Chapter V…

Chapter V

THE GREAT AGE OF THE GREEK REPUBLICS TO 362 B.C. [1]

31. THE PERILS OF HELLAS

ASIATIC GREEKS CONQUERED BY CROESUS

The history of the Greeks for many centuries had been uneventful--a history of their uninterrupted expansion over barbarian lands. But now the time was approaching when the independent and isolated Greek communities must meet the attack of the great despotic empires of Asia. The Greek cities of Asia Minor were the first part of the Hellenic world to be involved. Their conquest by the Lydian king, Croesus, about the middle of the sixth century B.C., showed how grave was the danger to Greek independence from the ambitious designs of Oriental monarchs.

CONQUESTS OF CYRUS AND CAMBYSES

As we have already learned, Croesus himself soon had to submit to a foreign overlord, in the person of Cyrus the Great. The subjugation of Lydia and the Greek seaboard by Cyrus extended the Persian Empire to the Mediterranean. The conquest of Phoenicia and Cyprus by Cambyses added the Phoenician navy to the resources of the mighty empire. Persia had now become a sea power, able to cope with the Greeks on their own element. The subjection of Egypt by the same king led naturally to the annexation of the Greek colonies on the north African shore. The entire coast of the eastern Mediterranean had now come under the control of a new, powerful, and hostile state.

CONQUESTS OF DARIUS

The accession of Darius to the Persian throne only increased the dangers that overshadowed Hellas. He aimed to complete the work of Cyrus and Cambyses by extending the empire wherever a natural frontier had not been reached. Accordingly, about 512 B.C., Darius invaded Europe with a large army, annexed the Greek colonies on the Hellespont (the modern Dardanelles), and subdued the wild tribes of Thrace and Macedonia. The Persian dominions now touched those of the Greeks. [2]

THE IONIAN REVOLT, 499-493 B.C.

Not long after this European expedition of Darius, the Ionian cities of Asia Minor revolted against the Persians. Unable to face their foes single-handed, they sought aid from Sparta, then the chief military power of Greece. The Spartans refused to take part in the war, but the Athenians, who realized the menace to Greece in the Persian advance, sent ships and men to fight for the Ionians. Even with this help the Ionian cities could not hold out against the vast resources of the Persians. One by one they fell again into the hands of the Great King.

32. EXPEDITIONS OF DARIUS AGAINST GREECE

FIRST EXPEDITION, 492 B.C.

No sooner was quiet restored in Asia Minor than Darius began preparations to punish Athens for her part in the Ionian Revolt. The first expedition under the command of Mardonius, the son-in-law of the Persian monarch, was a failure. Mardonius never reached Greece, because the Persian fleet, on which his army depended for provisions, was wrecked off the promontory of Mount Athos.

SECOND EXPEDITION, 490 B.C.

Darius did not abandon his designs, in consequence of the disaster. Two years later a second fleet, bearing a force of perhaps sixty thousand men, set out from Ionia for Greece. Datis and Artaphernes, the Persian leaders, sailed straight across the Aegean and landed on the plain of Marathon, twenty-six miles from Athens.

BATTLE OF MARATHON, 490 B.C.

The situation of the Athenians seemed desperate. They had scarcely ten thousand men with whom to face an army far larger and hitherto invincible. The Spartans promised support, but delayed sending troops at the critical moment. Better, perhaps, than a Spartan army was the genius of Miltiades, one of the Athenian generals. Relying on Greek discipline and Greek valor to win the day, he decided to take the offensive. His heavy armed soldiers made a smashing charge on the Persians and drove them in confusion to their ships. Datis and Artaphernes then sailed back to Asia with their errand of vengeance unfulfilled.

POLICIES OF ARISTIDES AND THEMISTOCLES

After the battle of Marathon the Athenians began to make preparations to resist another Persian invasion. One of their leaders, the eminent Aristides, thought that they should increase their army and meet the enemy on land. His rival, Themistocles, urged a different policy. He would sacrifice the army to the navy and make Athens the strongest sea power in Greece. The safety of Athens, he argued, lay in her ships. In order to settle the question the opposing statesmen were put to the test of ostracism. [3] The vote went against Aristides, who was obliged to withdraw into exile. Themistocles, now master of the situation, persuaded the citizens to use the revenues from some silver mines in Attica for the upbuilding of a fleet. When the Persians came, the Athenians were able to oppose them with nearly two hundred triremes [4]--the largest navy in Greece.

33. XERXES AND THE GREAT PERSIAN WAR

PREPARATIONS OF PERSIA

"Ten years after Marathon," says a Greek historian, "the 'barbarians' returned with the vast armament which was to enslave Hellas." [5] Darius was now dead, but his son Xerxes had determined to complete his task. Vast quantities of provisions were collected; the Hellespont was bridged with boats; and the rocky promontory of Mount Athos, where a previous fleet had suffered shipwreck, was pierced with a canal. An army of several hundred thousand men was brought together from all parts of the Great King's domain. He evidently intended to crush the Greeks by sheer weight of numbers.

GREEK PREPARATIONS

Xerxes did not have to attack a united Greece. His mighty preparations frightened many of the Greek states into yielding, when Persian heralds came to demand "earth and water," the customary symbols of submission. Some of the other states, such as Thebes, which was jealous of Athens, and Argos, equally jealous of Sparta, did nothing to help the loyal Greeks throughout the struggle. But Athens and Sparta with their allies remained joined for resistance to the end. Upon the suggestion of Themistocles a congress of representatives from the patriotic states assembled at the isthmus of Corinth in 481 B.C. Measures of defense were taken, and Sparta was put in command of the allied fleet and army.

BATTLE OF THERMOPYLAE, 480 B.C.

The campaigns of the Great Persian War have been described, once for all, in the glowing pages of the Greek historian, Herodotus. [6] Early in the year 480 B.C. the Persian host moved out of Sardis, crossed the Hellespont, and advanced to the pass of Thermopylae, commanding the entrance to central Greece. This position, one of great natural strength, was held by a few thousand Greeks under the Spartan king, Leonidas. For two days Xerxes hurled his best soldiers against the defenders of Thermopylae, only to find that numbers did not count in that narrow defile. There is no telling how long the handful of Greeks might have kept back the Persian hordes, had not treachery come to the aid of the enemy. A traitor Greek revealed to Xerxes the existence of an unfrequented path, leading over the mountain in the rear of the pass. A Persian detachment marched over the trail by night and took up a position behind the Greeks. The latter still had time to escape, but three hundred Spartans and perhaps two thousand allies refused to desert their post. While Persian officers provided with whips lashed their unwilling troops to battle, Leonidas and his men fought till spears and swords were broken, and hands and teeth alone remained as weapons. Xerxes at length gained the pass--but only over the bodies of its heroic defenders. Years later a monument to their memory was raised on the field of battle. It bore the simple inscription: "Stranger, go tell the Spartans that we lie here in obedience to their commands." [7]

AFTER THERMOPYLAE

After the disaster at Thermopylae nearly all the states of central Greece submitted to the Persians. They marched rapidly through Boeotia and Attica to Athens, but found a deserted city. Upon the advice of Themistocles the non-combatants had withdrawn to places of safety, and the entire fighting force of Athens had embarked on the ships. The Athenian fleet took up a position in the strait separating the island of Salamis from Attica and awaited the enemy. [8]

BATTLE OF SALAMIS, 480 B.C.

The battle of Salamis affords an interesting example of naval tactics in antiquity. The trireme was regarded as a missile to be hurled with sudden violence against the opposing ship, in order to disable or sink it. A sea fight became a series of maneuvers; and victory depended as much on the skill of the rowers and steersmen as on the bravery of the soldiers. The Persians at Salamis had many more ships than the Greeks, but Themistocles rightly believed that in the narrow strait their numbers would be a real disadvantage to them. Such proved to be the case. The Persians fought well, but their vessels, crowded together, could not navigate properly and even wrecked one another by collision. After an all-day contest what remained of their fleet withdrew from the strait.

AFTER SALAMIS

The victory at Salamis had important results. It so crippled the Persians that henceforth they lost command of the sea. Xerxes found it difficult to keep his men supplied with provisions and at once withdrew with the larger part of his force to Asia. The Great King himself had no heart for further fighting, but he left Mardonius, with a strong body of picked troops, to subjugate the Greeks on land. So the real crisis of the war was yet to come.

BATTLES OF PLATAEA AND MYCALE, 479 B.C.

Mardonius passed the winter quietly in Thessaly, preparing for the spring campaign. The Greeks in their turn made a final effort. A strong Spartan army, supported by the Athenians and their allies, met the Persians near the little town of Plataea in Boeotia. Here the heavy-armed Greek soldiers, with their long spears, huge shields, and powerful swords, easily overcame the enormous masses of the enemy. The success at Plataea showed how superior to the Persians were the Greeks in equipment, leadership, and fighting power. At the same time as this battle the remainder of the Persian fleet suffered a crushing defeat at Mycale, a promontory off the Ionian coast. These two battles really ended the war. Never again was Persia to make a serious effort to secure dominion over Continental Greece.

VICTORIUS HELLAS

The Great Persian War was much more than a conflict between two rival states. It was a struggle between East and West; between Oriental despotism and Occidental individualism. On the one side were all the populous, centralized countries of Asia; on the other side, the small, disunited states of Greece. In the East was the boundless wealth, in men and money, of a world-wide empire. In the West were the feeble resources of a few petty communities. Nevertheless Greece won. The story of her victory forms an imperishable record in the annals of human freedom.

34. ATHENS UNDER THEMISTOCLES, ARISTIDES, AND CIMON

THEMISTOCLES AND THE FORTIFICATIONS OF ATHENS

After the battle of Plataea the Athenians, with their wives and children, returned to Attica and began the restoration of their city, which the Persians had burned. Their first care was to raise a wall so high and strong Athens in future would be impregnable to attack. Upon the suggestion of Themistocles it was decided to include within the fortifications a wide area where all the country people, in case of another invasion, could find a refuge. Themistocles also persuaded the Athenians to build a massive wall on the land side of Piraeus, the port of Athens. That harbor town now became the center of Athenian industry and commerce.

ARISTIDES AND THE DELIAN LEAGUE, 477 B.C.

While the Athenians were rebuilding their city, important events were taking place in the Aegean. After the battle of Mycale the Greek states in Asia Minor and on the islands once more rose in revolt against the Persians. Aided by Sparta and Athens, they gained several successes and removed the immediate danger of another Persian attack. It was clearly necessary, however, for the Greek cities in Asia Minor and the Aegean to remain in close alliance with the Continental Greeks, if they were to preserve their independence. Under the guidance of Aristides, the old rival of Themistocles, [9] the allies formed a union known as the Delian League.

CONSTITUTION OF THE LEAGUE

The larger cities in the league agreed to provide ships and crews for a fleet, while the smaller cities were to make their contributions in money. Athens assumed the presidency of the league, and Athenian officials collected the revenues, which were placed in a treasury on the island of Delos. As head of this new federation Athens now had a position of supremacy in the Aegean like that which Sparta enjoyed in the Peloponnesus. [10]

CIMON AND THE WAR AGAINST PERSIA

The man who succeeded Themistocles and Aristides in leadership of the Athenians was Cimon, son of Miltiades, the hero of Marathon. While yet a youth his gallantry at the battle of Salamis gained him a great reputation, and when Aristides introduced him to public life the citizens welcomed him gladly. He soon became the head of the aristocratic or conservative party in the Athenian city. To Cimon the Delian League entrusted the continuation of the war with Persia. The choice was fortunate, for Cimon had inherited his father's military genius. No man did more than he to humble the pride of Persia. As the outcome of Cimon's successful campaigns the southern coast of Asia Minor was added to the Delian League, and the Greek cities at the mouth of the Black Sea were freed from the Persian yoke. Thus, with Cimon as its leader, the confederacy completed the liberation of the Asiatic Greeks.

THE DELIAN LEAGUE BECOMES SUBJECT TO ATHENS, ABOUT 454 B.C.

While the Greeks were gaining these victories, the character of the Delian League was being transformed. Many of the cities, instead of furnishing ships, had taken the easier course of making all their contributions in money. The change really played into the hands of Athens, for the tribute enabled the Athenians to build the ships themselves and add them to their own navy. They soon had a fleet powerful enough to coerce any city that failed to pay its assessments or tried to withdraw from the league. Eventually the common treasure was transferred from Delos to Athens. The date of this event (454 B.C.) may be taken as marking the formal establishment of the Athenian naval empire.

DECLINE OF CIMON'S INFLUENCE

Sparta and her Peloponnesian allies viewed with growing jealousy the rapid rise of Athens. As long, however, as Cimon remained at the head of Athenian affairs, there was little danger of a break with Sparta. He desired his city to keep on good terms with her powerful neighbor: Athens should be mistress of the seas, and Sparta should be mistress on the mainland. A contest between them, Cimon foresaw, would work lasting injury to all Greece. Cimon's pro-Spartan attitude brought him, however, into disfavor at Athens, and he was ostracized. New men and new policies henceforth prevailed in the Athenian state.

35. ATHENS UNDER PERICLES

PERICLES

The ostracism of Cimon deprived the aristocrats of their most prominent representative. It was possible for the democratic or liberal party to assume complete control of public affairs. Pericles, their leader and champion, was a man of studious habits. He never appeared on the streets except when walking between his house and the popular assembly or the market place, kept rigidly away from dinners and drinking bouts, and ruled his household with strict economy that he might escape the suspicion of enriching himself at the public expense. He did not speak often before the people, but came forward only on special occasions; and the rarity of his utterances gave them added weight. Pericles was a thorough democrat, but he used none of the arts of the demagogue. He scorned to flatter the populace. His power over the people rested on his majestic eloquence, on his calm dignity of demeanor, and above all on his unselfish devotion to the welfare of Athens.

AGE OF PERICLES, 461-429 B.C.

The period, about thirty years in length, between the ostracism of Cimon and the death of Pericles, forms the most brilliant epoch in Greek history. Under the guidance of Pericles the Athenian naval empire reached its widest extent. Through his direction Athens became a complete democracy. Inspired by him the Athenians came to manifest that love of knowledge, poetry, art, and all beautiful things which, even more than their empire or their democracy, has made them famous in the annals of mankind. The Age of Pericles affords, therefore, a convenient opportunity to set forth the leading features of Athenian civilization in the days of its greatest glory.

ATHENIAN IMPERIALISM

Athens under Pericles ruled more than two hundred towns and cities in Asia Minor and the islands of the Aegean Sea. [11] The subjects of Athens, in return for the protection that she gave them against Persia, owed many obligations. They paid an annual tribute and furnished soldiers in time of war. In all legal cases of importance the citizens had to go to Athens for trial by Athenian courts. The Delian communities, in some instances, were forced to endure the presence of Athenian garrisons and officers. To the Greeks at large all this seemed nothing less than high-handed tyranny. Athens, men felt, had built up an empire on the ruins of Hellenic liberty.

NATURE OF THE ATHENIAN DEMOCRACY

If the Athenians possessed an empire, they themselves were citizens of a state more democratic than any other that has existed, before or since, in the history of the world. They had now learned how unjust was the rule of a tyrant or of a privileged class of nobles. They tried, instead, to afford every one an opportunity to make the laws, to hold office, and to administer justice. Hence the Athenian popular assembly and law courts were open to all respectable citizens. The offices, also, were made very numerous--fourteen hundred in all--so that they might be distributed as widely as possible. Most of them were annual, and some could not be held twice by the same person. Election to office was usually by lot. This arrangement did away with favoritism and helped to give the poor man a chance in politics, as well as the man of wealth or noble birth.

THE ASSEMBLY

The center of Athenian democracy was the Assembly. Its membership included every citizen who had reached twenty years of age. Rarely, however, did the attendance number more than five thousand, since most of the citizens lived outside the walls in the country districts of Attica. Forty regular meetings were held every year. These took place on the slopes of the hill called the Pnyx. A speaker before the Assembly faced a difficult audience. It was ready to yell its disapproval of his advice, to mock him if he mispronounced a word, or to drown his voice with shouts and whistles. Naturally, the debates became a training school for orators. No one could make his mark in the Assembly who was not a clear and interesting speaker. Voting was by show of hands, except in cases affecting individuals, such as ostracism, when the ballot was used. Whatever the decision of the Assembly, it was final. This great popular gathering settled questions of war and peace, sent out military and naval expeditions, voted public expenditures, and had general control over the affairs of Athens and the empire.

THE TEN GENERALS

The Assembly was assisted in the conduct of public business by many officers and magistrates, among whom the Ten Generals held the leading place. It was their duty to guide the deliberations of the Assembly and to execute the orders of that body.

THE JURY COURTS

There was also a system of popular jury courts composed of citizens selected by lot from the candidates who presented themselves. The number of jurors varied; as many as a thousand might serve at an important trial. A court was both judge and jury, it decided by majority vote; and from its decision lay no appeal. Before these courts public officers accused of wrong-doing were tried; disputes between different cities of the empire and other important cases were settled; and all ordinary legal business affecting the Athenians themselves was transacted. Thus, even in matters of law, the Athenian government was completely democratic.

STRENGTH AND WEAKNESS OF THE ATHENIAN DEMOCRACY

Democracy then, reached its height in ancient Athens. The people ruled, and they ruled directly. Every citizen had some active part in politics. Such a system worked well in the management of a small city-state like Athens. But if the Athenians could govern themselves, they proved unable to govern an empire with justice and wisdom. There was no such thing as representation in their constitution. The subject cities had no one to speak for them in the Assembly or before the jury courts. We shall notice the same absence of a representative system in republican Rome. [12]

SYSTEM OF STATE PAY

A large number of Athenians were relieved from the necessity of working for themselves through the system of state pay introduced by Pericles. Jurors, soldiers, and sailors received money for their services. Later, in the fourth century, citizens accepted fees for attending the Assembly. These payments, though small, enabled poor citizens to devote much time to public duties.

INDUSTRIAL ATHENS

Athens contained many skilled workmen whose daily tasks gave them scant opportunity to engage in the exciting game of politics. The average rate of wages was very low. In spite of cheap food and modest requirements for clothing and shelter, it must have been difficult for the laborer to keep body and soul together. Outside of Athens, in the country districts of Attica, lived the peasants whose little farms produced the olives, grapes, and figs for which Attica was celebrated.

SLAVERY

There were many thousands of slaves in Athens and Attica at this period. Their number was so great and their labor so cheap that we may think of them as taking the place of modern machines. It was the slaves who did most of the work on the large estates owned by wealthy men, who toiled in the mines and quarries, and who served as oarsmen on the ships. The system of slavery enabled many an Athenian to live a life of leisure, but it lowered the dignity of labor and tended to prevent the rise of the poorer citizens to positions of responsibility. In Greece, as in the Orient, [13] slavery cast its blight over free industry.

COMMERCIAL ATHENS

The Athenian city was now the chief center of Greek commerce. [14] "The fruits of the whole earth," said Pericles, "flow in upon us; so that we enjoy the goods of other Commercial countries as freely as of our own." [15] Exports of Athens wine and olive oil, pottery, metal wares, and objects of art were sent out from Piraeus [16] to every region of the Mediterranean. The imports from the Black Sea region, Thrace, and the Aegean included such commodities as salt, dried fish, wool, timber, hides, and, above all, great quantities of wheat. Very much as modern England, Athens was able to feed all her people only by bringing in food from abroad. To make sure that in time of war there should be no interruption of food supplies, the Athenians built the celebrated Long Walls, between the city and its port of Piraeus. (See the map below) Henceforth they felt secure from attack, as long as their navy ruled the Aegean.

ARTISTIC AND INTELLECTUAL ATHENS

In the days of her prosperity Athens began to make herself not only a strong, but also a beautiful, city. The temples and other structures which were raised on the Acropolis during the Age of Pericles still excite, even in their ruins, the envy and wonder of mankind. [17] Athens at this time was also the center of Greek intellectual life. In no other period of similar length have so many admirable books been produced. No other epoch has given birth to so many men of varied and delightful genius. The greatest poets, historians, and philosophers of Greece were Athenians, either by birth or training. As Pericles himself said in a noble speech, Athens was "the school of Hellas." [18]

36. THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, 431-404 B.C.

INEVITABLENESS OF THE WAR

The brilliant Age of Pericles had not come to an end before the two chief powers in the Hellenic world became involved in a deadly war. It would seem that Athens and Sparta, the one supreme upon the sea, the other at the head of the Peloponnesus, might have avoided a struggle which was sure to be long and costly. But Greek cities were always ready to fight one another. When Athens and Sparta found themselves rivals for the leadership of Greece, it was easy for the smouldering fires of distrust and jealousy to flame forth into open conflict. "And at that time," says Thucydides, the Athenian historian who described the struggle, "the youth of Sparta and the youth of Athens were numerous; they had never seen war, and were therefore very willing to take up arms." [19]

ORIGIN OF THE WAR

The conflict was brought on by Corinth, one of the leading members of the Peloponnesian League and, next to Athens, the most important commercial power in Greece. She had already seen her once-profitable trade in the Aegean monopolized by Athens. That energetic city was now reaching out for Corinthian commerce in Italian and Sicilian waters. When the Athenians went so far as to interfere in a quarrel between Corinth and her colony of Corcyra, even allying themselves with the latter city, the Corinthians felt justly resentful and appealed to Sparta for aid. The Spartans listened to their appeal and, with the apparent approval of the Delphic oracle which assured them "that they would conquer if they fought with all their might," [20] declared war.

RESOURCES OF THE CONTESTANTS

The two antagonists were fairly matched. The one was strong where the other was weak. Sparta, mainly a continental power, commanded all the Peloponnesian states except Argos and Achaea, besides some of the smaller states of central Greece. Athens, mainly a maritime power, ruled all the subject cities of the Aegean. The Spartans possessed the most formidable army then in the world, but lacked money and ships. The Athenians had a magnificent navy, an overflowing treasury, and a city impregnable to direct attack. It seemed, in fact, as if neither side could seriously injure the other.

FIRST STAGE OF THE WAR, 431-421 B.C.

The war began in 431 B.C. Its first stage was indecisive. The Athenians avoided a conflict in the open field with the stronger Peloponnesian army, which ravaged Attica. They were crippled almost at the outset of the struggle by a terrible plague among the refugees from Attica, crowded behind the Long Walls. The pestilence slew at least one-fourth of the inhabitants of Athens, including Pericles himself. After ten years of fighting both sides grew weary of the war and made a treaty of peace to last for fifty years.

THE SICILIAN EXPEDITION, 4l5-4l3 B.C.

Not long after the conclusion of peace the Athenians were persuaded by a brilliant and ambitious politician, named Alcibiades, to undertake an expedition against Syracuse in Sicily. This city was a colony of Corinth, and hence was a natural ally of the Peloponnesian states. The Athenians, by conquering it, expected to establish their power in Sicily. But the siege of Syracuse ended in a complete failure. The Athenians failed to capture the city, and in a great naval battle they lost their fleet. Then they tried to retreat by land, but soon had to surrender. Many of the prisoners were sold as slaves; many were thrown by their inhuman captors into the stone quarries near Syracuse, where they perished from exposure and starvation. The Athenians, says Thucydides, "were absolutely annihilated--both army and fleet--and of the many thousands who went away only a handful ever saw their homes again." [21]

LAST STAGE OF THE WAR 413-404 B.C.

Athens never recovered from this terrible blow. The Spartans quickly renewed the contest, now with the highest hopes of success. The Athenians had to guard their city against the invader night and day; their slaves deserted to the enemy; and they themselves could do no farming except under the walls of the city. For supplies they had to depend entirely on their ships. For nearly ten years, however, the Athenians kept up the struggle. At length the Spartans captured an Athenian fleet near Aegospotami on the Hellespont. Soon afterwards they blockaded Piraeus and their army encamped before the walls of Athens. Bitter famine compelled the Athenians to sue for peace. The Spartans imposed harsh terms. The Athenians were obliged to destroy their Long Walls and the fortifications of Piraeus, to surrender all but twelve of their warships, and to acknowledge the supremacy of Sparta.

37. THE SPARTAN AND THEBAN SUPREMACIES, 404-362 B.C.

SPARTAN DESPOTISM

Sparta was now the undisputed leader of Continental Greece and of the Aegean. As the representative of the liberty-loving Greeks she had humbled the pride and power of "tyrant" Athens. A great opportunity lay before her to reorganize the Hellenic world and to end the struggles for supremacy between rival cities. But Sparta entered upon no such glorious career. She had always stood as the champion of aristocracy against democracy, and now in her hour of triumph she began to overturn every democratic government that still existed in Greece. The Greek cities soon found they had exchanged the mild sway of Athens for the brutal despotism of Sparta.

THE FREEING OF THEBES 379 B.C.

But Spartan despotism provoked resistance. It was the Boeotian city of Thebes which raised the standard of revolt. Some of the liberty-loving Thebans, headed by Pelopidas, a patriotic noble, formed a conspiracy to drive the Spartans out of the city. Disguised as huntsmen, Pelopidas and his followers entered Thebes at nightfall, killed the tyrants whom Sparta had set over the people, and forced the Spartan garrison to surrender.

BATTLE OF LEUCTRA, 371 B.C.

The Thebans had now recovered their independence. Eight years later they totally defeated a superior Peloponnesian force at the battle of Leuctra and brought the supremacy of Sparta to an end. This engagement from a military standpoint is one of the most interesting in ancient history. Epaminondas, the skilful Theban commander, massed his best troops in a solid column, fifty men deep, and hurled it with terrific force against the Spartan ranks. The enemy, drawn up twelve men deep in the customary formation, could not withstand the impact of the Theban column; their lines gave way, and the fight was soon won. The battle destroyed once for all the legend of Spartan invincibility.

PELOPIDAS AND EPAMINONDAS

The sudden rise of Thebes to the position of the first city in Greece was the work of two men whose names are always linked together in the annals of the time. In Pelopidas and Epaminondas, bosom friends and colleagues, Thebes found the heroes of her struggle for independence. Pelopidas was a fiery warrior whose bravery and daring won the hearts of his soldiers. Epaminondas was both an able general and an eminent statesman. No other Greek, save perhaps Pericles, can be compared with him. Even Pericles worked for Athens alone and showed no regard for the rest of Greece. Epaminondas had nobler ideals and sought the general good of the Hellenic race. He fought less to destroy Sparta than to curb that city's power of doing harm. He aimed not so much to make Thebes mistress of an empire as to give her a proper place among Greek cities. The Thebans, indeed, sometimes complained that Epaminondas loved Hellas more than his native city.

BATTLE OF MANTINEA, 362 B.C.

By crippling Sparta, Epaminondas raised Thebes to a position of supremacy. Had he been spared for a longer service, Epaminondas might have realized his dream of bringing unity and order into the troubled politics of his time. But circumstances were too strong for him. The Greek states, which had accepted the leadership of Athens and Sparta, were unwilling to admit the claims of Thebes to a position of equal power and importance. The period of Theban rule was filled, therefore, with perpetual conflict. Nine years after Leuctra Epaminondas himself fell in battle at Mantinea in the Peloponnesus, and with his death ended the brief glory of Thebes.

38. DECLINE OF THE CITY-STATE

WEAKNESS OF CITY-STATES

The battle of Mantinea proved that no single city--Athens, Sparta, or Thebes--was strong enough to rule Greece. By the middle of the fourth century B.C. it had become evident that a great Hellenic power could the not be created out of the little, independent city-states of Greece.

A RECORD OF ALMOST CEASELESS CONFLICT

The history of Continental Hellas for more than a century after the close of the Persian War had been a record of almost ceaseless conflict. We have seen how Greece came to be split up into two great alliances, the one a naval league ruled by Athens, the other a confederacy of Peloponnesian cities under the leadership of Sparta. How the Delian League became the Athenian Empire; how Sparta began a long war with Athens to secure the independence of the subject states and ended it by reducing them to her own supremacy; how the rough-handed sway of Sparta led to the revolt of her allies and dependencies and the sudden rise of Thebes to supremacy; how Thebes herself established an empire on the ruins of Spartan rule-- this is a story of fruitless and exhausting struggles which sounded the knell of Greek liberty and the end of the city-state.

THE FUTURE

Far away in the north, remote from the noisy conflicts of Greek political life, a new power was slowly rising to imperial greatness--no insignificant city-state, but an extensive territorial state like those of modern times. Three years after the battle of Mantinea Philip II ascended the throne of Macedonia. He established Hellenic unity by bringing the Hellenic people within a widespread empire. Alexander the Great, the son of this king, carried Macedonian dominion and Greek culture to the ends of the known world. To this new period of ancient history we now turn.

STUDIES

1. On an outline map indicate the principal places mentioned in this chapter.

2. On an outline map indicate the Athenian allies and dependencies and those of Sparta at the opening of the Peloponnesian War.

3. What do you understand by a "decisive" battle? Why has Marathon been considered such a battle?

4. Why did Xerxes take the longer route through Thrace, instead of the shorter route followed by Datis and Artaphernes?

5. What was the importance of the Phoenician fleet in the Persian invasions?

6. What reasons can be given for the Greek victory in the struggle against Persia?

7. Distinguish between a confederacy and an empire.

8. Compare the relations of the Delian subject cities to Athens with those of British colonies, such as Canada and Australia, to England.

9. What do you understand by representative government?

10. If the Athenian Empire could have rested on a representative basis, why would it have been more likely to endure?

11. How far can the phrase "government of the people, by the people, for the people" be applied to the Athenian democracy?

12. Did the popular assembly of Athens have any resemblance to a New England town meeting?

13. Compare the Athenian jury system with that of England and the United States.

14. The Athenian democracy of the time of Pericles has been described as a pure democracy and not, like the American, as a representative democracy. In what lies the difference?

15. Can you suggest any objections to the system of state pay introduced by Pericles? To what extent do we employ the same system under our government?

16. What conditions of the time help to explain the contempt of the Greeks for money-making?

17. Trace on the map, page 107, the Long Walls of Athens.

18. Why has the Peloponnesian War been called an "irrepressible conflict"? Why has it been called the "suicide of Greece"?

19. What states of the Greek mainland were neutral in the Peloponnesian War (map facing page 108)?

20. Contrast the resources of the contending parties. Where was each side weak and where strong?

21. Why was the tyranny of Sparta more oppressive than that of Athens?

22. What were the reasons for the failure of the Athenian, Spartan, and Theban attempts at empire?

FOOTNOTES

[1] Webster, Readings in Ancient History, chapter vii, "Xerxes and the Persian Invasion of Greece"; chapter viii, "Episodes from the Peloponnesian War"; chapter ix, "Alcibiades the Athenian"; chapter x, "The Expedition of the Ten Thousand"; chapter xi, "The Trial and Death of Socrates."Return to passage

[2] See the map facing page 38.Return to passage

[3] See page 87.Return to passage

[4] See the illustration, page 99.Return to passage

[5] Thucydides, i, 18.Return to passage

[6] See page 272.Return to passage

[7] Herodotus, vii, 228.Return to passage

[8] See the map on page 107.Return to passage

[9] See page 96.Return to passage

[10] See page 83.Return to passage

[11] See the map facing page 108.Return to passage

[12] See page 155.Return to passage

[13] See page 44.Return to passage

[14] The commercial importance of Athens is indicated by the general adoption of her monetary standard by the other Greek states. (For illustrations of Greek coins see the plate facing page 134.)Return to passage

[15] Thucydides, ii, 38.Return to passage

[16] See the map, page 107.Return to passage

[17] For a description of ancient Athens, see pages 288-292.Return to passage

[18] Thucydides, ii, 41.Return to passage

[19] Thucydides, ii, 8.Return to passage

[20] Thucydides, i, 118.Return to passage

[21] Thucydides, vii, 87.Return to passage

VI. MINGLING OF EAST AND WEST AFTER 359 B.C. [1]

39. PHILIP AND THE RISE OF MACEDONIA

MACEDONIA AND THE MACEDONIANS

The land of Macedonia, lying to the north of Greece, for a long time had been an inconspicuous part of the ancient world. Its people, though only partially civilized, were Greeks in blood and language. No doubt they formed an offshoot of those northern invaders who had entered the Balkan peninsula before the dawn of history. The Macedonian kings, from the era of the Persian wars, seized every opportunity of spreading Greek culture throughout their realm. By the middle of the fourth century B.C., when Philip II ascended the throne, the Macedonians were ready to take a leading place in the Greek world.

PHILIP'S AIMS

Philip of Macedonia, one of the most remarkable men of antiquity, was endowed with a vigorous body, a keen mind, and a resolute will. He was no stranger to Greece and its ways. Part of his boyhood had been passed as a hostage at Thebes in the days of Theban glory. His residence there gave him an insight into Greek politics and taught him the art of war as it had been perfected by Epaminondas. In the distracted condition of Greece, worn out by the rivalries of contending cities, Philip saw the opportunity of his own country. He aimed to secure for Macedonia the position of supremacy which neither Athens, Sparta, nor Thebes had been able to maintain.

THE MACEDONIAN ARMY

Philip's most important achievement was the creation of the Macedonian army, which he led to the conquest of Greece and which his son was to lead to the conquest of the World. Taking a hint from the tactics of Epaminondas, Philip trained his infantry to fight by columns, but with sufficient intervals between the files to permit quick and easy movements. Each man bore an enormous lance, eighteen feet in length. When this heavy phalanx was set in array, the weapons carried by the soldiers in the first five ranks presented a bristling thicket of lance-points, which no onset, however determined, could penetrate. The business of the phalanx was to keep the front of the foe engaged, while horsemen rode into the enemy's flanks. This reliance on masses of cavalry to win a victory was something new in warfare. Another novel feature consisted in the use of engines called catapults, able to throw darts and huge stones three hundred yards, and of battering rams with force enough to hurl down the walls of cities. All these different arms working together made a war machine of tremendous power--the most formidable in the ancient world until the days of the Roman legion.

CONQUESTS OF PHILIP

Philip commanded a fine army; he ruled with absolute sway a territory larger than any other Hellenic state; and he himself possessed a genius for both war and diplomacy, With such advantages the Macedonian king entered on the subjugation of disunited Greece. His first great success was won in western Thrace. Here he founded the city of Philippi [2] and seized some rich gold mines, the income from which enabled him to keep his soldiers always under arms, to fit out a fleet, and, by means of liberal bribes, to hire a crowd of agents in nearly every Greek city. Philip next made Macedonia a maritime state by subduing the Greek cities on the peninsula of Chalcidice. [3] He also appeared in Thessaly, occupied its principal fortresses, and brought the frontier of Macedonia as far south as the pass of Thermopylae.

40. DEMOSTHENES AND THE END OF GREEK FREEDOM

DEMOSTHENES, 384-322 B.C.

Philip for many years had been steadily extending his sway over Greece. In the face of his encroachments would Athens, Sparta, and Thebes, so long the leading cities, submit tamely to this Macedonian conqueror? There was one man, at least, who realized the menace to Greek freedom from Philip's onward march. In Demosthenes Greece found a champion of her threatened liberties.

DEMOSTHENES AS AN ORATOR AND A PATRIOT

Demosthenes was the last, as well as the most famous, of the great Athenian orators. When he first began to speak, the citizens laughed at his long, involved sentences, over-rapid delivery, and awkward bearing. Friends encouraged him to persist, assuring him that, if the manner of his speeches was bad, their matter was worthy of Pericles. Numerous stories are told of the efforts made by Demosthenes to overcome his natural defects. He practiced gesturing before a mirror and, to correct a stammering pronunciation, recited verses with pebbles in his mouth. He would go down to the seashore during storms and strive to make his voice heard above the roar of wind and waves, in order the better to face the boisterous Assembly. Before long he came to be regarded as the prince of speakers even in the city of orators. Demosthenes was a man cast in the old heroic mold. His patriotic imagination had been fired by the great deeds once accomplished by free Greeks. Athens he loved with passionate devotion. Let her remember her ancient glories, he urged, and, by withstanding Philip, become the leader of Hellas in a second war for liberty.

LAST STRUGGLE OF THE GREEKS

The stirring appeals of the great orator at first had little effect. There were many friends of Philip in the Greek states, even in Athens itself. When, however, Philip entered central Greece and threatened the independence of its cities, the eloquence of Demosthenes met a readier response. In the presence of the common danger Thebes and Athens gave up their ancient rivalry and formed a defensive alliance against Philip. Had it been joined by Sparta and the other Peloponnesian states, it is possible that their united power might have hurled back the invader. But they held aloof.

BATTLE OF CHAERONEA, 338 B.C.

The decisive battle was fought at Chaeronea in Boeotia. On that fatal field the well-drilled and seasoned troops of Macedonia, headed by a master of the art of war, overcame the citizen levies of Greece. The Greeks fought bravely, as of old, and their defeat was not inglorious. Near the modern town of Chaeronea the traveler can still see the tomb where the fallen heroes were laid, and the marble lion set up as a memorial to their dauntless struggle.

PHILIP'S POLICY AS A CONQUEROR

Chaeronea gave Philip the undisputed control of Greece. But now that victory was assured, he had no intention of playing the tyrant. He compelled Thebes to admit a Macedonian garrison to her citadel, but treated Athens so mildly that the citizens were glad to conclude with him a peace which left their possessions untouched. Philip entered the Peloponnesus as a liberator. Its towns and cities welcomed an alliance with so powerful a protector against Sparta.

CONGRESS AT CORINTH, 337 B.C.

Having completely realized his design of establishing Macedonian rule over Greece, Philip's restless energy drove him forward to the next step in his ambitious program. He determined to carry out the plans, so long cherished by the Greeks, for an invasion of Asia Minor and, perhaps, of Persia itself. In the year 337 B.C. a congress of all the Hellenic states met at Corinth under Philip's presidency. The delegates voted to supply ships and men for the great undertaking and placed Philip in command of the allied forces. A Macedonian king was to be the captain-general of Hellas.

DEATH OF PHILIP, 336 B.C.

But Philip was destined never to lead an army across the Hellespont. Less than two years after Chaeronea he was killed by an assassin, and the scepter passed to his young son, Alexander.

41. ALEXANDER THE GREAT

THE YOUTHFUL ALEXANDER

Alexander was only twenty years of age when he became ruler of Macedonia. From his father he inherited the powerful Frame, the kingly figure, the masterful will, which made so deep an impression on all his contemporaries. His mother, a proud and ambitious woman, told him that the blood of Achilles ran in his veins, and bade him emulate the deeds of that national hero. We know that he learned the Iliad by heart and always carried a copy of it on his campaigns. As he came to manhood, Alexander developed into a splendid athlete, skillful in all the sports of his rough-riding companions, and trained in every warlike exercise.

EDUCATION OF ALEXANDER BY ARISTOTLE

Philip believed that in Alexander he had a worthy son, for he persuaded Aristotle, [4] the most learned man in Greece, to become the tutor of the young prince. The influence of that philosopher remained with Alexander throughout life. Aristotle taught him to love Greek art and science, and instilled into his receptive mind an admiration for all things Grecian. Alexander used to say that, while he owed his life to his father, he owed to Aristotle the knowledge of how to live worthily.

ALEXANDER CRUSHES REBELLION

The situation which Alexander faced on his accession might well have dismayed a less dauntless spirit. Philip had not lived long enough to unite firmly his wide dominions. His unexpected death proved the signal for uprisings and disorder. The barbarous Thracians broke out in widespread rebellion, and the Greeks made ready to answer the call of Demosthenes to arms. But Alexander soon set his kingdom in order. After crushing the tribes of Thrace, he descended on Greece and besieged Thebes, which had risen against its Macedonian garrison. The city was soon captured; its inhabitants were slaughtered or sold into slavery; and the place itself was destroyed. The terrible fate of Thebes induced the other states to submit without further resistance.

SEEMING STRENGTH OF THE PERSIAN EMPIRE

With Greece pacified, Alexander could proceed to the invasion of Persia. Since the days of Darius the Great the empire had remained almost intact-- a huge, loosely-knit collection of many different peoples, whose sole bond of union was their common allegiance to the Great King. [5] Its resources were enormous. There were millions of men for the armies and untold wealth in the royal treasuries. Yet the empire was a hollow shell.

EXPEDITION OF THE "TEN THOUSAND," 401-400 B.C.

Some seventy years before Alexander set forth on his expedition the Greeks had witnessed a remarkable disclosure of the military weakness of Persia. One of those rare revolts which troubled the security of the Persian Empire broke out in Asia Minor. It was headed by Cyrus the Younger, a brother of the Persian monarch. Cyrus gathered a large body of native troops and also hired about ten thousand Greek soldiers. He led this mixed force into the heart of the Persian dominions, only to fall in battle at Cunaxa, near Babylon. The Greeks easily routed the enemy arrayed against them, but the death of Cyrus made their victory fruitless. In spite of their desperate situation the Greeks refused to surrender and started to return homewards. The Persians dogged their footsteps, yet never ventured on a pitched battle. After months of wandering in Assyria and Armenia the little band of intrepid soldiers finally reached Trapezus, (Modern Trebizond) a Greek city on the Black Sea.

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE EXPEDITION

The story of this invasion of Persia and the subsequent retreat was written by the Athenian Xenophon [6] in his Anabasis. It is one of the most interesting books that have come down to us from antiquity. We can judge from it how vivid was the impression which the adventures of the "Ten Thousand" made on the Greeks of Xenophon's time. A small army had marched to the center of the Persian dominions, had overcome a host many times its size, and had returned to Greece in safety. It was clear proof that the Persian power, however imposing on the outside, could offer no effective resistance to an attack by a strong force of disciplined Greek soldiers. Henceforth the Greeks never abandoned the idea of an invasion of Persia.

ALEXANDER'S INVASION

The gigantic task fell, however, to Alexander, as the champion of Hellas against the "barbarians." With an army of less than forty thousand men Alexander destroyed an empire before which, for two centuries, all Asia had been wont to tremble. History, ancient or modern, contains no other record of conquests so widespread, so thorough, so amazingly rapid.

42. CONQUEST OF PERSIA AND THE FAR EAST, 334-323 B.C.

BATTLE OF THE GRANICUS, 334 B.C.

Alexander crossed the Hellespont in the spring of the year 334 B.C. He landed not far from the historic plain of Troy and at once began his march along the coast. Near the little river Granicus the satraps of Asia Minor had gathered an army to dispute his passage. Alexander at once led his cavalry across the river in an impetuous charge, which soon sent the Persian troops in headlong flight. The victory cost the Macedonians scarcely a hundred men; but it was complete. As Alexander passed southward, town after town opened its gates--first Sardis, next Ephesus, then all the other cities of Ionia. They were glad enough to be free of Persian control. Within a year Asia Minor was a Macedonian possession.

BATTLE OF ISSUS, 333 B.C.

In the meantime Darius III, the Persian king, had been making extensive preparations to meet the invader. He commanded half a million men, but he followed Alexander too hastily and had to fight in a narrow defile on the Syrian coast between the mountains and the sea. In such cramped quarters numbers did not count. The battle became a massacre, and only the approach of night stayed the swords of the victorious Macedonians. A great quantity of booty, including the mother, wife, and children of Darius, fell into Alexander's hands. He treated his royal captives kindly, but refused to make peace with the Persian king.

CAPTURE OF TYRE, 332 B.C.

The next step was to subdue the Phoenician city of Tyre, the headquarters of Persia's naval power. The city lay on a rocky island, half a mile from the shore. Its fortifications rose one hundred feet above the waves. Although the place seemed impregnable, Alexander was able to capture it after he had built a mole, or causeway, between the shore and the island. Powerful siege engines then breached the walls, the Macedonians poured in, and Tyre fell by storm. Thousands of its inhabitants perished and thousands more were sold into slavery. The great emporium of the East became a heap of ruins.

ALEXANDER IN EGYPT

From Tyre Alexander led his ever-victorious army through Syria into Egypt. The Persian forces here offered little resistance, and the Egyptians themselves welcomed Alexander as a deliverer. The conqueror entered Memphis in triumph and then sailed down the Nile to its western mouth, where he laid the foundations of Alexandria, a city which later became the metropolis of the Orient.

ALEXANDER IN LIBYA

Another march brought Alexander to the borders of Libya, Here he received the submission of Cyrene, the most important Greek colony in Africa. [7] Alexander's dominions were thus extended to the border of the Carthaginian possessions. It was at this time that Alexander visited a celebrated temple of the god Amon, located in an oasis of the Libyan desert. The priests were ready enough to hail him as a son of Amon, as one before whom his Egyptian subjects might bow down and adore. But after Alexander's death his worship spread widely over the world, and even the Roman Senate gave him a place among the gods of Olympus.

BATTLE OF ARBELA, 331 B.C.

The time had now come to strike directly at the Persian king. Following the ancient trade routes through northern Mesopotamia, Alexander crossed the Euphrates and the Tigris and, on a broad plain not far from the ruins of ancient Nineveh, [8] found himself confronted by the Persian host. Darius held an excellent position and hoped to crush his foe by sheer weight of numbers. But nothing could stop the Macedonian onset; once more Darius fled away, and once more the Persians, deserted by their king, broke up in hopeless rout.

END OF THE PERSIAN EMPIRE

The battle of Arbela decided the fate of the Persian Empire. It remained only to gather the fruits of victory. The city of Babylon surrendered without a struggle. Susa, with its enormous treasure, fell into the conqueror's hands. Persepolis, the old Persian capital, was given up to fire and sword. [9] Darius himself, as he retreated eastward, was murdered by his own men. With the death of Darius the national war of Greece against Persia came to an end.

CONQUEST OF IRAN

The Macedonians had now overrun all the Persian provinces except distant Iran and India. These countries were peopled of by warlike tribes of a very different stamp from the effeminate Persians. Alexander might well have been content to leave them undisturbed, but the man could never rest while there were still conquests to be made. Long marches and much hard fighting were necessary to subdue the tribes about the Caspian and the inhabitants of the countries now known as Afghanistan and Turkestan.

CONQUEST OF INDIA

Crossing the lofty barrier of the Hindu-Kush, Alexander led his weary soldiers into northwestern India, where a single battle added the Persian province of the Punjab [10] to the Macedonian possessions. Alexander then pressed forward to the conquest of the Ganges valley, but in the full tide of victory his troops refused to go any farther. They had had their fill of war and martial glory; they would conquer no more lands for their ambitious king. Alexander gave with reluctance the order for the homeward march.

ALEXANDER'S RETURN TO BABYLON

Alexander was of too adventurous a disposition to return by the way he had come. He resolved to reach Babylon by a new route. He built a navy on the Indus and had it accompany the army down the river. At the mouth of the Indus Alexander dispatched the fleet under his admiral, Nearchus, to explore the Indian Ocean and to discover, if possible, a sea route between India and the West. He himself led the army, by a long and toilsome march through the deserts of southern Iran, to Babylon. That city now became the capital of the Macedonian Empire.

DEATH OF ALEXANDER, 323 B.C.

Scarcely two years after his return, while he was planning yet more extensive conquests in Arabia, Africa, and western Europe, he was smitten by the deadly Babylonian fever. In 323 B.C., after several days of illness, the conqueror of the world passed away, being not quite thirty- three years of age.

43. THE WORK OF ALEXANDER

ALEXANDER AS WARRIOR AND STATESMAN

Alexander the Great was one of the foremost, perhaps the first, of the great captains of antiquity. But he was more than a world-conqueror; he was a statesman of the highest order. Had he been spared for an ordinary lifetime, there is no telling how much he might have accomplished. In eleven years he had been able to subdue the East and to leave an impress upon it which was to endure for centuries. And yet his work had only begun. There were still lands to conquer, cities to build, untrodden regions to explore. Above all, it was still his task to shape his possessions into a well-knit, unified empire, which would not fall to pieces in the hands of his successors. His early death was a calamity, for it prevented the complete realization of his splendid ambitions.

HELLENIZING OF THE ORIENT

The immediate result of Alexander's conquests was the disappearance of the barriers which had so long shut in the Orient. The East, until his day, was an almost unknown land. Now it lay open to the spread of Greek civilization. In the wake of the Macedonian armies followed Greek philosophers and scientists, Greek architects and artists, Greek colonists, merchants, and artisans. Everywhere into that huge, inert, unprogressive Oriental world came the active and enterprising men of Hellas. They brought their arts and culture and became the teachers of those whom they had called "barbarians."

FUSION OF EAST AND WEST

The ultimate result of Alexander's conquests was the fusion of East and West. He realized that his new empire must contain a place for Oriental, as well as for Greek and East and Macedonian, subjects. It was Alexander's aim, therefore, to build up a new state in which the distinction between the European and the Asiatic should gradually pass away. He welcomed Persian nobles to his court and placed them in positions of trust. He organized the government of his provinces on a system resembling that of Darius the Great. [11] He trained thousands of Persian soldiers to replace the worn-out veterans in his armies. He encouraged by liberal dowries mixed marriages between Macedonians and Orientals, and himself wedded the daughter of the last Persian king. To hold his dominions together and provide a meeting place for both classes of his subjects, he founded no less than seventy cities in different parts of the empire. Such measures as these show that Alexander had a mind of wide, even cosmopolitan, sympathies. They indicate the loss which ancient civilization suffered by his untimely end.

44. HELLENISTIC KINGDOMS AND CITIES

THE THREE GREAT KINGDOMS

The half century following Alexander's death is a confused and troubled period in ancient history. The king had left no legitimate son--no one with an undisputed title to the succession. On his deathbed Alexander had himself declared that the realm should go "to the strongest." [12] It was certain, under these circumstances, that his possessions would become the prey of the leading Macedonian generals. The unwieldy empire at length broke in pieces. Out of the fragments arose three great states, namely, Macedonia, Egypt, and Syria. The kingdom of Egypt was ruled by Ptolemy, one of Alexander's generals. Seleucus, another of his generals, established the kingdom of Syria. It comprised nearly all western Asia. These kingdoms remained independent until the era of Roman conquest in the East.

MINOR INDEPENDENT STATES

Several small states also arose from the break-up of Alexander's empire. [13] Each had its royal dynasty, its capital city, and its own national life. Thus the conquests of Alexander, instead of establishing a world- power under one ruler, led to the destruction of the unity of government which Persia had given to the East.

CITY LIFE IN THE ORIENT

More significant for the history of civilization than these kingdoms were the Hellenistic [14] cities, which from the time of Alexander arose in every part of the eastern world. Some were only garrison towns in the heart of remote provinces or outposts along the frontiers. Many more, however, formed busy centers of trade and industry, and became seats of Greek influence in the Orient. Such cities were quite unlike the old Greek city-states. [15] They were not free and independent, but made a part of the kingdom in which they were situated. The inhabitants consisted of Greeks and Macedonians, comprising the governing class, together with native artisans and merchants who had abandoned their village homes for life in a metropolis. In appearance, also, these cities contrasted with those of old Greece. They had broad streets, well paved and sometimes lighted at night, enjoyed a good water supply, and possessed baths, theaters, and parks.

ALEXANDRIA

In the third century B.C. the foremost Hellenistic city was Alexandria. It lay on a strip of flat, sandy land separating Lake Mareotis from the Mediterranean. On the one side was the lake-harbor, connected with the Nile; on the other side were two sea-harbors, sheltered from the open sea by the long and narrow island of Pharos. [16] The city possessed a magnificent site for commerce. It occupied the most central position that could be found in the ancient world with respect to the three continents, Africa, Asia, and Europe. The prosperity which this port has enjoyed for more than two thousand years is ample evidence of the wisdom which led to its foundation.

ANTIOCH

The chief city in the kingdom of Syria was splendid and luxurious Antioch. It lay in the narrow valley of the Orontes River, so close to both the Euphrates and the Mediterranean that it soon became an important commercial center. The city must have been a most delightful residence, with its fine climate, its location on a clear and rapid stream, and the near presence of the Syrian hills. In the sixth century A.D. repeated earthquakes laid Antioch in ruins. The city never recovered its prosperity, though a modern town, Antakia, still marks the site of the once famous capital.

PERGAMUM

Asia Minor, during this period, contained many Hellenistic cities. One of the most important was Pergamum, the capital of a small but independent kingdom of the same name. Its rulers earned the gratitude of all the Greeks by their resistance to the terrible Gauls. About fifty years after Alexander's death this barbarous people, pouring down from central Europe, had ravaged Greece and invaded Asia Minor. The kings of Pergamum celebrated their victories over the Gauls with so many works of architecture and sculpture that their city became the artistic rival of Athens.

RHODES

One other great Hellenistic center existed in the island city of Rhodes. Founded during the closing years of the Peloponnesian War, Rhodes soon distanced Athens in the race for commercial supremacy. The merchants of Rhodes framed admirable laws, especially for business affairs, and many of these were incorporated in the Roman code. Rhodes was celebrated for art. No less than three thousand statues adorned the streets and public buildings. It was also a favorite place of education for promising orators and writers. During Roman days many eminent men, Cicero and Julius Caesar among them, studied oratory at Rhodes.

45. THE HELLENISTIC AGE

HELLENISTIC LITERATURE

These splendid cities in the Orient were the centers of much literary activity. Their inhabitants, whether Hellenic or "barbarian," used Greek as a common language. During this period Greek literature took on a cosmopolitan character. It no longer centered in Athens. Writers found their audiences in all lands where Greeks had settled. At the same time literature became more and more an affair of the study. The authors were usually professional bookmen writing for a bookish public. They produced many works of literary criticism, prepared excellent grammars and dictionaries, but wrote very little poetry or prose of enduring value.

THE MUSEUM AT ALEXANDRIA

The Hellenistic Age was distinguished as an age of learning. Particularly was this true at Alexandria, where the Museum, founded by the first Macedonian king of Egypt, became a real university. It contained galleries of art, an astronomical observatory, and even zoological and botanical gardens. The Museum formed a resort for men of learning, who had the leisure necessary for scholarly research. The beautiful gardens, with their shady walks, statues, and fountains, were the haunt of thousands of students whom the fame of Alexandria attracted from all parts of the civilized world.

THE ALEXANDRIAN LIBRARY

In addition to the Museum there was a splendid library, which at one time contained over five hundred thousand manuscripts--almost everything that had been written in antiquity. The chief librarian ransacked private collections and purchased all the books he could find. Every book that entered Egypt was brought to the Library, where slaves transcribed the manuscript and gave a copy to the owner in place of the original. Before this time the manuscripts of celebrated works were often scarce and always in danger of being lost. Henceforth it was known where to look for them.

SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERIES

The Hellenistic Age was remarkable for the rapid advance of scientific knowledge. Most of the mathematical works of the Greeks date from this epoch. Euclid wrote a treatise on geometry which still holds its place in the schools. Archimedes of Syracuse, who had once studied at Alexandria, made many discoveries in engineering. A water screw of his device is still in use. He has the credit for finding out the laws of the lever. "Give me a fulcrum on which to rest," he said, "and I will move the earth." The Hellenistic scholars also made remarkable progress in medicine. The medical school of Alexandria was well equipped with charts, models, and dissecting rooms for the study of the human body. During the second century of our era all the medical knowledge of antiquity was gathered up in the writings of Galen (born about 130 A.D.). For more than a thousand years Galen of Pergamum remained the supreme authority in medicine.

ANCIENT AND MODERN SCIENCE COMPARED

In scientific work it seems as if the Greeks had done almost all that could be accomplished by sheer brain power aided only by rude instruments. They had no real telescopes or microscopes, no mariner's compass or chronometer, and no very delicate balances. Without such inventions the Greeks could hardly proceed much farther with their researches. Modern scientists are perhaps no better thinkers than were those of antiquity, but they have infinitely better apparatus and can make careful experiments where the Greeks had to rely on shrewd guesses.

EXTENSION OF GEOGRAPHICAL KNOWLEDGE

During the Hellenistic Age men began to gain more accurate ideas regarding the shape and size of the habitable globe. Such events as the expedition of the "Ten Thousand" [17] and Alexander's conquests in central Asia and India brought new information about the countries and peoples of the Orient. During Alexander's lifetime a Greek named Pytheas, starting from Massilia, [18] made an adventurous voyage along the shores of Spain and Gaul and spent some time in Britain. He was probably the first Greek to visit that island.

ERATOSTHENES, ABOUT 276-194 B.C.

All this new knowledge of East and West was soon gathered together by Eratosthenes, the learned librarian of Alexandria. He was the founder of scientific geography. Before his time some students had already concluded that the earth is spherical and not flat, as had been taught in the Homeric poems. [19] Guesses had even been made of the size of the earth. Eratosthenes by careful measurements came within a few thousand miles of its actual circumference. Having estimated the size of the earth, Eratosthenes went on to determine how large was its habitable area. He reached the conclusion that the distance from the strait of Gibraltar to the east of India was about one-third of the earth's circumference. The remaining two-thirds, he thought, was covered by the sea. And with what seems a prophecy he remarked that, if it was not for the vast extent of the Atlantic Ocean, one might almost sail from Spain to India along the same parallel of latitude.

PTOLEMY

The next two centuries after Eratosthenes saw the spread of Roman rule over Greeks and Carthaginians in the Mediterranean and over the barbarous inhabitants of Gaul, Britain, and Germany. The new knowledge thus gained was summed up in the Greek Geography by Ptolemy [20] of Alexandria. His famous map shows how near he came to the real outlines both of Europe and Asia.

THE PTOLEMAIC SYSTEM

Ptolemy was likewise an eminent astronomer. He believed that the earth was the center of the universe and that the sun, planets, and fixed stars all revolved around it. This Ptolemaic system was not overthrown until the grand discovery of Copernicus in the sixteenth century of our era.

46. THE GRAECO-ORIENTAL WORLD

THE NEW LUXURY

The Hellenistic Age was characterized by a general increase in wealth. The old Greeks and Macedonians, as a rule, had been content to live plainly. Now kings, nobles, and rich men began to build splendid palaces and to fill them with the products of ancient art--marbles from Asia Minor, vases from Athens, Italian bronzes, and Babylonian tapestries. They kept up great households with endless lords in waiting, ladies of honor, pages, guards, and servants. Soft couches and clothes of delicate fabric replaced the simple coverlets and coarse cloaks of an earlier time. They possessed rich carpets and hangings, splendid armor and jewelry, and gold and silver vessels for the table. The Greeks thus began to imitate the luxurious lives of Persian nobles.

THE SEA ROUTE TO INDIA

These new luxuries flowed in from all parts of the ancient world. Many came from the Far East in consequence of the rediscovery of the sea route to India, by Alexander's admiral, Nearchus. [21] The voyage of Nearchus was one of the most important results of Alexander's eastern conquests. It established the fact, which had long been forgotten, that one could reach India by a water route much shorter and safer than the caravan roads through central Asia. [22] Somewhat later a Greek sailor, named Harpalus, found that by using the monsoons, the periodic winds which blow over the Indian Ocean, he could sail direct from Arabia to India without laboriously following the coast. The Greeks, in consequence, gave his name to the monsoons.

ORIENTAL INFLUENCE ON THE GREEKS

All this sudden increase of wealth, all the thousand new enjoyments with which life was now adorned and enriched, did not work wholly for good. With luxury there went, as always, laxity in morals. Contact with the vice and effeminacy of the East tended to lessen the manly vigor of the Greeks, both in Asia and in Europe. Hellas became corrupt, and she in turn corrupted Rome.

GREEK INFLUENCE ON THE ORIENT

Yet the most interesting, as well as the most important, feature of the age is the diffusion of Hellenic culture--the "Hellenizing" of the Orient. It was, indeed, a changed world in which men were now living. Greek cities, founded by Alexander and his successors, stretched from the Nile to the Indus, dotted the shores of the Black Sea and Caspian, and arose amid the wilds of central Asia. The Greek language, once the tongue of a petty people, grew to be a universal language of culture, spoken even by "barbarian" lips. And the art, the science, the literature, the principles of politics and philosophy, developed in isolation by the Greek mind, henceforth became the heritage of many nations.

THE NEW COSMOPOLITANISM

Thus, in the period after Alexander the long struggle between East and West reached a peaceful conclusion. The distinction between Greek and Barbarian gradually faded away, and the ancient world became ever more unified in sympathies and aspirations. It was this mingled civilization of Orient and Occident with which the Romans were now to come in contact, as they pushed their conquering arms beyond Italy into the eastern Mediterranean.

STUDIES

1. On an outline map indicate the routes of Alexander, marking the principal battle fields and the most important cities founded by him. Note, also, the voyage of Nearchus.

2. On an outline map indicate the principal Hellenistic kingdoms about 200 B.C.

3. Give the proper dates for (a) accession of Alexander; (b) battle of Issus; (c) battle of Arbela; and (d) death of Alexander.

4. In what sense was Chaeronea a decisive battle?

5. How is it true that the expedition of the Ten Thousand forms "an epilogue to the invasion of Xerxes and a prologue to the conquests of Alexander"?

6. How much can you see and describe in the Alexander Mosaic (illustration, page 123)?

7. Compare Alexander's invasion of Persia with the invasion of Greece by Xerxes.

8. Distinguish between the immediate and the ultimate results of Alexander's conquests.

9. Comment on the following statement: "No single personality, excepting the carpenter's son of Nazareth, has done so much to make the world we live in what it is as Alexander of Macedon."

10. How did the Macedonian Empire compare in size with that of Persia? With that of Assyria?

11. What modern countries are included within the Macedonian Empire under Alexander?

12. How did the founding of the Hellenistic cities continue the earlier colonial expansion of Greece?

13. Why were the Hellenistic cities the real "backbone" of Hellenism?

14. Why do great cities rarely develop without the aid of commerce? Were all the great cities in Alexander's empire of commercial importance?

15. Show how Alexandria has always been one of the meeting points between Orient and Occident.

16. How did the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 A.D. affect the commercial importance of Alexandria?

17. Name some of the great scientists of the Alexandrian age.

18. What were their contributions to knowledge?

19. Using the maps on pages 76 and 132, trace the growth of geographical knowledge from Homer's time to that of Ptolemy.

20. What parts of the world are most correctly outlined on Ptolemy's map?

21. "The seed-ground of European civilization is neither Greece nor the Orient, but a world joined of the two." Comment on this statement.

FOOTNOTES

[1] Webster, Readings in Ancient History, chapter xii, "Demosthenes and the Struggle against Philip"; chapter xiii, "Exploits of Alexander the Great."

[2] Philippi became noted afterwards as the first city in Europe where Christianity was preached. See Acts, xvi, 9.Return to passage

[3] See the map between pages 68-69.Return to passage

[4] See page 275.Return to passage

[5] See page 39.Return to passage

[6] See page 272.Return to passage

[7] See page 90.Return to passage

[8] See page 36.Return to passage

[9] See John Dryden's splendid ode, Alexander's Feast.Return to passage

[10] See pages 20 and 39.Return to passage

[11] See pages 39-40.Return to passage

[12] Arrian, Anabasis of Alexander, vii, 26.Return to passage

[13] See the map facing page 128.Return to passage

[14] The term "Hellenic" refers to purely Greek culture; the term "Hellenistic," to Greek culture as modified by contact with Oriental life and customs.Return to passage

[15] See page 81.Return to passage

[16] The lighthouse on the island of Pharos was considered one of the "seven wonders" of the ancient world. The others were the hanging gardens and walls of Babylon, the pyramids, the Colossus of Rhodes, the temple of Artemis at Ephesus, the mausoleum at Halicarnassus, and the statue of Zeus at Olympia.Return to passage

[17] See page 120.Return to passage

[18] See page 89.Return to passage

[19] See page 74.Return to passage

[20] Not to be confused with King Ptolemy (page 127).Return to passage

[21] See page 125.Return to passage

[22] See page 48.Return to passage

VII. THE RISE OF ROME TO 264 B.C. [1]

47. ITALY AND SICILY

THE APENNINES

The shape of Italy is determined by the course of the Apennines. Branching off from the Alps at the gulf of Genoa, these mountains cross the peninsula in an easterly direction, almost to the Adriatic. Here they turn sharply to the southeast and follow the coast for a considerable distance. The plains of central Italy, in consequence, are all on the western slope of the Apennines. In the lower part of the peninsula the range swerves suddenly to the southwest, so that the level land is there on the eastern side of the mountains. Near the southern extremity of Italy the Apennines separate into two branches, which penetrate the "heel and toe" of the peninsula.

DIVISIONS OF ITALY

Italy may be conveniently divided into a northern, a central, and a southern section. These divisions, however, are determined by the direction of the mountains and not, as in Greece, chiefly by inlets of the sea. Northern Italy contains the important region known in ancient times as Cisalpine Gaul. This is a perfectly level plain two hundred miles in length, watered by the Po (Padus), which the Romans called the "king of rivers," because of its length and many tributary streams. Central Italy, lying south of the Apennines, includes seven districts, of which the three on the western coast--Etruria, Latium, and Campania--were most conspicuous in ancient history. Southern Italy, because of its warm climate and deeply indented coast, early attracted many Greek colonists. Their colonies here came to be known as Magna Graecia, or Great Greece.

SICILY

The triangular-shaped island of Sicily is separated from Italy by the strait of Messina, a channel which, at the narrowest part, is only two miles wide. At one time Sicily must have been joined to the mainland. Its mountains, which rise at their highest point in the majestic volcano of Aetna, nearly eleven thousand feet above sea level, are a continuation of those of Italy. The greater part of Sicily is remarkably productive, containing rich grainfields and hillsides green with the olive and the vine. Lying in the center of the Mediterranean and in the direct route of merchants and colonists from every direction, Sicily has always been a meeting place of nations. In antiquity Greeks, Carthaginians, and Romans contended for the possession of this beautiful island.

INFLUENCE OF GEOGRAPHICAL CONDITIONS

On Italian history, as on that of Greece, [2] we are able to trace the profound influence of geographical conditions. In the first place, the peninsula of Italy is not cut up by a tangle of mountains into many small districts. Hence it was easier for the Italians, than for the Greeks, to establish one large and united state. In the second place, Italy, which has few good harbors but possesses fine mountain pastures and rich lowland plains, was better adapted to cattle raising and agriculture than was Greece. The Italian peoples, in consequence, instead of putting to sea, remained a conservative, home-staying folk, who were slow to adopt the customs of other nations. Finally, the location of Italy, with its best harbors and most numerous islands on the western coast, brought that country into closer touch with Gaul, Spain, and northwestern Africa than with Greece and the Orient. Italy fronted the barbarous West.

48. THE PEOPLES OF ITALY

NEIGHBORS OF THE ROMANS

Long before the Romans built their city by the Tiber every part of Italy had become the home of wandering peoples, attracted by the mild climate and rich soil of this favored land. Two of these peoples were neighbors of the Romans--Etruscans on the north and Greeks on the south.

THE ETRUSCANS

The ancestors of the historic Etruscans were probably Aegean sea-rovers who settled in the Italian peninsula before the beginning of the eighth century B.C. The immigrants mingled with the natives and by conquest and colonization founded a strong power in the country to which they gave their name--Etruria. At one time the Etruscans appear to have ruled over Campania and also in the Po Valley as far as the Alps. Their colonies occupied the shores of Sardinia and Corsica. Their fleets swept the Tyrrhenian Sea. The Etruscans for several centuries were the leading nation in Italy.

ETRUSCAN CIVILIZATION

These Etruscans, like the Hittites of Asia Minor, [3] are a mysterious race. No one as yet has been able to read their language, which is quite unlike any Indo-European tongue. The words, however, are written in an alphabet borrowed from Greek settlers in Italy. Many other civilizing arts besides the alphabet came to the Etruscans from abroad. Babylonia gave to them the principle of the round arch and the practice of divination. [4] Etruscan graves contain Egyptian seals adorned with hieroglyphics and beautiful vases bearing designs from Greek mythology. The Etruscans were skillful workers in iron, bronze, and gold. They built their cities with massive walls, arched gates, paved streets, and underground drains. In the course of time a great part of this Etruscan civilization was absorbed in that of Rome.

THE GREEKS

As teachers of the Romans the Etruscans were followed by the Greeks. About the middle of the eighth century B.C. Hellenic colonies began to occupy the coasts of Sicily and southern Italy. The earliest Greek settlement was Cumae, near the bay of Naples. [5] It was a city as old as Rome itself, and a center from which Greek culture, including the Greek alphabet, spread to Latium. A glance at the map [6] shows that the chief Greek Colonies were all on or near the Sea, from Campania to the gulf of Tarentum. North of the "heel" of Italy extends an almost harborless coast, where nothing tempted the Greeks to settle. North of Campania, again, they found the good harbors already occupied by the Etruscans. The Greeks, in consequence, were never able to make Italy a completely Hellenic land. Room was left for the native Italian peoples, under the leadership of Rome, to build up their own power in the peninsula.

THE ITALIAN HIGHLANDERS

The Italians were an Indo-European people who spoke a language closely related, on the one side, to Greek and, on the other side, to the Celtic tongues of western Europe. They entered Italy through the Alpine passes, long before the dawn of history, and gradually pushed southward until they occupied the interior of the peninsula. At the beginning of historic times they had separated into two main branches. The eastern and central parts of Italy formed the home of the highlanders, grouped in various tribes. Among them were the Umbrians in the northeast, the Sabines in the upper valley of the Tiber, and the Samnites in the south. Still other Italian peoples occupied the peninsula as far as Magna Graecia.

THE LATINS

The western Italians were known as Latins. They dwelt in Latium, the "flat land" extending south of the Tiber between the Apennines and the Tyrrhenian Sea. Residence in the lowlands, where they bordered on the Etruscans, helped to make the Latins a civilized people. Their village communities grew into larger settlements, until the whole of Latium became filled with a number of independent city-states. The ties of kinship and the necessity of defense against Etruscan and Sabine foes bound them together. At a very early period they had united in the Latin League, under the headship of Alba Longa. Another city in this league was Rome.

49. THE ROMANS

FOUNDING OF ROME

Rome sprang from a settlement of Latin shepherds, farmers, and traders on the Palatine Mount. [7] This was the central eminence in a group of low hills south of the Tiber, about fifteen miles by water from the river's mouth. Opposite the Palatine community there arose on the Quirinal Hill another settlement, which seems to have been an outpost of the Sabines. After much hard fighting the rival hill towns united on equal terms into one state. The low marshy land between the Palatine and Quirinal became the Forum, or common market place, and the steep rock, known as the Capitoline, formed the common citadel. [8]

UNION OF THE SEVEN HILLS

The union of the Palatine and Quirinal settlements greatly increased the area and population of the Roman city. In course of time settlements were made on the neighboring hills and these, too, cast in their lot with Rome. Then a fortification, the so-called "Wall of Servius," was built to bring them all within the boundaries of the enlarged community. Rome came into existence as the City of the Seven Hills.

MYTHS OF EARLY ROME

Long after the foundation of Rome, when that city had grown rich and powerful, her poets and historians delighted to relate the many myths which clustered about the earlier stages of her career. According to these myths Rome began as a colony of Alba Longa, the capital of Latium. The founder of this city was Ascanius, son of the Trojan prince Aeneas, who had escaped from Troy on its capture by the Greeks and after long wanderings had reached the coast of Italy. Many generations afterwards, when Numitor sat on the throne of Alba Longa, his younger brother, Amulius, plotted against him and drove him into exile. He had Numitor's son put to death, and forced the daughter, Rhea Silvia, to take the vows of a Vestal Virgin. [9]

ROMULUS AND REMUS

But Rhea Silvia, beloved by Mars, the god of war, gave birth to twin boys of more than human size and beauty. The wicked Amulius ordered the children to be set adrift in a basket on the Tiber. Heaven, however, guarded these offspring of a god; the river cast them ashore near Mount Palatine, and a she-wolf came and nursed them. There they were discovered by a shepherd, who reared them in his own household. When the twins, Romulus and Remus, reached manhood, they killed Amulius and restored their grandfather to his kingdom. With other young men from Alba Longa, they then set forth to build a new city on the Palatine, where they had been rescued. As they scanned the sky to learn the will of the gods, six vultures, birds of Jupiter, appeared to Remus; but twelve were seen by Romulus. So Romulus marked out the boundary of the city on the Palatine, and Remus, who in derision leaped over the half-finished wall, he slew in anger. Romulus thus became the sole founder of Rome and its first king.

SUCCESSORS OF ROMULUS

Romulus was followed by a Sabine, Numa Pompilius, who taught the Romans the arts of peace and the worship of the gods. Another king destroyed Alba Longa and brought the inhabitants to Rome. The last of Rome's seven kings was an Etruscan named Tarquin the Proud. His tyranny finally provoked an uprising, and Rome became a republic.

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE MYTHS

These famous tales have become a part of the world's literature and still possess value to the student. They show us what the Romans themselves believed about the foundation and early fortunes of their city. Sometimes they refer to what seem to be facts, such as the first settlement on the Palatine, the union with the Sabines on the Quirinal, the conquest of Alba Longa, and Etruscan rule at Rome. The myths also contain so many references to customs and beliefs that they are a great help in understanding the social life and religion of the early Romans.

50. EARLY ROMAN SOCIETY

THE ROMANS AN AGRICULTURAL PEOPLE

Agriculture was the chief occupation of the Roman people. "When our forefathers," said an ancient writer, "would praise a worthy man, they praised him as a good farmer and a good landlord; and they believed that an praise could go no further." [10] Roman farmers raised large crops of grain--the staple product of ancient Italy. Cattle-breeding, also, must have been an important pursuit, since in early times prices were estimated in oxen and sheep. [11]

ECONOMIC CONDITIONS

In such a community of peasants no great inequalities of wealth existed. Few citizens were very rich; few were very poor. The members of each household made their own clothing from flax or wool, and fashioned out of wood and clay what utensils were needed for their simple life. For a long time the Romans had no coined money whatever. When copper came into use as currency, it passed from hand to hand in shapeless lumps that required frequent weighing. It was not until the fourth century that a regular coinage began. [12] This use of copper as money indicates that gold and silver were rare among the Romans, and luxury almost unknown.

MORAL CHARACTER OF THE EARLY ROMANS

Hard-working, god-fearing peasants are likely to lead clean and sober lives. This was certainly true of the early Romans. They were a manly breed, abstemious in food and drink, iron-willed, vigorous, and strong. Deep down in the Roman's heart was the proud conviction that Rome should rule over all her neighbors. For this he freely shed his blood; for this he bore hardship, however severe, without complaint. Before everything else, he was a dutiful citizen and a true patriot. Such were the sturdy men who on their farms in Latium formed the backbone of the Roman state. Their character has set its mark on history for all time.

THE ROMAN FAMILY

The family formed the unit of Roman society. Its most marked feature was the unlimited authority of the father. In his house he reigned an absolute king. His wife had no legal rights: he could sell her into slavery or divorce her at will. Nevertheless, no ancient people honored women more highly than the Romans. A Roman wife was the mistress of the home, as her husband was its master. Though her education was not carried far, we often find the Roman matron taking a lively interest in affairs of state, and aiding her husband both in politics and business. It was the women, as well as the men, who helped to make Rome great among the nations. Over his unmarried daughters and his sons, the Roman father ruled as supreme as over his wife. He brought up his children to be sober, silent, modest in their bearing, and, above all, obedient. Their misdeeds he might punish with penalties as severe as banishment, slavery, or death. As head of the family he could claim all their earnings; everything they had was his. The father's great authority ceased only with his death. Then his sons, in turn, became lords over their families.

51. ROMAN RELIGION

WORSHIP OF ANCESTORS

The Romans, like the ancient Greeks and the modern Chinese, paid special veneration to the souls of the dead. These were known by the flattering name of manes, the "pure" or "good ones." The Romans always regarded the manes as members of the household to which they had belonged on earth. The living and the dead were thus bound together by the closest ties. The idea of the family triumphed even over the grave.

THE HOUSEHOLD DEITIES

The ancient Roman house had only one large room, the atrium, where all members of the family lived together. It was entered by a single door, which was sacred to the god Janus. On the hearth, opposite the doorway, the housewife prepared the meals. The fire that ever blazed upon it gave warmth and nourishment to the inmates. Here dwelt Vesta, the spirit of the kindling flame. The cupboard where the food was kept came under the charge of the Penates, who blessed the family store. The house as a whole had its protecting spirits, called Lares.

WORSHIP OF THE HOUSEHOLD DEITIES

The daily worship of these deities took place at the family meal. The table would be placed at the side of the hearth, and when the father and his family sat down to it, a little food would be thrown into the flames and a portion of wine poured out, as an offering to the gods. The images of the Lares and Penates would also be fetched from the shrine and placed on the table in token of their presence at the meal. This religion of the family lasted with little change throughout the entire period of Roman history.

JANUS AND VESTA

The early Roman state was only an enlarged family, and hence the religion of the state was modeled after that of the family. Some of the divinities, such as Janus and Vesta, were taken over with little change from the domestic worship. The entrance to the Forum formed a shrine of Janus, [13] which Numa himself was said to have built. The door, or gateway, stood open in time of war, but shut when Rome was at peace. At the south end of the Forum stood the round temple of Vesta, containing the sacred hearth of the city. Here Vesta was served by six virgins of free birth, whose duty it was to keep the fire always blazing on the altar. If by accident the fire went out, it must be relighted from a "pure flame," either by striking a spark with flint or by rubbing together two dry sticks. Such methods of kindling fire were those familiar to the prehistoric Romans.

JUPITER AND MARS

The Romans worshiped various gods connected with their lives as shepherds, farmers, and warriors. The chief divinity was Jupiter, who ruled the heavens and sent rain and sunshine to nourish the crops. The war god Mars reflected the military character of the Romans. His sacred animal was the fierce, cruel wolf, his symbols were spears and shields; his altar was the Campus Martius (Field of Mars) outside the city walls, where the army assembled in battle array. March, the first month of the old Roman year, was named in his honor. Some other gods were borrowed from the Greeks, together with many of the beautiful Greek myths.

DIVINATION

The Romans took many precautions, before beginning any enterprise, to find out what was the will of the gods and how their favor might first be gained. They did not have oracles, but they paid much attention to omens of all sorts. A sudden flash of lightning, an eclipse of the sun, a blazing comet, or an earthquake shock was an omen which awakened superstitious fear. It indicated the disapproval of the gods. From the Etruscans the Romans learned to divine the future by examining the entrails of animal victims. They also borrowed from their northern neighbors the practice of looking for signs in the number, flight, and action of birds. To consult such signs was called "taking the auspices." [14]

PRIESTHOODS

Roman priests, who conducted the state religion, did not form a separate class, as in some Oriental countries. They were chosen, like other magistrates, from the general body of citizens. A board, or "college," of six priests had charge of the public auspices. Another board, that of the pontiffs, regulated the calendar, kept the public annals, and regulated weights and measures. They were experts in all matters of religious ceremonial and hence were very important officials. [15]

IMPORTANCE OF THE STATE RELIGION

This old Roman faith was something very different from what we understand by religion. It had little direct influence on morality. It did not promise rewards or threaten punishments in a future world. Roman religion busied itself with the everyday life of man. Just as the household was bound together by the tie of common worship, so all the citizens were united in a common reverence for the deities which guarded the state. The religion of Rome made and held together a nation.

52. THE ROMAN CITY-STATE

EARLY ROMAN GOVERNMENT

We find in early Rome, as in Homeric Greece, [16] a city-state with its king, council, and assembly. The king was the father of his people, having over them the same absolute authority that the house-father held within the family. The king was assisted by a council of elders, or Senate (Latin senes, "old men"). Its members were chosen by the king and held office for life. The most influential heads of families belonged to the Senate. The common people at first took little part in the government, for it was only on rare occasions that the king summoned them to deliberate with him in an assembly.

THE REPUBLICAN CONSULS

Toward the close of the sixth century, as we have already learned, [17] the ancient monarchy disappeared from Rome. In place of the lifelong king two magistrates, named consuls, were elected every year. Each consul had to share his honor and authority with a colleague who enjoyed the same power as himself. Unless both agreed, there could be no action. Like the Spartan kings, [18] the consuls served as checks, the one on the other. Neither could safely use his position to aim at unlawful rule.

THE DICTATOR

This divided power of the consuls might work very well in times of peace. During dangerous wars or insurrections it was likely to prove disastrous. A remedy was found in the temporary revival of the old kingship under a new name. When occasion required, one of the consuls, on the advice of the Senate, appointed a dictator. The consuls then gave up their authority and the people put their property and lives entirely at the dictator's disposal. During his term of office, which could not exceed six months, the state was under martial law. Throughout Roman history there were many occasions when a dictatorship was created to meet a sudden emergency.

PATRICIANS AND PLEBEIANS

The Roman state, during the regal age, seems to have been divided between an aristocracy and a commons. The nobles were called patricians, [19] and the common people were known as plebeians. [20] The patricians occupied a privileged position, since they alone sat in the Senate and served as priests, judges, and magistrates. In fact, they controlled society, and the common people found themselves excluded from much of the religious, legal, and political life of the Roman city. Under these circumstances it was natural for the plebeians to agitate against the patrician monopoly of government. The struggle between the two orders of society lasted about two centuries.

THE TRIBUNES

A few years after the establishment of the republic the plebeians compelled the patricians to allow them to have officers of their own, called tribunes, as a means of protection. There were ten tribunes, elected annually by the plebeians. Any tribune could veto, that is, forbid, the act of a magistrate which seemed to bear harshly on a citizen. To make sure that a tribune's orders would be respected, his person was made sacred and a solemn curse was pronounced upon the man who injured him or interrupted him in the performance of his duties. The tribune's authority, however, extended only within the city and a mile beyond its walls. He was quite powerless against the consul in the field.

THE TWELVE TABLES, 449 B.C.

We next find the plebeians struggling for equality before the law. Just as in ancient Athens, [21] the early Roman laws had never been written down or published. About half a century after the plebeians had obtained the tribunes, they forced the patricians to give them written laws. A board of ten men, known as decemvirs, was appointed to frame a legal code, binding equally on both patricians and plebeians. The story goes that this commission studied the legislation of the Greek states of southern Italy, and even went to Athens to examine some of Solon's laws which were still in force. The laws framed by the decemvirs were engraved on twelve bronze tablets and set up in the Forum. A few sentences from this famous code have come down to us in rude, unpolished Latin. They mark the beginning of what was to be Rome's greatest gift to civilization--her legal system.

FINAL TRIUMPH OF THE PLEBEIANS

The hardest task of the plebeians was to secure the right of holding the great offices of state. Eventually, however, they gained entrance to Senate and became eligible to the consulship and other magistracies and to the priesthoods. By the middle of the third century the plebeians and patricians, equal before the law and with equal privileges, formed one compact body of citizens in the Roman state.

ROME AS A REPUBLIC

The Roman state called itself a republic--respublica--"a thing of the people." Roman citizens made the laws and elected public officers. Though the people in their gatherings had now become supreme, their power was really much limited by the fact that very little discussion of a proposed measure was allowed. This formed a striking contrast to the vigorous debating which went on in the Athenian Assembly. [22] Roman citizens could not frame, criticize, or amend public measures; they could only vote "yes" or "no" to proposals made to them by a magistrate.

MAGISTRATES

Rome had many magistrates. Besides the two consuls and an occasional dictator there were the ten tribunes, the praetors, who served as judges, and the quaestors, or keepers of the treasury. The two censors were also very important officers. It was their business to make an enumeration or census of the citizens and to assess property for taxation. The censors almost always were reverend seniors who had held the consulship and enjoyed a reputation for justice and wisdom. Their office grew steadily in importance, especially after the censors began to exercise an oversight of the private life of the Romans. They could expel a senator from his seat for immorality and could deprive any citizen of his vote. The word "censorious," meaning faultfinding, is derived from the name of these ancient officials.

MEMBERSHIP OF THE SENATE

The authority of the magistrates was much limited by the Senate. This body contained about three hundred members, who held their seats generally for life. When vacancies occurred, they were filled, as a rule, by those who had previously held one or more of the higher magistracies. There sat in the Senate every man who, as statesman, general, or diplomatist, had served his country well.

POWERS EXERCISED BY THE SENATE

The Senate furnished an admirable school for debate. Any senator could speak as long and as often as he chose. The opportunities for discussion were numerous, for all weighty matters came before this august assemblage. It managed finances and public works. It looked after the state religion. It declared and conducted war, received ambassadors from foreign countries, made alliances, and administered conquered territories. The Senate formed the real governing body of the republic.

"AN ASSEMBLY OF KINGS"

The Senate proved not unworthy of its high position. For two centuries, while Rome was winning dominion over Italy and the Mediterranean, that body held the wisest and noblest Romans of the time. To these men office meant a public trust--an opportunity to serve their country with distinction and honor. The Senate, in its best days, was a splendid example of the foresight, energy, and wisdom of republican Rome. An admiring foreigner called it "an assembly of kings." [23]

53. EXPANSION OF ROME OVER ITALY, 509(?)-264 B.C.

ROME SUPREME IN LATIUM, 338 B.C.

The first centuries of the republic were filled with constant warfare. The Romans needed all their skill, bravery, and patriotism to keep back the Etruscans on the north, and the wild tribes of the Apennines. About 390 B.C. the state was brought near to destruction by an invasion of the Gauls. [24] These barbarians, whose huge bulk and enormous weapons struck terror to the hearts of their adversaries, poured through the Alpine passes and ravaged far and wide. At the river Allia, only a few miles from Rome, they annihilated a Roman army and then captured and burned the city itself. But the Gallic tide receded as swiftly as it had come, and Rome rose from her ashes mightier than ever. Half a century after the Gallic invasion she was able to subdue her former allies, the Latins, and to destroy their league. The Latin War, as it is called, ended in 338 B.C., the year of the fateful battle of Chaeronea in Greece. [25] By this time Rome ruled in Latium and southern Etruria and had begun to extend her sway over Campania. There remained only one Italian people to contest with her the supremacy of the peninsula--the Samnites.

ROME SUPREME IN CENTRAL ITLAY, 290 B.C.

The Samnites were the most vigorous and warlike race of central Italy. While the Romans were winning their way in Latium, the Samnites were also entering on a career of conquest. They coveted the fertile Campanian plain with its luxurious cities, Cumae and Neapolis, which the Greeks had founded. The Romans had also fixed their eyes on the same region, and so a contest between the two peoples became inevitable. In numbers, courage, and military skill Romans and Samnites were well matched. Nearly half a century of hard fighting was required before Rome gained the upper hand. The close of the Samnite wars found Rome supreme in central Italy. Her authority was now recognized from the upper Apennines to the foot of the peninsula.

ROME SUPREME IN SOUTHERN ITALY, 264 B.C.

The wealthy cities of southern Italy offered a tempting prize to Roman greed. Before long many of them received Roman garrisons and accepted the rule of the great Latin republic. Tarentum, [26] however, the most important of the Greek colonies, held jealously to her independence. Unable single-handed to face the Romans, Tarentum turned to Greece for aid. She called on Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, the finest soldier of his age. Pyrrhus led twenty-five thousand mercenary soldiers into Italy, an army almost as large as Alexander's. The Romans could not break the bristling ranks of the Greek phalanx, and they shrank back in terror before the huge war elephants which Pyrrhus had brought with him. The invader won the first battle, but lost many of his best troops. He then offered peace on condition that the Romans should give up their possessions in southern Italy. The Senate returned the proud reply that Rome would not treat with the enemy while he stood on Italian soil. A second battle was so bitterly contested that Pyrrhus declared, "Another such victory, and I am lost." [27] Weary of the struggle, Pyrrhus now crossed over to Sicily to aid his countrymen against the Carthaginians. The rapid progress of the Roman arms called him back, only to meet a severe defeat. Pyrrhus then withdrew in disgust to Greece; Tarentum fell; and Rome established her rule over southern Italy.

POLITICAL SITUATION IN 264 B.C.

The triumph over Pyrrhus and the conquest of Magna Graecia mark a decisive moment in the history of Rome. Had Pyrrhus won Italy, as well as Asia and Egypt, might have become a Greek land, ruled by Hellenistic kings. Now it was clear that Rome, having met the invader so bravely, was to remain supreme in the Italian peninsula. She was the undisputed mistress of Italy from the strait of Messina northward to the Arnus and the Rubicon. Etruscans, Latins, Samnites, and Greeks acknowledged her sway. The central city of the peninsula had become the center of a united Italy. [28]

54. ITALY UNDER ROMAN RULE

THE ROMAN CITIZENS

Italy did not form a single state under Roman rule. About one-third of Italy composed the strictly Roman territory occupied by Roman citizens. Since ancient Rome knew nothing of the great principle of representative government, [29] it was necessary that citizens who wished to vote or to stand for office should visit in person the capital city. Few men, of course, would journey many miles to Rome in order to exercise their political rights. The elections, moreover, were not all held on one day, as with us, but consuls, praetors, and other magistrates were chosen on different days, while meetings of the assemblies might be held at any time of the year. A country peasant who really tried to fulfill his duties as a citizen would have had little time for anything else. In practice, therefore, the city populace at Rome had the controlling voice in ordinary legislation. The Romans were never able to remedy this grave defect in their political system. We shall see later what evils government without representation brought in its train.

THE ITALIANS

Over against this body of Roman citizens were the Italian peoples. Rome was not yet ready to grant them citizenship, but she did not treat them as complete subjects. The Italians were called the "allies and friends" of the Roman people. They lost the right of declaring war on one another, of making treaties, and of coining money. Rome otherwise allowed them to govern themselves, never calling on them for tribute and only requiring that they should furnish soldiers for the Roman army in time of war. These allies occupied a large part of the Italian peninsula.

THE LATIN COLONIES

The Romans very early began to establish what were called Latin colonies [30] in various parts of Italy. The colonists were usually veteran soldiers or poor plebeians colonies who wanted farms of their own. When the list of colonists was made up, they all marched forth in military array to lake possession of their new homes and build their city. The Latin colonies were really offshoots of Rome and hence were always faithful to her interests. Scattered everywhere in Italy they formed so many permanent camps or garrisons to keep the conquered peoples in subjection. At the same time they helped mightily in spreading the Latin language, law, and civilization throughout the peninsula.

ROMAN ROADS

All the colonies were united with one another and with Rome by an extensive system of roads. The first great road, called the Appian Way, was made during the period of the Samnite wars. It united the city of Rome with Capua and secured the hold of Rome on Campania. The Appian Way was afterwards carried across the Apennines to Brundisium on the Adriatic, whence travelers embarked for the coast of Greece. Other trunk lines were soon built in Italy, and from them a network of smaller highways was extended to every part of the peninsula.

USES OF ROMAN ROADS

Roman roads had a military origin. Like the old Persian roads [31] they were intended to facilitate the rapid dispatch of troops, supplies, and official messages into every corner of Italy. Hence the roads ran, as much as possible, in straight lines and on easy grades. Nothing was allowed to obstruct their course. Engineers cut through or tunneled the hills, bridged rivers and gorges, and spanned low, swampy lands with viaducts of stone. So carefully were these roads constructed that some stretches of them are still in good condition. These magnificent highways were free to the public. They naturally became avenues of trade and travel and so served to bring the Italian peoples into close touch with Rome.

ROMANIZATION OF ITALY

Rome thus began in Italy that wonderful process of Romanization which she was to extend later to Spain, Gaul, and Britain. She began to make, the Italian peoples like herself in blood, speech, customs, and manners. More and more the Italians, under Rome's leadership, came to look upon themselves as one people--the people who wore the gown, or toga, as contrasted with the barbarous and trousers-wearing Gauls.

55. THE ROMAN ARMY

THE LEGION

While the Romans were conquering Italy, they were making many improvements in their army. All citizens between the ages of seventeen and forty-six were liable to active service. These men were mainly landowners--hardy, intelligent peasants--who knew how to fight and how to obey orders. An army in the field consisted of one or more legions. A legion included about three thousand heavy-armed footmen, twelve hundred light infantry, and three hundred horsemen. After the conquest of Italy the states allied with Rome had to furnish soldiers, chiefly archers and cavalry. These auxiliaries, as they were called, were at least as numerous as legionaries. The Romans, in carrying on war, employed not only their citizens but also their subjects.

METHOD OF FIGHTING

The legion offered a sharp contrast to the unwieldy phalanx. [32] Roman soldiers usually fought in an open order, with the heavy-armed infantry arranged in three lines: first, the younger men; next, the more experienced warriors; and lastly the veterans. A battle began with skirmishing by the light troops, which moved to the front and discharged their darts to harass the enemy. The companies of the first line next flung their javelins at a distance of from ten to twenty paces and then, wielding their terrible short swords, came at once to close quarters with the foe. It was like a volley of musketry followed by a fierce bayonet charge. If the attack proved unsuccessful, the wearied soldiers withdrew to the rear through the gaps in the line behind. The second line now marched forward to the attack; if it was repulsed, there was still the third line of steady veterans for the last and decisive blow.

FORTIFIED CAMPS

A very remarkable part of the Roman military system consisted in the use of fortified camps. Every time the army halted, if only for a single night, the legionaries intrenched themselves within a square inclosure. It was protected by a ditch, an earthen mound, and a palisade of stakes. This camp formed a little city with its streets, its four gates, a forum, and the headquarters of the general. Behind the walls of such a fortress an army was always at liberty to accept or decline a battle. As a proverb said, the Romans often conquered by "sitting still."

DISCIPLINE: REWARDS AND HONORS

Roman soldiers lived under the strictest discipline. To their general they owed absolute, unquestioning obedience. He could condemn them to death without trial. The sentinel who slept on his watch, the legionary who disobeyed an order or threw away his arms on the field of battle, might be scourged with rods and then beheaded. The men were encouraged to deeds of valor by various marks of distinction, which the general presented to them in the presence of the entire army. The highest reward was the civic crown of oak leaves, granted to one who had saved the life of a fellow-soldier on the battle field.

THE TRIUMPH

The state sometimes bestowed on a victorious general the honor of a triumph. This was a grand parade and procession in the city of Rome. First came the magistrates and senators, wagons laden with booty, and captives in chains. Then followed the conqueror himself, clad in a gorgeous robe and riding in a four-horse chariot. Behind him marched the soldiers, who sang a triumphal hymn. The long procession passed through the streets to the Forum and mounted the Capitoline Hill. There the general laid his laurel crown upon the knees of the statue of Jupiter, as a thank offering for victory. Meanwhile, the captives who had just appeared in the procession were strangled in the underground prison of the Capitol. It was a day of mingled joy and tragedy.

MILITARY GENIUS OF THE ROMANS

The Romans, it has been said, were sometimes vanquished in battle, but they were always victorious in war. With the short swords of her disciplined soldiers, her flexible legion, and her fortified camps, Rome won dominion in Italy and began the conquest of the world.

STUDIES

1. On an outline map indicate the Roman dominions in 509 B.C.; in 338 B.C.; in 264 B.C.

2. Make a list of the Roman magistrates mentioned in this chapter, and of the powers exercised by each.

3. Give the meaning of our English words "patrician," "plebeian," "censor," "dictator," "tribune," "augury," "auspices," and "veto."

4. Connect the proper events with the following dates: 753 B.C.; 509 B.C.; and 338 B.C.

5. Why have Sicily, Sardinia, and Corsica been called the "suburbs of Italy"?

6. "Italy and Greece may be described as standing back to back to each other." Explain this statement.

7. What is the origin of our names of the two months, January and March?

8. Compare the early Roman with the early Greek religion as to (a) likenesses; (b) differences.

9. Why have the consuls been called "joint kings for one year"?

10. What do you understand by "martial law"? Under what circumstances is it sometimes declared in the United States?

11. Compare the position of the Roman patricians with that of the Athenian nobles before the legislation of Draco and Solon.

12. What officers in American cities perform some of the duties of the censors, praetors, and aediles?

13. In the Roman and Spartan constitutions contrast: (a) consuls and kings; (b) censors and ephors; and (c) the two senates.

14. Compare the Roman Senate and the Senate of the United States as to size, term of office of members, conditions of membership, procedure, functions, and importance.

15. How far can the phrase, "government of the people, by the people, for the people," be applied to the Roman Republic at this period?

16. What conditions made it easy for the Romans to conquer Magna Graecia and difficult for them to subdue the Samnites?

17. What is a "Pyrrhic victory"?

18. Compare the nature of Roman rule over Italy with that of Athens over the Delian League.

19. Trace on the map, page 156, the Appian and Flaminian ways, noting some of the cities along the routes and the terminal points of each road.

20. Explain: "all roads lead to Rome."

21. Contrast the legion and the phalanx as to arrangement, armament, and method of fighting.

22. "Rome seems greater than her greatest men." Comment on this statement.

FOOTNOTES

[1] Webster, Readings in Ancient History, chapter xiv, "Legends of Early Rome."

[2] See page 67.Return to passage

[3] See page 28.Return to passage

[4] See pages 53, 61.Return to passage

[5] Naples, the ancient Neapolis, was a colony of Cumae. See page 89.Return to passage

[6] See the map facing page 50.Return to passage

[7] The Romans believed that their city was founded in 753 B.C., from which year all Roman dates were reckoned.Return to passage

[8] See the map, page 293.Return to passage

[9] See page 146.Return to passage

[10] Cato, De agricultura, I.Return to passage

[11] See page 6.Return to passage

[12] See the illustration, page 7.Return to passage

[13] Since a door (janua) had two sides, Janus, the door god, was represented with the curious double face which appears on Roman coins (See the plate facing page 134) The month of January in the Julian calendar was named for him.Return to passage

[14] Latin auspicium, from auspex, a bird seer.Return to passage

[15] The title of the president of the pontiffs, Pontifex Maximus (Supreme Pontiff), is still that of the pope. See page 364.Return to passage

[16] See page 81.Return to passage

[17] See page 143.Return to passage

[18] See page 83.Return to passage

[19] From the Latin patres, "fathers."Return to passage

[20] Latin plebs, "the crowd."Return to passage

[21] See page 85.Return to passage

[22] See page 105.Return to passage

[23] The four letters inscribed on Roman military standards indicate the important place held by the Senate. They are S. P. Q. R., standing for Senatus Populusque Romanus, "The Senate and the People of Rome."Return to passage

[24] See page 129.Return to passage

[25] See page 118.Return to passage

[26] See page 89.Return to passage

[27] Plutarch, Pyrrhus, 21.Return to passage

[28] It should be noticed, however, that as yet Rome controlled only the central and southern parts of what is the modern kingdom of Italy. Two large divisions of that kingdom, which every Italian now regards as essential to its unity, were in other hands--the Po valley and the island of Sicily.Return to passage

[29] See page 106.Return to passage

[30] Latin colonists did not have the right of voting in the assemblies at Rome. This privilege was enjoyed, however, by members of the "Roman" colonies, which were planted mainly along the coast. See the map, page 156.Return to passage

[31] See page 40.Return to passage

[32] See page 116.Return to passage

VIII. THE GREAT AGE OF THE ROMAN REPUBLIC, 264-31 B.C. [1]

56. THE RIVALS: ROME AND CARTHAGE, 264-218 B.C.

THE PUNIC WARS

The conquest of Italy made Rome one of the five leading states of the Mediterranean world. In the East there were the kingdoms of Macedonia, Syria, and Egypt, which had inherited the dominions of Alexander the Great. In the West there were Carthage and Rome, once in friendly alliance, but now to become the bitterest foes. Rome had scarcely reached the headship of united Italy before she was involved in a life-and-death struggle with this rival power. The three wars between them are known as the Punic wars; they are the most famous contests that ancient history records; and they ended in the complete destruction of Carthage.

FOUNDATION OF CARTHAGE

More than a century before the traditional date at which Rome rose upon her seven hills, Phoenician colonists laid the foundations of a second Tyre. The new city occupied an admirable site, for it bordered on rich farming land and had the largest harbor of the north African coast. A position at the junction of the eastern and western basins of the Mediterranean gave it unsurpassed opportunities for trade. At the same time Carthage was far enough away to be out of the reach of Persian or Macedonian conquerors.

COMMERCIAL EMPIRE OF CARTHAGE

By the middle of the third century B.C. the Carthaginians had formed an imposing commercial empire. Their African dominions included the strip of coast from Cyrene westward to the strait of Gibraltar. Their colonies covered the shores of Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, and southern Spain. The western half of the Mediterranean had become a Carthaginian lake.

CARTHAGINIAN CIVILIZATION

Before the opening of the Punic wars Carthage had been much enlarged by emigrants from Tyre, after the capture of that city by Alexander. [2] The Phoenician colonists kept their own language, customs, and beliefs and did not mingle with the native African peoples. Carthage in form was a republic, but the real power lay in the hands of one hundred men, selected from the great merchant families. It was a government by capitalists who cared very little for the welfare of the poor freemen and slaves over whom they ruled. The wealth of Carthage enabled her to raise huge armies of mercenary soldiers and to build warships which in size, number, and equipment surpassed those of any other Mediterranean state. Mistress of a wide realm, strong both by land and sea, Carthage was now to prove herself Rome's most dangerous foe.

ORIGIN OF THE FIRST PUNIC WAR

The First Punic War was a contest for Sicily. The Carthaginians aimed to establish their rule over that island, which from its situation seems to belong almost as much to Africa as to Italy. But Rome, having become supreme in Italy, also cast envious eyes on Sicily. She believed, too, that the Carthaginians, if they should conquer Sicily, would sooner or later invade southern Italy. The fear for her possessions, as well as the desire to gain new ones, led Rome to fling down the gage of battle.

COURSE AND RESULTS OF THE WAR, 264-241 B.C.

The contest between the two rival states began in 264 B.C. and lasted nearly twenty-four years. The Romans overran Sicily and even made an unsuccessful invasion of Africa, but the main struggle was on the sea. Here at first the Romans were at a disadvantage, for they had no ships as large and powerful as those of the Carthaginians. With characteristic energy, however, they built several great war fleets and finally won a complete victory over the enemy. The treaty of peace provided that Carthage should abandon Sicily, return all prisoners without ransom, and pay a heavy indemnity.

THE INTERVAL OF PREPARATION, 241-218 B.C.

Carthage, though beaten, had not been humbled. She had lost Sicily and the commercial monopoly of the Mediterranean. But she was not ready to abandon all hope of recovering her former supremacy. The peace amounted to no more than an armed truce. Both parties were well aware that the real conflict was yet to come. The war, however, was delayed for nearly a quarter of a century. During this interval Rome strengthened her military position by seizing the islands of Sardinia and Corsica from Carthage and by conquering the Gauls in the Po valley. The Carthaginians, meanwhile, began to create a new empire in Spain, whose silver mines would supply fresh means for another contest and whose hardy tribes would furnish soldiers as good as the Roman legionaries.

57. HANNIBAL AND THE GREAT PUNIC WAR, 218-201 B.C.

BEGINNING OF THE SECOND PUNIC WAR, 218 B.C.

The steady advance of the Carthaginian arms in Spain caused much uneasiness in Rome and at length led that city to declare war. Carthage herself was not unwilling for a second trial of strength. Her leading general, Hannibal, who had been winning renown in Spain, believed that the Carthaginians were now in a position to wage an aggressive war against their mighty rival. And so the two great Mediterranean powers, each confident of success, renewed the struggle for supremacy.

HANNIBAL

At the opening of the conflict Hannibal was not quite twenty-seven years of age. While yet a mere child, so the story went, his father had led him to the altar, and bade him swear by the Carthaginian gods eternal enmity to Rome. He followed his father to Spain and there learned all the duties of a soldier. As a master of the art of war, he ranks with Alexander the Great. The Macedonian king conquered the world for the glory of conquest; Hannibal, burning with patriotism, fought to destroy the power which had humbled his native land. He failed; and his failure left Carthage weaker than he found her. Few men have possessed a more dazzling genius than Hannibal, but his genius was not employed for the lasting good of humanity.

HANNIBAL'S INVASION OF ITALY

The Romans planned to conduct the war in Spain and Africa, at a distance from their own shores. Hannibal's bold movements totally upset these calculations. The Carthaginian general had determined that the conflict should take place in the Italian peninsula itself. Since Roman fleets now controlled the Mediterranean, it was necessary for Hannibal to lead his army, with its supplies, equipment, and beasts of burden, by the long and dangerous land route from Spain to Italy. In the summer of 218 B.C. Hannibal set out from Spain with a large force of infantry and cavalry, besides a number of elephants. Beyond the river Ebro he found himself in hostile territory, through which the soldiers had to fight their way. To force the passage of the Pyrenees and the Alps cost him more than half his original army. When, after a five months' march he stood on the soil of Italy, Hannibal had scarcely twenty-five thousand troops with which to meet the immense power of Rome--a power that, given time, could muster to her defense more than half a million disciplined soldiers.

FIRST VICTORIES OF HANNIBAL

The Romans were surprised by the boldness and rapidity of Hannibal's movements. They had expected to conduct the war far away in foreign lands; they now knew that they must fight for their own homes and firesides. The first battles were complete victories for the Carthaginians and opened the road to Rome. Hannibal's plans, however, did not include a siege of the capital. He would not shatter his victorious army in an assault on a fortified town. Hannibal's real object was to bring the Italians over to his side, to ruin Rome through the revolts of her allies. But now he learned, apparently for the first time, that Italy was studded with Latin colonies, [3] each a miniature Rome, each prepared to resist to the bitter end. Not a single city opened its gates to the invader. On such solid foundations rested Roman rule in Italy.

A DICTATORSHIP

The Senate faced the crisis with characteristic energy. New forces were raised and intrusted to a dictator, [4] Quintus Fabius Maximus. He refused to meet Hannibal in a pitched battle, but followed doggedly his enemy's footsteps, meanwhile drilling his soldiers to become a match for the Carthaginian veterans. This strategy was little to the taste of the Roman populace, who nicknamed Fabius Cunctator, "the Laggard." However, it gave Rome a brief breathing space, until her preparations to crush the invader should be completed.

BATTLE OF CANNAE, 316 B.C.

After the term of Fabius as dictator had expired, new consuls were chosen. They commanded the largest army Rome had ever put in the field. The opposing forces met at Cannae in Apulia. The Carthaginians numbered less than fifty thousand men; the Romans had more than eighty thousand troops. Hannibal's sole superiority lay in his cavalry, which was posted on the wings with the infantry occupying the space between. Hannibal's center was weak and gave way before the Romans, who fought this time massed in solid columns. The arrangement was a poor one, for it destroyed the mobility of the legions. The Roman soldiers, having pierced the enemy's lines, now found themselves exposed on both flanks to the African infantry and taken in the rear by Hannibal's splendid cavalry. The battle ended in a hideous butchery. One of the consuls died fighting bravely to the last; the other escaped from the field and with the wreck of his army fled to Rome. A Punic commander who survived such a disaster would have perished on the cross; the Roman commander received the thanks of the Senate "for not despairing of the republic." [5]

AFTER CANNAE

The battle of Cannae marks the summit of Hannibal's career. He maintained himself in Italy for thirteen years thereafter, but the Romans, taught by bitter experience, refused another engagement with their foe. Hannibal's army was too small and too poorly equipped with siege engines for a successful attack on Rome. His brother, Hasdrubal, led strong reinforcements from Spain to Italy, but these were caught and destroyed before they could effect a junction with Hannibal's troops. Meanwhile the brilliant Roman commander, Publius Scipio, drove the Carthaginians from Spain and invaded Africa. Hannibal was summoned from Italy to face this new adversary. He came, and on the field of Zama (202 B.C.) met his first and only defeat. Scipio, the victor, received the proud surname, Africanus.

PEACE IN 201 B.C.

Exhausted Carthage could now do no more than sue for peace on any terms that Rome was willing to grant. In the hour of defeat she still trusted her mighty soldier, and it was Hannibal who conducted the final negotiations. The conditions of peace were severe enough. The Carthaginians gave up Spain and all their ships except ten triremes. They were saddled with a huge indemnity and bound to engage in no war without the consent of Rome. Carthage thus became a dependent ally of the Roman city.

VICTORIOUS ROME

In describing the course and outcome of the Second Punic War our sympathies naturally go out to the heroic figure of Hannibal, who fought so long and so bravely for his native land. It is clear, however, that Rome's victory in the gigantic struggle was essential to the continued progress of classical civilization. The triumph of Carthage in the third century, like that of Persia in the fifth century, [6] must have resulted in the spread of Oriental ideas and customs throughout the Mediterranean. From this fate Rome saved Europe.

58. ROMAN SUPREMACY IN THE WEST AND IN THE EAST, 201-133 B.C.

THIRD PUNIC WAR BEGUN, 148 B.C.

Carthage had been humbled, but not destroyed. She still enjoyed the advantages of her magnificent situation and continued to be a competitor of Rome for the trade of the Mediterranean. The Romans watched with jealousy the reviving strength of the Punic city and at last determined to blot it out of existence. In 149 B.C. a large army was landed in Africa, and the inhabitants of Carthage were ordered to remove ten miles from the sea. They resolved to perish in the ruins of their capital, rather than obey such a cruel command.

DESTRUCTION OF CARTHAGE, 146 B.C.

Carthage held out for three years. The doubtful honor of its capture belonged to Scipio Aemilianus, grandson, by adoption, of the victor of Zama. For seven days the legionaries fought their way, street by street, house by house, until only fifty thousand inhabitants were left to surrender to the tender mercies of the Romans. The Senate ordered that the city should be burned and that its site should be plowed up and dedicated to the infernal gods. Such was the end of the most formidable rival Rome ever met in her career of conquest. [7]

SICILY

The two European countries, Sicily and Spain, which Rome had taken from Carthage, presented to the conqueror very different problems. Sicily had been long accustomed to foreign masters. Its civilized and peace-loving inhabitants were as ready to accept Roman rule as, in the past, they had accepted the rule of Greeks and Carthaginians. Every year the island became more and more a part of Italy and of Rome.

SPAIN

Spain, on the contrary, gave the Romans some hard fighting. The wild Spanish tribes loved their liberty, and in their mountain fastnesses long kept up a desperate struggle for independence. It was not until the Romans sent Scipio Aemilianus to Spain that the Spanish resistance was finally overcome (133 B.C.).

ROMANIZATION OF SPAIN

All Spain, except the inaccessible mountain district in the northwest, now became Roman territory. Many colonists settled there; traders and speculators flocked to seaports; even the legionaries, quartered in Spain for long periods, married Spanish wives and, on retiring from active service, made their homes in the peninsula. Rome thus continued in Spain the process of Romanization which she had begun in Italy. [8] She was to repeat this process in Gaul and Britain. [9] Her way was prepared by the sword; but after the sword came civilization.

ROME AND MACEDONIA

While Rome was subduing the West, she was also extending her influence over the highly civilized peoples of the East. Roman interference in the affairs of Macedonia found an excuse in the attempt of that country, during the Second Punic War, to give aid to Hannibal. It was a fateful moment when, for the second time, the legion faced the phalanx. The easy victory over Macedonia showed that this Hellenistic kingdom was no match for the Italian republic. Macedonia was finally made into a subject state or province of Rome. Thus disappeared a great power, which Philip had founded and which Alexander had led to the conquest of the world.

ROME AND GREECE

Having subdued Macedonia, Rome proclaimed Greece a free state. But this "freedom" really meant subjection, as was amply proved when some of the Greek cities rose in revolt against Roman domination. The heavy hand of Roman vengeance especially descended on Corinth, at this time one of the most beautiful cities of the world. In 146 B.C., the same year in which the destruction of Carthage occurred, Corinth was sacked and burned to the ground. [10] The fall of Corinth may be said to mark the final extinction of Greek liberty. Though the Hellenic cities and states were allowed to rule themselves, they paid tribute and thus acknowledged the supremacy of Rome. A century later, Greece became in name, as well as in fact, a province of the Roman Empire. [11]

ROME AND SYRIA

Rome, in the meantime, was drawn into a conflict with the kingdom of Syria. That Asiatic power proved to be no more capable than Macedonia of checking the Roman advance. The Syrian king had to give up the greater part of his possessions in Asia Minor. The western part of the peninsula, together with the Greek cities on the coast, was formed in 133 B.C. into the province of Asia. Thus the same year that witnessed the complete establishment of Roman rule in Spain saw Rome gain her first possessions at the opposite end of the Mediterranean.

POLITICAL SITUATION IN 133 B.C.

Roman supremacy over the Mediterranean world was now all but complete. In 264 B.C. Rome had been only one of the five great Mediterranean states. In 133 B.C. no other power existed to match its strength with that of Rome. To her had fallen in the West the heritage of Carthage, in the East the heritage of Alexander. Rome had built up this mighty empire at a terrible cost in blood and treasure. Let us see what use she was to make of it.

59. THE MEDITERRANEAN WORLD UNDER ROMAN RULE

CREATION OF THE PROVINCIAL SYSTEM

Rome's dealings with the new dependencies across the sea did not follow the methods that had proved so successful in Italy. The Italian peoples had been treated with great liberality. Rome regarded them as allies, exempted them from certain taxes, and in many instances gave them Roman citizenship. It did not seem possible to extend this wise policy to remote and often barbarous lands beyond the borders of Italy. Rome adopted, instead, much the same system of imperial rule that had been previously followed by Persia and by Athens. [12] She treated the foreign peoples from Spain to Asia as subjects and made her conquered territories into provinces. [13] Their inhabitants were compelled to pay tribute and to accept the oversight of Roman officials.

EVILS OF THE PROVINCIAL SYSTEM

As the Romans came more and more to relish the opportunities for plunder afforded by a wealthy province, its inhabitants were often wretchedly misgoverned. Many governors of the conquered lands were corrupt and grasping men. They tried to wring all the money they could from their helpless subjects. To the extortions of the governors must be added those of the tax collectors, whose very name of "publican" [14] became a byword for all that was rapacious and greedy. In this first effort to manage the world she had won, Rome had certainly made a failure. A city-state could not rule, with justice and efficiency, an empire.

THE PROFITS OF CONQUEST

In the old days, before Rome entered on a career of foreign conquest, her citizens were famous among men for their love of country, their simple lives, and their conservative, old-fashioned ways. They worked hard on their little farms, fought bravely in the legions, and kept up with careful piety all the ceremonies of their religion. But now the Roman republic was an imperial power with all the privileges of universal rule. Her foreign wars proved to be immensely profitable. At the end of a successful campaign the soldiers received large gifts from their general, besides the booty taken from the enemy. The Roman state itself profited from the sale of enslaved prisoners and their property. Large sums of money were sometimes seized and taken to Rome. When once peace had been made, the Roman governors and tax collectors followed in the wake of the armies and squeezed the provincials at every turn. The Romans, indeed, seem to have conquered the world less for glory than for profit.

GROWTH OF LUXURY

So much wealth poured into Rome from every side that there could scarcely fail to be a sudden growth of luxurious tastes. Rich nobles quickly developed a relish for all sorts of reckless display. They built fine houses adorned with statues, costly paintings, and furnishings. They surrounded themselves with troops of slaves. Instead of plain linen clothes they and their wives wore garments of silk and gold. At their banquets they spread embroidered carpets, purple coverings, and dishes of gilt plate. Pomp and splendor replaced the rude simplicity of an earlier age.

DISAPPEARANCE OF THE PEASANTRY

But if the rich were becoming richer, it seems that the poor were also becoming poorer. After Rome became mistress of the Mediterranean, her markets were flooded with the cheap wheat raised in the provinces, especially in those granaries, Sicily and Africa. The price of wheat fell so low that Roman peasants could not raise enough to support their families and pay their taxes. When agriculture became unprofitable, the farmer was no longer able to remain on the soil. He had to sell out, often at a ruinous sacrifice. His land was bought by capitalists, who turned many small fields into vast sheep pastures and cattle ranches. Gangs of slaves, laboring under the lash, gradually took the place of the old Roman peasantry, the very strength of the state. Not unjust was the famous remark, "Great domains ruined Italy." [15]

THE EXODUS OF THE CITIES

The decline of agriculture and the disappearance of the small farmer under the stress of foreign competition may be studied in modern England as well as in ancient Italy. Nowadays an English farmer, under the same circumstances, will often emigrate to America or to Australia, where land is cheap and it is easy to make a living. But these Roman peasants did not care to go abroad and settle on better soil in Spain or in Africa. They thronged, instead, to the cities, to Rome especially, where they labored for a small wage, fared plainly on wheat bread, and dwelt in huge lodging houses, three or four stories high.

THE CITY MOB

We know very little about this poorer population of Rome. They must have lived from hand to mouth. Since their votes controlled elections, [16] they were courted by candidates for office and kept from grumbling by being fed and amused. Such poor citizens, too lazy for steady work, too intelligent to starve, formed, with the other riffraff of a great city, the elements of a dangerous mob. And the mob, henceforth, plays an ever- larger part in the history of the times.

HELLENIC INFLUENCE AT ROME

We must not imagine, however, that all the changes in Roman life worked for evil. If the Romans were becoming more luxurious, they were likewise gaining in culture. The conquests which brought Rome in touch, first with Magna Graecia and Sicily, then with Greece itself and the Hellenic East, prepared the way for the entrance of Hellenism. Roman soldiers and traders carried back to Italy an acquaintance with Greek customs and ideas. Thousands of cultivated Greeks, some as slaves, others as freemen, settled in the capital as actors, physicians, artists, and writers. There they introduced the Greek language, as well as the religion, literature, and art of their native land. Roman nobles of the better type began to take an interest in other things than simply farming, commerce, or war. They imitated Greek fashions in dress and manners, collected Greek books, and filled their homes with the productions of Greek artists. Henceforth every aspect of Roman society felt the quickening influence of the older, richer culture of the Hellenic world. It was a Roman poet who wrote, "Captive Greece captured her conqueror rude." [17]

60. THE GRACCHI

TIBERIUS AND GAIUS GRACCHUS

In 133 B.C., a year otherwise made memorable by the final subjugation of Spain and the acquisition of Asia, efforts began Rome to remedy some of the disorders which were now seen to be sapping the strength of Roman society. The first persons to undertake the work of reform were the two brothers, Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus. The Gracchi belonged to the highest nobility of Rome. Their father had filled a consulship and a censorship and had celebrated triumphs. Cornelia, their mother, was a daughter of Scipio Africanus, the conqueror of Hannibal. A fine type of the Roman matron, she called her boys her "jewels," more precious than gold, and brought them up to love their country better than their own lives. Tiberius, the elder brother, was only thirty years of age when he became a tribune and began his career in Roman politics.

AGRARIAN LAW OF TIBERIUS GRACCHUS

Tiberius signalized his election to the tribunate by bringing forward his celebrated agrarian law. He proposed that the public lands of Rome, then largely occupied by wealthy men who alone had the money necessary to work them with cattle and slaves, should be reclaimed by the state, divided into small tracts, and given to the poorer citizens. By getting the people back again on the soil, Tiberius hoped to revive the declining agriculture of Italy.

DEFECTS OF THE AGRARIAN LAW

This agrarian law, though well intentioned, did not go to the root of the real difficulty--foreign competition. No legislation could have helped the farming class, except import duties to keep out the cheap grain from abroad. But the idle mob at Rome, controlling the assemblies, would never have voted in favor of taxing their food, thus making it more expensive. At the same time the proposal to take away part of the public domains from its possessors roused a hornet's nest about the reformer's ears. Rich people had occupied the public land for so long that they had come to look upon it as really their own. They would be very sure to oppose such a measure. Poor people, of course, welcomed a scheme which promised to give them farms for nothing. Tiberius even wished to use the public funds to stock the farms of his new peasantry. This would have been a mischievous act of state philanthropy.

FAILURE AND DEATH OF TIBERIUS, 133 B.C.

In spite of these defects in his measure, Tiberius urged its passage with fiery eloquence. But the great landowners in the Senate got another tribune, devoted to their interests, to place his veto [18] on the proposed legislation. The impatient Tiberius at once took a revolutionary step. Though a magistrate could not legally be removed from office, Tiberius had the offending tribune deposed and dragged from his seat. The law was then passed without further opposition. This action of Tiberius placed him clearly in the wrong. The aristocrats threatened to punish him as soon as his term of office was over. To avoid impeachment Tiberius sought reelection to the tribunate for the following year. This, again, was contrary to custom, since no one might hold office for two successive terms. On the day appointed for the election, while voting was in progress, a crowd of angry senators burst into the Forum and killed Tiberius, together with three hundred of his followers. Both sides had now begun to display an utter disregard for law. Force and bloodshed, henceforth, were to help decide political disputes.

GAIUS GRACCHUS BECOMES TRIBUNE, 123 B.C.

Tiberius Gracchus, in his efforts to secure economic reform, had unwittingly provoked a conflict between the Senate and the assemblies. Ten years after his death, his brother, Gaius Gracchus, came to the front. Gaius quickly made himself a popular leader with the set purpose of remodeling the government of Rome. He found in the tribunate an office from which to work against the Senate. After the death of Tiberius a law had been passed permitting a man to hold the position of tribune year after year. Gaius intended to be a sort of perpetual tribune, and to rule the Roman assemblies very much as Pericles had ruled the people at Athens. [19] One of his first measures was a law permitting the sale of grain from the public storehouses to Roman citizens at about half the market price. This measure, of course, won over the city mob, but it must be regarded as very unwise. It saddled the treasury with a heavy burden, and later the government had to furnish the grain for nothing. Indiscriminate charity of this sort increased, rather than lessened, the number of paupers.

MEASURES OF GAIUS TO RELIEVE THE POOR

Having won popular support, Gaius was able to secure the additional legislation which he deemed necessary to carry out his brother's work. He reenacted the land laws for the benefit of the peasantry and furnished work for the unemployed by building roads throughout Italy. He also began to establish colonies of poor citizens, both in Italy and in the provinces. This was a wise policy. Had it been allowed to continue, such state-assisted emigration, by providing the landless poor of Italy with farms abroad, would have relieved the economic distress of the peninsula.

AN EFFORT TO EXTEND ROMAN CITIZENSHIP

Gaius now came forward with another measure which marked him as an able and prudent statesman. He proposed to bestow the right of voting in the Roman assemblies upon the inhabitants of the Latin colonies. [20] He thought, also, that the Italian allies should be allowed to intermarry with Romans and hold property under the protection of the Roman law. No doubt Gaius believed that the time might come when all the Italian peoples would be citizens of Rome. This time did come, thirty years later, but only after a terrible war that nearly ruined Rome.

FAILURE AND DEATH OF GAIUS, 121 B.C.

The effort by Gaius to extend Roman citizenship cost the reformer all his hard-won popularity. It aroused the jealousy of the selfish city mob, which believed that the entrance of so many new citizens would mean the loss of its privileges. There would not be so many free shows and so much cheap grain. So the people rejected the measure and, turning from their former favorite, failed to reëlect him to the tribunate. When Gaius was no longer protected by the sanctity of the tribune's office, [21] he fell an easy victim to senatorial hatred. Another bloody tumult broke out, in which Gaius and three thousand of his followers perished. The consul who quelled the disturbance erected at the head of the Forum a temple to Harmony (Concordia).

THE GRACCHI BEGIN THE REVOLUTION

The pathetic career of the Gracchi had much significance in Roman history. They were the unconscious sponsors of a revolutionary movement which did not end until the republic had come under the rule of one man. They failed because they put their trust in the support of the Roman mob. Future agitators were to appear with the legionaries at their heels.

61. MARIUS AND SULLA

MARIUS AND THE JUGURTHINE WAR, 112-106 B.C.

Although Rome now ruled throughout the Mediterranean, she was constantly engaged in border wars in one corner or another of her wide dominions. These wars brought to the front new military leaders, of whom the first was Gaius Marius. He was a peasant's son, a coarse, rude soldier, but an honest, courageous, and able man. Marius rose to prominence in the so- called Jugurthine War, which the Romans were waging against Jugurtha, king of Numidia. That wily African had discovered that it was easier to bribe the Roman commanders than to fight them; and the contest dragged on in disgraceful fashion year after year. Marius at last persuaded the people to elect him consul and intrust him with the conduct of the war. By generalship and good fortune he speedily concluded the struggle and brought Jugurtha in chains to Rome.

MARIUS AND THE WAR WITH THE GERMANS, 102-101 B.C.

A few years later Marius had another opportunity to win distinction. He became the defender of Rome and Italy against a dangerous invasion of Germanic barbarians, who were ravaging Transalpine Gaul and the Po Valley. The decisive victories which Marius gained over them removed a grave danger which threatened the Roman world. The time had not yet come for ancient civilization to be submerged under a wave of barbarism.

SULLA AND THE SOCIAL WAR, 90-88 B.C.

The second military leader whom this troubled period brought forth was Lucius Cornelius Sulla. He was a man of noble birth, and with his social gifts, his appreciation of art and letters, his knowledge of men and the world, presented a sharp contrast to Marius. Sulla's great abilities quickly brought him into public notice; he rose rapidly from one office to another; and in the Social War showed his skill as a commander. This struggle was the consequence of Rome's refusal to grant the rights of citizenship to her Italian allies. The strength of the rebellion lay among the Samnites and other peoples of central and southern Italy. The war came to an end only when Rome promised the franchise to all Italians who returned to their allegiance. Before many years had passed, the inhabitants of nearly all the Italian towns south of the Rubicon River received Roman citizenship. It was this same wise policy of making conquered peoples equal with herself that afterwards led Rome to grant citizenship to the inhabitants of the provinces. [22]

SULLA AND THE MITHRADATIC WAR, 88-84 B.C.

What military honors were gained in the struggle belonged to Sulla. His reward was the consulship and an appointment as general in still another conflict which distracted Rome had to face. While that city had been busy with civil enemies and barbarian foes, a powerful state, known as Pontus, had been growing up in Asia Minor. Its king, Mithradates, overran the Roman provinces in the Orient and threatened to annex them to his own kingdom. But Sulla, with greatly inferior forces, compelled Mithradates to abandon his conquests, surrender his fleet, and pay a large indemnity. If Marius had the honor of repelling the barbarian invasion of the West, Sulla had the honor of preserving Rome's possessions in the East.

RIVALRY OF MARIUS AND SULLA

Marius and Sulla were rivals not only in war but also in politics. Sulla naturally espoused the aristocratic cause and stood as the champion of the Senate. Marius just as naturally became the head of the democratic party. The rivalry between the two leaders finally led to civil war. During Sulla's absence in the East the democrats got the upper hand at Rome and revenged themselves by murdering their political foes among the aristocrats. The reign of terror ended only with the sudden death of Marius, just after he had been elected to his seventh consulship. A few years later Sulla returned to Italy with his army and defeated the democrats in a great battle outside the Colline Gate of Rome. Sulla signalized his victory by ordering the assassination of every prominent man in the democratic party.

SULLA AS "PERPETUAL DICTATOR"

Sulla regarded this legalized butchery as a necessary step in his self- appointed task of putting the Roman government once more to rights. He now received the title of "Perpetual Dictator," with complete authority to govern the state until the new order of things should be established. Rome thus came under the rule of one man for the first time since the expulsion of the kings.

SULLA'S DEATH, 78 B.C.

The various measures by which Sulla intrenched the Senate in power did not long survive his death and hence had no lasting influence on Roman politics. After a rule of three years Sulla voluntarily gave up the dictatorship and retired to his villa on the bay of Naples. He died a few months later. The Senate honored him with a public funeral, the most splendid that Rome had ever seen. His monument bore an inscription which the dictator himself is said to have composed: "No friend ever did him a kindness and no enemy, a wrong, without being fully repaid." [23] That was one epitaph which told the truth.

62. POMPEY AND CAESAR

RISE OF POMPEY

The struggle between Marius and Sulla, decided as it was by the sword, marks a stage in the decline of the Roman Republic. The careers of these two men showed how easily the state could be ruled by a successful commander who had his soldiers behind him. After Sulla's death his friend Pompey became the leading figure in Roman politics. Pompey's first service was in Spain, where the adherents of Marius sought to humble the Senate and the aristocratic party by encouraging the Spaniards to rise against Roman rule. Having crushed this rebellion, Pompey returned to Italy in time to take part in putting down a formidable insurrection of slaves, outlaws, and ruined peasants. He was next intrusted with the war against the pirates, who swarmed in the Mediterranean, preyed on commerce, and plundered wealthy cities near the coast. Brilliant success in clearing the seas of these marauders led to his being sent to the East to end the war with Mithradates, who was once more in arms against Rome. Pompey drove the Pontic monarch from his kingdom and then annexed Syria to the Roman dominions. When Pompey returned to Rome in 62 B.C., he brought with him a reputation as the most successful general of his time.

MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO

We have seen how steadily since the days of the Gracchi the Roman state had been moving toward the rule of one man. Marius, Sulla, and Pompey each represent a step in the direction of monarchy. Yet there were still able and patriotic leaders at Rome who believed in the old order of things and tried their best to uphold the fast-perishing republic. No republican statesman was more devoted to the constitution than Cicero. A native of Arpinum, the same Italian town which had already given birth to Marius, Cicero came to Rome a youth without wealth or family influence. He made his way into Roman society by his social and conversational powers and by his capacity for friendship. His mind had been carefully trained under the influence of Hellenic culture; he had traveled and studied in Greece; and throughout life he loved to steal away from the tumult of the Forum and the law courts and enjoy the companionship of his books. Though the proud nobles were inclined to look down on him as a "new man," Cicero's splendid eloquence soon gave him prominence in politics. He ranks in fame as the second orator of antiquity, inferior only to Demosthenes.

IMPEACHMENT OF VERRES, 70 B.C.

Cicero rose to prominence through his prosecution of Verres, a thieving governor of Sicily. Verres had powerful friends among the nobles at Rome and counted on his influence and wealth to escape punishment. He openly boasted that he had plunder enough to live in luxury, even though he had to surrender two-thirds of it as fees to his lawyers and bribes to the jury. But Verres had not reckoned with the brilliant young advocate who took up the cause of the oppressed provincials. Cicero hurried to Sicily and there collected such an overwhelming mass of evidence that the bare statement of the facts was enough to condemn the criminal. Verres went into exile. Cicero became the head of the Roman bar. Seven years later he was elected consul.

CONSPIRACY OF CATILINE, 63 B.C.

The year of Cicero's consulship was marked by an event which throws a lurid light on the conditions of the time. Lucius Catiline, a young noble of ability, but bankrupt in character and purse, organized a conspiracy to seize Rome, murder the magistrates, and plunder the rich. He gathered about himself outlaws of every description, slaves, and starving peasants --all the discontented and needy classes throughout Italy. He and his associates were desperate anarchists who sought to restore their own broken fortunes by overturning the government. The spread of the insurrection was checked by Cicero's vigorous measures. In a series of famous speeches he exposed Catiline's plans to the astounded Senate. Catiline then fled to his camp in Etruria and shortly afterwards perished in battle, together with three thousand of his followers. Cicero now gained fresh popularity and honor. The grateful citizens called him "Father of his Country" (Pater Patriae).

RISE OF CAESAR

Rome at this time held another prominent leader in politics, namely, Gaius Julius Caesar. He belonged to a noble family, but his father had favored the democratic cause and his aunt had married Marius. After Sulla's death Caesar threw himself with energy into the game of politics at the capital city. In these early years the future statesman seems to have been a demagogue of the usual type, who sought through the favor of the people a rapid rise to power. He won the ear of the multitude by his fiery harangues, his bribes of money, and his gifts of food and public shows. Caesar's expenditures for such purposes were enormous. Before he was twenty-four he had spent all his private fortune. Henceforth he was "financed" by the millionaire Crassus, who lent him the money so necessary for a successful career as a politician.

THE FIRST TRIUMVIRATE, 60 B.C.

Caesar and Crassus, the two leaders of the democratic party at Rome, now joined with Pompey in what is called the First Triumvirate. To this "ring" Pompey contributed his military reputation, Crassus, his wealth, and Caesar, his influence over the Roman mob. Supported both by the people and by the army, these three men were really masters of Rome. An immediate result of the First Triumvirate was the appointment of Caesar as governor of Cisalpine and Transalpine Gaul.

CAESAR'S CAMPAIGNS IN GAUL, 58-50 B.C.

The story of his career in Gaul has been related by Caesar himself in the famous Commentaries. This book describes a series of military successes which have given the author a place among the world's generals. Caesar overran Transalpine Gaul, twice bridged the Rhine and invaded Germany, made two expeditions to Britain, and brought within the Roman dominions all the territory bounded by the Pyrenees, the Alps, the Rhine, and the Atlantic Ocean.

ROMANIZATION OF GAUL

Caesar's conquests in Gaul are more than a chapter in the history of the art of war. They belong to the history of civilization. Henceforth the frontier of prehistoric Europe retreated rapidly to the north. The map of the ancient civilized world widened from the Mediterranean basin to the shores of the Atlantic. Into the conquered lands came the Latin language, the Roman law, and the customs and institutions of Rome. Gaul speedily became one of the most flourishing parts of the Roman world. "Let the Alps sink," exclaimed Cicero, "the gods raised them to shelter Italy from the barbarians, but now they are no longer needed."

DEFEAT AND DEATH OF CRASSUS, 53 B.C.

During Caesar's long absence in Gaul the First Triumvirate was suddenly ended by the death of one of its members. It had been a part of their bargain in dividing the Roman world that Crassus should have the government of Syria. But this unlucky general, while aspiring to rival Caesar's exploits by new conquests beyond the Euphrates, lost his army and his life in battle with the Parthians. Besides checking the extension of the Roman arms in the remote East, the disaster had its effect on Roman politics. It dissolved the triumvirate and prepared the way for that rivalry between Caesar and Pompey which formed the next step in the downward course of the republic.

GROWING OPPOSITION BETWEEN POMPEY AND CAESAR

The two men were now rapidly drawing apart. Pompey grew more and more jealous of Caesar and more and more fearful that the latter was aiming at despotic power. He himself had no desire to be king or dictator. He was equally determined that Caesar should not gain such a position. In this attitude he had the full support of Cicero and the other members of the Senate. They saw clearly that the real danger to the state was Caesar, not Pompey.

CAESAR DECLARES WAR IN THE REPUBLIC, 49 B.C.

Caesar's command in Gaul was to expire in 49 B.C. The senatorial party desired that he should return to Rome without an army. His opponents intended to prosecute him when he became a private citizen. Caesar had no inclination to trust himself to their tender mercies and refused to disband his legions unless his rival did the same. Finally the Senate, conscious of Pompey's support, ordered him to lay down his arms on pain of outlawry. Caesar replied to this challenge of the Senate by leading his troops across the Rubicon, the little stream that separated Cisalpine Gaul from Italy. As he plunged into the river, he exclaimed, "The die is cast." [24] He had now declared war on the republic.

CAESAR MASTER OF THE WEST

Caesar's bold movement caught the senatorial party unawares. Pompey could not gather his legions before his audacious foe reached Rome. Finding it impossible to make a stand in Italy, Pompey, with the consuls and many senators, withdrew to Greece. Caesar did not follow him at once. He hurried to Spain and, after a brilliant campaign only six weeks in length, broke down the republican resistance in that peninsula. Having now secured Italy and Spain, Caesar was free to turn his forces against Pompey in the East.

BATTLE OF PHARSALUS, 48 B.C.

The final battle took place on the plain of Pharsalus in Thessaly. Pompey's troops, though nearly twice as numerous as Caesar's, were defeated after a severe struggle. Their great leader then fled to Egypt, only to be foully murdered. Pompey's head was sent to Caesar, but he turned from it with horror. Such was the end of an able general and an honest man, one who should have lived two hundred years earlier, when Rome was still a free state.

CAESAR IN EGYPT, ASIA MINOR, AND AFRICA, 48-46 B.C.

After Pharsalus there still remained several years of fighting before Caesar's victory was complete. He made Cleopatra, the beautiful queen of Egypt, secure in the possession of the throne and brought that country into dependence on Rome. He passed through Asia Minor and in one swift campaign crushed a revolt headed by the son of Mithridates. The conqueror sent tidings of his victory in a laconic dispatch: "I came, I saw, I conquered." [25] After subduing the remnants of the senatorial party in Africa, Caesar returned home to crown his exploits by a series of splendid triumphs and to enjoy less than two years of untrammeled power.

63. THE WORK OF CAESAR

AUTHORITY AND POSITION OF CAESAR

The new government which Caesar brought into being was a monarchy in all except name. He became dictator for life and held other republican offices, such as the consulship and censorship. He refused the title of king, but accepted as a civil magistrate the name of imperator, [26] with which the soldiers had been wont to salute a victorious general. Though he abolished none of the old republican forms, the Senate became simply his advisory council, the assemblies, his submissive agents the consuls, praetors and tribunes, his pliant tools. The laurel wreath, the triumphal dress, the conqueror's scepter--all proclaimed the autocrat.

CHARACTER OF CAESAR'S RULE

Caesar used his power wisely and well. No massacres or confiscations sullied his victory. He treated his former foes with clemency and even with kindness. No sooner was domestic tranquillity assured than, with restless energy, he entered on a series of far-reaching reforms.

REFORMS AT ROME AND IN ITALY

Caesar's measures sought to remove the economic evils which a century of discord had made so manifest. By restricting the monthly distribution of grain to those actually in need, he tried to discourage the public charity which was making the capital city a paradise for the idle and the shiftless. By planning great colonies beyond the sea, notably at Corinth and Carthage, he sought to provide farms for the landless citizens of Italy. His active mind even found time for such matters as the codification of Roman law, the construction of great public works, and the improvement of the coinage and the calendar. [27]

REFORMATION OF THE PROVINCIAL SYSTEM

Caesar's reforms in the provinces had an epoch-making character. He reduced taxes, lessened the burden of their collection, and took into his own hands the appointment of provincial magistrates. Henceforth oppressive governors and swindling publicans had to expect swift, stern punishment from one whose interests included the welfare of both citizens and subjects. By granting Roman citizenship to communities in Gaul and Sicily, he indicated his purpose, as rapidly as possible, to convert the provincials into Romans. It was Caesar's aim to break down the barriers between Rome and her provinces, to wipe out the distinction between the conquerors and the conquered.

ASSASSINATION OF CAESAR, 44 B.C.

Caesar did not live to complete his task. Like that other colossal figure, Alexander the Great, he perished before his work as a statesman had hardly more than begun. On the Ides of March, 44 B.C., he was struck down in the Senate-house by the daggers of a group of envious and irreconcilable nobles, headed by Cassius and Brutus. He fell at the foot of Pompey's statue, pierced with no less than twenty-three wounds. His body was burnt on a pyre in the Forum, and his friend, Antony, pronounced the funeral eulogy.

CONSEQUENCES OF CAESAR'S DEATH

In the light of all the possibilities of beneficent government which Caesar was revealing, his cowardly murder becomes one of the most stupendous follies recorded in history. Caesar's death could not restore the republic. It served only to prolong disorder and strife within the Roman state. As Cicero himself said, hearing the news, "The tyrant is dead; the tyranny still lives."

64. ANTONY AND OCTAVIAN

ANTONY BECOMES CAESAR'S SUCCESSOR

The murderers of Caesar called themselves the "liberators" of the republic. They thought that all Rome would applaud their deed, but the contrary was true. The senatorial order remained lukewarm. The people, instead of flocking to their support, mourned the loss of a friend and benefactor. Soon the conspirators found themselves in great peril. Caesar's friend and lieutenant, Antony, who became sole consul after Caesar's death, quickly made himself master of the situation. Brutus and Cassius were forced to withdraw to the provinces which had been previously assigned to them by Caesar, leaving Antony to rule Rome as his successor.

A RIVAL IN THE YOUNG OCTAVIAN

Antony's hope of reigning supreme was soon disturbed by the appearance of a new rival. Caesar, in his will, had made his grandnephew, Octavian, [28] his heir. He now came to Rome to claim the inheritance. In that sickly, studious youth people did not at first recognize the masterful personality he was soon to exhibit. They rather reëchoed Cicero's sentiment that "the young man was to be praised, complimented, and got rid of." [29] But Octavian easily made himself a power, winning the populace by paying Caesar's legacies to them and conciliating the senatorial party by siding with it against Antony. Men now began to talk of Octavian as the destined restorer of the republic.

THE SECOND TRIUMVIRATE, 43 B.C.

Octavian, however, entertained other designs. He had never been sincere in his support of the Senate, and the distrustful policy of that body soon converted him into an active foe. From fighting Antony, Octavian turned to alliance with him. The two antagonists made up their differences, and with Lepidus, one of Caesar's lieutenants, as a third ally, marched on Rome at the head of their legions. The city fell again under military rule. The three men then united in the Second Triumvirate with full authority to govern and reorganize the state. The advent of this new tyranny was signalized by a butchery almost as bloody as Sulla's. Cicero, who had incurred the hatred of Antony by his fiery speeches against him, was the most illustrious victim. More than two thousand persons, mainly men of high rank, were slain. The triumvirs by this massacre firmly established their rule at Rome and in the West.

BATTLES OF PHILIPPI, 42 B.C.

In the East, where Brutus and Cassius had gathered a formidable force, the triumvirs were not to win without a struggle. It took place on the plain of Philippi in Macedonia. The two battles fought there ended in the suicide of the republican leaders and the dispersal of their troops. This was the last attempt to restore the republic by force of arms.

DIVISION OF THE ROMAN WORLD

Though the republic had been overthrown, it remained to be seen who would be master of the new empire, Antony or Octavian. The triumvirate lasted for more than ten years, but during this period the incompetent Lepidus was set aside by his stronger colleagues. The two remaining members then divided between them the Roman world. Octavian took Italy and the West; Antony took the East, with Alexandria as his capital.

OCTAVIAN IN THE WEST

In the western half of the empire Octavian ruled quietly and with success. Men were already congratulating themselves on the return of peace under a second Caesar. In a few years Octavian, from an obscure boy of eighteen, had grown to be one of the most powerful personalities of his age.

ANTONY IN THE EAST

In the eastern half of the empire things did not go so well. Antony was clever, but fond of luxury and vice. He had married a sister of Octavian, but he soon grew tired of her and put her away for the fascinating Cleopatra. [30] The Roman world was startled by tidings that she had been proclaimed "queen of kings," and that to her and her sons had been given the richest provinces in the East. It was even rumored that Cleopatra, having enslaved Antony with her charms, planned to be enthroned as queen at Rome.

BATTLE OF ACTIUM, 31 B.C.

Antony's disgraceful conduct aroused the Roman people. They willingly followed Octavian to a war against one who seemed a national enemy. A naval battle in the bay of Actium, on the coast of Epirus, decided the issue. The fight had hardly begun before Cleopatra and Antony sailed away, leaving their fleet to take care of itself. Octavian pursued the infatuated pair into Egypt. Antony committed suicide, and Cleopatra, rather than be led a captive in a Roman triumph, followed his example. With the death of Cleopatra the dynasty of the Ptolemies [31] came to an end. Egypt henceforth formed a province of the Roman Empire.

THE TRIUMPH OF OCTAVIAN

Octavian, on his return to Rome, enjoyed the honors of a three days' triumph. [32] As the grand parade moved along the Sacred Way through the Forum, and thence to the temple of Jupiter on the Capitoline, men noted that the magistrates, instead of heading the procession as was the custom, followed in the conqueror's train. It was a significant change. Octavian, not the magistrates of Rome, now ruled the Roman world.

65. THE END OF AN EPOCH

DOOM OF THE REPUBLIC

The republic, indeed, was doomed. A hundred years of dissension and civil warfare proclaimed clearly enough the failure of the old order. Rome was a city-state suddenly called to the responsibilities of universal rule. Both the machinery of her government and the morals of her people were inadequate for so huge a task. The gradual revolution which changed this Roman city-state into imperial Rome, judged by its results, is perhaps the most momentous movement in the annals of mankind. Let us summarize its course.

A CENTURY OF REVOLUTION

In 133 B.C. Roman society had been corrupted and enfeebled as the result of foreign conquests. The supreme power in the state more and more tended to fall into the hands of a narrow oligarchy--the senatorial nobility. Its dishonesty and weakness soon led to efforts at reform. The attempts of the Gracchi to overthrow the Senate's position and restore popular sovereignty ended in disaster. Then, in quick succession, arose a series of military leaders who aimed to secure by the sword what was no longer to be obtained through constitutional and legal means. Marius, a great general but no politician, could only break down and destroy. Sulla, a sincere but narrow-minded statesman, could do no more than prop up the structure-- already tottering--of senatorial rule. Pompey soon undid that work and left the constitution to become again the sport of rival soldiers. Caesar, triumphing over Pompey, gained a position of unchallenged supremacy. After Caesar's death, imperial power was permanently restored in the person of Octavian. The battle of Actium in 31 B.C. made Octavian master of the Roman world.

THE FUTURE

But the Romans were not yet an old and worn-out people. On the ruins of the old republican order it was still possible to build up a new imperial system in which good government, peace, and prosperity should prevail for more than two centuries. During this period Rome performed her real, her enduring, work for civilization.

STUDIES

1. Write a summary account (500 words) of Roman expansion 264-133 B.C.

2. On outline maps indicate the possessions of Carthage and Rome at the beginning of the First Punic War; at the beginning of the Second Punic War; at the end of the Second Punic War.

3. On outline maps indicate the boundaries of the Roman world in 133 B.C. and in 31 B.C. and the division into provinces at these dates.

4. What events are connected with the following places: Zama; Cannae; Actium; Pharsalus, and Philippi?

5. Who were Quintus Fabius Maximus, Mithradates, Catiline, and Cleopatra?

6. Identify the following dates: 146 B.C.; 264 B.C.; 133 B.C.; 201 B.C.; 44 B.C.; and 63 B.C.

7. Why has Carthage been called the "London" of the ancient world?

8. What is meant by the statement that Carthage is a "dumb actor on the stage of history"?

9. Was Rome wise in adopting her new policy of expansion beyond the limits of Italy?

10. Give some examples in modern times of war indemnities paid by defeated nations.

11. Why did the Romans call the Second Punic War the "War of Hannibal"?

12. What is a "Fabian policy"? Do you know why Washington was called the "American Fabius"?

13. What reasons can you give for Hannibal's early successes and final failure?

14. Show the signal importance to Rome of her control of the sea during the Second Punic War.

15. Comment on this statement: "As the rise of Rome was central in history, the Second Punic War was central in the rise of Rome."

16. What provinces had been formed by 133 B.C. (map facing page 184)?

17. What parts of the world belonged to Rome in 133 B.C. but were not yet provinces?

18. Might Rome have extended her federal policy to her territories outside of Italy? Was a provincial system really necessary?

19. Compare a Persian satrapy with a Roman province.

20. Would import duties on foreign grain have revived Italian agriculture?

21. Why did the cattle breeder in Italy have no reason to fear foreign competition?

22. Compare the Athenian practice of state pay with the Roman "bread and the games of the circus."

23. Had the Italians triumphed in the Social War, is it likely they would have established a better government than that of Rome?

24. Was Marius or was Sulla more to blame for the Civil War?

25. Explain the real meaning of Sulla's "perpetual dictatorship."

26. Why was the rule of the Senate, unsatisfactory though it was, to be preferred to that of the Roman populace?

27. Why is the First Triumvirate described as a "ring"? Did it have an official character?

28. Why does the First Triumvirate mark a distinct step toward the establishment of the empire?

29. Why can wars with barbarous and savage peoples be justified as "the most ultimately righteous of all wars"?

30. Can you suggest why Caesar's conquest of Gaul had even greater importance than Pompey's conquests in the East?

31. Was Caesar justified in leading his army against Rome?

32. Had Pompey triumphed over Caesar, is it probable that the republic would have been restored?

33. What contrasts can you draw between Caesar and Alexander?

34. Justify the aphorism, "In the midst of arms the laws are silent," by the statements in this chapter.

35. How do you account for the failure of the republican institutions of Rome?

FOOTNOTES

[1] Webster, Readings in Ancient History, chapter xv, "Hannibal and the Great Punic War"; chapter xvi, "Cato the Censor: a Roman of the Old School"; chapter xvii, "Cicero the Orator"; chapter xviii, "The Conquest of Gaul, Related by Caesar"; chapter xix, "The Makers of Imperial Rome: Character Sketches by Suetonius."

[2] See page 123.Return to passage

[3] See page 155.Return to passage

[4] See page 149.Return to passage

[5] Livy, xxii, 61.Return to passage

[6] See page 100.Return to passage

[7] In 29 B.C., one hundred and seventeen years after the destruction of Carthage at the end of the Punic wars, a new town was founded near the old site by the emperor Augustus. It became in time the third city of the Roman Empire. It was destroyed by the Arabs in 698 A.D.Return to passage

[8] See page 158.Return to passage

[9] See pages 184 and 197.Return to passage

[10] Corinth offered too good a site to remain long in ruins. Resettled in 46 B.C. as a Roman colony, it soon became one of the great cities in the empire. It was to the Corinthians that St Paul wrote two of his Epistles.Return to passage

[11] The Greeks were not again a free people until the nineteenth century of our era. In 1821 A.D. they rose against their Turkish masters in a glorious struggle for liberty. Eight years later the powers of Europe forced the Sultan to recognize the freedom of Greece. That country then became an independent kingdom, with its capital at Athens.Return to passage

[12] See pages 39-40 and 104.Return to passage

[13] In 133 B.C. there were eight provinces--Sicily, Sardinia and Corsica, Hither Spain, Farther Spain, Illyricum, Africa, Macedonia, and Asia. See the map facing page 184.Return to passage

[14] In the New Testament "publicans and sinners" are mentioned side by side. See Matthew, ix, 10.Return to passage

[15] Latifundia perdidere Italiam (Pliny, Natural History, xviii, 7).Return to passage

[16] See page 155.Return to passage

[17] Horace, Epistles, ii, 1, 156.Return to passage

[18] See page 103.Return to passage

[19] See page 150.Return to passage

[20] See page 155, note 2.Return to passage

[21] See page 150.Return to passage

[22] See page 204.Return to passage

[23] Plutarch, Sulla, 38.Return to passage

[24] Suetonius, Julius Caesar, 32.Return to passage

[25] Veni, vidi, vici (Suetonius, Julius Caesar, 37).Return to passage

[26] Hence our word "emperor."Return to passage

[27] Before Caesar's reform (46 B.C.) the Roman year consisted of 12 months and 355 days. As this lunar year, like that of the Greeks, was shorter than the solar year, it had been necessary to intercalate an additional month, of varying length, in every alternate year. Caesar adopted the more accurate Egyptian calendar of 365 days and instituted the system of leap years. His rearrangement made the year 11 minutes, 14 seconds too long. By 1582 A.D. this difference had amounted to nearly 10 days. Pope Gregory XIII modified the "Julian Calendar" by calling Oct. 5, 1582, Oct. 15, and continuing the count 10 days in advance. This "Gregorian Calendar" was adopted by Great Britain in 1752 A.D. and subsequently by other Protestant countries. It has not won acceptance in Russia and Greece. The difference between the two systems--the Old Style and the New Style--is now about 13 days.Return to passage

[28] His name was Octavius, but after his adoption by Caesar he called himself Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus.Return to passage

[29] Cicero, Letters, xix, 20.Return to passage

[30] See page 185.Return to passage

[31] See page 127.Return to passage

[32] See page 160.Return to passage

Chapter IX

THE EARLY EMPIRE: THE WORLD UNDER ROMAN RULE, 31 B.C.-l80 A.D. [1]

66. AUGUSTUS, 31 B.C.-l4 A.D.

THE EARLY EMPIRE, 31 B.C.-180 A.D.

The period of two hundred and eleven years, between the accession of Augustus and the death of Marcus Aurelius, is known as the Early Empire. As we shall now learn, it was a time of settled government and of internal tranquillity. Except for a brief period of anarchy at the close of the reign of Nero, it was also a time of regular succession to the throne. Nearly all the emperors were vigorous and capable rulers. The peace and prosperity which they gave to the Roman world amply justify--if justification be needed--the change from republic to empire.

THE NEW RULER

Few persons have set their stamp more indelibly on the pages of history than Octavian, whom we may now call by his more familiar name Augustus ("Majestic"). Augustus was no military genius to dazzle the world with his achievements. He was a cool and passionless statesman who took advantage of a memorable opportunity to remake the Roman state, and who succeeded in the attempt. Absolute power, which destroys weaker men, with Augustus brought out the nobler elements of character. From the successful leader of a party he became the wise and impartial ruler of an empire.

THE NEW GOVERNMENT

Augustus had almost unlimited power. His position was that of a king, as supreme as Julius Caesar had ever been. Better, however, than Julius Caesar, Augustus realized that an undisguised autocracy would only alienate public opinion and invite fresh plots and rebellions, Augustus intended to be the real master, but he would also be careful to conceal his authority under republican forms. The emperor was neither king, dictator, nor triumvir. He called himself a republican magistrate-- Princeps [2]--the "First Citizen" of the state.

POWERS ENJOYED BY AUGUSTUS

Augustus gave up the externals, only to keep the essentials, of royalty. He held the proconsular authority, which extended over the frontier provinces and their legions. He held the tribunician authority, which made his person sacred. As perpetual tribune he could preside over the popular assemblies, manage the Senate and change its membership at pleasure, and veto the acts of almost any magistrate. In the provinces and at home in the capital city the emperor was supreme.

THE EMPIRE UNDER AUGUSTUS

Augustus ruled a vast realm. In it all the dreams of world dominion which Alexander had cherished were more than realized. The empire included nearly the entire circle of the Mediterranean lands. On the west and south it found natural barriers in the Atlantic Ocean and the African desert. On the east the Euphrates River had formed, since the defeat of Crassus, [3] the dividing line between Rome and Parthia. The northern frontier, beyond which lay the Germanic barbarians, required, however, additional conquests for its protection.

THE DANUBE BOUNDARY

The Danube River made an admirable boundary for much of the Roman territory between the Black Sea and the Rhine. Augustus annexed the district south of the lower course of this river and formed it into the province of Moesia (modern Serbia and Bulgaria). The line of the upper Danube was later secured by the creation of three new provinces on the northern slopes of the Alps. [4] Henceforth the Balkan peninsula and Italy on the northeast, where the Alpine passes are low and comparatively easy, were shielded from attack.

THE RHINE BOUNDARY

After the conquests of Julius Caesar in Gaul the Rhine had become the frontier between that country and Germany. Augustus repeatedly sent the legions into western Germany on punitive expeditions to strike terror into its warlike tribes and to inspire respect for Roman power. It is doubtful, however, whether he ever intended to conquer Germany and to convert it into another province. His failure to do so meant that the Germans were not to be Romanized as were their neighbors, the Celts of Gaul. The Rhine continued to be the dividing-line between Roman civilization and Germanic barbarism.

THE AUGUSTAN AGE

The clash of arms on the distant frontiers scarcely disturbed the serenity of the Roman world. Within the boundaries of the empire the Augustan Age was an age of peace and prosperity. The emperor, with unwearied devotion, turned to the task of ruling wisely and well his vast dominions. He followed the example of Julius Caesar in his insistence on just government of the provincials. [5] In Italy he put down brigandage, repaired the public highways, and planted many colonies in unsettled districts. In Rome he established a regular police service, organized the supply of grain and water, and continued, on a larger scale than ever, the public games. So many were his buildings in the capital city that he could boast he had "found Rome of brick and left it of marble." [6] Augustus was also very successful as a religious reformer. He restored numerous temples that had fallen into decay, revived the ancient sacrifices, and celebrated with pomp and majesty the festivals that had been neglected. These reforms gave new vigor to the Roman state religion.

DEIFICATION OF AUGUSTUS

Even during the lifetime of Augustus worship had been offered to him by the provincials. After his death the Senate gave him divine honors and enrolled his name among the gods. Temples rose in every province to the deified Augustus, and altars smoked with sacrifices to him. Emperor worship spread rapidly over the ancient world and helped to unite all classes in allegiance to the new government. It provided a universal religion for a universal empire. Yet just at the time when this new cult was taking root, and in the midst of the happy reign of Augustus, there was born in Bethlehem of Judea the Christ whose religion was to overcome the worship of the emperors and with it all other faiths of pagan antiquity. [7]

67. THE SUCCESSORS OF AUGUSTUS, 14-96 A.D.

JULIAN AND CLAUDIAN CAESARS, 14-68 A.D.

For more than half a century following the death of Augustus his place was filled by emperors who, either by descent or adoption, claimed kinship with himself and the mighty Julius. They are known as the Julian and Claudian Caesars. [8] Though none of these four princes had the political ability of Augustus, two of them (Tiberius and Claudius) were excellent rulers, who ably maintained the standards set by that great emperor. The other two (Caligula and Nero) were vicious tyrants, the recital of whose follies and crimes occupies much space in the works of ancient historians. Their doings and misdoings fortunately exerted little influence outside the circle of the imperial court and the capital city. Rome itself might be disturbed by conspiracy and bloodshed, but Italy and the provinces kept their prosperity.

CONQUEST OF BRITAIN BEGUN, 43 A.D.

The reign of Claudius was marked by the beginning of the extension of the empire over Britain. For nearly a hundred years after Caesar's expeditions no further attempt had been made to annex that island. But its nearness to Gaul, already thoroughly Romanized, brought the country within the sphere of Roman influence. The thorough conquest of Britain proved to be no easy task. It was not until the close of the first century that the island, as far north as the Scottish Highlands, was brought under Roman sway. The province of Britannia remained a part of the empire for more than three hundred years.

BURNING OF ROME, 64 A.D.

During Nero's reign half of Rome was laid in ashes by a great fire, which raged for a week. But a new Rome speedily arose. It was a much finer city than the old, with wide, straight streets instead of narrow alleys, and with houses of good stone in place of wooden hovels. Except for the loss of the temples and public buildings, the fire was a blessing in disguise.

FLAVIAN CAESARS, 69-96 A.D.

After the death of Nero the dynasty that traced its descent from Julius and Augustus became extinct. There was no one who could legally claim the vacant throne. The Senate, which in theory had the appointment of a successor, was too weak to exercise its powers. The imperial guard and the legions on the frontiers placed their own candidates in the field. The Roman world fell into anarchy, and Italy became once more the seat of civil war. The throne was finally seized by the able general, Flavius Vespasianus, supported by the armies of the East. He and his two sons, Titus and Domitian, are called the Flavian Caesars.

CAPTURE OF JERUSALEM, 70 A.D.

During the reign of Vespasian a revolt of the Jews was crushed, and Jerusalem was captured by Titus, Vespasian's son. It is said, doubtless with exaggeration, that one million Jews perished in the siege, the most awful that history records. The Holy City, together with the Temple, was destroyed, and a Roman camp was pitched upon the spot. We may still see in Rome the splendid arch that commemorates this tragic event. [9]

ERUPTION OF VESUVIUS, 79 A.D.

The reign of Titus is chiefly memorable for the destruction of Pompeii and Herculaneum, two cites on the bay of Naples. After long inactivity the volcano of Vesuvius suddenly belched forth torrents of liquid lava and mud, followed by a rain of ashes. Pompeii was covered to a depth of about fifteen feet by the falling cinders. Herculaneum was overwhelmed in a sea of sulphurous mud and lava to a depth of eighty feet in many places. The cities were completely entombed, and in time even their location was forgotten. Modern excavations have disclosed a large part of Pompeii, with its streets, shops, baths, temples, and theaters. The visitor there gains a vivid impression of Roman life during the first century of our era. [10]

68. THE "GOOD EMPERORS," 96-180 A.D.

THE ANTONINE CAESARS

The five rulers--Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, and Marcus Aurelius--whose reigns cover the greater part of the second century, are sometimes called the Antonine Caesars, because two of them bore the name Antoninus. They are better known as the "Good Emperors," a title which well describes them. Under their just and beneficent government the empire reached its greatest prosperity.

TRAJAN THE CONQUEROR

The emperor Trajan rivaled Julius Caesar in military ability and enlarged the Roman world to the widest limits it was ever to attain. His first conquests were in Europe and resulted in the annexation of Dacia, an extensive territory north of the Danube. Thousands of colonists settled in Dacia and spread everywhere the language and arts of Rome. Its modern name (Rumania) bears witness to Rome's abiding influence there. Trajan's campaigns in Asia had less importance, though in appearance they were more splendid. He drove the Parthians from Armenia and conquered the Tigris- Euphrates valley. To hold in subjection such distant regions only increased the difficulty of guarding the frontiers. Trajan's successor, Hadrian, at once abandoned them.

HADRIAN THE ADMINISTRATOR

Hadrian distinguished himself as an administrator. He may be compared with Augustus in his love of peace and in his care for the interests of the provincials. Hadrian made two long journeys throughout the Roman world. On the frontiers he built fortresses and walls, in the provinces he raised baths, aqueducts, theaters, and temples. Scarcely a city throughout the empire lacked some monument to his generosity. Hadrian left behind him the memory of a prince whose life was devoted to the public welfare--the first servant of the state.

MARCUS AURELIUS, THE PHILOSOPHER ON THE THRONE

The last of the "Good Emperors," Marcus Aurelius, was a thinker and a student, but he enjoyed little opportunity for meditation. His reign was filled with an almost uninterrupted series of campaigns against the Parthians on the Euphrates and the Germans on the Danube and the Rhine. These wars revealed the weakness of the frontiers and rapidly growing strength of the barbarians. After the death of Marcus Aurelius the empire entered on its downward course. But before passing to this period of our study, we may take a survey of the world under Roman rule, during the two centuries between Augustus and Marcus Aurelius.

69. THE PROVINCES OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE

THE STANDING ARMY

The Roman Empire, at its widest extent in the second century, included forty-three provinces. They were protected against Germans, Parthians and other foes by twenty-five legions, numbering with the auxiliary forces, about three hundred thousand men. This standing army was one of Rome's most important agencies for the spread of her civilization over barbarian lands. Its membership was drawn largely from the border provinces, often from the very countries where the soldiers' camps were fixed. Though the army became less and less Roman in blood, it always kept in character and spirit the best traditions of Rome. The long intervals of peace were not passed by the soldiers in idleness. They built the great highways that penetrated every region of the empire, spanned the streams with bridges, raised dikes and aqueducts, and taught the border races the arts of civilization. It was due, finally, to the labors of the legionaries, that the most exposed parts of the frontiers were provided with an extensive system of walls and ramparts.

THE ROMAN ROADS

The Roman system of roads received its great extension during the imperial age. The principal trunk lines began at the gates of Rome and radiated thence to every province. Along these highways sped the couriers of the Caesars, carrying dispatches and making, by means of relays of horses, as much as one hundred and fifty miles a day. The roads resounded to the tramp of the legionaries passing to their stations on the distant frontier. Travelers by foot, horseback, or litter journeyed on them from land to land, employing maps which described routes and distances. Traders used them for the transport of merchandise. Roman roads, in short, were the railways of antiquity. [11]

THE PAX ROMANA

In her roads and fortifications, in the living rampart of her legions, Rome long found security. Except for the districts conquered by Trajan but abandoned by Hadrian, [12] the empire during this period did not lose a province. For more than two hundred years, throughout an area as large as the United States, the civilized world rested under what an ancient writer calls "the immense majesty of the Roman peace." [13]

EXTENSION OF ROMAN CITIZENSHIP

The grant of Roman citizenship to all Italians after the Social War [14] only increased for a time the contrast between Italy and the provinces. But even before the fall of the republic Caesar's legislation had begun the work of uniting the Roman and the provincial. [15] More and more the emperors followed in his footsteps. The extension of Roman citizenship was a gradual process covering two centuries. It was left for the emperor Caracalla, early in the third century, to take the final step. In 212 A.D. he issued an edict which bestowed citizenship on all freeborn inhabitants of the empire. This famous edict completed the work, begun so many centuries before, of Romanizing the ancient world.

PRIVILEGES OF ROMAN CITIZENS

The grant of citizenship, though it increased the burden of taxation, brought no slight advantage to those who possessed it. A Roman citizen could not be maltreated with impunity or punished without a legal trial before Roman courts. If accused in a capital case, he could always protect himself against an unjust decision by an "appeal to Caesar", that is, to the emperor at Rome. St. Paul did this on one occasion when on trial for his life. [16] Wherever he lived, a Roman citizen enjoyed, both for his person and his property, the protection of Roman law.

70. THE ROMAN LAW AND THE LATIN LANGUAGE

IMPROVEMENT OF ROMAN LAW

The Romans were the most legal-minded people of antiquity. It was their mission to give laws to the world. Almost at the beginning of the republic they framed the code of the Twelve Tables, [17] which long remained the basis of their jurisprudence. This code, however, was so harsh, technical, and brief that it could not meet the needs of a progressive state. The Romans gradually improved their legal system, especially after they began to rule over conquered nations. The disputes which arose between citizens and subjects were decided by the praetors or provincial governors in accordance with what seemed to them to be principles of justice and equity. These principles gradually found a place in Roman law, together with many rules and observances of foreign peoples. Roman law in this way tended to take over and absorb all that was best in ancient jurisprudence.

CHARACTER OF ROMAN LAW

Thus, as the extension of the citizenship carried the principles and practice of Roman law to every quarter of the empire, the spirit of that law underwent an entire change. It became exact, impartial, liberal, humane. It limited the use of torture to force confession from persons accused of crime. It protected the child against a father's tyranny. It provided that a master who killed a slave should be punished as a murderer, and even taught that all men are originally free by the law of nature and therefore that slavery is contrary to natural right. Justice it defined as "the steady and abiding purpose to give every man that which is his own." [18] Roman law, which began as the rude code of a primitive people, ended as the most refined and admirable system of jurisprudence ever framed by man. This law, as we shall see later, has passed from ancient Rome to modern Europe. [19]

LATIN IN ITALY

The conquest by Latin of the languages of the world is almost as interesting and important a story as the conquest by Rome of the nations of the world. At the beginning of Latin in Roman history Latin was the speech of only the Italy people of Latium. Beyond the limits of Latium Latin came into contact with the many different languages spoken in early Italy. Some of them, such as Greek and Etruscan, soon disappeared from Italy after Roman expansion, but those used by native Italian peoples showed more power of resistance. It was not until the last century B.C. that Latin was thoroughly established in the central and southern parts of the peninsula. After the Social War the Italian peoples became citizens of Rome, and with Roman citizenship went the use of the Latin tongue.

LATIN IN THE WESTERN PROVINCES

The Romans carried their language to the barbarian peoples of the West, as they had carried it to Italy. Their missionaries were colonists, merchants, soldiers, and public officials. The Latin spoken by them was eagerly taken up by the rude, unlettered natives, who tried to make themselves as Roman as possible in dress, customs, and speech. This provincial Latin was not simply the language of the upper classes; the common people themselves used it freely, as we know from thousands of inscriptions found in western and central Europe. In the countries which now make up Spain, France, Switzerland, southern Austria, England, and North Africa, the old national tongues were abandoned for the Latin of Rome.

ROMANCE LANGUAGES

The decline of the Roman Empire did not bring about the downfall of the Latin language in the West. It became the basis of the so-called Romance languages--French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Rumanian--which arose in the Middle Ages out of the spoken Latin of the common people. Even our English language, which comes to us from the speech of the Germanic invaders of Britain, contains so many words of Latin origin that we can scarcely utter a sentence without using some of them. The rule of Rome has passed away; the language of Rome still remains to enrich the intellectual life of mankind.

71. THE MUNICIPALITIES OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE

PREVALENCE OF CITY LIFE

The world under Roman rule was a world of cities. Some had earlier been native settlements, such as those in Gaul before the Roman conquest. Others were the splendid Hellenistic cities in the East. [20] Many more were of Roman origin, arising from the colonies and fortified camps in which citizens and soldiers had settled. [21] Where Rome did not find cities, she created them.

SOME IMPORTANT CITIES

Not only were the cities numerous, but many of them, even when judged by modern standards, reached great size. Rome was the largest, her population being estimated at from one to two millions. Alexandria came next with more than half a million people. Syracuse was the third metropolis of the empire. Italy contained such important towns as Verona, Milan, and Ravenna. In Gaul were Marseilles, Nîmes, Bordeaux, Lyons--all cities with a continuous existence to the present day. In Britain York and London were seats of commerce, Chester and Lincoln were military colonies, and Bath was celebrated then, as now, for its medicinal waters. Carthage and Corinth had risen in new splendor from their ashes. Athens was still the home of Greek art and Greek culture. Asia included such ancient and important centers as Pergamum, Smyrna, Ephesus, Rhodes, and Antioch. The student who reads in his New Testament the Acts of the Apostles will get a vivid impression of some of these great capitals.

APPEARANCE OF THE CITIES

Every municipality was a Rome in miniature. It had its forum and senate- house, its temples, theaters, and baths, its circus for racing, and its amphitheater for gladiatorial combats. Most of the municipalities enjoyed an abundant supply of water, and some had good sewer systems. The larger towns had well-paved, though narrow, streets. Pompeii, a small place of scarcely thirty thousand inhabitants, still exists to give us an idea of the appearance of one of these ancient cities. And what we find at Pompeii was repeated on a more splendid scale in hundreds of places from the Danube to the Nile, from Britain to Arabia.

CITY GOVERNMENT

The municipalities of Roman origin copied the government of Rome itself. [22] Each city had a council, or senate, and a popular assembly which chose the magistrates. These officials were generally rich men; they received no salary, and in fact had to pay a large sum on entering office. Local politics excited the keenest interest. Many of the inscriptions found on the walls of Pompeii are election placards recommending particular candidates for office. Women sometimes took part in political contests. Distributions of grain, oil, and money were made to needy citizens, in imitation of the bad Roman practice. There were public banquets, imposing festivals, wild-beast hunts, and bloody contests of gladiators, like those at Rome.

SURVIVAL OF THE ROMAN MUNICIPAL SYSTEM

The busy, throbbing life in these countless centers of the Roman world has long since been stilled. The cities themselves, in many instances, have utterly disappeared. Yet the forms of municipal government, together with the Roman idea of a free, self-governing city, never wholly died out. Some of the most important cities which flourished in southern and western Europe during the later Middle Ages preserved clear traces of their ancient Roman origin.

72. ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL CONDITIONS IN THE FIRST AND SECOND CENTURIES

PROMOTION OF COMMERCE

The first two centuries of our era formed the golden age of Roman commerce. The emperors fostered it in many ways. Augustus and his successors kept the Mediterranean free from pirates, built lighthouses and improved harbors, policed the highways, and made travel by land both speedy and safe. An imperial currency [23] replaced the various national coinages with their limited circulation. The vexatious import and export duties, levied by different countries and cities on foreign produce, were swept away. Free trade flourished between the cities and provinces of the Roman world.

PRINCIPAL TRADE ROUTES

Roman commerce followed, in general, the routes which Phoenicians had discovered centuries before. After the annexation of Gaul the rivers of that country became channels of trade between western Europe and Italy. The conquest of the districts north and south of the Danube opened up an important route between central Europe and the Mediterranean. Imports from the far eastern countries came by caravan through Asia to ports on the Black Sea. The water routes led by way of the Persian Gulf to the great Syrian cities of Antioch and Palmyra and, by way of the Red Sea, to Alexandria on the Nile. From these thriving commercial centers products were shipped to every region of the empire. [24]

LOCAL TRADING AT ROME

The importation and disposal of foreign goods at Rome furnished employment for many thousands of traders. There were great wholesale merchants whose warehouses stored grain and all kinds of merchandise. There were also many retail shopkeepers. They might be sometimes the slaves or freedmen of a wealthy noble who preferred to keep in the background. Sometimes they were men of free birth. The feeling that petty trade was unworthy of a citizen, though strong in republican days, tended to disappear under the empire.

FREE LABORERS AT ROME

The slaves at Rome, like those at Athens, [25] carried on many industrial tasks. We must not imagine, however, that all the manual labor of the city was performed by bondmen. The number of slaves even tended to decline, when there were no more border wars to yield captives for the slave markets. The growing custom of emancipation worked in the same direction. We find in this period a large body of free laborers, not only in the capital city, but in all parts of the empire.

THE GUILDS

The workmen engaged in a particular calling frequently formed clubs, or guilds. [26] There were guilds of weavers, shoe-makers, jewelers, painters, musicians, and even of gladiators. These associations were not organized for the purpose of securing higher wages and shorter hours by strikes or threat of strikes. They seem to have existed chiefly for social and religious purposes. Each guild had its clubhouse for official meetings and banquets. Each guild had its special deity, such as Vesta, the fire goddess, for bakers, and Bacchus, the wine god, for innkeepers. Every year the guildsmen held a festival, in honor of their patron, and marched through the streets with banners and the emblems of their trade. Nearly all the guilds had as one main object the provision of a proper funeral and tomb for deceased members. The humble laborer found some consolation in the thought that he belonged to a club of friends and fellow workers, who after death would give him decent burial and keep his memory green.

LIFE OF THE WORKING CLASSES

Free workingmen throughout the Roman world appear to have led reasonably happy lives. They were not driven or enslaved by their employers or forced to labor for long hours in grimy, unwholesome factories. Slums existed, but no sweatshops. If wages were low, so also was the cost of living. Wine, oil, and wheat flour were cheap. The mild climate made heavy clothing unnecessary and permitted an outdoor life. The public baths-- great clubhouses--stood open to every one who could pay a trifling fee. [27] Numerous holidays, celebrated with games and shows, brightened existence. On the whole we may conclude that working people at Rome and in the provinces enjoyed greater comfort during this period than had ever been their lot in previous ages.

GREAT FORTUNES

It was an age of millionaires. There had been rich men, such as Crassus, [28] during the last century of the republic; their numbers increased and their fortunes rose during the first century of the empire. The philosopher Seneca, a tutor of Nero, is said to have made twelve million dollars within four years by the emperor's favor. Narcissus, the secretary of Claudius, made sixteen million dollars--the largest Roman fortune on record. This sum must be multiplied four or five times to find its modern equivalent, since in antiquity interest rates were higher and the purchasing power of money was greater than to-day. Such private fortunes are surpassed only by those of the present age.

LUXURY AND EXTRAVAGANCE

The heaping-up of riches in the hands of a few brought its natural consequence in luxury and extravagance. The palaces of the wealthy, with their gardens, baths, picture galleries, and other features, were costly to build and costly to keep up. The money not lavished by a noble on his town house could be easily sunk on his villas in the country. All Italy, from the bay of Naples, to the foot of the Alps, was dotted with elegant residences, having flower gardens, game preserves, fishponds, and artificial lakes. Much senseless waste occurred at banquets and entertainments. Vast sums were spent on vessels of gold and silver, jewelry, clothing, and house furnishings. Even funerals and tombs required heavy outlays. A capitalist of imperial Rome could get rid of a fortune in selfish indulgences almost as readily as any modern millionaire not blessed with a refined taste or with public spirit.

SOME SOCIAL EVILS

Some of the customs of the time appear especially shocking. The brutal gladiatorial games [29] were a passion with every one, from the emperor to his lowest subject. Infanticide was a general practice. Marriage grew to be a mere civil contract, easily made and easily broken. Common as divorce had become, the married state was regarded as undesirable. Augustus vainly made laws to encourage matrimony and discourage celibacy. Suicide, especially among the upper classes, was astonishingly frequent. No one questioned another's right to leave this life at pleasure. The decline of the earlier paganism left many men without a deep religious faith to combat the growing doubt and worldliness of the age.

BRIGHTER ASPECTS OF ROMAN SOCIETY

Yet this dark picture needs correction at many points. It may be questioned whether the vice, luxury, and wickedness of ancient Rome, Antioch, or Alexandria much exceeded what our great modern capitals can show, During this period, moreover, many remarkable improvements took place in social life and manners. There was an increasing kindliness and charity. The weak and the infirm were better treated. The education of the poor was encouraged by the founding of free schools. Wealthy citizens of the various towns lavished their fortunes on such public works as baths, aqueducts, and temples, for the benefit of all classes. Even the slaves were much better treated. Imperial laws aimed to check the abuses of cruelty, overwork, and neglect, and philosophers recommended to masters the exercise of gentleness and mercy toward slaves. In fact, the first and second centuries of our era were marked by a great growth of the humanitarian spirit.

73. THE GRAECO-ROMAN WORLD

THE NEW COSMOPOLITANISM

Just as the conquests of Alexander, by uniting the Orient to Greece, produced a Graeco-Oriental civilization, so now the expansion of Rome over the Mediterranean formed another world-wide culture, in which both Greek and Roman elements met and mingled. A new sense of cosmopolitanism arose in place of the old civic or national patriotism. Roman elements met and mingled. A new sense of cosmopolitanism arose in place of the old civic or national patriotism.

UNIFYING AND CIVILIZING FORCES This cosmopolitan feeling was the outcome of those unifying and civilizing forces which the imperial system set at work. The extension of Roman citizenship broke down the old distinction between the citizens and the subjects of Rome. The development of Roman law carried its principles of justice and equity to the remotest regions. The spread of the Latin language provided the western half of the empire with a speech as universal there as Greek was in the East. Trade and travel united the provinces with one another and with Rome. The worship of the Caesars dimmed the luster of all local worships and kept constantly before men's minds the idea of Rome and of her mighty emperors. Last, but not least important, was the fusion of alien peoples through intermarriage with Roman soldiers and colonists. "How many settlements," exclaims the philosopher Seneca, "have been planted in every province! Wherever the Roman conquers, there he dwells." [30]

MONUMENTS OF ROMAN RULE

The best evidence of Rome's imperial rule is found in the monuments she raised in every quarter of the ancient world. Some of the grandest ruins of antiquity are not in the capital city itself, or even in Italy, but in Spain, France, England, Greece, Switzerland, Asia Minor, Syria, and North Africa. Among these are Hadrian's Wall in Britain, the splendid aqueduct known as the Pont du Gard near Nîmes in southern France, the beautiful temple called La Maison Carrée in the same city, the Olympieum at Athens, and the temple of the Sun at Baalbec in Syria Thus the lonely hilltops, the desolate desert sands, the mountain fastnesses of three continents bear witness even now to the widespreading sway of Rome.

ROMANIZATION OF EAST AND WEST

The civilized world took on the stamp and impress of Rome. The East, indeed, remained Greek in language and feeling, but even there Roman law and government prevailed, Roman roads traced their unerring course, and Roman architects erected majestic monuments. The West became completely Roman. North Africa, Spain, Gaul, distant Dacia, and Britain were the seats of populous cities, where the Latin language was spoken and Roman customs were followed. From them came the emperors. They furnished some of the most eminent men of letters. Their schools of grammar and rhetoric attracted students from Rome itself. Thus unconsciously, but none the less surely, local habits and manners, national religions and tongues, provincial institutions and ways of thinking disappeared from the ancient world.

STUDIES

1. On an outline map indicate the additions to Roman territory: during the reign of Augustus, 31 B.C.-14 A.D.; during the period 14-180 A.D.

2. On an outline map indicate ten important cities of the Roman Empire.

3. Connect the proper events with the following dates: 79 A.D.; 180 A.D.; and 14 A.D.

4. Whom do you consider the greater man, Julius Caesar or Augustus? Give reasons for your answer.

5. Compare the Augustan Age at Rome with the Age of Pericles at Athens.

6. What is the Monumentum Ancyranum and its historic importance (illustration Monumentum Ancyranum, section 66. Augustus, 31 B.C.-l4 A.D., topic The Augustan Age)?

7. How did the worship of the Caesars connect itself with ancestor worship?

8. In the reign of what Roman emperor was Jesus born? In whose reign was he crucified?

9. How did the "year of anarchy" after Nero's death exhibit a weakness in the imperial system?

10. How many provinces existed under Trajan?

11. What modern countries are included within the limits of the Roman Empire in the age of Trajan?

12. Compare the extent of the Roman Empire under Trajan with (a) the empire of Alexander; and (b) the empire of Darius.

13. Give the Roman names of Spain, Italy, Gaul, Germany, Britain, Scotland, and Ireland.

14. Contrast the Roman armies under the empire with the standing armies of modern Europe.

15. Trace on the map, page 205, the Roman roads in Britain.

16. "To the Roman city the empire was political death; to the provinces it was the beginning of new life." Comment on this statement.

17. Why should Rome have made a greater success of her imperial policy than either Athens or Sparta?

18. Compare Roman liberality in extending the franchise with the similar policy displayed by the United States.

19. Compare the freedom of trade between the provinces of the Roman Empire with that between the states of the American Union.

20. On the map, page 48, trace the trade routes during imperial times.

21. Compare as civilizing forces the Roman and the Persian empires.

22. What was the Pax Romana? What is the Pax Britannica?

23. Compare the Romanization of the ancient world with that process of Americanization which is going on in the United States to-day.

24. Explain this statement: "The Roman Empire is the lake in which all the streams of ancient history lose themselves and which all the streams of modern history flow out of."

25. "Republican Rome had little to do, either by precept or example, with the modern life of Europe, Imperial Rome everything." Can you justify this statement?

FOOTNOTES

[1] Webster, Readings in Ancient History, chapter xix, "The Makers of Imperial Rome: Character Sketches by Suetonius"; chapter xx, "Nero, a Roman Emperor."Return to passage

[2] Hence our word "prince".Return to passage

[3] See page 184.Return to passage

[4] The provinces of Pannonia, Noricum, and Raetia. See the map facing page 184.Return to passage

[5] See page 187.Return to passage

[6] For a description of ancient Rome see pages 292-296.Return to passage

[7] Jesus was born probably in 4 B.C., the last year of the reign of Herod, whom the triumvirs, Antony and Octavian, had placed on the throne of Judea in 37 B.C.Return to passage

[8] A Roman emperor was generally called "Caesar" by the provincials. See, for example, Matthew, xxii, 17-21, or Acts, xxv, 10-12. This title survives in the German Kaiser and perhaps in the Russian Tsar or Czar.Return to passage

[9] In 131 A.D., during the reign of the emperor Hadrian, the Jews once more broke out in revolt. Jerusalem, which had risen from its ruins, was again destroyed by the Romans, and the plow was passed over the foundations of the Temple. From Roman times to the present the Jews have been a people without a country.Return to passage

[10] See Bulwer-Lytton's novel, The Last Days of Pompeii.Return to passage

[11] See the map on page 205 for the system of Roman roads in Britain.Return to passage

[12] See page 200.Return to passage

[13] Pliny, Natural History, xxvii, 1.Return to passage

[14] See page 179.Return to passage

[15] See page 187.Return to passage

[16] See Acts, XXV, 9-12.Return to passage

[17] See page 151.Return to passage

[18] Institutes, bk. i, tit. i.Return to passage

[19] See page 331.Return to passage

[20] See page 127.Return to passage

[21] Several English cities, such as Lancaster, Leicester, Manchester, and Chester, betray in their names their origin in the Roman castra, or camp.Return to passage

[22] See page 149.Return to passage

[23] For illustrations of Roman coins see the plate facing page 134.Return to passage

[24] See the map on page 48.Return to passage

[25] See page 107.Return to passage

[26] Latin collegia, whence our "college."Return to passage

[27] See pages 263 and 285.Return to passage

[28] See page 183.Return to passage

[29] See page 267.Return to passage

[30] Seneca, Minor Dialogues, XI, 7.Return to passage