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[1] Dum haec, si modo hoc anno acta sunt, Romae aguntur, consules ambo in Liguribus gerebant bellum. is hostis uelut natus ad continendam inter magnorum interualla bellorum Romanis militarem disciplinam erat; nec alia prouincia militem magis ad uirtutem acuebat. nam Asia et amoenitate urbium et copia terrestrium maritimarumque rerum et mollitia hostium regiisque opibus ditiores quam fortiores exercitus faciebat.
[1] While these things—if indeed they were done in this year—are being transacted at Rome, both consuls were carrying on war among the Ligurians. That enemy was, as it were, born to keep for the Romans their military discipline in the intervals between great wars; nor did any other province sharpen the soldier more to virtue. For Asia, both by the amenity of its cities and by the abundance of terrestrial and maritime things, and by the softness of the enemies and by royal opulence, made armies richer rather than braver.
especially under the command of Cn. Manlius they were handled loosely and negligently. and so a somewhat harsher march in Thrace and a more exercised enemy chastised them with a great disaster. among the Ligurians there were all things to arouse the soldier: mountainous and rough places, which were a toil both to seize for themselves and to cast the enemy down from positions pre-occupied; routes steep, narrow, infested with ambushes; an enemy light-armed and swift and sudden, who would allow no time anywhere, no place to be quiet or secure; a necessary storming of fortified strongholds, laborious and at the same time perilous; a needy region, which by parsimony pinched the soldiers, and offered not much of booty.
and so no sutler followed, nor did a long line of pack-animals stretch out the column. there was nothing except arms and men placing all their hope in arms. nor was there ever lacking with them either the matter of war or a cause, because, on account of domestic scarcity, they would raid the neighboring fields.
[2] C. Flaminius consul, cum Friniatibus Liguribus in agro eorum pluribus proeliis secundis factis, in deditionem gentem accepit et arma ademit. ea quia non sincera fide tradebant, cum castigarentur, relictis uicis in montem Auginum profugerunt. confestim secutus est consul.
[2] Gaius Flaminius, consul, having fought many successful battles with the Ligurian Friniates in their territory, received the tribe into surrender and deprived them of their arms. Because they were not handing these over with sincere good faith, when they were being chastised, they abandoned their villages and fled to Mount Auginus. The consul followed forthwith.
then the war was transferred against the Apuan Ligurians, who had made incursions into the Pisan and Bolognese territory to such a degree that it could not be cultivated. These also having been thoroughly subdued, the consul granted peace to the neighboring peoples. And because he had brought it about that the province was quiet from war, lest he have the soldiery in idleness, he carried a road from Bononia through to Arretium.
M. Aemilius, the other consul, burned and devastated the fields of the Ligurians and the villages which were in the plains or valleys, while they themselves were holding two mountains, Ballista and Suismontium. Then, having attacked those who were in the mountains, he at first wearied them with light skirmishes; at last, when they were forced to descend into line of battle, he defeated them in a regular battle, in which he also vowed a temple to Diana. With all on this side of the Apennines subdued, then he attacked those beyond the mountains — among these were the Friniates Ligurians, whom Gaius Flaminius had not approached — Aemilius subjugated them all and took away their arms, and led the multitude down from the mountains into the plains.
with the Ligurians pacified, he led the army into the Gallic territory, and he carried a road from Placentia through to Ariminum, so as to join it to the Flaminian Way. In the final battle, in which he engaged the Ligurians in a pitched encounter, he vowed a temple to Juno the Queen. These things were done among the Ligurians in that year.
[3] In Gallia M. Furius praetor insontibus Cenomanis, in pace speciem belli quaerens, ademerat arma. id Cenomani conquesti Romae apud senatum reiectique ad consulem Aemilium, cui ut cognosceret statueretque senatus permiserat, magno certamine cum praetore habito obtinuerunt causam. arma reddere Cenomanis, decedere prouincia praetor iussus.
[3] In Gaul, Marcus Furius, the praetor, seeking a semblance of war in time of peace, had taken away the arms from the innocent Cenomani. The Cenomani complained of this at Rome before the senate and, being referred to the consul Aemilius, to whom the senate had permitted to investigate and determine, after a great contest held with the praetor they prevailed in the case. The praetor was ordered to return the arms to the Cenomani and to withdraw from the province.
legatis deinde sociorum Latini nominis, qui toto undique ex Latio frequentes conuenerant, senatus datus est. his querentibus magnam multitudinem ciuium suorum Romam commigrasse et ibi censos esse, Q. Terentio Culleoni praetori negotium datum est, ut eos conquireret, et quem C. Claudio M. Liuio censoribus postue eos censores ipsum parentemue eius apud se censum esse probassent socii, ut redire eo cogeret, ubi censi essent. hac conquisitione duodecim milia Latinorum domos redierunt, iam tum multitudine alienigenarum urbem onerante.
Then an audience with the senate was granted to the legates of the allies of the Latin name, who from all Latium on every side had assembled in crowds. As they complained that a great multitude of their citizens had migrated to Rome and had there been registered, the task was given to the praetor Q. Terentius Culleo to seek them out, and to compel to return to the place where they had been registered anyone whom the allies should prove to have been registered among themselves by the censors C. Claudius and M. Livius, or by the censors after them, either the man himself or his parent. By this search twelve thousand Latins returned to their homes, the city already then being burdened by a multitude of aliens.
[4] Priusquam consules redirent Romam, M. Fuluius proconsul ex Aetolia redit; isque ad aedem Apollinis in senatu cum de rebus in Aetolia Cephallaniaque ab se gestis disseruisset, petit a patribus, ut, <si> aequum censerent, ob rem publicam bene ac feliciter gestam et diis immortalibus honorem haberi iuberent et sibi triumphum decernerent. M. Aburius tribunus plebis, si quid de ea re ante M. Aemilii consulis aduentum decerneretur, intercessurum se ostendit: eum contra dicere uelle, proficiscentemque in prouinciam ita sibi mandasse, ut ea disceptatio integra in aduentum suum seruaretur. Fuluium temporis iacturam facere: senatum etiam praesente consule quod uellet decreturum.
[4] Before the consuls returned to Rome, M. Fulvius, proconsul, returned from Aetolia; and after he had discoursed in the senate at the temple of Apollo about the affairs accomplished by himself in Aetolia and Cephallenia, he asked of the fathers that, if they judged it equitable, for the commonwealth well and happily conducted they should order honor to be paid to the immortal gods and should decree a triumph for himself. M. Aburius, tribune of the plebs, declared that if anything on that matter were decreed before the arrival of the consul M. Aemilius, he would interpose his veto: that he wished to speak in opposition, and, as he was setting out to his province, had given him this charge, that that discussion be kept intact for his arrival. That Fulvius was making a waste of time: the senate would, even with the consul present, decree what it wished.
<then> Fulvius: if either the feud of M. Aemilius with me were unknown to men, or the way in which he prosecutes those enmities with unbridled and almost regal wrath, yet it ought not to have been endured that the consul, while absent, should both stand in the way of honor to the immortal gods and delay a deserved and due triumph, [and that] a commander, with matters excellently achieved, and a victorious army with booty and captives, should stand before the gates until it should have pleased the consul—lingering on this very account—to return to Rome. But in very truth, since my enmities with the consul are most notorious, what fairness can anyone expect from him who, in a thin attendance, stealthily carried to the treasury a senatorial decree that had been passed, [declaring] that Ambracia not be seen as taken by force—though it was besieged with ramp and vineae, where, when the works were burned, others were made anew, where for fifteen days there was fighting around the walls, above and beneath the ground, where from first light, when the soldier had already overleapt the walls, the long and doubtful battle lasted until night, where more than three thousand of the enemy were cut down. And now, concerning the temples of the immortal gods despoiled in the captured city, what sort of calumny * * did he bring before the pontifices?
if it has been lawful for the city to be adorned with the ornaments of Syracuse and the other captured communities, surely the right of war did not fail to prevail in Ambracia alone, a city likewise taken. He both entreats the Conscript Fathers and makes a request of the tribune, that they not allow him to be a laughingstock to his most overbearing enemy.
[5] Undique omnes alii deprecari tribunum, alii castigare. Ti. Gracchi collegae plurimum oratio mouit. ne suas quidem simultates pro magistratu exercere boni exempli esse: alienarum uero simultatum tribunum plebis cognitorem fieri turpe et indignum collegii eius potestate et sacratis legibus esse.
[5] On all sides, some were beseeching the tribune, others were chastising him. The speech of the colleague of Tiberius Gracchus had the greatest effect: that not even a magistrate should exercise his own feuds by virtue of office—a bad precedent; and that for a tribune of the plebs to become an arbiter of other men’s feuds is disgraceful and unworthy of the power of that college and its sacrosanct laws.
each person ought by his own judgment both to hate or to love men and to approve or disapprove things, not to hang upon another’s face and nod nor be whirled about by the impulses of another’s mind, and for a tribune of the plebs not to assent to an angry consul; and that he remembers what M. Aemilius has enjoined in private, but forgets that the tribunate has been entrusted to him by the Roman people—and entrusted for the aid and liberty of private citizens, not for consular kingship. not even this does he discern: that it will come to be consigned to memory and posterity that of the same college one of the two tribunes of the plebs has remitted his own enmities for the commonwealth, the other has exercised others’ and delegated ones. overcome by these chastisements, when the tribune had gone out from the temple, with Ser. reporting,
With Sulpicius as praetor, a triumph was decreed for M. Fulvius. When he had given thanks to the enrolled fathers, he added that he had vowed great games to Jupiter Best and Greatest on the day on which he had taken Ambracia; for that purpose a hundred pounds of gold had been contributed to him by the communities; he asked that they order that gold to be set apart from that money which, having been carried in his triumph, he was going to deposit in the treasury. The senate ordered the college of pontiffs to be consulted, whether it was necessary that all that gold be expended on the games.
when the pontiffs had said that it did not pertain to religion how great an expense should be made for the games, the senate permitted Fulvius to spend as much as he would, provided he did not exceed the sum of 80,000. he had determined to triumph in the month of January: but when he heard that the consul M. Aemilius, after letters from M. Aburius, tribune of the plebs, had been received about the remitted intercession, he himself, coming to Rome to hinder the triumph, had halted sick on the road—so that he might not have more contests in the triumph than in the war—he brought forward the day of the triumph. he triumphed on the tenth day before the Kalends.
In January, over the Aetolians and over Cephallenia. golden crowns of one hundred twelve pounds were carried before the chariot; of silver, 83,000 pounds; of gold, 243 pounds; Attic tetradrachms, 118,000; Philip-coins, 12,322; bronze statues, 785; marble statues, 230; arms, missiles, and the other spoils of the enemy, a great number; in addition, catapults, ballistae, engines of every kind; commanders either Aetolian and Cephallenian or royal ones left there by Antiochus, up to twenty-seven. Many on that day, before he was carried into the city, in the Circus Flaminius—tribunes, prefects, horsemen, centurions, Romans and allies—he endowed with military gifts.
[6] Iam consularium comitiorum appetebat tempus; quibus quia M. Aemilius, cuius sortis ea cura erat, occurrere non potuit, C. Flaminius Romam uenit. ab eo creati consules Sp. Postumius Albinus Q. Marcius Philippus. praetores inde facti T. Maenius P. Cornelius Sulla C. Calpurnius Piso M. Licinius Lucullus C. Aurelius Scaurus L. Quinctius Crispinus.
[6] Now the time of the consular elections was approaching; and since M. Aemilius, to whose lot that charge belonged, could not attend to them, C. Flaminius came to Rome. By him were elected consuls Sp. Postumius Albinus and Q. Marcius Philippus. Then the praetors were appointed T. Maenius, P. Cornelius Sulla, C. Calpurnius Piso, M. Licinius Lucullus, C. Aurelius Scaurus, L. Quinctius Crispinus.
Extremo anni, magistratibus iam creatis, ante diem tertium nonas Martias Cn. Manlius Uulso de Gallis qui Asiam incolunt triumphauit. serius ei triumphandi causa fuit, ne Q. Terentio Culleone praetore causam lege Petillia diceret, et incendio alieni iudicii, quo L. Scipio damnatus erat, conflagraret, eo infensioribus in se quam in illum iudicibus, quod disciplinam militarem seuere ab eo conseruatam successorem ipsum omni genere licentiae corrupisse fama attulerat. neque ea sola infamiae erant, quae in prouincia procul ab oculis facta narrabantur, sed ea etiam magis, quae in militibus eius quotidie aspiciebantur.
At the end of the year, with the magistrates already created, on the third day before the Nones of March, Cn. Manlius Vulso triumphed over the Gauls who inhabit Asia. His reason for celebrating a triumph later was, so that he might not plead a case under the Petillian law before the praetor Q. Terentius Culleo, and that he might not be caught up in the conflagration of another’s judgment, by which L. Scipio had been condemned—the judges being more hostile toward himself than toward that man—because report had brought that he, the successor, had corrupted by every kind of license the military discipline which had been strictly conserved by him. Nor were those the only grounds of ill-repute which were said to have been done in the province far from eyes, but even more those which were seen every day in his soldiers.
for the origin of foreign luxury was brought into the city by the Asiatic army. They were the first to carry to Rome bronze-mounted couches, costly coverlets, small rugs and other textiles, and, what were then accounted items of magnificent furnishings, monopodia and abaci. Then psaltriae and sambucistriae, and other convivial amusements of entertainments, were added to banquets; the banquets themselves too began to be prepared with greater care and expense.
[7] In triumpho tulit Cn. Manlius coronas aureas ducenta duodecim [pondo], argenti pondo ducenta uiginti milia, auri pondo duo milia centum tria, tetrachmum Atticum centum uiginti septem milia, cistophori ducenta quinquaginta, Philippeorum aureorum nummorum sedecim milia trecentos uiginti; et arma spoliaque multa Gallica carpentis trauecta, duces hostium duo et quinquaginta ducti ante currum. militibus quadragenos binos denarios diuisit, duplex centurioni, triplex in equites, et stipendium duplex [in pedites] dedit; multi omnium ordinum donati militaribus donis currum secuti sunt. carminaque a militibus ea in imperatorem dicta, ut facile appareret in ducem indulgentem ambitiosumque ea dici, triumphum esse militari magis fauore quam populari celebrem.
[7] In his triumph Gnaeus Manlius carried golden crowns, 212 [pounds by weight]; of silver, 220,000 pounds; of gold, 2,103 pounds; Attic tetradrachms, 127,000; cistophori, 250; Philippean gold coins, 16,320; and many Gallic arms and spoils conveyed on wagons, with fifty-two leaders of the enemy led before his chariot. To the soldiers he distributed forty-two denarii apiece, double to a centurion, triple to the horsemen, and he gave double stipend to the [infantry]; many of every order, having been endowed with military decorations, followed the chariot. And such songs were spoken by the soldiers at the general that it was easy to see they were said of a leader indulgent and ambitious, and that the triumph was celebrated as renowned more by military favor than by popular favor.
but the friends of Manlius also prevailed for winning the favor of the people; through their exertions a senatorial decree was passed, that from the money which had been carried in the triumph, the contribution (stipendium) levied from the people into the public treasury, insofar as any part of it had not previously been discharged, should be paid out. the urban quaestors, with fidelity and care, paid 25,500 asses. about the same time two military tribunes arrived from the two Spains with letters from C. Atinius and L. Manlius, who were administering those provinces.
Ludis Romanis eo anno, quos P. Cornelius Cethegus A. Postumius Albinus faciebant, malus in circo instabilis in signum Pollentiae procidit atque id deicit. ea religione moti patres et diem unum adiciendum ludorum censuerunt, et signa duo pro uno reponenda, et nouum auratum faciendum. et plebeii ludi ab aedilibus C. Sempronio Blaeso et M. Furio Lusco diem unum instaurati sunt.
At the Roman Games that year, which P. Cornelius Cethegus and A. Postumius Albinus were putting on, an unstable mast in the circus fell onto the statue of Pollentia and cast it down. Moved by this religious concern, the Fathers decreed that one day should be added to the games, and that two statues should be set up in place of the one, and that a new gilded one should be made. And the Plebeian Games were renewed for one day by the aediles C. Sempronius Blaesus and M. Furius Luscus.
[8] Insequens annus Sp. Postumium Albinum et Q. Marcium Philippum consules ab exercitu bellorumque et prouinciarum cura ad intestinae coniurationis uindictam auertit. praetores prouincias sortiti sunt, T. Maenius urbanam, M. Licinius Lucullus inter ciues et peregrinos, C. Aurelius Scaurus Sardiniam, P. Cornelius Sulla Siciliam, L. Quinctius Crispinus Hispaniam citeriorem, C. Calpurnius Piso Hispaniam ulteriorem. consulibus ambobus quaestio de clandestinis coniurationibus decreta est.
[8] The ensuing year diverted the consuls Sp. Postumius Albinus and Q. Marcius Philippus from the army and from the care of wars and provinces to the retribution for an internal conspiracy. The praetors drew lots for the provinces: T. Maenius the urban jurisdiction, M. Licinius Lucullus cases between citizens and foreigners, C. Aurelius Scaurus Sardinia, P. Cornelius Sulla Sicily, L. Quinctius Crispinus Hither Spain, C. Calpurnius Piso Farther Spain. For both consuls an inquiry into clandestine conspiracies was decreed.
An ignoble Greek first came into Etruria with none of those arts which the most erudite nation of all has imported to us in many forms for the cultivation of minds and bodies, but as a petty sacrificer and seer; and not the sort who, with religion open, by publicly professing both profit and discipline, would imbue minds with error, but a priest of occult and nocturnal rites. There were initiations, which at first were handed down to a few, then began to be made vulgar among men and women. Pleasures of wine and banquets were added to the religion, whereby the spirits of more people might be enticed.
when the wine had inflamed their spirits, and night, and males mixed with females, the tender-aged with their elders, had extinguished every distinction of modesty, then corruptions of every kind began to be perpetrated, since each had ready-to-hand the pleasure for that to which, in libido, his nature was more prone. nor was there a single kind of offense: there were promiscuous defilements of freeborn men and women; but from the same workshop there issued false witnesses, forged seals and testaments, and proofs; poisons from that same source, and domestic murders, so that sometimes not even the bodies remained for burial. many acts were dared by guile, the more by violence.
[9] Huius mali labes ex Etruria Romam ueluti contagione morbi penetrauit. primo urbis magnitudo capacior patientiorque talium malorum ea celauit: tandem indicium hoc maxime modo ad Postumium consulem peruenit. P. Aebutius, cuius pater publico equo stipendia fecerat, pupillus relictus, mortuis deinde tutoribus sub tutela Duroniae matris et uitrici T. Sempronii Rutili educatus fuerat.
[9] The stain of this evil penetrated to Rome from Etruria, as though by the contagion of a disease. At first the city’s magnitude, more capacious and more tolerant of such evils, concealed them; at length disclosure, especially in this way, reached the consul Postumius. P. Aebutius, whose father had done his military service with the public horse, had been left a ward; then, his guardians having died, he had been brought up under the guardianship of his mother Duronia and his stepfather T. Sempronius Rutilus.
Both the mother was devoted to her husband, and the stepfather, because he had so conducted the guardianship that he could not render an account, desired either that the ward be taken off, or that he be made subject to him by some bond. The Bacchanalia were the one road to corruption. The mother addresses the youth: that on his behalf, when he was ill, she had vowed that, as soon as he had convalesced, she would initiate him into the Bacchic rites; that, bound by her vow, thanks to the benignity of the gods, she wished to discharge it.
a ten days’ chastity-rite was needed: on the tenth day, once dinner had been taken, then, after a pure washing, she would conduct him into the sacrarium. a notable courtesan, the freedwoman Hispala Faecenia—her trade not worthy of her, to which, as a little maidservant, she had been accustomed—even after she had been manumitted, maintained herself by that same kind. she had an intimacy with Aebutius, owing to neighborhood proximity, by no means damaging either to the young man’s means or to his reputation: for he was loved and sought unbidden, and, since his own people provided everything grudgingly, he was supported by the courtesan’s munificence.
[10] Haec amoris pignora cum essent, nec quicquam secretum alter ab altero haberent, per iocum adulescens uetat eam mirari, si per aliquot noctes secubuisset: religionis se causa, ut uoto pro ualetudine sua facto liberetur, Bacchis initiari uelle. id ubi mulier audiuit, perturbata 'dii meliora.' inquit: mori et sibi et illi satius esse quam id faceret; et in caput eorum detestari minas periculaque, qui id suasissent. admiratus cum uerba tum perturbationem tantam adulescens parcere exsecrationibus iubet: matrem id sibi adsentiente uitrico imperasse.
[10] Since these were pledges of love, and they had nothing secret one from the other, the young man, in jest, forbids her to be surprised if he should have lain apart for several nights: for a religious reason, that, in order to be released from a vow made for his health, he wishes to be initiated into the Bacchic rites. When the woman heard that, disturbed, she said, 'May the gods grant better.'; that it was better for both herself and him to die than that he should do that; and she imprecated threats and dangers upon the heads of those who had advised it. The young man, amazed both at the words and at so great a perturbation, bids her to spare the execrations: that his mother, with his stepfather assenting, had ordered this for him.
'your stepfather,' he says, 'for it may perhaps not be right to accuse your mother—hastens by this deed to send your chastity, reputation, hope, and life to ruin.' As he, all the more astonished and asking what the matter was, she, having prayed for the peace and pardon of the gods and goddesses, in case she had, compelled by her affection for him, disclosed things that must be kept silent, says that she, as a handmaid, had entered that shrine as her mistress’s companion, that a freewoman has never gone in there. She knows that it is a workshop of corruptions of every kind; and that for now two years it is established that no one initiated there is older than twenty years. As each person is brought in, he is handed over to the priests as if a victim.
to lead them down into a place which resounds all around with ululations and with the song of a symphony and the beating of cymbals and tympana, lest the voice of one crying for help, when rape is inflicted by force, can be heard. then to pray and beseech that he, by whatever means, would shake off that matter and not hurl himself there, where all unspeakable things would first have to be endured, then perpetrated. nor did she dismiss him before the young man gave his pledge that he would keep himself from these rites.
[11] Postquam domum uenit, et mater mentionem intulit, quid eo die, quid deinceps ceteris, quae ad sacra pertinerent, faciendum esset, negat eorum se quicquam facturum, nec initiari sibi in animo esse. aderat sermoni uitricus. confestim mulier exclamat Hispalae concubitu carere eum decem noctes non posse; illius excetrae delenimentis et uenenis imbutum nec parentis nec uitrici nec deorum uerecundiam habere.
[11] After he came home, and his mother introduced mention of what on that day, and what thereafter on the other days which pertained to the sacred rites, ought to be done, he says he will do none of those things, nor has it in mind to be initiated. The stepfather was present to the conversation. Immediately the woman exclaims that he cannot go without Hispala’s intercourse for ten nights; that, steeped in the blandishments and poisons of that viper, he has no reverence for parent, nor for stepfather, nor for the gods.
Quarreling—on the one side the mother, on the other the stepfather—they drove him from the house with four slaves. The young man then betook himself to Aebutia, his aunt, and told her the reason why he had been cast out by his mother; then, on her authority, on the next day he brought the matter to the consul Postumius, with all bystanders removed. The consul dismissed him, having ordered him to return to him three days later; he himself questioned Sulpicia, a grave (dignified) woman, his mother-in-law, whether she knew any old woman named Aebutia from the Aventine.
when she had replied that she knew her, a worthy woman and of old-fashioned morals, he said that he had need to confer with her: she should send a messenger to summon her. Aebutia, having been called, came to Sulpicia, and the consul a little after, as if he had happened to intervene by chance, introduces a conversation about Aebutius, her brother’s son. Tears sprang to the woman, and she began to pity the young man’s lot, who, despoiled of his fortunes by those by whom least it ought, was then with her, cast out by his mother, because the upright youth—may the gods be propitious—refused, as the report was, to be initiated into obscene sacred rites.
[12] Satis exploratum de Aebutio ratus consul non uanum auctorem esse, Aebutia dimissa socrum rogat, ut Hispalam indidem ex Auentino libertinam, non ignotam uiciniae, arcesseret ad sese: eam quoque esse quae percunctari uellet. ad cuius nuntium perturbata Hispala, quod ad tam nobilem et grauem feminam ignara causae arcesseretur, postquam lictores in uestibulo turbamque consularem et consulem ipsum conspexit, prope exanimata est. in interiorem partem aedium abductam socru adhibita consul, si uera dicere inducere in animum posset, negat perturbari debere; fidem uel a Sulpicia, tali femina, uel ab se acciperet; expromeret sibi, quae in luco Stimulae Bacchanalibus in sacro nocturno solerent fieri.
[12] The consul, judging it sufficiently ascertained from Aebutius that he was no empty authority, after dismissing Aebutia asks the mother-in-law to summon to him Hispala, likewise from the Aventine, a freedwoman, not unknown to the neighborhood: she too was one whom he wished to question. At this message Hispala was disturbed, because she was being summoned, unaware of the cause, to so noble and grave a woman; and when she saw the lictors in the vestibule, the consular throng, and the consul himself, she was almost exanimate. Led into the inner part of the house, with the mother-in-law present, the consul says she ought not to be perturbed, if she could bring herself to speak the truth; let her take a pledge of good faith either from Sulpicia, a woman of such a sort, or from himself; let her disclose to him what was wont to be done in the grove of Stimula at the Bacchanalia, in the nocturnal rite.
When she heard this, so great a fear and a trembling of all her limbs seized the woman that for a long time she could not open her mouth. At length, steadied, she said that, as a very young girl, a maidservant, she had been initiated together with her mistress: for several years, since she was manumitted, she knows nothing of what is done there. Now the consul praises this very point, that she did not disavow having been initiated; but that she also disclose the rest with the same good faith.
[13] Mulier haud dubie, id quod erat, Aebutium indicem arcani rata esse, ad pedes Sulpiciae procidit, et eam primo orare coepit, ne mulieris libertinae cum amatore sermonem in rem non seriam modo sed capitalem etiam uerti uellet: se terrendi eius causa, non quod sciret quicquam, ea locutam esse. hic Postumius accensus ira tum quoque ait eam cum Aebutio se amatore cauillari credere, non in domo grauissimae feminae et cum consule loqui. et Sulpicia attollere pauentem, simul illam adhortari, simul iram generi lenire.
[13] The woman, without doubt—as indeed it was—thinking Aebutius to be the informer of the secret, fell at Sulpicia’s feet, and at first began to beg her not to wish that the conversation of a freedwoman with her lover be turned into a matter not merely unserious but even capital: that she had spoken those things for the purpose of frightening him, not because she knew anything. Here Postumius, incensed with anger, even then says that she believes she is cavilling with Aebutius her lover, not speaking in the house of a most dignified woman and with a consul. And Sulpicia raises the trembling woman, at once exhorts her and at the same time softens her son‑in‑law’s anger.
at length, strengthened, after much accusing the perfidy of Aebutius—who had returned such gratitude to one who had deserved optimally of him—she said that she had a great fear of the gods, whose occult initiations she was divulging, but a much greater fear of men, who would tear her to pieces with their own hands as an informer. therefore this she begged of Sulpicia, this of the consul: that they send her away somewhere outside Italy, where she might pass the remainder of her life in safety. the consul bade her be of good courage, and said that it would be his concern that she should dwell safely at Rome.
Then Hispala discloses the origin of the sacred rites: at first that shrine had been for women, and no man was wont to be admitted there. They had three fixed days in the year, on which by day they were initiated into the Bacchic rites; the priestesses used to be appointed in turn from among matrons.
Paculla Annia, a Campanian priestess, changed everything, as though by the monition of the god: for she was the first to initiate men—her own sons, Minius and Herennius Cerrinius; and she made the sacred rite nocturnal instead of diurnal, and in place of three days in the year she made five days of initiations in each month. From that time, since the rites were in common and men were mingled with women, and the license of night had been added, nothing of crime, nothing of disgrace was omitted there. There were more acts of sexual outrage among men with one another than among women.
if any are less patient of disgrace and more sluggish toward crime, they are immolated as victims. to deem nothing impious, this is the highest point of religion among them. the men, as if their mind were seized, vaticinate with fanatical tossing of the body; the matrons, in the habit of Bacchae, hair spread, with burning torches run down to the Tiber, and, the torches having been plunged into the water—because live sulphur with lime is inserted—bring them out with the flame intact.
men are said to be snatched by the gods, those whom, bound to a machine, they snatch out of sight into hidden caverns: these are they who were unwilling either to swear a conspiracy, or to be associated with crimes, or to endure sexual outrage. there exists a huge multitude, now almost a second people; among them certain noble men and women. in the last two years it has been instituted that no one over twenty years be initiated: they hunt for ages susceptible to both error and to sexual outrage.
[14] Peracto indicio aduoluta rursus genibus preces easdem, ut se ablegaret, repetiuit. consul rogat socrum, ut aliquam partem aedium uacuam faceret, quo Hispala immigraret. cenaculum super aedes datum est, scalis ferentibus in publicum obseratis, aditu in aedes uerso.
[14] With the testimony completed, having fallen again at his knees she repeated the same prayers, that he would send her away. The consul asks his mother-in-law to make some part of the house vacant, into which Hispala might immigrate. An upper room above the house was given, the stairs leading into the street being barred, with the access turned inward to the house.
Ita cum indices ambo in potestate essent, rem ad senatum Postumius defert, omnibus ordine expositis, quae delata primo, quae deinde ab se inquisita forent. patres pauor ingens cepit, cum publico nomine, ne quid eae coniurationes coetusque nocturni fraudis occultae aut periculi importarent, tum priuatim suorum cuiusque uicem, ne quis adfinis ei noxae esset. censuit autem senatus gratias consuli agendas, quod eam rem et cum singulari cura et sine ullo tumultu inuestigasset.
Thus, when both informers were in his power, Postumius refers the matter to the Senate, setting out in order everything—what had first been reported, and what thereafter had been inquired by himself. A great fear seized the Fathers, both on public account, lest those conspiracies and nocturnal gatherings should import any hidden fraud or peril, and also privately for the case of each man’s own people, lest anyone be allied to that guilt. Moreover, the Senate decreed that thanks should be given to the consul, because he had investigated that matter with singular care and without any tumult.
then they entrust to the consuls, out of the ordinary course, an inquiry concerning the Bacchanalia and the nocturnal sacra; they order them to take care that this matter be no harm to the informers Aebutius and Faecenia, and to invite other informers by rewards; that the priests of those rites, whether they were men or women, be sought out not only at Rome but through all the fora and meeting-places, so that they may be in the consuls’ power; further, that it be proclaimed in the city of Rome and that edicts be sent through all Italy, that no one who had been initiated into the Bacchic rites should wish to have come together or convened for the sake of the sacra, nor to have performed anything of such a divine rite. above all, that an inquiry be held concerning those who have come together or conspired, to the end that debauchery or outrage be inflicted. These things the senate decreed.
The consuls ordered the curule aediles to seek out all the priests of that rite, and, once apprehended, to keep them in a separate chamber for interrogation; the plebeian aediles were to see that no sacred rites were performed under cover. The triumvirs of capital jurisdiction were instructed to station watches throughout the city and to ensure that no nocturnal assemblies should take place, and that precautions be taken against fires; as assistants to the triumvirs, five-men beyond and on this side of the Tiber were each to preside over the buildings of his own region.
[15] Ad haec officia dimissis magistratibus consules in rostra escenderunt, et contione aduocata cum sollemne carmen precationis, quod praefari, priusquam populum adloquantur, magistratus solent, peregisset consul, ita coepit. 'nulli umquam contioni, Quirites, tam non solum apta sed etiam necessaria haec sollemnis deorum comprecatio fuit, quae uos admoneret hos esse deos, quos colere uenerari precarique maiores uestri instituissent, non illos, qui prauis et externis religionibus captas mentes uelut furialibus stimulis ad omne scelus et ad omnem libidinem agerent. equidem nec quid taceam nec quatenus proloquar inuenio.
[15] With the magistrates dismissed to these duties, the consuls mounted the Rostra, and, an assembly having been summoned, when the consul had completed the solemn chant of supplication, which magistrates are accustomed to preface before they address the people, he thus began. 'To no assembly ever, Quirites, has this solemn invocation of the gods been so not only apt but even necessary, to remind you that these are the gods whom your ancestors established that you should cultivate, venerate, and beseech, not those who, by depraved and foreign religions, drive captured minds, as if by the Furies’ goads, to every crime and to every lust. For my part I find neither what I should keep silent about nor how far I should speak out.
if you will be ignorant of anything, I fear lest, if I keep anything back, I may give a place to negligence; if I strip everything bare, lest I pour too much terror upon you. whatever I shall say, know it to have been said less than in proportion to the atrocity and magnitude of the matter: effort will be given by us, that it may suffice for precaution. that the Bacchanalia have long since been throughout all Italy and now even through the city in many places, I am certain you have received not by rumor only, but also by the clatterings and nocturnal ululations which resound through the whole city; but what that thing is you are ignorant: some believe it to be the cult of some god, others a permitted play and lasciviousness, and, whatever it is, that it pertains to a few.
as regards their multitude, if I were to say that there are many thousands of persons, at once it is necessary that you be terrified, unless I add who and of what sort they are. first, then, a great part are women, and this was the source of this evil; next, males most similar to females, debauched and debauchers, fanatics, dazed by vigils, wine, and nocturnal din and shouts. the conspiracy as yet has no forces; however, it has an enormous increment of strength, because day by day they become more numerous.
your ancestors did not even wish you to come together by chance and at random, unless either, with the vexillum set up on the citadel, the army had been led out for the sake of the comitia, or the tribunes had proclaimed a Council of the Plebs, or some one of the magistrates had called to a contio; and wherever a multitude was, there too they judged that there ought to be a lawful rector of the multitude. what do you suppose such gatherings to be, first nocturnal, then promiscuous of women and men? if you knew at what ages the males are initiated, you would not only pity them, but also be ashamed.
[16] Minus tamen esset, si flagitiis tantum effeminati forent—ipsorum id magna ex parte dedecus erat—, a facinoribus manus, mentem a fraudibus abstinuissent: numquam tantum malum in re publica fuit, nec ad plures nec ad plura pertinens. quidquid his annis libidine, quidquid fraude, quidquid scelere peccatum est, ex illo uno sacrario scitote ortum esse. necdum omnia, in quae coniurarunt, edita facinora habent.
[16] Yet it would be less, if they had been effeminated only by flagitious acts—the disgrace was in great part their own—if they had kept their hands from crimes, their mind from frauds: never has there been so great an evil in the commonwealth, nor one reaching to more persons nor to more things. Whatever in these years has been sinned by lust, whatever by fraud, whatever by wickedness, know that it sprang from that one shrine. Nor yet have they carried out all the crimes on which they conspired.
unless you take precautions, Quirites, already a nocturnal assembly will be able to be equal to this daytime one, lawfully summoned by the consul. now they, one by one, fear you all while you are assembled for a contio; but once you have dispersed to your homes and into your fields, and they have come together, they will consult about their own salvation along with your perdition: then by each of you all of them will have to be feared. therefore each one of you ought to wish that good sense has been present in all his own.
If lust, if fury has snatched anyone into that whirlpool, let him judge that he is theirs—of those with whom he has conspired into every flagitious deed and crime—not his own. Nor am I secure, Quirites, that none of you may slip even by error; for nothing is more deceptive in appearance than perverse religion.
When the numen of the gods is held forth as a pretext for crimes, a fear steals into the mind lest, in avenging human frauds, we violate something of divine law that has been intermixed. From this religious scruple countless decrees of the pontiffs, senatorial decrees, and, finally, the responses of the haruspices set you free. How often, in the age of our fathers and grandfathers, was this business assigned to magistrates: that they should forbid foreign rites to be performed; that they should prohibit petty sacrificers and seers from the Forum, the Circus, and the City; that they should seek out and burn vaticinal books; that they should abolish every discipline of sacrificing except according to the Roman custom.
for the most prudent men judged that, of all divine and human law, nothing was equally so destructive of religion as when sacrifice was offered not by the ancestral but by a foreign rite. I have thought these things ought to be proclaimed to you, lest any superstition should agitate your minds, when you see us demolishing the Bacchanalia and dispersing the nefarious assemblies. We shall do all things, with the gods propitious and willing, [these]; who, because they bore it with indignation that their divinity was being contaminated by crimes and lusts, drew these things out of hidden darkness into the light, and they wished them to be laid open, not that they might be unpunished, but that they might be avenged and suppressed.
The senate has mandated an extraordinary inquiry concerning that matter to me and to my colleague. We will energetically carry out the things that must be done by us ourselves; we have entrusted the care of the nocturnal watches throughout the city to the lesser magistrates. It is also just that you too, whatever your duties are, in whatever place each person will be stationed, perform energetically what will be ordered, and give attention that no danger or tumult arise by the fraud of the guilty.'
[17] Recitari deinde senatus consulta iusserunt, indicique praemium proposuerunt, si quis quem ad se deduxisset nomenue absentis detulisset. qui nominatus profugisset, diem certam se finituros, ad quam nisi citatus respondisset, absens damnaretur. si quis eorum, qui tum extra terram Italiam essent, nominaretur, ei laxiorem diem daturos, si uenire ad causam dicendam uellet.
[17] Then they ordered that the decrees of the senate be read, and they proposed a reward for an informer, if anyone should have brought someone to them or should have reported the name of an absentee. Whoever, having been named, had fled, they would set a fixed day, by which, unless, when summoned, he responded, he would be condemned in absentia. If anyone of those who were then outside the land of Italy should be named, they would grant him a more extended deadline, if he were willing to come to plead his case.
Contione dimissa terror magnus urbe tota fuit, nec moenibus se tantum urbis aut finibus Romanis continuit, sed passim per totam Italiam, litteris hospitum de senatus consulto et contione et edicto consulum acceptis, trepidari coeptum est. multi ea nocte, quae diem insecuta est, quo in contione res palam facta est, custodiis circa portas positis fugientes a triumuiris comprehensi et reducti sunt: multorum delata nomina. quidam ex iis uiri feminaeque mortem sibi consciuerunt.
When the assembly was dismissed, a great terror was in the whole city, nor did it confine itself only within the walls of the city or the Roman borders, but everywhere throughout all Italy, once letters from their hosts had been received about the senate’s decree and the assembly and the edict of the consuls, people began to be in a flutter. Many that night, which followed the day on which the matter was made public in the assembly, with guards posted around the gates, were seized by the triumvirs as they were fleeing and brought back; the names of many were reported. Some of them, men and women, took their own lives.
It was said that above seven thousand men and women had conspired. Moreover, it was established that the heads of the conspiracy were M. and C. Atinius of the Roman plebs, and the Faliscan L. Opicernius and Minius Cerrinius the Campanian: from these all crimes and flagitious deeds had arisen, that they were the chief priests and founders of that rite. Special pains were taken that they be apprehended at the earliest possible time.
[18] Ceterum tanta fuga ex urbe facta erat, ut, quia multis actiones et res peribant, cogerentur praetores T. Maenius et M. Licinius per senatum res in diem tricesimum differre, donec quaestiones a consulibus perficerentur. eadem solitudo, quia Romae non respondebant nec inueniebantur, quorum nomina delata erant, coegit consules circa fora proficisci ibique quaerere et iudicia exercere. qui tantum initiati erant et ex carmine sacro, praeeunte uerba sacerdote, precationes fecerant, [in] quibus nefanda coniuratio in omne facinus ac libidinem continebatur, nec earum rerum ullam, in quas iureiurando obligati erant, in se aut alios admiserant, eos in uinculis relinquebant: qui stupris aut caedibus uiolati erant, qui falsis testimoniis, signis adulterinis, subiectione testamentorum, fraudibus aliis contaminati, eos capitali poena adficiebant.
[18] However, so great a flight from the city had occurred that, because for many their actions-at-law and property were perishing, the praetors T. Maenius and M. Licinius were compelled, through the senate, to defer the matters to the 30th day, until the inquisitions by the consuls were completed. The same solitude—because those whose names had been denounced neither responded at Rome nor were found—drove the consuls to set out around the fora and there to seek and to conduct trials. Those who had only been initiated and, from the sacred chant, with the priest prompting the words, had made prayers, [in] which an unspeakable conspiracy into every crime and lust was contained, and who had admitted none of those things, to which they had been bound by oath, either upon themselves or upon others—these they left in chains; but those who had been violated by debaucheries or murders, those contaminated by false testimonies, adulterine seals, the substitution of wills, and other frauds—these they afflicted with capital punishment.
more were slain than were cast into chains. There was a great number in both categories, of men and of women. The condemned women they handed over to their kin, or to those in whose hand they were, so that they themselves might punish them in private; if there was no one suitable as an exactor of punishment, it was inflicted in public.
Then the business was given to the consuls to raze all the Bacchanalia, first at Rome, then throughout all Italy, except in so far as there might be there some ancient altar or consecrated statue. For the future, then, it was provided by a senatus consultum that there should be no Bacchanalia at Rome nor in Italy. If anyone deemed such a sacred rite solemn and necessary, and that he could not omit it without religious scruple and piacular guilt, he should make declaration before the urban praetor; the praetor should consult the senate.
[19] Aliud deinde huic coniunctum referente Q. Marcio consule senatus consultum factum est, ut de iis, quos pro indicibus consules habuissent, integra res ad senatum referretur, cum Sp. Postumius quaestionibus perfectis Romam redisset. Minium Cerrinium Campanum Ardeam in uincula mittendum censuerunt, magistratibusque Ardeatium praedicendum, ut intentiore eum custodia adseruarent, non solum ne effugeret, sed ne mortis consciscendae locum haberet. Sp. Postumius aliquanto post Romam uenit: eo referente de P. Aebutii et Hispalae Faeceniae praemio, quod eorum opera indicata Bacchanalia essent, senatus consultum factum est, uti singulis his centena milia aeris quaestores urbani ex aerario darent; utique consul cum tribunis plebis ageret, ut ad plebem primo quoque tempore ferrent, ut P. Aebutio emerita stipendia essent, ne inuitus militaret neue censor ei inuito equum publicum adsignaret; utique Faeceniae Hispalae datio, deminutio, gentis enuptio, tutoris optio item esset, quasi ei uir testamento dedisset; utique ei ingenuo nubere liceret, neu quid ei qui eam duxisset ob id fraudi ignominiaeue esset; utique consules praetoresque, qui nunc essent quiue postea futuri essent, curarent, ne quid ei mulieri iniuriae fieret, utique tuto esset.
[19] Then another senatorial decree, connected with this, was passed on the motion of the consul Q. Marcius, that as to those whom the consuls had treated as informers, the matter should be referred intact to the senate when Sp. Postumius, the investigations having been completed, had returned to Rome. They judged that Minius Cerrinius, a Campanian, was to be sent in chains to Ardea, and proclamation to be made to the magistrates of the Ardeates that they should keep him under more intent custody, not only lest he escape, but lest he have opportunity for procuring his death. Sp. Postumius came to Rome somewhat later: on his motion, concerning the reward of P. Aebutius and Hispala Faecenia, because by their agency the Bacchanalia had been brought to light, a senatorial decree was passed that the urban quaestors should give to each of these one hundred thousand asses from the treasury; and that the consul should deal with the tribunes of the plebs, in order that they bring it to the plebs at the earliest possible time, that P. Aebutius should have his service accounted as completed, so that he not serve unwillingly, nor the censor assign him a public horse against his will; and that to Faecenia Hispala there should likewise be the power of grant, diminution, marriage out of her gens, and choice of a tutor, as if a husband had given it to her by testament; and that it should be permitted her to marry a freeborn man, and that nothing of this should be to the detriment or disgrace of him who had married her; and that the consuls and praetors, who now were or who would thereafter be, should take care that no injury be done to that woman, and that she be safe.
[20] Et iam Q. Marcius quaestionibus suae regionis perfectis in Ligures prouinciam proficisci parabat, tribus milibus peditum Romanorum, centum quinquaginta equitibus, et quinque milibus Latini nominis peditum ducentis equitibus in supplementum acceptis. eadem prouincia, idem numerus peditum equitumque et collegae decretus erat. exercitus acceperunt, quos priore anno C. Flaminius et M. Aemilius consules habuerant.
[20] And now Q. Marcius, with the inquiries of his district completed, was preparing to set out to the Ligurian province, having received as a supplement 3,000 Roman infantry, 150 cavalry, and 5,000 infantry of the Latin name with 200 cavalry. The same province, the same number of infantry and horse, had been decreed also to his colleague. They received the armies which in the prior year the consuls C. Flaminius and M. Aemilius had held.
Moreover, by decree of the senate they were ordered to enroll two new legions, and they laid upon the allies and the Latin name a levy of twenty thousand infantry and eight hundred horse, and upon the Romans three thousand infantry and two hundred horse. It was decided that this whole force, apart from the legions, should be led as a supplement to the Spanish army. Therefore the consuls, while they themselves were impeded by the inquiries, put T. Maenius in charge of holding the levy.
with the investigations completed, first Q. Marcius set out against the Apuan Ligurians. while he was pursuing deep into hidden woodland-passes, which had always been their lairs and receptacles, he was surrounded, with the narrow defiles pre-occupied, in unfavorable ground. 4,000 soldiers were lost, and three standards of the second legion, eleven banners of the allies of the Latin name came into the enemy’s power, and many arms, which, because they were a hindrance to those fleeing along forest paths, were being cast everywhere.
The Ligurians made an end of pursuing before the Romans made an end of fleeing. The consul, as soon as he had escaped from the enemy’s territory, so that it might not appear how much the forces had been diminished, dismissed the army in pacified places. Yet he could not obliterate the fame of the ill-managed affair: for the pass from which the Ligurians had routed him was called “Marcius.”
[21] Sub hunc nuntium ex Ligustinis uulgatum litterae ex Hispania mixtam gaudio tristitiam adferentes recitatae sunt. C. Atinius, qui biennio ante praetor in eam prouinciam profectus erat, cum Lusitanis in agro Hastensi signis collatis pugnauit: ad sex milia hostium sunt caesa, ceteri fusi et fugati castrisque exuti. ad oppidum deinde Hastam oppugnandum legiones ducit: id quoque haud multo maiore certamine cepit quam castra; sed dum incautius subit muros, ictus ex uulnere post dies paucos moritur.
[21] Upon this report being spread among the Ligurians, letters from Spain were read aloud, bringing a sadness mixed with joy. C. Atinius, who two years earlier had set out as praetor to that province, fought a pitched battle with the Lusitanians in the territory of Hasta: about 6,000 of the enemy were cut down, the rest routed and put to flight and stripped of their camp. Then he leads the legions to assault the town of Hasta: this too he captured with not much greater struggle than the camp; but while he approached the walls too incautiously, being struck, he died after a few days from the wound.
upon the letters about the death of the propraetor being recited, the senate decreed that a messenger should be sent to overtake C. Calpurnius the praetor at the Port of Luna, and to announce that the senate judges it equitable that the province not be without imperium, and that he should hasten to set out. on the fourth day the one who had been sent came to Luna; a few days earlier Calpurnius had set out. and in Hither Spain L. Manlius Acidinus, who at the same time at which C. Atinius had gone into the province, engaged the Celtiberians in pitched battle.
They withdrew with the victory uncertain, except that the Celtiberians moved their camp from there on the next night, and the Romans were given the opportunity both to bury their own and to gather the spoils from the enemies. A few days later, with a larger army assembled, the Celtiberians at the town of Calagurris of their own accord challenged the Romans to battle. Nothing is reported as to what cause, though their numbers were increased, made them the weaker.
they were overcome in the battle: about twelve thousand men were cut down, more than two thousand were captured, and the Roman made himself master of the camp. And had not the advent of his successor checked the impetus of the victor, the Celtiberians would have been subjugated. Both new praetors led the armies into winter quarters.
[22] Per eos dies, quibus haec ex Hispania nuntiata sunt, ludi Taurii per biduum facti religionis causa. decem deinde <dies magno> apparatu ludos M. Fuluius, quos uouerat Aetolico bello, fecit. multi artifices ex Graecia uenerunt honoris eius causa.
[22] During the days on which these things were announced from Hispania, the Taurian Games were held for two days for reasons of religion. Then for ten <days with great> display, M. Fulvius put on the games which he had vowed in the Aetolian war. Many artists from Greece came for the sake of his honor.
the contest of athletes too was then for the first time a spectacle for the Romans, and a hunt of lions and panthers was given, and the show was celebrated with almost the abundance and variety of this age. Then a nine‑day sacred rite was held, because in Picenum for three days it had rained stones, and heavenly fires, arising in many places, were said especially to have singed the garments of several persons with a light breath. A supplication for a single day also was added by decree of the pontiffs, because the temple of Ops on the Capitol had been struck from the sky.
with greater victims the consuls performed expiations and lustrated the city. at about the same time it was also reported from Umbria that a semimale, nearly twelve years old, had been found. abominating that prodigy, they ordered it to be warded off from the Roman territory and put to death as soon as possible.
Eodem anno Galli Transalpini transgressi in Uenetiam sine populatione aut bello haud procul inde, ubi nunc Aquileia est, locum oppido condendo ceperunt. legatis Romanis de ea re trans Alpes missis responsum est neque profectos ex auctoritate gentis eos, nec quid in Italia facerent sese scire.
In the same year the Transalpine Gauls, having crossed into Venetia without devastation or war, not far from there, where now Aquileia is, seized a place for founding a town. When Roman envoys were sent across the Alps about that matter, the response was that they had neither set out by the authority of their nation, nor did they themselves know what they were doing in Italy.
L. Scipio ludos eo tempore, quos bello Antiochi uouisse sese dicebat, ex collata ad id pecunia ab regibus ciuitatibusque per dies decem fecit. legatum eum post damnationem et bona uendita missum in Asiam ad dirimenda inter Antiochum et Eumenem reges certamina Ualerius Antias est auctor: tum collatas ei pecunias congregatosque per Asiam artifices, et quorum ludorum post bellum, in quo uotos diceret, mentionem non fecisset, de iis post legationem demum in senatu actum.
L. Scipio at that time held games, which he said he had vowed in the war of Antiochus, out of money contributed for that purpose by kings and communities, for ten days. Valerius Antias is authority that, after his condemnation and the sale of his goods, he was sent as a legate into Asia to settle the contests between the kings Antiochus and Eumenes: then that funds were contributed to him and artisans gathered throughout Asia, and that, of the games of which, after the war in which he said they had been vowed, he had made no mention, only after the embassy was the matter at last dealt with in the senate.
[23] Cum iam in exitu annus esset, Q. Marcius absens magistratu abiturus erat, Sp. Postumius quaestionibus cum summa fide curaque perfectis comitia habuit. creati consules sunt Ap. Claudius Pulcher M. Sempronius Tuditanus. postero die praetores facti P. Cornelius Cethegus A. Postumius Albinus C. Afranius Stellio C. Atilius Serranus L. Postumius Tempsanus M. Claudius Marcellinus.
[23] When now the year was at its close, Q. Marcius, being absent, was about to lay down his magistracy; Sp. Postumius, with the investigations completed with the utmost fidelity and care, held the elections. Ap. Claudius Pulcher and M. Sempronius Tuditanus were elected consuls. On the following day the praetors were elected: P. Cornelius Cethegus, A. Postumius Albinus, C. Afranius Stellio, C. Atilius Serranus, L. Postumius Tempsanus, M. Claudius Marcellinus.
At the end of the year, because Sp. Postumius, the consul, had reported that, while traversing both coasts of Italy on account of the investigations, he had found the colonies Sipontum on the upper sea and Buxentum on the lower sea deserted, a board of three (triumvirs) for enrolling colonists there was created by decree of the senate by T. Maenius, the urban praetor: L. Scribonius Libo, M. Tuccius, Cn. Baebius Tamphilus.
Cum Perseo rege et Macedonibus bellum quod imminebat, non unde plerique opinantur, nec ab ipso Perseo causas cepit: inchoata initia a Philippo sunt; et is ipse, si diutius uixisset, id bellum gessisset. una eum res, cum uicto leges imponerentur, maxime angebat, quod qui Macedonum ab se defecerant in bello, in eos ius saeuiendi ademptum ei ab senatu erat, cum, quia rem integram Quinctius in condicionibus pacis distulerat, non desperasset impetrari posse. Antiocho rege deinde bello superato ad Thermopylas, diuisis partibus, cum per eosdem dies consul Acilius Heracleam, Philippus Lamiam oppugnasset, capta Heraclea quia iussus abscedere a moenibus Lamiae erat Romanisque oppidum deditum est, aegre eam rem tulerat.
The war that was impending with King Perseus and the Macedonians did not take its causes from where most people suppose, nor from Perseus himself: its beginnings were initiated by Philip; and he himself, if he had lived longer, would have waged that war. One thing especially vexed him, when terms were being imposed upon the vanquished, namely that, as to those of the Macedonians who had defected from him in the war, the right of being savage against them had been taken from him by the senate, since, because Quinctius had deferred the matter intact in the conditions of peace, he had not despaired that it could be obtained. Then, when King Antiochus had been overcome in war at Thermopylae, the parts having been apportioned, when in those same days the consul Acilius had attacked Heraclea, Philip had assaulted Lamia; after Heraclea was captured, because he had been ordered to withdraw from the walls of Lamia and the town was surrendered to the Romans, he took that matter hard.
The consul soothed his anger, because, as he himself was hastening to Naupactus, whither the Aetolians had betaken themselves in flight, he allowed Philip to carry war into Athamania and against Amynander, and to add to the kingdom the cities which the Aetolians had taken from the Thessalians. With no great struggle he both drove Amynander out of Athamania and recovered several cities. Demetrias also, a strong city and convenient for all purposes, and the nation of the Magnetes he brought under his own dominion.
[24] His sedata in praesentia regis ira in Romanos est. numquam tamen remisit animum a colligendis in pace uiribus, quibus, quandoque data fortuna esset, ad bellum uteretur. uectigalia regni non fructibus tantum agrorum portoriisque maritimis auxit, sed metalla etiam et uetera intermissa recoluit et noua multis locis instituit.
[24] By these things the king’s anger against the Romans was calmed for the present. Nevertheless, he never remitted his purpose of collecting forces in peace, which, whenever fortune were given, he would employ for war. He increased the revenues of the kingdom not only by the fruits of the fields and maritime customs-dues, but he also reworked the mines, reviving old ones long discontinued, and instituted new ones in many places.
But indeed, in order to restore the ancient multitude of men which had been lost by the disasters of war, he was preparing not only, by compelling all, to procreate and to educate children, but he had also led across into Macedonia a great multitude of Thracians; and, quiet for some time from wars, he had been intent with all care on augmenting the resources of the kingdom. Then the causes returned which might afresh stir anger against the Romans. The complaints of the Thessalians and Perrhaebians about their cities possessed by him, and of the legates of King Eumenes concerning Thracian towns occupied by force and the multitude transferred into Macedonia, had been heard in such a manner that it was apparent enough they would not be neglected.
It had especially moved the senate that they had now heard that possession of Aenus and Maronea was being aimed at; they cared less about the Thessalians. Legates of the Athamanes had also come, complaining not of a portion lost nor of a loss of boundaries, but that all Athamania had come under the law and jurisdiction of the king; and exiles of the Maronites had come, driven out because they had defended the cause of liberty against the royal garrison: they reported that not Maronea only but Aenus also was in Philip’s power. There had also come envoys from Philip to purge these matters, who affirmed that nothing had been done except with the permission of the Roman commanders: that the cities of the Thessalians and Perrhaebians and the Magnetes, and, together with Amynander, the Athamanian nation, were in the same case as the Aetolians; that, with King Antiochus routed, the consul, occupied with besieging Aetolian cities, had sent Philip to recover those communities; that those subdued by arms obey.
the senate, so that it might not determine anything with the king absent, sent envoys to adjudicate those controversies: Q. Caecilius Metellus, M. Baebius Tamphilus, and Ti. Sempronius. Upon their approach to Thessalian Tempe, a council was proclaimed for all those communities which had a dispute with the king.
[25] Ibi cum Romani legati disceptatorum loco, Thessali Perrhaebique et Athamanes haud dubii accusatores, Philippus ad audienda crimina tamquam reus consedissent, pro ingenio quisque eorum, qui principes legationum erant, et gratia cum Philippo aut odio acerbius leniusue egerunt. in controuersiam autem ueniebant Philippopolis Tricca Phaloria et Eurymenae et cetera circa eas oppida, utrum, Thessalorum iuris cum <essent>, ui ademptae possessaeque ab Aetolis forent —nam Philippum Aetolis ademisse eas constabat—, an Aetolica antiquitus ea oppida fuissent: ita enim Acilium regi concessisse, si Aetolorum fuissent, et si uoluntate, non si ui atque armis coacti cum Aetolis essent. eiusdem formulae disceptatio de Perrhaeborum Magnetumque oppidis fuit: omnium enim iura possidendo per occasiones Aetoli miscuerant.
[25] There, when the Roman legates had taken their seats in the place of arbiters, the Thessalians, Perrhaebians, and Athamanians as no doubtful accusers, and Philip, as though a defendant, to hear the charges, each, according to the character of those who were the chiefs of the embassies, and according to favor with Philip or hatred, acted more harshly or more mildly. But into controversy came Philippopolis, Tricca, Phaloria, and Eurymenae, and the other towns around them—whether, being of Thessalian jurisdiction, they had been taken by force and held by the Aetolians (for it was agreed that Philip had taken them from the Aetolians), or whether those towns had been Aetolian from antiquity: for thus Acilius had conceded to the king, if they had been the Aetolians’ and if they were with the Aetolians by will, not if compelled by force and arms. The disputation was of the same formula concerning the towns of the Perrhaebians and the Magnetes: for the Aetolians, by taking possession whenever opportunities arose, had commingled the rights of all.
To these matters, which were for disputation, the complaints of the Thessalians were added: that, even if those towns were now restored to them, he would restore them despoiled and deserted; for, besides those lost by the chances of war, he had led away five hundred of the leading youth into Macedonia and was abusing their labor in servile ministrations; and the towns which he had restored under compulsion to the Thessalians he had taken care to render useless before restoring. Phthian Thebes had once been for the Thessalians their single maritime emporium, profitable and fructiferous: there, after cargo-ships had been procured, the king had diverted all maritime commerce thither, directing the course of ships past Thebes to Demetrias. Now he does not even refrain from violating ambassadors, who are sacred by the law of nations: an ambush was laid for those going to T. Quinctius.
and so, therefore, all the Thessalians have been cast into such great fear that not in their own cities, not in the common councils of the nation, does anyone dare to open his mouth. for the Romans, authors of liberty, are far away; at their side there adheres a burdensome master, prohibiting them from using the benefactions of the Roman People. but what, moreover, is it to be free, if the voice be not free?
now, even with the confidence and protection of the legates, they groan rather than speak. unless the Romans provide something by which both the fear of the Greeks bordering on Macedonia may be lessened and Philip’s audacity diminished, it has been to no purpose that he was conquered and that they were liberated. that, like a headstrong horse not obeying the reins, he must be chastised with harsher curbs.
These things the last speakers said bitterly, whereas the earlier had gently soothed his anger, asking that he forgive those speaking for liberty, and that, the acerbity of a master laid aside, he grow accustomed to show himself an ally and a friend, and imitate the Roman people, who prefer to join allies to themselves by affection rather than by fear. After the Thessalians were heard, the Perrhaebians pressed that Gonnocondylum, which Philip had called Olympias, had belonged to Perrhaebia, and that it be restored to them; and concerning Malloea and Ericinium the same demand was made. The Athamanes were claiming back liberty and the forts Athenaeum and Poetneum.
[26] Philippus, ut accusatoris potius quam rei speciem haberet, et ipse a querellis orsus Menelaidem in Dolopia, quae regni sui fuisset, Thessalos ui atque armis expugnasse questus est; item Petram in Pieria ab iisdem Thessalis Perrhaebisque captam. Xynias quidem, haud dubie Aetolicum oppidum, sibi contribuisse eos; et Paracheloida, quae sub Athamania esset, nullo iure Thessalorum formulae factam. nam quae sibi crimina obiciantur de insidiis legatorum et maritimis portubus frequentatis aut desertis, alterum ridiculum esse, se reddere rationem, quos portus mercatores aut nautici petant, alterum mores respuere suos.
[26] Philip, in order to have the look of an accuser rather than a defendant, he too beginning from complaints, alleged that the Thessalians had stormed Menelaïs in Dolopia, which had been of his realm, by force and arms; likewise that Petra in Pieria had been seized by those same Thessalians and Perrhaebians. Xynias, indeed—undoubtedly an Aetolian town—they had annexed to themselves; and Paracheloïs, which was under Athamania, had been made subject to the jurisdiction of the Thessalians with no right. For as to the charges being brought against him about plots against envoys and about sea-ports frequented or deserted, the one was ridiculous—that he should render an account of which ports merchants or seafarers resort to; the other his character utterly repudiates.
that for so many years the legates have never ceased, now to the Roman commanders, now to Rome to the senate, to bring charges against him: whom has he ever violated even in a word? once, it is said, an ambush was laid for those going to Quinctius; but what befell them is not added. these are charges from men seeking something to allege falsely, since they have nothing of the truth.
insolently and immoderately the Thessalians were abusing the indulgence of the Roman People, as if, from a long thirst, too greedily drawing pure liberty: thus, like slaves, beyond hope suddenly manumitted, they were testing the license of voice and tongue and were flaunting themselves in the harassment and invectives of their masters. Carried away then by anger, he added that the sun had not yet set for all days. That utterance, spoken menacingly, not the Thessalians alone took as aimed at themselves, but even the Romans.
and when a murmur had arisen after that utterance and had at last been quieted, he then replied to the envoys of the Perrhaebi and the Athamanians that the case of the cities about which they were dealing was the same: that Consul Acilius and the Romans had granted them to him, when they were the property of enemies. If those who had given the gift should wish to take it away, he knew he must yield; but that they would be committing an injury against a better and more faithful friend for the sake of the favor of light and useless allies.
for in truth nothing wins a less enduring gratitude than liberty, especially among those who, by misusing it, are going to corrupt it. The case having been heard, the legates pronounced that it was their pleasure that the garrisons of the Macedonians be withdrawn from those cities, and that the kingdom be bounded by the ancient boundaries of Macedonia. As to the injuries which they complain were inflicted to and fro, a formula for the execution of law was to be established, setting out in what way adjudication should be conducted between those nations and the Macedonians.
[27] Inde grauiter offenso rege Thessalonicen ad cognoscendum de Thraciae urbibus proficiscuntur. ibi legati Eumenis, si liberas esse Aenum et Maroneam uelint Romani, nihil sui pudoris esse ultra dicere, quam ut admoneant, re, non uerbo eos liberos relinquant, nec suum munus intercipi ab alio patiantur. sin autem minor cura sit ciuitatium in Thracia positarum, multo uerius esse, quae sub Antiocho fuerint, praemia belli Eumenem quam Philippum habere, uel pro patris Attali meritis bello, quod aduersus Philippum ipsum gesserit populus Romanus, uel suis, quod Antiochi bello terra marique laboribus periculisque omnibus interfuerit.
[27] From there, with the king grievously offended, they set out to Thessalonica to ascertain about the cities of Thrace. There the envoys of Eumenes said that, if the Romans wish Aenus and Maronea to be free, it is nothing consistent with their own modesty to say more than to admonish that in reality, not in word, they leave them free, and that they should not allow their own gift to be intercepted by another. But if there is less concern for the cities situated in Thrace, it is by much truer that those which had been under Antiochus Eumenes rather than Philip should have as the prizes of war, either on account of the merits of his father Attalus in the war which the Roman people waged against Philip himself, or on account of his own, because in the war of Antiochus he took part by land and sea in all labors and dangers.
that he has, moreover, in this matter the precedent of the ten legates: since, when they granted the Chersonese and Lysimachia, they surely also granted Maronea and Aenus, which, by the very proximity of the region, were as it were appendices of the larger munus. For by what either merit toward the Roman People or right of imperium had Philip imposed garrisons upon these communities, since they are so far from the borders of Macedonia? They should order the Maronitae to be summoned: from them they would learn all things more certain about the condition of those communities.
Legati Maronitarum uocati non uno tantum loco urbis praesidium regium esse, sicut in aliis ciuitatibus, dixerunt, sed pluribus simul, et plenam Macedonum Maroneam esse. itaque dominari adsentatores regios: his solis loqui et in senatu et in contionibus licere; eos omnes honores et capere ipsos et dare aliis. optimum quemque, quibus libertatis, quibus legum cura sit, aut exsulare pulsos patria aut inhonoratos et deterioribus obnoxios silere.
The legates of the Maronites, when called, said that there was a royal garrison not in only one place of the city, as in other cities, but in several at once, and that Maronea was full of Macedonians. Accordingly the royal assentators dominate: to them alone it is permitted to speak both in the senate and in the public assemblies; they both seize all honors for themselves and bestow them on others. The best men, those who have a concern for liberty and for the laws, either are in exile, driven from their fatherland, or, dishonored and subject to worse men, keep silence.
they added a few points also on the law of the boundaries: that Q. Fabius Labeo, when he had been in that region, had drawn the boundary for Philip along the old royal road, which goes under the Paroreia of Thrace, nowhere declining to the sea; that Philip afterward had deflected a new road, by which he takes in the cities and fields of the Maronites.
[28] Ad ea Philippus longe aliam, quam aduersus Thessalos Perrhaebosque nuper, ingressus disserendi uiam 'non cum Maronitis' inquit 'mihi aut cum Eumene disceptatio est, sed iam uobiscum, Romani, a quibus nihil aequi me impetrare iam diu animaduerto. ciuitates Macedonum, quae a me inter indutias defecerant, reddi mihi aequum censebam, non quia magna accessio ea regni futura esset—sunt enim et parua oppida et in finibus extremis posita—sed quia multum ad reliquos Macedonas continedos exemplum pertinebat. negatum est mihi.
[28] To these points Philip entered upon a way of discoursing far other than that which he had lately used against the Thessalians and Perrhaebians, and said: 'My dispute is not with the Maronites or with Eumenes, but now with you, Romans, from whom I observe that for a long time I can obtain nothing equitable. I judged it fair that the cities of the Macedonians which had defected from me during the armistice be returned to me, not because that would be a great accession of the kingdom—for they are small towns and situated on the extreme borders—but because the precedent mattered much for keeping the rest of the Macedonians in check. It was denied to me.'
in the Aetolian war I was ordered by the consul M'. Acilius to assault Lamia; when I had long been wearied there by works and battles, as I was now scaling the walls, with the city nearly captured, the consul recalled me and compelled me to withdraw the forces from there. as a solace for this injury it was permitted that I should recover certain forts rather than cities of Thessaly, Perrhaebia, and the Athamanians. those very ones too you took from me, Q. Caecilius, a few days before.
Only a little before, if it please the gods, the envoys of Eumenes were assuming as beyond doubt that what had been Antiochus’s it was more equitable for Eumenes than for me to have. I judge that to be far otherwise. For Eumenes could not have remained in his kingdom, not if the Romans had conquered, but only if they had waged war.
and so he has your merit, not you his. But it was so far from the case that any part of my kingdom was in jeopardy that I spurned Antiochus—unbidden promising three thousand talents, fifty decked ships, and all the cities of Greece which I had previously held—as the price of alliance; and I preferred to be his enemy even before M'. Acilius should transport an army into Greece. And with that consul I waged whatever part of the war he assigned to me, and for the next consul, L. Scipio, when he had decided to lead the army by land to the Hellespont, I not only granted a route through our kingdom, but I even built roads, made bridges, and furnished supplies; and not through Macedonia only, but through Thrace as well, where, among other things, peace also had to be ensured against the barbarians.
for this zeal of mine toward you, not to say my desert, was it fitting, Romans, that you add something and amplify and augment my kingdom by your munificence, or to snatch away what I held either by my own right or by your beneficence—which is what you now do? The cities of the Macedonians, which you confess to have been of my kingdom, are not restored. Eumenes comes to despoil me as though for plundering an Antiochus; and, if it please the gods, he brandishes the decree of the ten legates as a cloak for most shameless calumny, by which most especially he can be both refuted and convicted.
for most eloquently and most plainly it is written therein that the Chersonese and Lysimachia are to be given to Eumenes. where, then, were Aenus and Maronea and the cities of Thrace ascribed? that which he did not even dare to request from them—will he obtain it with you, as though he had procured it from them?
[29] Mouit aliquantum oratio regis legatos. itaque medio responso rem suspenderunt: si decem legatorum decreto Eumeni datae ciuitates eae essent, nihil se mutare; si Philippus bello cepisset eas, praemium uictoriae iure belli habiturum; si neutrum eorum foret, cognitionem placere senatui reseruari et, ut omnia in integro manerent, praesidia, quae in iis urbibus sint, deduci.
[29] The speech of the king moved the legates somewhat. And so, with a middle reply, they suspended the matter: if by the decree of the Ten Legates those cities had been given to Eumenes, they would change nothing; if Philip had taken them in war, he would have the reward of victory by the right of war; if it were neither of these, that the inquiry should be reserved to the senate, and, in order that all things might remain intact, that the garrisons which are in those cities be withdrawn.
Hae causae maxime animum Philippi alienauerunt ab Romanis, ut non a Perseo filio eius nouis causis motum, sed ob has a patre bellum relictum filio uideri possit. Romae nulla Macedonici belli suspicio erat. L. Manlius proconsul ex Hispania redierat; cui postulanti ab senatu in aede Bellonae triumphum rerum gestarum magnitudo impetrabilem faciebat; exemplum obstabat, quod ita comparatum more maiorum erat, ne quis, qui exercitum non deportasset, triumpharet, nisi perdomitam pacatamque prouinciam tradidisset successori.
These causes most of all alienated Philip’s mind from the Romans, so that he might seem not to have been moved by new causes by his son Perseus, but that, on account of these, a war had been left by the father to the son. At Rome there was no suspicion of a Macedonian war. L. Manlius, proconsul, had returned from Spain; for him, as he requested from the senate a triumph in the temple of Bellona, the magnitude of his exploits was making it obtainable; precedent stood in the way, because it had been so established by the custom of the ancestors that no one who had not brought back his army should triumph, unless he had handed over to his successor a province thoroughly subdued and pacified.
However, a middle honor was accorded to Manlius, that he should enter the city in ovation. He brought fifty‑two golden crowns, besides 132 pounds of gold, 16,300 of silver; and he announced in the Senate that Q. Fabius the quaestor was conveying 10,000 pounds of silver and 80 of gold: this too he would deliver into the Treasury.
[30] Eodem anno in Hispania praetores C. Calpurnius et L. Quinctius, cum primo uere ex hibernis copias eductas in Baeturia iunxissent, in Carpetaniam, ubi hostium castra erant, progressi sunt, communi animo consilioque parati rem gerere. haud procul Dipone et Toleto urbibus inter pabulatores pugna orta est, quibus dum utrimque subuenitur a castris, paulatim omnes copiae in aciem eductae sunt. in eo tumultuario certamine et loca sua et genus pugnae pro hoste fuere.
[30] In the same year in Spain the praetors Gaius Calpurnius and Lucius Quinctius, when in early spring they had led their forces out of winter quarters and had joined them in Baeturia, advanced into Carpetania, where the enemy’s camp was, prepared to conduct the matter with a common spirit and counsel. Not far from the cities Dipo and Toledo, a fight arose among the foragers; and while relief was being brought to them from the camps on both sides, gradually all the forces were drawn out into battle line. In that tumultuary combat both the terrain and the kind of fighting were for the enemy.
At first light the Spaniards, with their battle-line drawn up, approached the rampart, and, entering the camp—empty beyond expectation—which had been abandoned amid the night-time panic, they plundered it; and, having returned to their own camp, they remained for a few days at rest in a standing camp. Of the Romans and their allies about five thousand were slain in the battle and the rout, with whose spoils the enemy armed themselves. Thence they set out for the river Tagus.
Meanwhile the Roman praetors spent all that time in mustering from the allied communities Spanish auxiliaries, and in restoring the spirits of the soldiers from the terror of the adverse battle. When their forces were sufficiently approved, and now the soldiery too was calling for the enemy to blot out the former ignominy, they pitched camp twelve miles from the river Tagus. Thence, at the third watch, with the standards lifted, in a square column, at first light they reached the bank of the Tagus.
Across the river, on a hill, was the enemy’s camp. Immediately, where in two places the river laid bare shallows, on the right Calpurnius, on the left Quinctius led the armies across, with the enemy quiet, while he marvels at the sudden arrival and takes counsel as to who could have thrown tumult upon men panic-stricken at the very crossing of the river. Meanwhile the Romans, with all the baggage also brought across and gathered into one place, because they already saw the enemy moving and there was no room for fortifying a camp, drew up the battle line.
[31] Hispani postquam in citeriore ripa duo Romanorum agmina conspexerunt, ut, priusquam se iungere atque instruere possent, occuparent eos, castris repente effusi cursu ad pugnam tendunt. atrox in principio pugna fuit, et Hispanis recenti uictoria ferocibus et insueta ignominia milite Romano accenso. acerrime media acies, duae fortissimae legiones, dimicabant.
[31] After the Spaniards, on the nearer bank, caught sight of two Roman columns, in order to seize them before they could join and form up, they poured suddenly out of camp and hastened at a run to battle. The fight was savage at the outset, with the Spaniards fierce from a recent victory, and the Roman soldier inflamed by unaccustomed ignominy. Most fiercely the center of the battle-line—the two strongest legions—fought.
When the enemy perceived that these could not be moved from their place by any other means, he pressed to fight in a wedge; and more and more numerous and massed troops were bearing upon the center. There, after Calpurnius the praetor saw the battle-line laboring, he swiftly sends T. Quinctilius Varus and L. Juventius Talna, legates, to exhort each legion; he orders them to teach and to admonish that upon those men rests all hope of conquering and of retaining Spain: if they yield that position, no one of that army will ever behold not only Italy, but not even the farther bank of the Tagus. He himself, with the horsemen of the two legions, having ridden a little around, charges from the flank into the enemy’s wedge which was pressing the middle of the line.
Quinctius with the allied cavalry assails the other flank of the enemy. But far more fiercely the Calpurnian cavalry were fighting, and the praetor before the others: for he both struck the foe first, and so plunged himself into the midst that it could scarcely be recognized of which side he was; and both the praetor’s cavalry were inflamed by his exceptional valor, and the infantry of the horsemen as well. Shame stirred the chief centurions, who espied the praetor amid the enemy’s missiles.
and so each man urges on the standard-bearers on his own behalf, orders that the standards be borne forward and that the soldiery follow at once. The clamor is renewed by all: an onslaught is made as if from higher ground. No otherwise, then, than in the manner of a torrent do they rout and lay low the stricken, nor can they be withstood as they press in, one upon another.
The horsemen pursued those fleeing into the camp, and, intermingled with the enemy’s throng, penetrated within the rampart; there the battle was renewed by those left in the camp’s garrison, and the Roman horsemen were compelled to dismount from their horses. As they fought, the 5th legion arrived; then, as each could, forces kept flowing in. The Spaniards were cut down everywhere throughout the whole camp, and not more than 4,000 men escaped.
before the assembly on the following day the cavalrymen were praised and presented by Gaius Calpurnius with phalerae, and he proclaimed that chiefly by their effort the enemies had been routed, the camp taken and stormed. Quinctius, the other praetor, presented his cavalry with little chains and brooches. very many centurions also from both armies were rewarded, especially those who had held the center of the line.
[32] Consules dilectibus aliisque, quae Romae agendae erant, peractis rebus in Ligures prouinciam exercitum duxerunt. Sempronius a Pisis profectus in Apuanos Ligures, uastando agros urendoque uicos et castella eorum aperuit saltum usque ad Macram fluuium et Lunae portum. hostes montem, antiquam sedem maiorum suorum, ceperunt; et inde superata locorum iniquitate proelio deiecti sunt.
[32] The consuls, the levies and the other matters that had to be transacted at Rome having been completed, led the army into the province against the Ligurians. Sempronius, setting out from Pisae against the Apuan Ligurians, by devastating their fields and burning their villages and forts, opened the pass as far as the river Macra and the port of Luna. The enemy seized a mountain, the ancient seat of their forefathers; and from there, after the disadvantage of the terrain had been overcome, they were driven down in battle.
and Appius Claudius matched the felicity and valor of his colleague among the Ingaunian Ligurians with several successful battles. Besides, he stormed six of their towns; he captured many thousands of men in them; he struck with the axe forty-three authors of the war. By now the time of the elections was approaching.
Claudius, however, came to Rome before Sempronius—on whom the lot had fallen to hold the elections—because his brother P. Claudius was canvassing for the consulship. He had patrician competitors, L. Aemilius, Q. Fabius, Ser. Sulpicius Galba, veteran candidates, and, after being previously repulsed, claiming the honor as all the more due—since it had been denied at first—renewing their bid for office.
also because it was not permitted that more than one from the patricians be created, the canvass was tighter with four seeking. Plebeians too, men of influence, were standing, L. Porcius, Q. Terentius Culleo, Cn. Baebius Tamphilus; and these, after repulses, were deferred in the hope of at last one day obtaining the honor. Claudius alone among all was a new candidate.
In the opinion of men, Q. Fabius Labeo and L. Porcius Licinus were without doubt being designated. But the consul Claudius, without lictors, together with his brother, by flitting through the whole Forum, while adversaries and the greater part of the Senate were shouting that he ought to remember that he was first the consul of the Roman people rather than the brother of P. Claudius: indeed that, sitting on the tribunal, he should present himself either as an arbiter or as a silent spectator of the comitia?—yet he could not be restrained from his effusive zeal. With great contentions also among the tribunes of the plebs, who fought either against the consul or in favor of his zeal, the comitia were several times thrown into confusion, until Appius prevailed, so that, Fabius having been cast down, he dragged in his brother.
P. Claudius Pulcher was elected beyond his own hope and that of the others. L. Porcius Licinus held his place, because the contest among the plebeians was waged with moderate partisanship, not with Claudian force. Thereupon the elections of praetors were held: C. Decimius Flauus P. Sempronius Longus P. Cornelius Cethegus Q. Naeuius Matho C. Sempronius Blaesus A. Terentius Uarro were made praetors.
[33] Principio insequentis anni P. Claudius L. Porcius consules, cum Q. Caecilius M. Baebius Ti. Sempronius, qui ad disceptandum inter Philippum et Eumenem reges Thessalorumque ciuitates missi erant, legationem renuntiassent, regum quoque eorum ciuitatiumque legatos in senatum introduxerunt. eadem utrimque iterata, quae dicta apud legatos in Graecia erant. aliam deinde nouam legationem patres, cuius princeps Ap. Claudius fuit, in Graeciam et Macedoniam decreuerunt ad uisendum, redditaene ciuitates Thessalis et Perrhaebis essent.
[33] At the beginning of the following year, P. Claudius and L. Porcius, consuls, when Q. Caecilius, M. Baebius, and Ti. Sempronius—who had been sent to arbitrate between the kings Philip and Eumenes and the cities of the Thessalians—had reported their embassy, also introduced into the senate the envoys of those kings and cities. The same matters were repeated on both sides as had been said before the legates in Greece. Then the Fathers decreed another new embassy, whose chief was Ap. Claudius, into Greece and Macedonia to inspect whether the cities had been restored to the Thessalians and the Perrhaebians.
to the same men it was mandated that the garrisons be withdrawn from Aenus and Maronea, and that the whole maritime coast of Thrace be liberated from Philip and the Macedonians. They were also ordered to go to the Peloponnesus, whence the earlier legation had departed with the state of affairs more uncertain than if they had not come: for, besides the rest, they had even been dismissed without an answer, nor had the council of the Achaeans been granted to those requesting it. As Quintus Caecilius was gravely complaining about this matter, and at the same time the Lacedaemonians were deploring that their walls had been torn down, that the common people had been carried off into Achaia and sold, that the laws of Lycurgus, by which the state had stood down to that day, had been taken away, the Achaeans were especially excusing the charge of the council’s being denied by reciting a law, which forbade a council to be proclaimed unless for a cause of war or peace, and when envoys should come from the senate with letters or written mandates.
[34] Dimissis iis legationibus, Philippus a suis certior factus cedendum ciuitatibus deducendaque praesidia esse, infensus omnibus in Maronitas iram effundit. Onomasto, qui praeerat maritimae orae, mandat, ut partis aduersae principes interficeret. ille per Casandrum quendam, unum ex regiis iam diu habitantem Maroneae, nocte Thracibus intromissis uelut in bello capta urbe caedem fecit.
[34] With those legations dismissed, Philip, having been informed by his own men that the cities must be ceded and the garrisons withdrawn, hostile to all, pours out his wrath upon the Maronites. He orders Onomastus, who was in command of the maritime coast, to kill the leaders of the adverse party. He, by means of a certain Cassander, one of the king’s men, long residing at Maronea, with Thracians admitted by night, wrought a massacre in the city as if it had been taken in war.
The same man, before the Roman legates—who were complaining that so cruelly had it been done against the innocent Maronites, so arrogantly against the Roman People, that those to whom the senate had voted liberty be restored were butchered as enemies—denied that any of those things pertained to himself or to any of his own; it had been fought out by a sedition among the Maronites themselves, since some were trying to draw the city to himself, others to Eumenes; they would easily learn this; let them question the Maronites themselves—, not at all in doubt, with all struck down by the terror of so recent a slaughter, that no one would dare to open his mouth against him. Appius declared that a matter evident was not to be sought as if it were doubtful. If he wished to remove the blame from himself, let him send Onomastus and Cassander, through whom the affair was said to have been carried out, to Rome, so that the senate might question them.
at first that voice so perturbed the king that neither color nor countenance held steady for him; then, his mind at last collected, he said that he would send Casander, who had been at Maronea, if they absolutely wished: as for Onomastus, what had that matter to do with him, who had not only not been at Maronea, but not even in a neighboring region? and he was sparing Onomastus the more, a more honored friend, and he feared that same informer by not a little more, because he himself had conferred conversation with him and had him as an agent and accomplice of many such things. Casander also—men having been sent to escort him through Epirus to the sea, lest any evidence should ooze out—is believed to have been taken off by poison.
[35] Et legati a Philippi colloquio ita digressi sunt, ut prae se ferrent nihil eorum sibi placere, et Philippus minime, quin rebellandum esset, dubius. quia tamen immaturae ad id uires erant, ad moram interponendam Demetrium minorem filium mittere Romam simul ad purganda crimina, simul ad deprecandam iram senatus statuit, satis credens ipsum etiam iuuenem, quod Romae obses specimen indolis regiae dedisset, aliquid momenti facturum. interim per speciem auxilii Byzantiis ferendi, re ipsa ad terrorem regulis Thracum iniciendum profectus, perculsis iis uno proelio et Amadoco duce capto in Macedoniam rediit, missis ad accolas Histri fluminis barbaros, ut in Italiam irrumperent, sollicitandos.
[35] And the envoys departed from their conference with Philip in such a way as to declare openly that none of those proposals pleased them, and Philip was in no doubt at all that there must be a rebellion. Because, however, the forces were unripe for that, he decided to send Demetrius, his younger son, to Rome to interpose a delay, both to purge the accusations and to deprecate the wrath of the Senate, believing sufficiently that the youth himself too—because, as a hostage at Rome, he had given a proof of royal character—would have some weight. Meanwhile, under the appearance of bringing aid to the Byzantines, but in reality to inject terror into the petty-kings of the Thracians, he set out; and when they were routed in a single battle and their leader Amadocus was captured, he returned to Macedonia, after dispatching agents to stir up the barbarians dwelling along the river Hister to burst into Italy.
And in the Peloponnese the arrival of the Roman legates, who had been ordered to go from Macedonia into Achaea, was being expected; against whom, that they might have prepared counsels, Lycortas the praetor convened a council. There the matter concerned the Lacedaemonians: that from enemies they had become accusers, and that there was danger lest, once conquered, they should be more to be feared than they had been while fighting. Indeed, in the war the Achaeans had made use of the Romans as allies; now those same Romans were more equitable to the Lacedaemonians than to the Achaeans—inasmuch as even Areus and Alcibiades, both exiles, restored by their favor, had undertaken an embassy to Rome against the nation of the Achaeans, so well deserving in respect to themselves, and had used so hostile a speech that they seemed not to have been restored to their fatherland but driven from it.
[36] Priusquam agerent quicquam, terror Achaeis iniectus erat et cogitatio, quam non ex aequo disceptatio futura esset, quod Areum et Alcibiadem capitis ab se concilio proximo damnatos cum legatis uidebant; nec hiscere quisquam audebat. Appius ea, quae apud senatum questi erant Lacedaemonii, displicere senatui ostendit: caedem primum ad Compasium factam eorum, qui a Philopoemene ad causam dicendam euocati uenissent; deinde cum in homines ita saeuitum esset, ne ulla parte crudelitas eorum cessaret, muros dirutos urbis nobilissimae esse, leges uetustissimas abrogatas, inclutamque per gentes disciplinam Lycurgi sublatam. haec cum Appius dixisset, Lycortas, et quia praetor et quia Philopoemenis, auctoris omnium quae Lacedaemone acta fuerant, factionis erat, ita respondit.
[36] Before they transacted anything, a terror had been injected into the Achaeans, and the thought that the disputation would not be on equal terms, because they saw Areus and Alcibiades, condemned on a capital charge by their own council at the last meeting, together with the legates; nor did anyone dare to open his mouth. Appius showed that the things about which the Lacedaemonians had complained before the senate were displeasing to the senate: first, the slaughter at Compasium of those who had come, having been summoned by Philopoemen to plead their case; then, as though their cruelty should not cease in any part, the walls of a most noble city had been torn down, the most ancient laws abrogated, and the discipline of Lycurgus, illustrious among the nations, abolished. When Appius had said these things, Lycortas—both because he was praetor and because he belonged to the faction of Philopoemen, the author of all the things that had been transacted at Lacedaemon—thus replied.
'Our oration, Appius Claudius, is more difficult before you than it was recently at Rome before the senate. For then we had to respond with the Lacedaemonians accusing; now we have been accused by you yourselves, before whom the case must be pleaded. We undergo this inequity of condition with the hope that you will listen with the mind of a judge, the contention with which you acted a little before set aside.
I, for my part, since those matters which the Lacedaemonians complained of—both here earlier before Quintus Caecilius and afterwards at Rome—have just now been recounted by you, will think that I am replying not to you but to them, before you. You allege the slaughter of those who, having been summoned by the praetor Philopoemen to plead their case, were put to death. This charge, I judge, ought not to have been brought against us—not only by you, Romans, but not even before you.
Why so? Because in your treaty it was that the Lacedaemonians should abstain from the maritime cities. At the time when, arms having been taken up, they seized by a nocturnal assault the cities from which they had been ordered to abstain, if T. Quinctius, if the Roman army, as before, had been in the Peloponnese, thither, to be sure, those taken and oppressed would have fled for refuge.
since you were far away, to whom else but to us, your allies—whom previously they had seen bringing aid at Gytheum, whom they had seen assaulting Lacedaemon with you for a similar cause—should they have fled for refuge? therefore on your behalf we undertook a just and pious war. which, though others praise it, not even the Lacedaemonians can reprehend; the gods themselves too have approved it, who gave us victory: in what way do those things which were done by the law of war come into disputation?
of which, however, the greatest part pertains nothing to us. It is ours that we summoned to plead their case those who had roused the multitude to arms, who had taken by storm the maritime towns, who had pillaged, who had made a slaughter of the chiefs. But that they, coming into the camp, were slain is yours, Areus and Alcibiades—who now, if it pleases the gods, accuse us—not ours.
the exiles of the Lacedaemonians, among whose number these two also were, and who were then with us, and because they had chosen the maritime towns as their domicile, believing themselves to be the targets, made an attack upon those by whose agency, being outcasts from their fatherland, they were indignant that they could not grow old even in safe exile. therefore Lacedaemonians killed Lacedaemonians, not the Achaeans; nor is it relevant to argue whether they were slain justly or unjustly.
[37] At enim illa certe uestra sunt, Achaei, quod leges disciplinamque uetustissimam Lycurgi sustulistis, quod muros diruistis. quae utraque ab iisdem obici qui possunt, cum muri Lacedaemoniis non ab Lycurgo, sed paucos ante annos ad dissoluendam Lycurgi disciplinam exstructi sint? tyranni enim nuper eos arcem et munimentum sibi, non ciuitati parauerunt; et si exsistat hodie ab inferis Lycurgus, gaudeat ruinis eorum, et nunc se patriam et Spartam antiquam agnoscere dicat.
[37] But indeed those things are certainly yours, Achaeans—namely, that you abolished the laws and the most ancient discipline of Lycurgus, that you tore down the walls. How can both of these be objected by the same people, since the walls for the Lacedaemonians were constructed not by Lycurgus, but a few years before for the dissolving of Lycurgus’s discipline? For tyrants recently prepared them as a citadel and a bulwark for themselves, not for the state; and if Lycurgus should arise today from the underworld, he would rejoice at their ruins, and would say that now he recognizes his fatherland and ancient Sparta.
you ought not to await Philopoemen nor the Achaeans, but you yourselves, Lacedaemonians, with your own hands ought to remove and demolish all vestiges of tyranny. for those were your disfiguring, as it were, marks of servitude; and whereas without walls for nearly eight hundred years you had been free, at times even princes of Greece, with walls, as though fetters set around you, you were enslaved for one hundred years. as to the laws taken away, I judge that the tyrants took from the Lacedaemonians their ancient laws; that we did not take away their own—which they did not have—but gave our laws; nor did we consult ill for the commonwealth, since we made it of our council and mingled it with us, so that it might be one body and the council of the whole Peloponnese.
then, as I suppose, if we ourselves were living under other laws, and had enjoined different ones upon those men, they could complain that they were under inequitable law and be indignant. I know, Appius Claudius, that this oration which I have used thus far is neither that of allies among allies nor of a free nation, but truly of slaves disputing before their masters. for if that cry of the herald was not empty, by which you ordered that the Achaeans be the first of all to be free, if the treaty is ratified, if alliance and amity are observed on equal terms, why do I not inquire what you Romans did with Capua captured, while you demand an account of what we Achaeans did to the Lacedaemonians conquered in war?
You say, in appearance, the treaty is equitable; in reality, among the Achaeans there is a precarious liberty, among the Romans there is even imperium. I perceive it, Appius, and, if it ought not to be so, I am not indignant; but I beg you, however great the difference between Romans and Achaeans, only let not your enemies and ours be with you on an equal footing with us your allies—nay, let them not be in a better right. For that they should be on equal terms we made, when we gave them our own laws, when we brought it about that they should belong to the Achaean council; what is enough for the victors is too little for the vanquished; enemies demand more than allies possess.
the things which by oath, which by monuments of letters inscribed in stone for eternal memory, have been hallowed and consecrated—these they are preparing to abolish by our perjury. We do indeed revere you, Romans, and, if you wish it so, we even fear you: but we both revere and fear the immortal gods more.' He was heard with the assent of the greatest part, and all judged that he had spoken in a manner worthy of the majesty of a magistrate, so that it was easy to see that by dealing gently the Romans could not maintain their dignity. Then Appius said that he strongly advised the Achaeans that, while it was permitted to do it of their own will, they should enter into favor, lest soon they do it unwilling and compelled.
This utterance was indeed heard with the groan of all, but it instilled fear of refusing the orders. They asked only this: that the Romans should change, as seemed good, regarding the Lacedaemonians, and should not bind the Achaeans by religious obligation to the doing of things that would render void those which they had sanctioned by oath. Only the condemnation of Areus and Alcibiades, which had recently been passed, was removed.
[38] Romae principio eius anni, cum de prouinciis consulum et praetorum actum est, consulibus Ligures, quia bellum nusquam alibi erat, decreti. praetores C. Decimius Flauus urbanam, P. Cornelius Cethegus inter ciues et peregrinos sortiti sunt, C. Sempronius Blaesus Siciliam, Q. Naeuius Matho Sardiniam et ut idem quaereret de ueneficiis, A. Terentius Uarro Hispaniam citeriorem, P. Sempronius Longus Hispaniam ulteriorem. de iis duabus prouinciis legati per id fere tempus L. Iuuentius Talna et T. Quinctilius Uarus uenerunt, qui, quantum bellum iam profligatum in Hispania esset, senatu edocto postularunt simul, ut pro rebus tam prospere gestis diis immortalibus haberetur honos et ut praetoribus exercitum deportare liceret.
[38] At Rome, at the beginning of that year, when it was dealt with concerning the provinces of the consuls and praetors, the Ligurians were assigned to the consuls, because there was war nowhere else. The praetors C. Decimius Flavus and P. Cornelius Cethegus drew lots: the former received the urban jurisdiction, the latter the court between citizens and foreigners; C. Sempronius Blaesus received Sicily, Q. Naevius Matho Sardinia, and that he likewise should conduct an inquiry concerning poisonings; A. Terentius Varro received Hither Spain, P. Sempronius Longus Farther Spain. About those two provinces envoys came around that same time, L. Iuventius Talna and T. Quinctilius Varus, who, after the senate had been informed how far the war in Spain had already been brought to an end, requested at the same time both that, for affairs managed so prosperously, honor be paid to the immortal gods, and that it be permitted to the praetors to convey the army home.
a public supplication for two days was decreed; regarding the legions to be brought home, when the forces of the consuls and praetors were being discussed, they ordered the matter to be referred back intact (i.e., deferred). a few days later, for the consuls against the Ligurians, two legions—the ones which Ap. Claudius and M. Sempronius had had—were assigned. concerning the Spanish armies there was a great contention between the new praetors and the friends of the absentees, Calpurnius and Quinctius.
Each side had tribunes of the plebs, each side had a consul. The former gave notice that they would intercede against a senatus consultum, if they should judge the armies to be deported; the latter declared that, if this intercession were made, they would allow no other matter to be decreed. In the end the favor of the absentees prevailed, and a senatus consultum was passed that the praetors should enroll four thousand Roman infantry, three hundred cavalry, and five thousand infantry of the allies of the Latin name, five hundred cavalry, whom they were to take with them into Spain.
when they had distributed those four thousand into the legions, so that in each legion there might be more than five thousand infantry and three hundred cavalry, they were to dismiss, first, those who had completed their terms of service; then those whose most valiant service Calpurnius and Quinctius had employed in battle.
[39] Hac sedata contentione alia subinde C. Decimii praetoris morte exorta est. Cn. Sicinius et L. Pupius, qui aediles proximo anno fuerant, et C. Ualerius flamen Dialis et Q. Fuluius Flaccus—is quia aedilis curulis designatus erat, sine toga candida, sed maxima ex omnibus contentione—petebant; certamenque ei cum flamine erat. et postquam primo aequare, mox superare etiam est uisus, pars tribunorum plebis negare rationem eius habendam esse, quod duos simul unus magistratus, praesertim curules, neque capere posset nec gerere; pars legibus eum solui aequum censere, ut quem uellet praetorem creandi populo potestas fieret.
[39] With this quarrel composed, another straightway arose upon the death of the praetor Gaius Decimius. Gnaeus Sicinius and Lucius Pupius, who had been aediles the previous year, and Gaius Valerius the flamen Dialis and Quintus Fulvius Flaccus—he, because he had been designated curule aedile, was canvassing without the white toga, but with the greatest zeal of all—were seeking the office; and the contest for him was with the flamen. And after he seemed at first to match him, soon even to surpass him, part of the tribunes of the plebs declared that his candidacy ought not to be considered, because one man could neither at the same time be elected to nor exercise two magistracies, especially curule ones; part judged it fair that he be exempted from the laws, so that the power might be the people’s of creating as praetor whom they wished.
L. Porcius the consul was at first of the opinion not to accept his name; then, in order to do the same by the authority of the senate, having convoked the fathers he said that he was referring the matter to them, because neither by any right nor by a tolerable precedent in a free commonwealth should a curule aedile-designate seek the praetorship; that he himself, unless something else seemed good to them, intended to hold the comitia according to law. The fathers decreed that L. Porcius the consul should deal with Q. Fulvius, that he should not be an impediment, whereby the comitia for a praetor to be substituted in the place of C. Decimius might be held according to law. To the consul acting in accordance with the senatus-consultum, Flaccus replied that he would do nothing that was unworthy of himself.
By a middle reply he had given, to those interpreting it according to their wish, the hope that he would yield to the authority of the Fathers. At the comitia he was canvassing even more keenly than before, by alleging that a beneficium of the Roman People was being extorted from him by the consul and the senate, and that odium was being created by the doubling of honor, as though it were not apparent that, once he were designated praetor, he would immediately abdicate the aedileship. When the consul saw both the stubbornness of the candidate increasing and the favor of the people inclining more and more toward him, the comitia dismissed, he called the senate.
they voted in full attendance that, since the authority of the senators had moved Flaccus not at all, the matter should be dealt with before the people together with Flaccus. A public assembly having been called, when the consul had spoken, not even then moved from his opinion he gave thanks to the Roman people, because with such zeal, whenever an opportunity of declaring its will had been afforded, it had wished to make him praetor: that he did not intend to abandon such enthusiasms of his fellow citizens. This truly so obstinate utterance kindled so much favor for him that he would have been a praetor beyond doubt, if the consul were willing to accept the name.
There was a vast contest for the tribunes both among themselves and with the consul, until a meeting of the senate was held by the consul and a decree passed: since the comitia for subrogating a praetor, from being conducted according to the laws, were being hindered by the obstinacy of Quintus Flaccus and the depraved enthusiasms of men, the senate judged that there were praetors enough; that Publius Cornelius should hold both jurisdictions in the city, and should celebrate the Games of Apollo.
[40] His comitiis prudentia et uirtute senatus sublatis, alia maioris certaminis, quo et maiore de re et inter plures potentioresque uiros, sunt exorta. censuram summa contentione petebant L. Ualerius Flaccus P. et L. Scipiones Cn. Manlius Uulso L. Furius Purpurio patricii, plebeii autem M. Porcius Cato M. Fuluius Nobilio Ti. et M. Sempronii, Longus et Tuditanus. sed omnes patricios plebeiosque nobilissimarum familiarum M. Porcius longe anteibat.
[40] With these elections set aside by the prudence and virtue of the senate, other matters of greater contention—since the dispute was both about a greater affair and among more numerous and more powerful men—arose. The censorship was being sought with the utmost contention by the patricians L. Ualerius Flaccus, P. and L. Scipiones, Cn. Manlius Uulso, L. Furius Purpurio; and by the plebeians M. Porcius Cato, M. Fuluius Nobilio, and the two M. and Ti. Sempronii, Longus and Tuditanus. But M. Porcius far outstripped all, both patricians and plebeians, of the most noble families.
in this man there was so great a force of spirit and of talent, that, in whatever place he had been born, he would have seemed likely to make his fortune for himself. no art of managing either private or public affairs was lacking to him; he was equally conversant with urban and rustic matters. to the highest honors some men have been advanced by knowledge of law, others by eloquence, others by military glory: in his case a versatile genius was so equally adapted to all things that you would say he was born for that one thing, whatever he happened to be doing. in war he was most brave in hand and renowned for many distinguished combats; the same man, after he had come to great honors, was a consummate commander; the same, in peace, if you consulted the law, was most expert; if a case had to be pleaded, most eloquent. nor was he of the sort whose tongue flourished only while he lived, with no monument of eloquence extant: rather, his eloquence lives and even thrives, consecrated in writings of every kind.
many orations both for himself and for others and against others: for he wearied his enemies not only by accusing but also by pleading causes. Feuds far too many both exercised him, and he in turn exercised them; nor would you easily say whether the nobility pressed him more, or he agitated the nobility. He was, beyond doubt, of a harsh spirit and of a bitter and immoderately free tongue, but of a mind unconquered by desires, of rigid innocence, a contemner of favor and of riches.
[41] Hunc, sicut omni uita, tum petentem premebat nobilitas; coierantque praeter L. Flaccum, qui collega in consulatu fuerat, candidati omnes ad deiciendum honore, non solum ut ipsi potius adipiscerentur, nec quia indignabantur nouum hominem censorem uidere, sed etiam quod tristem censuram periculosamque multorum famae et ab laeso a plerisque et laedendi cupido exspectabant. etenim tum quoque minitabundus petebat, refragari sibi, qui liberam et fortem censuram timerent, criminando. et simul L. Ualerio suffragabatur: illo uno collega castigare se noua flagitia et priscos reuocare mores posse.
[41] Him, as throughout his whole life, so then also when seeking office, the nobility pressed; and all the candidates, except for L. Flaccus, who had been his colleague in the consulship, had come together to cast him down from the honor—not only that they themselves might rather obtain it, nor because they were indignant to see a new man as censor, but also because they expected a grim censorship, perilous to the reputation of many, and, in one injured by very many, a desire to injure. For even then he was canvassing in a minatory manner, by alleging that those who feared a free and brave censorship were opposing him. And at the same time he was voting for L. Valerius: with that one man as colleague he said he could chastise new flagitia and recall the ancient mores.
Secundum comitia censorum consules praetoresque in prouincias profecti praeter Q. Naeuium, quem quattuor non minus menses, priusquam in Sardiniam iret, quaestiones ueneficii, quarum magnam partem extra urbem per municipia conciliabulaque habuit, quia ita aptius uisum erat, tenuerunt. si Antiati Ualerio credere libet, ad duo milia hominum damnauit. et L. Postumius praetor, cui Tarentum prouincia euenerat, magnas pastorum coniurationes uindicauit, et reliquias Bacchanalium quaestionis cum cura exsecutus est.
After the elections of the censors, the consuls and praetors set out to the provinces, except Q. Naevius, whom inquiries into poisoning detained for not less than four months before he went to Sardinia; a great part of these he held outside the city through the municipal towns and country meeting-places, because thus it seemed more apt. If one is willing to believe Valerius Antias, he condemned up to two thousand persons. And L. Postumius, praetor, to whom Tarentum had fallen as his province, punished great conspiracies of shepherds, and he pursued with care the remnants of the inquiry into the Bacchanalia.
[42] In Hispania ulteriore fractis proximo bello Lusitanis quietae res fuerunt: in citeriore A. Terentius in Suessetanis oppidum Corbionem uineis et operibus expugnauit, captiuos uendidit: quieta deinde hiberna et citerior prouincia habuit. ueteres praetores C. Calpurnius Piso et L. Quinctius Romam redierunt. utrique magno patrum consensu triumphus est decretus.
[42] In Further Spain, with the Lusitanians broken in the most recent war, affairs were quiet: in Hither Spain A. Terentius in the territory of the Suessetani took the town Corbio by vineae and siege-works, and sold the captives: thereafter both the winter-quarters and the Hither province were quiet. The former praetors C. Calpurnius Piso and L. Quinctius returned to Rome. For both a triumph was decreed by the great consensus of the Fathers.
The first, C. Calpurnius, triumphed over the Lusitanians and Celtiberians: he bore eighty‑three golden crowns and twelve thousand pounds of silver. A few days later L. Quinctius Crispinus triumphed over those same Lusitanians and Celtiberians: in that triumph there was displayed as much gold as silver. The censors M. Porcius and L. Valerius enrolled the senate with expectation mixed with fear; they removed seven from the senate, among whom one remarkable both for nobility and for honors, L. Quinctius Flamininus, a consular.
It is reported that, in the memory of the fathers, a practice was instituted that the censors would append marks to those removed from the senate. Cato’s and other indeed bitter speeches survive against those whom he either removed from the senatorial rank or from whom he took away their horses; by far the most weighty speech was against L. Quinctius—such that, if he had used it as an accuser before the mark, not as a censor after the mark, not even his brother T. Quinctius, if he had been censor at that time, could have retained L. Quinctius in the senate. Among other charges he alleged against him Philippus the Punic, a cherished and notable prostitute, conducted from Rome into the province of Gaul by hope of immense gifts.
that boy, <per> lasciviousness as he was cavilling, was accustomed [per]often to upbraid the consul, because at the very time of the gladiatorial spectacle he had been abducted from Rome, to peddle his obsequiousness to his lover. by chance, while they were feasting, when now they had grown warm with wine, it was announced at the banquet that a noble Boiian, a defector, had come with his children; that he wished to meet the consul, so that he might receive a pledge from him in person. having been brought into the tent, he began to address the consul through an interpreter.
during whose speech Quinctius said to the courtesan, “Do you wish, since you have left the gladiatorial spectacle, now to see this Gaul dying?” And when he had scarcely nodded in earnest, then at the courtesan’s nod the consul, with the sword drawn which was hanging above his head, while the Gaul was speaking, first struck him on the head, then, as he fled and appealed to the good faith of the Roman People and of those present, pierced his side through.
[43] Ualerius Antias, ut qui nec orationem Catonis legisset et fabulae tantum sine auctore editae credidisset, aliud argumentum, simile tamen et libidine et crudelitate peragit. Placentiae famosam mulierem, cuius amore deperiret, in conuiuium arcessitam scribit. ibi iactantem sese scorto inter cetera rettulisse, quam acriter quaestiones exercuisset, et quam multos capitis damnatos in uinculis haberet, quos securi percussurus esset.
[43] Valerius Antias, as one who had not read the oration of Cato and had believed only a tale published without an author, carries through another argument, similar nevertheless in both lust and cruelty. He writes that at Placentia a notorious woman, with whose love he was wasting away, was summoned to a banquet. There, boasting to the harlot, he related among other things how sharply he had conducted interrogations, and how many men condemned on a capital charge he had in chains, whom he was going to strike with the axe.
then that woman, reclining beneath him, denied that she had ever seen anyone struck by the axe, and was very eager to see that. hereupon the indulgent lover ordered one of those wretches to be dragged in and to be struck with the axe. whether the crime was committed in the manner the Censor alleged, or as Valerius relates, it was savage and atrocious: amid cups and banquets, where it was the custom to libate to the gods the viands and to offer good prayers, for the spectacle of a procacious harlot, in the bosom of the reclining consul, a human victim was sacrificed and the table was besprinkled with blood.
in the closing section of Cato’s speech the condition to Quintius is reported as follows: that if he denied that deed and the rest which he had objected, he should defend himself by a sponsion; but if he confessed it, did he think that anyone would be pained by his own ignominy, when he himself, mad with wine and venery, had made sport with a man’s blood at a banquet?
[44] In equitatu recognoscendo L. Scipioni Asiatico ademptus equus. in censibus quoque accipiendis tristis et aspera in omnes ordines censura fuit. ornamenta et uestem muliebrem et uehicula, quae pluris quam quindecim milium aeris essent, <deciens tanto pluris quam quanti essent> in censum referre iuratores iussi; item mancipia minora annis uiginti, quae post proximum lustrum decem milibus aeris aut pluris eo uenissent, uti ea quoque deciens tanto pluris quam quanti essent aestimarentur, et his rebus omnibus terni in milia aeris attribuerentur.
[44] In the review of the equestrian order, the horse was taken from Lucius Scipio Asiaticus. In the taking of the censuses as well, the censorship was grim and harsh toward all orders. The sworn declarants were ordered to enter on the census women’s ornaments and clothing and vehicles which were worth more than 15,000 asses,
they took away all public water flowing into a private edifice or field; and the things which private persons had built upon or encroached in public places they demolished within thirty days. Then they let out the works to be done from the money decreed for that purpose: the cisterns to be paved with stone, and the sewers to be detergeted, where there was need, and on the Aventine and in other parts, where they did not yet exist, to be made. And separately Flaccus made a mole at the Neptunian waters, so that there might be a passage for the people, and a road through the Formian mountain; Cato bought into the public two atria, the Maenian and the Titian, in the stone‑quarries, and four shops, and he made a basilica there, which was called the Porcian.
and they let the revenues at the highest prices, and the voluntary tributes at the lowest. When the senate, overcome by the prayers and tears of the publicans, had ordered those lettings to be rescinded and re-let afresh, the censors, by an edict removing from the auction those who had made a mockery of the prior letting, let all the same items with the prices slightly reduced. It was a notable censorship and full of enmities, which they pursued against M. Porcius throughout his whole life, to whom that harshness was ascribed.
[45] In insequentem annum crearunt consules M. Claudium Marcellum Q. Fabium Labeonem. M. Claudius Q. Fabius idibus Martiis, quo die consulatum inierunt, de prouinciis suis praetorumque rettulerunt. praetores creati erant C. Ualerius flamen Dialis, qui et priore anno petierat, et Sp. Postumius Albinus et P. Cornelius Sisenna L. Pupius L. Iulius Cn. Sicinius.
[45] For the ensuing year they created as consuls Marcus Claudius Marcellus and Quintus Fabius Labeo. On the Ides of March, the day on which they entered upon the consulship, Marcus Claudius and Quintus Fabius reported on their own provinces and those of the praetors. The praetors had been created Gaius Valerius, the Flamen Dialis (who had also sought it in the prior year), and Spurius Postumius Albinus and Publius Cornelius Sisenna and Lucius Pupius and Lucius Julius and Gnaeus Sicinius.
The province of the Ligurians was assigned to the consuls, with the same armies which P. Claudius and L. Porcius had had. The Spains were reserved, outside the lot, for the praetors of the previous year, with their own armies. The praetors were ordered to draw lots in such a way that for the Flamen Dialis, in any case, one of the provinces of pronouncing law at Rome should be his: he drew the peregrine jurisdiction.
Sisenna Cornelius obtained the urban jurisdiction; to Sp. Postumius fell by lot Sicily, to L. Pupius Apulia, to L. Julius Gaul, to Cn. Sicinius Sardinia. L. Julius was ordered to make haste. The Transalpine Gauls, through the passes of a route previously unknown, as was said before, having crossed into Italy, were building a town in the territory which is now Aquileian.
[46] Huius principio anni P. Licinius Crassus pontifex maximus mortuus est, in cuius locum M. Sempronius Tuditanus pontifex est cooptatus; pontifex maximus est creatus C. Seruilius Geminus. P. Licinii funeris causa uisceratio data, et gladiatores centum uiginti pugnauerunt, et ludi funebres per triduum facti, post ludos epulum. in quo cum toto foro strata triclinia essent, tempestas cum magnis procellis coorta coegit plerosque tabernacula statuere in foro: eadem paulo post, cum undique disserenasset, sublata; defunctosque uulgo ferebant quod inter fatalia uates cecinissent, necesse esse tabernacula in foro statui.
[46] At the beginning of this year Publius Licinius Crassus, the pontifex maximus, died; in his place Marcus Sempronius Tuditanus was co-opted as pontifex; Gaius Servilius Geminus was elected pontifex maximus. For the funeral of P. Licinius a visceration (distribution of meat) was given, and one hundred twenty gladiators fought, and funeral games were held for three days; after the games, a banquet. At this, since dining-couches had been spread throughout the whole Forum, a storm arising with great squalls compelled many to set up tents in the Forum; the same, a little later, when it had cleared on all sides, were removed; and people commonly reported that the prophecy among the fated utterances, chanted by the seers—that it was necessary that tents be set up in the Forum—had been fulfilled.
Priusquam consules in prouincias proficiscerentur, legationes transmarinas in senatum introduxerunt. nec umquam ante tantum regionis eius hominum Romae fuerat. nam ex quo fama per gentes, quae Macedoniam accolunt, uulgata est crimina querimoniasque de Philippo non neglegenter ab Romanis audiri, multis operae pretium fuisse queri, pro se quaeque ciuitates gentesque, singuli etiam priuatim—grauis enim accola omnibus erat—Romam aut ad spem leuandae iniuriae aut ad deflendae solacium uenerunt.
Before the consuls set out into their provinces, they introduced transmarine legations into the senate. Nor had there ever before been so many men of that region in Rome. For since the rumor was spread among the peoples who border Macedonia that the charges and complaints about Philip were being heard not negligently by the Romans, it was worth the trouble for many to complain—each cities and peoples on their own behalf, and even individuals privately—for he was a grievous neighbor to all; they came to Rome either with the hope of alleviating their injury or for the solace of bewailing it.
[47] Respondendum ad omnia iuueni tum admodum Demetrio erat. cum haud facile esset aut ea, quae obicerentur, aut quae aduersus ea dicenda erant, memoria complecti—nec enim multa solum, sed etiam pleraque oppido quam parua erant, de controuersia finium, de hominibus raptis pecoribusque abactis, de iure aut dicto per libidinem aut non dicto, de rebus per uim aut gratiam iudicatis—, nihil horum neque Demetrium docere dilucide nec se satis liquido discere ab eo senatus cum cerneret posse, simul et tirocinio et perturbatione iuuenis moueretur, quaeri iussit ab eo, ecquem de his rebus commentarium a patre accepisset. cum respondisset accepisse se, nihil prius nec potius uisum est quam regis ipsius de singulis responsa accipere.
[47] At that time it fell to the very young Demetrius to respond to everything. Since it was by no means easy to comprise in memory either the things that were being objected or the things that had to be said in answer to them—for they were not only many, but indeed most were exceedingly petty: about boundary-controversy, about men snatched and herds driven off, about a pronouncement of law either uttered out of caprice or not uttered, about matters adjudged by force or by favor—when the senate perceived that in none of these could Demetrius expound clearly, nor could they learn from him with sufficient clarity, and was at the same time moved by the youth’s novitiate and perturbation, it ordered that inquiry be made of him whether he had received any commentary on these matters from his father. When he replied that he had received one, nothing seemed prior or preferable than to receive the king’s own answers on each point.
they demanded the book at once; then they allowed him to recite it himself. moreover, for each several matter the cases had been compressed into brief, to the effect that he said he had done some things according to the decrees of the legates, others that it had not depended on himself that he failed to do, but on those very persons who were accusing. he had also interposed complaints about the iniquity of the decrees, and that the disputation before Caecilius had not been on equal terms, and that indignities had been inflicted upon him by all, unworthily and with no desert of his.
the senate gathered these marks of his irritated mind: moreover, it pleased them that, to the youth—who was excusing some things and taking others upon himself as to be done in the way the senate most wished—this reply be given: that his father had done nothing either more correctly or more in accordance with the will of the senate than this, namely, that, however those matters had been conducted, he had wished satisfaction to be made to the Romans through his son Demetrius. the senate could both dissemble many things and forget and endure what was past, and also to trust Demetrius [that he should be believed]. for they held his mind as a hostage, although they had returned his body to his father; and they knew that, so far as he could with piety toward his father safe, he was a friend of the Roman people, and that for the sake of that honor they would send legates into Macedonia, in order that, if anything had been done less than it ought, then even so it might be done without expiation for the things omitted. they also wished Philip to perceive that, thanks to his son Demetrius, all things were intact for him with the Roman people.
[48] Haec, quae augendae amplitudinis eius causa facta erant, extemplo in inuidiam, mox etiam in perniciem adulescenti uerterunt. Lacedaemonii deinde introducti sunt. multae et paruae disceptationes iactabantur: sed quae maxime rem continerent, erant, utrum restituerentur, quos Achaei damnauerant, necne; inique an iure occidissent, quos occiderant, [uertebatur] et utrum manerent in Achaico concilio Lacedaemonii, an, ut ante fuerat, secretum eius unius in Peloponneso ciuitatis ius esset.
[48] These things, which had been done for the sake of augmenting his amplitude, straightway turned into envy, soon even into perdition for the youth. The Lacedaemonians were then introduced. Many and petty disputations were bandied about; but those which most contained the matter were: whether those whom the Achaeans had condemned should be restored, or not; whether they had slain unjustly or by right those whom they had slain, [the issue turned]; and whether the Lacedaemonians should remain in the Achaean council, or whether, as it had been before, there should be a separate right of that single city in the Peloponnese.
Legatus in Macedoniam Q. Marcius est missus, iussus idem in Peloponneso sociorum res aspicere. nam ibi quoque et ex ueteribus discordiis residui motus erant, et Messene desciuerat a concilio Achaico. cuius belli et causas et ordinem si expromere uelim, immemor sim propositi, quo statui non ultra attingere externa, nisi qua Romanis cohaererent rebus.
A legate was sent into Macedonia, Q. Marcius, ordered likewise in the Peloponnese to look to the affairs of the allies. For there too there were remaining movements from old discords, and Messene had defected from the Achaean council. If I should wish to set forth both the causes and the order of that war, I would be forgetful of my plan, by which I determined not to touch further on external matters, except in so far as they cohere with Roman affairs.
[49] Euentus memorabilis est, quod, cum bello superiores essent, Achaei, Philopoemen praetor eorum capitur, ad praeoccupandam Coronen, quam hostes petebant, in<ita> ualle iniqua cum equitibus paucis oppressus. ipsum potuisse effugere Thracum Cretensiumque auxilio tradunt: sed pudor relinquendi equites, nobilissimos gentis, ab ipso nuper lectos, tenuit. quibus dum locum ad euadendas angustias cogendo ipse agmen praebet, sustinens impetus hostium, prolapso equo et suo ipse casu et onere equi super eum ruentis haud multum afuit, quin exanimaretur, septuaginta annos iam natus et diutino morbo, ex quo tum primum reficiebatur, uiribus admodum attenuatis.
[49] A memorable outcome was this: although in the war the Achaeans were superior, Philopoemen, their praetor, was captured, as he went to pre-occupy Corone, which the enemy were seeking, having been overpowered with a few cavalry after entering an unfavorable valley. They relate that he himself could have escaped with the aid of the Thracians and the Cretans; but shame at abandoning the cavalry—men of the noblest rank of the nation, recently chosen by himself—restrained him. While for these men, by compressing the column himself, he provides room to escape the narrows, sustaining the assaults of the enemy, when his horse slipped, by his own fall and by the weight of the horse rushing down upon him, he was not far from being killed—already seventy years old, and with his strength very much attenuated by a long illness, from which just then for the first time he was recovering.
the enemies, having poured over him as he lay, overpowered him; and, once recognized, [first] out of reverence and the memory of his merits, they lift him up and restore him no less than as if he were their own leader, and carry him from the out-of-the-way valley into the road, scarcely believing themselves because of the unhoped-for joy; some send messengers ahead to Messene, that the war has been fought to an end, that Philopoemen, captured, is being brought in. at first the thing seemed so incredible that the messenger was listened to not only as a babbler but scarcely as sane. then, as one after another came, all affirming the same, trust was at last established; and before they knew well enough that they were approaching the city, all together—free and slaves, boys also with the women—pour out for the spectacle.
Thus the crowd had closed the gate, since each man, unless he had believed with his own eyes, seemed hardly about to hold so great a matter as ascertained. With difficulty, driving back those who met them, those who were leading Philopoemen were able to enter the gate. An equally packed crowd had blocked the rest of the way; and, since the greater part was shut out from the spectacle, they suddenly filled the theater, which was near the road, and with one voice they all demanded that he be led there into the sight of the people.
the magistrates and the leading men, fearing lest compassion for so great a man now present might cause some disturbance—since in some reverence for his former majesty, contrasted with his present fortune, and in others the recollection of his vast merits, was likely to move them—set him at a distance, within sight; then rapidly removed him from the eyes of men, the praetor Dinocrates saying that there were matters pertaining to the sum of the war which the magistrates wished to inquire of him. then, with him led away into the curia and the senate summoned, deliberation was begun.
[50] Iam inuesperascebat, et non modo cetera, sed ne in proximam quidem noctem ubi satis tuto custodiretur, expediebant. obstupuerant ad magnitudinem pristinae eius fortunae uirtutisque, et neque ipsi domum recipere custodiendum audebant, nec cuiquam uni custodiam eius satis credebant. admonent deinde quidam esse thesaurum publicum sub terra, saxo quadrato saeptum.
[50] It was already growing toward evening, and they were making ready not only nothing else, but not even for the coming night a place where he might be guarded with sufficient safety. They had been stupefied at the greatness of his former fortune and virtue, and they did not themselves dare to receive him into a house to be kept in custody, nor did they trust the custody of him sufficiently to any one man. Then certain men remind them that there is a public treasury underground, enclosed with squared stone.
there he was lowered bound, and a huge stone, with which it was covered, was set atop by a machine. Thus, thinking that custody was to be entrusted to the place rather than to any person, they awaited the ensuing light. On the next day the multitude, indeed intact, mindful of his former merits toward the city, judged that he should be spared and that through him remedies should be sought for the present evils; the authors of the defection, in whose hand the republic was, consulting in secret, all were agreeing to his death.
but whether they should hasten or defer was in doubt. the more avid faction for punishment prevailed, and one was sent to bring poison. on receiving the cup, they report that he said nothing else than to ask whether Lycortas—he was the other general of the Achaeans—and the horsemen had escaped unscathed.
After it was said that they were unharmed, 'it is well,' he said; and, the cup fearlessly drained, not very much later he expired. The joy at his death was not long-lasting for the authors of the cruelty. For Messene, conquered in war, surrendered the guilty at the demand of the Achaeans, and Philopoemen’s bones were returned, and he was buried by the entire Achaean council, with all human honors heaped up to such a degree that they did not even refrain from divine ones.
by Greek and Latin writers of affairs so much is attributed to this man that by some of them, as a distinguished mark of that year, it has been consigned to memory that three famous commanders died in that year—Philopoemen, Hannibal, P. Scipio: to such a degree did they place him on equal footing with the highest commanders of the two most powerful nations.
[51] Ad Prusiam regem legatus T. Quinctius Flamininus uenit, quem suspectum Romanis et receptus post fugam Antiochi Hannibal et bellum aduersus Eumenem motum faciebat. ibi seu quia a Flaminino inter cetera obiectum Prusiae erat hominem omnium, qui uiuerent, infestissimum populo Romano apud eum esse, qui patriae suae primum, deinde fractis eius opibus Antiocho regi auctor belli aduersus populum Romanum fuisset; seu quia ipse Prusias, ut gratificaretur praesenti Flaminino Romanisque, per se necandi aut tradendi eius in potestatem consilium cepit; a primo colloquio Flaminini milites extemplo ad domum Hannibalis custodiendam missi sunt. semper talem exitum uitae suae Hannibal prospexerat animo et Romanorum inexpiabile odium in se cernens, et fidei regum nihil sane confisus: Prusiae uero leuitatem etiam expertus erat; Flaminini quoque aduentum uelut fatalem sibi horruerat.
[51] To King Prusias came as envoy T. Quinctius Flamininus, who was being rendered suspect to the Romans by the fact that Hannibal, received after the flight of Antiochus, and a war stirred up against Eumenes, made him so. There, either because it had been alleged by Flamininus among other things to Prusias that with him there was the man most hostile to the Roman people of all who were living—one who had been, first to his own fatherland, then, when its power was broken, to King Antiochus the author of war against the Roman people—or because Prusias himself, to do a favor to the present Flamininus and to the Romans, conceived the plan either of killing him on his own initiative or of handing him over into their power, from the first interview soldiers of Flamininus were immediately sent to guard Hannibal’s house. Hannibal had always foreseen in mind such an outcome of his life, both discerning the inexpiable hatred of the Romans against himself and surely putting no trust in the faith of kings; indeed, he had even experienced the levity of Prusias, and he shuddered at the arrival of Flamininus as if it were fated for himself.
With everything hostile on every side, so that he might always have some route prepared for flight, he had made seven exits from the house, and some of these hidden, lest they be fenced off by a guard. But the grave authority of kings leaves nothing unexplored that they wish to track down. They encompassed the entire circuit of the house with guards in such a way that no one could slip out from there.
Hannibal, after it was announced that the king’s soldiers were in the vestibule, tried to flee by the postern, which was the most out‑of‑the‑way and most hidden exit; but when he perceived that that too was blocked by the interception of the soldiers, and that everything around was shut in with guards posted, he called for the venom which he had long before prepared for such contingencies. ‘Let us free,’ he said, ‘the Roman people from their protracted anxiety, since they judge it a long wait for an old man’s death. Nor will Flamininus carry a great nor a memorable victory from an unarmed and betrayed man.’
"The morals indeed of the Roman people—how much they have changed—even this day will be evidence. Their fathers to King Pyrrhus, an armed enemy, having an army in Italy, foretold that he should beware of poison: these men sent a consular legate, who was to be an instigator to Prusias for the crime of killing his guest." Having then called down curses upon the head and kingdom of Prusias, and invoking the hospital gods as witnesses of the faith violated by him, he drained the cup. This was the end of the life of Hannibal.
[52] Scipionem et Polybius et Rutilius hoc anno mortuum scribunt. ego neque his neque Ualerio adsentior, his, quod censoribus M. Porcio L. Ualerio <L. Ualerium> principem senatus ipsum censorem lectum inuenio, cum superioribus duobus lustris Africanus fuisset, quo uiuo, nisi ut ille senatu moueretur, quam notam nemo memoriae prodidit, alius princeps in locum eius lectus non esset. Antiatem auctorem refellit tribunus plebis M. Naeuius, aduersus quem oratio inscripta P. Africani est.
[52] Both Polybius and Rutilius write that Scipio died in this year. I assent neither to these nor to Valerius Antias: to the former, because under the censors M. Porcius and L. Valerius <L. Valerium> I find that the princeps of the senate—the censor himself—was chosen, whereas in the two previous lustra Africanus had been; while he was alive, unless that man were removed from the senate—a mark which no one has handed down to memory—another princeps would not have been chosen in his place. The Antiate author is refuted by the tribune of the plebs M. Naevius, against whom there is a speech inscribed with the name of P. Africanus.
That Naevius, in the books of the magistrates, is tribune of the plebs under the consuls P. Claudius and L. Porcius, but he entered upon the tribunate under the consuls Ap. Claudius and M. Sempronius on the fourth day before the Ides of December. Thence there are three months to the Ides of March, on which date P. Claudius and L. Porcius entered upon the consulship. Thus he seems to have lived into the tribunate of Naevius, and that a day could have been named against him by him; but that he died before the censorship of L. Valerius and M. Porcius.
the death of three most illustrious men, each of his own nation, seems comparable not so much in the congruence of their time as in this: that none of them had an end sufficiently worthy of the splendor of his life. To begin with, none of them died or were buried on his native soil. Hannibal and Philopoemen were consumed by poison; Hannibal, an exile, betrayed by a host; Philopoemen, captured, expired in prison and in chains: Scipio, although neither an exile nor condemned, yet, when a day in court was named, at which, not having been present as the defendant, he was summoned in absentia, declared a voluntary exile not only for himself but even for his own funeral.
[53] Dum ea in Peloponneso, a quibus deuertit oratio, geruntur, reditus in Macedoniam Demetrii legatorumque aliter aliorum adfecerat animos. uulgus Macedonum, quos belli ab Romanis imminentis metus terruerat, Demetrium ut pacis auctorem cum ingenti fauore conspiciebant, simul et spe haud dubia regnum ei post mortem patris destinabant. nam etsi minor aetate quam Perseus esset, hunc iusta matre familiae, illum paelice ortum esse; illum ut ex uulgato corpore genitum nullam certi patris notam habere, hunc insignem Philippi similitudinem prae se ferre.
[53] While those things in the Peloponnesus, from which the narrative had turned aside, were being transacted, the return into Macedonia of Demetrius and of the legates had affected men’s minds in different ways. The common multitude of the Macedonians, whom the fear of a war imminent from the Romans had terrified, were regarding Demetrius as the author of peace with huge favor, and at the same time, with a hope by no means doubtful, were destining the kingdom for him after his father’s death. For although he was younger in age than Perseus, this one had been born of a lawful matron of the household, that one of a concubine; that one, as sprung from a common woman, had no sure token of a father, this one bore conspicuously a striking likeness to Philip.
In addition, they said that the Romans would seat Demetrius upon his paternal throne, and that Perseus had no favor with them. These things were commonly talked of. And so concern tormented Perseus as well, lest age alone should avail too little for him, since in all other respects his brother was superior; and Philip himself, believing that it would scarcely be in his own power whom he would leave as heir of the kingdom, said that the younger son was to him also more burdensome than he would wish.
He was sometimes offended by the concourse of Macedonians to him, and was indignant that, while he himself was still alive, there was now a second royal court. And the youth himself had without doubt returned more inflated, relying on the judgments of the senate in his favor, and on concessions granted to himself which had been denied to his father; and every mention of the Romans procured for him as much dignity among the other Macedonians as envy, not only with his brother but even with his father—especially after [other] Roman legates arrived—and he was compelled to withdraw from Thrace and to lead away the garrisons, and to do other things either from the decree of the earlier legates or from a new ordinance of the senate. But all these things he did obediently toward the Romans, grieving indeed and groaning, all the more because he saw his son almost more frequently with them than with himself, lest he provide any cause for setting war in motion immediately.
thinking also that minds ought to be averted from suspicion of such designs, he led the army straight through Thrace against the Odrysae and the Dentheletae and the Bessi: Philippopolis, a city deserted in flight by its townsmen, who had withdrawn with their families to the nearest ridges of the mountains, he took; and the plains-dwelling barbarians, after laying waste their fields, he received into surrender. leaving thereupon at Philippopolis a garrison—which not long after was driven out by the Odrysae—he set about founding a town in Deuriopus —that region is of Paeonia— near the river Erigon, which, flowing from Illyricum through Pe<lag>onia, is discharged into the river Axius, not far from Stobi, an ancient city: he ordered the new city to be called Perseida, so that this honor might be held for his elder son.
[54] Dum haec in Macedonia geruntur, consules in prouincias profecti. Marcellus nuntium praemisit ad L. Porcium proconsulem, ut ad nouum Gallorum oppidum legiones admoueret. aduenienti consuli Galli sese dediderunt.
[54] While these things are being transacted in Macedonia, the consuls set out to their provinces. Marcellus sent a messenger ahead to Lucius Porcius, proconsul, to bring up the legions to the new town of the Gauls. On the consul’s arrival, the Gauls surrendered themselves.
there were twelve thousand armed men: the majority had arms snatched from the fields: these, with them bearing it with difficulty, were taken away, as also whatever other things they either had seized while ravaging the fields or had brought with them. As to these matters, those who complained sent envoys to Rome. Introduced into the senate by the praetor Gaius Valerius, they set forth that, the multitude in Gaul being excessive, compelled by want of land and by destitution to seek a seat, they had crossed the Alps, and that whatever uncultivated tracts they saw through the wildernesses, there they had settled without injury to anyone.
that they had also begun to build a town, which was an indication that they had come to bring force to neither any land nor any city. Recently, Marcus Claudius had sent to them as a messenger that he would wage war with them unless they surrendered. They, preferring a certain, though not splendid, peace to the uncertainties of war, had surrendered themselves first into the good faith rather than into the power of the Roman People.
after a few days, having been ordered to depart both from the city and from the land, they had intended to go away in silence, wherever in the world they could. then their arms were taken from them, and at last all other things that they were bearing and driving were taken away. they begged the Senate and the Roman People not to be more savage against them—innocent men who had surrendered—than against enemies.
To this oration the Senate ordered that an answer be given thus: that they had not acted rightly when they came into Italy and attempted to build a stronghold on another’s land without the permission of any Roman magistrate who presided over that province; nor did it please the Senate that those who had surrendered be despoiled. Therefore it would send with them legates to the consul, who should order that, if they return whence they came, all their own possessions be restored to them; and who should go immediately across the Alps and denounce to the Gallic peoples that they keep their multitude at home: that the Alps were an almost insuperable boundary lying between; that it would by no means be better for them <than> for those who first made them passable. The legates sent were L. Furius Purpurio, Q. Minucius, and L. Manlius Acidinus.
[55] Legatis Romanis Transalpini populi benigne responderunt. seniores eorum nimiam lenitatem populi Romani castigarunt, quod eos homines, qui gentis iniussu profecti occupare agrum imperii Romani et in alieno solo aedificare oppidum conati sint, impunitos dimiserint: debuisse grauem temeritatis mercedem statui. quod uero etiam sua reddiderint, uereri ne tanta indulgentia plures ad talia audenda impellantur.
[55] The peoples across the Alps responded kindly to the Roman legates. Their elders chastised the excessive lenity of the Roman people, because they had dismissed unpunished those men who, having set out without the order of their tribe, had attempted to occupy land of the Roman Empire and to build a town on another’s soil: a grave price for their temerity ought to have been set. And as to the fact that they even returned their property, they feared lest by such indulgence more might be driven to dare such things.
M. Claudius consul Gallis ex prouincia exactis Histricum bellum moliri coepit litteris ad senatum missis, ut sibi in Histriam traducere legiones liceret. id senatui
Marcus Claudius, the consul, with the Gauls driven out from the province, began to set on foot a war against the Histri, sending letters to the senate that it might be permitted to him to transfer the legions into Histria. This did not please the senate. They were deliberating that a colony should be led out to Aquileia, and it was not sufficiently settled whether it should be a Latin colony or one of Roman citizens that was to be led out.
Two thousand men, on land which, lying nearest to the Boii, had formerly been the Tuscans’, received eight iugera apiece at Parma, five apiece at Mutina. The triumvirs led out the colonists: M. Aemilius Lepidus, T. Aebutius Parrus, L. Quinctius Crispinus. And the colony of Roman citizens Saturnia was established in the Caletran territory.
[56] Eodem anno A. Terentius proconsul haud procul flumine Hibero, in agro Ausetano, et proelia secunda cum Celtiberis fecit, et oppida, quae ibi communierant, aliquot expugnauit. ulterior Hispania eo anno in pace fuit, quia et P. Sempronius proconsul diutino morbo est implicitus, et nullo lacessente peropportune quieuerunt Lusitani. nec in Liguribus memorabile quicquam a Q. Fabio consule gestum.
[56] In the same year A. Terentius, proconsul, not far from the river Hiberus, in the land of the Ausetani, both fought successful engagements with the Celtiberians and took by storm several towns which they had fortified there. Further Spain that year was at peace, because both P. Sempronius, proconsul, was entangled in a long-standing illness, and, with no one provoking them, the Lusitanians most opportunely kept quiet. Nor among the Ligurians was anything memorable accomplished by Q. Fabius, consul.
Ex Histria reuocatus M. Marcellus exercitu dimisso Romam comitiorum causa rediit. creauit consules Cn. Baebium Tamphilum et L. Aemilium Paulum. cum M. Aemilio Lepido hic aedilis curulis fuerat; a quo consule quintus annus erat, cum is ipse Lepidus post duas repulsas consul factus esset.
Recalled from Histria, Marcus Marcellus, with the army dismissed, returned to Rome for the sake of the elections. He elected as consuls Gnaeus Baebius Tamphilus and Lucius Aemilius Paulus. Along with Marcus Aemilius Lepidus this man had been curule aedile; it was the fifth year from that consulship, when this same Lepidus, after two repulses, was made consul.
Supplicatio extremo anno fuit prodigiorum causa, quod sanguine per biduum pluuisse in area Concordiae satis credebant, nuntiatumque erat haud procul Sicilia insulam, quae non ante fuerat, nouam editam e mari esse. Hannibalem hoc anno Antias Ualerius decessisse est auctor legatis ad eam rem ad Prusiam missis praeter T. Quinctium Flamininum, cuius in ea re celebre est nomen, L. Scipione Asiatico et P. Scipione Nasica.
A supplication at the end of the year was held on account of prodigies, because they quite believed that it had rained blood for two days in the Area of Concord, and it had been announced that not far from Sicily an island, which had not been before, new, had been brought forth from the sea. Valerius Antias is authority that Hannibal died in this year, with envoys sent for that matter to Prusias, besides T. Quinctius Flamininus—whose name in that affair is celebrated—L. Scipio Asiaticus and P. Scipio Nasica.