
found time, would have destroyed them as far as fire and sword
can destroy a city and its citizens.
Sieges
Praeneste
Norba
Nola
With this battle the war was, in the main, at an end. The garrison
of Praeneste surrendered, when it learned the issue of the battle
of Rome from the heads of Carrinas and other officers thrown over
the walls. The leaders, the consul Gaius Marius and the son of
Pontius, after having failed in an attempt to escape, fell on each
other's swords. The multitude cherished the hope, in which it
was confirmed by Cethegus, that the victor would even now have
mercy upon them. But the times of mercy were past. The more
unconditionally Sulla had up to the last moment granted full pardon
to those who came over to him, the more inexorable he showed
himself toward the leaders and communities that had held out to
the end. Of the Praenestine prisoners, 12,000 in number, most
of the Romans and individual Praenestines as well as the women
and children were released, but the Roman senators, almost all
the Praenestines and the whole of the Samnites, were disarmed and
cut to pieces; and the rich city was given up to pillage. It was
natural that, after such an occurrence, the cities of new burgesses
which had not yet passed over should continue their resistance with
the utmost obstinacy. In the Latin town of Norba for instance,
when Aemilius Lepidus got into it by treason, the citizens killed
each other and set fire themselves to their town, solely in order
to deprive their executioners of vengeance and of booty. In Lower
Italy Neapolis had already been taken by assault, and Capua had,
as it would seem, been voluntarily surrendered; but Nola was only
evacuated by the Samnites in 674. On his flight from Nola the last
surviving leader of note among the Italians, the consul of the
insurgents in the hopeful year 664, Gaius Papius Mutilus, disowned
by his wife to whom he had stolen in disguise and with whom he had
hoped to find an asylum, fell on his sword in Teanum before the
door of his own house. As to the Samnites, the dictator declared
that Rome would have no rest so long as Samnium existed, and that
the Samnite name must therefore be extirpated from the earth; and,
as he verified these words in terrible fashion on the prisoners
taken before Rome and in Praeneste, so he appears to have also
undertaken a raid for the purpose of laying waste the country,
to have captured Aesernia(16) (674?), and to have converted that
hitherto flourishing and populous region into the desert which it
has since remained. In the same manner Tuder in Umbria was stormed
by Marcus Crassus. A longer resistance was offered in Etruria
by Populonium and above all by the impregnable Volaterrae, which
gathered out of the remains of the beaten party an army of four
legions, and stood a two years' siege conducted first by Sulla
in person and then by the former praetor Gaius Carbo, the brother
of the democratic consul, till at length in the third year after
the battle at the Colline gate (675) the garrison capitulated on
condition of free departure. But in this terrible time neither
military law nor military discipline was regarded; the soldiers
raised a cry of treason and stoned their too compliant general; a
troop of horse sent by the Roman government cut down the garrison
as it withdrew in terms of the capitulation. The victorious army
was distributed throughout Italy, and all the insecure townships
were furnished with strong garrisons: under the iron hand of the
Sullan officers the last palpitations of the revolutionary and
national opposition slowly died away.
The Provinces
There was still work to be done in the provinces. Sardinia had
been speedily wrested by Lucius Philippus from the governor of the
revolutionary government Quintus Antonius (672), and Transalpine
Gaul offered little or no resistance; but in Sicily, Spain, and
Africa the cause of the party defeated in Italy seemed still by
no means lost. Sicily was held for them by the trustworthy governor
Marcus Perpenna. Quintus Sertorius had the skill to attach to
himself the provincials in Hither Spain, and to form from among the
Romans settled in that quarter a not inconsiderable army, which in
the first instance closed the passes of the Pyrenees: in this he
had given fresh proof that, wherever he was stationed, he was in
his place, and amidst all the incapables of the revolution was the
only man practically useful. In Africa the governor Hadrianus, who
followed out the work of revolutionizing too thoroughly and began
to give liberty to the slaves, had been, on occasion of a tumult
instigated by the Roman merchants of Utica, attacked in his
official residence and burnt with his attendants (672); nevertheless
the province adhered to the revolutionary government, and Cinna's
son-in-law, the young and able Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus,
was invested with the supreme command there. Propagandism had
even been carried from thence into the client-states, Numidia
and Mauretania. Their legitimate rulers, Hiempsal II son of Gauda,
and Bogud son of Bocchus, adhered doubtless to Sulla; but with the
aid of the Cinnans the former had been dethroned by the democratic
pretender Hiarbas, and similar feuds agitated the Mauretanian
kingdom. The consul Carbo who had fled from Italy tarried on the
island Cossyra (Pantellaria) between Africa and Sicily, at a loss,
apparently, whether he should flee to Egypt or should attempt to
renew the struggle in one of the faithful provinces.
Spain
Sertorius Embarks
Sulla sent to Spain Gaius Annius and Gaius Valerius Flaccus,
the former as governor of Further Spain, the latter as governor
of the province of the Ebro. They were spared the difficult task
of opening up the passes of the Pyrenees by force, in consequence
of the general who was sent thither by Sertorius having been killed
by one of his officers and his troops having thereafter melted away.
Sertorius, much too weak to maintain an equal struggle, hastily
collected the nearest divisions and embarked at New Carthage--for
what destination he knew not himself, perhaps for the coast of
Africa, or for the Canary Islands--it mattered little whither,
provided only Sulla's arm did not reach him. Spain then willingly
submitted to the Sullan magistrates (about 673) and Flaccus fought
successfully with the Celts, through whose territory he marched,
and with the Spanish Celtiberians (674).
Sicily
Gnaeus Pompeius was sent as propraetor to Sicily, and, when he
appeared on the coast with 120 sail and six legions, the island was
evacuated by Perpenna without resistance. Pompeius sent a squadron
thence to Cossyra, which captured the Marian officers sojourning
there. Marcus Brutus and the others were immediately executed;
but Pompeius had enjoined that the consul Carbo should be brought
before himself at Lilybaeum in order that, unmindful of the
protection accorded to him in a season of peril by that very
man,(17) he might personally hand him over to the executioner (672).
Africa
Having been ordered to go on to Africa, Pompeius with his
army which was certainly far more numerous, defeated the not
inconsiderable forces collected by Ahenobarbus and Hiarbas, and,
declining for the time to be saluted as -imperator-, he at once
gave the signal for assault on the hostile camp. He thus became
master of the enemy in one day; Ahenobarbus was among the fallen:
with the aid of king Bogud, Hiarbas was seized and slain at Bulla,
and Hiempsal was reinstated in his hereditary kingdom; a great
razzia against the inhabitants of the desert, among whom a number
of Gaetulian tribes recognized as free by Marius were made subject
to Hiempsal, revived in Africa also the fallen repute of the Roman
name: in forty days after the landing of Pompeius in Africa all was
at an end (674?). The senate instructed him to break up his army--
an implied hint that he was not to be allowed a triumph, to which
as an extraordinary magistrate he could according to precedent make
no claim. The general murmured secretly, the soldiers loudly; it
seemed for a moment as if the African army would revolt against the
senate and Sulla would have to take the field against his son-in-
law. But Sulla yielded, and allowed the young man to boast of
being the only Roman who had become a triumphator before he was
a senator (12 March 675); in fact the "Fortunate," not perhaps
without a touch of irony, saluted the youth on his return from
these easy exploits as the "Great."
Fresh Difficulties with Mithradates
In the east also, after the embarkation of Sulla in the spring of
671, there had been no cessation of warfare. The restoration of
the old state of things and the subjugation of individual towns
cost in Asia as in Italy various bloody struggles. Against the
free city of Mytilene in particular Lucius Lucullus was obliged
at length to bring up troops, after having exhausted all gentler
measures; and even a victory in the open field did not put an end
to the obstinate resistance of the citizens.
Meanwhile the Roman governor of Asia, Lucius Murena, had fallen
into fresh difficulties with king Mithradates. The latter had
since the peace busied himself in strengthening anew his rule,
which was shaken even in the northern provinces; he had pacified
the Colchians by appointing his able son Mithradates as their
governor; he had then made away with that son, and was now preparing
for an expedition into his Bosporan kingdom. The assurances of
Archelaus who had meanwhile been obliged to seek an asylum with
Murena,(18) that these preparations were directed against Rome,
induced Murena, under the pretext that Mithradates still kept
possession of Cappadocian frontier districts, to move his troops
towards the Cappadocian Comana and thus to violate the Pontic
frontier (671). Mithradates contented himself with complaining
to Murena and, when this was in vain, to the Roman government.
In fact commissioners from Sulla made their appearance to dissuade
the governor, but he did not submit; on the contrary he crossed
the Halys and entered on the undisputed territory of Pontus,
whereupon Mithradates resolved to repel force by force. His general
Gordius had to detain the Roman army till the king came up with
far superior forces and compelled battle; Murena was vanquished
and with great loss driven back over the Roman frontier to Phrygia,
and the Roman garrisons were expelled from all Cappadocia. Murena
had the effrontery, no doubt, to call himself the victor and to
assume the title of -imperator- on account of these events (672);
but the sharp lesson and a second admonition from Sulla induced
him at last to push the matter no farther; the peace between
Rome and Mithradates was renewed (673).
Second Peace
Capture of Mytilene
This foolish feud, while it lasted, had postponed the reduction
of the Mytilenaeans; it was only after a long siege by land and
by sea, in which the Bithynian fleet rendered good service, that
Murena's successor succeeded in taking the city by storm (675).
General Peace
The ten years' revolution and insurrection were at an end in the
west and in the east; the state had once more unity of government
and peace without and within. After the terrible convulsions of
the last years even this rest was a relief. Whether it was to
furnish more than a mere relief; whether the remarkable man, who
had succeeded in the difficult task of vanquishing the public foe
and in the more difficult work of subduing the revolution, would
be able to meet satisfactorily the most difficult task of all--
the re-establishing of social and political order shaken to its
very foundations--could not but be speedily decided