The History of Rome, Theodor Mommsen [good english books to read txt] 📗
- Author: Theodor Mommsen
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According to the older constitutional law there were, with the exception of the not numerous communities that were declared to have forfeited their treaties in consequence of the Hannibalic war (p. 24), no Italian -dediticii-; in the Plautian law of 664-5 the description: -qui foederatis civitatibus adscripti fuerunt- (Cic. pro Arch. 4, 7) still included in substance all Italians. But as the -dediticii- who received the franchise supplementary in 667 cannot reasonably be understood as embracing merely the Bruttii and Picentes, we may assume that all the insurgents, so far as they had laid down their arms and had not acquired the franchise under the Plautio-Papirian law were treated as -dediticii-, or—which is the same thing— that their treaties cancelled as a matter of course by the insurrection (hence -qui foederati fuerunt- in the passage of Cicero cited) were not legally renewed to them on their surrender.
21. II. III. Laws Imposing Taxes
22. IV. VI. The Equestrian Party
23. II. XI. Squandering of the Spoil
24. It is not clear, what the -lex unciaria- of the consuls Sulla and Rufus in the year 666 prescribed in this respect; but the simplest hypothesis is that which regards it as a renewal of the law of 397 (i. 364), so that the highest allowable rate of interest was again 1 1/12th of the capital for the year of ten months or 10 per cent for the year of twelve months.
25. III. XI. Reform of the Centuries
26. II. III. Powers of the Senate
27. IV. II. Death of Gracchus, IV. III. Attack on The Transmarine Colonization. Downfall of Gracchus, IV. VI. Saturninus Assailed
28. II. III. The Tribunate of the People As an Instrument of Government
Chapter VIII1. IV. VIII. Occupation of Cilicia
2. III. IX. Armenia
3. IV. I. Western Asia
4. The words quoted as Phrygian —Bagaios— = Zeus and the old royal name —Manis— have been beyond doubt correctly referred to the Zend -bagha- = God and the Germanic -Mannus-, Indian -Manus- (Lassen, -Zeitschrift der deutschen morgenland-. Gesellschaft, vol. x. p. 329 f.).
5. They are here grouped together, because, though they were in part doubtless not executed till between the first and the second war with Rome, they to some extent preceded even the first (Memn. 30; Justin, xxxviii. 7 ap. fin.; App. Mithr. 13; Eutrop. v. 5) and a narrative in chronological order is in this case absolutely impracticable. Even the recently found decree of Chersonesus (p. 17) has given no information in this respect According to it Diophantus was twice sent against the Taurian Scythians; but that the second insurrection of these is connected with the decree of the Roman senate in favour of the Scythian princes (p. 21) is not clear from the document, and is not even probable.
6. It is very probable that the extraordinary drought, which is the chief obstacle now to agriculture in the Crimea and in these regions generally, has been greatly increased by the disappearance of the forests of central and southern Russia, which formerly to some extent protected the coast-provinces from the parching northeast wind.
7. The recently discovered decree of the town of Chersonesus in honour of this Diophantus (Dittenberger, Syll. n. 252) thoroughly confirms the traditional account. It shows us the city in the immediate vicinity—the port of Balaclava must at that time have been in the power of the Tauri and Simferopol in that of the Scythians—hard pressed partly by the Tauri on the south coast of the Crimea, partly and especially by the Scythians who held in their power the whole interior of the peninsula and the mainland adjoining; it shows us further how the general of king Mithradates relieves on all sides the Greek city, defeats the Tauri, and erects in their territory a stronghold (probably Eupatorion), restores the connection between the western and the eastern Hellenes of the peninsula, overpowers in the west the dynasty of Scilurus, and in the east Saumacus prince of the Scythians, pursues the Scythians even to the mainland, and at length conquers them with the Reuxinales—such is the name given to the later Roxolani here, where they first appear—in the great pitched battle, which is mentioned also in the traditional account. There does not seem to have been any formal subordination of the Greek city under the king; Mithradates appears only as protecting ally, who fights the battles against the Scythians that passed as invincible (—tous anupostatous dokountas eimen—), on behalf of the Greek city, which probably stood to him nearly in the relation of Massilia and Athens to Rome. The Scythians on the other band in the Crimea become subjects (—upakooi—) of Mithradates.
8. The chronology of the following events can only be determined approximately. Mithradates Eupator seems to have practically entered on the government somewhere about 640; Sulla's intervention took place in 662 (Liv. Ep. 70) with which accords the calculation assigning to the Mithradatic wars a period of thirty years (662-691) (Plin. H. N. vii. 26, 97). In the interval fell the quarrels as to the Paphlagonian and Cappadocian succession, with which the bribery attempted by Mithradates in Rome (Diod. 631) apparently in the first tribunate of Saturninus in 651 (IV. VI. Saturninus) was probably connected. Marius, who left Rome in 665 and did not remain long in the east, found Mithradates already in Cappadocia and negotiated with him regarding his aggressions (Cic. ad Brut. i. 5; Plut. Mar. 31); Ariarathes VI had consequently been by that time put to death.
9. IV. III. Character of the Constitution of Gaius Gracchus
10. A decree of the senate of the year 638 recently found in the village Aresti to the south of Synnada (Viereck, -Sermo Graecus quo senatus Romanus usus sit-, p. 51) confirms all the regulations made by the king up to his death and thus shows that Great Phrygia after the death of the father was not merely taken from the son, as Appian also states, but was thereby brought directly under Roman allegiance.
11. III. IX. Rupture between Antiochus and the Romans
12. Retribution came upon the authors of the arrest and surrender of Aquillius twenty-five years afterwards, when after Mithradates' death his son Pharnaces handed them over to the Romans.
13. IV. VII. Economic Crisis
14. We must recollect that after the outbreak of the Social War the legion had at least not more than half the number of men which it had previously, as it was no longer accompanied by Italian contingents.
15. The chronology of these events is, like all their details, enveloped in an obscurity which investigation is able to dispel, at most, only partially. That the battle of Chaeronea took place, if not on the same day as the storming of Athens (Pausan, i. 20), at any rate soon afterwards, perhaps in March 668, is tolerably certain. That the succeeding Thessalian and the second Boeotian campaign took up not merely the remainder of 668 but also the whole of 669, is in itself probable and is rendered still more so by the fact that Sulla's enterprises in Asia are not sufficient to fill more than a single campaign. Licinianus also appears to indicate that Sulla returned to Athens for the winter of 668-669 and there took in hand the work of investigation and punishment; after which he relates the battle of Orchomenus. The crossing of Sulla to Asia has accordingly been placed not in 669, but in 670.
16. The resolution of the citizens of Ephesus to this effect has recently been found (Waddington, Additions to Lebas, Inscr. iii. 136 a). They had, according to their own declaration, fallen into the power of Mithradates "the king of Cappadocia," being frightened by the magnitude of his forces and the suddenness of his attack; but, when opportunity offered, they declared war against him "for the rule (—egemonia—) of the Romans and the common weal."
17. The statement that Mithradates in the peace stipulated for impunity to the towns which had embraced his side (Memnon, 35) seems, looking to the character of the victor and of the vanquished, far from credible, and it is not given by Appian or by Licinianus. They neglected to draw up the treaty of peace in writing, and this neglect afterwards left room far various misrepresentations.
18. Armenian tradition also is acquainted with the first Mithradatic war. Ardasches king of Armenia—Moses of Chorene tells us—was not content with the second rank which rightfully belonged to him in the Persian (Parthian) empire, but compelled the Parthian king Arschagan to cede to him the supreme power, whereupon he had a palace built for himself in Persia and had coins struck there with his own image. He appointed Arschagan viceroy of Persia and his son Dicran (Tigranes) viceroy of Armenia, and gave his daughter Ardaschama in marriage to the great-prince of the Iberians Mihrdates (Mithradates) who was descended from Mihrdates satrap of Darius and governor appointed by Alexander over the conquered Iberians, and ruled in the northern mountains as well as over the Black Sea. Ardasches then took Croesus the king of the Lydians prisoner, subdued the mainland between the two great seas (Asia Minor), and crossed the sea with innumerable vessels to subjugate the west. As there was anarchy at that time in Rome, he nowhere encountered serious resistance, but his soldiers killed each other and Ardasches fell by the hands of his own troops. After Ardasches' death his successor Dicran marched against the army of the Greeks (i. e. the Romans) who now in turn invaded the Armenian land; he set a limit to their advance, handed over to his brother- in-law Mihrdates the administration of Madschag (Mazaca in Cappadocia) and of the interior along with a considerable force, and returned to Armenia. Many years afterwards there were still pointed out in the Armenian towns statues of Greek gods by well- known masters, trophies of this campaign.
We have no difficulty in recognizing here various facts of the first Mithradatic war, but the whole narrative is evidently confused, furnished with heterogeneous additions, and in particular transferred by patriotic falsification to Armenia. In just the same way the victory over Crassus is afterwards attributed to the Armenians. These Oriental accounts are to be received with all the greater caution, that they are by no means mere popular legends; on the contrary the accounts of Josephus, Eusebius, and other authorities current among the Christians of the fifth century have been amalgamated with the Armenian traditions, and the historical romances of the Greeks and beyond doubt the patriotic fancies also of Moses himself have been laid to a considerable extent under contribution. Bad as is cur Occidental tradition in itself, to call in the aid of Oriental tradition in this and similar cases—as has been attempted for instance by the uncritical Saint-Martin—can only lead to still further confusion.
19. III. X. Intervention in the Syro-Egyptian War
Chapter IX1. The whole of the representation that follows is based in substance on the recently discovered account of Licinianus, which communicates a number of facts previously unknown, and in particular enables us to perceive the sequence and connection of these events more clearly than was possible before.
2. IV. VII. The Bestowal of the Franchise and Its Limitations. That there was no confirmation by the comitia, is clear from Cic. Phil. xii. 11, 27. The senate seems to have made use of the form of simply prolonging the term of the Plautio- Papirian law (IV. VII. Bestowal of Latin Rights on the Italian Celts), a course which by use and wont
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