The History of Rome, Book IV - Theodor Mommsen
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16. Hardly any other name can well be concealed under the corrupt
reading in Liv. 89 -miam in Samnio-; comp. Strabo, v. 3, 10.
17. IV. IX. Pompeius
18. IV. VIII. New Difficulties
Chapter X
1. III. XI. Abolition of the Dictatorship
2. -Satius est uti regibus quam uti malis legibus- (Ad Herenn. ii.
36).
3. II. I. The Dictator, II. II. The Valerio-Horatian Laws, II. III.
Limitation of the Dictatorship
4. IV. VII. Legislation of Sulla
5. This total number is given by Valerius Maximus, ix. 2. 1.
According to Appian (B. C. i. 95), there were proscribed by Sulla
nearly 40 senators, which number subsequently received some
additions, and about 1600 equites; according to Florus (ii. 9,
whence Augustine de Civ. Dei, iii. 28), 2000 senators and equites.
According to Plutarch (Sull. 31), 520 names were placed on the list
in the first three days; according to Orosius (v. 21), 580 names
during the first days. there is no material contradiction between
these various reports, for it was not senators and equites alone
that were put to death, and the list remained open for months.
When Appian, at another passage (i. 103), mentions as put to death
or banished by Sulla, 15 consulars, 90 senators, 2600 equites, he
there confounds, as the connection shows, the victims of the civil
war throughout with the victims of Sulla. The 15 consulars were--
Quintus Catulus, consul in 652; Marcus Antonius, 655; Publius
Crassus, 657; Quintus Scaevola, 659; Lucius Domitius, 660; Lucius
Caesar, 664; Quintus Rufus, 666; Lucius Cinna, 667-670; Gnaeus
Octavius, 667; Lucius Merula, 667; Lucius Flaccus, 668; Gnaeus
Carbo, 669, 670, 672; Gaius Norbanus, 671; Lucius Scipio, 671;
Gaius Marius, 672; of whom fourteen were killed, and one, Lucius
Scipio, was banished. When, on the other hand, the Livian account
in Eutropius (v. 9) and Orosius (v. 22) specifies as swept away
(-consumpti-) in the Social and Civil wars, 24 consulars, 7
praetorians, 60 aedilicians, 200 senators, the calculation includes
partly the men who fell in the Italian war, such as the consulars
Aulus Albinus, consul in 655; Titus Didius, 656; Publius Lupus,
664; Lucius Cato, 665; partly perhaps Quintus Metellus Numidicus
(IV. VI. Violent Proceedings in The Voting), Manius Aquillius,
Gaius Marius the father, Gnaeus Strabo, whom we may certainly regard
as also victims of that period, or other men whose fate is unknown to us.
Of the fourteen consulars killed, three--Rufus, Cinna, and Flaccus--
fell through military revolts, while eight Sullan and three Marian
consulars fell as victims to the opposite party. On a comparison of
the figures given above, 50 senators and 1000 equites were regarded
as victims of Marius, 40 senators and 1600 equites as victims
of Sulla; this furnishes a standard--at least not altogether
arbitrary--for estimating the extent of the crimes on both sides.
6. The Sextus Alfenus, frequently mentioned in Cicero's oration on
behalf of Publius Quinctius, was one of these.
7. II. VII. Latins. To this was added the peculiar aggravation that,
while in other instances the right of the Latins, like that of
the -peregrini-, implied membership in a definite Latin or foreign
community, in this case--just as with the later freedmen of Latin
and deditician rights (comp. IV. VII. The Bestowal of the Franchise and
Its Limitations. n.)--it was without any such right of urban membership.
The consequence was, that these Latins were destitute of the privileges
attaching to an urban constitution, and, strictly speaking, could not
even make a testament, since no one could execute a testament otherwise
than according to the law of his town; they could doubtless, however,
acquire under Roman testaments, and among the living could hold dealings
with each other and with Romans or Latins in the forms of Roman law.
8. IV. IV. The Domain Question under the Restoration
9. That Sulla's assessment of the five years' arrears and of the
war expenses levied on the communities of Asia (Appian, Mithr. 62
et al.) formed a standard for the future, is shown by the facts,
that the distribution of Asia into forty districts is referred to
Sulla (Cassiodor. Chron. 670) and that the Sullan apportionment
was assumed as a basis in the case of subsequent imposts (Cic. pro
Flacc. 14, 32), and by the further circumstance, that on occasion
of building a fleet in 672 the sums applied for that purpose were
deducted from the payment of tribute (-ex pecunia vectigali populo
Romano-: Cic. Verr. l. i. 35, 89). Lastly, Cicero (ad Q. fr. i. i,
ii, 33) directly says, that the Greeks "were not in a position of
themselves to pay the tax imposed on them by Sulla without -publicani-."
10. III. XI. Separation of the Orders in the Theatre
11. IV. III. Insignia of the Equites. Tradition has not indeed
informed us by whom that law was issued, which rendered it necessary
that the earlier privilege should be renewed by the Roscian theatre-law
of 687 (Becker-Friedlander, iv, 531); but under the circumstances
the author of that law was undoubtedly Sulla.
12. IV. VI. Livius Drusus
13. IV. VII. Rejection of the Proposals for an Accomodation
14. III. XI. The Nobility in Possession of the Senate
15. How many quaestors had been hitherto chosen annually, is not
known. In 487 the number stood at eight--two urban, two military,
and four naval, quaestors (II. VII. Quaestors of the Fleet,
II. VII. Intermediate Fuctionaries); to which there fell to be added
the quaestors employed in the provinces (III. III. Provincial Praetors).
For the naval quaestors at Ostia, Cales, and so forth were by no means
discontinued, and the military quaestors could not be employed
elsewhere, since in that case the consul, when he appeared as
commander-in-chief, would have been without a quaestor. Now, as
down to Sulla's time there were nine provinces, and moreover two
quaestors were sent to Sicily, he may possibly have found as many
as eighteen quaestors in existence. But as the number of the
supreme magistrates of this period was considerably less than that
of their functions (p. 120), and the difficulty thus arising was
constantly remedied by extension of the term of office and other
expedients, and as generally the tendency of the Roman government
was to limit as much as possible the number of magistrates, there
may have been more quaestorial functions than quaestors, and it may
be even that at this period no quaestor at all was sent to small
provinces such as Cilicia. Certainly however there were, already
before Sulla's time, more than eight quaestors.
16. III. XI. The Censorship A Prop of the Nobility
17. We cannot strictly speak at all of a fixed number of senators.
Though the censors before Sulla prepared on each occasion a list of
300 persons, there always fell to be added to this list those non-
senators who filled a curule office between the time when the list
was drawn up and the preparation of the next one; and after Sulla
there were as many senators as there were surviving quaestorians
But it may be probably assumed that Sulla meant to bring the senate
up to 500 or 600 members; and this number results, if we assume
that 20 new members, at an average age of 30, were admitted
annually, and we estimate the average duration of the senatorial
dignity at from 25 to 30 years. At a numerously attended sitting
of the senate in Cicero's time 417 members were present.
18. II. III. The Senate. Its Composition
19. IV. VI. Political Projects of Marius
20. III. XI. Interference of the Community in War and Administration
21. IV. VII. Legislation of Sulla
22. II. III. Restrictions As to the Accumulation and the Reoccupation
of Offices
23. IV. II. Attempts at Reform
24. To this the words of Lepidus in Sallust (Hist. i. 41, 11
Dietsch) refer: -populus Romanus excitus... iure agitandi-, to
which Tacitus (Ann. iii. 27) alludes: -statim turbidis Lepidi
rogationibus neque multo post tribunis reddita licentia quoquo
vellent populum agitandi-. That the tribunes did not altogether
lose the right of discussing matters with the people is shown by
Cic. De Leg. iii. 4, 10 and more clearly by the -plebiscitum de
Thermensibus-, which however in the opening formula also designates
itself as issued -de senatus sententia-. That the consuls on the
other hand could under the Sullan arrangements submit proposals to
the people without a previous resolution of the senate, is shown
not only by the silence of the authorities, but also by the course
of the revolutions of 667 and 676, whose leaders for this very
reason were not tribunes but consuls. Accordingly we find at this
period consular laws upon secondary questions of administration,
such as the corn law of 681, for which at other times we should
have certainly found -plebiscita-.
25. II. III. Influence of the Elections
26. IV. II. Vote by Ballot
27. For this hypothesis there is no other proof, except that
the Italian Celt-land was as decidedly not a province--in the sense
in which the word signifies a definite district administered by a
governor annually changed--in the earlier times, as it certainly was
one in the time of Caesar (comp. Licin. p. 39; -data erat et Sullae
provincia Gallia Cisalpina-).
The case is much the same with the advancement of the frontier;
we know that formerly the Aesis, and in Caesar's time the Rubico,
separated the Celtic land from Italy, but we do not know when the
boundary was shifted. From the circumstance indeed, that Marcus
Terentius Varro Lucullus as propraetor undertook a regulation of
the frontier in the district between the Aesis and Rubico (Orelli,
Inscr. 570), it has been inferred that that must still have been
provincial land at least in the year after Lucullus' praetorship 679,
since the propraetor had nothing to do on Italian soil. But it was
only within the -pomerium- that every prolonged -imperium- ceased of
itself; in Italy, on the other hand, such a prolonged -imperium- was
even under Sulla's arrangement--though not regularly existing--at
any rate allowable, and the office held by Lucullus was in any case
an extraordinary one. But we are able moreover to show when and
how Lucullus held such an office in this quarter. He was already
before the Sullan reorganization in 672 active as commanding
officer in this very district (p, 87), and was probably, just like
Pompeius, furnished by Sulla with propraetorian powers; in this
character he must have regulated the boundary in question in 672
or 673 (comp. Appian, i. 95). No inference therefore may be drawn
from this inscription as to the legal position of North Italy, and
least of all for the time after Sulla's dictatorship. On the other
hand a remarkable hint is contained in the statement, that Sulla
advanced the Roman -pomerium- (Seneca, de brev. vitae, 14; Dio,
xliii. 50); which distinction was by Roman state-law only accorded
to one who had advanced the bounds not of the empire, but of the
city--that is, the bounds of Italy (i. 128).
28. As two quaestors were sent to Sicily, and one to each of the
other provinces, and as moreover the two urban quaestors, the two
attached to the consuls in conducting war, and the four quaestors
of the fleet continued to subsist, nineteen magistrates were
annually required for this office. The department of the twentieth
quaestor cannot be ascertained.
29. The Italian confederacy was much older (II. VII. Italy and
The Italians); but it was a league of states, not, like the Sullan
Italy, a state-domain marked off as an unit within the Roman empire.
30. II. III. Complete Opening Up of Magistracies and Priesthoods
31. II. III. Combination of The Plebian Aristocracy and The Farmers
against The Nobility
32. III. XIII. Religious Economy
33. IV. X. Punishments Inflicted on Particular Communities
34. e. g. IV. IV. Dissatisfaction in the Capital, IV. V. Warfare of
Prosecutions
35. IV. II. Vote by Ballot
36. IV. III. Modifications of the Penal Law
37. II. II. Intercession
38. IV. III. Modifications of the Penal Law
39. IV. VII. Rejection of the Proposals for an Accomodation
40. II. VII. Subject Communities
41. IV. X. Cisapline Gaul Erected into A Province
42. IV. VII. Preparations for General Revolt against Rome
43. III. XI. Roman Franchise More Difficult of Acquisition
44. IV. IX. Government of Cinna
45. IV. VII. Decay of Military Discipline
46. IV. VII. Economic Crisis
47. IV. VII. Strabo
48. IV. VIII. Flaccus Arrives in Asia
49. IV. IX. Death of Cinna
50. IV. IX. Nola
51. IV. IX. Fresh Difficulties with Mithradates
52. Euripides, Medea, 807:-- --Meideis me phaulein kasthenei
nomizeto Meid eisuchaian, alla thateron tropou Bareian echthrois
kai philoisin eumenei--.
53. IV. IX. Fresh Difficulties with Mithradates
54. IV. IX. Fresh Difficulties with Mithradates, IV. X. Re-establishment
of Constitutional Order
55. Not -pthiriasis-, as another account states; for the simple
reason that such a disease is entirely imaginary.
Chapter XI
1. IV. V. Transalpine Relations of Rome, IV. V. The Romans Cross
the Eastern Alps
2. IV. I. The Callaeci Conquered
3. IV. V. And Reach the Danube
4. -Exterae nationes in arbitratu dicione potestate amicitiave
populi Romani- (lex repet. v. i), the official designation of the
non-Italian subjects and clients as contrasted with the Italian
"allies and kinsmen" (-socii nominisve Latini-).
5. III. XI. As to the Management of the Finances
6. III. XII. Mercantile Spirit
7. IV. III. Jury Courts, IV. III. Character of the Constitution
of Gaius Gracchus
8. This tax-tenth, which the state levied from private landed
property, is to be clearly distinguished from the proprietor's
tenth, which it imposed on the domain-land. The former was let in
Sicily, and was fixed once for all; the latter--especially that of
the territory of Leontini--was let by the censors in Rome, and the
proportion of produce payable and other conditions were regulated
at their discretion (Cic. Verr. iii. 6, 13; v. 21, 53; de leg. agr.
i. 2, 4; ii. 18, 48). Comp, my Staatsrecht, iii. 730.
9. The mode of proceeding was apparently as follows. The Roman
government fixed in the first instance the kind and the amount of
the tax. Thus in Asia, for instance, according to the arrangement
of Sulla and Caesar the tenth sheaf was levied (Appian. B. C. v.
4); thus the Jews by Caesar's edict contributed every second year
a fourth of the seed (Joseph, iv. 10, 6; comp. ii. 5); thus in
Cilicia and Syria subsequently there was paid 5 per cent from
estate (Appian. Syr. 50), and in Africa also an apparently similar
tax was paid--in which case, we may add, the estate seems to have
been valued according to certain presumptive indications, e. g. the
size of the land occupied, the number of doorways, the number of
head of children and slaves (-exactio capitum atque ostiorum-,
Cicero, Ad Fam. iii. 8, 5, with reference to Cilicia; --phoros epi
tei gei kai tois somasin--, Appian. Pun. 135, with reference to
Africa). In accordance with this regulation the magistrates of
each community under the superintendence of the Roman governor
(Cic. ad Q. Fr. i. 1, 8; SC. de Asclep. 22, 23) settled who were
liable to the tax, and what was to be paid by each tributary (
-imperata- --epikephalia--, Cic. ad Att. v. 16); if any one did not
pay this in proper time, his tax-debt was sold just as in Rome, i.
e. it was handed over to a contractor with an adjudication to
collect it (-venditio tributorum-, Cic. Ad Fam. iii. 8, 5; --onas--
-omnium venditas-, Cic. ad Att. v. 16). The produce of these taxes
flowed into the coffers of the leading communities--the Jews, for
instance, had to send their corn to Sidon--and from these coffers
the fixed amount in money was then conveyed to Rome. These taxes
also were consequently raised indirectly, and the intermediate
agent either retained, according to circumstances, a part of the
produce of the taxes for himself, or advanced it from his own
substance; the distinction between this mode of raising and the
other by means of the -publicani- lay merely in the circumstance,
that in the former the public authorities of the contributors,
in the latter Roman private contractors, constituted the
intermediate agency.
10. IV. III. Jury Courts
11. III. VII. Administration of Spain
12. IV. X. Regulation of the Finances
13. For example, in Judaea the town of Joppa paid 26,075 -modii-
of corn, the other Jews the tenth sheaf, to the native princes; to
which fell to be added the temple-tribute and the Sidonian payment
destined for the Romans. In Sicily too, in addition to the Roman
tenth, a very considerable local taxation was raised from property.
14. IV. VI. The New Military Organization
15. IV. II. Vote by Ballot
16. III. VII. Liguria
17. IV. V. Province of Narbo
18. IV. V. In Illyria
19. IV. I. Province of Macedonia
20. III. XI. Italian Subjects, III. XII. Roman Wealth
21. IV. V. Taurisci
22. III. IV. Pressure of the War
23. IV. VII. Outbreak of the Mithradatic War
24. IV. IX. Preparations on Either Side
25. III. XII. The Management of Land and of Capital
26. IV. V. Conflicts with the Ligurians. With this may be connected
the remark of the Roman agriculturist, Saserna, who lived after Cato
and before Varro (ap. Colum. i. 1, 5), that the culture of the vine
and olive was constantly moving farther to the north.--The decree of
the senate as to the translation of the treatise of Mago (IV. II.
The Italian Farmers) belongs also to this class of measures.
27. IV. II. Slavery and Its Consequences
28. IV. VIII. Thrace and Macedonia Occupied by the Pontic Armies.
29. IV. I. Destruction of Carthage, IV. I. Destruction of Corinth
30. IV. V. The Advance of the Romans Checked by the Policy
of the Restoration
31. IV. IV. The Provinces
32. IV. VII. Economic Crisis
33. IV. VII. The Sulpician Laws
34. IV. VII. Legislation of Sulla
35. IV. IX. Government of Cinna
36. IV. VIII. Orders Issued from Ephesus for A General Massacre
37. IV. VIII. Thrace and Macedonia Occupied by the Pontic Armies.
38. IV. VI. Roman Intervention
39. III. XII. Roman Wealth
40. IV. V. Taurisci
41. III. VI. Pressure of the War
42. II. VIII. Silver Standard of Value
43. III. VI. Pressure of the War
44. III. I. Comparison between Carthage and Rome
45. IV. X. Proscription-Lists
46. III. III. Autonomy, III. VII. the State of Culture in Spain,
III. XII. Coins and Moneys
47. III. XII. Coins and Moneys
48. III. XIII. Increase of Amusements
49. In the house, which Sulla inhabited when a young man, he paid
for the ground-floor a rent of 3000 sesterces, and the tenant of
the upper story a rent of 2000 sesterces (Plutarch, Sull. 1);
which, capitalized at two-thirds of the usual interest on capital,
yields nearly the above amount. This was a cheap dwelling. That a
rent of 6000 sesterces (60 pounds) in the capital is called a high
one in the case of the year 629 (Vell. ii. 10) must have been due
to special circumstances.
50. III. I. Comparison between Carthage and Rome
51. IV. II. Tribunate of Gracchus
52. "If we could, citizens"--he said in his speech--"we should
indeed all keep clear of this burden. But, as nature has so
arranged it that we cannot either live comfortably with wives
or live at all without them, it is proper to have regard rather
to the permanent weal than to our own brief comfort."
Chapter XII
1. IV. XI. Money-Dealing and Commerce
2. IV. X. The Roman Municipal System
3. IV. I. The Subjects
4. IV. I. The Callaeci Conquered
5. IV. I. The New Organization of Spain
6. IV. VII. Second Year of the War
7. The statement that no "Greek games" were exhibited in Rome
before 608 (Tac. Ann. xiv. 21) is not accurate: Greek artists
(--technitai--) and athletes appeared as early as 568 (Liv. xxxix.
22), and Greek flute-players, tragedians, and pugilists in 587
(Pol. xxx, 13).
8. III. XIII. Irreligious Spirit
9. A delightful specimen may be found in Cicero de Officiis,
iii. 12, 13.
10. IV. VI. Collision between the Senate and Equites in the
Administration of the Provinces; IV. IX. Siege of Praeneste
11. In Varro's satire, "The Aborigines," he sarcastically set
forth how the primitive men had not been content with the God
who alone is recognized by thought, but had longed after
puppets and effigies.
12. III. XI. Interference of The Community in War and Administration
13. IV. VI. Political Projects of Marius
14. IV. X. Co-optation Restored in the Priestly Colleges
15. IV. VI. The Equestrian Party
16. III. XIV. Cato's Encyclopedia
17. Cicero says that he treated his learned slave Dionysius more
respectfully than Scipio treated Panaetius, and in the same sense
it is said in Lucilius:--
-Paenula, si quaeris, canteriu', servu', segestre Utilior mihi,
quam sapiens-.
18. IV. XII. Panaetius
Chapter XIII
1. Thus in the -Paulus-, an original piece, the following line
occurred, probably in the description of the pass of Pythium
(III. X. Perseus Is Driven Back to Pydna):--
-Qua vix caprigeno generi gradilis gressio est-.
And in another piece the hearers are expected to understand the
following description--
-Quadrupes tardigrada agrestis humilis aspera, Capite brevi,
cervice anguina, aspectu truci, Eviscerata inanima cum
animali sono-.
To which they naturally reply--
-Ita saeptuosa dictione abs te datur, Quod conjectura sapiens aegre
contuit; Non intellegimus, nisi si aperte dixeris-.
Then follows the confession that the tortoise is referred to.
Such enigmas, moreover, were not wanting even among the Attic
tragedians, who on that account were often and sharply taken to
task by the Middle Comedy.
2. Perhaps the only exception is in the -Andria- (iv. 5) the
answer to the question how matters go:--
"-Sic Ut quimus," aiunt, "quando ut volumus non licet-"
in allusion to the line of Caecilius, which is, indeed, also
imitated from a Greek proverb:--
-Vivas ut possis, quando non quis ut velis-.
The comedy is the oldest of Terence's, and was exhibited by
the theatrical authorities on the recommendation of Caecilius.
The gentle expression of gratitude is characteristic.
3. A counterpart to the hind chased by dogs and with tears calling
on a young man for help, which Terence ridicules (Phorm. prol. 4),
may be recognized in the far from ingenious Plautine allegory of
the goat and the ape (Merc, ii. 1). Such excrescences are
ultimately traceable to the rhetoric of Euripides (e. g.
Eurip. Hec. 90).
4. Micio in the -Adelphi- (i. i) praises his good fortune in life,
more particularly because he has never had a wife, "which those
(the Greeks) reckon a piece of good fortune."
5. In the prologue of the -Heauton Timorumenos- he puts
the objection into the mouth of his censors:--
-Repente ad studium hunc se applicasse musicum Amicum ingenio
fretum, haud natura sua-.
And in the later prologue (594) to the -Adelphi- he says--
-Nam quod isti dicunt malevoli, homines nobiles Eum adiutare,
adsidueque una scribere; Quod illi maledictum vehemens esse
existimant Eam laudem hic ducit maximam, quum illis placet Qui
vobis universis et populo placent; Quorum opera in bello, in otio,
in negotio, Suo quisque tempore usus est sine superbia-.
As early as the time of Cicero it was the general supposition that
Laelius and Scipio Aemilianus were here meant: the scenes were
designated which were alleged to proceed from them; stories were
told of the journeys of the poor poet with his genteel patrons to
their estates near Rome; and it was reckoned unpardonable that
they should have done nothing at all for the improvement of his
financial circumstances. But the power which creates legend is,
as is well known, nowhere more potent than in the history of
literature. It is clear, and even judicious Roman critics
acknowledged, that these lines could not possibly apply to Scipio
who was then twenty-five years of age, and to his friend Laelius
who was not much older. Others with at least more judgment thought
of the poets of quality Quintus Labeo (consul in 571) and Marcus
Popillius (consul in 581), and of the learned patron of art and
mathematician, Lucius Sulpicius Gallus (consul in 588); but this
too is evidently mere conjecture. That Terence was in close
relations with the Scipionic house cannot, however, be doubted: it
is a significant fact, that the first exhibition of the -Adelphi-
and the second of the -Hecyra- took place at the funeral games of
Lucius Paullus, which were provided by his sons Scipio and Fabius.
6. IV. XI. Token-Money
7. III. XIV. National Comedy
8. External circumstances also, it may be presumed, co-operated in
bringing about this change. After all the Italian communities had
obtained the Roman franchise in consequence of the Social war, it
was no longer allowable to transfer the scene of a comedy to any
such community, and the poet had either to keep to general ground
or to choose places that had fallen into ruin or were situated
abroad. Certainly this circumstance, which was taken into account
even in the production of the older comedies, exercised an
unfavourable effect on the national comedy.