History of Julius Caesar Vol. 1 of 2

1058

Probably in the modern province of Leyria.

1059

A survey made, in August, 1861, by the Duc de Bellune, leaves no doubt that the peninsula of Peniche was once an island. The local traditions state that in ancient times the ocean advanced as far as the town of Atoguia; but since Dio Cassius speaks of the rising tide which swept away soldiers, we must believe that there were fords at low tide. We give extracts from Portuguese authors who have written on this subject.

Bernard de Brito (Portuguese Monarchy, I. p. 429, Lisbon, 1790) says: – “As along the entire coast of Portugal we cannot find, at the present time, a single island that fulfils the conditions of the one where Cæsar sought to disembark better than the peninsula, on which there is a locality which, taking its name from its situation, is called Peniche, we shall maintain, with our countryman Resende, that it is to this that all the authors refer. And I do not believe it possible to find one more suitable in every way than this: because, over and above the fact that it is the only one, and situated at but a short distance from the mainland, we see that when the tide is low it is possible to traverse the strait dryshod, and with still greater facility than would have been possible in ancient times, because the sea has silted up sand against a large portion of this coast, and brought it to pass that the sea does not rise to so high a point upon the land. Still, it rises high enough to make it necessary, at high tide, to use a boat to reach the island, and that in a space of about 500 paces in width, which separates the island from the mainland.”

The following is the passage of Resende: – “Sed quærendum utrobique quænam insula ista fuerit terræ contigua, ad quam sive pedibus sive natatu profugi transire potuerint, ad quam similiter et milites trajicere tentarint? Non fuisse Londobrin, cujus meminit Ptolomæus (Berligam modo dicimus), indicio est distantia a continente non modica. Et quum alia juxta Lusitaniæ totius littus nulla nostra ævo exstet, hæc de qua Dion loquitur, vel incumbenti violentius mari abrasa, vel certe peninsula illa oppidi Peniche juxta Atonguiam, erit intelligenda. Nam etiam nunc alveo quingentis passibus lato a continente sejungitur, qui pedibus æstu cedente transitur, redeunte vero insula plane fit, neque adiri vado potest. Et forte illo sæculo fuerit aliquanto major.” (L. André de Resende. De Antiquitatibus Lusitaniæ cæteraque Historica quæ exstant Opera, Conimbricæ, 1790, I., p. 77.)

Antonio Carvalho (Da costa corografia Portuguesa, II. p. 144, Lisbon, 1712) sets forth the same view.

The preceding information is confirmed by the following letter of an English bishop who accompanied the Crusaders, at the time of the siege of Lisbon, in the reign of Alfonso Henrique, a.d. 1147: – “Die vero quasi decima, impositis sarcinis nostris cum episcopis velificare incepimus iter prosperum agentes. Die vero postera ad insulam Phenicis (vulgo Peniche) distantis a continente quasi octingentis passibus feliciter applicuimus. Insula abundat cervis et maxime cuniculis: liquiricium (lege glycyrrhizum) habet. Tyrii dicunt eam Erictream. Peni Gaddis, id est septem, ultra quam non est terra: ideo extremus noti orbis terminus dicitur. Juxta hanc sunt duæ insulæ quæ vulgo dicuntur Berlinges, id est Baleares lingua corrupta, in una quarum est palatium admirabilis architecturæ et multa officinarum diversoria regi cuidam, ut aiunt, quondam gratissimum secretale hospicium.” (Letter of an English Crusader on the sack of Lisbon, in Portugalliæ Monumenta Historica, a sæculo octavo post Christum usque ad quintum decimum, justa Academiæ Scientiarum Olisiponensis edita. Volumen I., fasciculus iii. Lisbon, 1861, p. 395.)

1060

Dio Cassius, XXXVII. 52, 53. – “Cæsar, as soon as he arrived, defeated the Lusitanians and the inhabitants of Galicia, and advanced as far as the outer sea. Thus he caused people who had never yet recognised the authority of the Romans to submit to them, and returned from his government loaded with glory and wealth, of which he gave a part to his soldiers.” (Zonaras, Annales, X. 6.)

1061

Appian, Civil Wars, II. 8.

1062

Cæsar, Spanish War, 42.

1063

Plutarch, Cæsar, 12.

1064

“There come forward a whole army of accusers against those who enriched themselves by usury in contempt of a law passed by Cæsar when he was dictator, regulating the proportion to be observed between the debts and possessions in Italy: a law which had for a long while fallen into desuetude through the interest of individuals.” (Tacitus, Annals, vi. 16. – Suetonius, Cæsar, 42.)

1065

“I will not enumerate all the marks of honour with which Cæsar distinguished the people of this town when he was prætor in Spain; the divisions he found means of healing among the citizens of Gades; the laws which, with their consent, he gave them; the old barbarism of their manners and customs, which he caused to disappear; the eagerness with which, at the request of Balbus, he loaded them with benefits.” (Cicero, Oration for Balbus, 19.)

1066

“From his youth he was acquainted with Cæsar, and that great man was pleased with him. Cæsar, among the crowd of friends he had, marked him out as one of his intimates when he was prætor: when he was consul, he made him overseer of the manufactory of his military engines. He had experience of his prudence; appreciated his devotion; accepted his acts of kindness and his affection. At that time Balbus shared nearly all the labours of Cæsar.” (Cicero, Oration for Balbus, 28.)

1067

“For this man (Cæsar) began by being prætor in Spain, and, distrusting the loyalty of this province, he would not give its inhabitants the chance of being subsequently more dangerous, through a delusive peace. He chose to do what was of importance to the interests of the Republic rather than to pass the days of his magistracy in tranquillity; and as the Spaniards refused to surrender, he compelled them to it by force. So he surpassed in honour those who had preceded him in Spain; for it is a harder task to keep a conquest than to make one.” (Dio Cassius, XLIV. 41.)

1068

Suetonius, Cæsar, 54.

1069

“Cæsar arrives in two days.” (Cicero to Atticus, II. 1, June, 694.)

1070

Thence the name of candidate.

1071

“Many candidates for the consulship had been nominated in their absence; as, for instance, Marcellus, in 540.” (Titus Livius, XXIV. 9.)

1072

Plutarch, Cato, 36.

1073

Florus, III. 23.

1074

Cicero, Letters to Atticus, I. 18.

1075

Cicero, Letters to Atticus, I. 18.

1076

Cicero, Letters to Atticus, II. 1.

1077

“It even appears that Cicero had lent the accused a million of sestertii to purchase a mansion on the Palatine.” (Aulus Gellius, XII. 12.)

1078

Cicero, Letters to Atticus, I. 12.

1079

Cicero, Letters to Atticus, I. 19.

1080

Cicero, Letters to Atticus, II. 1.

1081

Cicero, Letters to Atticus, I. 19.

1082

Suetonius, Cæsar, 50.

1083

Cicero, Letters to Quintus, I. 1, 11.

1084

Cæsar, when consul and dictator, declared many foreign cities free.

1085

It will be seen in the next chapter that Cæsar recognized as friends to the Roman people Auletes, king of Egypt, and Ariovistus, king of the Germans.

1086

Duumvirs, decemvirs, vigintivirs were the names given to magistrates who shared the same duties in boards of two, ten, or twenty. In the present case, however, the object was only to bind together the men of the greatest importance by a secret bond. Therefore the word triumvirate would be a misnomer.

1087

“He wished me to join these three intimate consular men.” (Cicero, Oration on the Consular Provinces, 17.)

1088

Dio Cassius, XXXVII. 57.

1089

Cicero, Familiar Letters, V. 12.

1090

Suetonius, Cæsar, 19. – Eutropius, VI. 14. – Plutarch, Cæsar, 13.

1091

Suetonius, Cæsar, 19.

1092

Plutarch, Cato, 26. – Suetonius, 19.

1093

“But will you say that we can only have the knights on our side by paying for them? What are we to do? Have we a choice of means?” (Cicero, Letters to Atticus, II. 1.)

1094

“Inde domum repetes toto comitante senatu,

Officium populi vix capiente domo.”

Ovid, Ex Ponto, IV. Epist. 4.

1095

Suetonius, Cæsar, 19.

1096

Dio Cassius, XXXVIII. 1.

1097

Appian, Civil Wars, II. 10.

1098

Cicero, Epistle to Atticus, II. 3. – “When consul, he wished me to take part in the operations of his consulship. Without approving them, I felt nevertheless grateful to him for his deference.” (Oration on the Consular Provinces, 17.)

1099

Plutarch, Cæsar, 14. – Suetonius, Cæsar, 21.

1100

Plutarch, Cæsar, 14.

1101

Plutarch, Cato, 24.

1102

Plutarch, Cato, 59.

1103

Suetonius, Cæsar, 20.

1104

Titus Livius, IX. 8.

1105

Appian, Civil Wars, II. 7.

1106

Cicero, Familiar Letters, XIII. 4.

1107

Dio Cassius, XXXVIII. 1.

1108

Epistles to Atticus, I. 18. – In allusion to a former law, we read as follows: “The senators who have discussed the present law shall be held, within ten days following the plebiscitum, to swear to maintain it before the questor, in the treasury, in open day, and taking for witnesses Jupiter and the gods Penates.” (Table of Bantia, Klenze, Philologische Abhandlungen, IV. 16-24.)

1109

Dio Cassius, XXXVIII. 1.

1110

Dio Cassius, XXXVIII. 2.

1111

Ateius Capito, Treatise on the Duties of the Senator, quoted by Aulus Gellius, IV. 10. – Valerius Maximus, II. 10, § 7.

1112

Dio Cassius, XXXVIII. 4.

1113

Suetonius, Cæsar, 21.

1114

Appian, Civil Wars, II. 11.

1115

Dio Cassius, XXXVIII. 6.

1116

The consuls, prætors, and generally all those who presided at an assembly of the people, or even who attended in quality of magistrates, had a right of veto, founded on popular superstition. This right was exercised by declaring that a celestial phenomenon had been observed by them, and that it was no longer permitted to deliberate. Jupiter darting thunder or rain, all treating on affairs with the people must be stopped; such was the text of the law, religious or political, published in 597. It was not necessary that it should thunder or rain, in fact; the affirmation of a magistrate qualified to observe the sky being enough. (Cicero, Oration for Sextius, 15. —Oration on the Consular Provinces, 19.) – (Asconius, In Piso, p. 9, ed. Orelli.) – (Orelli, Indices to his edition of Cicero, VIII. 126.) – (Index Legum, articles Laws Ælia and Fusia.)

1117

Valerius Maximus, III. vii. 6.

1118

Plutarch, Cato, 37.

1119

Dio Cassius, XXXVIII. 7. – “The Campanian law contains a provision which compels the candidates to swear, in the assembly of the people, that they will never propose anything contrary to the Italian legislation upon property. All have sworn, except Laterensis, who preferred desisting from the candidature for the tribuneship to taking the oath, and much gratitude has been shown to him for it.” (Cicero, Epistles to Atticus, II. 18.)

1120

This appears from the words of Dio Cassius (XXXVIII. 1). Several scholars are unwilling to admit the existence of two agrarian laws; yet Cicero, in his letter to Atticus (II. 7), written in April, announces that the twenty commissioners are named. In this first law (Familiar Letters, XIII. 4), he mentions the ager of Volaterra, which was certainly not in Campania. In another letter of the beginning of May (Letters to Atticus, II. 16), he speaks of Campania for the first time, and says that Pompey had approved the first agrarian law. Finally, in that written in the month of June (Letters to Atticus, II. 18), he speaks of the oath taken to the agrarian laws. Suetonius (Cæsar, 20) and Appian (Civil Wars, II. 10) mention the Julian agrarian laws in the plural. Titus Livius (Epitome of Book CIII.) speaks of the leges agrariæ of Cæsar; and Plutarch (Cato, 38) says positively: “Elated with this victory, Cæsar proposed a new law, to share among the poor and indigent citizens nearly all the lands of Campania;” and previously, in chapter 36, the same author had said of Cæsar, that he proposed laws for the distribution of the lands to the poor citizens. Thus there were positively two laws published at an interval of some months; and if the object of the second was the distribution of the ager Campanus, the first had without doubt a more general character. Dio Cassius, after having related the proposal of the first agrarian law, in which Campania was excepted, says similarly: “Besides, the territory of Campania was given to those who had three children or more” (XXXVIII. 7).

1121

Cicero, Second Philippic, 15.

1122

Liber Coloniarum, edit. Lachmann, pp. 220, 235, 239, 259, 260. – Several of these colonies probably dated no farther back than the dictatorship of Cæsar.

1123

Suetonius, Cæsar, 20. – Velleius Paterculus, II. 44. – Appian, Civil Wars, II. 10. – “Capua mura ducta colonia Julia Felix, jussu imperatoris Cæsaris a xx. viris deducta.” (Liber Coloniarum, I. p. 231, edit. Lachmann.)

1124

Cicero, Second Philippic, 39.

1125

Dio Cassius, XXXVIII. 1. – Cicero, Epistles to Atticus, II. 19.

1126

Cicero, Epistles to Atticus, II. 7.

1127

Cicero, Oration on the Consular Provinces, 17.

1128

Cicero, Familiar Letters, VIII. 10.

1129

Appian, Civil Wars, II. 13. —Scholiast of Bobbio on Cicero. – Cicero, Oration for Plancus, p. 261, edit. Orelli.

1130

Cicero, Oration for Plancus, 14.

1131

Cicero, Letters to Atticus, II. 1. – Suetonius, Cæsar, 20.

1132

Suetonius, Cæsar, 20. – Dio Cassius, XXXVIII. 7. – Appian, II. 13.

1133

Suetonius, Cæsar, 20.

1134

Cicero, Second Oration on the Agrarian Law, 16. —Scholiast of Bobbio on Cicero’s Oration In Rege Alexandrino, p. 350, edit. Orelli. This Ptolemy Alexas, or Alexander, appears to have been a natural son of Alexander I., younger brother of Ptolemy Lathyrus, who is also called Ptolemy Soter II.; in this case he would be, though illegitimate, cousin of Ptolemy Auletes. He had succeeded Alexander II., legitimate son of Alexander I., who married his step-mother, Berenice, only legitimate daughter of Ptolemy Soter II.

1135

Cicero, Letters to Atticus, II. 16. – The King of Egypt gave nearly 6,000 talents (35 millions of francs) to Cæsar and Pompey. (Suetonius, Cæsar, 14.)

1136

Suetonius, Cæsar, 54. – Dio Cassius, XXXIX. 12. – Cæsar’s expressions (War of Alexandria, 33, and Civil Wars, III. 107) show the friendship of Ptolemy Auletes for the Romans.

1137

Cæsar, War in Gaul, I. 35. – Plutarch, Cæsar, 35. – Dio Cassius, XXXVIII. 34.

1138

Suetonius, Cæsar, 20.

1139

Plutarch, Cato, 38. – “It was about the sixth hour, when, in the course of my speech in court for C. Antonius, my colleague, I deplored certain abuses which prevailed in the State, and which seemed to me to be closely allied to the case of my unfortunate client. Some ill-disposed persons reported my words to certain men of high position in different terms to those I had used; and on the same day, at the ninth hour, the adoption of Clodius was carried.” (Cicero, Oration for his House, 16.)

1140

Appian, Civil Wars, II. 14. – Dio Cassius, XXXVIII. 12. – Plutarch, Pompey, 50. – Cicero, 39.

1141

Cicero, Oration for Sestius, loc. cit.

1142

Cicero, writing to Atticus about Cæsar’s first consulship, says: “Weak as he was then, Cæsar was stronger than the entire State.” (Letters to Atticus, VII. 9.)

1143

“Bibulus thought to render Cæsar an object of suspicion. He made him more powerful than before.” (Velleius Paterculus, II. 44.)

1144

Suetonius, Cæsar, 20.

1145

Cæsar rode an extraordinary horse, whose feet were shaped almost like those of man, the hoof being divided in such a way as to present the appearance of fingers. He had reared this horse, which had been foaled in his house, with great care, for the soothsayers had predicted the empire of the world to its master. Cæsar was the first who tamed it: before that time the animal had allowed no one to mount it. Finally, he erected a statue to its honour in front of the Temple of Venus Genetrix.” (Suetonius, Cæsar, 61.)

1146

“I am quite of opinion that the right of absent candidates to solicit the offices of the priesthood may be examined by the comitia, for there is a precedent for that. C. Marius, whilst in Cappadocia, was elected augur by the law Domitia, and no subsequent law has forbidden the course; for the Julian Law, the last on the subject of the priesthood, states: ‘He who is a candidate, or he whose right to become one has been examined.’” (Cicero, Letters to Brutus, I. 5.)

1147

Cicero, Oration against Piso, 37.

1148

Cicero, Oration on the Consular Provinces, 4. —Oration against Piso, 21.

1149

Cicero, Oration against Piso, 16; Letters to Atticus, V. 10, 16, 21. —First Philippic, 8.

1150

“You have obtained,” says he, addressing Piso, “a consular province with no other limits than those of your cupidity, in contravention of the law of your son-in-law. In fact, by a law of Cæsar’s, as just as it is salutary, free nations used to enjoy a full and entire liberty.” (Cicero, Oration against Piso, 16.)

1151

Cicero, Oration against Piso, 25; Familiar Letters, II. 17; Letters to Atticus, VI. 7. – “I will add, that if the ancient right and antique usage were still in force, I should not have had to send in my accounts till after I had discoursed about them, and had them audited with good humour, and the formalities that our intimacy justifies. What I would have done in Rome according to the old fashion, I ought, according to the Julian law, to have done in my province: send in my accounts on the spot, and only deposit in the treasury an exact copy of them. I was obliged to follow the provisions of the law. The accounts, duly audited and compared, were to be deposited in two towns, and I chose, in the terms of the law, the two most important – Laodicea and Apamea… I come to the point of the customary presents. You must know that I had only included in my list the military tribunes, the prefects, and the officers of my house (contubernales). I even made a blunder. I thought I was allowed any latitude in point of time. Subsequently I learnt that the request ought to be sent in during the thirty days allowed for the settling the accounts. Happily, all is safe as far as the centurions are concerned, and the officers of the household of the military tribunes – for the law is silent in regard to the latter. (Cicero, Familiar Letters, V. 20.)

1152

Dio Cassius, XLIII. 25.

1153

“I say nothing about the golden crown that has been so long a torture to you, in your uncertainty as to whether you ought to demand it or not. In fact, the law of your son-in-law forbad them to give it or you to receive it, unless your triumph had been granted you.” (Cicero, Oration against Piso, 37.)

1154

Cicero, Oration against Piso, 37; Letters to Atticus, V. 10, 16.

1155

“Take notice, I beg you, that I paid into the hands of the farmers of the revenues at Ephesus twenty-two millions of sestertii, a sum to which I have a perfect right, and that Pompey laid hands on the whole. I have made up my mind on the subject – whether wisely or unwisely matters not.” (Cicero, Oration against Piso, xxxvii. 16.)

1156

Cicero, Oration against Piso, 21.

1157

Cicero, Oration on the Consular Provinces, 2, 3, 4.

1158

“Is there any position more disgraceful than that of a senator, who goes on a mission without the slightest authorisation on the part of the State? It was this kind of mission that I should have abolished during my consulship, even with the consent of the Senate, notwithstanding the apparent advantages it held out, had it not been for the senseless opposition of a tribune. At any rate I caused its duration to be shortened: formerly it had no limit; now I have reduced it to a year.” (Cicero, On Laws, III. 8.)

1159

“Moreover, I think that the Julian law has defined the duration of free embassies: nor will it be easy to extend it.” (Cicero, Letters to Atticus, XV. 11. – Orelli, Index Legum, p. 192.)