Chapter XXIV: Part 24

[54] I, 48.

[55] Varro I, l. V. (IV) 42.

[56] I have spent many days in Rome in searching for the old churches which were pulled down at the brilliant reconstruction of the town; yet I had no guide to them, until I saw the work of a clergyman, who still showed their traces. Like him, Varro could point out the Sabine chapels.

[57] See p. 115, 116.

[58] See R. H. II, page 202, 250, and others.

[59] Viz. 4 + 5, as five is the plebeian number.--Note of the German Editor.

[60] When the Achæans spread over the Peloponnesus, Sicyon first, and then by degrees the other towns, adopted their νόμιμα. It was tried to force them also upon the Spartans, but in vain.

[61] Classical Tour, II, p. 195.--Note of the German Editor.

[62] The decay of this monument is the fault of the constructors themselves, inasmuch as they did not choose better materials.

[63] Rasena, probably not Rasenna; _Ras_ is the root, and _ena_ the termination, as in Porsena, Cæcina; yet the Etruscans do not double the consonants any more than the Shemitic nations.

[64] Livy XXII, 57.

[65] I have not chosen to suppress this passage on the Etruscan descent of Servius, which belongs to the lectures of the year 1826, although lower down there occurs a different view, of the year 1828. The disquisition given here, is in connection with that in R. H. I, 422, foll. but comes forth here more clearly and distinctly.--Note of the German Editor.

[66] In the earliest times, antiquities and history cannot be entirely separated. The _Commentarii pontificum_, as well as Livy and Dionysius, set us an example in this.

[67] Although I cannot succeed in finding an instance of the word _clientus_, yet the feminine _clienta_ offers sufficient justification for supposing also the masculine in us.--Note of the Germ. Ed.

[68] Non. 486, 24. _Campas_, _Plaut, Trin._ II, 4, 144. Lind.--Germ. Ed.

[69] These class distinctions under the second Temple, have only been elucidated by the great Selden, but for whom I should have known nothing of the matter, as the language and literature are unknown to me.

[70] These relative positions were so familiar to our (German) forefathers, that in the Mayence translation of Livy, _populus_ is rendered throughout by _Geschlechter_, _plebes_ by _Gemeinde_. Thus it says, “There were appointed as burgomasters (consuls), T. Quinctius by the _Geschlechter_, and L. Genucius by the _Gemeinde_;” where Livy has _populus_ and _plebes_. The consequence of such an artless view of the several positions was, that the men of the sixteenth century had very correct notions of many things, although devoid of the scientific learning which we cannot do without. I have found this out only a few weeks ago.

[71] The researches into the histories of the Italian cities, such as those which I have made, throw a considerable light on the whole development of the Roman constitution.

[72] The German expression used by Niebuhr is _Hörige_, which is a derivative of _hören_ to hear.--TRANSL.

[73] Ulpian’s fragm. V, 8.

[74] In the canton of Schwytz the country people were in the same manner divided into four quarters, to which two were afterwards added.

[75] I have omitted to elucidate this in my history.--Nieb.

[76] This expression puzzles Livy very much at the battle of Fidenæ. The old annalist had, _classibus certare_; yet Livy mistook the meaning of this for fleet, and on this doubts whether on the narrow Tiber a contest with fleets could have taken place. But it means nothing else but a fight with heavy armed men.

[77] Sixty stivers made a dollar of Cologne, the value of which is estimated at 23 silver groats (Silbergroschen). An as is therefore something less than 7 Prussian pennies 6⁹⁄₁₀ths.--GERM. EDIT.

One Prussian dollar = 30 Silv. gr.
One Silver gr. = 12 pennies.
The dollar (thaler) = 2s. 9d.
The as = ²⁵³⁄₄₀₀ penny Sterling.--TRANSL.

[78] The Abbé Sieyes, said, it is true, _La minorité a toujours tort_.

[79] Lyon, Narrative of Travels in Northern Africa, Lond. 1821, vol. iv. p. 162, gives that notice. The two tribes which inhabit the town, are the Beni Walid and the Beni Wasid; yet according to his statement, however, it is precisely in war time that the gate in the wall is closed.--Germ. Edit.

[80] A palm is about 9 inches.

[81] See above p. 88. It has already been remarked there that the following disquisition dates from the year 1828, and is therefore to be considered as the ultimate result of Niebuhr’s researches on this subject.--Germ. Edit.

[82] Livy V, 1. and the commentators on that passage.

[83] Ulric Becker, in Dahlmann’s Researches in the Field of Ancient History (_Forschungen auf dem Gebiete der alten Geschichte_.)--Germ. Edit.

[84] Orelli T. V., II. p. 255.

[85] This is not quite correct. There are native officers in the Company’s Sepoy regiments; but they are in every case subordinate to the Europeans.--Note of the English Translator.

[86] The Fasti, such as we have them, mention four Valerii as the sons of Volesus; Publius Poplicola, Marcus, Manius, and Lucius; the latter, or his son Caius, only occurs as Quæstor. The old legends, on the other hand, only knew of two, Publius Poplicola, and Marcus surnamed Maximus. Volesus, wherever he occurs, is mentioned as a Sabine, in the Annals, which Dionysius follows in order to fill up the blank of the earliest times, as a companion of Tatius; others assert, that he had emigrated to Rome at the bidding of the oracles, and very likely this is the older tradition. It is a common genealogical mistake to deem all of them brothers, Dio Cassius calls Marcus only a clansman of Publius, and the additional term which all the others bestow upon the Valerii, _Volesi filius_ or _nepos_, originated merely from the general desire to trace back all the members of a _gens_ to some Hero as the common ancestor of their race.

[87] Lar is an Etruscan prænomen frequently occurring on the monuments, and it probably means king or God. Martial’s scansion Porsĕna is incorrect: in Vibenna, Cæcina, and others, the same termination always appears with the penultima long.

[88] That this number is the correct one,--the MSS. of Livy having thirty-one,--is proved in the new edition of the first volume of the Roman History.

[89] That is to say, the patricians: for these, and not the senate, are meant by _patres_ in every correct writer.

[90] Boekh, Political Œconomy of the Athenians, vol. ii. p. 12.--Germ. Ed.

[91] Ingenious and learned men among the commentators of Livy have written on the relations of the nexi; yet all their researches have missed their object, with the exception of what Doujat, who if I remember right, was a councillor of Parliament in Paris, has said about the matter. Yet those, who wrote after him, did not allow themselves to be taught by him, but they returned to the former errors; as for instance, Drakenborch, although he quotes this author, a proof that learned students, who are not men of the world, may often be mistaken in such matters.

[92] During the middle ages, in Rome the _popolanti_, with the exception of the Corso, were no genuine Romans, but Slavonians and Albanians, who had immigrated under Innocent VIII., and as late as in the fifteenth century, spoke their own language.

[93] See above, p. 169.

[94] Glacier.

[95] It may have been an attempt to conquer the Veientines by establishing a strong hold within their own territory, similar to the ἐπιτειχισμός of Decelea against Athens; for in those ages a campaign lasted only a very short time, from eight to fourteen days. Either the armed force of the country marched against the enemy, or it besieged them within their walls. To prevent the inhabitants therefore from quietly returning to their fields after the departure of the hostile army, it often happened that the latter established some fortified position in the enemy’s territory.

[96] Livy says of the Fabii that they had gone _infelici via, porta Carmentali, dextro Jano_; and Ovid, _Carmentis portæ dextro via proxima Jano est: Ire per hanc noli, quisquis es: omen habet_. This is to be understood as follows. All the Roman gates had a double arch, by one of which people went out, and by the other they came in; the former was termed _Janus dexter_, the latter, _Janus sinister_. The Carmental gate was situated between the Capitoline and the Quirinal hills. Since therefore those, who wanted to go out, could not pass through the left Janus, they had to make a great round, even if they wanted to go to a place quite close to it; for the right Janus was ominous, as the Fabii had passed through it on their last journey out.

[97] Livy, V, 46.

[98] The works of Sigonius and of Beaufort _sur la Republique Romaine_ are to be recommended as a rich treasure of subject matter treated by clever men; but they can only be relied on with any safety in the later period. Manutius also may be mentioned with praise: his commentary on Cicero’s epistles is quite indispensable for any one who wishes to understand that age. Yet in the earlier times, he too gropes his way in the dark, and that still worse than the others.

[99] From the discovery of this place all my researches on Roman topography have arisen.

[100] Quite incorrect is the spelling _Plebisscita_: _plebi_ is the old form of the genitive of _plebes_, as _Hercules_, _Herculi_; _Cœles_, _Cœli_; _dies_, _dii_.

[101] Properly speaking, ἰσονομία (in Herodotus and Thucydides) is that state of liberty in which no one is beyond or above the law; and ἰσηγορία (in Demosthenes), the equal dignity of every free citizen. R. H., II, p. 640, note.

[102] The motive for dating it so early was perhaps this, that Coriolanus was judged by it.

[103] I, 2, 29. cf. II, 2, 2.--Germ. Edit.

[104] The nature of the cury had essentially altered in the course of time. R. H. II, p. 178.--Germ. Ed.

[105] The history of the constitution of Elis offers a close parallel to that of Rome. The highest magistracy in that state was at first held for life. As late as in the Peloponnesian war, the clans of Elis alone are sovereign, and the country district is in a state of subjection, the whole of the power being in the hands of a council of ninety men who were elected for life. The people was divided into three phylæ, of thirty clans each. Afterwards the country district obtained the right of citizenship. The whole of Elis is divided into twelve regions, and the nation into twelve tribes; four of the latter are lost during the war, so that eight tribes only remain. This is an unmistakeable counterpart of the Roman history.

[106] See concerning this relation R. H. II., p. 419-423.--Germ. Ed.

[107] In some recent editions of Livy, we find Clœlius instead of Cæcilius; yet this is an emendation: in Dionysius the MSS. have Κλύσιον.--Germ. Edit.

[108] A double disquisition on the same subject (for it occurs here, and now and then in some other places), is to be accounted for from the circumstance that it had to be interrupted at the end of a lecture, and that afterwards in the following one the thread of the argument was not quite accurately taken up.--Germ. Edit.

[109] Enigmatical is what occurs in Livy and elsewhere, that a special law had been granted for a dictator, _ut ei equum escendere liceret_. The way in which this is interpreted, is that the dictator was not entitled to mount on horseback, whilst the _Magister Equitum_ was. Perhaps the dictator was not only entitled to make use of a carriage, but even he was not entitled to appear in any other way but in a carriage, particularly on his return from battle. To this refers a line in Varro, _Dictator ubi currum insedit vehitur usque ad oppidum_. _Oppidum_, according to Varro, is properly speaking the townwall (also a town surrounded by walls in contradistinction to _pagus_ and _vicus_).

[110] Festus, s. v. Præteriti Senatores, R. H. I. note 1163.--Germ. Ed.

[111] Cic. pro Cluent. c. 42. Ascon. in Orat. Tog. Cand. p. 84 Orell.

[112] The story of a bashaw of Aleppo is quite similar to that of Sp. Mælius. In a great scarcity he summons the principal men, and makes every one of them state the amount of all the corn which he had in store; then he rides to the magazines, and on admeasurement finds double the quantity of what had been written down from their statements; so he takes away the surplus, and the scarcity is at an end.

[113] Labici, as it is generally spelled in the editions of Livy, is a mistake of a copyist in the fourth or fifth century for Lavici, the reverse of which, Vola instead of Bola, is frequently read in the old editions.

[114] The Etruscan town of Capena was perhaps as near Rome as Veii was, though this cannot be decided, as the town disappeared at an early period. Certain it is that it lay between Veii, Falerii, and the Tiber.

[115] Cf. on the other hand R. H. III. note 1034. I nevertheless did not wish to suppress the passage given in the text from the year 182⁶⁄₇. According to Arago, the winters in Tuscany are now less cold, and the summers less warm than they were in olden times. (Berghaus Länder-und Völkerkunde, I. p. 248.)--Germ. Edit.

[116] This notice is from the lectures of 182⁸⁄₉, and is uniformly given by all the MSS. In the year 182⁶⁄₇, N. said, the length of the _emissarius_ is not measured; it is stated to be one (Italian) mile and a half, 7,500 feet: in R. H. II. p. 570, there are 6,000 feet. Abeken _Mittel Italien_, p. 179, says:--“The subterraneous drain cuts the south-western banks of the lake to an extent of nearly four thousand feet.” The statement of its length, as given in the text, seems therefore to be founded on a mistake.--Germ. Edit.

[117] See the speech of Fabricius in Dionysius, p. 747. I. 43. Sylb. from the Exc. de Leg.

[118] See R. H. III. note 485. Above p. 45.

[119] The southern mountains in Spain are connected with the African ones.

[120] In Lombardy, the battle fields of 1799 are very difficult to make out since the direction of the roads has been changed. Near Lützen, near Breitenfeld, and near Leuthen, the sites are also very hard to be recognised; even near Prague and Collin, it is not easily done.

[121] A difficult passage in the Metamorphoses of Ovid, refers perhaps to this war. It is stated in it that a heron had risen from the ruins of the city, after its destruction by the barbarians. The latest commentators have, without any just authority, tried to connect this destruction with the war of Hannibal. It might apply to a Samnite campaign, in which Ardea was burnt down; as Strabo, perhaps, would induce us to believe, when asserting, that the Samnites had carried on their conquests as far as Ardea. Yet the Samnites would scarcely have been called barbarians. Most likely there is here an inversion of the tradition which we have just mentioned, that the Ardeates under Camillus had defeated the Gauls.

[122] As an artist, by working in the presence of his pupil, improves his eye, and thus gives him the best practice, so is it also in literary pursuits. He who has studied for the whole of his life, certainly does a service to his hearers, when he shows them how he has got on, and how also he has sometimes gone back.

[123] Mirabeau said at Marseilles in the year 1789, that C. Gracchus had called on heaven to requite the shedding of his blood, and that from this blood Marius had sprung. But Gracchus was a pure-minded, guiltless man; Marius, a tyrant.

[124] Συμφωνεῖται σχεδὸν ὑπὸ πάντων, says Dionysius; this σχεδὸν shows, that all were not unanimous. I believe that the excellent Cincius had placed it in a different year, perhaps Ol. 99, 1. or 2.

[125] The chronology is very unsettled here on account of the uncertain change of the magistrates. It was not till after the Punic wars, that the consuls entered regularly into office in spring; and it was only in the last years of the republic that they did so on the first of January.

[126] I have, in the neighbourhood of Tivoli, still found vestiges of several places of which nothing is generally known, and which may have been then destroyed. These are square enclosures of walls on the tops of hills, without any traces of surrounding ramparts. We may see from thence how small those towns were, which lay scattered through Italy; they may have contained about fifty houses each.

[127] Probably VII, 12. and VIII, 6. or 8.; yet it is alluded to in other places besides.--Germ. Editor.

[128] The triumph on the Alban mount, which is first mentioned of Papirius Maso after the Punic war, is generally looked upon as a discretionary act of the generals, when they were refused a triumph in Rome; but it is undoubtedly a reminiscence of the ancient custom. Formerly, the Latin general triumphed on the Alban mount, as the Roman in Rome. When there was now no more a Latin general, the _imperator_, as general of the allies, took his triumph on the Alban mount, if it was denied him at Rome.

[129] Monte Sasso _di Castro_, above Mugello, is, according to a surmise of the editor of the R. H. III, note 144, the name to which N. here alludes.

[130] By this remark the difficulty is obviated, which otherwise arises as to how in an assembly wherein those only voted who happened to be present, it could have been the majority of the votes which decided. Applying this to Rome, how could the members of the _Tribus Velina_, the residence of which was very far off, not have felt grievously prejudiced in comparison with those of the _Palatina_? But all this is explained by the fact, that each tribe had only one vote; so that in important discussions the distant ones sent their most able men to town, and thus arose _de facto_ a representative government.

[131] The war of the Samnites with the Sidicines shows, that the territory of the Samnites at that time reached to the upper Liris, so that its limits are drawn too narrowly by d’Anville.

[132] _Campania_ is the district of the Campanians, that is to say, of the inhabitants of Capua (_Capani_ on coins). _Campas_ instead of _Campanus_ is met with in Plautus.

[133] Niebuhr’s positions do not here agree with those in d’Anville.--TRANSL.

[134] In his Roman history (III. 137.), Niebuhr pronounces much more decidedly for the second view; but it is to be remarked that the same version as that in this passage occurs already in the first edition (1812), whilst that, given in our text, dates from the lectures of 182⁸⁄₉. The detailed account of the battle (of the year 1826), on the other hand, still follows the version adopted before, of which fact, in order to prevent mistakes, we here expressly remind the reader.--Germ. Edit.

[135] VIII, 8. towards the end.--Germ. Edit.

[136] It is a common mistake of the moderns, that, when they hear of _cornu dextrum_ and _sinistrum_, they think of our system, and then suppose also a main body in the centre (corps de bataille). Yet the Roman host consisted of those two halves only (_cornua_). All the modern writers on tactics, with the exception of Guischard, are mistaken in this respect.

[137] In one MS. only, there is instead of “in the field,” _in campis Tincetanis_; but evidently as a subsequent filling up of a gap, which had been left whilst taking the notes. It is therefore probable that Niebuhr quoted the expression _in campis Ferectanis_, which occurs in Livy, without adding any further remark.--Germ. Edit.

[138] Also Popinia, Festus, s. v. Pupinia tribus, p. 233. M.

[139] The Plautii preserved on their coins the memory of the conquest of Privernum as the most glorious event of their family-history, R. H. III, 201. L. Æmilius Mamercinus Privernas and C. Plautius Decianus triumphed over the Privernates.--Germ. Edit.

[140] Liv. VIII. 37.

[141] Herennius, as it seems, was on the whole considered as a model of wisdom among the Samnites. According to a passage in Cicero _De Senectute_, he occurs as a speaking personage together with Archytas in a philosophical dialogue of a Pythagorean: a remarkable proof how intimately those Italiote towns were connected with the Sabellian peoples, and how far they were from looking upon them as barbarians. They had a great contempt for the Ὀπικοί, and may therefore have made a broad distinction between them and the Samnites. This intercourse with the Greeks accounts for Numa, the fountain head of Sabellian wisdom, having been imagined to have been a Pythagorean. This is a truly Sabine tradition. They went so far in their friendly connection, that the Greeks affected to consider the Samnites as a Spartan colony.

[142] In the lectures of 1826-7, Niebuhr places the end of the first period _before_ the disaster of Caudium, so that the second period is the brilliant one of the Samnites.--Germ. Ed.

[143] They consequently were not annihilated, as Zonaras has it.

[144] This is probably the passage from Dionysius, Mai Excerpt XVI, 6 quoted in R. H. III, p. 415. note 604.--Germ. Edit.

[145] See R. H. III, p. 323.--Germ. Edit.

[146] Reading Ὀμβρίκων instead of ὁμόρων. R. H. III, p. 330, note 438.--Germ. Edit.

[147] In the lectures of 1826-7 N. still mentioned here the battle on the lake of Vadimo, which afterwards he probably rejected, as may be inferred from R. H. III. 332.--Germ. Edit.

[148] See above, p. 152.

[149] Not Clusium, as Livy has it, for this was called in the language of the Umbrians Camers. Polybius has the correct name, and a mere comparison, based on the nature of the locality, might show us that Clusium is out of question.

[150] During the revolutionary wars I had so fully entered into the manner of the different generals, that, in very important cases, I foretold how, for instance, Napoleon would act. People would not believe in my predictions; yet they were generally fulfilled.

[151] For the arguments for this opinion see R. H. III, p. 431, note 647.--G. Ed.

[152] We always follow here the chronology of Cato; in Varro and in the Capitoline Fasti whole years are interpolated. This difference is founded upon a monstrous mistake, which Varro makes in the period between the conquest of Rome by the Gauls and the Licinian law. That conquest is dated by him three years earlier than it is in any of the other accounts: from the building of the city to the Gallic invasion, Varro and Cato agree with one another. Varro’s mode of reckoning tallies with the Greek one, and therefore it is sometimes used for synchronistical purposes. But there is not one among the ancient historians who makes use of these patch works: Polybius, especially, follows the era of Cato, which is also to be preferred on this account, that it may always be shown with certainty why Cato has reckoned in such or such a manner. A perfectly satisfactory Roman chronology is an impossibility: it was only in the first Punic war that the beginning of the year first remained fixed.

[153] See above, p. 501.

[154] Reprinted in the _Kleine historische und philologische Schriften_. Vol. II. p. 241-256.--G. Ed.

[155] “The benefit of the assignation of land was brought about at a period, when the people was sorely in want of its domestic circumstances being bettered, but too late for it to have been granted.” R. H. III, p. 488.

[156] There is evidently, by some mistake, the _Lex Publilia_ mentioned instead of the _Lex Valeria Horatia_; as the former merely referred to administrative measures, whilst the latter was still the only valid form for actual laws. See above, p. 321.--G. Ed.

[157] To C. Fabricius.

[158] This dignity must have been abolished before the Punic war, between 471 and 489.

[159] One is not to imagine, that the whole of the phalanx, sixteen thousand men, stood always in one compact mass sixteen files deep; but the Macedonians advanced by smaller divisions of about four hundred and twenty, as is done in most cases even now. These were able to move, and to find spaces to pass through, which was impossible for the great phalanx, when it had closed its ranks. This closing in was the resource of the last moment, and then this mass was impenetrable.

[160] We may see from this, what may be done by determination; as it was such an excellent cavalry, and so vastly superior in numbers.

J. OGDEN AND CO., PRINTERS, 172, ST. JOHN STREET, E.C.

Transcriber’s Notes

Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected. Variations in hyphenation and accents have been standardised but all other spelling and punctuation remains unchanged.

On page 535, the heading has been changed from "WAR WITH THE SAMNITES" to "WAR WITH THE SABINES" to match the table of contents and actual content of the section.

Italics are represented thus _italic_.