On the Fortunes of the Romans (10-13)

And even the kings who succeeded Numa honoured Fortune as the head and foster-parent of

Rome and, as Pindar[*] has it, truly the Prop of the State. [*] And Servius Tullius, the man who of all the kings most increased the power of his people, and introduced a well-regulated government and imposed order upon both the holding of elections and military procedure, and became the first censor and overseer of the lives and decorum of the citizens, and held the highest repute for courage and wisdom, of his own initiative attached himself to Fortune and bound his sovereignty fast to her, with the result that it was even thought that Fortune consorted with him, descending into his chamber through a certain window which they now call the Porta Fenestella.[*] He, accordingly, built on the Capitoline a temple of Fortune which is now called the Temple of Fortuna Primigenia[*] (which one might translate as First-Born) and the Temple of Fortuna Obsequens,[*] which some think means obedient and others gracious. However, I prefer to abandon the Latin nomenclature, and shall endeavour to enumerate in Greek the different functions of the shrines of Fortune. There is, in fact, a shrine of Private Fortune on the Palatine, and the shrine of the Fowler’s Fortune which, even though it be a ridiculous name, yet gives reason for reflexion on metaphorical grounds, as if she attracted far-away objects and held them fast when they come into contact with her. Beside the Mossy Spring, as it is called, there is even yet a temple of Virgin Fortune; and on the Esquiline a shrine of Regardful[*] Fortune. In the Angiportus Longus there is an altar of Fortune of Good Hope; and there is also beside the altar of Venus of the Basket a shrine of the Men’s Fortune. And there are countless other honours and appellations of Fortune, the greater part of which Servius instituted; for he knew that Fortune is of great moment, or rather, she is everything in human affairs, [*] and particularly since he himself, through good fortune, had been promoted from the family of a captive enemy to the kingship. For, when the town of Corniculum was taken by the Romans, a captive maiden Ocrisia,[*] whose fortune could not obscure either her beauty or her character, was given to be a slave to Tanaquil, the wife of king Tarquin; and a certain dependent, one of those whom the Romans call clientes, had her to wife; from these parents Servius was born. Others deny this, but assert that Ocrisia was a maiden who took the first-fruits and the libations on all occasions from the royal table and brought them to the hearth; and once on a time when she chanced, as usual, to be casting the offerings upon the fire, suddenly, as the flames died down, the member of a man rose up out of the hearth; and this the girl, greatly frightened, told to Tanaquil only. Now Tanaquil was an intelligent and understanding woman, and she decked the maiden in garments such as become a bride, and shut her up in the room with the apparition, for she judged it to be of a divine nature. Some declare that this love was manifested by the Lar of the house, others that it was by Vulcan. At any rate, it resulted in the birth of Servius, and, while he was still a child, his head shone with a radiance very like the gleam of lightning. But Antias[*] and his school say not so, but relate that when Servius’s wife Gegania lay dying, in the presence of his mother he fell into a sleep from dejection and grief; and as he slept, his face was seen by the women to be surrounded by the gleam of fire. This was a token of his birth from fire and an excellent sign pointing to his unexpected accession to the kingship, which he gained after the death of Tarquin, by the zealous assistance of Tanaquil.[*] Inasmuch as he of all kings is thought to have been naturally the least suited to monarchy and the least desirous of it, he who was minded to resign the kingship,[*] but was prevented from doing so; for it appears that Tanaquil on her death-bed made him swear that he would remain in power and would ever set before him the ancestral Roman form of government. Thus to Fortune wholly belongs the kingship of Servius, which he received contrary to his expectations and retained against his will.

That we may not, however, appear to be retreating and withdrawing from illuminating and perspicuous testimonials into the dim past, as into a place of darkness, let us now leave the kings and transfer our discourse to the most notable deeds and the most celebrated wars. And in these wars, who would not acknowledge that much daring and courage was needed and also, as Timotheüs[*] has it,

Shame, the helpmate of warring Valour?

Yet the smooth flow of events and the impelling swiftness of Rome’s progress to so high a pinnacle of power and expansion demonstrates to all who reason aright that the progress of Rome’s sovereignty was not brought about by the handiwork and urging of human beings, but was speeded on its way by divine escort and the fair wind of Fortune. Trophy upon trophy arises, triumph meets triumph, and the first blood, while still warm on their arms, is overtaken and washed away by a second flood. They count their victories, not by the multitude of corpses and spoils, but by captive kingdoms, by nations enslaved, by islands and continents added to their mighty realm. In one battle Philip lost Macedonia, with one stroke Antiochus was forced to withdraw from Asia, by one defeat the Carthaginians lost Africa. One man[*] in the swift onset of one campaign added to the Roman dominion Armenia, Pontus, the Euxine, Syria, Arabia, the Albanians, the Iberians, and all the territory to the Caucasus and the Hyrcanians; thrice did the Ocean which encircles the inhabited world see him victorious, for in Africa he drove back the Numidians[*] to the strands of the southern sea; even as far as the Atlantic Ocean, he subdued Iberia,[*] which had joined in the distemper of Sertorius; the kings of the Albanians were pursued until he brought them to a halt near the Caspian Sea.[*] All these successes he won through enjoying the Fortune of the Roman commonwealth; then he was overthrown by his own fate.

But the great Guardian Spirit of Rome sent a favouring breeze, not for one day, nor at its height for a brief time only, like the Macedonian, nor but a land breeze, like the Spartan, nor but a sea breeze, like the Athenian, nor late to rise, like the Persian, nor quick to cease, like the Carthaginian[*]; but this Spirit, from its first creation, grew in maturity, in might, and

in polity together with the City, and remained constant to it on land and on sea, in war and in peace, against foreigners, against Greeks. This it was that dissipated and exhausted in the confines of Italy, like a mountain torrent, Hannibal the Carthaginian, since no fresh aid flowed to him from home because of jealousy and political enmities. This it was that separated and kept apart by great intervals of space and time the armies of the Cimbri and of the Teutons, that Marius[*] might avail to fight each of them in turn, and that three hundred thousand men of irresistible and invincible arms might not simultaneously invade and overwhelm Italy. Through the agency of this Spirit Antiochus was fully occupied while war was being waged against Philip,[*] and Philip had been vanquished and was falling when Antiochus was making his venture; the Sarmatian and Bastarnian wars restrained Mithridates[*] during the time when the Marsian war was blazing up against Rome; suspicion and jealousy kept Tigranes[*] from Mithridates while Mithridates was brilliantly successful, but he joined himself to Mithridates only to perish with him in defeat.

And why not admit that Fortune also retrieved the city in times of the greatest disaster? When the Gauls were encamped round about the Capitol and were besieging the citadel,

Baneful the plague that she brought on the host, and the people were dying.[*]

And as for the Gauls’ nocturnal assault, though they were noticed by none, yet Fortune and Chance brought about the discovery.

Concerning this assault of the Gauls it will perhaps not be unseasonable to give some additional details, however briefly. After the great defeat of the Romans at the river Allia,[*] some in their flight found a haven in Rome and filled the people with consternation and terror, and caused them to scatter far and wide, although a few went to the Capitol and prepared to stand a siege.[*] Others, immediately after their defeat, gathered together at Veii and appointed as dictator Furius Camillus, whom the people in their prosperity and lofty pride had rejected and deposed because he had become involved in a suit concerning the appropriation of public property.[*] But now, cowed and humbled after their defeat, they were for recalling him, and offered to hand over to him the supreme command, accountable to no one. Accordingly, that he might not be thought to be obtaining office because of the crisis, but in accordance with the law, and that he should not, as if he had given up all hope for the city, be elected by soldiery in a canvass of the remnants of the army, now scattered and wandering, it was necessary that the senators on the Capitolino should vote upon the matter after they had been informed of the decision of the soldiers. Now there was a certain Gaius Pontius,[*] a brave man, who, by volunteering personally to report these resolutions to the Senate on the Capitol, took upon himself great danger. For the way led through the midst of the enemy, who encompassed the citadel with sentries and

palisades. When, accordingly, he had come by night to the river, he bound broad strips of cork beneath his breast and, entrusting his body to the buoyancy of this support, committed himself to the stream. Encountering a gentle current which bore him slowly down stream, he reached the opposite bank in safety, and, climbing out of the river, advanced toward the section void of lights, inferring from the darkness and quiet that no one was there. Clinging to the precipitous cliff and entrusting himself to the support of sloping and circuitous ways and jagged surfaces of the rock which would allow a foothold or afford a clutch for his hand, he reached the top of the rock; he was received by the sentries, and made known to those within the decision of the army, and having obtained the decree of the Senate, he returned again to Camillus.

The next day one of the barbarians was wandering idly about this place, when he saw in one spot prints of feet and marks of slipping, and in another the bruising and tearing off of the grass, which grew on the earth of the cliff, and marks of the zigzag dragging and pulling up of a body; and this he told to the others. They, thinking that the way was pointed out to them by their enemies, attempted to rival them; and waiting till the very dead of night, they made the ascent, unnoticed not only by the sentinels, but also by the dogs which shared guard duty and formed the outpost, but then were overcome by sleep.

Rome’s Fortune, however, did not lack a voice capable of revealing and declaring such a great mischance. Sacred geese[*] were kept near the temple of Juno for

the service of the goddess. Now by nature this bird is easily disturbed and frightened by noise; and at this time, since they were neglected, because dire want oppressed the garrison, their sleep was light, and was made uncomfortable by hunger, with the result that they were at once aware of the enemy as they showed themselves above the edge of the cliif. The geese hissed at them and rushed at them impetuously, and, at the sight of arms, became even more excited, and filled the place with piercing and discordant clamour. By this the Romans were aroused, and, when they comprehended what had happened, they forced back their enemies and hurled them over the precipice. And even to this day, in memory of these events, there are borne in solemn procession a dog impaled on a stake,[*] but a goose perched in state upon a costly coverlet in a litter.

This spectacle exhibits the might of Fortune and the ease with which, whenever she busies herself and takes command, she provides from unexpected sources against all emergencies by implanting intelligence in the unreasoning and senseless, and prowess and daring in the craven. For who would not, truly, be struck with astonishment and amazement when he has come to learn and has embraced in his consideration the former dejection of the city and her present prosperity, and has looked upon the splendour of her temples, the richness of her votive offerings, the rivalry of her arts and crafts, the ambitious efforts of subject cities, the crowns of dependent kings, and all things which the earth contributes and the sea and islands, continents,

rivers, trees, living creatures, plains, mountains, mines, the first-fruits of everything, vying for beauty in the aspect and grace that adorns this place? And then comes the thought: how near did all this come to not being created and to not existing at all! When all things else were overcome by fire and frightful darkness and gloom, by foreign swords and murderous rage, it was poor, irrational, and timorous creatures that contributed the beginning of deliverance; and those great heroes and commanders, the Manlii, the Servilii, the Postumii, the Papirii, the founders of future illustrious houses, whom naught separated from death, geese aroused to make defence for the god of their fathers and for their fatherland. But if it be true, as Polybius[*] has recorded in his second book, concerning the Gauls who had at this time seized Rome, that, when news suddenly came to them that their domains at home were in danger of being lost to them at the hands of neighbouring barbarians who had invaded their land and were masters of it, they concluded a treaty of peace with Camillus and withdrew - if this be true, then there can be no contention with Fortune that she was not the cause of Rome’s preservation, by distracting the enemy, or rather, by abstracting them from Rome quite unexpectedly.

But what need is there to dwell on these matters, which offer nothing certain or definite because of the confusion of the events of Roman history and the destruction of contemporary chronicles, as Livy[*] has recorded? Certainly the

later events, plainer and clearer as they are, exhibit Fortune’s benignity; and to Fortune I ascribe also the death of Alexander, a man who by great good luck and brilliant successes, the result of his invincible daring and lofty aspirations, was sweeping swiftly through the world like a shooting star from East to West, and was already allowing the lustre of his arms to gleam upon Italy, since the destruction of Alexander the Molossian[*] near Pandosia at the hands of the Bruttians and Lucanians served him as pretext for the campaign. But truly that love of glory which led him against all mankind embraced both an emulous desire for sovereignty and a wish to rival and to pass beyond the limits of Dionysus’s and Heracles’[*] expeditions. He learned that Rome’s power and courage was arrayed for the protection of Italy like a firm-set battle-line; for some account of their illustrious name and fame was often transmitted to him, as of athletes thoroughly practised in countless wars.

Not without spilling of blood could this matter, I deem, have been settled,[*]

had the great aspirations of these two unconquered peoples with their invincible arms clashed with each other. For in numbers at this time the Romans were no fewer than an hundred and thirty thousand men[*]; and every one of them was warlike and intrepid,[*]

Knowing on horseback

How to do battle with men, and even, if need be, dismounted.[*]