B.C.200.]

WAR IN GALLIA CISALPINA.

535

CHAPTER XXX.

CONQUESTS OF ROME IN THE WEST, AND CONDITION OF THE REPUBLIC.-FROM THE END OF THE SECOND PUNIC WAR TO THE FORMATION OF THE PROVINCE OF ASIA, AND THE DEATH OF THE YOUNGER SCIPIO. B.C. 200 TO B.C. 129.

"Rome had its heroic age: the Romans knew that they had such an age, and we may believe them. Polybius saw the end of it: he saw the destruction of Carthage and the savage sack of Corinth, and the beginning of a worse time. But he has recorded his tes timony that some honesty still remained."-LONG.

MAXIMUS

THE ROMAN DOMINIONS IN THE WEST-WAR IN CISALPINE GAUL-CONQUEST OF THE INSUBRES AND BOII-LIGURIAN WARS-CONDITION OF SPAIN-CONSULSHIP OF CATO-GOVERNMENT OF TIBERIUS GRACCHUS HIS TRIUMPH OVER SARDINIA-FIRST CELTIBERIAN WAR-NUMANTIA—MARCELLUS AND LUCULLUS IN SPAIN-CRUELTIES OF GALBA-LUSITANIAN WAR-VIRIATHUS-Q. FABIUS MAXIMUS EMILIANUS AND Q. FABIUS SERVILIANUS-MURDER OF VIRIATHUS-NUMANTINE WAR-MANCINUS-BRUTUS SUBDUES LUSITANIA AND THE GALLECI-SCIPIO AFRICANUS IN SPAIN-SIEGE AND DESTRUCTION OF NUMANTIA-TRIUMPH OF SCIPIO-SERVILE WAR IN SICILY-ROMAN SLAVERY-LAWS AND OVATION OF RUPILIUS-ATTALUS III. BEQUEATHS PERGAMUS TO THE ROMANSTHE WAR WITH ARISTONICUS-CRASSUS IN ASIA-FORMATION OF THE PROVINCE OF ASIA -EXTENT OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE-CONDITION OF THE REPUBLIC-THE NEW NOBILITY AND THE CITY RABBLE-THE NOBLES IN POSSESSION OF THE SENATE AND THE CHIEF CIVIL AND MILITARY OFFICES-THE GOVERNMENT OF THE OLIGARCHY-SUCCESSFUL FOREIGN POLICY-INTERNAL AFFAIRS-FINANCIAL ADMINISTRATION-INCREASE OF CORRUPTION-PUBLIC WORKS-THE Aqueducts OF ROME-PARTY OF OPPOSITION AND REFORM-M. PORCIUS CATO-HIS EARLY LIFE AND SERVICE IN THE SECOND PUNIC WAR -QUESTOR IN SICILY-OPPOSITION TO SCIPIO-CATO AT THERMOPYLE-THE PROSECUTION OF L. SCIPIO ASIATICUS-VIOLENCE OF AFRICANUS-PROSECUTION AND TRIUMPH OF SCIPIO AFRICANUS-HIS RETIREMENT AND DEATH-SCIPIO AND WELLINGTON-CENSORSHIP OF CATO-HIS VAST INFLUENCE AND ITS SMALL RESULTS-THE YOUNGER AFRICANUS-VOTE BY BALLOT AT ROME-LAWS AGAINST BRIBERY-UNPOPULARITY AND DEATH OF SCIPIO-RELIGION AND MANNERS-ROMAN LITERATURE.

THE half century during which Rome was contending for empire with the Hellenic and Semitic races was occupied with an incessant conflict for the mastery of her newly-acquired dominion in the West; and the same period-or rather the first two-thirds of the century-was signalized at home by events of the deepest interest, in which such actors as Cato and the Scipios play their part. The grand result was the extension of the Roman empire over the European shores of the Mediterranean from the Pillars of Hercules to the Hellespont, the acquisition of provinces both in Africa and Asia, and the supremacy of Roman influence over the vassal kings and tribes of Asia Minor, Syria, Egypt, and Numidia; till only Mauretania remained to complete the circuit of the Mediterranean, on whose waters the ships of the Republic no longer en

countered any enemies but pirates. It was the reaction of this brilliant career abroad that mainly determined the course of events at home, and paved the way for the fall of the Republic.

Cisalpine Gaul had to be re-conquered, and the tribes of Spain to be subdued. We have seen that a war was still in progress with the Gauls, when Hannibal's passage of the Alps roused them to a general revolt; and from that time Carthaginian influence had been predominant between the Alps and the Apennines. And now it seemed as if the last remnants of the Barcine spirit had found a refuge among the Celtic tribes. In the very year when the peace was ratified with Carthage, a certain Hamilcar united the Gauls and Ligurians in a general attack upon the fortresses which the Romans had continued to hold throughout the war (B.c. 200). Placentia was stormed and destroyed, and Cremona was besieged. It is needless to follow the ten years' contest which the Gauls maintained with the obstinacy of a last effort against the resources and discipline of Rome. The Insubrians and Cenomani— the two chief tribes on the left of the Po, in the modern Lombardy -were first defeated (B.c. 196); but the great nation of the Boii, between the right bank of the river and the Apennines, were only subdued by P. Scipio Nasica in B.C. 191. Their subjugation was followed by the foundation of the colonies, the names of which have become so famous in medieval and modern history, Bononia (Bologna), Mutina (Modena), and Parma; and the Flaminian Road was continued through their country from Ariminum (Rimini) to Mediolanum (Milan), under the name of the Via Emilia, by the censor M. Æmilius Lepidus (B.c. 179).

The conquest of the hardy mountaineers of Liguria * was a longer and more difficult task. In B.c. 187 the consul Lepidus, the same who has just been mentioned, marched against them with his colleague such was the importance attached to the war-and from that period almost to the end of the century, we read of perpetual hostilities, in which the Roman generals for a long time gained no more than an occasional success, just sufficient to form the pretext for a triumph. The powerful tribe of the Apuani, in the Etruscan Apennines, eastward of the river Macra, submitted in B.c. 180, and were removed to the heart of Samnium, to the number of 40,000, while the Roman hold on their former country was made sure by colonies at Pisa (B.c. 180) and Luca (B.c. 179).† The

*See note to p. 140.

Luca, the modern Lucca, was reckoned the southernmost city of the Ligurians; but it belonged to the province of Cisalpine Gaul.

B.C. 154.]

SETTLEMENT OF LIGURIA.

537

Ingauni, in the Maritime Alps, west of Genoa, had been nominally subdued a year earlier (B.c. 181); but they long continued powerful enough, even by sea, to harass both the Romans and Massaliots with their piratical attacks. The armies of Rome gradually fought their way westward along the Riviera, till in B.c. 154 they crossed the Varus (Var), and for the first time came into contact with a Ligurian tribe (the Oxybii) within the limits of Transalpine Gaul. The wars in that country thirty years later, under the consul Sextius Calvinus, are again connected with triumphs over Ligurian tribes (B.c. 123-2); while the last triumph over those in Italy was won by the proconsul C. Marcius (B.c. 117). But, as always with such tribes, it was found that military roads were the most effectual instruments of subjugation, and in B.C. 109 the censor M. Æmilius Scaurus made the road along the coast from Luna (Luni) to Vada Sabata (Vado), and thence over the Apennines and down the valley of the Bormida to Dertona (Tortona). Strabo tells us that, after eighty years of warfare, the public officers of Rome, on their journeys through the country, could only command a space of twelve stadia (less than a mile and a half) in breadth; and the conquest of Liguria was only completed under Augustus (B.c. 14).

A far more formidable resistance had to be encountered in Spain, before the country won for Rome by the elder Scipio Africanus was finally subdued through the destruction of Numantia, the stronghold of Iberian independence, by the younger (B.c. 205133). The Second Punic War had left the peninsula divided among a strange intermixture of elements, Celtic and Iberian, Phoenician, Hellenic, and Roman. The province within the Ebro, except the northern mountains, and the east coast as far as New Carthage, had been reduced by the arms of Rome; and the more quiet peoples of Bætica, long since brought under Phoenician culture, began to feel the influence of the Roman garrisons and of the Italian adventurers who came to work the silver mines. Here were founded the first Latin communities (except Agrigentum) beyond the limits of Italy: Italica (near Seville), where Scipio left the veterans of his army who, having married Spanish women, desired to remain in Spain (B.c. 205),* and the colony of Carteia, which was founded by Tiberius Gracchus in B.c. 171. The regions subject to Rome corresponded to the modern Catalonia, Valencia, Murcia, and Andalusia, or the districts between the eastern coast

* Italica was not a municipal town, but it had a market-place, and formed a kind of centre for the Latin settlers of the neighbourhood—what the Romans called forum et conciliabulum civium Romanorum.

and the mountains running parallel to it, and between the southern coast and the Sierra Morena. The tribes of the central table-land, especially the great nation of the Celtiberians, preserved their own forms of government, which appear to have been republican, in nominal league with the Romans, but only serving in their armies for pay, while some of them still furnished mercenaries to Carthage as late as the battle of Zama. The remote Lusitanians and Gallæcians were completely independent, and the wild Cantabrians of the northern mountains scarcely known to the Romans so much as by name. Willing as they had been to aid the enemies who came to break the yoke of Carthage, the Iberians were little disposed to bow to that of Rome. Like their modern descendants, they harassed by a constant guerilla warfare the intruders who supposed themselves masters of the country. In B.C. 195, it was found necessary to send a powerful army into Spain, under the consul M. Porcius Cato, who had served with distinction through the Second Punic War. He had already established that character for the stern Roman virtues which has made his name proverbial in history, and had decisively assumed the position of rivalry against Scipio Africanus. His treatment of the Spaniards showed none of the weakness with which he had charged that general. His artifices set tribe against tribe; some were induced to demolish their own defences: others were taken into the pay of Rome: several victories were gained in the field: multitudes of unarmed captives, who had surrendered voluntarily, were partly massacred in cold blood, and partly sold for slaves, while many put themselves to death to avoid the same fate. Cato returned to enjoy a triumph in the same year as that of Flamininus over Philip V., boasting that he had destroyed more towns than he had spent days in Spain (B.c. 194).

The readers of modern history can easily imagine the effect of such treatment on the Iberian character. After fifteen years of sullen discontent, breaking out into frequent rebellion, another method was tried by a general of a very different temper. This was Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, the son of the general who had fallen in battle against Hannibal, and the father of the two tribunes famous in history as "the Gracchi." He was, besides, the son-in-law of the elder and the father-in-law of the younger Scipio Africanus. Elected prætor in B.o. 181, he received Hither Spain as his province; and having brought to a successful end an obstinate war with the Celtiberians, he effected the pacification of the country by his wisdom and moderation. The natives bound

B.C. 158.]

THE FIRST CELTIBERIAN WAR.

539

themselves to build no more towns, and the power of Rome was now established in Catalonia, Valencia, Arragon, and the eastern part of Castile (B.c. 179). The opportnnity may be taken to mention another war in which Gracchus was eminently successful. In B.C. 177 he was sent, as consul, to subdue a revolt of the Sardinians, over whom he triumphed in B.c. 175, bringing back with him to Rome such a multitude of captives, that the slave-markets were glutted, and the phrase as "cheap as Sardinians" passed into a proverb.* His colleague in the consulship, C. Claudius Pulcher, subdued the people of the Istrian peninsula. The wars in Corsica (B.C. 163) and Dalmatia (B.c. 156-5) afford other examples of the numerous conflicts by which Rome had to make good her empire.

The settlement effected by Gracchus ensured comparative tranquillity to the province of Hither Spain for a quarter of a century, during which the, Roman arms appear to have advanced beyond the central table-land, into the valleys of the Tagus and Douro. But, as in modern times, Lusitania proved the refuge of Iberian independence, when the armies of the Latin race had overrun most of the peninsula. Its hardy people, united with the Vettones and Vaccæi, on the upper Tagus and Douro, defeated the united forces of both provinces, and carried their depredations almost to the walls of New Carthage (B.c. 154). For the first time since forty years, a Roman consul, Q. Fulvius Nobilior, was sent into Spain; and to hasten his departure, it was enacted that the consuls should enter upon their office on the 1st of January, B.C. 153. But Nobilior was too late to avert a great defeat of the prætor Lucius Mummius, which was used by the victors as the means of rousing the central tribes to arms, and so gave the signal for the first CELTIBERIAN War.

Two small Celtiberian tribes had already begun to build the town of Segeda, and had refused the demands of the governor to desist, and to pay the arrears of tribute, which had not been collected for a long time, when Nobilior arrived with his army of 30,000 men. The unfinished city could offer no resistance; but the warriors escaped to the powerful tribe of the Arevaci, whom the success of the Lusitanians had prepared to take up arms; and the Romans were defeated in a great battle, with the loss of nearly 6000 citizens, on the 23d of August. The insurgents now established their head-quarters at the famous city of NUMANTIA, near

* Sardi venales.

Such was the accident that fixed that beginning of the year which, after a long struggle, has superseded the more natural epoch of the vernal equinox.