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Clay Tablets from Sumer, Babylon and Assyria

Clay Tablets from Sumer, Babylon and Assyria (224)

Clay Tablets in Cuneiforn language

The term "cuneiform" is very deceptive, in that it tricks people into thinking that it's some type of writing system.

The truth is that cuneiform denotes not one but several kinds of writing systems, including logosyllabic, syllabic, and alphabetic scripts.

Many languages, including Semitic, Indo-European, and isolates, are written in cuneiform, as the following list shows:

Sumerian

Eastern Semitic, including Akkadian, Assyrian, and Babylonian

Elamite Eblaite Hittite Hurrian Utartian Ugaritic, in fact an alphabetic system unrelated to other cuneiform scripts except in outward appearance.

Old Persian, a mostly syllabic system with a few logograms.

Clay Tokens:

The Precursors of Cuneiform The earliest examples of Mesopotamian script date from approximately the end of the 4th millenium BCE, coinciding in time and in geography with the rise of urban centers such as Uruk, Nippur, Susa, and Ur.

These early records are used almost exclusively for accounting and record keeping. However, these cuneiform records are really descendents of another counting system that had been used for five thousand years before. Clay tokens have been used since as early as 8000 BCE in Mesopotamia for some form of record-keeping.

Clay tokens are basically three dimension geometric shapes. There are two types of clay tokens, plain and complex. The plain tokens are the oldest ones, found as far back as 8000 BCE, in a very wide area, including modern places like Turkey, Syria, Israel, Jordan, Iraq, and Iran, at settlements of all sizes. They are plain, unadorned geometric shapes like spheres, disks, cones, tetrahedrons, and cylinders. In contrast, complex tokens are decorated with markings, and appeared only during the 4th millenium BCE in large settlements in southern Mesopotamia.

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Lives of the Ceasars by Caius Suetonius

Lives of the Ceasars by Caius Suetonius (13)

Caius Suetonius

The Life of the Ceasars

Suetonius (Caius Suetonius Tranquillus), c. A.D. 69 c. A.D.140, Roman biographer. Little is known about his life except that he was briefly the private secretary of Emperor Hadrian.

His De vita Caesarum [concerning the lives of the Caesars] survives almost in full; it was translated into English by Robert Graves as The Twelve Caesars (1957).

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The Annals by Tacitus

The Annals by Tacitus (135)

The Remorse of Nero After the Murdering of his Mother. Artist: John William Waterhouse [1878] (Public Domain Image)

The Works of Tacitus

The Annals, The Histories, Germanica, Agrigola, Dialog on Oratory

tr. by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb

[1864-1877]

 

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Tacitus: Annals: Book 4 [20]

The Works of Tacitus

tr. by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb

[1864-1877]

Tacitus: Annals Book 4 [20]

20. Yet there was a merciless confiscation of his property, though not to refund their money to the provincials, none of whom pressed any demand. But Augustus's bounty was wrested from him, and the claims of the imperial exchequer were computed in detail. This was the first instance on Tiberius's part of sharp dealing with the wealth of others. Sosia was banished on the motion of Asinius Gallus, who had proposed that half her estate should be confiscated, half left to the children. Marcus Lepidus, on the contrary, was for giving a fourth to the prosecutors, as the law required, and the remainder to the children. This Lepidus, I am satisfied, was for that age a wise and high-principled man. Many a cruel suggestion made by the flattery of others he changed for the better, and yet he did not want tact, seeing that he always enjoyed an uniform prestige, and also the favour of Tiberius. This compels me to doubt whether the liking of princes for some men and their antipathy to others depend, like other contingencies, on a fate and destiny to which we are born, or, to some degree, on our own plans; so that it is possible to pursue a course between a defiant independence and a debasing servility, free from ambition and its perils. Messalinus Cotta, of equally illustrious ancestry as Lepidus, but wholly different in disposition, proposed that the Senate should pass a decree providing that even innocent governors who knew nothing of the delinquencies of others should be punished for their wives' offences in the provinces as much as for their own.

21. Proceedings were then taken against Calpurnius Piso, a high-spirited nobleman. He it was, as I have related, who had exclaimed more than once in the Senate that he would quit Rome because of the combinations of the informers, and had dared in defiance of Augusta's power, to sue Urgulania and summon her from the emperor's palace. Tiberius submitted to this at the time not ungraciously, but the remembrance of it was vividly impressed on a mind which brooded over its resentments, even though the first impulse of his displeasure had subsided. Quintus Granius accused Piso of secret treasonable conversation, and added that he kept poison in his house and wore a dagger whenever he came into the Senate. This was passed over as too atrocious to be true. He was to be tried on the other charges, a multitude of which were heaped on him, but his timely death cut short the trial. Next was taken the case of Cassius Severus' an exile. A man of mean origin and a life of crime, but a powerful pleader, he had brought on himself, by his persistent quarrelsomeness, a decision of the Senate, under oath, which banished him to Crete. There by the same practices he drew on himself, fresh odium and revived the old; stripped of his property and outlawed, he wore out his old age on the rock of Seriphos.

22. About the same time Plautius Silvanus, the praetor, for unknown reasons, threw his wife Apronia out of a window. When summoned before the emperor by Lucius Apronius, his father-in-law, he replied incoherently, representing that he was in a sound sleep and consequently knew nothing, and that his wife had chosen to destroy herself. Without a moment's delay Tiberius went to the house and inspected the chamber, where were seen the marks of her struggling and of her forcible ejection. He reported this to the Senate, and as soon as judges had been appointed, Urgulania, the grandmother of Silvanus, sent her grandson a dagger. This was thought equivalent to a hint from the emperor, because of the known intimacy between Augusta and Urgulania. The accused tried the steel in vain, and then allowed his veins to be opened. Shortly afterwards Numantina, his former wife, was charged with having caused her husband's insanity by magical incantations and potions, but she was acquitted.

23. This year at last released Rome from her long contest with the Numidian Tacfarinas. Former generals, when they thought that their successes were enough to insure them triumphal distinctions, left the enemy to himself. There were now in Rome three laurelled statues, and yet Tacfarinas was still ravaging Africa, strengthened by reinforcements from the Moors, who, under the boyish and careless rule of Ptolemaeus, Juba's son, had chosen war in preference to the despotism of freedmen and slaves. He had the king of the Garamantes to receive his plunder and to be the partner of his raids, not indeed with a regular army, but with detachments of light troops whose strength, as they came from a distance, rumour exaggerated. From the province itself every needy and restless adventurer hurried to join him, for the emperor, as if not an enemy remained in Africa after the achievements of Blaesus, had ordered the ninth legion home, and Publius Dolabella, proconsul that year, had not dared to retain it, because he feared the sovereign's orders more than the risks of war.

24. Tacfarinas accordingly spread rumours; that elsewhere also nations were rending the empire of Rome and that therefore her soldiers were gradually retiring from Africa, and that the rest might be cut off by a strong effort on the part of all who loved freedom more than slavery. He thus augmented his force, and having formed a camp, he besieged the town of Thubuscum. Dolabella meanwhile collecting all the troops on the spot, raised the siege at his first approach, by the terror of the Roman name and because the Numidians cannot stand against the charge of infantry. He then fortified suitable positions, and at the same time beheaded some chiefs of the Musulamii, who were on the verge of rebellion. Next, as several expeditions against Tacfarinas had proved the uselessness of following up the enemy's desultory movements with the attack of heavy troops from a single point, he summoned to his aid king Ptolemaeus and his people, and equipped four columns, under the command of his lieutenants and tribunes. Marauding parties were also led by picked Moors, Dolabella in person directing every operation.

25. Soon afterwards news came that the Numidians had fixed their tents and encamped near a half-demolished fortress, by name Auzea, to which they had themselves formerly set fire, and on the position of which they relied, as it was inclosed by vast forests. Immediately the light infantry and cavalry, without knowing whither they were being led, were hurried along at quick march. Day dawned, and with the sound of trumpets and fierce shouts, they were on the half-asleep barbarians, whose horses were tethered or roaming over distant pastures. On the Roman side, the infantry was in close array, the cavalry in its squadrons, everything prepared for an engagement, while the enemy, utterly surprised, without arms, order, or plan, were seized, slaughtered, or captured like cattle. The infuriated soldiers, remembering their hardships and how often the longed-for conflict had been eluded, sated themselves to a man with vengeance and bloodshed. The word went through the companies that all were to aim at securing Tacfarinas, whom, after so many battles, they knew well, as there would be no rest from war except by the destruction of the enemy's leader. Tacfarinas, his guards slain round him, his son a prisoner, and the Romans bursting on him from every side, rushed on the darts, and by a death which was not unavenged, escaped captivity.

26. This ended the war. Dolabella asked for triumphal distinctions, but was refused by Tiberius, out of compliment to Sejanus, the glory of whose uncle Blaesus he did not wish to be forgotten. But this did not make Blaesus more famous, while the refusal of the honour heightened Dolabella's renown. He had, in fact, with a smaller army, brought back with him illustrious prisoners and the fame of having slain the enemy's leader and terminated the war. In his train were envoys from the Garamantes, a rare spectacle in Rome. The nation, in its terror at the destruction of Tacfarinas, and innocent of any guilty intention, had sent them to crave pardon of the Roman people. And now that this war had proved the zealous loyalty of Ptolemaeus, a custom of antiquity was revived, and one of the Senators was sent to present him with an ivory sceptre and an embroidered robe, gifts anciently bestowed by the Senate, and to confer on him the titles of king, ally, and friend.

27. The same summer, the germs of a slave war in Italy were crushed by a fortunate accident. The originator of the movement was Titus Curtisius, once a soldier of the praetorian guard. First, by secret meetings at Brundisium and the neighbouring towns, then by placards publicly exhibited, he incited the rural and savage slave-population of the remote forests to assert their freedom. By divine providence, three vessels came to land for the use of those who traversed that sea. In the same part of the country too was Curtius Lupus, the quaestor, who, according to ancient precedent, had had the charge of the "woodland pastures" assigned to him. Putting in motion a force of marines, he broke up the seditious combination in its very first beginnings. The emperor at once sent Staius, a tribune, with a strong detachment, by whom the ringleader himself, with his most daring followers, were brought prisoners to Rome where men already trembled at the vast scale of the slave-establishments, in which there was an immense growth, while the freeborn populace daily decreased.

28. That same consulship witnessed a horrible instance of misery and brutality. A father as defendant, a son as prosecutor, (Vibius Serenus was the name of both) were brought before the Senate; the father, dragged from exile in filth and squalor now stood in irons, while the son pleaded for his guilt. With studious elegance of dress and cheerful looks, the youth, at once accuser and witness, alleged a plot against the emperor and that men had been sent to Gaul to excite rebellion, further adding that Caecilius Cornutus, an ex-praetor, had furnished money. Cornutus, weary of anxiety and feeling that peril was equivalent to ruin, hastened to destroy himself. But the accused with fearless spirit, looked his son in the face, shook his chains, and appealed to the vengeance of the gods, with a prayer that they would restore him to his exile, where he might live far away from such practices, and that, as for his son, punishment might sooner or later overtake him. He protested too that Cornutus was innocent and that his terror was groundless, as would easily be perceived, if other names were given up; for he never would have plotted the emperor's murder and a revolution with only one confederate.

29. Upon this the prosecutor named Cneius Lentulus and Seius Tubero, to the great confusion of the emperor, at finding a hostile rebellion and disturbance of the public peace charged on two leading men in the state, his own intimate friends, the first of whom was in extreme old age and the second in very feeble health. They were, however, at once acquitted. As for the father, his slaves were examined by torture, and the result was unfavourable to the accuser. The man, maddened by remorse, and terror-stricken by the popular voice, which menaced him with the dungeon, the rock, or a parricide's doom, fled from Rome. He was dragged back from Ravenna, and forced to go through the prosecution, during which Tiberius did not disguise the old grudge he bore the exile Serenus. For after Libo's conviction, Serenus had sent the emperor a letter, upbraiding him for not having rewarded his special zeal in that trial, with further hints more insolent than could be safely trusted to the easily offended ears of a despot. All this Tiberius revived eight years later, charging on him various misconduct during that interval, even though the examination by torture, owing to the obstinacy of the slaves, had contradicted his guilt.

Next: Book 4 [30]

Tacitus: Annals: Book 4 [10]

The Works of Tacitus

tr. by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb

[1864-1877]

Tacitus: Annals Book 4 [10]

10. In relating the death of Drusus I have followed the narrative of most of the best historians. But I would not pass over a rumour of the time, the strength of which is not even yet exhausted. Sejanus, it is said, having seduced Livia into crime, next secured, by the foulest means, the consent of Lygdus, the eunuch, as from his youth and beauty he was his master's favourite, and one of his principal attendants. When those who were in the secret had decided on the time and place of the poisoning, Sejanus, with the most consummate daring, reversed his plan, and, whispering an accusation against Drusus of intending to poison his father, warned Tiberius to avoid the first draught offered him as he was dining at his son's house. Thus deceived, the old emperor, on sitting down to the banquet, took the cup and handed it to Drusus. His suspicions were increased when Drusus, in perfect unconsciousness, drank it off with youthful eagerness, apparently, out of fear and shame, bringing on himself the death which he had plotted against his father.

11. These popular rumours, over and above the fact that they are not vouched for by any good writer, may be instantly refuted. For who, with moderate prudence, far less Tiberius with his great experience, would have thrust destruction on a son, without even hearing him, with his own hand too, and with an impossibility of returning to better thoughts. Surely he would rather have had the slave who handed the poison, tortured, have sought to discover the traitor, in short, would have been as hesitating and tardy in the case of an only son hitherto unconvicted of any crime, as he was naturally even with strangers. But as Sejanus had the credit of contriving every sort of wickedness, the fact that he was the emperor's special favourite, and that both were hated by the rest of the world, procured belief for any monstrous fiction, and rumour too always has a dreadful side in regard to the deaths of men in power. Besides, the whole process of the crime was betrayed by Apicata, Sejanus's wife, and fully divulged, under torture, by Eudemus and Lygdus. No writer has been found sufficiently malignant to fix the guilt on Tiberius, though every circumstance was scrutinized and exaggerated. My object in mentioning and refuting this story is, by a conspicuous example, to put down hearsay, and to request all into whose hands my work shall come, not to catch eagerly at wild and improbable rumours in preference to genuine history which has not been perverted into romance.

12. Tiberius pronounced a panegyric on his son before the Rostra, during which the Senate and people, in appearance rather than in heart, put on the expression and accents of sorrow, while they inwardly rejoiced at the brightening future of the family of Germanicus. This beginning of popularity and the ill-concealed ambition of their mother Agrippina, hastened its downfall. Sejanus when he saw that the death of Drusus was not avenged on the murderers and was no grief to the people, grew bold in wickedness, and, now that his first attempt had succeeded, speculated on the possibility of destroying the children of Germanicus, whose succession to the throne was a certainty. There were three, and poison could not be distributed among them, because of the singular fidelity of their guardians and the unassailable virtue of Agrippina. So Sejanus inveighed against Agrippina's arrogance, and worked powerfully on Augusta's old hatred of her and on Livia's consciousness of recent guilt, and urged both these women to represent to the emperor that her pride as a mother and her reliance on popular enthusiasm were leading her to dream of empire. Livia availed herself of the cunning of accusers, among whom she had selected Julius Postumus, a man well suited to her purpose, as he had an intrigue with Mutilia Prisca, and was consequently in the confidence of Augusta, over whose mind Prisca had great influence. She thus made her aged grandmother, whose nature it was to tremble for her power, irreconcilably hostile to her grandson's widow. Agrippina's friends too were induced to be always inciting her proud spirit by mischievous talk.

13. Tiberius meanwhile, who did not relax his attention to business, and found solace in his work, occupied himself with the causes of citizens at Rome and with petitions from allies. Decrees of the Senate were passed at his proposal for relieving the cities of Cibyra and Aegium in Asia and Achaia, which had suffered from earthquakes, by a remission of three years' tribute. Vibius Serenus too, proconsul of Further Spain, was condemned for violence in his official capacity, and was banished to the island of Amorgus for his savage temper. Carsidius Sacerdos, accused of having helped our enemy Tacfarinas with supplies of grain, was acquitted, as was also Caius Gracchus on the same charge. Gracchus's father, Sempronius, had taken him when a mere child to the island of Cercina to be his companion in exile. There he grew up among outcasts who knew nothing of a liberal education, and after a while supported himself in Africa and Sicily by petty trade. But he did not escape the dangers of high rank. Had not his innocence been protected by Aelius Lamia and Lucius Apronius, successive governors of Africa, the splendid fame of that ill-starred family and the downfall of his father would have dragged him to ruin.

14. This year too brought embassies from the Greek communities. The people of Samos and Cos petitioned for the confirmation of the ancient right of sanctuary for the respective temples of Juno and Aesculapius. The Samians relied on a decree of the Amphictyonic Council, which had the supreme decision of all questions when the Greeks, through the cities they had founded in Asia, had possession of the sea-coast. Cos could boast equal antiquity, and it had an additional claim connected with the place. Roman citizens had been admitted to the temple of Aesculapius, when king Mithridates ordered a general massacre of them throughout all the islands and cities of Asia. Next, after various and usually fruitless complaints from the praetors, the emperor finally brought forward a motion about the licentious behaviour of the players. "They had often," he said, "sought to disturb the public peace, and to bring disgrace on private families, and the old Oscan farce, once a wretched amusement for the vulgar, had become at once so indecent and so popular, that it must be checked by the Senate's authority. The players, upon this, were banished from Italy.

15. That same year also brought fresh sorrow to the emperor by being fatal to one of the twin sons of Drusus, equally too by the death of an intimate friend. This was Lucilius Longus, the partner of all his griefs and joys, the only senator who had been the companion of his retirement in Rhodes. And so, though he was a man of humble origin, the Senate decreed him a censor's funeral and a statue in the forum of Augustus at the public expense. Everything indeed was as yet in the hands of the Senate, and consequently Lucilius Capito, procurator of Asia, who was impeached by his province, was tried by them, the emperor vehemently asserting "that he had merely given the man authority over the slaves and property of the imperial establishments; that if he had taken upon himself the powers of a praetor and used military force, he had disregarded his instructions; therefore they must hear the provincials." So the case was heard and the accused condemned. The cities of Asia, gratified by this retribution and the punishment inflicted in the previous year on Caius Silanus, voted a temple to Tiberius, his mother, and the Senate, and were permitted to build it. Nero thanked the Senators and his grandfather on their behalf and carried with him the joyful sympathies of his audience, who, with the memory of Germanicus fresh in their minds, imagined that it was his face they saw, his voice they heard. The youth too had a modesty and a grace of person worthy of a prince, the more charming because of his peril from the notorious enmity of Sejanus.

16. About the same time the emperor spoke on the subject of electing a priest of Jupiter in the room of Servius Maluginensis, deceased, and of the enactment of a new law. "It was," he said, "the old custom to nominate together three patricians, sons of parents wedded according to the primitive ceremony, and of these one was to be chosen. Now however there was not the same choice as formerly, the primitive form of marriage having been given up or being observed only by a few persons." For this he assigned several reasons, the chief being men's and women's indifference; then, again, the ceremony itself had its difficulties, which were purposely avoided; and there was the objection that the man who obtained this priesthood was emancipated from the father's authority, as also was his wife, as passing into the husband's control. So the Senate, Tiberius argued, ought to apply some remedy by a decree of a law, as Augustus had accommodated certain relics of a rude antiquity to the modern spirit. It was then decided, after a discussion of religious questions, that the institution of the priests of Jupiter should remain unchanged. A law however was passed that the priestess, in regard to her sacred functions, was to be under the husband's control, but in other respects to retain the ordinary legal position of women. Maluginensis, the son, was chosen successor to his father. To raise the dignity of the priesthood and to inspire the priests with more zeal in attending to the ceremonial, a gift of two million sesterces was decreed to the Vestal Cornelia, chosen in the room of Scantia; and, whenever Augusta entered the theatre, she was to have a place in the seats of the Vestals.

17. In the consulship of Cornelius Cethegus and Visellius Varro, the pontiffs, whose example was followed by the other priests in offering prayers for the emperor's health, commended also Nero and Drusus to the same deities, not so much out of love for the young princes as out of sycophancy, the absence and excess of which in a corrupt age are alike dangerous. Tiberius indeed, who was never friendly to the house of Germanicus, was then vexed beyond endurance at their youth being honoured equally with his declining years. He summoned the pontiffs, and asked them whether it was to the entreaties or the threats of Agrippina that they had made this concession. And though they gave a flat denial, he rebuked them but gently, for many of them were her own relatives or were leading men in the State. However he addressed a warning to the Senate against encouraging pride in their young and excitable minds by premature honours. For Sejanus spoke vehemently, and charged them with rending the State almost by civil war. "There were those," he said, "who called themselves the party of Agrippina, and, unless they were checked, there would be more; the only remedy for the increasing discord was the overthrow of one or two of the most enterprising leaders."

18. Accordingly he attacked Caius Silius and Titius Sabinus. The friendship of Germanicus was fatal to both. As for Silius, his having commanded a great army for seven years, and won in Germany the distinctions of a triumph for his success in the war with Sacrovir, would make his downfall all the more tremendous and so spread greater terror among others. Many thought that he had provoked further displeasure by his own presumption and his extravagant boasts that his troops had been steadfastly loyal, while other armies were falling into mutiny, and that Tiberius's throne could not have lasted had his legions too been bent on revolution. All this the emperor regarded as undermining his own power, which seemed to be unequal to the burden of such an obligation. For benefits received are a delight to us as long as we think we can requite them; when that possibility is far exceeded, they are repaid with hatred instead of gratitude.

19. Silius had a wife, Sosia Galla, whose love of Agrippina made her hateful to the emperor. The two, it was decided, were to be attacked, but Sabinus was to be put off for a time. Varro, the consul, was let loose on them, who, under colour of a hereditary feud, humoured the malignity of Sejanus to his own disgrace. The accused begged a brief respite, until the prosecutor's consulship expired, but the emperor opposed the request. "It was usual," he argued, "for magistrates to bring a private citizen to trial, and a consul's authority ought not to be impaired, seeing that it rested with his vigilance to guard the commonwealth from loss." It was characteristic of Tiberius to veil new devices in wickedness under ancient names. And so, with a solemn appeal, he summoned the Senate, as if there were any laws by which Silius was being tried, as if Varro were a real consul, or Rome a commonwealth. The accused either said nothing, or, if he attempted to defend himself, hinted, not obscurely, at the person whose resentment was crushing him. A long concealed complicity in Sacrovir's rebellion, a rapacity which sullied his victory, and his wife Sosia's conduct, were alleged against him. Unquestionably, they could not extricate themselves from the charge of extortion. The whole affair however was conducted as a trial for treason, and Silius forestalled impending doom by a self-inflicted death.

Next: Book 4 [20]

Tacitus: Annals: Book 4 [1]

The Works of Tacitus

tr. by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb

[1864-1877]

Tacitus: Annals Book 4 [1]

A.D. 23-28

1. THE year when Caius Asinius and Caius Antistius were consuls was the ninth of Tiberius's reign, a period of tranquillity for the State and prosperity for his own house, for he counted Germanicus's death a happy incident. Suddenly fortune deranged everything; the emperor became a cruel tyrant, as well as an abettor of cruelty in others. Of this the cause and origin was Aelius Sejanus, commander of the praetorian cohorts, of whose influence I have already spoken. I will now fully describe his extraction, his character, and the daring wickedness by which he grasped at power. Born at Vulsinii, the son of Seius Strabo, a Roman knight, he attached himself in his early youth to Caius Caesar, grandson of the Divine Augustus, and the story went that he had sold his person to Apicius, a rich debauchee. Soon afterwards he won the heart of Tiberius so effectually by various artifices that the emperor, ever dark and mysterious towards others, was with Sejanus alone careless and freespoken. It was not through his craft, for it was by this very weapon that he was overthrown; it was rather from heaven's wrath against Rome, to whose welfare his elevation and his fall were alike disastrous. He had a body which could endure hardships, and a daring spirit. He was one who screened himself, while he was attacking others; he was as cringing as he was imperious; before the world he affected humility; in his heart he lusted after supremacy, for the sake of which he sometimes lavish and luxurious, but oftener energetic and watchful, qualities quite as mischievous when hypocritically assumed for the attainment of sovereignty.

2. He strengthened the hitherto moderate powers of his office by concentrating the cohorts scattered throughout the capital into one camp, so that they might all receive orders at the same moment, and that the sight of their numbers and strength might give confidence to themselves, while it would strike terror into the citizens. His pretexts were the demoralisation incident to a dispersed soldiery, the greater effectiveness of simultaneous action in the event of a sudden peril, and the stricter discipline which would be insured by the establishment of an encampment at a distance from the temptations of the city. As soon as the camp was completed, he crept gradually into the affections of the soldiers by mixing with them and addressing them by name, himself selecting the centurions and tribunes. With the Senate too he sought to ingratiate himself, distinguishing his partisans with offices and provinces, Tiberius readily yielding, and being so biassed that not only in private conversation but before the senators and the people he spoke highly of him as the partner of his toils, and allowed his statues to be honoured in theatres, in forums, and at the head-quarters of our legions.

3. There were however obstacles to his ambition in the imperial house with its many princes, a son in youthful manhood and grown-up grandsons. As it would be unsafe to sweep off such a number at once by violence, while craft would necessitate successive intervals in crime, he chose, on the whole, the stealthier way and to begin with Drusus, against whom he had the stimulus of a recent resentment. Drusus, who could not brook a rival and was somewhat irascible, had, in a casual dispute, raised his fist at Sejanus, and, when he defended himself, had struck him in the face. On considering every plan Sejanus thought his easiest revenge was to turn his attention to Livia, Drusus's wife. She was a sister of Germanicus, and though she was not handsome as a girl, she became a woman of surpassing beauty. Pretending an ardent passion for her, he seduced her, and having won his first infamous triumph, and assured that a woman after having parted with her virtue will hesitate at nothing, he lured her on to thoughts of marriage, of a share in sovereignty, and of her husband's destruction. And she, the niece of Augustus, the daughter-in-law of Tiberius, the mother of children by Drusus, for a provincial paramour, foully disgraced herself, her ancestors, and her descendants, giving up honour and a sure position for prospects as base as they were uncertain. They took into their confidence Eudemus, Livia's friend and physician, whose profession was a pretext for frequent secret interviews. Sejanus, to avert his mistress's jealousy, divorced his wife Apicata, by whom he had had three children. Still the magnitude of the crime caused fear and delay, and sometimes a conflict of plans.

4. Meanwhile, at the beginning of this year, Drusus, one of the children of Germanicus, assumed the dress of manhood, with a repetition of the honours decreed by the Senate to his brother Nero. The emperor added a speech with warm praise of his son for sharing a father's affection to his brother's children. Drusus indeed, difficult as it is for power and mutual harmony to exist side by side, had the character of being kindly disposed or at least not unfriendly towards the lads. And now the old plan, so often insincerely broached, of a progress through the provinces, was again discussed. The emperor's pretext was the number of veterans on the eve of discharge and the necessity of fresh levies for the army. Volunteers were not forthcoming, and even if they were sufficiently numerous, they had not the same bravery and discipline, as it is chiefly the needy and the homeless who adopt by their own choice a soldier's life. Tiberius also rapidly enumerated the legions and the provinces which they had to garrison. I too ought, I think, to go through these details, and thus show what forces Rome then had under arms, what kings were our allies, and how much narrower then were the limits of our empire.

5. Italy on both seas was guarded by fleets, at Misenum and at Ravenna, and the contiguous coast of Gaul by ships of war captured in the victory of Actium, and sent by Augustus powerfully manned to the town of Forojulium. But chief strength was on the Rhine, as a defence alike against Germans and Gauls, and numbered eight legions. Spain, lately subjugated, was held by three. Mauretania was king Juba's, who had received it as a gift from the Roman people. The rest of Africa was garrisoned by two legions, and Egypt by the same number. Next, beginning with Syria, all within the entire tract of country stretching as far as the Euphrates, was kept in restraint by four legions, and on this frontier were Iberian, Albanian, and other kings, to whom our greatness was a protection against any foreign power. Thrace was held by Rhoemetalces and the children of Cotys; the bank of the Danube by two legions in Pannonia, two in Moesia, and two also were stationed in Dalmatia, which, from the situation of the country, were in the rear of the other four, and, should Italy suddenly require aid, not to distant to be summoned. But the capital was garrisoned by its own special soldiery, three city, nine praetorian cohorts, levied for the most part in Etruria and Umbria, or ancient Latium and the old Roman colonies. There were besides, in commanding positions in the provinces, allied fleets, cavalry and light infantry, of but little inferior strength. But any detailed account of them would be misleading, since they moved from place to place as circumstances required, and had their numbers increased and sometimes diminished.

6. It is however, I think, a convenient opportunity for me to review the hitherto prevailing methods of administration in the other departments of the State, inasmuch as that year brought with it the beginning of a change for the worse in Tiberius's policy. In the first place, public business and the most important private matters were managed by the Senate: the leading men were allowed freedom of discussion, and when they stooped to flattery, the emperor himself checked them. He bestowed honours with regard to noble ancestry, military renown, or brilliant accomplishments as a civilian, letting it be clearly seen that there were no better men to choose. The consul and the praetor retained their prestige; inferior magistrates exercised their authority; the laws too, with the single exception of cases of treason, were properly enforced. As to the duties on corn, the indirect taxes and other branches of the public revenue, they were in the hands of companies of Roman knights. The emperor intrusted his own property to men of the most tried integrity or to persons known only by their general reputation, and once appointed they were retained without any limitation, so that most of them grew old in the same employments. The city populace indeed suffered much from high prices, but this was no fault of the emperor, who actually endeavoured to counteract barren soils and stormy seas with every resource of wealth and foresight. And he was also careful not to distress the provinces by new burdens, and to see that in bearing the old they were safe from any rapacity or oppression on the part of governors. Corporal punishments and confiscations of property were unknown.

7. The emperor had only a few estates in Italy, slaves on a moderate scale, and his household was confined to a few freedmen. If ever he had a dispute with a private person, it was decided in the law courts. All this, not indeed with any graciousness, but in a blunt fashion which often alarmed, he still kept up, until the death of Drusus changed everything. While he lived, the system continued, because Sejanus, as yet only in the beginning of his power, wished to be known as an upright counsellor, and there was one whose vengeance he dreaded, who did not conceal his hatred and incessantly complained "that a stranger was invited to assist in the government while the emperor's son was alive. How near was the step of declaring the stranger a colleague! Ambition at first had a steep path before it; when once the way had been entered, zealous adherents were forthcoming. Already, at the pleasure of the commander of the guards, a camp had been established; the soldiers given into his hands; his statues were to be seen among the monuments of Cneius Pompeius; his grandsons would be of the same blood as the family of the Drusi. Henceforth they must pray that he might have self-control, and so be contented." So would Drusus talk, not unfrequently, or only in the hearing of a few persons. Even his confidences, now that his wife had been corrupted, were betrayed.

8. Sejanus accordingly thought that he must be prompt, and chose a poison the gradual working of which might be mistaken for a natural disorder. It was given to Drusus by Lygdus, a eunuch, as was ascertained eight years later. As for Tiberius, he went to the Senate house during the whole time of the prince's illness, either because he was not afraid, or to show his strength of mind, and even in the interval between his death and funeral. Seeing the consuls, in token of their grief, sitting on the ordinary benches, he reminded them of their high office and of their proper place; and when the Senate burst into tears, suppressing a groan, he revived their spirits with a fluent speech. "He knew indeed that he might be reproached for thus encountering the gaze of the Senate after so recent an affliction. Most mourners could hardly bear even the soothing words of kinsfolk or to look on the light of day. And such were not to be condemned as weak. But he had sought a more manly consolation in the bosom of the commonwealth." Then deploring the extreme age of Augusta, the childhood of his grandsons, and his own declining years, he begged the Senate to summon Germanicus's children, the only comfort under their present misery. The consuls went out, and having encouraged the young princes with kind words, brought them in and presented them to the emperor. Taking them by the hand he said: "Senators, when these boys lost their father, I committed them to their uncle, and begged him, though he had children of his own, to cherish and rear them as his own offspring, and train them for himself and for posterity. Drusus is now lost to us, and I turn my prayers to you, and before heaven and your country I adjure you to receive into your care and guidance the great-grandsons of Augustus, descendants of a most noble ancestry. So fulfil your duty and mine. To you, Nero and Drusus, these senators are as fathers. Such is your birth that your prosperity and adversity must alike affect the State."

9. There was great weeping at these words, and then many a benediction. Had the emperor set bounds to his speech, he must have filled the hearts of his hearers with sympathy and admiration. But he now fell back on those idle and often ridiculed professions about restoring the republic, and the wish that the consuls or some one else might undertake the government, and thus destroyed belief even in what was genuine and noble. The same honours were decreed to the memory of Drusus as to that of Germanicus, and many more were added. Such is the way with flattery, when repeated. The funeral with its procession of statues was singularly grand. Aeneas, the father of the Julian house, all the Alban kings, Romulus, Rome's founder, then the Sabine nobility, Attus Clausus, and the busts of all the other Claudii were displayed in a long train.

Next: Book 4 [10]

Tacitus: Annals: Book 3 [70]

The Works of Tacitus

tr. by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb

[1864-1877]

Tacitus: Annals Book 3 [70]

70. Audience was next given to the people of Cyrene, and on the prosecution of Ancharius Priscus, Caesius Cordus was convicted of extortion. Lucius Ennius, a Roman knight, was accused of treason, for having converted a statue of the emperor to the common use of silver plate; but the emperor forbade his being put upon his trial, though Ateius Capito openly remonstrated, with a show of independence. "The Senate," he said, "ought not to have wrested from it the power of deciding a question, and such a crime must not go unpunished. Granted that the emperor might be indifferent to a personal grievance, still he should not be generous in the case of wrongs to the commonwealth." Tiberius interpreted the remark according to its drift rather than its mere expression, and persisted in his veto. Capito's disgrace was the more conspicuous, for, versed as he was in the science of law, human and divine, he had now dishonoured a brilliant public career as well as a virtuous private life.

71. Next came a religious question, as to the temple in which ought to be deposited the offering which the Roman knights had vowed to Fortune of the Knights for the recovery of Augusta. Although that Goddess had several shrines in Rome, there was none with this special designation. It was ascertained that there was a temple so called at Antium, and that all sacred rites in the towns of Italy as well as temples and images of deities were under the jurisdiction and authority of Rome. Accordingly the offering was placed at Antium. As religious questions were under discussion, the emperor now produced his answer to Servius Maluginensis, Jupiter's priest, which he had recently deferred, and read the pontifical decree, prescribing that whenever illness attacked a priest of Jupiter, he might, with the supreme pontiff's permission, be absent more than two nights, provided it was not during the days of public sacrifice or more than twice in the same year. This regulation of the emperor Augustus sufficiently proved that a year's absence and a provincial government were not permitted to the priests of Jupiter. There was also cited the precedent of Lucius Metellus, supreme pontiff, who had detained at Rome the priest Aulus Postumius. And so Asia was allotted to the exconsul next in seniority to Maluginensis.

72. About the same time Lepidus asked the Senate's leave to restore and embellish, at his own expense, the basilica of Paulus, that monument of the Aemilian family. Public-spirited munificence was still in fashion, and Augustus had not hindered Taurus, Philippus, or Balbus from applying the spoils of war or their superfluous wealth to adorn the capital and to win the admiration of posterity. Following these examples, Lepidus, though possessed of a moderate fortune, now revived the glory of his ancestors. Pompeius's theatre, which had been destroyed by an accidental fire, the emperor promised to rebuild, simply because no member of the family was equal to restoring it, but Pompeius's name was to be retained. At the same time he highly extolled Sejanus on the ground that it was through his exertions and vigilance that such fury of the flames had been confined to the destruction of a single building. The Senate voted Sejanus a statue, which was to be placed in Pompeius's theatre. And soon afterwards the emperor in honouring Junius Blaesus proconsul of Africa, with triumphal distinctions, said that he granted them as a compliment to Sejanus, whose uncle Blaesus was.

73. Still the career of Blaesus merited such a reward. For Tacfarinas, though often driven back, had recruited his resources in the interior of Africa, and had become so insolent as to send envoys to Tiberius, actually demanding a settlement for himself and his army, or else threatening us with an interminable war. Never, it is said, was the emperor so exasperated by an insult to himself and the Roman people as by a deserter and brigand assuming the character of a belligerent. "Even Spartacus when he had destroyed so many consular armies and was burning Italy with impunity, though the State was staggering under the tremendous wars of Sertorius and Mithridates, had not the offer of an honourable surrender on stipulated conditions; far less, in Rome's most glorious height of power, should a robber like Tacfarinas be bought off by peace and concessions of territory." He intrusted the affair to Blaesus, who was to hold out to the other rebels the prospect of laying down their arms without hurt to themselves, while he was by any means to secure the person of the chief. Many surrendered themselves on the strength of this amnesty. Before long the tactics of Tacfarinas were encountered in a similar fashion.

74. Unequal to us in solid military strength, but better in a war of surprises, he would attack, would elude pursuit, and still arrange ambuscades with a multitude of detachments. And so we prepared three expeditions and as many columns. One of the three under the command of Cornelius Scipio, Blaesus's lieutenant, was to stop the enemy's forays on the Leptitani and his retreat to the Garamantes. In another quarter, Blaesus's son led a separate force of his own, to save the villages of Cirta from being ravaged with impunity. Between the two was the general himself with some picked troops. By establishing redoubts and fortified lines in commanding positions, he had rendered the whole country embarrassing and perilous to the foe, for, whichever way he turned, a body of Roman soldiers was in his face, or on his flank, or frequently in the rear. Many were thus slain or surprised. Blaesus then further divided his triple army into several detachments under the command of centurions of tried valour. At the end of the summer he did not, as was usual, withdraw his troops and let them rest in winter-quarters in the old province; but, forming a chain of forts, as though he were on the threshold of a campaign, he drove Tacfarinas by flying columns well acquainted with the desert, from one set of huts to another, till he captured the chief's brother, and then returned, too soon however for the welfare of our allies, as there yet remained those who might renew hostilities. Tiberius however considered the war as finished, and awarded Blaesus the further distinction of being hailed "Imperator" by the legions, an ancient honour conferred on generals who for good service to the State were saluted with cheers of joyful enthusiasm by a victorious army. Several men bore the title at the same time, without pre-eminence above their fellows. Augustus too granted the name to certain persons; and now, for the last time, Tiberius gave it to Blaesus.

75. Two illustrious men died that year. One was Asinius Saloninus, distinguished as the grandson of Marcus Agrippa, and Asinius Pollio, as the brother of Drusus and the intended husband of the emperor's granddaughter. The other was Capito Ateius, already mentioned, who had won a foremost position in the State by his legal attainments, though his grandfather was but a centurion in Sulla's army, his father having been a praetor. He was prematurely advanced to the consulship by Augustus, so that he might be raised by the honour of this promotion above Labeo Antistius, a conspicuous member of the same profession. That age indeed produced at one time two brilliant ornaments of peace. But while Labeo was a man of sturdy independence and consequently of wider fame, Capito's obsequiousness was more acceptable to those in power. Labeo, because his promotion was confined to the praetorship, gained in public favour through the wrong; Capito, in obtaining the consulship, incurred the hatred which grows out of envy.

76. Junia too, the niece of Cato, wife of Caius Cassius and sister of Marcus Brutus, died this year, the sixty-fourth after the battle of Philippi. Her will was the theme of much popular criticism, for, with her vast wealth, after having honourably mentioned almost every nobleman by name, she passed over the emperor. Tiberius took the omission graciously and did not forbid a panegyric before the Rostra with the other customary funeral honours. The busts of twenty most illustrious families were borne in the procession, with the names of Manlius, Quinctius, and others of equal rank. But Cassius and Brutus outshone them all, from the very fact that their likenesses were not to be seen.

Next: Book 4 [1]

Tacitus: Annals: Book 3 [60]

The Works of Tacitus

tr. by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb

[1864-1877]

Tacitus: Annals Book 3 [60]

60. Tiberius meantime, while securing to himself the substance of imperial power, allowed the Senate some shadow of its old constitution by referring to its investigation certain demands of the provinces. In the Greek cities license and impunity in establishing sanctuaries were on the increase. Temples were thronged with the vilest of the slaves; the same refuge screened the debtor against his creditor, as well as men suspected of capital offences. No authority was strong enough to check the turbulence of a people which protected the crimes of men as much as the worship of the gods. It was accordingly decided that the different states were to send their charters and envoys to Rome. Some voluntarily relinquished privileges which they had groundlessly usurped; many trusted to old superstitions, or to their services to the Roman people. It was a grand spectacle on that day, when the Senate examined grants made by our ancestors, treaties with allies, even decrees of kings who had flourished before Rome's ascendancy, and the forms of worship of the very deities, with full liberty as in former days, to ratify or to alter.

61. First of all came the people of Ephesus. They declared that Diana and Apollo were not born at Delos, as was the vulgar belief. They had in their own country a river Cenchrius, a grove Ortygia, where Latona, as she leaned in the pangs of labour on an olive still standing, gave birth to those two deities, whereupon the grove at the divine intimation was consecrated. There Apollo himself, after the slaughter of the Cyclops, shunned the wrath of Jupiter; there too father Bacchus, when victorious in war, pardoned the suppliant Amazons who had gathered round the shrine. Subsequently by the permission of Hercules, when he was subduing Lydia, the grandeur of the temple's ceremonial was augmented, and during the Persian rule its privileges were not curtailed. They had afterwards been maintained by the Macedonians, then by ourselves.

62. Next the people of Magnesia relied on arrangements made by Lucius Scipio and Lucius Sulla. These generals, after respectively defeating Antiochus and Mithridates, honoured the fidelity and courage of the Magnesians by allowing the temple of Diana of the White Brow to be an inviolable sanctuary. Then the people of Aphrodisia produced a decree of the dictator Caesar for their old services to his party, and those of Stratonicea, one lately passed by the Divine Augustus, in which they were commended for having endured the Parthian invasion without wavering in their loyalty to the Roman people. Aphrodisia maintained the worship of Venus; Stratonicea, that of Jupiter and of Diana of the Cross Ways. Hierocaesarea went back to a higher antiquity, and spoke of having a Persian Diana, whose fane was consecrated in the reign of Cyrus. They quoted too the names of Perperna, Isauricus, and many other generals who had conceded the same sacred character not only to the temple but to its precincts for two miles. Then came the Cyprians on behalf of three shrines, the oldest of which had been set up by their founder Aerias to the Paphian Venus, the second by his son Amathus to Venus of Amathus, and the last to Jupiter of Salamis, by Teucer when he fled from the wrath of his father Telamon.

63. Audience was also given to embassies from other states. The senators wearied by their multiplicity and seeing the party spirit that was being roused, intrusted the inquiry to the consuls, who were to sift each title and see if it involved any abuse, and then refer back the entire matter to the Senate. Besides the states already mentioned, the consuls reported that they had ascertained that at Pergamus there was a sanctuary of Aesculapius, but that the rest relied on an origin lost in the obscurity of antiquity. For example, the people of Smyrna quoted an oracle of Apollo, which had commanded them to dedicate a temple to Venus Stratonicis; and the islanders of Tenos, an utterance from the same deity, bidding them consecrate a statue and a fane to Neptune. Sardis preferred a more modern claim, a grant from the victorious Alexander. So again Miletus relied on king Darius. But in each case their religious worship was that of Diana or Apollo. The Cretans too demanded a like privilege for a statue of the Divine Augustus. Decrees of the Senate were passed, which though very respectful, still prescribed certain limits, and the petitioners were directed to set up bronze tablets in each temple, to be a sacred memorial and to restrain them from sinking into selfish aims under the mask of religion.

64. About this time Julia Augusta had an alarming illness, which compelled the emperor to hasten his return to Rome, for hitherto there had been a genuine harmony between the mother and son, or a hatred well concealed. Not long before, for instance, Julia in dedicating a statue to the Divine Augustus near the theatre of Marcellus had inscribed the name of Tiberius below her own, and it was surmised that the emperor, regarding this as a slight on a sovereign's dignity, had brooded over it with deep and disguised resentment. However the Senate now decreed supplications to the gods and the celebration of the Great Games, which were to be exhibited by the pontiffs, augurs, the colleges of the Fifteen and of the Seven, with the Augustal Brotherhood. Lucius Apronius moved that the heralds too should preside over these Games. This the emperor opposed, distinguishing the peculiar privileges of the sacred guilds, and quoting precedents. Never, he argued, had the heralds this dignity. "The Augustal priests were included expressly because their sacred office was specially attached to the family for which vows were being performed."

65. My purpose is not to relate at length every motion, but only such as were conspicuous for excellence or notorious for infamy. This I regard as history's highest function, to let no worthy action be uncommemorated, and to hold out the reprobation of posterity as a terror to evil words and deeds. So corrupted indeed and debased was that age by sycophancy that not only the foremost citizens who were forced to save their grandeur by servility, but every exconsul, most of the ex-praetors and a host of inferior senators would rise in eager rivalry to propose shameful and preposterous motions. Tradition says that Tiberius as often as he left the Senate-House used to exclaim in Greek, "How ready these men are to be slaves." Clearly, even he, with his dislike of public freedom, was disgusted at the abject abasement of his creatures.

66. From unseemly flatteries they passed by degrees to savage acts. Caius Silanus, pro-consul of Asia, was accused by our allies of extortion; whereupon Mamercus Scaurus, an ex-consul, Junius Otho, a praetor, Brutidius Niger, an aedile, simultaneously fastened on him and charged him with sacrilege to the divinity of Augustus, and contempt of the majesty of Tiberius, while Mamercus Scaurus quoted old precedents, the prosecutions of Lucius Cotta by Scipio Africanus, of Servius Galba by Cato the Censor and of Publius Rutilius by Scaurus. As if indeed Scipio's and Cato's vengeance fell on such offences, or that of the famous Scaurus, whom his great grandson, a blot on his ancestry, this Mamercus was now disgracing by his infamous occupation. Junius Otho's old employment had been the keeping of a preparatory school. Subsequently, becoming a senator by the influence of Sejanus, he shamed his origin, low as it was, by his unblushing effronteries. Brutidius who was rich in excellent accomplishments, and was sure, had he pursued a path of virtue, to reach the most brilliant distinction, was goaded on by an eager impatience, while he strove to outstrip his equals, then his superiors, and at last even his own aspirations. Many have thus perished, even good men, despising slow and safe success and hurrying on even at the cost of ruin to premature greatness.

67. Gellius Publicola and Marcus Paconius, respectively quaestor and lieutenant of Silanus, swelled the number of the accusers. No doubt was felt as to the defendant's conviction for oppression and extortion, but there was a combination against him, that must have been perilous even to an innocent man. Besides a host of adverse Senators there were the most accomplished orators of all Asia, who, as such, had been retained for the prosecution, and to these he had to reply alone, without any experience in pleading, and under that personal apprehension which is enough to paralyse even the most practised eloquence. For Tiberius did not refrain from pressing him with angry voice and look, himself putting incessant questions, without allowing him to rebut or evade them, and he had often even to make admissions, that the questions might not have been asked in vain. His slaves too were sold by auction to the state-agent, to be examined by torture. And that not a friend might help him in his danger, charges of treason were added, a binding guarantee for sealed lips. Accordingly he begged a few days' respite, and at last abandoned his defence, after venturing on a memorial to the emperor, in which he mingled reproach and entreaty.

68. Tiberius, that his proceedings against Silanus might find some justification in precedent, ordered the Divine Augustus's indictment of Volesus Messala, also a proconsul of Asia, and the Senate's sentence on him to be read. He then asked Lucius Piso his opinion. After a long preliminary eulogy on the prince's clemency, Piso pronounced that Silanus ought to be outlawed and banished to the island of Gyarus. The rest concurred, with the exception of Cneius Lentulus, who, with the assent of Tiberius, proposed that the property of Silanus's mother, as she was very different from him, should be exempted from confiscation, and given to the son.

> 68. Tiberius quae in Silanum parabat quo excusatius sub exemplo acciperentur, libellos divi Augusti de Voleso Messala eiusdem Asiae pro consule factumque in eum senatus consultum recitari iubet. tum L. Pisonem sententiam rogat. ille multum de clementia principis praefatus aqua atque igni Silano interdicendum censuit ipsumque in insulam Gyarum relegandum. eadem ceteri, nisi quod Cn. Lentulus separanda Silani materna bona, quippe Atia parente geniti, reddendaque filio dixit, adnuente Tiberio.

69. Cornelius Dolabella however, by way of carrying flattery yet further, sharply censured the morals of Silanus, and then moved that no one of disgraceful life and notorious infamy should be eligible for a province, and that of this the emperor should be judge. "Laws, indeed," he said, "punish crimes committed; but how much more merciful would it be to individuals, how much better for our allies, to provide against their commission." The emperor opposed the motion. "Although," he said, "I am not ignorant of the reports about Silanus, still we must decide nothing by hearsay. Many a man has behaved in a province quite otherwise than was hoped or feared of him. Some are roused to higher things by great responsibility; others are paralysed by it. It is not possible for a prince's knowledge to embrace everything, and it is not expedient that he should be exposed to the ambitious schemings of others. Laws are ordained to meet facts, inasmuch as the future is uncertain. It was the rule of our ancestors that, whenever there was first an offence, some penalty should follow. Let us not revolutionise a wisely devised and ever approved system. Princes have enough burdens, and also enough power. Rights are invariably abridged, as despotism increases; nor ought we to fall back on imperial authority, when we can have recourse to the laws." Such constitutional sentiments were so rare with Tiberius, that they were welcomed with all the heartier joy. Knowing, as he did, how to be forbearing, when he was not under the stimulus of personal resentment, he further said that Gyarus was a dreary and uninhabited island, and that, as a concession to the Junian family and to a man of the same order as themselves, they might let him retire by preference to Cythnus. This, he added, was also the request of Torquata, Silanus's sister, a vestal of primitive purity. The motion was carried after a division.

Next: Book 3 [70]

Tacitus: Annals: Book 3 [50]

The Works of Tacitus

tr. by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb

[1864-1877]

Tacitus: Annals Book 3 [50]

50. Marcus Lepidus spoke against the sentence as follows: - "Senators, if we look to the single fact of the infamous utterance with which Lutorius has polluted his own mind and the ears of the public, neither dungeon nor halter nor tortures fit for a slave would be punishment enough for him. But though vice and wicked deeds have no limit, penalties and correctives are moderated by the clemency of the sovereign and by the precedents of your ancestors and yourselves. Folly differs from wickedness; evil words from evil deeds, and thus there is room for a sentence by which this offence may not go unpunished, while we shall have no cause to regret either leniency or severity. Often have I heard our emperor complain when any one has anticipated his mercy by a self-inflicted death. Lutorius's life is still safe; if spared, he will be no danger to the State; if put to death, he will be no warning to others. His productions are as empty and ephemeral as they are replete with folly. Nothing serious or alarming is to be apprehended from the man who is the betrayer of his own shame and works on the imaginations not of men but of silly women. However, let him leave Rome, lose his property, and be outlawed. That is my proposal, just as though he were convicted under the law of treason."

51. Only one of the ex-consuls, Rubellius Blandus, supported Lepidus. The rest voted with Agrippa. Priscus was dragged off to prison and instantly put to death. Of this Tiberius complained to the Senate with his usual ambiguity, extolling their loyalty in so sharply avenging the very slightest insults to the sovereign, though he deprecated such hasty punishment of mere words, praising Lepidus and not censuring Agrippa. So the Senate passed a resolution that their decrees should not be registered in the treasury till nine days had expired, and so much respite was to be given to condemned persons. Still the Senate had not liberty to alter their purpose, and lapse of time never softened Tiberius.

52. Caius Sulpicius and Didius Haterius were the next consuls. It was a year free from commotions abroad, while at home stringent legislation was apprehended against the luxury which had reached boundless excess in everything on which wealth is lavished. Some expenses, though very serious, were generally kept secret by a concealment of the real prices; but the costly preparations for gluttony and dissipation were the theme of incessant talk, and had suggested a fear that a prince who clung to oldfashioned frugality would be too stern in his reforms. In fact, when the aedile Caius Bibulus broached the topic, all his colleagues had pointed out that the sumptuary laws were disregarded, that prohibited prices for household articles were every day on the increase, and that moderate measures could not stop the evil. The Senate on being consulted had, without handling the matter, referred it to the emperor. Tiberius, after long considering whether such reckless tastes could be repressed, whether the repression of them would not be still more hurtful to the State, also, how undignified it would be to meddle with what he could not succeed in, or what, if effected, would necessitate the disgrace and infamy of men of distinction, at last addressed a letter to the Senate to the following purport:-

53. Perhaps in any other matter, Senators, it would be more convenient that I should be consulted in your presence, and then state what I think to be for the public good. In this debate it was better that my eyes should not be on you, for while you were noting the anxious faces of individual senators charged with shameful luxury, I too myself might observe them and, as it were, detect them. Had those energetic men, our aediles, first taken counsel with me, I do not know whether I should not have advised them to let alone vices so strong and so matured, rather than merely attain the result of publishing what are the corruptions with which we cannot cope. They however have certainly done their duty, as I would wish all other officials likewise to fulfil their parts. For myself, it is neither seemly to keep silence nor is it easy to speak my mind, as I do not hold the office of aedile, praetor, or consul. Something greater and loftier is expected of a prince, and while everybody takes to himself the credit of right policy, one alone has to bear the odium of every person's failures. For what am I first to begin with restraining and cutting down to the old standard? The vast dimensions of country houses? The number of slaves of every nationality? The masses of silver and gold? The marvels in bronze and painting? The apparel worn indiscriminately by both sexes, or that peculiar luxury of women which, for the sake of jewels, diverts our wealth to strange or hostile nations?

54. I am not unaware that people at entertainments and social gatherings condemn all this and demand some restriction. But if a law were to be passed and a penalty imposed, those very same persons will cry out that the State is revolutionised, that ruin is plotted against all our most brilliant fashion, that not a citizen is safe from incrimination. Yet as even bodily disorders of long standing and growth can be checked only by sharp and painful treatment, so the fever of a diseased mind, itself polluted and a pollution to others, can be quenched only by remedies as strong as the passions which inflame it. Of the many laws devised by our ancestors, of the many passed by the Divine Augustus, the first have been forgotten, while his (all the more to our disgrace) have become obsolete through contempt, and this has made luxury bolder than ever. The truth is, that when one craves something not yet forbidden, there is a fear that it may be forbidden; but when people once transgress prohibitions with impunity, there is no longer any fear or any shame. Why then in old times was economy in the ascendant? Because every one practised self-control; because we were all members of one city. Nor even afterwards had we the same temptations, while our dominion was confined to Italy. Victories over the foreigner taught us how to waste the substance of others; victories over ourselves, how to squander our own. What a paltry matter is this of which the aediles are reminding us! What a mere trifle if you look at everything else! No one represents to the Senate that Italy requires supplies from abroad, and that the very existence of the people of Rome is daily at the mercy of uncertain waves and storms. And unless masters, slaves, and estates have the resources of the provinces as their mainstay, our shrubberies, forsooth, and our country houses will have to support us. Such, Senators, are the anxieties which the prince has to sustain, and the neglect of them will be utter ruin to the State. The cure for other evils must be sought in our own hearts. Let us be led to amendment, the poor by constraint, the rich by satiety. Or if any of our officials give promise of such energy and strictness as can stem the corruption, I praise the man, and I confess that I am relieved of a portion of my burdens. But if they wish to denounce vice, and when they have gained credit for so doing they arouse resentments and leave them to me, be assured, Senators, that I too am by no means eager to incur enmities, and though for the public good I encounter formidable and often unjust enmities, yet I have a right to decline such as are unmeaning and purposeless and will be of use neither to myself nor to you.

55. When they had heard the emperor's letter, the aediles were excused from so anxious a task, and that luxury of the table which from the close of the war ended at Actium to the armed revolution in which Servius Galba rose to empire, had been practised with profuse expenditure, gradually went out of fashion. It is as well that I should trace the causes of this change. Formerly rich or highly distinguished noble families often sank into ruin from a passion for splendour. Even then men were still at liberty to court and be courted by the city populace, by our allies and by foreign princes, and every one who from his wealth, his mansion and his establishment was conspicuously grand, gained too proportionate lustre by his name and his numerous clientele. After the savage massacres in which greatness of renown was fatal, the survivors turned to wiser ways. The new men who were often admitted into the Senate from the towns, colonies and even the provinces, introduced their household thrift, and though many of them by good luck or energy attained an old age of wealth, still their former tastes remained. But the chief encourager of strict manners was Vespasian, himself old-fashioned both in his dress and diet. Henceforth a respectful feeling towards the prince and a love of emulation proved more efficacious than legal penalties or terrors. Or possibly there is in all things a kind of cycle, and there may be moral revolutions just as there are changes of seasons. Nor was everything better in the past, but our own age too has produced many specimens of excellence and culture for posterity to imitate. May we still keep up with our ancestors a rivalry in all that is honourable!

56. Tiberius having gained credit for forbearance by the check he had given to the growing terror of the informers, wrote a letter to the Senate requesting the tribunitian power for Drusus. This was a phrase which Augustus devised as a designation of supremacy, so that without assuming the name of king or dictator he might have some title to mark his elevation above all other authority. He then chose Marcus Agrippa to be his associate in this power, and on Agrippa's death, Tiberius Nero, that there might be no uncertainty as to the succession. In this manner he thought to check the perverse ambition of others, while he had confidence in Nero's moderation and in his own greatness. Following this precedent, Tiberius now placed Drusus next to the throne, though while Germanicus was alive he had maintained an impartial attitude towards the two princes. However in the beginning of his letter he implored heaven to prosper his plans on behalf of the State, and then added a few remarks, without falsehood or exaggeration, on the character of the young prince. He had, he reminded them, a wife and three children, and his age was the same as that at which he had himself been formerly summoned by the Divine Augustus to undertake this duty. Nor was it a precipitate step; it was only after an experience of eight years, after having quelled mutinies and settled wars, after a triumph and two consulships, that he was adopted as a partner in trials already familiar to him.

57. The senators had anticipated this message and hence their flattery was the more elaborate. But they could devise nothing but voting statues of the two princes, shrines to certain deities, temples, arches and the usual routine, except that Marcus Silanus sought to honour the princes by a slur on the consulate, and proposed that on all monuments, public or private, should be inscribed, to mark the date, the names, not of the consuls, but of those who were holding the tribunitian power. Quintus Haterius, when he brought forward a motion that the decrees passed that day should be set up in the Senate House in letters of gold, was laughed at as an old dotard, who would get nothing but infamy out of such utterly loathsome sycophancy.

58. Meantime Junius Blaesus received an extension of his government of Africa, and Servius Maluginensis, the priest of Jupiter, demanded to have Asia allotted to him. "It was," he asserted, "a popular error that it was not lawful for the priests of Jupiter to leave Italy; in fact, his own legal position differed not from that of the priests of Mars and of Quirinus. If these latter had provinces allotted to them, why was it forbidden to the priests of Jupiter? There were no resolutions of the people or anything to be found in the books of ceremonies on the subject. Pontiffs had often performed the rites to Jupiter when his priest was hindered by illness or by public duty. For seventy-five years after the suicide of Cornelius Merula no successor to his office had been appointed; yet religious rites had not ceased. If during so many years it was possible for there to be no appointment without any prejudice to religion, with what comparative ease might he be absent for one year's proconsulate? That these priests in former days were prohibited by the pontiff from going into the provinces, was the result of private feuds. Now, thank heaven, the supreme pontiff was also the supreme man, and was influenced by no rivalry, hatred or personal feeling."

59. As the augur Lentulus and others argued on various grounds against this view, the result was that they awaited the decision of the supreme pontiff. Tiberius deferred any investigation into the priest's legal position, but he modified the ceremonies which had been decreed in honour of Drusus's tribunitian power with special censure on the extravagance of the proposed inscription in gold, so contrary to national usage. Letters also from Drusus were read, which, though studiously modest in expression, were taken to be extremely supercilious. "We have fallen so low," people said, "that even a mere youth who has received so high an honour does not go as a worshipper to the city's gods, does not enter the Senate, does not so much as take the auspices on his country's soil. There is a war, forsooth, or he is kept from us in some remote part of the world. Why, at this very moment, he is on a tour amid the shores and lakes of Campania. Such is the training of the future ruler of mankind; such the lesson he first learns from his father's counsels. An aged emperor may indeed shrink from the citizen's gaze, and plead the weariness of declining years and the toils of the past. But, as for Drusus, what can be his hindrance but pride?"

Next: Book 3 [60]

Tacitus: Annals: Book 3 [40]

The Works of Tacitus

tr. by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb

[1864-1877]

Tacitus: Annals Book 3 [40]

40. That same year, some states of Gaul, under the pressure of heavy debts, attempted a revolt. Its most active instigators were Julius Florus among the Treveri and Julius Sacrovir among the Aedui. Both could show noble birth and signal services rendered by ancestors, for which Roman citizenship had formerly been granted them, when the gift was rare and a recompense only of merit. In secret conferences to which the fiercest spirits were admitted, or any to whom poverty or the fear of guilt was an irresistible stimulus to crime, they arranged that Florus was to rouse the Belgae, Sacrovir the Gauls nearer home. These men accordingly talked sedition before small gatherings and popular assemblies about the perpetual tributes, the oppressive usury, the cruelty and arrogance of their governors, hinting too that there was disaffection among our soldiers, since they had heard of the murder of Germanicus. "It was," they said, "a grand opportunity for the recovery of freedom, if only they would contrast their own vigour with the exhaustion of Italy, the unwarlike character of the city populace, and the utter weakness of Rome's armies in all but their foreign element."

41. Scarcely a single community was untouched by the germs of this commotion. First however in actual revolt were the Andecavi and Turoni. Of these the former were put down by an officer, Acilius Aviola, who had summoned a cohort which was on garrison duty at Lugdunum. The Turoni were quelled by some legionary troops sent by Visellius Varro who commanded in Lower Germany, and led by the same Aviola and some Gallic chieftains who brought aid, in order that they might disguise their disaffection and exhibit it at a better opportunity. Sacrovir too was conspicuous, with head uncovered, cheering on his men to fight for Rome, to display, as he said, his valour. But the prisoners asserted that he sought recognition that he might not be a mark for missiles. Tiberius when consulted on the matter disdained the information, and fostered the war by his irresolution.

42. Florus meanwhile followed up his designs and tried to induce a squadron of cavalry levied among the Treveri, trained in our service and discipline, to begin hostilities by a massacre of the Roman traders. He corrupted a few of the men, but the majority were steadfast in their allegiance. A host however of debtors and dependents took up arms, and they were on their way to the forest passes known as the Arduenna, when they were stopped by legions which Visellius and Silius had sent from their respective armies, by opposite routes, to meet them. Julius Indus from the same state, who was at feud with Florus and therefore particularly eager to render us a service, was sent on in advance with a picked force, and dispersed the undisciplined rabble. Florus after eluding the conquerors by hiding himself in one place after another, at last when he saw some soldiers who had barred every possible escape, fell by his own hand. Such was the end of the rebellion of the Treveri.

43. A more formidable movement broke out among the Aedui, proportioned to the greater wealth of the state and the distance of the force which should repress it. Sacrovir with some armed cohorts had made himself master of Augustodunum, the capital of the tribe, with the noblest youth of Gaul, there devoting themselves to a liberal education, and with such hostages he proposed to unite in his cause their parents and kinsfolk. He also distributed among the youth arms which he had had secretly manufactured. There were forty thousand, one fifth armed like our legionaries; the rest had spears and knives and other weapons used in the chase. In addition were some slaves who were being trained for gladiators, clad after the national fashion in a complete covering of steel. They were called crupellarii, and though they were ill-adapted for inflicting wounds, they were impenetrable to them. This army was continually increased, not yet by any open combination of the neighbouring states, but by zealous individual enthusiasm, as well as by strife between the Roman generals, each of whom claimed the war for himself. Varro after a while, as he was infirm and aged, yielded to Silius who was in his prime.

44. At Rome meanwhile people said that it was not only the Treveri and Aedui who had revolted, but sixty-four states of Gaul with the Germans in alliance, while Spain too was disaffected; anything in fact was believed, with rumour's usual exaggeration. All good men were saddened by anxiety for the country, but many in their loathing of the present system and eagerness for change, rejoiced at their very perils and exclaimed against Tiberius for giving attention amid such political convulsions to the calumnies of informers. "Was Sacrovir too," they asked, "to be charged with treason before the Senate? We have at last found men to check those murderous missives by the sword. Even war is a good exchange for a miserable peace." Tiberius all the more studiously assumed an air of unconcern. He changed neither his residence nor his look, but kept up his usual demeanour during the whole time, either from the profoundness of his reserve; or was it that he had convinced himself that the events were unimportant and much more insignificant than the rumours represented?

45. Silius meantime was advancing with two legions, and having sent forward some auxiliary troops was ravaging those villages of the Sequani, which, situated on the border, adjoin the Aedui, and were associated with them in arms. He then pushed on by forced marches to Augustodunum, his standard-bearers vying in zeal, and even the privates loudly protesting against any halt for their usual rest or during the hours of night. "Only," they said, "let us have the foe face to face; that will be enough for victory." Twelve miles from Augustodunum they saw before them Sacrovir and his army in an open plain. His men in armour he had posted in the van, his light infantry on the wings, and the half-armed in the rear. He himself rode amid the foremost ranks on a splendid charger, reminding them of the ancient glories of the Gauls, of the disasters they had inflicted on the Romans, how grand would be the freedom of the victorious, how more intolerable than ever the slavery of a second conquest.

46. His words were brief and heard without exultation. For now the legions in battle array were advancing, and the rabble of townsfolk who knew nothing of war had their faculties of sight and hearing quite paralysed. Silius, on the one hand, though confident hope took away any need for encouragement, exclaimed again and again that it was a shame to the conquerors of Germany to have to be led against Gauls, as against an enemy. "Only the other day the rebel Turoni had been discomfited by a single cohort, the Treveri by one cavalry squadron, the Sequani by a few companies of this very army. Prove to these Aedui once for all that the more they abound in wealth and luxury, the more unwarlike are they, but spare them when they flee." Then there was a deafening cheer; the cavalry threw itself on the flanks, and the infantry charged the van. On the wings there was but a brief resistance. The men in mail were somewhat of an obstacle, as the iron plates did not yield to javelins or swords; but our men, snatching up hatchets and pickaxes, hacked at their bodies and their armour as if they were battering a wall. Some beat down the unwieldy mass with pikes and forked poles, and they were left lying on the ground, without an effort to rise, like dead men. Sacrovir with his most trustworthy followers hurried first to Augustodunum and then, from fear of being surrendered, to an adjacent country house. There by his own hand he fell, and his comrades by mutually inflicted wounds. The house was fired over their heads, and with it they were all consumed.

47. Then at last Tiberius informed the Senate by letter of the beginning and completion of the war, without either taking away from or adding to the truth, but ascribing the success to the loyalty and courage of his generals, and to his own policy. He also gave the reasons why neither he himself nor Drusus had gone to the war; he magnified the greatness of the empire, and said it would be undignified for emperors, whenever there was a commotion in one or two states, to quit the capital, the centre of all government. Now, as he was not influenced by fear, he would go to examine and settle matters. The Senate decreed vows for his safe return, with thanksgivings and other appropriate ceremonies. Cornelius Dolabella alone, in endeavouring to outdo the other Senators, went the length of a preposterous flattery by proposing that he should enter Rome from Campania with an ovation. Thereupon came a letter from the emperor, declaring that he was not so destitute of renown as after having subdued the most savage nations and received or refused so many triumphs in his youth, to covet now that he was old an unmeaning honour for a tour in the neighbourhood of Rome.

48. About the same time he requested the Senate to let the death of Sulpicius Quirinus be celebrated with a public funeral. With the old patrician family of the Sulpicii this Quirinus, who was born in the town of Lanuvium, was quite unconnected. An indefatigable soldier, he had by his zealous services won the consulship under the Divine Augustus, and subsequently the honours of a triumph for having stormed some fortresses of the Homonadenses in Cilicia. He was also appointed adviser to Caius Caesar in the government of Armenia, and had likewise paid court to Tiberius, who was then at Rhodes. The emperor now made all this known to the Senate, and extolled the good offices of Quirinus to himself, while he censured Marcus Lollius, whom he charged with encouraging Caius Caesar in his perverse and quarrelsome behaviour. But people generally had no pleasure in the memory of Quirinus, because of the perils he had brought, as I have related, on Lepida, and the meanness and dangerous power of his last years.

49. At the close of the year, Caius Lutorius Priscus, a Roman knight, who, after writing a popular poem bewailing the death of Germanicus, had received a reward in money from the emperor, was fastened on by an informer, and charged with having composed another during the illness of Drusus, which, in the event of the prince's death, might be published with even greater profit to himself. He had in his vanity read it in the house of Publius Petronius before Vitellia, Petronius's mother-in-law, and several ladies of rank. As soon as the accuser appeared, all but Vitellia were frightened into giving evidence. She alone swore that she had heard not a word. But those who criminated him fatally were rather believed, and on the motion of Haterius Agrippa, the consul-elect, the last penalty was invoked on the accused.

Next: Book 3 [50]

Tacitus: Annals: Book 3 [30]

The Works of Tacitus

tr. by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb

[1864-1877]

Tacitus: Annals Book 3 [30]

30. Two remarkable men died at the end of the year, Lucius Volusius and Sallustius Crispus. Volusius was of an old family, which had however never risen beyond the praetorship. He brought into it the consulship; he also held the office of censor for arranging the classes of the knights, and was the first to pile up the wealth which that house enjoyed to a boundless extent. Crispus was of equestrian descent and grandson of a sister of Caius Sallustius, that most admirable Roman historian, by whom he was adopted and whose name he took. Though his road to preferment was easy, he chose to emulate Maecenas, and without rising to a senator's rank, he surpassed in power many who had won triumphs and consulships. He was a contrast to the manners of antiquity in his elegance and refinement, and in the sumptuousness of his wealth he was almost a voluptuary. But beneath all this was a vigorous mind, equal to the greatest labours, the more active in proportion as he made a show of sloth and apathy. And so while Maecenas lived, he stood next in favour to him, and was afterwards the chief depository of imperial secrets, and accessory to the murder of Postumus Agrippa, till in advanced age he retained the shadow rather than the substance of the emperor's friendship. The same too had happened to Maecenas, so rarely is it the destiny of power to be lasting, or perhaps a sense of weariness steals over princes when they have bestowed everything, or over favourites, when there is nothing left them to desire.

31. Next followed Tiberius's fourth, Drusus's second consulship, memorable from the fact that father and son were colleagues. Two years previously the association of Germanicus and Tiberius in the same honour had not been agreeable to the uncle, nor had it the link of so close a natural tie. At the beginning of this year Tiberius, avowedly to recruit his health, retired to Campania, either as a gradual preparation for long and uninterrupted seclusion, or in order that Drusus alone in his father's absence might discharge the duties of the consulship. It happened that a mere trifle which grew into a sharp contest gave the young prince the means of acquiring popularity. Domitius Corbulo, an ex-praetor, complained to the Senate that Lucius Sulla, a young noble, had not given place to him at a gladiatorial show. Corbulo had age, national usage and the feelings of the older senators in his favour. Against him Mamercus Scaurus, Lucius Arruntius and other kinsmen of Sulla strenuously exerted themselves. There was a keen debate, and appeal was made to the precedents of our ancestors, as having censured in severe decrees disrespect on the part of the young, till Drusus argued in a strain calculated to calm their feelings. Corbulo too received an apology from Mamercus, who was Sulla's uncle and stepfather, and the most fluent speaker of that day. It was this same Corbulo, who, after raising a cry that most of the roads in Italy were obstructed or impassable through the dishonesty of contractors and the negligence of officials, himself willingly undertook the complete management of the business. This proved not so beneficial to the State as ruinous to many persons, whose property and credit he mercilessly attacked by convictions and confiscations.

32. Soon afterwards Tiberius informed the Senate by letter that Africa was again disturbed by an incursion of Tacfarinas, and that they must use their judgment in choosing as proconsul an experienced soldier of vigorous constitution, who would be equal to the war. Sextus Pompeius caught at this opportunity of venting his hatred against Lepidus, whom he condemned as a poor-spirited and needy man, who was a disgrace to his ancestors, and therefore deserved to lose even his chance of the province of Asia. But the Senate were against him, for they thought Lepidus gentle rather than cowardly, and that his inherited poverty, with the high rank in which he had lived without a blot, ought to be considered a credit to instead of a reproach. And so he was sent to Asia, and with respect to Africa it was decided that the emperor should choose to whom it was to be assigned.

33. During this debate Severus Caecina proposed that no magistrate who had obtained a province should be accompanied by his wife. He began by recounting at length how harmoniously he had lived with his wife, who had borne him six children, and how in his own home he had observed what he was proposing for the public, by having kept her in Italy, though he had himself served forty campaigns in various provinces. "With good reason," he said, "had it been formerly decided that women were not to be taken among our allies or into foreign countries. A train of women involves delays through luxury in peace and through panic in war, and converts a Roman army on the march into the likeness of a barbarian progress. Not only is the sex feeble and unequal to hardship, but, when it has liberty, it is spiteful, intriguing and greedy of power. They show themselves off among the soldiers and have the centurions at their beck. Lately a woman had presided at the drill of the cohorts and the evolutions of the legions. You should yourselves bear in mind that, whenever men are accused of extortion, most of the charges are directed against the wives. It is to these that the vilest of the provincials instantly attach themselves; it is they who undertake and settle business; two persons receive homage when they appear; there are two centres of government, and the women's orders are the more despotic and intemperate. Formerly they were restrained by the Oppian and other laws; now, loosed from every bond, they rule our houses, our tribunals, even our armies."

34. A few heard this speech with approval, but the majority clamorously objected that there was no proper motion on the subject, and that Caecina was no fit censor on so grave an issue. Presently Valerius Messalinus, Messala's son, in whom the father's eloquence was reproduced, replied that much of the sternness of antiquity had been changed into a better and more genial system. "Rome," he said, "is not now, as formerly, beset with wars, nor are the provinces hostile. A few concessions are made to the wants of women, but such as are not even a burden to their husbands homes, much less to the allies. In all other respects man and wife share alike, and this arrangement involves no trouble in peace. War of course requires that men should be unincumbered, but when they return what worthier solace can they have after their hardships than a wife's society? But some wives have abandoned themselves to scheming and rapacity. Well; even among our magistrates, are not many subject to various passions? Still, that is not a reason for sending no one into a province. Husbands have often been corrupted by the vices of their wives. Are then all unmarried men blameless? The Oppian laws were formerly adopted to meet the political necessities of the time, and subsequently there was some remission and mitigation of them on grounds of expediency. It is idle to shelter our own weakness under other names; for it is the husband's fault if the wife transgresses propriety. Besides, it is wrong that because of the imbecility of one or two men, all husbands should be cut off from their partners in prosperity and adversity. And further, a sex naturally weak will be thus left to itself and be at the mercy of its own voluptuousness and the passions of others. Even with the husband's personal vigilance the marriage tie is scarcely preserved inviolate. What would happen were it for a number of years to be forgotten, just as in a divorce? You must not check vices abroad without remembering the scandals of the capital." Drusus added a few words on his own experience as a husband. "Princes," he said, "must often visit the extremities of their empire. How often had the Divine Augustus travelled to West and to the East accompanied by Livia? He had himself gone to Illyricum and, should it be expedient, he would go to other countries, not always however with a contented mind, if he had to tear himself from a much loved wife, the mother of his many children."

35. Caecina's motion was thus defeated. At the Senate's next meeting came a letter from Tiberius, which indirectly censured them for throwing on the emperor every political care, and named Marcus Lepidus and Junius Blaesus, one of whom was to be chosen pro-consul of Africa. Both spoke on the subject, and Lepidus begged earnestly to be excused. He alleged ill-health, his children's tender age, his having a daughter to marry, and something more of which he said nothing, was well understood, the fact that Blaesus was uncle of Sejanus and so had very powerful interest. Blaesus replied with an affectation of refusal, but not with the same persistency, nor was he backed up by the acquiescence of flatterers.

36. Next was exposed an abuse, hitherto the subject of many a whispered complaint. The vilest wretches used a growing freedom in exciting insult and obloquy against respectable citizens, and escaped punishment by clasping some statue of the emperor. The very freedman or slave was often an actual terror to his patron or master whom he would menace by word and gesture. Accordingly Caius Cestius, a senator, argued that "though princes were like deities, yet even the gods listened only to righteous prayers from their suppliants, and that no one fled to the Capitol or any other temple in Rome to use it as an auxiliary in crime. There was an end and utter subversion of all law when, in the forum and on the threshold of the Senate House, Annia Rufilla, whom he had convicted of fraud before a judge, assailed him with insults and threats, while he did not himself dare to try legal proceedings, because he was confronted by her with the emperor's image." There rose other clamorous voices, with even more flagrant complaints, and all implored Drusus to inflict exemplary vengeance, till he ordered Rufilla to be summoned, and on her conviction to be confined in the common prison.

37. Considius Aequus too and Coelius Cursor, Roman knights, were punished on the emperor's proposal, by a decree of the Senate, for having attacked the praetor, Magius Caecilianus, with false charges of treason. Both these results were represented as an honour to Drusus. By moving in society at Rome, amid popular talk, his father's dark policy, it was thought, was mitigated. Even voluptuousness in one so young gave little offence. Better that he should incline that way, spend his days in architecture, his nights in banquets, than that he should live in solitude, cut off from every pleasure, and absorbed in a gloomy vigilance and mischievous schemes.

38. Tiberius indeed and the informers were never weary. Ancharius Priscus had prosecuted Caesius Cordus, proconsul of Crete, for extortion, adding a charge of treason, which then crowned all indictments. Antistius Vetus, one of the chief men of Macedonia, who had been acquitted of adultery, was recalled by the emperor himself, with a censure on the judges, to be tried for treason, as a seditious man who had been implicated in the designs of Rhescuporis, when that king after the murder of his brother Cotys had meditated war against us. The accused was accordingly outlawed, with the further sentence that he was to be confined in an island from which neither Macedonia nor Thrace were conveniently accessible. As for Thrace, since the division of the kingdom between Rhoemetalces and the children of Cotys, who because of their tender age were under the guardianship of Trebellienus Rufus, it was divided against itself, from not being used to our rule, and blamed Rhoemetalces no less than Trebellienus for allowing the wrongs of his countrymen to go unpunished. The Coelaletae, Odrusae and Dii, powerful tribes, took up arms, under different leaders, all on a level from their obscurity. This hindered them from combining in a formidable war. Some roused their immediate neighbourhood; others crossed Mount Haemus, to stir up remote tribes; most of them, and the best disciplined, besieged the king in the city of Philippopolis, founded by the Macedonian Philip.

39. When this was known to Publius Vellaeus who commanded the nearest army, he sent some allied cavalry and light infantry to attack those who were roaming in quest of plunder or of reinforcements, while he marched in person with the main strength of the foot to raise the siege. Every operation was at the same moment successful; the pillagers were cut to pieces; dissensions broke out among the besiegers, and the king made a well-timed sally just as the legion arrived. A battle or even a skirmish it did not deserve to be called, in which merely half-armed stragglers were slaughtered without bloodshed on our side.

Next: Book 3 [40]

Tacitus: Annals: Book 3 [20]

The Works of Tacitus

tr. by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb

[1864-1877]

Tacitus: Annals Book 3 [20]

20. That same year Tacfarinas who had been defeated, as I have related, by Camillus in the previous summer, renewed hostilities in Africa, first by mere desultory raids, so swift as to be unpunished; next, by destroying villages and carrying off plunder wholesale. Finally, he hemmed in a Roman cohort near the river Pagyda. The position was commanded by Decrius, a soldier energetic in action and experienced in war, who regarded the siege as a disgrace. Cheering on his men to offer battle in the open plain, he drew up his line in front of his intrenchments. At the first shock, the cohort was driven back, upon which he threw himself fearlessly amid the missiles in the path of the fugitives and cried shame on the standard-bearers for letting Roman soldiers show their backs to a rabble of deserters. At the same moment he was covered with wounds, and though pierced through the eye, he resolutely faced the enemy and ceased not to fight till he fell deserted by his men.

21. On receiving this information, Lucius Apronius, successor to Camillus, alarmed more by the dishonour of his own men than by the glory of the enemy, ventured on a deed quite exceptional at that time and derived from old tradition. He flogged to death every tenth man drawn by lot from the disgraced cohort. So beneficial was this rigour that a detachment of veterans, numbering not more than five hundred, routed those same troops of Tacfarinas on their attacking a fortress named Thala. In this engagement Rufus Helvius, a common soldier, won the honour of saving a citizen's life, and was rewarded by Apronius with a neck-chain and a spear. To these the emperor added the civic crown, complaining, but without anger, that Apronius had not used his right as proconsul to bestow this further distinction. Tacfarinas, however, finding that the Numidians were cowed and had a horror of siege-operations, pursued a desultory warfare, retreating when he was pressed, and then again hanging on his enemy's rear. While the barbarian continued these tactics, he could safely insult the baffled and exhausted Romans. But when he marched away towards the coast and, hampered with booty, fixed himself in a regular camp, Caesianus was despatched by his father Apronius with some cavalry and auxiliary infantry, reinforced by the most active of the legionaries, and, after a successful battle with the Numidians, drove them into the desert.

22. At Rome meanwhile Lepida, who beside the glory of being one of the Aemilii was the great-granddaughter of Lucius Sulla and Cneius Pompeius, was accused of pretending to be a mother by Publius Quirinus, a rich and childless man. Then, too, there were charges of adulteries, of poisonings, and of inquiries made through astrologers concerning the imperial house. The accused was defended by her brother Manius Lepidus. Quirinus by his relentless enmity even after his divorce, had procured for her some sympathy, infamous and guilty as she was. One could not easily perceive the emperor's feelings at her trial; so effectually did he interchange and blend the outward signs of resentment and compassion. He first begged the Senate not to deal with the charges of treason, and subsequently induced Marcus Servilius, an ex-consul, to divulge what he had seemingly wished to suppress. He also handed over to the consuls Lepida's slaves, who were in military custody, but would not allow them to be examined by torture on matters referring to his own family. Drusus too, the consul-elect, he released from the necessity of having to speak first to the question. Some thought this a gracious act, done to save the rest of the Senators from a compulsory assent, while others ascribed it to malignity, on the ground that he would have yielded only where there was a necessity of condemning.

23. On the days of the games which interrupted the trial, Lepida went into the theatre with some ladies of rank, and as she appealed with piteous wailings to her ancestors and to that very Pompey, the public buildings and statues of whom stood there before their eyes, she roused such sympathy that people burst into tears and shouted, without ceasing, savage curses on Quirinus, "to whose childless old-age and miserably obscure family, one once destined to be the wife of Lucius Caesar and the daughter-in-law of the Divine Augustus was being sacrificed." Then, by the torture of the slaves, her infamies were brought to light, and a motion of Rubellius Blandus was carried which outlawed her. Drusus supported him, though others had proposed a milder sentence. Subsequently, Scaurus, who had had daughter by her, obtained as a concession that her property should not be confiscated. Then at last Tiberius declared that he had himself too ascertained from the slaves of Publius Quirinus that Lepida had attempted their master's life by poison.

24. It was some compensation for the misfortunes of great houses (for within a short interval the Calpurnii had lost Piso and the Aemilii Lepida) that Decimus Silanus was now restored to the Junian family. I will briefly relate his downfall. Though the Divine Augustus in his public life enjoyed unshaken prosperity, he was unfortunate at home from the profligacy of his daughter and granddaughter, both of whom he banished from Rome, and punished their paramours with death or exile. Calling, as he did, a vice so habitual among men and women by the awful name of sacrilege and treason, he went far beyond the indulgent spirit of our ancestors, beyond indeed his own legislation. But I will relate the deaths of others with the remaining events of that time, if after finishing the work I have now proposed to myself, I prolong my life for further labours. Decimus Silanus, the paramour of the granddaughter of Augustus, though the only severity he experienced was exclusion from the emperor's friendship, saw clearly that it meant exile; and it was not till Tiberius's reign that he ventured to appeal to the Senate and to the prince, in reliance on the influence of his brother Marcus Silanus, who was conspicuous both for his distinguished rank and eloquence. But Tiberius, when Silanus thanked him, replied in the Senate's presence, "that he too rejoiced at the brother's return from his long foreign tour, and that this was justly allowable, inasmuch as he had been banished not by a decree of the Senate or under any law. Still, personally," he said, "he felt towards him his father's resentment in all its force, and the return of Silanus had not cancelled the intentions of Augustus." Silanus after this lived at Rome without attaining office.

25. It was next proposed to relax the Papia Poppaea law, which Augustus in his old age had passed subsequently to the Julian statutes, for yet further enforcing the penalties on celibacy and for enriching the exchequer. And yet, marriages and the rearing of children did not become more frequent, so powerful were the attractions of a childless state. Meanwhile there was an increase in the number of persons imperilled, for every household was undermined by the insinuations of informers; and now the country suffered from its laws, as it had hitherto suffered from its vices. This suggests to me a fuller discussion of the origin of law and of the methods by which we have arrived at the present endless multiplicity and variety of our statutes.

26. Mankind in the earliest age lived for a time without a single vicious impulse, without shame or guilt, and, consequently, without punishment and restraints. Rewards were not needed when everything right was pursued on its own merits; and as men desired nothing against morality, they were debarred from nothing by fear. When however they began to throw off equality, and ambition and violence usurped the place of self-control and modesty, despotisms grew up and became perpetual among many nations. Some from the beginning, or when tired of kings, preferred codes of laws. These were at first simple, while men's minds were unsophisticated. The most famous of them were those of the Cretans, framed by Minos; those of the Spartans, by Lycurgus, and, subsequently, those which Solan drew up for the Athenians on a more elaborate and extensive scale. Romulus governed us as he pleased; then Numa united our people by religious ties and a constitution of divine origin, to which some additions were made by Tullus and Ancus. But Servius Tullius was our chief legislator, to whose laws even kings were to be subject.

27. After Tarquin's expulsion, the people, to check cabals among the Senators, devised many safeguards for freedom and for the establishment of unity. Decemvirs were appointed; everything specially admirable elsewhere was adopted, and the Twelve Tables drawn up, the last specimen of equitable legislation. For subsequent enactments, though occasionally directed against evildoers for some crime, were oftener carried by violence amid class dissensions, with a view to obtain honours not as yet conceded, or to banish distinguished citizens, or for other base ends. Hence the Gracchi and Saturnini, those popular agitators, and Drusus too, as flagrant a corrupter in the Senate's name; hence, the bribing of our allies by alluring promises and the cheating them by tribunes vetoes. Even the Italian and then the Civil war did not pass without the enactment of many conflicting laws, till Lucius Sulla, the Dictator, by the repeal or alteration of past legislation and by many additions, gave us a brief lull in this process, to be instantly followed by the seditious proposals of Lepidus, and soon afterwards by the tribunes recovering their license to excite the people just as they chose. And now bills were passed, not only for national objects but for individual cases, and laws were most numerous when the commonwealth was most corrupt.

28. Cneius Pompeius was then for the third time elected consul to reform public morals, but in applying remedies more terrible than the evils and repealing the legislation of which he had himself been the author, he lost by arms what by arms he had been maintaining. Then followed twenty years of continuous strife; custom or law there was none; the vilest deeds went unpunished, while many noble acts brought ruin. At last, in his sixth consulship, Caesar Augustus, feeling his power secure, annulled the decrees of his triumvirate, and gave us a constitution which might serve us in peace under a monarchy. Henceforth our chains became more galling, and spies were set over us, stimulated by rewards under the Papia Poppaea law, so that if men shrank from the privileges of fatherhood, the State, as universal parent, might possess their ownerless properties. But this espionage became too searching, and Rome and Italy and Roman citizens everywhere fell into its clutches. Many men's fortunes were ruined, and over all there hung a terror till Tiberius, to provide a remedy, selected by lot five ex-consuls, five ex-praetors, and five senators, by whom most of the legal knots were disentangled and some light temporary relief afforded.

29. About this same time he commended to the Senate's favour, Nero, Germanicus's son, who was just entering on manhood, and asked them, not without smiles of ridicule from his audience, to exempt him from serving as one of the Twenty Commissioners, and let him be a candidate for quaestorship five years earlier than the law allowed. His excuse was that a similar decree had been made for himself and his brother at the request of Augustus. But I cannot doubt that even then there were some who secretly laughed at such a petition, though the Caesars were but in the beginning of their grandeur, and ancient usage was more constantly before men's eyes, while also the tie between stepfather and stepson was weaker than that between grandfather and grandchild. The pontificate was likewise conferred on Nero, and on the day on which he first entered the forum, a gratuity was given to the city-populace, who greatly rejoiced at seeing a son of Germanicus now grown to manhood. Their joy was further increased by Nero's marriage to Julia, Drusus's daughter. This news was met with favourable comments, but it was heard with disgust that Sejanus was to be the father-in-law of the son of Claudius. The emperor was thought to have polluted the nobility of his house and to have yet further elevated Sejanus, whom they already suspected of overweening ambition.

Next: Book 3 [30]

Tacitus: Annals: Book 3 [10]

The Works of Tacitus

tr. by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb

[1864-1877]

Tacitus: Annals Book 3 [10]

10. Next day, Fulcinius Trio asked the consul's leave to prosecute Piso. It was contended against him by Vitellius and Veranius and the others who had been the companions of Germanicus, that this was not Trio's proper part, and that they themselves meant to report their instructions from Germanicus, not as accusers, but as deponents and witnesses to facts. Trio, abandoning the prosecution on this count, obtained leave to accuse Piso's previous career, and the emperor was requested to undertake the inquiry. This even the accused did not refuse, fearing, as he did, the bias of the people and of the Senate; while Tiberius, he knew, was resolute enough to despise report, and was also entangled in his mother's complicity. Truth too would be more easily distinguished from perverse misrepresentation by a single judge, where a number would be swayed by hatred and ill-will. Tiberius was not unaware of the formidable difficulty of the inquiry and of the rumours by which he was himself assailed. Having therefore summoned a few intimate friends, he listened to the threatening speeches of the prosecutors and to the pleadings of the accused, and finally referred the whole case to the Senate.

11. Drusus meanwhile, on his return from Illyricum, though the Senate had voted him an ovation for the submission of Maroboduus and the successes of the previous summer, postponed the honour and entered Rome. Then the defendant sought the advocacy of Lucius Arruntius, Marcus Vinicius, Asinius Gallus, Aeserninus Marcellus and Sextus Pompeius, and on their declining for different reasons, Marcus Lepidus, Lucius Piso, and Livineius Regulus became his counsel, amid the excitement of the whole country, which wondered how much fidelity would be shown by the friends of Germanicus, on what the accused rested his hopes, and how far Tiberius would repress and hide his feelings. Never were the people more keenly interested; never did they indulge themselves more freely in secret whispers against the emperor or in the silence of suspicion.

12. On the day the Senate met, Tiberius delivered a speech of studied moderation. "Piso," he said, "was my father's representative and friend, and was appointed by myself, on the advice of the Senate, to assist Germanicus in the administration of the East. Whether he there had provoked the young prince by wilful opposition and rivalry, and had rejoiced at his death or wickedly destroyed him, is for you to determine with minds unbiassed. Certainly if a subordinate oversteps the bounds of duty and of obedience to his commander, and has exulted in his death and in my affliction, I shall hate him and exclude him from my house, and I shall avenge a personal quarrel without resorting to my power as emperor. If however a crime is discovered which ought to be punished, whoever the murdered man may be, it is for you to give just reparation both to the children of Germanicus and to us, his parents. "Consider this too, whether Piso dealt with the armies in a revolutionary and seditious spirit; whether he sought by intrigue popularity with the soldiers; whether he attempted to repossess himself of the province by arms, or whether these are falsehoods which his accusers have published with exaggeration. As for them, I am justly angry with their intemperate zeal. For to what purpose did they strip the corpse and expose it to the pollution of the vulgar gaze, and circulate a story among foreigners that he was destroyed by poison, if all this is still doubtful and requires investigation? For my part, I sorrow for my son and shall always sorrow for him; still I would not hinder the accused from producing all the evidence which can relieve his innocence or convict Germanicus of any unfairness, if such there was. And I implore you not to take as proven charges alleged, merely because the case is intimately bound up with my affliction. Do you, whom ties of blood or your own true-heartedness have made his advocates, help him in his peril, every one of you, as far as each man's eloquence and diligence can do so. To like exertions and like persistency I would urge the prosecutors. In this, and in this only, will we place Germanicus above the laws, by conducting the inquiry into his death in this house instead of in the forum, and before the Senate instead of before a bench of judges. In all else let the case be tried as simply as others. Let no one heed the tears of Drusus or my own sorrow, or any stories invented to our discredit."

13. Two days were then assigned for the bringing forward of the charges, and after six days' interval, the prisoner's defence was to occupy three days. Thereupon Fulcinius Trio began with some old and irrelevant accusations about intrigues and extortion during Piso's government of Spain. This, if proved, would not have been fatal to the defendant, if he cleared himself as to his late conduct, and, if refuted, would not have secured his acquittal, if he were convicted of the greater crimes. Next, Servaeus, Veranius, and Vitellius, all with equal earnestness, Vitellius with striking eloquence, alleged against Piso that out of hatred of Germanicus and a desire of revolution he had so corrupted the common soldiers by licence and oppression of the allies that he was called by the vilest of them "father of the legions" while on the other hand to all the best men, especially to the companions and friends of Germanicus, he had been savagely cruel. Lastly, he had, they said, destroyed Germanicus himself by sorceries and poison, and hence came those ceremonies and horrible sacrifices made by himself and Plancina; then he had threatened the State with war, and had been defeated in battle, before he could be tried as a prisoner.

14. On all points but one the defence broke down. That he had tampered with the soldiers, that his province had been at the mercy of the vilest of them, that he had even insulted his chief, he could not deny. It was only the charge of poisoning from which he seemed to have cleared himself. This indeed the prosecutors did not adequately sustain by merely alleging that at a banquet given by Germanicus, his food had been tainted with poison by the hands of Piso who sat next above him. It seemed absurd to suppose that he would have dared such an attempt among strange servants, in the sight of so many bystanders, and under Germanicus's own eyes. And, besides, the defendant offered his slaves to the torture, and insisted on its application to the attendants on that occasion. But the judges for different reasons were merciless, the emperor, because war had been made on a province, the Senate because they could not be sufficiently convinced that there had been no treachery about the death of Germanicus. At the same time shouts were heard from the people in front of the Senate House, threatening violence if he escaped the verdict of the Senators. They had actually dragged Piso's statues to the Gemonian stairs, and were breaking them in pieces, when by the emperor's order they were rescued and replaced. Piso was then put in a litter and attended by a tribune of one of the Praetorian cohorts, who followed him, so it was variously rumoured, to guard his person or to be his executioner.

15. Plancina was equally detested, but had stronger interest. Consequently it was considered a question how far the emperor would be allowed to go against her. While Piso's hopes were in suspense, she offered to share his lot, whatever it might be, and in the worst event, to be his companion in death. But as soon as she had secured her pardon through the secret intercessions of Augusta, she gradually withdrew from her husband and separated her defence from his. When the prisoner saw that this was fatal to him, he hesitated whether he should still persist, but at the urgent request of his sons braced his courage and once more entered the Senate. There he bore patiently the renewal of the accusation, the furious voices of the Senators, savage opposition indeed from every quarter, but nothing daunted him so much as to see Tiberius, without pity and without anger, resolutely closing himself against any inroad of emotion. He was conveyed back to his house, where, seemingly by way of preparing his defence for the next day, he wrote a few words, sealed the paper and handed it to a freedman. Then he bestowed the usual attention on his person; after a while, late at night, his wife having left his chamber, he ordered the doors to be closed, and at daybreak was found with his throat cut and a sword lying on the ground.

16. I remember to have heard old men say that a document was often seen in Piso's hands, the substance of which he never himself divulged, but which his friends repeatedly declared contained a letter from Tiberius with instructions referring to Germanicus, and that it was his intention to produce it before the Senate and upbraid the emperor, had he not been deluded by vain promises from Sejanus. Nor did he perish, they said, by his own hand, but by that of one sent to be his executioner. Neither of these statements would I positively affirm; still it would not have been right for me to conceal what was related by those who lived up to the time of my youth. The emperor, assuming an air of sadness, complained in the Senate that the purpose of such a death was to bring odium on himself, and he asked with repeated questionings how Piso had spent his last day and night. Receiving answers which were mostly judicious, though in part somewhat incautious, he read out a note written by Piso, nearly to the following effect:- "Crushed by a conspiracy of my foes and the odium excited by a lying charge, since my truth and innocence find no place here, I call the immortal gods to witness that towards you Caesar, I have lived loyally, and with like dutiful respect towards your mother. And I implore you to think of my children, one of whom, Cneius is in way implicated in my career, whatever it may have been, seeing that all this time he has been at Rome, while the other, Marcus Piso, dissuaded me from returning to Syria. Would that I had yielded to my young son rather than he to his aged father! And therefore I pray the more earnestly that the innocent may not pay the penalty of my wickedness. By forty-five years of obedience, by my association with you in the consulate, as one who formerly won the esteem of the Divine Augustus, your father, as one who is your friend and will never hereafter ask a favour, I implore you to save my unhappy son." About Plancina he added not a word.

17. Tiberius after this acquitted the young Piso of the charge of civil war on the ground that a son could not have refused a father's orders, compassionating at the same time the high rank of the family and the terrible downfall even of Piso himself, however he might have deserved it. For Plancina he spoke with shame and conscious disgrace, alleging in excuse the intercession of his mother, secret complaints against whom from all good men were growing more and more vehement. "So it was the duty of a grandmother," people said, "to look a grandson's murderess in the face, to converse with her and rescue her from the Senate. What the laws secure on behalf of every citizen, had to Germanicus alone been denied. The voices of a Vitellius and Veranius had bewailed a Caesar, while the emperor and Augusta had defended Plancina. She might as well now turn her poisonings, and her devices which had proved so successful, against Agrippina and her children, and thus sate this exemplary grandmother and uncle with the blood of a most unhappy house." Two days were frittered away over this mockery of a trial, Tiberius urging Piso's children to defend their mother. While the accusers and their witnesses pressed the prosecution with rival zeal, and there was no reply, pity rather than anger was on the increase. Aurelius Cotta, the consul, who was first called on for his vote (for when the emperor put the question, even those in office went through the duty of voting), held that Piso's name ought to be erased from the public register, half of his property confiscated, half given up to his son, Cneius Piso, who was to change his first name; that Marcus Piso, stript of his rank, with an allowance of five million sesterces, should be banished for ten years, Plancina's life being spared in consideration of Augusta's intercession.

18. Much of the sentence was mitigated by the emperor. The name of Piso was not to be struck out of the public register, since that of Marcus Antonius who had made war on his country, and that of Julius Antonius who had dishonoured the house of Augustus, still remained. Marcus Piso too he saved from degradation, and gave him his father's property, for he was firm enough, as I have often related, against the temptation of money, and now for very shame at Plancina's acquittal, he was more than usually merciful. Again, when Valerius Messalinus and Caecina Severus proposed respectively the erection of a golden statue in the temple of Mars the Avenger and of an altar to Vengeance, he interposed, protesting that victories over the foreigner were commemorated with such monuments, but that domestic woes ought to be shrouded in silent grief. There was a further proposal of Messalinus, that Tiberius, Augusta, Antonia, Agrippina and Drusus ought to be publicly thanked for having avenged Germanicus. He omitted all mention of Claudius. Thereupon he was pointedly asked by Lucius Asprenas before the Senate, whether the omission had been intentional, and it was only then that the name of Claudius was added. For my part, the wider the scope of my reflection on the present and the past, the more am I impressed by their mockery of human plans in every transaction. Clearly, the very last man marked out for empire by public opinion, expectation and general respect was he whom fortune was holding in reserve as the emperor of the future.

19. A few days afterwards the emperor proposed to the Senate to confer the priesthood on Vitellius, Veranius and Servaeus. To Fulcinius he promised his support in seeking promotion, but warned him not to ruin his eloquence by rancour. This was the end of avenging the death of Germanicus, a subject of conflicting rumours not only among the people then living but also in after times. So obscure are the greatest events, as some take for granted any hearsay, whatever its source, others turn truth into falsehood, and both errors find encouragement with posterity. Drusus meanwhile quitted Rome to resume his command and soon afterwards re-entered the city with an ovation. In the course of a few days his mother Vipsania died, the only one of all Agrippa's children whose death was without violence. As for the rest, they perished, some it is certain by the sword, others it was believed by poison or starvation.

Next: Book 3 [20]

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