Tacitus: History: Book 1 [70]

The Works of Tacitus

tr. by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb

[1864-1877]

Tacitus: History Book 1 [70]

70. Caecina while halting for a few days in the Helvetian territory, till he
could learn the decision of Vitellius, and at the same time making preparations
for the passage of the Alps, received from Italy the good news, that Silius’
Horse, which was quartered in the neighbourhood of Padus, had sworn allegiance
to Vitellius. They had served under him when he was Proconsul in Africa, from
which place Nero had soon afterwards brought them, intending to send them on
before himself into Egypt, but had recalled them in consequence of the rebellion
of Vindex. They were still in Italy, and now, at the instigation of their decurions,
who knew nothing of Otho, but were bound to Vitellius, and who magnified the
strength of the advancing legions and the fame of the German army, they joined
the Vitellianists, and by way of a present to their new Prince they secured
for him the strongest towns of the country north of the Padus, Mediolanum, Novaria,
Eporedia, and Vercellae. This Caecina had learnt from themselves. Aware that
the widest part of Italy could not be held by such a force as a single squadron
of cavalry, he sent on in advance the auxiliary infantry from Gaul, Lusitania,
and Rhaetia, with the veteran troops from Germany, and Petra’s Horse, while
he made a brief halt to consider whether he should pass over the Rhaetian range
into Noricum, to attack Petronius, the procurator, who had collected some auxiliaries,
and broken down the bridges over the rivers, and was thought to be faithful
to Otho. Fearing however that he might lose the infantry and cavalry which he
had sent on in advance, and at the same time reflecting that more honour was
to be gained by holding possession of Italy, and that, wherever the decisive
conflict might take place, Noricum would be included among the other prizes
of victory, he marched the reserves and the heavy infantry through the Penine
passes while the Alps were still covered with the snows of winter.

71. Meanwhile Otho, to the surprise of all, was not sinking down into luxury
and sloth. He deferred his pleasures, concealed his profligacy, and moulded
his whole life to suit the dignity of empire. Men dreaded all the more virtues
so false, and vices so certain to return. Marius Celsus, consul elect, whom
he had rescued from the fury of the soldiers by pretending to imprison him,
he now ordered to be summoned to the Capitol. He sought to acquire a reputation
for clemency by sparing a distinguished man opposed to his own party. Celsus
pleaded guilty to the charge of faithful adherence to Galba, and even made a
merit of such an example of fidelity. Otho did not treat him as a man to be
pardoned, and, unwilling to blend with the grace of reconciliation the memory
of past hostility, at once admitted him to his intimate friendship, and soon
afterwards appointed him to be one of his generals. By some fatality, as it
seemed, Celsus maintained also to Otho a fidelity as irreproachable as it was
unfortunate. The escape of Celsus gratified the leading men in the State, was
generally praised by the people, and did not displease even the soldiers, who
could not but admire the virtue which provoked their anger.

72. Then followed as great a burst of joy, though from a less worthy cause,
when the destruction of Tigellinus was achieved. Sophonius Tigellinus, a man
of obscure birth, steeped in infamy from his boyhood, and shamelessly profligate
in his old age, finding vice to be his quickest road to such offices as the
command of the watch and of the Praetorian Guard, and to other distinctions
due to merit, went on to practise cruelty, rapacity, and all the crimes of maturer
years. He perverted Nero to every kind of atrocity; he even ventured on some
acts without the Emperor’s knowledge, and ended by deserting and betraying him.
Hence there was no criminal, whose doom was from opposite motives more importunately
demanded, as well by those who hated Nero, as by those who regretted him. During
the reign of Galba Tigellinus had been screened by the influence of Vinius,
who alleged that he had saved his daughter. And doubtless he had preserved her
life, not indeed out of mercy, when he had murdered so many, but to secure for
himself a refuge for the future. For all the greatest villains, distrusting
the present, and dreading change, look for private friendship to shelter them
from public detestation, caring not to be free from guilt, but only to ensure
their turn in impunity. This enraged the people more than ever, the recent unpopularity
of Vinius being superadded to their old hatred against Tigellinus. They rushed
from every part of the city into the palace and forum, and bursting into the
circus and theatre, where the mob enjoy a special license, broke out into seditious
clamours. At length Tigellinus, having received at the springs of Sinuessa a
message that his last hour was come, amid the embraces and caresses of his mistresses
and other unseemly delays, cut his throat with a razor, and aggravated the disgrace
of an infamous life by a tardy and ignominious death.

73. About the same time a demand was made for the execution of Galvia Crispinilla.
Various artifices on the part of the Emperor, who incurred much obloquy by his
duplicity, rescued her from the danger. She had instructed Nero in profligacy,
had passed over into Africa, that she might urge Macer into rebellion, and had
openly attempted to bring a famine upon Rome. Yet she afterwards gained universal
popularity on the strength of her alliance with a man of consular rank, and
lived unharmed through the reigns of Galba, Otho, and Vitellius. Soon she became
powerful as a rich and childless woman, circumstances which have as great weight
in good as in evil times.

74. Meanwhile frequent letters, disfigured by unmanly flatteries, were addressed
by Otho to Vitellius, with offers of wealth and favour and any retreat he might
select for a life of prodigal indulgence. Vitellius made similar overtures.
Their tone was at first pacific; and both exhibited a foolish and undignified
hypocrisy. Then they seemed to quarrel, charging each other with debaucheries
and the grossest crimes, and both spoke truth. Otho, having recalled the envoys
whom Galba had sent, dispatched others, nominally from the Senate, to both the
armies of Germany, to the Italian legion, and to the troops quartered at Lugdunum.
The envoys remained with Vitellius too readily to let it be supposed that they
were detained. Some Praetorians, whom Otho had attached to the embassy, ostensibly
as a mark of distinction, were sent back before they could mix with the legions.
Letters were also addressed by Fabius Valens in the name of the German army
to the Praetorian and city cohorts, extolling the strength of his party, and
offering terms of peace. Valens even reproached them with having transferred
the Imperial power to Otho, though it had so long before been entrusted to Vitellius.

75. Thus they were assailed by promises as well as by threats, were told
that they were not strong enough for war, but would lose nothing by peace. Yet
all this did not shake the loyalty of the Praetorians. Nevertheless secret emissaries
were dispatched by Otho to Germany, and by Vitellius to Rome. Both failed in
their object. Those of Vitellius escaped without injury, unnoticed in the vast
multitude, knowing none, and themselves unknown. Those of Otho were betrayed
by their strange faces in a place where all knew each other. Vitellius wrote
to Titianus, Otho’s brother, threatening him and his son with death, unless
the lives of his mother and his children were spared. Both families remained
uninjured. This in Otho’s reign was perhaps due to fear; Vitellius was victorious,
and gained all the credit of mercy.

76. The first encouraging tidings came to Otho from Illyricum. He heard that
the legions of Dalmatia, Pannonia, and Moesia had sworn allegiance to him. Similar
intelligence was received from Spain, and Cluvius Rufus was commended in an
edict. Immediately afterwards it became known that Spain had gone over to Vitellius.
Even Aquitania, bound though it was by the oath of allegiance to Otho which
Julius Cordus had administered, did not long remain firm. Nowhere was there
any loyalty or affection; men changed from one side to the other under the pressure
of fear or necessity. It was this influence of fear that drew over to Vitellius
the province of Gallia Narbonensis, which turned readily to the side that was
at once the nearer and the stronger. The distant provinces, and all the armies
beyond the sea, still adhered to Otho, not from any attachment to his party,
but because there was vast weight in the name of the capital and the prestige
of the Senate, and also because the claims which they had first heard had prepossessed
their minds. The army of Judaea under Vespasian, and the legions of Syria under
Mucianus, swore allegiance to Otho. Egypt and the Eastern provinces were also
governed in his name. Africa displayed the same obedience, Carthage taking the
lead. In that city Crescens, one of Nero’s freedmen (for in evil times even
this class makes itself a power in the State), without waiting for the sanction
of the proconsul, Vipstanus Apronianus, had given an entertainment to the populace
by way of rejoicings for the new reign, and the people, with extravagant zeal,
hastened to make the usual demonstrations of joy. The example of Carthage was
followed the other cities of Africa.

77. As the armies and provinces were thus divided, Vitellius, in order to
secure the sovereign power, was compelled to fight. Otho continued to discharge
his imperial duties as though it were a time of profound peace. Sometimes he
consulted the dignity of the Commonwealth, but often in hasty acts, dictated
by the expediency of the moment, he disregarded its honour. He was himself to
be consul with his brother Titianus till the 1st of March; the two following
months he assigned to Verginius as a compliment to the army of Germany. With
Verginius was to be associated Pompeius Vopiscus, avowedly on the ground of
their being old friends, though many regarded the appointment as meant to do
honour to the people of Vienna. The other consulships still remained as Nero
or Galba had arranged them. Caelius Sabinus and his brother Flavius were to
be consuls till the 1st of July; Arrius Antoninus and Marius Celsus from that
time to the 1st of September. Even Vitellius, after his victory, did not interfere
with these appointments. On aged citizens, who had already held high office,
Otho bestowed, as a crowning dignity, pontificates and augurships, while he
consoled the young nobles, who had lately returned from exile, by reviving the
sacerdotal offices, held by their fathers and ancestors. Cadius Rufus, Pedius
Blaesus, Saevinius Pomptinius, who in the reigns of Claudius and Nero had been
convicted under indictments for extortion, were restored to their rank as Senators.
Those who wished to pardon them resolved by a change of names to make, what
had really been rapacity, seem to have been treason, a charge then so odious
that it made even good laws a dead letter.

78. By similar bounty Otho sought to win the affections of the cities and
provinces. He bestowed on the colonies of Hispalis and Emerita some additional
families, on the entire people of the Lingones the privileges of Roman citizenship;
to the province of Baetica he joined the states of Mauritania, and granted to
Cappadocia and Africa new rights, more for display than for permanent utility.
In the midst of these measures, which may find an excuse in the urgency of the
crisis and the anxieties which pressed upon him, he still did not forget his
old amours, and by a decree of the Senate restored the statues of Poppaea. It
is even believed that he thought of celebrating the memory of Nero in the hope
of winning the populace, and persons were found to exhibit statues of that Prince.
There were days on which the people and the soldiers greeted him with shouts
of Nero Otho, as if they were heaping on him new distinction and honour. Otho
himself wavered in suspense, afraid to forbid or ashamed to acknowledge the
title.

79. Men’s minds were so intent on the civil war, that foreign affairs were
disregarded. This emboldened the Roxolani, a Sarmatian tribe, who had destroyed
two cohorts in the previous winter, to invade Moesia with great hopes of success.
They had 9000 cavalry, flushed with victory and intent on plunder rather than
on fighting. They were dispersed and off their guard, when the third legion
together with some auxiliaries attacked them. The Romans had everything ready
for battle, the Sarmatians were scattered, and in their eagerness for plunder
had encumbered themselves with heavy baggage, while the superior speed of their
horses was lost on the slippery roads. Thus they were cut down as if their hands
were tied. It is wonderful how entirely the courage of this people is, so to
speak, external to themselves. No troops could shew so little spirit when fighting
on foot; when they charge in squadrons, hardly any line can stand against them.
But as on this occasion the day was damp and the ice thawed, what with the continual
slipping of their horses, and the weight of their coats of mail, they could
make no use of their pikes or their swords, which being of an excessive length
they wield with both hands. These coats are worn as defensive armour by the
princes and most distinguished persons of the tribe. They are formed of plates
of iron or very tough hides, and though they are absolutely impenetrable to
blows, yet they make it difficult for such as have been overthrown by the charge
of the enemy to regain their feet. Besides, the Sarmatians were perpetually
sinking in the deep and soft snow. The Roman soldier, moving easily in his cuirass,
continued to harass them with javelins and lances, and whenever the occasion
required, closed with them with his short sword, and stabbed the defenceless
enemy; for it is not their custom to defend themselves with a shield. A few
who survived the battle concealed themselves in the marshes. There they perished
from the inclemency of the season and the severity of their wounds. When this
success was known, Marcus Aponius, governor of Moesia, was rewarded with a triumphal
statue, while Fulvius Aurelius, Julianus Titius, and Numisius Lupus, the legates
of the legions, received the ensigns of consular rank. Otho was delighted, and
claimed the glory for himself, as if it were he that commanded success in war,
and that had aggrandised the State by his generals and his armies.

Next: Book 1 [80]