The history of Rome. Book V

by Theodor Mommsen

  Insubordination of Pharnaces

  In Asia Minor there was, at the time of Caesar's departure for Egypt, no enemy. But Caesar's lieutenant there, the able Gnaeus Domitius Calvinus, had received orders to take away again from king Pharnaces what he had without instructions wrested from the allies of Pompeius; and, as Pharnaces, an obstinate and arrogant despot like his father, perseveringly refused to evacuate Lesser Armenia, no course remained but to march against him. Calvinus had been obliged to despatch to Egypt two out of the three legions left behind with him and formed out of the Pharsalian prisoners of war; he filled up the gap by one legion hastily gathered from the Romans domiciled in Pontus and two legions of Deiotarus exercised after the Roman manner, and advanced into Lesser Armenia. But the Bosporan army, tried in numerous conflicts with the dwellers on the Black Sea, showed itself more efficient than his own.

  Calvinus Defeated at Nicopolis - Victory of Caesar at Ziela

  In an engagement at Nicopolis the Pontic levy of Calvinus was cut to pieces and the Galatian legions ran off; only the one old legion of the Romans fought its way through with moderate loss. Instead of conquering Lesser Armenia, Calvinus could not even prevent Pharnaces from repossessing himself of his Pontic "hereditary states" and pouring forth the whole vials of his horrible sultanic caprices on their inhabitants, especially the unhappy Amisenes (winter of 706-707). When Caesar in person arrived in Asia Minor and intimated to him that the service which Pharnaces had rendered to him personally by having granted no help to Pompeius could not be taken into account against the injury inflicted on the empire, and that before any negotiation he must evacuate the province of Pontus and send back the property which he had pillaged, he declared himself doubtless ready to submit; nevertheless, well knowing how good reason Caesar had for hastening to the west, he made no serious preparations for the evacuation. He did not know that Caesar finished whatever he took in hand. Without negotiating further, Caesar took with him the one legion which he brought from Alexandria and the troops of Calvinus and Deiotarus, and advanced against the camp of Pharnaces at Ziela. When the Bosporans saw him approach, they boldly crossed the deep mountain-ravine which covered their front, and charged the Romans up the hill. Caesar's soldiers were still occupied in pitching their camp, and the ranks wavered for a moment; but the veterans accustomed to war rapidly rallied and set the example for a general attack and for a complete victory (2 Aug. 707). In five days the campaign was ended - an invaluable piece of good fortune at this time, when every hour was precious.

  Regulation of Asia Minor

  Caesar entrusted the pursuit of the king, who had gone home by way of Sinope to Pharnaces' illegitimate brother, the brave Mithradates of Pergamus, who as a reward for the services rendered by him in Egypt received the crown of the Bosporan kingdom in room of Pharnaces. In other respects the affairs of Syria and Asia Minor were peacefully settled; Caesar's own allies were richly rewarded, those of Pompeius were in general dismissed with fines or reprimands. Deiotarus alone, the most powerful of the clients of Pompeius, was again confined to his narrow hereditary domain, the canton of the Tolistobogii. In his stead Ariobarzanes king of Cappadocia was invested with Lesser Armenia, and the tetrarchy of the Trocmi usurped by Deiotarus was conferred on the new king of the Bosporus, who was descended by the maternal side from one of the Galatian princely houses as by the paternal from that of Pontus.

  War by Land and Sea in Illyria - Defeat of Gabinius - Naval Victory at Tauris

  In Illyria also, while Caesar was in Egypt, incidents of a very grave nature had occurred. The Dalmatian coast had been for centuries a sore blemish on the Roman rule, and its inhabitants had been at open feud with Caesar since the conflicts around Dyrrhachium; while the interior also since the time of the Thessalian war, swarmed with dispersed Pompeians. Quintus Cornificius had however, with the legions that followed him from Italy, kept both the natives and the refugees in check and had at the same time sufficiently met the difficult task of provisioning the troops in these rugged districts. Even when the able Marcus Octavius, the victor of Curicta[45], appeared with a part of the Pompeian fleet in these waters to wage war there against Caesar by sea and land, Cornificius not only knew how to maintain himself, resting for support on the ships and the harbour of the Iadestini (Zara), but in his turn also sustained several successful engagements at sea with the fleet of his antagonist. But when the new governor of Illyria, the Aulus Gabinius recalled by Caesar from exile[46], arrived by the landward route in Illyria in the winter of 706-707 with fifteen cohorts and 3000 horse, the system of warfare changed. Instead of confining himself like his predecessor to war on a small scale, the bold active man undertook at once, in spite of the inclement season, an expedition with his whole force to the mountains. But the unfavourable weather, the difficulty of providing supplies, and the brave resistance of the Dalmatians, swept away the army; Gabinius had to commence his retreat, was attacked in the course of it and disgracefully defeated by the Dalmatians, and with the feeble remains of his fine army had difficulty in reaching Salonae, where he soon afterwards died.

  Most of the Illyrian coast towns thereupon surrendered to the fleet of Octavius; those that adhered to Caesar, such as Salonae and Epidaurus (Ragusa vecchia), were so hard pressed by the fleet at sea and by the barbarians on land, that the surrender and capitulation of the remains of the army enclosed in Salonae seemed not far distant. Then the commandant of the depot at Brundisium, the energetic Publius Vatinius, in the absence of ships of war caused common boats to be provided with beaks and manned with the soldiers dismissed from the hospitals, and with this extemporized war-fleet gave battle to the far superior fleet of Octavius at the island of Tauris (Torcola between Lesina and Curzola) - a battle in which, as in so many cases, the bravery of the leader and of the marines compensated for the deficiencies of the vessels, and the Caesarians achieved a brilliant victory. Marcus Octavius left these waters and proceeded to Africa (spring of 707); the Dalmatians no doubt continued their resistance for years with great obstinacy, but it was nothing beyond a local mountain-warfare. When Caesar returned from Egypt, his resolute adjutant had already got rid of the danger that was imminent in Illyria.

  Reorganization of the Coalition in Africa

  All the more serious was the position of things in Africa, where the constitutional party had from the outset of the civil war ruled absolutely and had continually augmented their power. Down to the battle of Pharsalus king Juba had, properly speaking, borne rule there; he had vanquished Curio, and his flying horsemen and his numberless archers were the main strength of the army; the Pompeian governor Varus played by his side so subordinate a part that he even had to deliver those soldiers of Curio, who had surrendered to him, over to the king, and had to look on while they were executed or carried away into the interior of Numidia. After the battle of Pharsalus a change took place. With the exception of Pompeius himself, no man of note among the defeated party thought of flight to the Parthians. As little did they attempt to hold the sea with their united resources; the warfare waged by Marcus Octavius in the Illyrian waters was isolated, and was without permanent success.

  The great majority of the republicans as of the Pompeians betook themselves to Africa, where alone an honourable and constitutional warfare might still be waged against the usurper. There the fragments of the army scattered at Pharsalus, the troops that had garrisoned Dyrrhachium, Corcyra, and the Peloponnesus, the remains of the Illyrian fleet, gradually congregated; there the second commander-in-chief Metellus Scipio, the two sons of Pompeius, Gnaeus and Sextus, the political leader of the republicans Marcus Cato, the able officers Labienus, Afranius, Petreius, Octavius and others met. If the resources of the emigrants had diminished, their fanaticism had, if possible, even increased. Not only did they continue to murder their prisoners and even the officers of Caesar under flag of truce, but king Juba, in whom the exasperation of the partisan mingled with the fury of the half-barbarous African, laid down the maxim that in every community suspecte
d of sympathizing with the enemy the burgesses ought to be extirpated and the town burnt down, and even practically carried out this theory against some townships, such as the unfortunate Vaga near Hadrumetum. In fact it was solely owing to the energetic intervention of Cato that the capital of the province itself the flourishing Utica - which, just like Carthage formerly, had been long regarded with a jealous eye by the Numidian kings - did not experience the same treatment from Juba, and that measures of precaution merely were taken against its citizens, who certainly were not unjustly accused of leaning towards Caesar.

  As neither Caesar himself nor any of his lieutenants undertook the smallest movement against Africa, the coalition had full time to acquire political and military reorganization there. First of all, it was necessary to fill up anew the place of commander-in-chief vacant by the death of Pompeius. King Juba was not disinclined still to maintain the position which he had held in Africa up to the battle of Pharsalus; indeed he bore himself no longer as a client of the Romans but as an equal ally or even as a protector, and took it upon him, for example, to coin Roman silver money with his name and device; nay, he even raised a claim to be the sole wearer of purple in the camp, and suggested to the Roman commanders that they should lay aside their purple mantle of office.

  Further Metellus Scipio demanded the supreme command for himself, because Pompeius had recognized him in the Thessalian campaign as on a footing of equality, more from the consideration that he was his son-in-law than on military grounds. The like demand was raised by Varus as the governor - self-nominated, it is true - of Africa, seeing that the war was to be waged in his province. Lastly the army desired for its leader the propraetor Marcus Cato. Obviously it was right. Cato was the only man who possessed the requisite devotedness, energy, and authority for the difficult office; if he was no military man, it was infinitely better to appoint as commander-in-chief a non-military man who understood how to listen to reason and make his subordinates act, than an officer of untried capacity like Varus, or even one of tried incapacity like Metellus Scipio. But the decision fell at length on this same Scipio, and it was Cato himself who mainly determined that decision.

  He did so, not because he felt himself unequal to such a task, or because his vanity found its account rather in declining than in accepting; still less because he loved or respected Scipio, with whom he on the contrary was personally at variance, and who with his notorious inefficiency had attained a certain importance merely in virtue of his position as father-in-law to Pompeius; but simply and solely because his obstinate legal formalism chose rather to let the republic go to ruin in due course of law than to save it in an irregular way. When after the battle of Pharsalus he met with Marcus Cicero at Corcyra, he had offered to hand over the command in Corcyra to the latter - who was still from the time of his Cilician administration invested with the rank of general - as the officer of higher standing according to the letter of the law, and by this readiness had driven the unfortunate advocate, who now cursed a thousand times his laurels from the Arnanus, almost to despair; but he had at the same time astonished all men of any tolerable discernment. The same principles were applied now, when something more was at stake; Cato weighed the question to whom the place of commander-in-chief belonged, as if the matter had reference to a field at Tusculum, and adjudged it to Scipio.

  By this sentence his own candidature and that of Varus were set aside. But he it was also, and he alone, who confronted with energy the claims of king Juba, and made him feel that the Roman nobility came to him not suppliant, as to the great-prince of the Parthians, with a view to ask aid at the hands of a protector, but as entitled to command and require aid from a subject. In the present state of the Roman forces in Africa, Juba could not avoid lowering his claims to some extent; although he still carried the point with the weak Scipio, that the pay of his troops should be charged on the Roman treasury and the cession of the province of Africa should be assured to him in the event of victory.

  By the side of the new general-in-chief the senate of the "three hundred" again emerged. It established its seat in Utica, and replenished its thinned ranks by the admission of the most esteemed and the wealthiest men of the equestrian order.

  The warlike preparations were pushed forward, chiefly through the zeal of Cato, with the greatest energy, and every man capable of arms, even the freedman and Libyan, was enrolled in the legions; by which course so many hands were withdrawn from agriculture that a great part of the fields remained uncultivated, but an imposing result was certainly attained. The heavy infantry numbered fourteen legions, of which two were already raised by Varus, eight others were formed partly from the refugees, partly from the conscripts in the province, and four were legions of king Juba armed in the Roman manner. The heavy cavalry, consisting of the Celts and Germans who arrived with Labienus and sundry others incorporated in their ranks, was, apart from Juba's squadron of cavalry equipped in the Roman style, 1600 strong. The light troops consisted of innumerable masses of Numidians riding without bridle or rein and armed merely with javelins, of a number of mounted bowmen, and a large host of archers on foot. To these fell to be added Juba's 120 elephants, and the fleet of 55 sail commanded by Publius Varus and Marcus Octavius. The urgent want of money was in some measure remedied by a self-taxation on the part of the senate, which was the more productive as the richest African capitalists had been induced to enter it. Corn and other supplies were accumulated in immense quantities in the fortresses capable of defence; at the same time the stores were as far as possible removed from the open townships. The absence of Caesar, the troublesome temper of his legions, the ferment in Spain and Italy gradually raised men's spirits, and the recollection of the Pharsalian defeat began to give way to fresh hopes of victory.

  The time lost by Caesar in Egypt nowhere revenged itself more severely than here. Had he proceeded to Africa immediately after the death of Pompeius, he would have found there a weak, disorganized, and frightened army and utter anarchy among the leaders; whereas there was now in Africa, owing more especially to Cato's energy, an army equal in number to that defeated at Pharsalus, under leaders of note, and under a regulated superintendence.

  Movements in Spain

  A peculiar evil star seemed altogether to preside over this African expedition of Caesar. He had, even before his embarkation for Egypt, arranged in Spain and Italy various measures preliminary and preparatory to the African war; but out of all there had sprung nothing but mischief. From Spain, according to Caesar's arrangement, the governor of the southern province Quintus Cassius Longinus was to cross with four legions to Africa, to be joined there by Bogud king of West Mauretania[47], and to advance with him towards Numidia and Africa. But that army destined for Africa included in it a number of native Spaniards and two whole legions formerly Pompeian; Pompeian sympathies prevailed in the army as in the province, and the unskilful and tyrannical behaviour of the Caesarian governor was not fitted to allay them. A formal revolt took place; troops and towns took part for or against the governor; already those who had risen against the lieutenant of Caesar were on the point of openly displaying the banner of Pompeius; already had Pompeius' elder son Gnaeus embarked from Africa for Spain to take advantage of this favourable turn, when the disavowal of the governor by the most respectable Caesarians themselves and the interference of the commander of the northern province suppressed just in right time the insurrection. Gnaeus Pompeius, who had lost time on the way with a vain attempt to establish himself in Mauretania, came too late; Gaius Trebonius, whom Caesar after his return from the east sent to Spain to relieve Cassius (autumn of 707), met everywhere with absolute obedience. But of course amidst these blunders nothing was done from Spain to disturb the organization of the republicans in Africa; indeed in consequence of the complications with Longinus, Bogud king of West Mauretania, who was on Caesar's side and might at least have put some obstacles in the way of king Juba, had been called away with his troops to Spain.

  Military Revolt in Campaniar />
  Still more critical were the occurrences among the troops whom Caesar had caused to be collected in southern Italy, in order to his embarkation with them for Africa. They were for the most part the old legions, which had founded Caesar's throne in Gaul, Spain, and Thessaly. The spirit of these troops had not been improved by victories, and had been utterly disorganized by long repose in Lower Italy. The almost superhuman demands which the general made on them, and the effects of which were only too clearly apparent in their fearfully thinned ranks, left behind even in these men of iron a leaven of secret rancour which required only time and quiet to set their minds in a ferment. The only man who had influence over them, had been absent and almost unheard-of for a year; while the officers placed over them were far more afraid of the soldiers than the soldiers of them, and overlooked in the conquerors of the world every outrage against those that gave them quarters, and every breach of discipline. When the orders to embark for Sicily arrived, and the soldier was to exchange the luxurious ease of Campania for a third campaign certainly not inferior to those of Spain and Thessaly in point of hardship, the reins, which had been too long relaxed and were too suddenly tightened, snapt asunder.

  The legions refused to obey till the promised presents were paid to them, scornfully repulsed the officers sent by Caesar, and even threw stones at them. An attempt to extinguish the incipient revolt by increasing the sums promised not only had no success, but the soldiers set out in masses to extort the fulfilment of the promises from the general in the capital. Several officers, who attempted to restrain the mutinous bands on the way, were slain. It was a formidable danger. Caesar ordered the few soldiers who were in the city to occupy the gates, with the view of warding off the justly apprehended pillage at least at the first onset, and suddenly appeared among the furious bands demanding to know what they wanted. They exclaimed: "discharge". In a moment the request was granted. Respecting the presents, Caesar added, which he had promised to his soldiers at his triumph, as well as respecting the lands which he had not promised to them but had destined for them, they might apply to him on the day when he and the other soldiers should triumph; in the triumph itself they could not of course participate, as having been previously discharged. The masses were not prepared for things taking this turn; convinced that Caesar could not do without them for the African campaign, they had demanded their discharge only in order that, if it were refused, they might annex their own conditions to their service. Half unsettled in their belief as to their own indispensableness; too awkward to return to their object, and to bring the negotiation which had missed its course back to the right channel; ashamed, as men, by the fidelity with which the Imperator kept his word even to soldiers who had forgotten their allegiance, and by his generosity which even now granted far more than he had ever promised; deeply affected, as soldiers, when the general presented to them the prospect of their being necessarily mere civilian spectators of the triumph of their comrades, and when he called them no longer "comrade", but "burgesses", - by this very form of address, which from his mouth sounded so strangely, destroying as it were with one blow the whole pride of their past soldierly career; and, besides all this, under the spell of the man whose presence had an irresistible power - the soldiers stood for a while mute and lingering, till from all sides a cry arose that the general would once more receive them into favour and again permit them to be called Caesar's soldiers. Caesar, after having allowed himself to be sufficiently entreated, granted the permission; but the ringleaders in this mutiny had a third cut off from their triumphal presents. History knows no greater psychological masterpiece, and none that was more completely successful.