Complete Works of Eutropius

by Eutropius

  XVII

  The consul Quintus Pompeius being afterwards defeated by the Numantines, the most powerful nation of Spain, made an ignominious peace with them. After him. the consul Caius Hostilius Mancinus again concluded a dishonourable peace with the Numantines, which the people and senate ordered to be annulled, and Mancinus himself to be given up to the enemy, that they might avenge themselves for the dissolution of the treaty on him with whom they had made it.4 After such signal disgrace, therefore, with which the Roman armies had been twice defeated by the Numantines, Publius Scipio Africanus was made consul a second time, and sent to Numantia. He reformed, in the first place, the dissolute and idle soldiery, rather by inuring them to labour than by punishment, and without any great severity. He then took several cities of Spain, some by force, and allowing others to surrender. At last he reduced Numantia itself by famine, after it had been long besieged, and razed it to the ground, and received the rest of the province into alliance.

  XVIII

  About this time Attalus, king of Asia, the brother of Eumenes, died, and left the Roman people his heir. Thus Asia was added to the Roman empire by will.

  XIX

  Shortly after, also, Decimus Junius Brutus triumphed with great glory over the Gallaeciansand Lusitanians; and Publius Scipio Africanus had a second triumph over the Numantines. in the fourteenth year after his first triumph for his exploits in Africa.

  XX

  A war in the meantime was kindled in Asia by Aristonicus, the son of Eumenes by a concubine: this Eumenes was the brother of Attalus. Against him was sent out Publius Licinius Crassus, who had ample assistance from several kings, for not only Nicomedes, the king of Bithynia, supported the Romans, but also Mithridates king of Pontus, with whom they had afterwards a very great war, as well as Ariarathes, king of Cappadocia, and Pylaemenes of Paphlagonia. Crassus notwithstanding was defeated, and killed in battle; his head was carried to Aristonicus, and his body buried at Smyrna. Soon after Perperna, the Roman consul, who was appointed successor to Grassus, hearing of the event of the war, hastened to Asia; and defeating Aristonicus in battle, near the city Stratonice to which he had fled, reduced him by famine to surrender. Aristonicus, by command of the senate, was strangled in prison at Rome; for a triumph could not be celebrated on his account, because Perperna had died at Pergamus on his return.

  XXI

  In the consulate of Lucius Caecilius Metellus and Titus Quintius Flamininus, Carthage in Africa, which still exists, was rebuilt by order of the senate, two and twenty years after it had been destroyed by Scipio. A colony of Roman citizens was sent out thither.

  XXII

  In the six hundred and twenty-seventh year from the founding of the city, Caius Cassius Longinus and Sextus Domitius Calvinus, the consuls, made war upon the Trans alpine Gauls, and the city of the Arverni, at that time very distinguished, and their king, Bituitus; and slew a vast number of men near the river Rhone. A great booty, consisting of the golden collars of the Gauls, was brought to Rome. Bituitus surrendered himself to Domitius, and was conveyed by him to Rome; and both consuls triumphed with great glory.

  XXIII

  In the consulship of Marcus Porcius Cato and Quintus Marcius Rex, in the six hundred and thirty-third year from the building of the city, a colony was led out to Narbonne in Gaul. Afterwards a triumph was obtained over Dalmatia by the consuls Lucius Metellus and Quintus Mucius Scaevola.

  XXIV

  In the six hundred and thirty-fifth year from the building of the city, the consul Caius Cato made war upon the Scordisci, and fought with them to his dishonour.

  XXV

  When Caius Caecilius Metellus and Cnaeus Carbo were consuls, the Metelli, two brothers, had triumphs on the same day, one for Sardinia, the other for Thrace; and news was brought to Rome, that the Cimbri had crossed from Gaul into Italy.

  XXVI

  In the consulship of Publius Scipio Nasica and Lucius Calpurnius Bestia, war was made upon Jugurtha, king of Numidia, because he had murdered Adherbal and Hiempsal, the sons of Micipsa, his cousins, princes, and allies of the Roman people. The consul Calpumius Bestia being sent against him, was corrupted by the king’s money, and concluded a most ignominious treaty of peace with him, which was afterwards repudiated by the senate. Spurius Albinus Postumius proceeded against him in the following year: he also, through the agency of his brother, fought against the Numidians to his disgrace.

  XXVII

  In the third place, the consul Quintus Caecilius Metellus being sent out against him, brought back the army, which he reformed with great severity and judgment, without exercising cruelty on any one, to the ancient Roman discipline. He defeated Jugurtha in various battles, killed or captured his elephants, and obliged many of his towns to surrender; and, when on the point of putting an end to the war, was succeeded by Caius Marius. Marius overthrew both Jugurtha and Bocchus, the king of Mauritania, who had undertaken to afford assistance to Jugurtha; he also took several towns in Numidia, and put an end to the war, having, through the instrumentality of his quaestor Cornelius Sulla, a distinguished man, taken Jugurtha prisoner, whom Bocchus, who had before fought for him, betrayed.

  In Gaul, the Cimbri were defeated by Marcus Junius Silanus, the colleague of Quintus Metellus, the Scordisci and Triballi in Macedonia by Minutius Rufus, and the Lusitani in Spain by Servilius Caepio; and two triumphs were celebrated on account of Jugurtha; the first by Metellus, the second by Marius. It was before the chariot of Marius, however, that Jugurtha, with his two sons, was led in chains; and he was soon after, by order of the consul, strangled in prison.

  ENDNOTES.

  1 186 BC.

  2 Altero. The Greek translator gives e9ni, in which signification he seems to have taken altero; as also in i. 18. On this point the learned are constantly disputing, and especially on the 49th epitome of Livy, where Duker does not decide whether alter signifies first or second. — Tzschucke. I consider that alter, used as in this passage, and as in i. 18, always signifies second. In such phrases as alter ab undecimo, Virg Ecl. viii. 39, it of course has a different signification.

  3 The sentence in brackets is not found in all manuscripts; nor is it acknowledged by the Greek translator. Verheyk, Cellarius, and Tzschucke omit it. “Some say that this hermaphrodite was born in the following year, and that a great pestilence ensued.” — Madame Dacier. See Livy, xxvii. 11, 37; xxxi. 12.

  4 See Florus, ii. 18; Vell. Pat. ii 1, 90, Bohn’s Cl. Library.

  BOOK V

  The war with the Cimbri, Teutones, and their allies, I. II. — The Social war, III. — The Civil war between Marius and Sulla, IV. — The Mithridatic war; the Thracian; continuation and conclusion of the Civil war, V. — IX.

  I

  While the war was going on in Numidia against Jugurtha, the Roman consuls, Marcus Manlius and Quintus Caepio, were defeated1 by the Cimbri, Teutones, Tigurini, and Ambrones, nations of Germany and Gaul, near the river Rhone; and, being reduced by a terrible slaughter, lost their very camp, as well as the greater part of their army. Great was the consternation at Rome, such as was scarcely experienced during the Punic wars in the time of Hannibal, from dread that the Gauls might again march to the city. Marius, in consequence, after his victory over Jugurtha, was created consul the second time,2 and the war against the Cimbri and Teutones was committed to his management. The consulship was also conferred on him a third3 and fourth time,4 in consequence of the war with the Cimbri being protracted; but in his fourth consulship he had for his colleague Quintus Lutatius Catulus. He came to battle, accordingly,5 with the Cimbri, and in two engagements killed two hundred thousand of the enemy, and took eighty thousand prisoners, with their general Teutobodus;6 for which service he was elected consul a fifth time during his absence.7

  II

  In the meantime the Cimbri and Teutones, whose force was still innumerable, passed over into Italy. Another battle was fought with them, by Caius Marius and Quintus Catulus, though with greater success on the part of Catulus, for in tha
t battle, in which they both commanded, a hundred and forty thousand were either slain in the field or in the pursuit, and sixty thousand taken prisoners. Of the Roman soldiers in the two armies three hundred fell. Thirty-three standards were taken from the Cimbri; of which the army of Marius captured two, that of Catulus thirty-one.8 This was the end of the war: a triumph was decreed to both the consuls.

  III

  In the consulship of Sextus Julius Caesar and Lucius Marcius Philippus, in the six hundred and fifty-ninth year from the building of the city,9 when almost all other wars were at an end, the Piceni, Marsi, and Peligni, excited a most dangerous war in Italy;10 for after they had lived for many years in subjection to the Roman people, they now began to assert their claim to equal privileges. This was a very destructive war. Publius Rutilius, one of the consuls, Caepio, a nobleman in the flower of his age, and Porcius Cato, another consul, were killed in it. The generals against the Romans on the part of the Piceni and Marsi were Titus Vettius, Hierius Asinius, Titus Herennius, and Aulus Cluentius. The Romans fought against them successfully under the conduct of Caius Marius, who had now been made consul for the sixth time, also under Cnaeus Pompey, but particularly under Lucius Cornelius Sulla, who, among other signal exploits, so completely routed Cluentius, one of the enemy’s generals, with his numerous forces, that he lost only one man of his own army. The war, however, was protracted for four years, with great havoc; at length, in the fifth, it was terminated by Lucius Cornelius Sulla when consul, who had greatly distinguished himself on many occasions when praetor in the same war.

  IV

  In the six hundred and sixty-second year from the foundation of the city,11 the first civil war began at Rome; and in the same year also the Mithridatic war. Marius, when in his sixth consulship, gave rise to the Civil war; for when Sulla. the consul, was sent to conduct the war against Mithridates, who had possessed himself of Asia and Achaia, and delayed his army for a short time in Campania, in order that the remains of the Social war, of which we have just spoken, and which had been carried on within the limits of Italy, might be extinguished, Marius showed himself ambitious to be appointed to the Mithridatic war. Sulla, being incensed at this conduct, marched to Rome with his army. There he fought with Marius and Sulpicius; he was the first to enter the city in arms; Sulpicius he killed; Marius he put to flight; and then, having appointed Cnaeus Octavius and Lucius Cornelius Cinna the consuls for the year ensuing, set out for Asia.

  V

  For Mithridates, who was king of Pontus, and possessed Armenia Minor and the entire circuit of the Pontic sea with the Bosphorus, first attempted to expel Nicomedes, an ally of the Romans, from Bithynia; sending word to the senate, that he was going to make war upon him on account of the injuries which he had received. Answer was returned by the senate to Mithridates, that if he did so he himself should feel the weight of a war from the Romans. Incensed at this reply, he immediately invaded Cappadocia, and expelled from thence Ariobarzanes the king, an ally of the Roman people. He next marched into Bithynia and Paphlagonia, driving out the kings, Pylaemenes and Nicomedes, who were also in alliance with the Romans. He then hastened to Ephesus, and sent letters into all parts of Asia, with directions that wherever any Roman citizens should be found, they should all be put to death the same day.

  VI

  In the meantime Athens also, a city of Achaia, was delivered up to Mithridates by Aristion an Athenian. For Mithridates had previously sent Archelaus, his general, into Achaia, with a hundred and twenty thousand horse and foot, by whom the rest of Greece was also occupied. Sulla besieged Archelaus at the Piraeeus near Athens, and took the city itself. Engaging afterwards in battle with Archelaus, he gave him such a defeat, that out of a hundred and twenty thousand of the army of Archelaus scarce ten remained; while of that of Sulla only fourteen were killed. Mithridates, on receiving intelligence of this battle, sent seventy thousand chosen troops out of Asia to Archelaus, with whom Sulla came again to an engagement. In the first battle twenty thousand of the enemy were slain, and Diogenes, the son of Archelaus; in the second the entire forces of Mithridates were cut off. Archelaus himself lay hid for three days, stript of his armour, in the marshes. On the news of this state of things, Mithridates sent orders to treat with Sulla concerning peace.

  VII

  In the meantime Sulla also reduced part of the Dardanians, Scordisci, Dalmatians, and Maedians, and granted terms of. alliance to the rest. But when ambassadors arrived from King Mithridates to treat about peace, Sulla replied that he would grant it on no other condition than that he should quit the countries on which he had seized, and withdraw into his own dominions. Afterwards, however, the two came to a conference, and peace was settled between them, in order that Sulla, who was in haste to proceed to the Civil war, might leave no danger in his rear; for while Sulla was victorious over Mithridates in Achaia and Asia, Marius, who had been driven from the city, and Cornelius Cinna, one of the consuls, had recommenced hostilities in Italy, and entering Rome, put to death the noblest of the senators and others of consular rank, proscribed many, and pulling down the house of Sulla himself, forced his sons and wife to seek safety by flight; while all the rest of the senate, hastily quitting the city, fled to Sulla in Greece, entreating him to come to the support of his country. He accordingly crossed over into Italy, to conduct the Civil war against the consuls Norbanus and Scipio. In the first battle he engaged with Norbanus not far from Capua, when he killed seven thousand of his men, and took six thousand prisoners, losing only a hundred and twenty-four of his own army. From thence he directed his efforts against Scipio, and before a battle was fought, or any blood shed, he received the surrender of his whole army.

  VIII

  But on a change of consuls at Rome, and the election of Marius, the son of Marius, and Papirius Carbo to the consulate, Sulla again came to battle with Marius the younger, and killed fifteen thousand men, with the loss of only four hundred. Immediately afterwards also he entered the city. He then pursued Marius, the younger, to Praeneste, besieged him there, and drove him even to self-destruction. He afterwards fought a terrible battle with Lamponius and Carinas, the leaders of the Marian faction, near the Colline gate. The number of the enemy in that battle against Sulla is said to have been seventy thousand; twelve thousand surrendered themselves to Sulla: the rest were cut off in the field, in the camp, or in the pursuit, by the insatiable resentment of the conqueror. Cnaeus Carbo also, the other consul, fled from Ariminum into Sicily, and was there slain by Cnaeus Pompey; to whom, although but a young man, being only one-and-twenty years of age, Sulla, perceiving his activity, had committed the management of his troops, so that he was accounted second only to Sulla himself.

  IX

  Carbo, then, being killed, Pompey recovered Sicily. Crossing next over into Africa, he put to death Domitius, a leader on the side of Marius, and Hiarbas the king of Mauritania, who had given assistance to Domitius. After these events, Sulla celebrated a triumph with great pomp for his success against Mithridates. Cnaeus Pompey also, while only in his twenty-fourth year, was allowed a triumph for his victories in Africa, a privilege which had been granted to no Roman before him. Such was the termination of two most lamentable wars, the Italian, also called the Social, and the Civil, which lasted for ten years, and occasioned the destruction of more than a hundred and fifty thousand men; twenty-four of consular rank, seven of praetorian, sixty of that of aedile, and nearly three hundred senators.

  ENDNOTES.

  1 Battle of Arausio, 105 BC.

  2 104 BC.

  3 103 BC.

  4 102 BC.

  5 Itaque. Eutropius seems to intimate that it was because Marius had Catulus for his colleague that he proceeded to engage the Cimbri.

  6 Battle of Aquae Sextiae.

  7 101 BC.

  8 Battle of Vercellae, 101 BC.

  9 91 BC.

  10 Social War (91–88 BC).

  11 88 BC.

  BOOK VI

  War with Sertorius in Spain; wars in
Macedonia, Pamphylia, Cilicia, and Dalmatia, I. — IV — -Nicomedes, king of Bithynia, makes the Romans his heirs; continuation of the war with Mithridates; wars with the slaves, pirates, and Macedonians, V. — XII. — Acts of Pompey against Tigranes, and in other parts of Asia, XIII. XIV. — Conspiracy of Catiline, XV. — Triumphs of Pompey and Metellus, XVI. — Wars of Caesar in Gaul, XVII. — Proceedings of Crassus in Parthia, XVIII. — Civil war between Caesar and Pompey, XIX. — XXV.

  I

  In the consulate of Marcus Aemilius Lepidus and Quintus Catulus,1 after Sulla had composed the troubles of the state, new wars broke out; one in Spain, another in Pamphylia and Cilicia, a third in Macedonia, a fourth in Dalmatia. Sertorius, who had taken the side of Marius, dreading the fate of others who had been cut off, excited the Spaniards to a war. The generals sent against him were Quintus Caecilius Metellus, the son of that Metellus who had subdued Jugurtha, and the praetor Lucius Domitius. Domitius was killed by Hirtuleius, Sertorius’s general. Metellus contended against Sertorius with various success. At length, as Metellus was thought singly unequal to the war, Cnaeus Pompey was sent into Spain. Thus, two generals being opposed to him, Sertorius often fought with very uncertain fortune. At last, in the eighth year of the war, he was put to death by his own soldiers, and an end made of the war by Cnaeus Pompey, at that time but a young man, and Quintus Metellus Pius; and nearly the whole of Spain was brought under the dominion of the Roman people.