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I.

Miraculous element in

tive.

themselves as the heirs of the power of the Tarquins over Latium.

As for the detail in the narrative of this war, it is full of miracles and poetry, as may be expected at this period. the narra- The description of the battle of Lake Regillus reminds us of Homer's battle-scenes. The armies fight, but the leaders decide the battle. It is a succession of single combats in which the heroes of that period perished. The old King Tarquin fought and fell. Even the gods took part in the battle: Castor and Pollux stormed the enemy's camp, and appeared in Rome as the first messengers announcing the victory. A horse's footprint in stone testified in later times to their presence in the battle.

1 Livy, ii. 19, 20.

2 Dionysius (vi. 11) found, upon calculation, that King Tarquin must have been nearly ninety years of age at the time of the battle of Regillus. He thought it unlikely that so old a man should fight hand-to-hand in a pitched battle. Therefore he substituted a son, Titus Tarquinius, who is a creature of Dionysius' imagination.

CHAPTER XII.

THE SABINE WAR.

CHAP.
XII.

versions of the Sabine

WE have not yet done with the wars, which, in the beginning of the republic follow one upon another with marvellous rapidity. According to the received chro- Different nology, the Latin war which we have just referred to was preceded by a dangerous war with the Sabines, which war. lasted from the year 505 to 501 B.C. Dionysius and Plutarch' give detailed accounts of this war, full of vivid descriptions of marches, stratagems, battles, victories, and triumphs. Livy mentions it in few words, and Zonaras appears to give it the place of the war with the Latins, which he entirely passes over. The war will find but little mercy at the hands of historical criticism.

2

3

nected

with the Tarquinii.

It is at the very outset surprising that this war, The war although coming between that of Porsenna and that of unconthe Latins, appears unconnected with the exertions of the Tarquins to regain their power in Rome. The shrewd Dionysius alone has endeavoured to remove this objection, by making Sextus Tarquinius take part in it. But in the older unsophisticated account this war has no connexion with the Tarquinians. The Sabines harass Rome for four years; Tarquinius waits until they are defeated, and then he makes his attack upon Rome in conjunction with the Latins. This is clearly most improbable. The whole story is not, however, to be condemned on account of a chronological error. If we could save the war by placing it after the war with the Latins instead of before it, we

' Dionysius, v. 37 ff. Plutarch, Poplicola, 20. Zonaras, vii. 13.

2 Livy, ii. 16.

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I.

The
Valerii.

Repetitions of

the story.

No historical ele

should be satisfied. But even with such a transposition very little is gained. The foul spot is in the subjectmatter itself, and cannot be removed by transposing the war to another place.

The descriptions of the war connect it especially with the name of the Valerian house. In the first campaign (505 B.C.) the Consul M. Valerius, the brother of Poplicola, beats the Sabines in two great battles; in the second of these the Sabines lose 13,000 men, but the Romans not one man.' In the following year (504 B.C.) the same story is repeated, with this difference, that instead of M. Valerius, his brother, the principal hero of the Valerian house, P. Valerius Poplicola, is mentioned as consul and conqueror over the Sabines. This time also, according to Dionysius,2 13,000 Sabines are killed; but Dionysius is too shrewd a writer to discredit his report by adding that the Romans lost not a single man. He is silent about this, and, to make his report more plausible, he adds the number of 4,200 prisoners.3

It might be supposed that, after such defeats, the Sabines must have been reduced to submission. But it is not so. The war begins afresh in the following year, and the indefatigable Dionysius relates new victories and triumphs. It was only in the fourth year of the war (502 B.C.) that peace was concluded, after the Sabines had been again signally beaten, and had again lost 13,000 men in battle, and about 4,000 prisoners.5

4

What is to be thought of the whole of this war? Can ment in the any historical foundation be brought to light by removing all exaggerations, or have we to deal with a simple

tradition.

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2 Dionysius, v. 42. In a subsequent war with the Equians again 13,470 enemies are killed.-Livy, iji. 8.

These 4,200 prisoners make up exactly one legion. The 13,000 killed are about three legions. Consequently, on the plausible assumption that the Sabine force consisted of four legions, their whole army would have been annihilated, agreeably to Zonaras (vii. 13), who says that Poplicola μpo πάντας ἀπώλεσε.

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Niebuhr remarks, in reference to the early Sabine wars (before Tarquinius Priscus), that it is difficult to see how Romans and Sabines could get into collision, so long as independent towns, like Tusculum and Nomentum, With this opinion we must separated both nations. agree, if we limit the name of Sabines to the inhabitants of the highlands on the east side of the mountain range stretching from Tibur to Narnia. Yet in the lowlands also, between this chain of hills and Rome, there were Sabines who had invaded this country, and had established themselves in Rome itself. Nomentum, Cures, Collatia, Canina, Crustumerium, and Antemnæ mentioned as Sabine towns. Fidene seems to have been Dionysius Sabine and Etruscan at different times. names the Anio as the boundary between the Sabines and the Romans. But even south-west of the Anio, the town Regillum, in the region of Tusculum, was called Sabine, and that Sabines lived there follows from a passage in Dionysius, where he relates that the Equians had to march to Rome through the country of Tusculum and that of the Sabines.

3

are

103

CHAP.

XII.

Sabine set

The fact that we find Sabines in the very heart of Extent of Latium agrees with the view already expressed,5 that the tlements. Sabines in the oldest time overran Latium and settled there. In course of time the Sabines and Latins in Latium became one people, and for a time the name of Latins was just as appropriate to designate them as that of Sabines. In the oldest sources referring to the intercourse of the Romans with their easterly and southerly neighbours, there was an uncertainty in the name which was applied to the latter; they were sometimes called Latins, and sometimes Sabines. This is evident from the story of the temple of Diana, which was built by Servius Tullius on the Aventine as a common sanctuary of the Romans and Latins. At that time it came to

pass

1 Niebuhr, Röm. Gesch., i. note 887; English translation, i. 353.
2 See Arnold, Hist. of Rome, i. 128.

that a

'Dionysius, v. 37.

'Dionysius, ix. 68.

• See p. 21.

BOOK

I.

Identity of the several wars.

certain Sabine had a cow of unusual size, and the soothsayers predicted that whoever sacrificed this cow to Diana would secure the supremacy to his nation. The Sabine brought the cow to Rome to the common sanctuary of the Romans and Latins on the Aventine, but was outwitted by the Roman priest, who sent him down to the Tiber for purification, and in his absence offered up the cow in the name of Rome. In this story the Sabines and the Latins are evidently looked upon as the same nation.2 We cannot, therefore, be surprised that Sabine towns, like Nomentum, were reckoned among the thirty allied Latin towns, and that Collatia is called Sabine as well as Latin. We conclude from this uncertainty in the designation of the neighbouring people, that a Latin war could easily be called a war with the Sabines. But if once the words Sabine war' were uttered, descriptions of battles and triumphs would follow as a matter of course. We arrive at the same result if we pursue another line of argument.

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3

The Latin war was especially famous on account of the battle of the Lake Regillus under the dictatorship of Aulus Postumius Albus Regillensis. The names Regillum and Regillensis were, therefore, intimately connected in the memory of this war. The people of Regillum were Sabines. They were the bitter enemies of Rome, and before the beginning of the war they expelled the house of Claudius which counselled peace with Rome, and, therefore, emigrated to that city. The stories of both these wars, therefore, have reference to the same locality. Still clearer proof of the identity of the two wars is contained in the name of the Roman general, who is said to have conquered the Sabines as well as the Latins, as consul or dictator. This was Postumius, called at one time Aulus, at another Publius, and sur1 Livy, i. 45.

1

2 To make the story intelligible, it has been supposed that the Sabines also had a share in the sanctuary of Diana along with the Romans and the Latins. -Arnold, Hist. of Rome, i. 129.

3

Dionysius, v. 61. See above, p. 96.

Servius, ad Virg. Æn., vi. 774.

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