Antony and Cleopatra

by Adrian Goldsworthy

  Candidates may have been allowed to make a speech. After that, the presiding magistrate gave the instruction, ‘Divide, citizens’ – Discedite, Quirites in Latin – and each tribe went to its allotted ‘sheep-pen’. One by one they would walk over a wooden gangway known as a ‘bridge’ and drop their written ballot into a basket. One official supervised this, and others were in charge of counting the votes and giving the totals to the presiding magistrate. Once a man received the vote of eighteen of the thirty-five tribes, then he was elected as quaestor. As soon as all twenty posts were filled, then the voting stopped.14

  Mark Antony was probably one of the first to win office amongst the quaestors of the year. He was now a senator and had taken his first formal step on a public career, following the well-established path. He was probably thirty-one, making him a year older than the minimum age for the office, so had missed winning the quaestorship in ‘his year’. This was much less serious at the start of a career than later on.

  Yet the traditional process of election should not blind us to the context. There had been months of political violence in which Antony had taken part. Elections were only possible at all because Pompey had been given dictatorial powers to deal with a crisis provoked by internal disorder and not any foreign enemy. Antony had witnessed the power of intimidation and bribery, and seen that only greater force could curb them. He had also watched Pompey manipulate the law and exploit his dominance for his own advantage.

  It must have been hard for anyone of Antony’s generation to grow up with much respect for the traditional constitution of the Republic. Too much had already happened and then continued to occur before their eyes. Force prevailed, laws counted for little and could not resist it, as leading senators amassed huge debts that could only be recovered if they were successful. Men were ruined, occasionally killed by opponents or succeeded spectacularly. His first taste of public life at Rome is unlikely to have done anything to convince Antony of the strength of the system.

  Julius Caesar chose Antony to be his quaestor. Such arrangements were common, and generally considered good, since if there was goodwill between the governor and his deputy then the two were likely to do their job better. Mark Antony went back to Gaul and found himself caught up in a massive rebellion of the tribes, many of whom had been staunchly loyal to Rome. Caesar had intervened in Gaul to protect allied peoples and had used this pretext to extend his operations further and further outside his province. After five years many Gauls realised that they were now effectively occupied by the Romans, who showed no signs of leaving. Many tribes and chieftains did well from the process, for Caesar was generous to loyal allies, making them rich and powerful. Those less favoured saw no prospect of rising to the top while the Romans remained. Some of those who had done well also now decided that they could grow even more powerful if the occupiers left. Tribe after tribe rebelled, uniting under the leadership of Vercingetorix – one of those who seem to have done well from Caesar’s favour.15

  Antony did not leave Rome until after the trial of Milo in April 52 BC and so missed the start of this extremely brutal campaign, which was marked from the very beginning by extreme savagery and ruthlessness on both sides. Caesar was himself caught south of the Alps when the revolt erupted and had to patch together a force to defend Transalpine Gaul, before making a desperate journey to reach his main army. Later in the year, Antony’s uncle Lucius Julius Caesar took over the defence of Transalpine Gaul. We do not know when or how the quaestor joined his commander.16

  Mark Antony is first mentioned by Caesar at the climactic siege of Alesia. As the summer wore on, the Romans had suffered a reverse in a costly and unsuccessful attack on the town of Gergovia. Caesar retreated and was harried by the Gauls. Then he repulsed a heavy attack on his column and seizing back the initiative counterattacked, chasing Vercingetorix and his army to the hilltop town of Alesia. The legions toiled to construct 11 miles of fortifications surrounding both the town and the Gaulish camp. Vercingetorix had sent to the tribes for aid and these now mustered a massive relief army. As soon as the Romans finished their siege line, Caesar ordered them to build another, even longer one, facing outwards. Both lines were strengthened with forts and in front of them was a network of obstacles and traps.

  Caesar did not attempt to attack Alesia, but relied on starvation to defeat his enemy. Vercingetorix expelled the non-combatant population of the town so that food would be consumed only by his warriors. Caesar refused to let the civilians — mostly women, and the very young and very old — pass through his lines. They were left to starve, in full sight of both armies. When the relief force mustered by the tribes arrived, they launched a series of attacks against sections of Caesar’s lines, trying to break in. At the same time, Vercingetorix led his men in sally after sally trying to break out. Mark Antony, along with the legate Caius Trebonius, was in command of one of the targets of an especially heavy attack. Caesar tells us that they took men from less threatened sectors as reinforcements and eventually repulsed the enemy.17

  All of the Gaulish attacks failed. The relief army lost heart and was running out of food, so began to disperse. Vercingetorix was faced with starvation and surrendered. The danger that the Romans would suffer outright defeat and lose Caesar’s conquests was over; the fighting was not. Throughout 51 BC there were skirmishes and raids as the last embers of the revolt were stamped out. It was not merely a question of brute force, as Caesar also spent a good deal of time and effort in diplomacy, and was lenient to many of the tribes, especially former allies. Antony took part in some of this fighting, although in one operation in December 52 BC to January 51 BC we are explicitly told that he was left behind with the troops protecting the army’s baggage train and headquarters.18

  Afterwards, Caesar took Antony — and also the Twelfth Legion — on a punitive expedition in the north-east against the Belgic Eburones. In many ways these operations had a lot in common with the campaigns in Judaea. Much of the fighting was small scale, opponents weak in numbers and poorly equipped. Aggression and speed of movement were more important for the Romans than careful preparation. When Caesar moved south to deal with the siege of a determined band of rebels at Uxelodunum, he left Antony behind with a force equivalent to one and a half legions to deter the Belgic tribes from rebellion. It was his first independent command in Gaul, and probably the largest of his career so far.19

  Charismatic leaders were important in keeping resistance going. One of these was Commius, a man who had been made king by Caesar and had proved a loyal ally until the rebellion of 53–52 BC. Antony sent the commander of the cavalry attached to his force to hunt Commius down. In a confused skirmish, this officer was wounded, as was the rebel leader, but the latter escaped. He sent envoys to Antony seeking peace terms, but asking that he never have to come into the presence of a Roman again – earlier in the year Roman envoys had tried to assassinate him during a negotiation. Antony accepted this request and took hostages as a pledge of Commius’ future goodwill.20

  Apart from Alesia, Antony seems not to have participated in any sizeable battles during his time in Gaul. In spite of Shakespeare, he was not with Caesar on ‘that day he overcame the Nervii’ in 57 BC. Alesia was the only major operation of the war at which he was present. This is worth stating only because of the emphasis in ancient and modern sources on Antony as a soldier. In fact, by this stage of his career, his record was competent, but unexceptional. He was not especially experienced and had usually acted under someone else’s command. Soon it was time to return to politics and in 50 BC Antony left Gaul and went to Rome to become a candidate again.

  [IX]

  ‘THE NEW SIBLING-LOVING GODS’

  When Gabinius and Antony left Egypt, plenty of Romans stayed behind. Many were soldiers, for the proconsul left a strong force ‘with King Ptolemy as a garrison’. Known as the Gabinians, these troops would remain for six years, beginning a Roman military presence that would last almost without break until the seventh century AD. Many were R
oman citizens, although some of these soldiers were foreign auxiliaries — we hear later of 500 Gaulish and German cavalry. Overall numbers are unclear, but a strength equivalent to one or even two legions seems quite likely.1

  Ptolemy Auletes had paid for Roman military force to regain his throne, and only this same force would guarantee that he kept it. Gabinius had no legal authority to invade Egypt, although he would later claim that Archelaus had encouraged piracy in the eastern Mediterranean and so needed to be defeated. Equally, he had no authority to station Roman troops in Egypt to protect Auletes. The king seems from the beginning to have paid and supplied these soldiers — Gabinius also claimed that the only money he had ever accepted from Ptolemy was to pay for the costs of his army. A few years later another proconsul of Syria clearly considered the Gabinians to be still part of the Roman army, and he does not seem to have been alone in this view.2

  Yet their status was ambiguous. No mention is made of an overall commander, but senior officers seem to have been Roman. Many of the men in Gabinius’ army had served in Pompey’s eastern campaigns, but presumably their enlistments had not expired by the time the latter returned to Rome. Our sources mention one man who had served as a centurion under Pompey and was later a tribune in Egypt. It is not clear whether he was one of the Gabinians or was recruited independently. Auletes hired as many mercenaries as he could, even enlisting runaway slaves. He may also have sought out experienced Roman officers in need of employment, and men with Italian names appear in the armies of many client kingdoms during this period. These supplemented the Gabinians and in practice all of them acted in every significant respect like a royal army.3

  Before long the Gabinians were called upon to suppress disorder within the kingdom, which they seem to have done with ease. However, a good deal of their time was spent in garrison in Alexandria. It was a comfortable posting, with the luxuries of one of the greatest cities in the world readily available. Legionary pay was not high in this period — at some point in these years Julius Caesar would double the salary of his legionaries — and Auletes may well have been more generous. Caesar himself later claimed that the Gabinians ‘got used to a life and licence in Alexandria and forgot the name and discipline of the Roman people, wed local women, with whom many had children’.4

  Roman soldiers restored Ptolemy Auletes and kept him in power; other Romans stayed with them to collect the price for this assistance. The king had borrowed vast sums to buy his restoration, since his friends in Rome proved reluctant to assist him purely on the basis of promises. Much of this was owed to a consortium of Roman financiers led by a certain Caius Rabirius Postumus. There were unpaid debts from 59 BC as well as the sum owed to Gabinius, although it is not clear if all of this was paid straight away. Rabirius had gone out to Cilicia with the staff of Lentulus Spinther, in the hope that the latter would restore the king. Disappointed when Lentulus gave up on the idea, the banker joined Gabinius and either accompanied the expedition to Egypt or arrived soon afterwards.

  Auletes made Rabirius his senior finance minister (dioecetes), so that the Roman would oversee taxation and other royal revenue and take his money directly. The sums involved were staggering, and the king also needed to pay for his own court and continue lavish programmes of spending to secure support. The Ptolemies had from the beginning treated their territory much like a private estate. Scholars may argue over the efficiency of the bureaucracy that governed Egypt, but none doubt that its most important function was generating revenue. Rabirius was now part of this system, and he and his associates dressed accordingly, wearing the Hellenic costume of royal officials rather than the tunic and toga of proper Romans.5

  With the king’s approval, Rabirius enthusiastically set about raising money, involving himself not simply with taxation and the produce of royal land, but royal monopolies and trade tariffs. Egypt was squeezed very tightly at a time when harvests were bad because the inundation of the Nile was low for several years in succession. Probably the irrigation system had been neglected in the years of disruption when the king was driven out. Auletes had also come to power after many decades of serious internal problems and power struggles within the dynasty. Institutions and central authority had decayed, becoming far more corrupt and much less efficient.

  It was hard for many of the king’s subjects to pay what was demanded of them. Desperation was probably the root cause of the unrest crushed by the Gabinians. The ruthless approach to raising revenue was not in itself enough. For centuries the currency of the Ptolemies had been very stable. Now the silver content of each coin was drastically reduced as the king sought to make his income go further. Having a Roman finance minister helped to deflect the blame away from Auletes himself. Rabirius was intensely unpopular.

  The king finally gave in to the demands of the Alexandrians and had the Roman banker imprisoned. Rabirius quickly ‘escaped’ and fled back to Rome. A good number of merchant ships had already been despatched carrying goods and there were rumours that one had a cargo far more valuable than the mundane contents of the others. Gabinius had already gone into exile and a prosecution was now brought against Rabirius in the hope of seizing the bribe allegedly paid to the proconsul to restore Auletes. Cicero defended the banker, but the trial was probably never completed because of a serious backlog of cases and the political disruptions at Rome. Rabirius survived, although how much he had lost on his dealings with Ptolemy XII Auletes is impossible to know. Julius Caesar took on much of the outstanding debt, in addition to the money still owed to him for his assistance to the king in 59 BC.6

  Auletes not only survived, but also, with the backing of the Gabinians, his grip on power was more secure than it had ever been in the past. For all the devaluation of the coinage and the hardships of many of his subjects, he was wealthy and had got away without paying anything like all of his huge debts to the Romans who had assisted him. In his last years his court remained splendid and there was money to spend on grand building projects.

  ALEXANDRIA

  The remains of much of the Alexandria known to Auletes and Cleopatra now lies under the sea and archaeologists are only beginning to unravel some of its mysteries. In some ways this is appropriate. Alexander the Great chose the site because it was on the coast. The old capitals at Memphis and Thebes had good access to the Nile, but were far from the sea, reflecting the priorities of the pharaohs. Alexander was more interested in securing good communications to his newly won territory. The Ptolemies also wanted their power to be centred on the Mediterranean. In better days their territories had stretched far across the sea. Culturally and ideologically they always looked back to Greece and Macedonia. Economically, they grew rich from trade, as the great surpluses from Egypt’s harvest were sold abroad and luxury goods from Arabia, India and beyond were sent further west. Alexandria was a port and, with Lake Mareotis to the south of the city, almost surrounded by water.

  It was no coincidence that the greatest monument of the Ptolemies looked out to sea. On an island called Pharos, which lay offshore and sheltered the anchorage, stood the great lighthouse. It was at least 328 feet high and built of white stone in three levels. Commissioned by Ptolemy I Soter and completed under his son, the tower was topped by a colossal statue of Zeus Soter. It was visible a long way out to sea and at night a beacon was kept burning – there is even talk of mirrors to increase the light – ensuring that it still served as a landmark. Not as high as the great pyramids, it was still the tallest structure built by the Greeks or Romans. In the late eighth century the highest storey collapsed, but much of the rest survived until the fourteenth century.7

  Alexandria

  There were two great harbours, separated by a mole almost a mile long connecting the shore with Pharos Island. To the east was the main harbour, sections of which were divided into smaller quays. To the west was the second harbour of‘Happy Return’ (Eunostos in Greek), which had an inner section known as ‘the Box’ (Kitotos), linking with a canal leading eventually to a branch of the N
ile. Shipping, warehouses and commerce provided occupations for far more Alexandrians than the royal bureaucracy. There were plenty of very rich families in the city, whose grand houses occupied street after street near the harbour.8

  A separate quarter, walled off from the houses of the wealthy and probably further subdivided, contained the royal palaces. Quite a few of the Ptolemies had chosen to build their own grand houses, although Strabo’s claim that every king constructed a new palace may well be an exaggeration. Other buildings – a theatre is mentioned and was probably dedicated to Dionysus – may have been associated with them to perform a role in ceremonies. Colonnaded courtyards linked the individual palaces and the whole complex was grand in scale and lavish in materials. The Museum complex was also in this area, as was the Sema, the grand tomb containing Alexander’s mummified remains and the corpses of the Ptolemies. Originally, Alexander the Great’s corpse had been housed in a golden coffin – possibly in the familiar style of an Egyptian sarcophagus, although we cannot be sure. However, Ptolemy XI in his desperate need for funds had melted this down and replaced it with one of glass or crystal.9

  Alexandria was a consciously Greek city, but its large population was always mixed. It included the biggest Jewish community outside Judaea. There were also many Egyptians, since from the start there were never enough Greek settlers to meet all the demands for labour. Laid out on a grid pattern of streets, the city was divided into five regions named after the first five letters of the alphabet, and the various nationalities seem to have lived separately – the Jews, for example, lived mostly in the region called Delta. On a day-to-day basis there was doubtless much more interaction. In later periods we read of periodic friction between the communities, especially between Jew and Gentile, but this is less clearly attested under the Ptolemies.10