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MACMILLAN'S LATIN CLASSICS

Edited by JAMES C. EGBERT, Ph.D. Profesior of Latin, Columbia University

TACITUS THE AGRICOLA

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

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TACITUS

THE AGRICOLA

WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY

DUANE REED STUART

PKOFESSOB OF CLASSICS IN PKINCETON UNIVEK8ITT

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

1911

AU rights reserved

COPTBIGHT, 1909,

Bt the macmillan company.

Set up and electrotyped. Published April, 1909. Reprinted February, igii.

NorfDooD Press

J. 8. Gushing Co. — Berwick <fe Smith Co.

Norwood, Ma8s., U.S.A.

PREFACE

This book attempts to convey in simple form such infor- mation as, in the judgment of the editor, should be imparted to the student who first makes acquaintance with Tacitus through the medium of the Agricola. I have aspired to instruct and not to impress. Hence I cannot hope that the professional scholar will learn much that is new to him in these pages. Whatever views learned men may hold con- cerning the literary genus of the Agricola, to the student the treatise makes its strongest appeal as the story of the life of a man of affairs who deserved well of his country in a troublous age. In the commentary, therefore, I have had more to say about the historical and the political aspects of the biography than about syntactical and stylistic phe- nomena. I trust that the learned note will be conspicuous by its absence.

I have excluded almost entirely references to works of a technical nature and to books written in foreign tongues. However, the initiated will recognize, and I gratefully acknowledge, my indebtedness to Andresen, Draeger, Fur- neaux, Gudeman, Hendrickson, Leo, Norden, Peter, Schanz, and Schwabe. Much of the work which has been done on the Agricola since Wex has become common property. I have taken account at least of all the authoritative editions issued since his time.

In making the text I have endeavored to evaluate to the best of my ability the data rendered accessible by Anni-

Vi PREFACE

baldi's recent publication of the Jesi manuscript. In mercy to the student the intricacies of textual criticism have been kept in the background. I do not flatter myself that the treatment of many vexed passages will command universal approval. However, thanks to the new manuscript, cer- tainty is now attainable in connection with numerous small points which previous editors have had to leave in doubt.

In conclusion I desire to acknowledge the useful services of Professor Egbert, the editor of the series, and to record my obligations to my colleagues, Professor David Magie, Jr., and Professor Edwin Rankin, who have assisted me by suggestion and criticism. Permission to adapt the map from the edition of Church and Brodribb was courteously granted by the Macmillan Company.

DUANE REED STUART.

Princeton University.

CONTENTS

PAGE

Introduction :

I. The Life of Tacitus is

II. Writings xiv

III. Purpose and Literary Form of the Agricola . . xv

IV. The Style of Tacitus xix

V. Manuscripts of the Agricola xxv

VI. Editions and Works of Reference .... xxvi

Text 1

Notes 81

Critical Appendix 105

Vll

INTRODUCTION

LIFE .y^^-i/^Jr A^P^

The books of Tacitus show vividly what manner of man he was. The works of no other ancient historian are so impregnated with the author's personality. By reading the writings of Tacitus between the lines it is easy to find out what he thought of the world in which he lived, what his convictions and what his prejudices were.

On the other hand, the information that he gives us directly about his life is very meager. No biography of Tacitus has come down to us from ancient times. It is possible, therefore, to reconstruct his career only in a bare outline in which much rests upon conjecture and surmise.

According to the more reliable tradition our author's full name was Publius Cornelius Tacitus. The year of his birth was probably 55 a.d. His boyhood thus coincided closely with the reign of Nero, 54-68 a.d. We do not know whether Tacitus was a native of Rome or whether he was born outside of the city, as were the other great figures of Roman literature. As to his station in the world there is good reason to believe that his father was a Cornelius Tacitus of the preceding generation, a Roman knight who served as procurator in Belgic Gaul. If this identifica- tion be correct, Tacitus came from equestrian stock — an inference which fits what we know about his education, his marriage, and his social connections. As he himself tells us, he was a disciple of M. Aper and Julius Secundus, the

iz

X INTRODUCTION

leaders of the bar in the time of Vespasian, 69-79 a.d. He thus had a place as a youth in that distinguished coterie of literary men of whose intercourse he gives a typical sketch in the Dialogus de Oratoribus. In the year 78 he married the daughter of Julius Agricola, one of the consuls of the previous year and a man who had already made his mark as a soldier and an administrator. Evidently this match bespeaks for Tacitus the approval of social position and official prestige. Throughout his hfe Tacitus was on terms of intimacy with the foremost men of the time, notably with the younger Pliny. Of this engaging type of Roman gentility Tacitus was the model and the constant ad- miration. Eleven of the published letters of Pliny have come down to us with the superscription C. Pliniiis Tacito suo salutem.

At a comparatively early age Tacitus established for himself a reputation as a pleader and an orator. During the reign of Vespasian he entered his official career by serving as military tribune and as a member of the board of vigintiviri so-called. Under the rules governing preferment at the time he thus became eligible for the higher state offices which marked the successive steps in a senatorial career. The first of these posts, the quaestor- ship, Tacitus held either in 80 or in 81 a.d. under the emperor Titus. During the reign of Domitian, 81-96 A.D., Tacitus for some years must have enjoyed the favor of the emperor whom, as we shall see, he was afterwards to portray in such dark colors. At least he reached the praetorship in the year 88 a.d. and therefore as a necessary- preliminary must have served as tribune of the people or as aedile. In accordance with the system of Roman provincial administration he waa sent, at the expiration of

INTRODUCTION XI

his praetorship, to fill some one of the posts that fell to the lot of the ex-praetors. He may have commanded a legion or may have governed a province. We do not know where this post was located. He spent some four years in this service, for, as we learn from chapter 44 of the Agricola, he was still absent from Rome when his father- in-law died in August 93.

Agricola undoubtedly carried with him the members of his household in his fall from favor. During the closing years of Domitian's principate Tacitus was persona ingrata at the palace. After his return to Rome he found it necessary to order his conduct with care if he were not to court what seemed to him a useless martyrdom. There- fore in the deliberations of the Senate he frankly assumed with the crowd an attitude of non-resistance. We may well believe that on many occasions only the tactful application of the doctrine of conformity which he preaches in the Agricola saved him from the fate which overtook those colleagues of his who dared openly to brave imperial displeasure. For the time being the path of official ad- vancement was blocked.

With the murder of Domitian came better times for the senatorial party. In 97 the emperor Nerva raised Tacitus to the consulship. One incident in the historian's tenure of the office has been handed down to us, namely, his de- livery of a eulogy of Verginius Rufus, the guardian of Pliny. Verginius had rendered distinguished service to the Empire in the Gallic revolt of 68, and if he had cared to accept the proffered support of his army, might possibly have been emperor. The speech of Tacitus, says Pliny, added the crowning touch to Verginius' s good fortune.

Two more events in the life of Tacitus as a public man

xii INTRODUCTION

are known to us. In the year 100, together with his friend Pliny, he acted for the inhabitants of Africa in proceed- ings instituted against Marius Priscus, a governor of the province, who was accused of malfeasance in ofl&ce. Taci- tus reached the culmination of his political career before he was sixty years old. In 112-113 the proconsulship of Asia fell to his lot. This post and the corresponding position in Africa were the highest honors that could be conferred on a senator. Therefore, Tacitus, more fortu- nate than Agricola, whom Domitian had forced to relin- quish claim on the proconsulship of Africa, obtained his due of recognition from the state.

At the expiration of his year of office Tacitus presuma- bly returned to Rome and began the composition of the Annals. Apparently he outlived Trajan and died some- time after 117 a.d., the year in which Hadrian began to rule. He died without completing the work which he had reserved for his old age, a history of the principates of Nerva and Trajan.

Tacitus was a man of tremendous earnestness. He took his work seriously and tried in good faith to meet the self-imposed obligation of narrating the history of the empire sine ira et studio. When he failed, as we know he sometimes did, to live up to his promise to preach the "gospel of things as they were," it was from no desire to falsify. His judgments were at the beck and call of a masterful individuality which confronts us everywhere and insists on leaving its subjective impress on the narra- tive. His view of things was pessimistic. He was unable to repress his prejudices in dealing with such emperors as Tiberius and Domitian. As a result their characters ap- pear before us with proportions distorted.

INTRODUCTION xiii

A critical historian in the modern sense he was not. Nevertheless he towers above the historians of Rome as Thucydides towers above those of Greece. Owing to the loss of the sources on which he tells us he drew, it is a well-nigh impossible task to discover his literary methods in detail. Compilation was in his day the accepted pro- cess of historical composition. The obeisance paid to the authority of a predecessor amounted often to the re- production — without acknowledgment — of the written word. Tacitus did not hesitate to appropriate phrase- ology as well as facts ; hence he sometimes shines with a luster not his own. Tested, however, by the standards of his age, he handled his sources scientifically. He did not slavishly follow one work for a given period, but he utilized several at a time, comparing them among themselves and occasionally checking their testimony by recourse to public documents.

It has been well said that whatever Tacitus was it is through his eyes that we must see the first century of the Empire. This, however, does not constitute his sole claim to a hearing nowadays. Although there was a strong dash of the misanthropist in his make-up, none the less his chief interest in the drama of history was centered on the human actors. Events are to be studied in terms of the human motives underlying them. These motives Tacitus divines with magic insight and sets forth with matchless power. In his hands history is not a mere chronicle of changes of dynasty, wars, and rumors of wars. It is a record of the ability of human virtues to make and human passions to mar. This story Tacitus elected to tell to his world that posterity might draw the moral. It would seem, therefore, that, as long as " the proper study

xiv INTRODUCTION

of mankind is man," the writings of Tacitus should hold a message.

WRITINGS

Besides the Agricola four works bearing the name of Tacitus have come down to us : —

1. The Dialogus de Oratoribus, an essay in literary- criticism, cast in the form of a conversation. The speak- ers inquire into the reasons for the decadence of oratory and discuss the relative merits of poetry and eloquence. Scholars are at variance as to the date of composition. The work appeared either in the reign of Titus, 79-81 A.D., or not until after the death of Domitian in 96 a.d.

2. The Germania so-called, being an account of ancient Germany and the Germans. The treatise was published in 98 A.D., not long after the appearance of the Agricola.

3. The Histories, the first of the purely historical works of Tacitus, presented in annalistic form the events of imperial history from January 1, 69, down to the death of Domitian. The work contained probably fourteen, cer- tainly no less than twelve, books. Of these the first four and a part of the fifth are extant. The Histories were published during the years following 104 a.d., prob- ably in installments, and were completed before Tacitus went out as proconsul of Asia in 112.

4. The Annals, formally entitled Ab Excessu Divi Au- gusti Libri. Herein were set forth the reigns of the four emperors of the Julian line who succeeded Augustus; namely, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero. The nar- rative presumably was carried down to the date at which the Histories begin. Of the sixteen or eighteen original books — the number is uncertain — we have books 1-4

INTRODUCTION XV

and 12-15 complete and portions of four other books. The ' work was begun after the return of Tacitus from Asia and could not have been finished until some time after the accession of Hadrian.

It is thus evident that the major portion of Tacitus's literary activity coincided with the reign of Trajan. Of course Tacitus wrote speeches and presumably he an- swered the letters of his friend Pliny. None of these has come down to us.

PURPOSE AND LITERARY FORM OF THE AGRICOLA

Agricola died in the year 93 a.d. Five years passed before Tacitus gave to the world the account of his father- in-law's life and character which we know under the title De Vita Iidii Agricolae Liber. The publication of the book was doubtless retarded by that attitude of self- effacement which, as we have seen, Tacitus felt bound to adopt during the last years of Domitian's reign. At all events, when the heart for literary work returned to him, he soon applied himself to the composition of his tribute to the memory of Agricola. One might naturally infer that this labor of love would be the first task undertaken by Tacitus after the lethargic effects of the enforced mental inactivity which had resulted from Domitian's measures of repression had begun to abate. However, because of the prevailing uncertainty as to the date of the Dialogus we cannot insist absolutely upon this conclusion, plausible and flattering to Tacitus though it may be. We simply know that if the Agricola was not the first of the works published after the death of Domitian, it was certainly the second.

Xvi INTRODUCTION

The first three chapters of the book are introductory. In them Tacitus tells his readers plainly what kind of a book he purposes to write and what point of view he will assume in writing it. The work is to be a biography — a literary form which had been well represented in Roman literature prior to Tacitus. Herewith was not implied a critical bi- ography as we now understand it, to which we look to learn the exact facts of the subject's career, — the shadows as well as the lights of his personality. Realistic portraiture was not attempted in the style of biographical writing to which the Agricola belongs. The object sought was the glori- fication of some man who had passed away. The author treated his material in a laudatory vein, and the familiar admonition de mortuis nil nisi bonum was in the main strictly observed. In such a spirit Tacitus wrote the Agricola. The book is frankly conceived as a eulogy ; its composition is viewed as an act of pious devotion. It is essential to the appreciation of the treatise that the reader keep these facts in mind.

However, the student will inevitably be impressed with the fact that some chapters read more like history than like biography. Agricola was a man of action. His great- est achievements lay in the field of arms and of military administration. It was unavoidable that in describing the career of Agricola in Britain Tacitus should tell us about events and incidents that would fall properly in a history of the Roman conquest of the island. Yet in nearly every chapter he contrives to keep uppermost in the mind of the reader the consciousness that Agricola is the central figure of the narrative. By many an adroit allusion Agricola is made to appear as the hero and the directing genius of the Roman advance. His energy and

INTEODUCTION XVU

promptitude, his resourcefulness in the field, the sagacity which he displayed in securing his conquests, his tactful treatment of subjugated peoples, are brought out in bold rehef. Contemporary history is introduced, not for its own sake, but to furnish a setting for the exploits of Agricola.

Withal it must be confessed that while Tacitus does not allow us to forget Agricola for long, he did not feel bound to mention his hero's name in every chapter or to exclude rigorously all matter which did not make directly for characterization or for praise. The reason is not far to seek. At the time at which Tacitus was busy with the Agricola, he had already conceived the project of writing a history of the reign of Domitian and thereby of bringing home to the minds of men by way of contrast the blessings they were enjoying under Trajan. In a word, the interests that were to put the stamp upon his subsequent literary productivity were then claiming his attention. It is not strange, therefore, that he occasionally overstepped the bounds prescribed by rhetorical usage for the biography and introduced certain material for the sake of its intrinsic interest or its dramatic effectiveness rather than because it could lay claim logically to a niche for itself. The mutiny and the desertion of the Usipi, chapter 28, is the clearest case. The anecdote is a lively bit of narrative, inserted because it seemed a memorable incident of the season's campaign. A more vital connection may be dis- cerned for chapters 13-17, in which the history of Anglo- Roman relations is sketched from the first invasion by Julius Caesar down to the beginning of the administration of Agricola. We learn of the progress that had been made in the subjugation of Britain before the coming of Agricola.

XVm INTEODUCTION

We are apprised of the difficulties of the undertaking with which previous governors had coped more or less success- fully. This preliminary information prepares the reader to be impressed at the manner in which Agricola suc- ceeded where others had failed. This is precisely the aim that Tacitus had in view. Nevertheless the content of these chapters is historical and the historical manner of Tacitus is visible in method of presentation. This is notably the case in chapter 15, where the grievances of the Britons and the motives that incited them to revolt are cast in the form of a speech. What a common device of the ancient historian it was to put into the mouths of characters harangues appropriate to an occasion but wholly or partly fictitious, the student who has read a book of Livy will remember.

A description of the country and peoples of Britain might have been utilized mainly to familiarize the reader with the scenes of Agricola's campaigns and to render intelligible the movements of army and fleet. However, chapters 10-12 are related in no such manner to the con- text. They are ethnographical, purely and simply. Tacitus himself tells us that his aim was to correct the erroneous notions disseminated by previous writers, since the complete subjugation of the island had made exact knowledge possible concerning geography and ethnology. The scientific spirit has here the upper hand, even though in chapter 10 he does weave in a reference to Agricola's demonstration of the insular character of Britain. Chapters 11 and 12, with their description of peoples, climate, and productions, owe their presence to the same interest in foreign climes and races that inspired the Germania.

INTRODUCTION xix

It may be that if Tacitus had published his eulogy in the first stress of sorrow soon after the death of Agricola, a singleness of purpose would have been discernible in every chapter. As to this possibility we can only speculate. At all events the admixture of historical elements is not so pervasive as to force us to deny to the Agricola claim of rhetorical unity. In the actual labor of composition Tacitus could not or did not stifle his literary predilections. The historical studies which were demanding his attention affected his choice of content and colored his method of presentation. Nevertheless in by far the larger portion of the book Tacitus is true to the aim expressed at the outset and repeated in the concluding sentence of the last chapter. He has given to posterity a eulogy of his father- in-law, couched in the form of a biography.

THE STYLE OF TACITUS

As the Agricola, notwithstanding its biographical form, contains the first premonitions of the works that have assigned to Tacitus for all time historian as his character- istic title, so stylistically the work marks a beginning. The earlier Dialogus was modeled consciously on the manner of Cicero, whose style was regarded by a school of Tacitus's contemporaries as the embodiment of correct rhetorical theory. In the four later works Tacitus dis- carded the Ciceronian idea and developed the unique medium of expression with which his name is associated par excellence.

The principles on which this style was based were not evolved by Tacitus. During the first century of the Empire, in the rhetorical schools and among literary

XX INTRODUCTION

craftsmen, there had been forming a movement away from the style of the Golden Age with its parallelism and sym- metry in construction and in diction, its formalism in syntax, its utilization of the periodic sentence, its restraint in expression. The adherents of the New Style favored variety in expression above regularity, brevity and con- densation above the developed sentence and the long period. By way of diversifying the monotony of classical syntax innovations suggested by the Greek and by the usage of the^ poets were received into prose. Similarly poetic words and turns of expression established them- selves in the prose vocabulary. The effect on the reader was ever uppermost in the mind of the writer. There was constant striving to stir admiration and to retain interest. To these ends a plentiful use of epigrams, sententious say- ings, and graphic descriptions contributed.

In the course of the thorough rhetorical training which Tacitus enjoyed he had of course become familiar with all the prevalent doctrines. He was therefore fitted to pick and choose a style in which to write his narrative works. It was quite in keeping with the canons of ancient taste that an author should adopt an established style which he might deem appropriate to his work in preference to writing as his personality might inspire him. However, a master mind does not pay absolute fealty to a system — and a master mind Tacitus was. In practice he leaned toward the innovative tendencies of his day as we have described them. Nevertheless he was not dominated by them. He took the elements which lay ready to his hand, worked them over in the crucible of his individuality, and so produced ultimately a creation of his own genius.

Of the extant works the Agricola, as has been said, was

INTRODUCTION XXI

the first essay in the style which we regard as typically Tacitean. Critical study, to be sure, reveals certain dif- ferences in diction and in usage between the Agricola and the longer works. During the fifteen years of literary work that followed the composition of the biography, the style of Tacitus underwent various modifications. This is a law of stylistic evolution. In the Agricola Tacitus was feeling his way; he had not yet acquired the sure touch exhibited in the Annals. Furthermore some of the rhetorical features peculiar to the Agricola are due to the fact that the book was written, as was the Dialogus, under the influence of a literary model. However, there had been a change of masters. Sallust had been substituted for Cicero. Lastly, traces of Tacitus's scholastic training in rhetoric are still visible in the Agricola. Witness the frequent recurrence of pairs of synonyms such as incensum ac flagrantem 4, 17; indecorus atque humilis 16, 22; fictum ac compositum 40, 11; celebritate et frequentia 40, 14. Examples are numerous. This device suggests the efforts of the pleader to drive home his argument by means of emphatic redundancy. The last chapter of the Agricola has an oratorical coloring which the eulogistic character of the piece naturally justifies.

Nevertheless, after due allowance has been made for its local stylistic features, the Agricola still displays clearly the characteristic qualities which differentiate so unmis- takably the style of Tacitus from that of the other prose writers hitherto encountered by the student. Before all else there is evident that penchant for succinctness of statement that became with Tacitus a fine art. The desire for brevity often led him to compress his thought to the point of obscurity. In such contexts as 5, 1-2 rvdimenta

xxii INTRODUCTION

. . . adprobavit; 21, 7-8 ingenia Britannorum studiis Gallorum anteferre, he places on the reader the brunt of discovering the real meaning of the sentence. Ellipsis of the forms of sum is more affected by him than by the writers of the classical period; e.g. 6, 16 idem praeturae tenor et silentium; 16, 20 discordia labor atum; 26, 12 donee pvlsi hastes. Other verbs, easily supplied from the context, are occasionally omitted, as in 15, 2-3 accendere: [nam dicebat]; 19, 6 nihil per libertos . . . [egit]; 33, 2-3 agmina et armorum fvlgores . . . [apparebant]. The ge- neric noun is commonly omitted with the genitive and the ablative of description, as in 4, 4 luLius Graecinus [vir] senaiorii ordinis; 4, 7 Procilla fuit [mvlier] rarae castitatis.

The complicated period so characteristic of Livy is not so highly favored by Tacitus. There is a noticeable inclination for short, independent sentences, which is especially apparent in some of the descriptive chapters of the Agricola and in the inserted speeches. This device imparts to the narrative tenseness and onward sweep, effects which are often heightened by a sparing use of con- nectives. Compare the following passages: 12, 16 S.; 13, 7 ff . ; 15, 4 fif . ; 24, 8 ff. Asyndeton is strikingly com- mon. Note by way of example, 12, 18 tarde mitescunt, cite proveniunt; 20, 4 midtus in agmine, laudare modestiam, disiedos coercere: 30, 22 auferre, trucidare, rapere; 36, 21 vagi currus, exterriti . . . equi. Another favorite device of Tacitus for securing economy of expression is zeugma, which is in its usual form the "yoking" together of two different nouns by a verb logically appropriate to one only. In the later works the historian went to great lengths in this direction. We meet in the Agricola such instances

INTRODUCTION xxiii

as 3, 4-5 nee spem modo ac votum securitas puhlica [con- ceperit] sed . . . Jiduciam ac robur adsumpserit ; 31, 13 neque . . . metcdla aut partus sunt, quihus exercendis reservemur (exercendis is strictly applicable to metalla only) ; boldest of all — if the text be correct — is 45, 7 nos Maurici Rusticique visvs [foedavit], nos innocenti san- guine Senecio perfudit.

Tacitus cherished an especial antipathy toward con- ventional phraseology. He was constantly going out of his way to vary current modes of expression, to put things in different fashion from what the reader was anticipating. This tendency led him to shift from one construction to another, as in 9, 17 ostentanda virtute avi per artem; 41, 7 temeritate aut per ignaviam ducum; to indulge in such unexpected combinations of abstract and concrete as 25, 8 mixti copiis et laetitia and 37, 26 nox et satietas; to avoid using stock formulae by resorting to new coinages, such as 6, 17 ludos . . . duxit for ludos fecit and 37, 13 terga praestare instead of terga praebere. The technical term for this quality of style which is so much in evidence in the writings of Tacitus is inconcinnity.

Tacitus shared the taste of his day for epigram and pithy saying. He kept, however, within artistic bounds and did not overreach himself in an effort to sparkle in every sen- tence. Hence, he escaped the pitfalls which caught many of his contemporaries in whom the sententious too often degenerates into the banal, the original into the overwrought. The books of Tacitus are full of effective phrases and turns of expression which lend themselves to quotation. Some of these, such as 30, 23 vbi solitu- dinem faciunt, pacem appellant and 42, 14 proprium hu- mani ingenii est odisse quern laeseris, have become part of

XXIV INTRODUCTION

the common heritage of literature. Tacitus has a notable way of closing a chapter with a sentence which rings in the ear of the reader and brings the context to a fitting climax. For illustration may be noted 15, 23 porro in eius modi consiliis pericidosius esse deprehendi quam audere; 21, 12 idque apud imperitos humanitas vocabatur cum pars servitutis esset. Rhetorical effects are constantly heightened by the use of antithesis and alliteration; compare 5, 17 nee minus periculum ex magna fama quam ex mala; 16, 24 seditio sine sanguine stetit; 41, 19 simvl suis virtutibus, simul vitiis aliorum; 46, 19 mvltos veterum velut inglorios et ignobilis oblivio obruit.

For much of the distinctive color of his style Tacitus is indebted to poetry. Vergil was his favorite poet, and the influence of the "Mantuan" is often in evidence in the narrative works. In the Agricola, quibus cruda ac viridis senectus 29, 15 is an indubitable reminiscence of Aeneid 6, 304 sed cruda deo viridisque senectus ; femina duce 16, 2 and et aliquando etiam victis ira virtusque 37, 15 may be echoes of dux femina facti, Aeneid 1, 364 and 2, 367 quondam etiam victis redit in praecordia virtus. Many examples of poetic parlance in Tacitus are not due to deliberate requisition upon some one poet. From the time of Livy on the usages of the great poets were con- tinually being incorporated into prose. Tacitus thus often utilized modes of expression that had been originally struck out by the poets, but had in time become part and parcel of the literary language of the Silver Age. Poetic usage manifests itself in the Agricola in such words as 14, 14 rebellibu^; 27, 5 magniloqui; 31, 5 annus in the sense of annona; 38, 6 pignorum; in the frequent use of meta- phorical phraseology, as illustrated by 18, 8 transvecta

INTRODUCTION XXV

aestas; 36, 11 miscere ictus; 38, 13 spargi bdlum; in such personifications as 22, 1 annus . . . aperuit; 38, 9 dies faciem victoriae . . . aperuit; in a few constructions such as 8, 3 the infinitive with peritus; 43, 14 securus followed by a genitive; 45, 22 the local ablative animo without a preposition.

MANUSCRIPTS

Until recent years knowledge of the Agricola rested on two manuscripts only. Both of these are preserved in the Library of the Vatican. During the last decade two new manuscripts which throw a flood of light on the text have been put at the service of students of Tacitus. One of these is in the possession of the Chapter Library of the Cathedral at Toledo in Spain and is, therefore, designated as the Codex Toletanus. Its existence was reported to the world of scholarship in 1897, but four years passed before its readings were published. The text of this manuscript shows important variations from the text of the Vatican manuscripts. In numerous passages where its fellows are wrong, the Toletanus has preserved the correct version. Nevertheless there was some difference of opinion as to the reliance to be placed upon it until its authority was vin- dicated by the discovery of another manuscript, which has turned out to be one of the most valuable palaeographical finds of our day.

This fourth manuscript of the Agricola was found in the year 1902 in the private library of Count Balleani of Jesi, an Italian town not far from Ancona. Technically the manuscript is termed the Codex Aesinus, abbreviated by E. Eight of the fourteen leaves which it contains once formed a part of a manuscript of the minor works of

XXVI INTRODUCTION

Tacitus which Enoch of Ascoli, an emissary of Pope Nicholas V, obtained at the German monastery of Hers- feld and carried to Rome in 1455. This was the first manuscript of the minor works brought into Italy after the Revival of Learning. The six remaining pages of E were copied by a trustworthy scholar of the Renaissance directly from Enoch's original.

For practical purposes, therefore, the discovery of E has brought our text five hundred years nearer to Tacitus, as Enoch's manuscript of the Agricola was copied in the tenth century. Furthermore E is the source of the other three manuscripts, all of which were produced in the latter half of the fifteenth century. The Toletanus was copied directly from E; the Vatican manuscripts go back through an intermediary, being copies of a copy of E now lost to us. We see, therefore, why the Toletanus escaped many errors which crept into the Vatican manuscripts in the process of transmission. In reconstructing the text of the Agricola E, as the parent manuscript, must henceforth be the point of departure.

EDITIONS AND WORKS OP REFERENCE

Perhaps the most elaborate Engli^ edition of the Agricola is that by Henry Furneaux, Oxford, 1898. Among German editions may be mentioned those of Wex (1852), Urlichs (1875), Peter (1876), Andresen (1880), and Halm (1897).

The following books will be found useful for collateral reading and occasional reference.

INTRODUCTION xxvii

On Britain and the history of the Roman conquest: —

H. M. ScARTH, Roman Britain. London. No date.

Theodok Mommsen, Roman Provinces, 2 vols., trans, by W. P.

Dickson. New York, 1906. See vol. 2, p. 185. F. Haverfield, The Romanization of Britain. London, 1906.

On social hfe and conditions : —

Maurice Pellison, Roman Life in Pliny's Times, trans, by Maud

Wilkinson. Philadelphia, 1897. J&MiLE Thomas, Roman Life under the Caesars. New York and

London, 1899. Samuel Dill, Roman Society from Nero to Marcus Aurelius.

London, 1904. Charles Bigg, Tlie Church's Task under the Roman Empire.

Oxford, 1905.

On political and constitutional antiquities : —

A. H. J. Greenidge, Roman Public Life. London, 1901. Frank Frost Abbott, A History and Description of Roman

Political Institutions. Boston and London, 1902. W. T. Arnold, The Roman System of Provincial Administration

to the Accession of Constantine the Great. Oxford, 1906.

On Tacitus and his work : —

Gaston Boissier, Tacitus and Other Roman Studies, trans, by W. G. Hutchison. New York, 1906.

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CORNELII TACITI DE VITA

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Clarorum virorum facta moresque posteris tradere, l antiquitus usitatum, ne nostris quidem temporibus quamquam incuriosa suorum aetas omisit, quotiens magna aliqua ac nobilis virtus vicit ac supergressa est vitium parvis magnisque civitatibus commune, ignoran-5 tiam recti et invidiam. Sed apud priores ut agere digna memoratu pronum magisque in aperto erat, ita celeberrimus quisque ingenio ad prodendam virtutis memoriam sine gratia aut ambitione bonae tantum conscientiae pretio ducebatur. Ac plerique suam ipsi lo vitam narrare fiduciam potius morum quam adrogan- tiam arbitrati sunt; nee id Rutilio et Scauro citra fidem aut obtrectationi fuit: adeo virtutes isdem temporibus optime aestimantur, quibus facillime gignuntur. At nunc narraturo mihi vitam defuncti hominis venia opus 15 fuit, quam non petissem incusaturus tam saeva et in- festa virtutibus tempora.

L^gimus, cum Aruleno Rustico Paetus Thrasea, Heren-2 ni3 Seneci5ni Priscus Helvidiua laudati essent, capitale fuisse, neque in ipsos modo auctores, sed in libros quo- que eorum saevitum, delegate triumviris ministerio ut monumenta clarissimorum ingeniorum in comitio ac5

B 1

2 CORNELU TACITI

foro urerentur. Scilicet illo igne vocem populi Romani et libertatem senatus et conscientiam generis humani aboleri arbitrabantur, expulsis insuper sapientiae pro- fessoribus atque omm bona arte in exilium acta, ne quid

lousquam honestum occurreret. Dedimus profecto grande patientiae documentum; et sicut vetus aetas vidit quid ultimum in libertate esset, ita nos quid in servitute, adempto per inquisitiones etiam loquendi audiendique commercio. Memoriam quoque ipsam cum voce per- is didissemus, si tarn in nostra potestate esset oblivisci quam tacere.

3 Nunc demum redit animus; et quamquam primo statim beatissimi saeculi ortu Nerva Caesar res olim dissociabiles miscuerit, principatum ac libertatem, augeatque cotidie felicitatem temporum Nerva Traianus, nee spem modo ac

5Votum securitas publica, sed ipsius voti fiduciam ac robur adsumpserit, natura tamen infirmitatis humanae tardiora sunt remedia quam mala; et ut corpora nostra lente augescunt, cito extinguuntur, sic ingenia studiaque oppresseris facilius quam revocaveris: subit quippe etiam

10 ipsius inertiae dulcedo, et invisa primo desidia postremo amatur. Quid, si per quindecim annos, grande mortalis aevi spatium, multi fortuitis casibus, promptissimus quisque saevitiS principis interciderunt, pauci, et ut ita dixerim, non modo aliorum sed etiam nostri superstites

issumus,, exemptis e media vita tot annis, quibus iuvenes ad senectutem, senes prope ad ipsos exactae aetatis ter- minos per silentium venimus? Non tamen pigebit vel incondita ac rudl voce memoriam prioris servitutis ac testimonium praesentium bonorum composuisse. Hie

20 interim liber honori Agricolae soeeri mei destinatus, professione pietatis aut laudatus erit aut excusatus.

Gnaeus lulius Agricola, vetere et inlustri For5iuli5n-4 slum colonia ortus, utrumque avum procuratorem Cae- sarum habuit, quae equestris nobilitas est. Pater illi lulius Graecinus senatoril ordinis, studio eloquentiae sapientiaeque notus, iisque ipsis virtutibus iram Gai5 Caesaris meritus: namque M. Silanum accusare iussus et, quia abnuerat, interfectus est. Mater lulia Procilla fuit, rarae castitatis. In huius sinu indulgentiaque educatus per omnem honestarum artium cultum pueritiam adulescentiamque trSnsegit. Arcebat eum ab inlecebris lo peccantium praeter ipsius bonam integramque naturam, quod statim parvulus sedem ac magistram studiorum Massiliam habuit, locum Graeca comitate et provinciali parsimonia mixtum ac bene compositum. Memoria teneo solitum ipsum narrare se priml in iuventa studium 15 philosophiae acrius, ultra quam concessum ROmano ac senator!, hausisse, ni prudentia matris incensum ac flagrantem animum coercuisset. Scilicet sublime et erec- tum ingenium pulchritudinem ac speciem magnae ex- celsaeque gloriae vehementius quam caute adpetebat. 20 Mox mttigSvit rati5 et^aetSs, retinuitque, quod est diffi- cillimum, ex sapientia modum.

Prima castrSrum rudlmenta in Britannia Suetonio5 Paulino, diligenti ac moderate duci, adprobavit, electus quem contubernio aestimaret. Nee Agricola licenter, more iuvenum qui militiam in lasciviam vertunt, neque segniter ad voluptates et commeatus titulum tribunatuss et inscitiam rettulit : sed noscere provinciam, nosci exercitui; discere a peritis, sequi optimos; nihil adpetere in iactationem, nihil ob formidinem recusare simulque et anxius et intentus agere. Non sane alias exercitatior magisque in ambiguo Britannia fuit : trucidati veterani, 10

4 CORNELn TACITI

incensae coloniae, intercept! exercitus; turn de salute, mox de victoria certavere. Quae cuncta (etsT consiliis ductuque alterlus agebantur ac summa rerum et recupe- ratae provinciae gloria in ducem cessit, artem et iisum et

isstimulos addidere iuvem, intravitque animum militaris glOriae cupido, ingrata temporibus quibus sinistra erga eminentes interpretatio nee minus periculum ex magna fama quam ex mala. z^^^' ^^

6 Hinc ad capessendos magistratus in urbem degressus Domitiam Decidianam, splendidis natalibus ortam, sibi iunxit: idque matrimonium ad maiora nitenti decus ac robur fuit. Vixeruntque mlra concordia, per mutuam 5caritatem et in vicem se anteponendo, nisi quod in bona uxore tanto maior laus quanto in mala plus culpae est. Sors quaesturae provinciam Asiam, proconsulem Salvium Titianum.dedit, quorum neutro corruptus est, quamquam et provincia dives ac parata peccantibus, et proconsul

10 in omnem aviditatem pronus quantalibet facilitate re- dempturus esset mutuam dissimulationem mali. Auctus est ibi filia, in subsidium simul ac solacium; nam filium ante sublatum brevi amisit. Mox. inter quaesturam ac tribunatum plebis atque ipsum etiam tribunatus annum

15 quiete et otio transiit, gnarus sub Nerone temporum, quibus inertia pro sapientia fuit. Tdem praeturae tenor et silentium; nee enim iurisdictio obvenerat. Ludos et inania ^ honoris medio rationis atque abundantiae duxit, uti longe a luxuria, ita famae propior. Tum electus a

2oGalba ad dona templorum recognoscenda diligentissima conquisitione fecit ne cuius alterius sacrilegium res t publica quam Neronis sensisset.

EC 7 Sequens annus gravi vulnere animum domumque eius adflixit.. Nam classis Othoniana licenter vaga dum

AGRICOLA 6

Intimilios (Liguriae pars est) hostiliter populatur, matrem Agricolae in praediis suis interfecit, praediaque ipsa et magnam patrimonii partem diripuit, quae causa caediss fuerat. Igitur ad sollemnia pietatis profectus Agricola, nuntio adfectati'' a Vespasiano imperii deprehensus ac statim in partes transgressus est. Initia principatus ac statum urbis Mucianus regebat, iuvene admodum Domi- - /5 tiano et ex paterna fortuna tantum licentiam usurpante. lo Is missum ad dilectus agendos Agricolam integreque ac strenue versatum vicensimae legioni tarde ad sacramen- tura transgressae praeposuit, ubi decessor seditiose agere narrabatur: quippe legatis quoque consularibus nimia ac formidolosa erat, nee legatus praetorius ad cohibendum 15 potens, incertum suo an militura ingenio. Ita successor simul et ultor electus rarissima moderatione maluit videri invenisse bonos quam fecisse. ^

Praeerat tunc Britanniae Vettius Bolanus, placidiusS quam feroci provincia dignum est. Temperavit Agricola vim suam ardoremque compescuit, ne incresceret, peritus obsequi eruditusque utilia honestis miscere. Brevi deinde f.\ Britannia consularem Petilium Cerialem accepit. Habu-5 '' erunt virtutes spatium exemplorum, sed primo Cerialis labores modo et discrimina, mox et gloriam communi- cabat: saepe parti exercitus in experimentum, aliquando maioribus copiis ex eventu praefecit. Nee Agricola um- quam in suam f amam gestis exsultavit : ad auctorem ac lo ducem ut minister fortunam referebat. Ita virtute in obse- quendo, verecundia in praedicando extra invidiam nee extra gloriam erat.

Revertentem ab legatione legionis divus Vespasianuse inter patricios adscivit; ac deinde provinciae Aquitaniae praeposuit, splendidae inprimis dignitatis administra-

6 6 oi^i^ iit^^'^'^^^ORNELII TACITI

tione ac spe consulates, cui destinarat. Credunt plerique

5 militaribus ingeniis subtilitatem deesse, quia castrensis iurisdictio secura et obtusior ac plura manu agens calli- ditatem^ f ori non exerceat. Agricola natural! prudentia, quamvis inter togatos, facile iusteque agebat. lam vero tempora curarura remissionumque divisa: ubi conventils

10 ac iudicia poscerent, gravis, intentus, severus, et saepius io*^ misericors: ubi officio satis factum, nulla ultra pote- statis persSna. Tristitiam et adrogantiam et avaritiam exuerat ; nee illi, quod est rarissimum, aut facilitas auctoritatem aut severitas amorem deminuit. Integritatem

isatque abstinentiam in tanto viro referre|iniuria virtu tum fuerit. Ne famam quidem, cui saepe etiam boni indul- gent, ostentanda virtute aut per artem quaesivit: procul ab aemulatione adversus collegas, procul a contentione adversus procuratores et vincere inglorium et atteri

2osordidum arbitrabatur. Minus triennium in ea lega- tione detentus ac statim ad spem consulatus revocatus est, comitante opinione Britanniam ei provinciam dari, niil- lis in hoc ipsius sermonibus, sed quia par videbatur. Haud semper errat fama, aliquando et eligit. Consul egregiae

25 tum spei filiam iuveni mihi despondit ac post consulatum collocavit, et statim Britanniae praepositus est, adiecto pontificatus sacerdStio.

10 Britanniae situm populosque multis scriptoribus memoratos non in comparationem curae ingeniive re- feram, sed quia tum primum perdomita est: ita quae priores, nondum comperta, Cloquentia percoluere, rerum

6 fide tradentur. Britannia, insularum quas Romana notitia complectitur maxima, spatio ac caelo in orientem Germaniae, in occidentem Hispaniae obtenditur, Gallis in meridiem etiam inspicitur; septentrionalia eius, nul-

AGRICOLA 7

lis contra terris, vasto atque aperto mari pulsantur. Formam totius Britanniae Livius veterura, Fabius Rus-io ticus recentium eloquentissimi auctores oblongae scutulae vel bipenni adsiraulavSre. Et est ea facies citra Caledo- nt niam, und^et in universum f ama : sed transgressis inmen- ' sum et enorme spatium procurrentium extreme iam litore .

terrarum velut in cuneum tenuatur. Hanc oram novis- is ••• simi maris tunc primum Romana classis circumvecta insulam esse Britanniam adfirmavit, ac simul incognitas ad id tempus insulas, quas Orcadas vocant, invSnit domuitque. Dispecta est et Thule, quia hactenus ius- sum; et hiems adpetebat. Sed mare pigrum et grave 20 remigantibus perhibent ne ventis quidem perinde at- tolli, credo quod rariores terrae montesque, causa ac materia tempestatum, et profunda moles continui maris tardius impellitur. Naturam Oceani atque aestus neque quaerere huius operis est, ac multi rettulere: unum ad- 25 diderim, nusquam latius dominari mare, multum flumi- num hue atque illuc ferre, nee litore tenus adcrescere aut resorberi, sed influere penitus atque ambire, et iugis etiam ac montibus inseri velut in suo. v

Ceterum Britanniam qui mortales initio coluerint, 11 t indigenae an advecti, ut inter barbaros parum compertum. Habitus corporum varii, atque ex eo arguraenta. Nam- que rutilae Caledoniam habitantium comae, magni artus Germanicam originem adseverant; Silurum colorati vultus, 5 torti plerumque crines et posita contra Hispania- Hiberos veteres traiecisse easque sedes occupasse fidem faciunt. Proximi Gallis et similes sunt, seu durante originis vi, seu procurrentibus in diversa terris positio caeli corporibus habitum dedit. In universum tamen aestimanti Gallosio vicinam insulam occupasse credibile est. Eorum sacra

^ ^ 0 CORNELII TACITI

deprehendas, superstitionum persuasiones. Sermo baud multum diversus, in deposcendis periculis eadem audacia et, ubi advenere, in detrectandis eadem formido. Plus

istamen ferociae Britanni praeferunt, ut quos nondum longa pax emollient. Nam Gallos quoque bellis floru- isse accepimus; mox segnitia cum otio intravit, amissa virtute pariter ac libertate. Quod , Britannorum olim victis evenit : ceteri manent quales Galli fuerunt.

12 In pedite robur; quaedam nationes et curru proeliantur. Honestior auriga; clientes propugnant. Olim regibus parebant; nunc per*'principes factionibus et studiis tra- huntur. Nee aliud adversus validissimas gentis pro 5 nobis utilius quam quod in commune non consulunt. Rarus duabus tribusve civitatibus ad propulsandum commune periculum conventus: ita singuli pugnant, universi vincuntur. Caelum crebris imbribus ac nebulis I foedum; asperitas frigorum abest. Dierum spatia

10 ultra nostri orbis mensuram; nox clara et extrema Britan- niae parte brevis, ut finem atque initium lucis exiguo discrimine internoscas. Quod si nubes non officiant, aspici per noctem solis fulgorem, nee occidere et exsurgere, sed transire adfirmant. Scilicet extrema et plana terra-

15 rum humili umbra nOn erigunt tenebras, infraque caelum et sidera nox cadit. Solum, praeter oleam vitemque et cetera calidioribus terris oriri sueta, patiens frugum, fecundum: tarde mitescunt, cito proveniunt; eSdemque utriusque rei caus^, multus umor terrarum caelique.

20 Fert Britannia aurum et argentum et alia metalla, pretium victoriae. Gignit et Oceanus margarita, sed subfusca ac liventia. Quidam artem abesse legentibus arbi- trantur; nam in Rubro Mari viva ac spirantia saxis avelli, in Britannia, prout expulsa sint, colligi: ego

AGRICOLA 9

facilius crediderim naturam margaritis deesse quam25 nobis avaritiam.

Ipsi Britanni dilectum ac tributa et iniuncta imperii 13 munia impigre obeunt, si iniuriae absint: has aegre tolerant, iam domiti ut pareant, nondum ut serviant. Igitur primus omnium Romanorum divus lulius cum exercitu Britanniam ingressus, quamquam prosperas pugna terruerit incolas ac litore potftus sit, potest vi- deri ostendisse posteris, non tradidisse. Mox bella civilia et in rem publicam versa principum arma, ac longa oblivio Britanniae etiam in pace: consilium id divus Augustus vocabat, Tiberius praeceptum. Agitasse Gaium Caesarem lo de intranda Britannia satis constat, ni yelox Qngenio mobiliy pa^nitentiae et ingentes adversus Germaniam

'/'t-j^?oi^3''tus frustra fuissent. Divus Claudius auctor iterati *y operis, transvectis legionibus auxiliisque et adsumpto

i^Jin partem rerum Vespasiano, quod initium venturae mox 15 fortunae fuit: domitae gentes, capti reges et monstratus fatis Vespasianus. • oi.oi^

^^ Consularium primus Aulus Plautius praepositus ac 14

subinde Ostorius Scapula, uterque bello egregius; re- dactaque paulatim in formam provinciae proxima pars Britanniae, addita insuper veteranorum colonia. Quae- dam civitates Cogidumno regi donatae (is ad nostrams usque memoriam fidissimus mansit), vetere ac iam pridem recepta populi Romani consuetudine, ut haberet in- strumenta servitutis et reges. Mox Didius Gallus parta a prioribus continuit, paucis admodum castellis in ulteri- ora promotis, per quae fama aucti oflficii quaereretur. 10 Didium Veranius excepit, isque intra annum extinctus est. • '; Suetonius hinc Paulinus biennio prosperas res habuit, subactis nationibus firmatisque praesidiis; quorum

10 ^CORNELII TACITI

fiducial Monam insulam ut vires rebellibus ministrantem 15 adgressu^ terga occasioni patefecit.

15 Namque absentia Iggati remoto metu Britanni agitare inter se mala servitiitis, conferre iniurias et interpretando accendere: nihil profici patientia nisi ut graviora tam- quam ex facili tolerantibus imperentur. Singulos sibi

5 olim reges fuisse, nunc binos imponi, e quibus ISgatus in sanguinem, procurator in bona saeviret. Aeque discordiam praepositorum, aeque concordiam subiectis exitiosam. Alterius manus, centuriones, alterius servos vim et con- tumelias miscere. Nihil iam cupiditati, nihil libidini

10 exceptum. In proelio fortiorem esse qui spoliet : nunc ab ignavis plerumque et imbellibus eripi domos, abstrahi liberos, iniungi dilectiis, tamquam mori tantum pr5 patriS nescientibus. Quantulum enim transisse militum, si sese Britanni numerent? Sic Germanias excussisse iugum; et

isflumine, non Oceano defendi. Sibi patriam coniuges parentes, illis avaritiam et luxuriam causas belli esse. Recessuros, ut divus lulius recessisset, modo virtutem maiorum suorum aemularentur. Neve proelii unius aut alterius eventu pavescerent: plus impetus felicibus,

2omaiorem constantiam penes miseros esse. Iam Britan- norum etiam deos misereri, qui Romanum ducem absentem, qui relegatum in alia insula exercitum detinerent ; iam ipsos, quod difficillimum fuerit, deliberare. Porro in eius modi consiliis periculosius esse deprehendi quam

25 audere.

16 His atque talibus in vicem instincti, Boudicca generis regii femina duce (neque enim sexum in imperils discer- nunt) sumpsere universi bellum; ac sparsos per castella milites consectati, expugnatis praesidiis ipsam coloniam

5 invasere ut sedem servitutis, nee uUum in barbaris ingeniis ,

AGRICOLA 11

saevitiae genus omisit irar*t victoria. Quod nisi Paulinus cognito provinciae m6tu propere subvenisset, amissa Britannid foret; quam unius proelii fortuna veteri pati- entiae restituit, tenentibus arma plerisque, quos con- ^ scientia defectionis et proprius ex legato timor agitabat, lo / 7 ne, quamquam egregius cetera, adroganter in deditos et ut suae cuiusque'iniuriae ultor durius consuleret. Missus . igitur Petronius Turpilianus tamquam exorabilior et A,*^^ delictis hostium novus eoque paenitentiae mitior, com- positis prioribus nihil ultra ausus Trebellio Maximo is provinciam tradidit. Trebellius segnior et nullis castro- rum experimentis, comitate quadam curandi provinciam *M^ tenuit. Didicere iam barbari quoque ignoscere vitiis blandientibus, et interventus civilium armorum praebuit iustam segnitiae excusationem : sed discordia laboratum, 20 cum adsuetus expeditionibus miles otio lasciviret. Trebellius, fuga ac latebris vitS,ta exercitus Ira indecSrus atque humilis, preclriS mox praefuit, ac velut pacti, exercitus licentiam, dux salutem, et seditio sine sanguine stetit. Nee Vettius BSlSnus, manentibus adhuc civilibus 25 j ^ bellis, agitavit Britanniam disciplina : eadem . inertia "J erga hostis, similis petulantia castrorum, nisi quod innocens Bolanus et nullis delictis invisus caritatem paraverat loco auctoritatis.

Sed ubi cum cetero orbe Vespasianus et Britanniam 17 recuperavit, magni duces, egregii exercitXis, minuta hostium spes. Et terrorem statim intulit Petilius Ceri- ^ j'" alls, Brigantum civitatem, quae numerosissima provin- f'

ciae totius perhibetur, adgressus. Multa proelia, ets aliquando non incruenta: magnamque Brigantum par- tem aut victoria amplexus est aut bello. Et Cerialis quidem alterius successoris curam famamque obruisset:

psy!

12 CORNELH TACITI

subiit sustinuitque molem lulius Frontinus, vir magnus,

10 quantum licebat, validamque et pugnacem Silunim gentem armis subegit, super virtutem hostium locorum quoque difficultates eluctatus.

18 Hunc Britanniae statum, has bellorum vices medilL-^ iam aestSte transgressus Agricola invenit, cum et milites velut omissa expeditione ad securitatem et hostes ad occasionem verterentur. Ordovicum civitas baud multo 5 ante adventum eius alam in finibus suis agentem prope universam obtriverat, eoque initio erecta provincia, Et quibus bellum volentibus erat, probare exemplum ac recentis legati animum opperiri, cum Agricola, quamquam trans- vecta aestas, sparsi per provinciam numeri, praesumpta

loapud militem illius anni quies, tarda et contraria bellum incohaturo, et plerisque custodiri suspecta potius videba- tur, ire obviam discrimini statuit; contractisque legionum vexillis et modica auxiliorum manu, quia in aequum degredi Ordovices non audebant, ipse ante agmen, quo

15 ceteris par animus simili periculo esset, erexit aciem. Caesaque prope universa gente, non ignarus instandum famae ac, prout prima cessissent, terrorem ceteris fore, Monam insulam,;a cuius possessione revocatum Paulinum rebellione totius Britanniae supra memoravi, redigere

20 in potestatem animo intendit. Sed ut in subitis con- siliis naves deerant: ratio et constantia ducis transvexit. Depositis omnibus sarcinis lectissimos auxiliarium, quibus nota vada et patrius nandi usus, quo simul seque et arma et equos regunt, ita repente inmisit, ut obstupefacti

25 hostes, qui classem, qui navis, qui mare expectabant, nihil arduum aut invictum crediderint sic ad bellum venientibus. Ita petita pace ac dedita insula clarus ac magnus haberi Agricola, quippe cui ingredienti provin-

AGRICOLA 13

ciam, quod tempus alii per ostentationem et officiorum ambitum transigunt, labor et periculum placuisset. 30 Nee Agricola prosperitate rerum in vanitatem usus, expeditionem aut victoriam vocabat victos continuisse, ne laureatis quidem gesta prosecutus est, sed ipsS dis- simulatione famae famam auxit, aestimantibus quanta, futuri spe tam magna tacuisset. 35

Ceterum animorum provinciae prudens, simulquei9 doctus per aliena experimenta parum profici armis, si iniuriae sequerentur, /causas bellorum statuit excidere. A se suisque orsus.primum domum suam coercuit, quod plerisque haud minus arduum est quam provinciam re- 5 nj^ gere. Nihil > per libertos servosque public ae rei, non ' studiis privatis nee ex commendatione aut precibus centurionem militesve ascire, sed optimum quemque fidissimum putare. Omnia scire, non omnia exsequi. Parvis peccatis veniam, magnis severitatem commodare;io nee poena semper, sed saepius paenitentia eontentus esse; oJQGiciis et administrationibus potius non peccaturos praeponere, quam damnare cum peceassent. Frumenti et tributorum exaetionem aequalitate munerum mollire, circumcisis, quae in quaestum reperta ipso tribute gravius 15 tolerabantur, Namque per liidibrium adsidere clausis horreis et emere ultro frumenta ac luere pretio eogebantur. Divortia itinerum et longinquitas regionum indicebatur, ut eivitates proximis hibernis in remota et avia deferrent, donee quod omnibus in promptu erat, paueis luerosum 20 fieret.

Haec primo statim anno cpmprimendo egregiam fa- 20 mam paci eireumdedit, quae vel ineuria vel intolerantia priorum haud minus quam bellum timebatur. Sed ubi ft^« aestas advenit, contracto exereitu multus in agmine,

<i^tX*^ O'unst^.'z.i.'-*^ y^-tMjL^yu^Z,yi^ ^t^jZ.^J-K^^tJL^ ^O-^^

^1.

14 CORNELII TACITI

slaudare modestiam, disiectos coercere; loca castris ipse

capere, aestuaria ac silvas ipse praetemptare : et nihil

interim apud hostis quietum pati, quo minus subitis

excursibus popularetur; atque ubi satis terruerat, par-

cendo rursus incitamenta pacis ostentare. Quibus re-

10 bus multae civitates, quae in ilium diem ex aequo egerant,

datis obsidibus iram posuere, et praesidiis castellisque

circumdatae et tanta ratione curaque ut nulla ante

Britanniae nova pars pariter illacessita transient.

' ' 21 Sequens hiems saluberrimis consiliis adsumpta. Nam-

que ut homines dispersi ac rudes eoque in bella faciles

quieti et otio per voluptates adsuescerent, hortari pri-

vatim, adiuvare publice, ut templa fora domos extrue-

5 rent, laudando promptos, castigando segnes: ita honoris

aemulatio pro necessitate erat. lam vero principum

filios liberalibus artibus erudire, et ingenia Britannorum

studiis Gallorum anteferre, ut qui modo linguam Ro-

manam abnuebant, eloquentiam concupiscerent. Inde

loetiam habitus nostri honor et frequens toga. Paulatim-

que discessum ad delenimenta vitiorum, porticus et

balinea et conviviorum elegantiam, Idque apud imperi-

, ■> tos humanitas vocabatur, cum pars servitutis esset. .

f.^ ^2 Tertius expeditionum annus novas gentis aperuit,

' vastatis usque ad Tanaum (aestuario nomen est) nationi-

bus. Qua formidine territi hostes quamquam conflicta-

tum saevis tempestatibus exercitum lacessere non ausi;

sponendisque insuper castellis spatium fuit. Adnotabant

periti non alium ducem opportunitates locorum sapien-

tius legisse; nullum ab Agricola positum castellum aut

vi hostium expugnatum aut pactione ac fuga desertum;

crebrae eruptiones, nam adversus moras obsidionis an-

lonuis copiis firmabantur. Ita intrepida ibi hiems, et

AGRICOLA

sibi quisque praesidio, irritis hostibus eoque desperanti- bus, quia soliti plerumque damna aestatis hibernis eventibus pensare turn aestate atque hieme iuxta pelle- bantur. Nee Agricola umquam per alios gesta avidus intercepit : seu centurio seu praefectus incorruptum f acti 15 testem habebat. Apud quosdam acerbior in conviciis narrabatur, et erat ut comis bonis, ita adversus males iniucundus. Ceterum ex iracundia nihil supererat secre- tum, ut silentiura eius non timeres: honestius putabat offendere quam odisse. 20

■i\j<5* Quarta aestas obtinendis quae percucurrerat insumpta;23

' ac si virtus exercituum et Romani nominis gloria pa-

teretur, inventus ^in ipsS; Britannia terminus. Namque aA^ Clota et Bodotria diversi maris aestibus per inmensum revectae, angusto terrarum spatio dirimuntur: quods tum praesidiis firmabatur atque omnis propior sinus tenebatur, summotis velut in aliam insulam hostibus.

^A^* Quinto expeditionum anno nSve prima transgressus 24 ignotas ad id tempus gentis crebris simul ac prosperis proeliis domuit; eamque partem Britanniae quae Hi- berniam aspicit copiis instruxit, in spem magis quam ob

, formidinem, si^quidem Hibernia medio inter Britanniams atque Hispaniam sita et Gallico quoque mari opportuna valentissimam imperii partem magnis in vicem usibus

VUtj miscuerit. Spatium eius, si Britanniae comparetur, angustius, nostri maris insulas superat. Solum caelum- que et ingenia cultusque hominum baud multum a Britan- 10 nia differunt nee in melius. Aditus portusque per eom- mercia et negotiatores cogniti. Agricola expulsum seditione domestica unum ex regulis gentis exceperat ac specie amieitiae in occasionem retinebat. Saepe ex 60 audivi legione una et modicis auxiliis debellari obtineri- 15

^ . . ^0 ^ ^

^Jyi.,a4yyyut^ /x^ ^- O^Y'''i<^o^^^

I ^v^k.

16 CORNELn TACITI

que Hiberniam posse; idque etiam adversus Britanniam

profuturum, si Romana ubique arma et velut e conspectu

^\ libertas toUeretur. ^-cyza^gyy*^

,. ^^5 Ceterum aestate, qua sextum officii annum incohabat,

amplexus civitates trans Bodotriam sitas, quia motus

universarum ultra gentium et infesta hostilis exercitus

itinera timebantur, portus classe exploravit; quae ab

5 Agricola primum adsumpta in partem virium sequebatur

egregia specie, cum simul terra simul mari bellum impel-

leretur, ac saepe isdem castris pedes equesque et nauticus

miles mixti copiis et laetitia sua quisque facta, suos casus

attollerent, 'ac modo silvarum ac montium profunda,

10 modo tempestatum ac fluctuum adversa, hinc terra et hostis, hinc victus Oceanus militari iactantia compara- rentur. Britannos quoque, ut ex captivis audiebatur, visa classis obstupefaciebat, tamquam aperto maris sui secreto ultimum victis perfugium clauderetur. Ad manias

15 et arma conversi Caledoniam incolentes populi, magno paratu, maiore fama, uti mos est de ignotis, oppug- nare ultro castella adorti, metum ut provocantes addi- derant; regrediendumque citra Bodotriam et cedendum potius quam pellerentur ignavi specie prudentium

20 admonebant, cum interim cognoscit hostTs pluribus agminibus irrupturos. Ac ne superante numero et peritia locorum circumiretur, diviso et ipse in tris partes exercitu incessit.

26 Quod ubi cognitum hosti, mutato repente consilio uni- versi nonam legionem ut maxime invalidam nocte ad- gressi, inter somnum ac trepidationem caesis vigilibus irriipere. lamque in ipsis castris pugnabatur, cum 5 Agricola iter hostium ab exploratoribus edoctus et vestigiis insecutus, velocissimos equitum peditumque

AGRICOLA 17

adsultare tergis pugnantium iubet, mox ab universis adici clamorem; et propinqua luce fulsere signa. Ita ancipiti malo territi Britanni; et nonanis redit animus, ac securi pro salute de gloria certabant. Ultro quin lo etiam erupere, et fuit atrox in ipsis portarum angustiis proelium, donee pulsi hostes, utroque exercitu certante, his, ut tulisse opem, illis, ne eguisse auxilio viderentur. Quod nisi paludes et silvae fugientes texissent, debellatura ilia victoria foret. 15

Cuius conscientia ac fama ferox exercitus nihil virtuti27 suae invium et penetrandam Caledoniam inveniendum- que tandem Britanniae terminum continuo proeliorum cursu fremebant. Atque illi modo cauti ac sapientes prompti post eventum ac magniloqui erant. Iniquissima 5 haec bellorum condicio est : prospera omnes sibi vindicant, adversa uni imputantur. At Britanni non virtute se vic- tos sed occasione et arte ducis rati, nihil ex adrogantia remittere, quo minus iuventutem armarent, coniuges ac liberos in loca tuta transferrent, coetibus et sacrificiis 10 conspirationem civitatum sancirent. Atque ita irritatis utrimque animis discessum. JM^' Eadem aestate cohors Usiporum per Germanias con- 28 scripta et in Britanniam transmissa magnum ac memora- bile facinus ausa est. Occiso centurione ac militibus, qui ad tradendam disciplinam inmixti manipulis exem- plum et rectores habebantur, tris liburnicas adactis per 5 vim gubernatoribus ascendere ; et uno regente remigantes, suspectis duobus eoque interfectis, nondum vulgato rumore ut miraculum praevehebantur. Mox ad aquan- dum atque utilia raptum egressi et cum plerisque Britanno- rum sua defensantium proelio congress! ac saepe victores, 10 aliquando pulsi, eo ad extremum inopiae venere, ut

18 CORNELU TACITI

infirmissimos suorum, mox sorte ductos vescerentur. Atque ita circumvecti Britanniam, amissis per inscitiam regendi navibus, pro praedonibus habiti, primum a Suebis,

15 mox a Frisiis intercept! sunt. Ac fuere quos per com- mercia venumdatos et in nostram usque ripam mutatione ementium adductos indicium tanti casus inlustravit.

29 Initio aestatis Agricola domestic© vulnere ictus: anno ante natum filium amisit. Quem casum neque ut pleri- que fortium virorum ambitiose, neque per lamenta rursus ac maerorem muliebriter tulit; et in luctu bellum inter Sremedia erat. Igitur praemissa classe, quae pluribus locis praedSta magnum et incertum terrorem faceret, expedito exercitu, cui ex Britannis fortissimos et longa pace exploratos addiderat, ad montem Graupium per- vSnit, quem iam hostis insederat. Nam Britanni nihil

lofracti pugnae prioris eventu et ultionem aut servitium expectantes, tandemque docti commune periculum Concordia propulsandum, legationibus et foederibus omnium civitatum vires exciverant. lamque super triginta milia armatorum aspiciebantur, et adhuc ad-

isfluebat omnis inventus et quibus cruda ac viridis senec- tus, clari bello et sua quisque decora gestantes, cum inter plures duces virtute et genere praestans nomine Calgacus, apud contractam multitudinem proelium poscentem in hunc modum locutus fertur:

80 "Quotiens causas belli et necessitatem nostram in- tueor, magnus mihi animus est hodiernum diem consen- sumque vestrum initium libertatis toti Britanniae fore; nam et universi colitis servitutis expertes|et nullae ultra sterrae'ac ne mare quidem securum inminente nobis classe RSmana. Ita proelium atque arma, quae fortibus ho- nesta, e^dem etiam ignavis tutissima sunt. Pricres

AGRICOLA 19

pugnae, quibus adversus Romanos varia fortuna certa- tum est, spem ac subsidium in nostris manibus habebant, quia nobilissimi totius Britanniae epque in ipsis penetra- lo libus siti nee ulla servientium litora aspicientes, oculos quoque a contactu dominationis inviolatos habebamus. Nos terrarum ac libertatis extremes recessus ipse ac sinus f amae in hunc diem defendit : atque omne ignotum pro magnifico est; sed nunc terminus Britanniae patet, 15 nulla iam ultra gens, nihil nisi fluctus ac saxa, et infesti- ores Romani, quorum superbiam frustra per obsequium ac modestiam effugias. Raptores orbis, postquam cuncta vastantibus defuere terrae, mare scrutantur; si locuples hostis est, avari, si pauper, ambitiosi, quos20 non Oriens, non Occidens satiaverit: soli omnium opes atque inopiam pari adfectu concupiscunt. Auferre trucidare rapere falsis n(5minibus imperium, atque ubi s51itudinem faciunt, j^Sc^m appellant."

" Liberos cuique ac propinquos suos natSra carissimosSl esse voluit; hi per dilectus alibi servituri auferuntur; coniuges sororesque etiam si hostilem libidinem effuge- runt, nomine amicorum atque hospitum polluuntur. Bona fortunaeque in tributum, ager atque annus ins frumentum, corpora ipsa ac manus(silvis ac paludibus emuniendis) inter verbera ac contumelias conteruntur. Nata servituti mancipia semel veneunt, atque ultro a dominis aluntur: Britannia servitutem suam cotidie emit, cotidie pascit. Ac sicut in familia recentissimus 10 quisque servorum etiam conservis ludibrio est, sic in hoc orbis terrarum vetere famulatu novi nos et viles in excidium petimur; neque enim arva nobis aut metalla aut portus sunt, quibus exercendis reservemur. Virtus porro ac ferocia subiectorum ingrata imperantibus; 15

•t.^<>-xtC

- f2>.^^^^:U^^^\JHi^J^

20 CORNELII TACITI

et longinquitas ac secretum ipsum quo tutius, eo suspec- tius. Ita sublata spe veniae tandem sumite animum, tarn quibus salus quam quibus gloria carissima est. Brigantes femina duce exurere coloniam, expugnare

20castra, ac nisi felicitas in socordiam vertisset, exuere iugum potuere : nos integri et indomiti et in libertatem, non in paenitentiam arma laturi, primo statim congressu ostendamus, quos sibi Caledonia viros seposuerit."

32 "An eandem Romanis in bello virtutem quam in pace lasclviam adesse creditis? Nostris illi dissensionibus ac discordiis clan vitia hostium in gloriam exercitus sui vertunt; quern contractum ex diversissimis gentibus 5ut secundae res tenent, ita adversae dissolvent; nisi si Gallos et Germanos et (pudet dictu) Britannorum plerosque, (licet dominationi alienae sanguinem commo- dent,j diutius tamen hostes quam servos, fide et adfectu teneri putatis. Metus ac terror sunt infirma vincla

locaritatis; quae ubi removeris, qui timere desierint, odisse

-, incipient. Omnia victoriae incitamenta pro nobis sunt:

' nullae Romanos coniuges accendunt, nulli parentes

fugam exprobrSturT sunt: aut nulla plerisque patria

aut alia est. Paucos numero, trepidos ignorantiS,

15 caelum ipsum ac mare et silvas, ignOta omnia circum- spectantes, clausos quodam modS ac vinctos di vobis . tradiderunt. Ne terreat vanus aspectus et auri fulgor atque argenti, quod neque tegit neque vulnerat. *Ln ipsa hostium acie inveniemus nostras mantis. Adgnoscent

20 Britanni suam causam, recordabuntur Galli priorem libertatem, deserent illos ceteri Germani, tam quam nuper Usipi relfquerunt. Nee quicquam ultrS formidinis: vacua castella, senum coloniae, inter' male pS^rentes et iniuste imperantes aegra municipia et discordantia. Hie

<JK.

dux, hie exercitus: ibi tributa et metalla et ceterae25 servientium poenae, quas in aeternum perferre aut statim ulcisci in hoc campo est. Proinde ituri in aciem et maiores vestros et posteros cogitate." ^

Excepere orationem alacrgs, ut barbaris moris, fremitu 38 ^ cantuque et clamoribus dissoms. Iamque*agmina et armorum fulgores audentissimi cuiusque procursu; ^ simul instruebatur acies, cum Agricola quamquam laetum et vix miinimentis coercitum militem accendendum 5 adhuc ratus, ita disseruit: "Septimus annus est, com- ^f ^^ militones, ex quo virtute vestra, auspiciis imperii Romani, fide atque operS nostra Britanniam vicistis. Tot expedi- tionibus, tot proeliis, (seu fortitudine adversus hostis seu patientia ac labore paene adversus ipsam rerum lo natiiram opus fuit,! neque me mUitum neque vos ducis paenituit. Ergo egressi, ego veterum legatorum, vos priorum exercituum terminos, finem Britanniae non f Jma nee rumSre, sed castris et armis tenemus : inventa Britan- nia et subacta. Equidem saepe in agmine, cum vosis paludes montesve et flumina fatigarent, fortissimi cuius- que voces audiebam: 'quando dabitur hostis? quando adimus ? ' Veniunt, e latebris suis extrusi, et vota virtus- que in aperto, omniaque prona victoribus atque eadem victis adversa. Nam ut superasse tantum itineris, evasisse 20 silvas, transisse aestuaria^ulchrum ac decorum in frbntem, -«^tT~ ita fugientibus periculosissima quae hodie prosperrima sunt; neque enim nobis aut locorum eadem notitia aut commeatuum eadem abundantia, sed manus et arma et in his omnia. Quod ad me attinet, iam pridem mihi decretum 25 est neque exercitus neque ducis terga tuta esse, Proinde et honesta mors turpi vltS potior, et incolumitas ac decus eodem loco sita sunt : nee inglorium fuerit in ipso terrarum ac naturae fine cecidisse." ^ '

X /HvjMi (}Jtry^ i^y^vK

22 CORNELII TACITI

34 " Si novae gentes atque ignota acies constitisset, aliorum exercituum exemplis vos hortarer: nunc vestra decora

__ recensete, vestros oculos interrogate. Hi sunt, quos

proximo anno unam legionem furto noctis adgressos 5 clamore debellastis; hi ceterorum Britannorum fugacissimi ideoque tam diu superstites. Quo modo silvas saltusque penetrantibus fortissimum quodque animal contra ruere, pavida et inertia ipso agminis sono pellebantur,^sic acer- rimi Britannorum iam pridem ceciderunt, reliquus est lonumerus ignavorum et metuentium. Quos quod tandem invenistis, non restiterunt, sed deprehensi sunt; novis- simae res et extremus metus corpora defixere in his ve- stigiis, in quibus pulchram et spectabilem victoriam ederetis. Transigite cum expeditionibus, imponite quin-

!..• isquaginta annis magnum diem, adprobate rei publicae numquam exercitui imputari potuisse aut moras belli aut causas rebellandi."

35 Et adloquente adhiic Agricola militum ardor eminebat, et finem orationis ingens alacritas consecuta est, statimque ad arma discursum. Instinctos ruentesque ita disposuit, ut peditum auxilia, quae octo milium erant, mediam

saciem firmarent, equitum tria milia cornibus adfunderen- tur. Legiones pro vallo stetere, ingens victoriae decus citra Romanum sanguinem bellandi, et auxilium, si pellerentur. Britannorum acies in speciem simul ac ter- rorem editioribus locis constiterat ita, ut primum agmen

10 in aequo, ceteri per adclive iugum conexi velut insurgerent; media campi covinnarius eques strepitu ac discursu comple- bat. Tum Agricola superante hostium multitudine veritus, ne in frontem simul et latera suorum pugnaretur, diductis ordinibus, quamquam porrectior acies futura erat et

15 arcessendas plerique legiones admonebant, promptior in

AGRICOLA 23

spem et firmus adversis, dimisso equo pedes ante vexilla constitit.

Ac primo congressu eminus certabatur; simulquese constantia, simul arte Britanni ingentibus gladiis et , brevibus caetris missilia nostrorum vTtare vel excutere, I atque ipsi magnam vim telorum superfundere, donee Agricola quattuor Batavorum cohortes ac Tungorums duas cohortatus est ut rem ad mucrones ac manus ad- ducerent; quod et ipsis vetustate militiae exercitatum et hostibus inhabile, parva scuta et enormes gladios gerentibus; nam Britannorum gladii sine mucrone com- plexum armorum et in arto pugnam non tolerabant. lo Igitur ut Batavi miscere ictus, ferire umbonibus, ora fodere, et stratis qui in aequo adstiterant, erigere in coUes aciem coep5re,/ceterae cohortes aemulatione et impetu conisae proximos quosque caed^re: ac plerique semineces aut integri festinatione victoriae relinqueban- 15 tur. Interim equitum turmae, ut fugere covinnarii, ' peditum se proelio miscuSre. Et quamquam recentem terrorem intulerant, densis tamen hostiura agminibus et inaequalibus locis haerebant; minimeque equestris ea pugnae facies erat, cum aegre clivo instantes simul 20 equorum corporibus impellerentur; ac saepe vagi currus, exterriti sine rectoribus equi, ut quemque formido tulerat, tfansversos aut obvios incursabant. -'• /"^

Et Britanni, qui adhuc pugnae expertes summa collium 37 insederant et paucitatem nostrorum vacui spernebant, degredi paulatira et circumire terga vincentium coeperant, ni id ipsum veritus Agricola quattuor equitum alas, ad subita belli retentas, venientibus opposuisset, quantoques ferocius adcucurrerant, tanto acrius pulsos in fugam disie- cisset. Ita consilium Britannorum in ipsos versum, trans-

24 CORNELII TACITI

vectaeque praecepto ducis a fronte pugnantium alae aversam hostium aciem invasere. Turn vero patentibus

lolocis grande et atrox spectaculum: sequi, vulnerare, capere, atque eosdem oblatis aliis trucidare. lam hostium, prout cuique ingenium erat, cateryae armatorum pauci- oribus terga praestare, quidam inermes ultro ruere ac se morti offere. Passim arma et corpora et laceri artus,

15 et cruenta humus ; et aliquando etiam victis ira virtusque postquam silvis appropinquaverunt; nam primos sequen- tium incautos collecti et locorum gnari circumveniebant. Quod ni frequens ubique Agricola vaHdas et expeditas cohortes indaginis modo, et sicubi artiora erant, partem

2oequitum dimissis equis, simul rariores silvas equitem persultare iussisset,j|acceptum aliquod vulnus per nimiam fiduciam foret. Ceterum ubi compositos firmis ordinibus sequi rursus vtdere,|in fugam versi, non agminibus, ut prius, nee alius alium respectantes, rari et vitabundi in_^

25vicem longinqua atque avia petiere. Finis sequendi nox et satietas fuit. Caesa hostium ad decem milia, nostrorum trecenti sexaginta cecidere, in quis Aulus Atticus praefectus cohortis, iuvenili ardore et ferocia equi hostibus inlatus.

38 Et nox quidem gaudio praedaque laeta victoribus: Britanni pSlantSs, mixto virorum mulierumque ploratu, trahere vulneratos, vocare integros, deserere domos ac per iram ultro incendere, eligere latebras et

5 statim relinquere; miscere in vicem consilia aliqua, dein separare: aliquando frangi aspectu pignorum suorum, saepius concitari. Satisque constabat saevisse quos- dam in coniuges ac liberos, tamquam misererentur. Proximus dies faciem victoriae latius aperuit: vastum

10 ubique silentium, secreti coUes, fumantia procul tecta,

AGRICOLA 25

nemo exploratoribus obvius. Quibus in omnem partem dimissis, ubi incerta fugae vestigia neque usquam con- globari hostes compertum (et exacta iam aestate spargi bellum nequibat), in finis Borestorum exercitum deducit. Ibi acceptis obsidibus, praefecto classis circumvehii5 Britanniam praecipit. Datae ad id vires, et praecesserat terror. Ipse peditera atque equites lento itinere, quo novarum gentium animi ipsa transitias mora terrerentur, in hibernis locavit. Et simul classis secunda tempestate ac fama Trucculensem portum tenuit, unde_ proximo 20 Britanniae latere praelecto omni redierat.

Hunc rerum cursum, quamquam niilla verborum39 iactantia epistulis Agricolae auctum, ut erat Domitianus, fronte laetus, pectore anxius excepit. Inerat conscientia derisui fuisse nuper falsum e Germania triumphum, emptis per commercia, quorum habitus et crines in cap- 5 tivorum speciem formarentur: at nunc veram magnamque victoriam tot milibus hostium caesis ingenti fama celebrari. Id sibi maxime formidoJosum, privati hominis nomen supra principem attolli; frustra studia fori et civilium artium decus in silentium acta, si militarem gloriam alius occu- 10 paret; cetera utcumque facilius dissimulari, ducis boni imperatoriam virtutem esse. Talibus curis exercitus, quodque saevae cogitationis indicium erat, secreto suo satiatus, optimum in praesentia statuit reponere odium, donee impetus famae et favor exercitus languesceret : 15 nam etiam tum Agricola Britanniam obtinebat.

Igitur triumphalia ornamenta et inlustris statuae 40 honorem et quidquid pro triumpho datur, multo verborum honore cumulata, decerni in senatu iubet addique insuper opinionem Suriam provinciam Agricolae destinari, vacuam tum morte Atilii Rufi consularis et maioribus reservatam. 5

26 CORNELH TACITI

Credidere plerique libertum ex secretioribus ministeriis missum ad Agricolam codicillos, quibus ei Suria dabatur, tulisse, cum eo praecepto ut, si in Britannia foret, traderen- tur; eumque libertum in ipso freto Oceani obvium Agri-

locolae, ne appellate quidem eo ad Domitianum remeasse,

, sive verum istud, sive ex ingenio principis fictum ac

d/^ r-' 'compositum est. Tradiderat interim Agricola successori

suo provinciam quietam tutamque. Ac ne notabilis

celebritate et frequentia occurrentium introitus esset,

15 vitato amicorum officio noctu in urbem, noctu in Palatium, ita ut praeceptum erat, venit: exceptusque brevi osculo et nullo sermone turbae servientium inmixtus est. Cete- rum uti militare nomen, grave inter otiosos, aliis virtuti- bus temper aret,y^tranquillitatem atque otium penitus

2ohausit, cultu modicus, sermone facilis, uno aut altero amicorum comitatus, adeo ut plerique, quibus magnos viros per ambitionem aestimare mos est, viso aspectoque Agricola quaererent famam, pauci interpretarentur. *!■ Crebro per eos dies apud Domitianum absens accusatus, absens absolutus est. Causa periculi non crimen ullum aut querella laesi cuiusquam, sed infensus virtutibus princeps et glori^ viri ac pessimum inimicorum genus,

5 laudantes. Et ea insecuta sunt rei publicae tempora, quae sileri Agricolam non sinerent: tot exercitus in Moesia Daciaque et Germania et Pannonia temeritate aut per ignaviam ducum amissi, tot militares viri cum to- tis cohortibus expugnati et capti ; nee iam de limite imperii

10 et ripa, sed de hibernis legionum et possessione dubitatum. Ita cum damna damnis continuarentur atque omnis annus funeribus et cladibus insigniretur, poscebatur ore vulgi dux Agricola, comparantibus cunctis vigorem, con- stantiam, et expertum bellis animum cum inertia et

'}■

formidine ceterorum. Quibus sermonibus satis constat 15 Domitiani quoque aures verberatas, dum optimus quisque libertorum amore et fide, pessimi malignitate et livore pronum deterioribus principem exstimulabant. Sic Agricola simul suis virtutibus, simul vitiis aliorum in ,^ ipsam gloriam praeceps agebatur. 20

■^ Aderat iam annus, ^uo proconsulatum Africae et Asiae42 i»P sortiretur, et occiso Civica nuper nee Agricolae consilium ^ deerat nee Domitiano exemplum. Accessere quidam \, cogitationum principis periti, qui iturusne esset in provin- ' ciam ultro Agricolam interrogarent. Ac primo occultiuss quietem et otium laudare, mox operam suam in adprobandST excusatione offerre, postremo non iam obscuri suadentes simul terrentesque pertraxere ad Domitianum. Qui para- tus simulatione, in adrogantiam compositus, et audiit pre- ces excusantis et, cum adnuisset, agi sibi gratias passus 10^ est, nee erubuit beneficii invidia. Salarium tamen pro- consulare{solitum offerri et quibusdam a se ipso concessum) Agricolae non dedit, sive offensus non petitum, sive ex conscientia, ne quod vetuerat videretur emisse. Proprium humani ingenii est odisse quem laeseris : Domitiani 15 vero natura praeceps in iram, et quo'obscurior, eo in- revocabilior, moderatione tamen prudentiaque Agricolae leniebatur, quia non contumaeia neque inSni iactatiohe libertatis famam fatumque provocabat. Sciant, quibus moris est inlicita mirari, posse etiam sub malis principi-20 bus magnos viros esse, obsequiumque ac modestiam, si ^.r^industria ac vigor adsint, eo laudis excedere, quo plerique /* per abrupta, sed in nullum rei publicae usum, ambitiosa f morte inclaruerunt. "S*

Finis vitae eius nobis luctuosus, amicis tristis, ex- 43 traneis etiam ignotisque non sine cura fuit. Vulgus

28 CORNELII TACITI

quoque et hie aliud agens populus et ventitavere ad domum et per fora et circulos locuti sunt; nee quisquam 5 audita^ morte Agricolae aut laetatus est aut statim oblitus. Augebat miserationem constans rumor veneno inter- eeptum: nobis nihil comperti,adfirmare ausim. Ceterum per omnem valetudinem eius erebrius quam ex more prineipatds per nuntios visentis, et libertorum primi et

10 medicorum intimi venere, sive etira illud sive inquisTtio erat. Supremo quidem die momenta ipsa deficientis per dispositos eursores nuntiata eonstabat, nullo credente sic adcelerari quae tristis audiret. Speciem tamen doloris nimii vultu prae se tuHt, seeurus iam odii et qui facilius

15 dissimularet gaudium quam metum. Satis eonstabat leeto testamento Agrieolae, quo eohei"6dem optimae uxori et piissimae filiae Domitianum scripsit, laetatum eum velut honore iudicioque. Tam eaeea et eorrupta mens assiduis adulationibus erat, ut neseiret a bono patre non

20scribi heredem nisi malum principem. /j S-w^^ie ^o A.T>.-

44 Natus erat Agricola Gaio Caesare tertium consule^r — Idibus luniis: excessit quarto et quinquagesimo anno, decimo Kalendas Septembris CollSgS Priscoque consulibus. ■^c^ Quod si habitum quoque eius posteri noscere velint, >^s sdecentior quam sublimior fuit; nihil impetus in vultu: '^ gratia oris supererat. Bonum virum facile crederes, V" magnum libenter. Et ipse quidem, quamquam medio ^^^ in spatio integrae aetatis ereptus, quantum ad gloriam, ^ longissimura aevum peregit. Quippe et vera bona, quae s^

10 in virtutibus sita sunt, impleverat, et consulari ac trium- ^ phalibus ornamentis praedito quid aliud adstruere fortuna "^ poterat? Opibus nimiis non gaudebat; speciosae non conti- gerant. Filia atque uxore superstitibus potest videri etiam beatus incolumi dignitate, florente f ama, salvis adfinitatibus

4^^lX^^»^''yyz^^'tiyC-tBtJ^^^

AGRICOLA 29

et amicitiis futura effugisse. Nam sicut ei non licuit durare 15 in banc beatissimi saeculi lucem ac principem Traianum videre, quod augurio votisqueapud nostras auris ominaba- tur, ita festinatae mortis grande solacium tulit evasisse postremum illud tempus, quo Domitianus non iam per intervalla ac spiramenta temporum, sed continue et20 velut uno ictu rem publicam exhausit.

Non vidit Agricola obsessam curiam et clausum45 armis senatum et eadem strage tot consularium caedes, tot nobilissimarum feminarum exilia et fugas. Una adhuc victoria Carus Mettius censebatur, et intra Albanam arcem sententia Messalini strepebat, et Massa Baebius5 etiam tum reus erat: mox nostrae duxere Helvidium in carcerem manus; nos Maurici Rusticique visus, nos innocenti sanguine Senecio perfudit. Nero tamen sub- traxit oculos suos iussitque scelera, non spectavit: prae- cipua sub Domitiano miseriarum pars erat videre etio aspici, cum suspiria nostra subscriberentur, cum deno- tandis tot hominum palloribus sufficeret saevus ille vultus et rubor, quo se contra pudorem muniebat.

Tu vero felix, Agricola, non vitae tantum claritate, sed etiam opportunitate mortis. Ut perhibent qui 15 interfuere novissimis sermonibus tuis, constans et libens fatum excepisti, tamquam pro virili portione innocentiam principi donares. Sed mihi filiaeque eius praeter acerbitatem parentis erepti auget maestitiam, quod adsidere valetudini, fovere deficientem, satiari20 vultu complexuque non contigit. Excepissemus certe mandata vocesque, quas penitus animo figeremus. Noster hie dolor, nostrum vulnus,: nobis tam longae absentiae condicione ante quadriennium amissus est. Omnia sine dubio, optime parentum, adsidente amantis-25

30 CORNELU TACITI

sima uxore superfuere honori tuo: paucioribus tamen lacrimis comploratus es, et novissima in luce desidera- vere aliquid oculi tui.

46 Si quis piorum manibus locus, si, ut sapientibus placet, non cum corpore extinguuntur magnae animae, placide qui- escas, nosque domum tuam ab infirmo desiderio et mulie- bribus lamentis ad contemplationem virtutum tuarum

5 voces, quas neque lugeri neque plangi fas est. Admiratione te potius et immortalibus laudibus et, si natura sup- peditet, similitudine colamus: is verus honos, ea con- iunctissimi cuiusque pietas. Id filiae quoque uxorique praeceperim, sic patris, sic mariti memoriam venerari,

10 ut omnia facta dictaque eius secum revolvant, formamque ac figuram animi magis quam corporis complectantur, non quia intercedendum putem imaginibus, quae marmore aut aere finguntur, sed ut vultus hominum, ita simulacra vultus imbecilla ac mortalia sunt, forma mentis , aeterna,

15 quam tenere et exprimere non per alienam materiam et artem, sed tuis ipse moribus possis. Quidquid ex Agricola amavimus, quidquid mirati sumus, manet mansurumque est in animis hominum, in aeternitate temporum, in fama rerum; nam multos veterum velut inglorios et ignobilis

20oblivio obruit: Agricola posteritati narratus et traditus superstes erit.

NOTES .

Chapter 1.

In former times lives of great men were often written. Even autobiographies were received with favor. Nowadays a biog- rapher has to crave a hearing.

2. antiquitus: in Republican times; apud priores below refers to the same period. In chapter 10.10 even Livy is classed with the veteres scriptores. — usitatum: a custom which. The participle has the force of an appositional clause introduced by id quod.

3v quamquam: used frequently by Tacitus to introduce an ad- jective or a participle without a finite verb. Cicero would have written quamvis. — suonun: this word may be taken either as masculine or as neuter.

4. virtus: not in the abstract ; the reference is to some notable instance of merit in an individual. — vicit ac supergressa est: imitate the metaphorical use of these words by translating van- quished and rose superior to.

5. ignorantiam recti et invidiam: invidia is the effect, ignorantia recti the cause. The idea, which is a commonplace in literature, is well expressed in the following lines of Thomson: —

" Base envy withers at another's joy And hates the excellence it cannot reach."

7. digna memoratu : what is the construction usual in Cicero ? — pronum: literally, downhill; hence, that which is easy as opposed to that which is arduum, literally, uphill. — in aperto: a favorite phrase of Tacitus both in the literal sense and in the derived sense, as here. Compare the English "a fair field." These words exemplify the penchant of Tacitus mentioned in the Introduction for coupling synonyms. The student will note many other examples in the treatise.

8. celeberrimus: in Tacitus, as well as in other writers of the Empire, celeber often equals clarus. The student who has been

31

32 NOTES [Chap. 1.

taught to avoid translating the word by famous or eminerU may now consider the embargo lifted. Join ingenio with celeberrimus in translation. — ad prodendam virtutis memoriam: the primary object of the eulogistic biography. Chief among biographical writers of the Republic were M, Terentius Varro, 116-27 b.c, the most learned man of his time, who wrote Imagines or Portraits of famous men both Greek and Roman, and a friend of Cicero, Cornelius Nepos, a portion of whose book De Viris Illv^tribus has come down to us.

9. sine gratia aut ambitione: without predilection or thought of self -advancement. — bonae tanttun conscientiae pretio: the realiza- tion that they had performed a good deed was their sole reward. Tantum is an adverb.

10. plerique: here, as often in Tacitus, in the modified sense of many. Cf. chapter 40. 6; 42. 22. — suam ipsi: equivalent in translation to suam ipsorum ; the intensive pronoun is attracted into the nominative, as is frequently the case. Cf. for a similar usage chapter 46. 16, tuis ipse moribus possis.

11. fiduciam . . . morum: (a token of) confidence in their character.

12. Rutilio et Scauro: Publiu^ RutUius Ruf us, consulin 105 :b.c., was an adherent of the Stoic philosophy and a man of high charac- ter. He was driven into exile on a false charge of extortion and died in Smyrna. He wrote, besides his autobiography, a History of Rome in Greek, and numerous speeches. He is elsewhere, as here, mentioned in connection with his political rival, Marcus Aemilivs Scaurus, consul in 115 B.C. and again in 107. Scaurus played a prominent part in the dealings of the Senate with Ju- gurtha and incurred infamy and prosecution by accepting bribes from the Numidian king. The autobiography here mentioned is characterized by Cicero as a valuable work which no one read. — citra fidem: their works did not, as we might say, "fall short" of obtaining credence. Citra in this sense is practically equiv- alent to sine. Cf. chapter 35. 7, citra Romanum sanguinem, "without shedding the blood of Romans."

13. adeo: at the beginning of a sentence odeo often introduces an illustration of a truth contained in a previous sentence. Trans- late : so true is it that, etc.

Chaps. 1, 2.] NOTES 83

14. at ntinc: contrasting the diflBculties under which the biographer labors nowadays with the happier conditions that prevailed apud priores. Tacitus has to ask for tolerance, although he is writing not an autobiography, but an account of the life of another man and one whom death should have carried beyond the reach of envy.

16. fuit: Tacitus projects himself in thought to the time of his reader and forestalls possible loss of patience with his apologetic attitude by taking the reader into his confidence. Translate: hut, in the present state of opinion, I have felt called upon to crave indulgence. — incusattirus . . . tempera: incusaturus balances narraturo; tempora balances vitam hominis. The antithesis may be stated as follows : Eulogy is my intent, the life of a worthy man my theme. I ask indulgence because "envy doth merit as its shade pursue" and because biographies are not favored now. It would be otherwise if my attitude were censorious — men lend ready ears to detraction — and if my subject were the hateful regime of Domitian, — a period, not a man. Then I would not need to ask for a hearing.

Chapter 2.

Domitian's antipathy to goodness was illustrated specifically by the execution of certain biographers and the destruction of their books; likewise by the expulsion of the philosophers. We submitted, but we cannot forget.

1. legimus: probably in the acta diurna, a gazette, officially inspired, in which were published the news of the City, gossip of the court, and such records of public business as the emf)eror chose to disseminate. Domitian evidently made an example of these two cases, so that a report of the penalty inflicted and the names of the culprits would certainly be published in the acta, although this was not his invariable practice. See Boissier, Tacitus, p. 197, The Roman Journal. Legimus is present ; the plural includes the contemporary public. — Aruleno Rustico: the name is inverted ; note the similar usage in Paetus Thrasea and Priscu^ Helvidius. Junius Rusticus Arulenus was an older contemporary of Tacitus, and a member of a Stoic coterie that off'ered determined opposition to Domitian, When Arulenus was tribune in the

84 NOTES [Chap. 2.

year 66, he proposed to interpose his veto to save Thrasea Paetus from condemnation, an act which was thwarted by Paetus him- self. Domitian took especial umbrage at the fact that Arulenus in his biography applied to Paetus the adjective sanctissimus. Aruleno is dative; Tacitus uses this case freely with forms of the passive verb where Cicero would write a or ab with the ablative. — Paetus Thrasea: Thrasea Partus, a senator of lofty character, who was condemned to death in the time of Nero because of his refusal to support measures which were designed to flatter the emperor. — Herennio Senecioni: Herennius Senecio, a native of Spain and a friend of Pliny, with whom he was associated in the prosecution of the notorious Baebius Massa, a favorite of Domitian (see chapter 45). The biography here mentioned was written at the request of Fannia, the wife of Helvidius Priscus.

2. Priscus Helvidius: Helvidius Priscus, son-in-law of Thrasea Paetus. He was an uncompromising opponent of the imperial power; was banished by Nero, but recalled by Galba. He in- curred the displeasure of Vespasian by indulging in outspoken criticism and deliberate affronts, was sent into exile a second time, and soon afterwards was put to death.

4. saevitum: vrrath was vented. There is a similar use of this verb in the first sentence of the first book of Livy: satis constat Troia capta in ceteros saevitum esse Troianos. — triiunviris: the so- called tres viri capitales, the public executioners and superin- tendents of prisons.

6. in comitio ac foro: the Comitium was a space lying north- west of the Forum and in front of the Senate house. In imperial times it had lost the special significance it had once possessed as the original assembly-ground of Rome and had been merged in the Forum. The books were therefore to be burned, in one place, in the public center of Rome; the formula in comitio acforo is designed to emphasize this fact.

6. scilicet: ironical.

7. conscientiam generis human!: ike power of mankind to remember.

8. ezpulsis insuper sapientiae professoribus: the ablative abso- lute does not precede the main verb in point of time, but joins an additional fact ; sapientiae professoribus = philosophis. Among

Chaps. 2, 3.] NOTES 86

the learned men driven out of Rome by Domitian was the famous Greek orator and philosopher, Dio Chrysostom.

9. omni bona arte: aU ennobling pursuits ; used abstractly for the i)ersons who engaged in them. Compare chapter 1. 4, virtus. — ne quid . . . honestmn occurreret ; Tacitus, as we should expect, puts the worst possible construction on Domitian's motives. As a political expedient there is something to be said for the banishment of the philosophers. Many of them had rendered themselves obnoxious by their defiance of existing orders of things, social, political, and religious. This is especially true of the sect called the Cynics, some of whom were impostors and mounte- banks. Read Dill, Roman Society from Nero to Marcus Aurelius, Book III, chapter II.

12. ultimum: extremes; a disparaging allusion to the lawless- ness of the late Republic. Although Tacitus theoretically re- garded the vetus aetas as the high-water mark of Roman greatness and virtue (see chapter 1. 13-14), he was not blind to the draw- backs of democratic government.

13. per inquisitiones: by the surveillance exercised by the delatores or professional informers who were especially active in the last part of Domitian's reign. See chapter 45. — loquendi audien- dique commercio: Pliny complains that the informers were "high- waymen" who plied their trade not "in lonely places, nor on the road, but in the forums and the temples."

Chapter 3.

A brighter day has dawned. Yet the intellectual life so long stifled revives but slowly. At some future time I shall do my poor best to write a history of past bondage and present freedom. This book is a tribute of affection and should not be viewed with the critic's eye.

1. redit: progressive present. — et: in translation equal to sed or et tamen ; in various passages in Tacitus et has this adversa- tive sense. See chapters 9. 10; 36. 17. — quamquam: in clauses introduced by quamquam the subjunctive predominates in the works of Tacitus. — primo statim: as we say in English with equal redundancy, "the very first."

2. ortu: metaphorical, like our "dawn of a new era." — Nerva

36 NOTES [Chap. 3.

Caesar: an aged senator who was chosen emperor after Domitian's death and reigned from September 18, 96 to January 25, 98. He was a weak administrator, but a man of good purpose, and his accession marked the beginning of better times. — dissociabiles: mutually exclusive.

4. Narva Traianus: Marcus Ulpius Traianus was adopted by Nerva in 97, and reigned from 98 to 117. He was one of the best and ablest of the emperors. — spem . . . ac votum: grammati- cally these words depend on adsumpserit, which, however, logically is connected with fiduciam ac robur only. This usage is called zeugma ; she has not only indulged in hopes and prayers.

5. securitas publica: a personified abstraction ; public tran- quillity is represented as offering vows for "her" continuance. A modern writer might imagine the Goddess of Liberty praying that freedom might endure. — fiduciam ac robur: Securitas has become confident that her prayers will be realized and hence has gained a firm footing.

9. oppresseris: potential, with indefinite subject; it is easier to crush creative talent and intellectual pursuits than to call them back into being. — subit : steals upon one.

10. in visa prime desidia postremo amatur: like Pop>e's lines: —

"Vice is a monster of so frightful mien As to be hated needs but to be seen; Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face, We first endure, then pity, then embrace."

11. quid si: this formula introduces the clinching explanation of the slow revival of literary activity. The thought is: what can one expect when one considers that the best have been killed and the few survivors are out of practice ? It is left to the reader to supply the self-evident answer, — the outlook is not promising. — per quin- decim annos: Domitian reigned from 81 to 96. — grande . . . spatium: the adjective is justified by the succeeding illustration of the changes possible in fifteen years.

12. fortuitis casibus: death by the visitation of I*rovidence, not by external violence. — promptissimus quisque: the leading

Chaps. 3, 4.] NOTES 37

spirits ; promptus signifies one who is mentally alert as well as one who is ready in action.

13. ut ita dixerim: an apology for the paradoxical nostri super- stites. What case is nostri?

15. iuvenes ad senectutem: theoretically the forty-sixth year was the dividing line between iuniores and seniores. Tacitus was about forty-two when Domitian died, hence, would fall only approximately in the category of those who had passed their prime.

17. tamen: in spite of the handicaps just described. — non . . . pigebit: litotes for iuvabit.

18. incondita ac rudi voce: in a style untutored and crude; an apology elicited by the fact that he is about to make his first essay in historical composition at a time when he still is conscious of mental torpor — or affects to be. — memoriam . , . bonarxun: at this time Tacitus had projected the work which afterwards took shape as the Histories. See Introduction, p. xvii. The original plan of the book was altered, however, in that the reigns of Ncrva and of Trajan were reserved for future treatment. Un- happily for our knowledge of the period Tacitus never completed this part of his task.

19. composuisse: perfect infinitive, because Tacitus imagines his feelings after the completion of the work.

20. interim: pending the completion of the /f is tones. — honori: the eulogistic aim of the biography is here plainly stated. See Introduction, p. xvi, on the significance of this sentence for the understanding of the Agricola.

21. excusatus: the artistic imperfections of the book will be pardoned because of the motives that led to its composition.

Chapter 4.

The lineage of Agricola ; his early training and his education ; his youthful devotion to philosophy.

1. Foroiuliensium colonia: Forum lulii, the modern Fr6jus, a town situated on the coast of Gallia Narbonensis, northeast of Massilia. It was founded by Julius Caesar in 46 B.C., and became an important port; hence, the adjectives vetere et inlustri.

2. procurator em Caesarum: the procurators were agents of the emperors, who were intrusted with the general control of imperial

38 NOTES [Chap. 4.

finances. They were stationed in Rome at the fiscus or imperial treasury, and also in the Caesarian provinces, where occasionally the office included duties of administration. Thus Pontius Pilate gov- erned Judaea as a procurator. Caesarum is not a variant of procura- tor Augusti, the ordinary title; the plural denotes service under dif- ferent emperors. Augustorum is sometimes used in the same sense.

3. quae: by attraction from quod, an office which is the patent of equestrian rank. — equestris nobilitas: Tacitus is thinking par- ticularly of the usage of his own times, in which the higher pro- curatorships were regarded as posts of honor. An incumbent of one of these positions was invested with equestrian rank and became eligible to the equestrian cursus honorum. Under the Julian emperors a different condition of affairs had prevailed ; even freedmen were employed in important procuratorships.

4. senatorii ordinis: he may have gained admission to the senate by adlectio, i.e. formal appointment by the emperor, or he may have held a curule office, which secured his entrance. Note the free use of the genitive of quality without the usual vir. Cf . rarae castitatis, line 8. — studio eloquentiae: not to be limited to talents in speaking. Eloquentia may be used of authors. Cf. chapter 10. 11, where Livy is called eloquentissimus. Graecinus wrote a work on Vine Growing, which was praised for its content and for its style.

5. sapientiae: as in chapter 2. 8. — virtutibus: Seneca the phi- losopher said of Graecinus that he was so good that a tyrant could not afford to let him live. — Gai Caesaris: better known as Caligula, the third of the emperors.

6. meritus: incurred, as elsewhere in Tacitus, unless with a touch of characteristic bitterness our author means to imply that in the case of Graecinus the reward of merit was the emperor's wrath. — M. Silanum: the father-in-law of Caligula. He was driven to suicide by the emperor in 38 a.d.

7. lulia Procilla: possibly a member of that family of Gallic aristocracy to which belonged Valerius Procillus, a chieftain men- tioned by Caesar, B. G. 1. 19. 3.

8. rarae castitatis: of exceptional purity of character. — in huius sinu indulgentiaque: hendiadys; in the shelter of her fond care. He was reared at his mother's knee instead of being in-

Chap. 4.] NOTES 89

trusted to a nurse. With the metaphorical use of sinus compare such English expressions as "in the bosom of the church," "in the bosom of one's family."

9. per omnem honestarum artium cultum: in a complete course of training in the polite subjects. Artes honestae or liberales were the studies that were fit for the Roman "gentleman and scholar" to pursue, viz. grammar, music, geometry, rhetoric, and philos- ophy. The terms carried with them to a certain extent the im- plication conveyed by the English expression "The Humanities" in its current sense.

11. peccantium: by a usage much favored by Tacitus the par- ticiple stands for an abstract noun. — integram: unspoiled.

12. statim parvulus: Quintilian, the great teacher of oratory, a contemporary of Tacitus, recommended that instruction be begun in the fourth year. Another pedagogical theory declared for seven as the proper age.

13. Massiliam: Marseilles, as we should expect from its Greek origin, had been a scholastic center for generations. Under the Empire youths in quest of a university training often resorted there in preference to sojourning at Athens. — Graeca comitate: the amenities of Greek life. — provinciali parsimonia: in the eyes of Tacitus and the satirists of his time the provincials preserved the simple life, while Rome was the center of decadent luxury. Here, however, the remark is not a commonplace, for Strabo, a Greek geographer of the Augustan age, says that the frugal Mas- silians prescribed strictly the size of dowries and the amounts to be spent for jewelry and clothing.

16. ultra quam : explanatory of the adverb acrius — too ardently, that is to say, beyond, etc. Tacitus here voices the long-standing national prejudice against philosophical speculation as such. Even the educated men of the Empire still cherished the tradi- tional Roman view that the pursuit of philosophy was justifiable only as it helped men to live and thus proved itself to be of prac- tical benefit. — Romano ac senatori: senatorial dignity did not sanction participation in certain pursuits which in the case of other social classes carried no stigma. See, e.g., Livy 21. 63. 4, quaestus omnis patribus indecorum visus. Statesmen and men of affairs were discouraged from obtaining anything beyond a smat-

40 NOTES [Chaps. 4, 5.

tering of philosophical knowledge, for fear their attention might be diverted from the business of active life.

17. hausisse: as we say "absorbed," "drank in"; Aausisse rep- resents hauriebam in direct discourse. The sentence involves an ellipsis of the logical apodosis of the unreal condition ni . . . coercuisset ; thus, he was on the point of absorbing . . . and he would have done so, had not, etc. Such "suppressions of the apodosis " are not rare in Tacitus. See chapters 13. 11 ; 37. 3.

18. scilicet: here introduces an obvious statement. — sublime et erectum: exalted and aspiring. Note the pairs of synonyms in this sentence.

19. pulchritudinem ac speciem: the beauty and perfection. Tacitus draws on philosophical terminology.

20. vehementius quam caute: a variation from the normal mode of expression which would call for cautius.

22. modtun: a proper mean.

Chapter 5.

Agricola's apprenticeship in arms ; his deportment in the service ; he conceives a taste for military renown.

1. rudimenta: literally, ^rs< attempts. What is its derivation? In imperial Latin the word has often a technical sense, equal to tirocinium, or military novitiate. Cf. Livy 21. 3. 4, pro militari rudimento. — Suetonio Paulino: C. Suetonius Paulinus, who had previously won distinction by the conquest of Maiu-etania, com- manded in Britain from 59 to 61. In 69 he led the forces of Otho against the Vitellians.

2. diligent! ac moderate duci: elsewhere Tacitus says that he enjoyed a reputation as a general second to none. — adprobavit: an interesting example of Tacitean brevity; the word combines the two ideas of service and of satisfactory service. Render: in his military novitiate which he passed . . . he served to the satisfaction of his chief. — electus: here, as elsewhere in Tacitus, the priority of time resident in the past participle is ignored. Agricola's admission to the staff of Suetonius was a mark of the approval that the young soldier had previously won. Translate: and was chosen.

3. contubemio: the ablative denotes the value at which he was

"' 41

rated. — aestimaret: the characterizing subjunctive. — nee: to indi- cate connection with the preceding sentence, And Agricola neither. — Lcenter: for wanton ends, explained by the following clause and balanced by segniter, which is in turn developed in the phrase ad . . . commeatus. Agricola did not take advantage of his rank and the fact that the services of a tyro were dispensable either to indulge in excesses or to obtain exemptions from duty.

4. iuvenum: the military tribunes who served under provincial governors were often representatives of the gilded youth of Rome who had no desire for military promotion. They went out to fill their purses or to qualify for office (tribuni honores petituri). Re- call the panic of Caesar's tribunes before the battle with Ariovistus, B. G. 1.39.2.

6. ad voluptates et commeatus: as excuses for obtaining the pleasures of furlough.

6. noscere: note the series of historical infinitives.

8. in iactationem: with a view to display. Tacitus often uses in and the accusative to express design.

9. anxius: here, circumspect. — exercitatior: in a more troublous state.

10. magis in ambiguo : in a more doubtful situation. — trucidati . . . exercitus: incidents of the revolt led by Boudicca in the year 61. See chapters 15 and 16. Veterans settled in Camulodunum, the only British colonia that had as yet been founded, were at- tacked and massacred and the town was burned. The Ninth Legion marched to the rescue, but was cut off and well-nigh anni- liilated. The plurals coloniae and exercitus are justifiable because Tacitus was intent on presenting events not numerically but generically. There were massacres of veterans, burnings of Roman colonies, etc.

11. intercept!: were cut off and destroyed.

12. mox: as often in Tacitus is equivalent to deinde.

13. alterius: not the other, but another. It stands for the genitive of alius, which is seldom used. — summa rerum: the chief credit for the campaign. — recuperatae: render as a substantive, comparing the phrase ab urbe condita.

14. cessit: fell to the lot of. — artem et usum: he learned the theory and the practice of warfare.

42 NOTES [Chaps. 5, 6.

16. ingrata: that is, to those in power. Temporibus is best explained as an ablative. The reference is not to any particular period, but to general conditions in the past. Naturally som3 of the emperors looked askance at too great achievements on the part of subjects. The view of Tacitus is perhaps colored by Domi- tian's attitude toward Agricola. Cf. chapter 39. 8 especially.

17. ex magna fama quam ex mala: the epigrammatic force of the sentence is heightened by the alliteration and the assonance. Like -peril attended the man of note and the man of notoriety.

Chapter 6.

The official career of Agricola from the quaestorship through the praetorship ; his marriage and his domestic relations.

1. hinc: thereafter; it may, however, be taken locally. — degressus: rarely used, as here, of departure from a place. After the middle of the last century B.C., a candidate was legally re- quired to file notice of candidacy in person. The date of Agricola's return was 61.

2. natalibus: frequent in Tacitus and Pliny in the sense of ancestry or stock. Domitia's father was one Domitius Decidius, probably a native of Gaul. He had held the posts of quaestor of the treasury and of praetor under the emperor Claudius.

3. decus ac robur: a source of social prestige (because of his alliance with an illustrious senatorial family) and of material support because by the provisions of the Lex Papia Poppaea, enacted by Augustus in 9 a.d., candidates for office were given precedence on the basis of the number of their children. A year of the legal age was remitted for each child. It has been com- puted that owing to the birth of the son mentioned in line 12 Agricola obtained the quaestorship in 63, when he was in his twenty-fourth year, a year before the ordinary age.

4. per mutuam caritatem: the coordination of the prepositional phrase and a case construction {i.e. anteponendo) is a favorite device of Tacitus to avoid parallelism in expression. This stylistic phenomenon is termed "inconcinnity." Cf. Introduction, p. xxiii and chapter 41, line 7, temeritate aut per ignaviam ducum.

6. in vicem se anteponendo: each according precedence to the other. — nisi quod: Tacitus, assuming the position of umpire in

Chap. 6.] NOTES 48

the friendly contest between husband and wife, tells why strict balance could not be maintained. A good wife wins warmer approval than a good husband, just as the bad wife is liable to greater blame than is a bad husband. Tacitus held the characteristic view that "when a woman was bad, she was horrid."

7. sors quaesturae: a quaestor was allotted to each senatorial province. Two, however, were sent to Sicily. — Asiam: Provincia Asia included, besides the adjacent islands, that portion of Asia Minor bounded by Bithynia on the north, Galatia on the east, Lycia and Pisidia on the south and southeast. — Salvium Titia- ntim: L. Salvius Otho Titianus, brother of the emperor Otho, was proconsul of Asia 63-64 a.d.

8. neutro: by neither circumstance, the wealth of the province and the fact that his superior was corrupt.

9. dives: agriculture, manufacturing, and commerce rendered Asia "one of the richest domains of the great Roman state." See Mommsen, Roman Provinces, vol. 1, pp. 387-391. — parata: supply esset. Tacitus omits forms of the subjunctive of esse freely when, as here, the mood is expressed in a following coordinate construction.

10. facilitate: compliance.

11. mutuam dissimulationem mali: a corresponding blindness to knavery. — auctus: a conventional term, blessed by the addi- tion of a daughter (to his family).

12. ibi: in Republican times and in the reign of Augustus wives were forbidden, as a rule, to accompany their husbands to the provinces. Under subsequent emperors the regulation was modi- fied. Agricola's wife was with him in Britain, the daughter here referred to became the wife of Tacitus and accompanied him to his command; Calpurnia, the third wife of Pliny, went out to Bithynia with her husband. — in subsidium: because he could again enjoy the privileges of oflBce-holding and of inheritance granted by the lex Papia Poppaea.

13. sublatum: equivalent to natum. The new-born child was laid at the feet of the father to be raised in acknowledgment of paternity. — moz: deinde, as in chapter 5. 12. — inter quae- sturam ac tribunatum: the phrase is used adjectively. Translate

44 NOTES [Chap. 6.

as if annum preceded inter. This construction, used with great circumspection by Cicero and by Caesar in the Gallic War. is found frequently in Livy and in Tacitus. Cf. line 15 below, sub Nerone temporum; chapter 36. 10, in arto pugnam, etc. At this time a year was the regular interval between the two offices.

14. tribunatus anniun: 66 a.d., according to the accepted chronology.

15. quiete et otic: not a difficult task. The tribunes had been shorn of real power. The right of intercession was retained in theory, but was exercised at the risk of incurring imperial dis- pleasure. On the condition of the magistracies under the Empire see F. F. Abbott, Roman Political Institutions, chapter XIX; A. H. J. Greenidge, Roman Public Life, p. 363.

16. pro sapientia: a justification of the discreet opportunism of Agricola, which contrasted unfavorably with the bold front main- tained in the same year by his colleague Arulenus Rusticus in defense of Thrasea Paetus. Cf. chapter 2. 1. — praetiu^ae: if we allow the usual interval of a year, Agricola's praetorship would fall in 68 A.D. — tenor et silentitun: as is often the case in a pair of synonyms, et is explicative; his praetorship ran a similar course ; thai is, passed in tranquillity.

17. iurisdlctio: there was not enough judicial work to occupy the eighteen praetors of Agricola's time. Hence, a non-irritant attitude was easy to maintain. — ludos: the activity of many of the praetors was confined to the direction of festivals and games and the supervision of the regions of the City.

18. inania honoris: including ludos; hence, translate, and the rest of the empty show of office. The connection of a genitive with a neuter adjective, generally plural but sometimes singu- lar, is a marked feature of Tacitean syntax. — duxit: ludos facere is the usual idiom. Tacitus, true to his distaste for the stereo- typed, substitutes a natural metaphor. We might say he guided . . . in a course midway between. Medio is an ablative of route.

19. uti . . . ita: although . . . yet. Agricola's discretion in expenditure enhanced his reputation in the eyes of sensible people, all the more because extravagance was the rule. — turn: in the year of his praetorship.

20. Galba: the successor of Nero; his reign extended from

Chaps. G, 7.] NOTES 46

June 9, 68 to January 15, 69. — ad dona , . . recognoscenda: people took advantage of the license occasioned by the fire of Nero to loot the temples. Agricola was commissioned to inventory the sacred treasures with a view to discovering and reclaiming lost articles.

21. fecit ne: ne is used not uncommonly in a negative consecu- tive clause for ut non.

22. quam Neronis: Nero pillaged Italy and the provinces to obtain works of art and treasure. Objects of gold and silver were melted, so that losses thus incurred could not be made good. — sensisset: the pluperfect signifies the completeness of Agricola's efforts at restitution; the state as good as never realized.

Chapter 7.

The mm-der of Agricola's mother; he espouses the cause of Vespasian and is sent to Britain to quell a mutiny.

1. sequens annus: 69 a.d., the "year of the four emperors," Galba, Otho, Vitellius, and Vespasian. Note the personifica- tion of annus ; this is an oft-recurring poetic element in Tacitus's style. Cf. chapter 22. 1; 38. 9.

2. classis Othoniana: while Otho marched north with his land force against the troops of his rival Vitellius who was holding the passes of the Alps, a naval armament was dispatched to Gallia Narbonensis to turn the flank of the invading army.

3. Intimilios: the municipium Alhintimilium, now Vintimiglia, on the Riviera.

4. suis: instead of eius to emphasize the enormity of the outrage committed by killing a defenseless woman in her own home.

6. causa caedis: they were intent on plunder and were not actuated by motives of animosity or political expediency.

6. soUemnia pietatis: the customary offices of filial devotion.

7. adfectati a Vespasiano imperii: Vespasian, who at the time was commander in Judaea, was hailed emperor early in July 69 by the Egyptian, Judaean, and Syrian legions. — deprehensus: to his surprise was overtaken by.

8. transgressus: a regular word for espousing a cause. Cf. line 13 below.

46 NOTES [Chap. 7.

9. Mucianus regebat: C. Licinius Mucianus, proconsular gov- ernor of Syria, had from the first assumed active leadership of Vespasian's forces, and after the occupation of Rome by Antonius Primus and the Flavian partisans took control of affairs in the City. — iuvene admodum Domitiano: Domitian is mentioned be- cause he was in Rome at the time and would have been naturally the deputy of his father except for the reasons given. He was eighteen years of age.

10. fortuna: rank ; especially imperial rank, as here.

11. ad dilectus agendos: to repair the losses occasioned by the civil conflicts of 69. — integre: uprightly.

12. vicensimae legioni: called ofRcially leg. XX Valeria Victrix, had been stationed in Britain since the reign of Claudius, and had become so identified with the service there that Tacitus did not deem it necessary to mention definitely the scene of Agricola's activity until the next chapter. — tarda ad sacramentiun : the XIV Gemina and the II Augusta, Vespasian's former command (of. chapter 13), declared for him, although the latter legion after- ward wavered in its allegiance. The other two legions serving in Britain, the IX Hispana and the XX Victrix, sided with Vitellius. Agricola crossed to Britain for the second time in the year 70.

13. ubi: i.e. in Britain, as the Roman reader would know. — decessor: Agricola's predecessor, M. Roscius Coelius, in the year 69 had fomented a revolt against Trebellius Maximus, the unpopular governor of Britain, and had forced him to flee for refuge to Vitellius in Gaul.

14. narrabatur: Tacitus conservatively gives the report of the matter as it came to Rome and does not himself vouch for the truth of the accusation. — quippe: equal to enim. — quoque: lends its force to consularibus, which it normally would follow. — con- sularibus: the governors of the province, Trebellius Maximus and his weak successor, Vettius Bolanus. Cf. chapter 16. The prin- cipal Caesarian provinces were ruled by ex-consuls or ex-praetors, according to the importance of the command. In Britain the governors were of consular rank. — nimia: as we say too much for. Supply legio.

15. legatus praetorius: i.e. Coelius. The legatv^ legionis — to be distinguished from the legatus provindae just mentioned —

Chaps. 7, 8.] NOTES 47

was regularly an ex-praetor. Thus Agricola was sent out after his praetorship to assume command of the Twentieth Legion. Consular legates were older men who had had wider experience.

17. rarissima moderatione: we are not to infer that Agricola compounded with the malcontents. He was a strict disciplinarian, (cf. chapters 19 and 22), and fecisse shows that he quelled the mutiny. Moderatione simply describes his attitude after insub- ordination had been crushed. He was willing to let bygones be bygones. Cf. chapter 22. 18, ex iracundia nihil supererat secretum.

Chapter 8.

Agricola's deportment toward his superiors was marked by modesty and by a disposition to "render unto Caesar that which was Caesar's."

1. Vettius Bolanus: had seen service in Armenia as legatus legionis; in 69 a.d. was sent by Vitellius to govern Britain after the flight of Trebellius Maximus. A characterization of his regime will be found in chapter 16.

2. feroci: in a good sense, warlike.

3. incresceret: that he (Agricola) might not rise too high. — peritus obsequi: the infinitive with adjectives, a construction with which the student becomes familiar in Vergil, is a frequent usage in post- Augustan prose.

4. utilia honestis: the expedient course with the honorable.

5. consularem: supply Zegfaium. — CexiaXeva.: Q.Petilius Cerialis, a kinsman and partisan of Vespasian; he was the commander of the ill-fated Ninth Legion during the revolt of 61. Cf. note on 5. 10. He was consul in 70 and was sent to Britain in 71 as legatus provinciae.

6. spatium : a field. — ezemplorum : exploits that might serve as models.

8. in experimentum : with final sense, hy way of testing him.

9. ex eventu: in consequence of his success.

11. fortunam: Agricola's modest description of what were actually res gestas, achievements. — ita: introducing, as in chapter 7. 16, a concluding sentence which sums up the matter under discussion.

12. extra: in a figurative sense similar to that which lies back of citra, chapter 1. 12. — nee: adversative, btU not.

48 NOTES [Chap. 9.

Chapter 9.

Agricola's advancement continues ; his excellent administration of Aquitania ; he reaches the consulship ; marriage of Tacitus and Agricola's daughter ; Agricola becomes governor of Britain.

1. revertentem: here, as elsewhere in Tacitus, the present participle does not retain its ordinary temporal value. Translate: immediately on his return. Agricola came back to Rome probably in 74.

2. inter patricios: from the time of Julius Caesar and Augustus the principes had been given or had assumed in virtue of their censorial power the right to fill the depleted ranks of the old patrician families by conferring the patriciate on distinguished men. Do not confuse this process with the adlectio of senators referred to in chapter 4, note 4. — provinciaeAquitaniae: Augustus divided Gaul, exclusive of the Province, into three administrative districts : Gallia Lugdunensis, Belgica, and Aquitanica. Each was governed by a legate of praetorian rank.

3. splendidae inprimis dignitatis: a genitive of quality loosely joined to Aquitaniae — a post of especial Mat. Precisely as is the case in our diplomatic service, posts in the Roman provincial system were graded in importance. Aquitania seems to have been, in oflScial usage, a stepping-stone to the consulship.

4. destinarat: the subject is Vespasianus. — plerique: many. 6. militaribus ingeniis: men of a military bent.

6. secura et obtusior: informal and somewhat rough and ready. The military court would thrust aside the fine distinctions of civil procedure and would concern itself chiefly with the spirit of the law. Cf. our idea of "frontier justice." — plura manu agens: gen- erally doing business in an off hand fashion. Martial law would not have to concern itself with the possibility of an appeal from its decisions.

7. naturali prudentia: variously explained as ablative of cause or of quality.

8. togatos: a standing term for civilians, since the toga was the distinctive garb of peace as opposed to the sagum or soldier's cloak. — iam vero : furthermore.

9. tempera . . . divisa: not as Livy, 21. 4. 6, says of Hannibal:

Chap. 9.] NOTES 49

vigiliarum somnique nee die nee node discriminaia tempora. — conventus: the provinces were divided into judicial districts in which assizes were regularly held by the governor. Conventus signifies either the district or the session — here evidently the latter. — iudicia: trials, specifying exactly the business of the conventus.

10. poscerent: the subjunctive of indefinite iteration, so fre- quent in Livy. — gravis . . . severus: gravitas — dignity, sobriety — and severitas — strictness — are often coupled as the typical qualities affected by the Roman magistrate and statesman of the old school. Tacitus says of Agricola what Cicero says of himself, Oran tion for Muraena, 3. 6: ego autem has partes lenitatis et miserin cordiae quas me natura ipsa docuit, semper egi libenter; illam vera gravitatis severitatisque personam non appetivi, referring to the magisterial attitude assumed toward Catiline. — et: adversative, withal.

11. potestatis persona^: the official pose precisely as in the passage just quoted from Cicero. Supply erat.

12. tristitiam: the magisterial severitas when it has passed proper bounds. The defects here mentioned are the stock failings attributed to Roman officialdom at all times.

13. exuerat: Agricola had divested himself of; hence, was free from those qualities which as one of the class of provincial gov- ernors he might reasonably have been expected to possess. This sentence does not refer simply to his behavior as a presiding judge of the conventus, but describes his conduct in the whole business of administration. — facilitas: affability. It would seem that Agricola had realized the ideal of Pliny, Letters, 8. 21 : ut in vita sic in studiis pulcherrimum et humanissimum existimo severi- tatem comitatemque miscere ne ilia in tristitiam, haec in petulantiam excedat.

16. iniuria virtutum fuerit: because in such a character the existence of probity and sobriety should be taken for granted. 16. etiam boni indulgent: —

"Still to her shining chariot lashed doth Fame Drag peasant ch\irl and noble all the same."

Hor. Satires, 1. 6. 23-24. Sir Theodore Martin's translation.

;r

60 NOTES [Chap, 9.

17. ostentanda virtute aut per artem: another illustration of inconcinnity. Per artem implies machinations by which subjects should be induced to give a favorable account of his government.

18. collegas: the governors of the other Gallic provinces. — contentione ad versus procuratores: it is conceivable that friction might arise between the military head of the province and the im- perial representative in charge of the bureau of finance. How far the procurator was subject to the legate's control is a matter of doubt. Beside the chief procurator of the fiscus, there were other officials charged with various functions in the province who bore the title. Cf. Greenidge, p. 417.

19. atteri sordidum: disgraceful to suffer compromise of dignity. Even victory in a petty squabble with an under-officer would be discreditable, to say nothing of defeat.

20. minus triennium: B. 217. 3; G. 296. 4; H.B. 416. d; A. and G. 407. c; H. 471. 4; W. 382. Agricola's command in Aqui- tania extended from 74 to early in 77. In the Caesarian provinces the emperors corrected what had been a serious flaw in the Repub- lican system of provincial government, — annual rotation in office. The political theorists of the Empire regarded not less than three years nor more than five as the proper term.

21. detentus: governors could not leave their provinces or resign from office without the approval of the emperor. — statim: join with spem consulatus in translation. Adjectival use of adverbs is frequent in Livy and Tacitus. Cf. Livy, 21. 8. 5, tres deinceps turres ; Agricola, chapter 25. 3, universarum ultra gentium.

22. dari: the present infinitive because in the popular mind the office was as good as given. — nullis . . . sermonibus: the ablative absolute without a participle is a characteristic usage of Tacitus-

23. par: he seemed equal to the task.

24. et: not a connective here. — consul: Agricola held office as consul suffectus sometime during the year 77. Beside the consules ordinarii who gave their names to the year it was the cus- tom under the Empire to designate other men to bear the title of consul through terms of from two to four months. These were called suffecti. — egregiae turn spei: at that time showing wonderful promise for the future. She was then thirteen years old; there are records of Roman girls who were married at an age earlier than this.

Chaps. 9, 10.] NOTES 51

25. iuveni: how old was Tacitus at this time?

26. statim: immediately after the wedding in 78 a.d.

27. pontificatus sacerdotio: membership in the rehgious colleges was an honor much coveted. Thus Pliny wrote to Trajan to beg an appointment to the epulones. The emperor nominated prospective members ; power of election — which amounted simply to con- firmation — was vested in the senate.

Chapter 10.

The geography of Britain.

1. multis scriptoribus: dative. Cf. note on chapter 2. 1. Tacitus has chiefly in mind Roman writers. Besides Livy and Fabius Rusticus (see below), Julius Caesar (in the Gallic War, Book 5), Pomponius Mela, a geographical writer of the time of Claudius, Pliny the Elder, the uncle of Tacitus's friend, had written of the country and the people of Britain. Pytheas of Massilia, a traveler contemporary with Alexander the Great, first acquainted the Greeks with Britain. His work furnished much material for subsequent writers.

2. curae: historical accuracy and painstaking. — ingenii: literary ability shown in attractive presentation of data.

3. quia . . . perdomita est: Tacitus's personal interest in geog- raphy and ethnology was a leading motive. Cf. Introduction, p. xviii.

4. eloquentia percoluere: with a slightly contemptuous force, have tricked out with the ornaments of rhetoric. — rerum fide: Tacitus, of course, was able to utilize the personal observations of Agricola.

6. spatio ac caelo: spatium signifies terrestrial extent; caelum, the commensurate quarter of the heavens above the island, means geographical situation mathematically determined.

7. Germaniae: take as dative with obtenditur. — in occidentem Hispaniae: by a curious error the ancient geographers in imagina- tion prolonged the Iberian Peninsula to the north and west and conceived of southern England as partly inclosed in the bay thus formed. — obtenditur: lies over against.

8. inspicitur: lies in sight of. The white cliffs of England are plainly visible from Calais, but are not discernible at all points of

62 NOTES [Chap. 10.

the French coast, as Tacitus implies under the hallucination that the Gallic coast stretched to the west, parallel to the southern shore line of England.

9. vasto atque aperto: standing expressions for the surprise aroused in the Roman by the sight of the Atlantic. Cf. Caesar, B. G. 3. 9. 7; 3. 12. 3.

10. Livius: we learn from the extant epitome that Livy treated Caesar's invasion of Britain in the lost 105th book. A description of the country was doubtless included. — Fabius Rusticus: a writer of the time of Nero and a friend of the philosopher Seneca. His history, which is also referred to in the Annals, comprehended, besides the reign of Nero, probably that of Claudius. Here some account of Britain would be in place.

11. eloquentissimi: again referring to stylistic qualities. — oblongae scutulae vel bipenni: previous writers, Caesar among them, had described the shape of Britain as triangular. Livy and Rusticus espoused a new theory. The shape of the scutula is in doubt; however, the use of vel indicates that its contour at least approached the familiar outlines of the double battle-ax with its two heads, fitted back to back, broad at the edge and converging regularly toward the shaft. See Smith, Did. of Ant., art. Securis. Such similes are a feature of ancient geography. Thus the Peloponnesus was compared to the leaf of a plane tree, oases in a desert to spots on a leopard's skin. Like our childish comparison of Italy with a boot, such likenesses are at best rough and in ancient times were founded on imperfect knowledge.

12. citra Caledoniam: excluding Scotland. The comparison with the double ax had been applied at a time when the northern part of Britain was an unknown land. On the basis of the scien- tific data gained by Agricola's exploring fleet Tacitus shows that the likeness cannot be extended to the whole island because Scot- land is wedge-shaped; its contour thus approximately reverses the ax-head.

13. unde et in universum fama: whence it is that the report has been made applicable as well to the island in its entirety. — trans- gressis: i.e. the border; the dative expresses the point of view.

14. enorme spatium: a shapeless tract. — extreme iam litore: where the shore seems already to end. One following the coast line

Chap. 10.] NOTES 53

of the island might imagine that the deep indentation of the Forth or the Clyde marked the end of the land.

15. velut in ctineum: Tacitus applies to Scotland approxi- mately the triangular description which Caesar, Mela, and Pliny applied to the whole island. — banc cram novissimi maris: i.e. the northern coast of Scotland ; novissimus = remote, as in Catullus, 4. 23, a mari novissimo (the Euxine).

16. circumvecta: the voyage is described in chapter 38. 14 ff.

17. adfirmavit: substantiated the insular character which had been asserted from Pytheas down, just as the spherical theory of the earth's form was maintained long before Columbus. — incog- nitas: unknown, in the sense of unexplored. Tacitus does not mean to imply that heretofore men had been unaware cf the existence of the islands. We speak of certain parts of Africa as "unknown lands."

18. invenit: used also, chapter 33. 14, of acquiring thorough acquaintance with a land already known. — Thule: the "farthest North" of the ancients, celebrated in fable and in poetry. Pytheas described it as lying six days' sail north of Britain, near to the Frozen Sea. It has been suggested that the largest of the Shet- land Islands, Mainland, may have been the place in question. — hactenus iussum: supply ire or progredi. Agricola had ordered the fleet to establish the location of Thule, but not to land.

20. et hiems adpetebat: the fleet did not start until the decisive battle of the summer campaign of 84 had been fought and won. — mare pignun: the legend of an inert sea had persisted from the time of Pytheas, who speaks of a frozen ocean and describes the region about Thule as a kind of protoplasmic mass resembling a jellyfish. A rationalistic explanation of the story might lie in masses of floating ice, an unwonted sight to dwellers by the Medi- terranean. Cf . Irving, Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus, Book III, chapter III: "The crews now called to mind some tale about the frozen ocean, where ships were said to be sometimes fixed immovable."

21. ne . . . perinde: not , . . in the same manner (as seas elsewhere; the second member of the comparison is omitted); hence, not . . . especially.

22. causa ac materia tempestattun: the origin of the winds was

64 NOTES [Chaps. 10, 11.

a stock topic in the works of ancient physicists and philosophers, some of whom, notably Aristotle, closely approximated the true explanation. According to the theory here adopted by Tacitus with small credit to his scientific knowledge, storms were caused by streams of air which were compressed by the obstruction of moun- tains or gathered in clefts of the earth and which then rushed forth with a rotary motion imparted by the contact with the opposing objects.

23. continui maris: on the contrary the wind gets a greater sweep on the open sea and the waves are higher.

24. naturam: natural characteristics.

25. multi rettulere: the cause of the tides was a commonplace of ancient scientific investigation. The influence of the moon on the tides was observed by Pytheas. Naturally the ebb and flow of the Atlantic were interesting phenomena to the Greeks and the Romans, since the Mediterranean is in most places a tideless sea. — addiderim: I might add.

26. fluminiun: the currents caused by the inrush and the outgo of the tide. In the deep indentations of the Scottish coast the effect of the ebb and flow is particularly visible. Italy has no deep bays. Greece has many gulfs and friths, but no tide. Keep mare as the subject of the infinitives.

27. litore: the outer coast line.

29. inseri: a middle use of the passive infinitive — penetrates. — in sue: i.e. regno; the metaphor in dominari is repeated.

Chapter 11.

The ethnology of Britain.

1. ceterum: resuming the description proper after the digression about the ocean and the tides. — initio coluerint: geological and archaeological investigation have traced the beginnings of man in Britain far beyond the limits comprehended by Tacitus and his age. See W. Boyd Dawkins, Early Man in Britain; Thomas Rice Holmes, Ancient Britain and the Invasions of Julius Caesar. The ethnological data here collected by Tacitus were derived from a comparatively late stage of civilization.

2. ut inter barbaros: as one would naturally expect in the case of barbarians. There would be no historical tradition; there might

Chap. 11.] NOTES 65

have been a poetical and mythological tradition, just as the Ger- mans traced their descent from Tuisto {Germania, 2), the Gauls from Dis. Caesar, B. G. 6. 18.

3. habitus corporum: physical types. — exec: from the variation in types. In the Germania, chapter 2, Tacitus rejects the immi- gration theory which he accepts here, on the ground that Ger- many was too forbidding a country to tempt settlers from other lands !

4. rutilae . . . comae: the regular description of the Germans' hair. Ci. Germania, 4, truces et caerulei oculi, rutilae comae, magna corpora. — magni artus: recall how Caesar's men feared the Ger- mans, — ingente magnitudine corporum, B. G. 1. 39. 1.

5. Germanicam originem: the possibility of a prehistoric inva- sion by Northmen has been discussed by ethnologists, but the question remains unsettled. Such evidence as there is makes against the view. — Silurum: a tribe which lived in southern Wales. They offered stubborn resistance to Roman rule and were never actually Romanized. — colorati : swarthy.

6. torti: curly. — posita contra Hispanla: Tacitus's argument thus rests partly on an erroneous assumption. It is debated by ethnologists whether the Silures were survivors of an aboriginal race which inhabited Britain before the coming of the Aryan Celts or were the result of an admixture of Celts with Aborigines.

8. proximi Gallis: the inhabitants of Cantium who, Caesar says also, neque multum a Gallica differunt consuetudine, B. G. 5. 14. 1. — durante originls vi: by the persistence of natural type.

9. procurrentibus in di versa: extending in opposite directions, hence, approaching each other. — positio caeli: the influence of climate on physical types is a well-attested fact.

10. in universum . . . aestimanti: in the opinion of one who regards the matter in all its aspects. The dative is closely akin to transgressis, chapter 10. 13. — Gallos: modern theory substan- tiates the assumption of a Celtic conquest of Britain in pre-Roman times. There were in fact two waves of immigration, the first possibly in the eighth century B.C.; the second in the second century before our era. The first comers, the Goidels, overran Great Britain and Ireland and were the ancestors of the Gaels in Ireland and the Scottish Highlands. They were followed by the

66 NOTES [Chaps. 11, 12.

Brythons, who came from Belgic Gaul and were of the same stock and, as Tacitus says, spoke the same language as the Gauls who remained on the Continent. Cf. J. Rhys, Celtic Britain, chapter 1; H. d'Arbois de Jubainville, Les Celtes, pp. 17-36.

11. eorum sacra: i.e. Druidism, which was the common ritual of the inhabitants of Britain and the Celts of the Continent. In the time of Caesar Britain was the fountain head of Druidic in- fluence.

12. sermo: see note on 10.

13. eadem audacia . . . eadem fonnido: so Caesar, B. G. 4. 5. 1, calls the Gauls in consUiis capiendis mobiles.

15. praeferunt: exhibit.

17. accepimus: Caesar, B. G. 6. 24. 1, says there was a time when the Gauls surpassed the Germans in courage.

18. olim victis: in the time of Claudius.

Chapter 12.

The British mode of warfare ; political conditions; climate and productions; minerals.

1. robur: mainstay. — quaedam nationes: certainly the Cale- donians. Cf. chapters 35 and 36. We should infer from Caesar's account that the use of the chariot was more general than Tacitus represents.

2. honestior auriga: contrast with the Homeric custom accord- ing to which the chief fought and a henchman did the driving. — ■ clientes propugnant: observe the laconic effect of the short, dis- connected sentences ; propugno is used regularly of defenders fighting from a point of vantage. The meaning is here that the vassals stand on the chariot and ward off assailants. — regibus: Caesar, B. G. 5. 22. 1, speaks of four kings who ruled in Cantium and acted in obedience to Cassivelaunus in opposing Roman aggression. Cf. chapter 13. 16.

3. per principes: an analogous state of affairs existed in Gaul in the time of Caesar, when every canton was honeycombed with parties; earum factionum principes sunt, B. G. 6. 11. 3. — fac- tionibus et studiis: parties and (attendant) rivalries. The ablatives are modal. In Tacitus the simple case without a modifying adjec- tive is frequently so used. — trahuntur: they are subject to the heck

Chap. 12.] NOTES 57

and coil of chieftains, in contrast to the rule once exercised by kings.

4. pro nobis utilius: a stronger expression than nobis utilius.

9. foedum: there is a modern saying, "It takes a good many foul days in Scotland to breed one fair one."

10. orbis: we should say "latitude." — mensuram: supply in thought dierum. The repetition of a noun or of a demonstrative representing it — in English " those of " would be required here — is regularly avoided by ellipsis in Latin. Cf. B. 374. 2. b. — nox brevis: in Edinburgh at midsummer a newspaper can be read without artificial light at 10 p.m. At Inverness the length of the longest day is over eighteen hours.

11. ut . . . internoscas: potential subjunctive in a consecutive clause. Homer says of his land of the Laestrygones, Odyssey, 10. 82-86: "There might a sleepless man have earned a double wage, the one as neatherd, the other shepherding white flocks — so near are the outgoings of the night and of the day."

13. occidere et exsurgere: supply solem. It is noteworthy that Tacitus says nothing of the long nights of winter although this phenomenon was known to his contemporaries and also to his predecessors. The midnight sun here described is not observed in Scottish latitudes.

14. extrema et plana terranun: the manipulation of a lighted candle beneath a large plate will furnish the best illustration of the passage. Tacitus here presents an hypothesis, discarded by the scientific men long before his time, to the effect that the earth was shaped like a curved shield flat at the edges. Night was the shadow cast by the earth when the sun was beneath it. Above the center of the shield darkness would be most intense, since there the shadow would rise perpendicularly to the heavens. The flat outer edge, where Britain was supposed to lie, would project a shadow at a low angle so that the sky would not be darkened.

17. frugum: includes fruits of the trees and products of the soU.

18. fecundum: heightens patiens — not only bears but is pro- lific. — cito provenixint: the asyndeton lends an adversative force, but they sprout rapidly.

20. metalla: as Tacitus says, both of the precious metals are

58 NOTES [Chaps. 12, 13.

found to some extent in the British Isles. Gold is very generally associated with tin. The tin mines of Cornwall were famous in early antiquity and their product was carried by the Phoenicians to the countries of the Mediterranean. Lead was mined exten- sively in Roman times and according to Caesar iron was found along the seacoast. B. G. 5. 12. 4.

21. margarita: margarita, -ae, is the usual form.

23. Rubro Marl: here the Persian Gulf, still noted as a fishing- ground for pearls.

25. naturam: quality. — nobis avaritiam: here again Tacitus speaks as the satirist of his luxury-loving age.

Chapter 13.

Tacitus begins his account of the political history of Britain; Roman policy touching the conquest of Britain up to and includ- ing the expedition of Claudius.

1. ipsi: the inhabitants themselves in contrast to products of the soil and mineral wealth. — tributa: imposed by Julius Caesar, although it is doubtful whether the Romans were long successful in collecting payment after his withdrawal from Britain. — imperii miinia: munia may signify the functions which attend the incum- bency of some office — thus we find munia ducis, consulatus — or the duties which accompany some pursuit or condition of life, as munia belli, militiae, pads, castrorum. Munia imperii here falls in the second group and means the functions which those who live subject to superior power are called upon to perform, such as building roads and harbors. Cf. chapter 31. 13.

4. igitiir: marking the beginning of the development of the general theme — the conquest of Britain — foreshadowed by domiti. — divus: the deified, the title applied formally to those em- perors to whom apotheosis was officially accorded.

6. ingressus: in the two expeditions of 55 and 54 b.c.

6. terruerit: overawed. — litore potitus: in the second expedition Caesar advanced beyond the Thames. — potest videri: may fairly he considered. Caesar's invasions at least paved the way for per- manent occupancy of the island by demonstrating the possibility of successful aggression.

8. principum arma: the wars between Caesar and Pompey,

Chap. 13.] NOTES 59

between the assassins of Caesar and Octavius and Antony, and between Octavius and Antony.

9. consilium: as a -policy Augustus devoted himself to unifying the Empire within its existent frontiers.

National pride, as voiced by the court poets Horace and Proper- tius, demanded the addition of the ultimi Britanni to the Roman dominions, and on two occasions announcement was made of a contemplated expedition. The plan, however, was not carried out.

10. praeceptum: injunction. Tiberius, the stepson and suc- cessor of Augustus, at the beginning of his reign, pledged himself to carry out the declared policies of his predecessor and hence adhered to the doctrine of non-expansion. — agitasse: supply animo. — Gaitmi Caesarem: Caligula gathered an army at Bou- logne in the spring of 40 a.d. with the avowed intention of crossing to Britain. According to the not entirely unprejudiced reports of the historians the expedition degenerated into a farce. The sol- diers were set to picking up shells on the beach as tokens of vic- tory to be displayed in triumph at Rome.

11. satis constat: another case of suppressed apodosis. Supply in thought intrasset. — ingenio mobili: by reason of natural volatility.

12. paenitentiae: join with velox. — ingentes . . . conatus: in the fall of 39 a.d. Caligula, at the head of a great armament, made a demonstration against Germany. The results of the expedition were not commensurate with the preparations, so that its achievements were belittled and caricatured by the historians.

13. Claudius: his invasion was undertaken in the year 43. He himself spent sixteen days on the field of action. — iterati: reckoning from the invasions of Caesar almost a century before.

16. in partem rerum: the supreme command was in the hands of Aulus Plautius; but Vespasian, as legate of the Second Legion, rendered signal service in the campaign.

16. fortunae: as in chapter 7. 10, referring to imperial power. — reges: there have come down to us fragments of a triumphal arch erected to Claudius at Rome by the Senate and the Roman people and thus inscribed : quod reges Britanniae XI devio

60 NOTES [Chaps. 13, 14.

tos . . . in dedUionem acceperU gentesque barbaras trans Oceanum primus in dicionem populi Romani redigerit. — monstratus fatis: Vespasian was pointed out to the world by the fates as a man for whom a great future was in store. So Napoleon was called "The Man of Destiny." Pliny said of Trajan with greater flat- tery: "It was not the hidden powers of the Fates that discovered him but Jove himself." — Panegyric, chapter 1.

Chapter 14.

Britain is organized into a province under Aulus Plautius and his immediate successors; Suetonius Paulinus, after a successful campaign of two years, invades the island of Mona; the Britons seize the opportunity for revolt.

1. consularium: the governors of Britain were regularly ex- consuls. — Aulus Plautius: consul in 29 a.d., the leader of the expedition of Claudius. His service in Britain extended from 43 to 47; he was accorded a triumph for his victories.

2. Ostorius Scapula: P. Ostorius Scapula, governor of Britain, 47-51 A.D., died in office; he established permanent camps as bulwarks of conquered territory and defeated and captured Caractacus, the last prince of Camulodunum.

3. proxima pars: the southern part of Britain ; the Roman lines had been advanced to the Welsh frontier.

4. addita insuper . . . colonia: Camulodunum, the modern Colchester, in Essex, near the coast. The colony was established by Ostorius, Explain the ablative absolute on the analogy of expulsis insuper professoribus, chapter 2. 8.

5. Cogidumno: the name occurs elsewhere on an inscription found at Chichester in Sussex, which, therefore, was presumably the seat of his power.

6. vetere . . . consuetudine: in accordance with a time-honored custom; explained by the following w^-clause.

8. et reges: in ironical contrast with servitutis. The Romans frequently contrived to obtain foothold in a country by attaching native rulers to their cause and by playing rival dynasties against each other. Instances of client princes are numerous in history, e.g. Masinissa of Numidia, Herod, Attalus and Eumenes of Pergamus; also Phraates and Tiridates, who were established in

Chaps. 14, 15.] NOTES 61

Parthia by Tiberius. Cf. W. T. Arnold, Roman Provincial Ad- ministration, revised edition, pp. 14 ff. — Didius Gallus: A. Didius Gallus, governor of Moesia in 46, was dispatched to Britain to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Ostorius. Didius served 52- 57 A.D. Elsewhere Tacitus lays his inactivity to old age and satis- fied ambition.

10. fama aucti officii: the reputation of having extended the limits of his jurisdiction. — quaereretur: final subjunctive.

H. Veranius: Q. Veranius Nepos, consul in 49 a.d., legate of Britain 58-59. His activity was confined to depredations among the Silures.

12. Suetonius . . . Paulinas: Agricola's chief. Cf. chapter 5.

13. firmatis praesidiis: establishing strong fortresses. Firmare has this meaning also in chapter 35. 5. — quorum: the achieve- ments just mentioned.

14. Monam: the present Anglesey, in ancient times the holy of holies of Druidism. The story of the attack and of the frenzied defense by the priests and the women is one of the most stirring recitals in Tacitus. Cf. Annals, 14. 30. ^

16. terga occasioni patefecit: laid himself open to attack, < liter- ally, opportunity Ain the rear. ^

Chapter 15.

. The Britons give vent to their dissatisfaction and exhort one another to cast off the Roman yoke.

2. conferre: compare notes on. — interpretando accendere: they intensify their wrongs by putting constructions upon them. In dis- cussing the conduct of their rulers the Britons natiu-ally saw the acts of the Romans in the worst light.

3. patientia: submission, as in chapter 2. 11. This sentence begins the indirect discourse which, as is often the case in Livy, depends on a verb of saying to be supplied from the context. The speech is, of course, manufactured by Tacitus to suit the occasion. Cf . Introduction, p. xviii. By this device he puts the just com- plaints of the Britons in their own mouths and thus lends a dramatic touch to his narrative. — tamquam: expressing the considerations by which the Romans were guided in oppressing the natives, not the opinion of the author.

62 NOTES [Chaps. 15, 16.

4. ex facili: ex with the neuter ablative of the adjective has the force of a simple adverb. Cf. ex aequo, chapter 20. 10.

5. in sanguinem: by enlisting them as soldiers as well as by inflicting punishment and subjecting them to forced labor.

6. discordiam: friction between civil and military authority. Cf. note on chapter 9. 19. — aeque . . . aeque: repeated for emphasis. Aeque ac is the usual formula.

8. manus: tools, catspaws. 10. exceptum: is exempt from.

12. tamquam: again introducing the Romans' contemptuous estimate of the Britons. — tantum : lends its force to pro patria.

13. enim: implies an ellipsis as follows: they think that we are not to be feared ; on the contrary they are at our mercy, for, etc. — militum: i.e. Romanorum.

14. Germanias: the plural of names of countries is often used when the different administrative or geographical divisions are thought of. Cf. our expression, " Czar of all the Russias." Ger- many was divided into an Upper and a Lower Province. The destruction of the legions of Varus in 9 a.d. caused a setback to Roman power in Germany, but by no means marked its extinction.

16. avaritiam et luxuriam: in the eyes of the victims the stock motives of Roman conquest.

17. divus lulius: the ceremonial designation has a somewhat incongruous sound in barbarian mouths. Some editors unneces- sarily regard divus as an ironical touch. As a matter of fact the Roman historians are constantly neglecting dramatic fitness in speeches of this kind. In Book 21 of Livy the student can dis- cover various passages in which Carthaginians speak in Roman terms.

19. felicibus: the Romans.

22. relegatum: a technical term for banishment. Suetonius was, as it were, "marooned."

23. quod difficillimum fuerit: "'Tis the first step that costs." Quod is relative.

Chapter 16.

The Britons seize arms and attack Camulodunum; Suetonius retm-ns from Mona and puts down the rebellion. In consequence

Chap. 16.] NOTES 63

of his harsh measures of retaliation he is superseded by Trebellius, who is driven out of the province by a mutiny of his soldiers; insubordination is still rife under his successor.

1. Boudicca: popularly known as Boadicea ; she became sovereign of the Iceni after the death of her husband Prasutagus. Roused to revolt by indignities perpetrated on herself and her family, she essayed unsuccessfully to crush Roman power in Britain.

2. femina duce: possibly a reminiscence of Vergil's dux /ewina facti, Aeneid, 1. 364. — neque enim sexum . . . discernunt: there is no evidence to show that women as a rule exercised sovereign power amongst the Britons. Boadicea owed her authority to her position as the wife of Prasutagus. However, in the household woman was held in high respect by the Celts as by the Germans.

4. coloniam: Camulodunum; the veterans quartered there had rendered themselves obnoxious by evictions and other acts of oppression.

5. in barbaris ingeniis: an attributive phrase — voith which barbarians are familiar.

6. ira et victoria: the two separate motives that governed their conduct — wrath for past injuries urged them to vengeance; it was victory that made revenge possible. Translate: fury and the consciousness of victory. — quod nisi : and unless ; literally, as to which, unless. Quod in this construction indicates connection with the preceding sentence. It may be explained either as an old ablative form or as an accusative of respect.

8. fortuna: best explained as nominative.

9. tenentibus . . . plerisque: concessive. — conscientia defec- tionis: guilty knowledge of (participation in) the revolt.

10. ex legato: equivalent to an objective genitive.

12. ut suae cuiusque iniuriae: of every offense as if it were a personal matter.

13. igitur: consequently, i.e. because the fears of the Britons were shared at Rome and it was believed that the harshness of Suetonius would prolong the revolt. — Petronius Turpilianus: P. Petronius Turpilianus, consul in 61, governor of Britain 61-63. He was honored by the triumphal insignia in 65 and as a partisan of Nero was put to death by Galba in 68.

64 NOTES [Chaps. 16, 17.

14. paenitentiae: dative of the abstract for the concrete. Translate : toward the penitent.

15. prioribus: the previous turbulence. — Maximo: M. Trebellius Maximus, governor of Britain 63-69; forced to take refuge with Vitellius as a result of a mutiny fomented by Roscius Coelius, the legate of the Twentieth Legion. Cf. chapter 7. 13. In the Histories, 1. 60, Tacitus gives a less favorable account of Trebellius, accusing him of greed and niggardliness.

17. experimentis : experience; ablative of quality. — comitate: exhibited toward the natives, not toward his own men.

18. ignoscere vitiis blandientibus: to condone alluring weak- nesses. Tacitus means that the native morality and strict ideals of life, which, according to his view, once distinguished the northern barbarians, had become things of the past among them as well as elsewhere (note quoque); the Britons, having learned to embrace the decadent ways of civilization, gave Trebellius no trouble.

19. civilium armorum: the struggles attendant on the usurpa- tions of the principate by Galba, Otho, Vitellius, and Vespasian. These conflicts actually coincided with only a year of the regime of Trebellius.

20. laboratum: trouble arose.

21. miles otio lasciriret: it was a cardinal principle of Roman military theory that " Satan finds mischief still for idle hands to do."

22. fuga: to Vitellius.

23. precario: on sufferance. — velut pacti: they struck a bargain as it were.

24. seditio sine sanguine stetit: the alliteration is probably not accidental; insubordination subsided bloodlessly.

25. Vettius Bolanus: see on chapter 8. 1.

26. agitavit . . . disciplina: sarcastic, hardly convulsed Britain by his regime.

27. petulantia: lawlessness.

Chapter 17.

Under Vespasian there is a change for the better in the adminis- tration of Britain; subjugation of the Brigantes and the Silures.

2. recuperavit: Vespasian recovered the Roman world from the successive dominations of warring factions, and restored it to law

Chaps. 17, 18.] NOTES ^ 65

and order. — magni duces: Vespasian's service in Britain had rendered him familiar with the problems of administration. He nalrurally chose as governors able men who kept the armies in a high state of effectiveness.

3. PetiliusCerealis: see note on chapter 8. 5.

4. Brigantum: they dwelt in northern England; Eburacvmi (York) was their chief city.

8. alterius: any other except Frontinus. — obruisset: would have consigned to oblivion.

9. subiit: the asyndeton conceals an adversative sense. — molem: the heavy responsibility which devolved upon him of showing himself a worthy successor of such a man as Cerealis. — Julius Frontinus: governor of Britain from 74 to 77 — the date is not altogether certain — and one of the great men of his time. He was three times consul, twice as a colleague of Trajan, and held the pro consulship of Asia and other important posts, such as the cura aquarum or superintendence of water supply. Besides various other books of a technical nature he wrote a work on the aqueducts of Rome, which has come down to us.

10. quantum licebat: limits magnus. Even good emperors necessarily limited the individual prestige of subjects.

11. subegit: he forced them to acknowledge the supremacy of Rome. But, as is shown by the persistence of Celtic civilization to this day and by the scarcity of Roman remains, Wales was never really Romanized. — super: = praeter. Cf. our "over and above." — locorum quoque difficultates eluctatus: as Hannibal says, Livy, 21. 43. 15: victorem eundem non Alpinarum modo gentium sed ipsarum, quod multo maius est, Alpium.

Chapter 18.

Agricola arrives in Britain; he surprises his soldiers and the Britons as well by taking the field against the rebellious Ordovices when the season is almost gone; the chastisement of this tribe is followed up by the conquest of Mona in the face of great diflS- culties. Agricola with his usual modesty refrains from magnifying his exploits.

1. hunc: as has been related in chapters 13-17. — media iam aestate: the summer of 78 a.d.

66 NOTES [Chap. 18.

3. velut: in the belief thai.

4. ad occasionem: as in chapter 14. 15. — Ordovicum: this tribe occupied the northern part of Wales.

5. alam: a squadron of auxiliary cavalry. — agentem: serving in, a military sense not rare in Tacitus.

7. quibus bellum volentibus: those who favored war; a construc- tion modeled upon a Greek idiom. The student may have met the mode of expression in Livy, 21. 50. 10: dixit . . . quibusdam volentibus novas res fore. — probate exempliun : they regard the action (of the Ordovices) as a fit 'pattern. — ac: and yet.

8. transvecta: the normal force of this verb is illustrated in line 21. It is here equivalent in meaning to transacta.

9. ntuneri: military units of greater or less size serving apart from the main army under the command of a single officer. We may translate detachments. — praesumpta: taken for granted.

10. tarda et contraria: neuter plurals.

13. vexillis: the numeri above referred to.

15. erexit agmen: led the army uphill.

16. non ignarus instandum famae: he realized the wisdom of making the most of the 6clat he had won by following up his advantage. Cf. Maharbal's remark to Hannibal, Livy, 22. 51. 4: "You know how to conquer; you do not know how to use your victory." Caesar made a similar comment about Pompey after the battle of Dyrrachium.

17. cessissent: for processissent. Tacitus is given to using the simple for the compound verb. — terrorem ceteris fore: a somewhat surprising conclusion of the sentence. We expect, so will be the issue of the rest of the combat. Tacitus takes the defeat of the Britons for granted.

18. possessione: seizure.

20. utinsubitisconsiliis: the thought is not fully expressed. The meaning is: just as some essential is usually lacking in plans hastily conceived, in this case ships were lacking.

22. lectissimos auxiliariiun: picked men from the cohorts of auxiliary troops attached to Agricola's army. They were pre- sumably Batavians, a German folk whose skill in the maneuvers here described is often mentioned by ancient writers.

23. nota vada: familiarity with these particular waters is not

ii

Chaps. 18, 19.] NOTES 67

implied; the meaning is that they were experienced in crossing fords in general, and knew how to cope with currents, pick out the best ways, etc. — patrius: the prowess of the Germans in swimming was proverbial amongst the Romans. Cf., for example, Histories, 5. 14.

25. qui . . . qui . . . qui: the anaphora portrays vividly the possibilities as they presented themselves to the minds of the Britons. — mare: summing up in general the nature of the antici- pated attack — in fine, a formal movement by sea. For a very similar use of mare see Histories, 2. 12: possessa per mare et naves maiore Italiae parte.

26. crediderlnt: on this use of the perfect subjunctive of abso- lute fact in a consecutive clause see B. 268. 6; H.B. 478; G. 513; A. and G. 485. c; H. 550; W. 469.

28. quippe cui: evidently a person to whom. — ingredienti: on his entrance; a use of the present participle already encountered in chapter 9. 1.

29. officiorum ambitum: canvassing for ceremonial honors, con- ferred by the provincials.

32. victos continuisse: substantive infinitive, keeping the con- quered in hounds.

33. ne laureatis quidem: supply litteris. Official dispatches announcing victories were decorated by laurel leaves.

34. famae famam: observe a favorite device of Latin word arrangement, the juxtaposition of different forms of the same word. — aestimantibus: ablative absolute with the noun omitted. The subject is general.

35. spe: the expectations entertained by Agricola.

Chapter 19.

Agricola introduces reforms in the administration of civil affairs; promotions are not governed by favoritism; he tempers justice with mercy; abuses in the collection of imposts are corrected.

2. experimenta: see chapter 16. 17.

3. causas: the insolence and the rapacity of the Roman oflBcials. Cf. chapter 15.

4. domum: his oflBcial household. 6. nihil: supply agere.

68 NOTES [Chap. 19.

8. milites ascire: attach soldiers to his retinue. These were the beneficiarii so called, soldiers who were excused from ordinary military duties and attached to the staff of an oflBcial in a clerical capacity or for some petty service of administration.

9. exseqiii: punish.

10. commodare: equals praebere, he employs.

11. poena: loosely joined to contentus, which is more appro- priate to paenitentia; he does not always resort to punishment.

13. fnunenti et tributorum exactionem: Agricola's measures of reform applied both to the requisition of grain and to the money tribute levied in Britain. Only the flagrant abuses connected with the former are here described.

14. aequalitate munenim: he adapted his assessment to the pro rata resources of a district.

15. circumcisis: eradicating practices.

16. namque . . . cogebantur: this sentence describes the schemes by which the Roman officials utilized the grain impost as a means of extortion. When the people of a district were unable to furnish enough grain to meet the requisition, they were compelled to go through the form of buying from the Roman granaries a quantity sufficient to make good the deficit. As it would have been necessary to redeliver immediately, the grain purchased was not moved from its place. The Romans kept both grain and money.

17. ultro: besides being required to appear at the granaries and wait the convenience of the Romans they likewise had to buy. The Romans fixed the price. — luere pretio: discharge their obligations with a money payment.

18. divortia: elsewhere in the sense of the forks of a road; here, roundabout ways, detours. — longinquitas regionum: remote dis- tricts; further explained by the ut-cla,use. By making the delivery of the grain as difficult as possible, the Romans tempted the pro- vincials to substitute for the contribution of grain a cash payment at a high rate. This " dodge " was practiced by Verres, the notori- ous praetor of Sicily, prosecuted by Cicero.

19. proximis hlbemis: the ablative absolute is concessive.

20. omnibus in promptu: an easy matter for aU parties concerned. — paucis: the Roman officials.

Chap. 20.] NOTES 69

Chapter 20.

Agricola adopts aggressive tactics in the campaign of the second summer, but by his clemency toward the conquered wins many states to allegiance.

1. prime statim anno: in the autumn and winter of 78 a.d.

2. circumdedit: literally, he enveloped peace in a mantle of fair fame; although it is difficult to say how far a Roman would feel the original force of the metaphor. — intolerantia : arrogance.

4. aestas: 79 a.d. contracto: mobilized. — multus in agmine: as we might say, he was everywhere in the line of march.

5. modestiam: set off against the concrete disiectos, s^ragrjZers. — ipse capere: this duty regularly devolved upon engineers, called metatores, who went in advance of the army.

6. aestuaria: sometimes taken as evidence that Agricola's operations during this campaign were in the west, where salt inlets are a feature of the topography. It is not safe to infer that Tacitus had a definite locality in mind. He is consistently indifferent to geographical accuracy and was primarily concerned with constructing an effective background for the central figure, Agricola.

7. interim: he was continually taking the offensive, even while he was engaged in increasing the efficiency of his army. — quominus: in translation equivalent to an adversative conjunction. Tacitus uses this particle with great freedom where previous writers would have written quin.

10. ex aequo: on an equal footing', hence, as independent states.

12. et tantaratione curaque: any general might locate fortresses in the enemy's country. The relegation of the ablatives to a separate clause connected by et emphasizes the fact that Agricola showed unusual tactical ability (ratione) in planning his lines. This praise is repeated in chapter 22.

13. illacessita: unassailed. Agricola's diplomacy and his skil- ful seizure of strategic points rendered recourse to arms unneces- sary.— transierit: cf. the use of transgredior, chapter 7. 8, of a change in allegiance.

70 NOTES [Chap. 21.

Cbapter 21.

The Britons are initiated into the arts and the refinements of Roman civilization ; decadence follows in the path of luxury.

1. consiliis adsumpta: appropriated for. It is self-evident that the winter saw only the beginning of the projects. Years would be required for their fruition.

2. dispersi: so in Germania 16 isolation of residence is quoted as an attribute of barbarism. The Roman was accustomed to connected blocks of dwellings {vici) in fortified towns.

3. privatim: unofficially, i.e. by personal encouragement of individuals.

4. publice: officially, i.e. by grants of money from the public treasury. — templa fora domos: partly as a result of formal exca- vation, partly in the process of modern building construction, there have come to light extensive remains of Roman architecture in many places in England, such as Silchester, Caerwent, Wroxeter, Lincoln, Chester, Bath, and York. The temples and fora repro- duce the ordinary plans found elsewhere in Roman Europe. Remains of villas (domos) are numerous in southern and western England; fourteen have been found near Bath alone. These show some deviations from the usual type, the modification being due to local conditions. See H. M. Scarth, Roman Britain, chapters 11, 15, 16; Samuel Swett Green, Some of the Roman Remains in England. Worcester, Mass., 1907.

6. pro necessitate erat: took the place of compulsion.

7. erudite: caused to be instructed. — ingenia . . . anteferre: he gave the intellectual possibilities of the Britons preeminence over the (actual) attainments of the Gauls. The thought is that, given the same opportunities, future British achievements in literature would outrank the present achievements of the Gauls. Agricola had an ax to grind, so that his expressed opinion should not be taken as his personal conviction.

9. eloquentiam concupiscerent: at the end of the first quarter of the second century a.d., Juvenal the satirist could say "even Thule speaks of hiring a professor of oratory." If we may judge from inscriptions incised on bricks and tiles (graffi,ti), by the third or fourth century Latin was used freely in everyday life by artisans

Chaps. 21, 22.] NOTES 71

and servants in the towns. Romanization could not have been so thorough in the country districts. See F. Haverfield, The Romanization of Britain; published also in the Proceedings of the British Academy for 1905-1906, pp. 185 ff. A lively picture of life in Roman Britain will be found in Edwin Arnold's novel, Phra, the Phoenician.

10. habitus nostri: predicate genitive; our costume came to he esteemed. The bracae, or pantaloons, were the distinctive national costume of the Brythonic Celts.

11. discessum: they departed from their erstwhile purity and simplicity of life. — delenimenta vitiorum: the charms of loose living.

12. balinea: extensive remains of Roman baths have been found at Silchester, Wroxeter, and Bath.

13. humanitas: civilization, as in Caesar, B.G. 1. 1. 3.

Chapter 22.

In the campaign of the third year, Agricola pushes beyond the erstwhile limits of Roman conquest and overawes the foe; he secures his conquered territory by fortresses; Agricola never appropriated the glory which another had earned; he had no patience with wrong-doers, but he never nursed a grudge.

1. Tertius annus: 80 a.d. Titus, elder son of Vespasian, was now emperor. On the personification in annus, see note on chapter 7. 1.

2. Tanaum: an unidentified tidal bay, erroneously supposed by Mommsen, Roman Provinces, vol. 1, p. 199, to be the Frith of Tay. Agricola had not yet advanced beyond the Forth.

5. adnotabant: called attention to the fact.

6. periti: experts.

8. pactione ac fuga: retreat as a result of negotiations; hence, capitulation.

9. crebrae eruptiones; nam . . . firmabantur: nam, as is fre- quently the case in Latin of all periods, gives a reason for a fact implied, but not expressed. Here nam introduces an explanation of the freedom of action presupposed in crebrae eruptiones. They were able to take the offensive without even thinking of the pos- sibility of blockade, for provisions were plenty.

10. intrepida: free from alarms.

11. irritis: used by Tacitus of persons as well as of things.

72 NOTES [Chaps. 22, 23.

15. praefectus: the title either of a commander of a cohort of allied infantry or of an ala of cavalry ; here probably the latter meaning is intended in order that each branch of the service may be included in the remark.

16. testem habebat: mentioned elsewhere as a mark of a great general. In Livy, 21. 43. 17, Hannibal boasts to his army that he is virtutis spectator ac testis ; Pliny, Panegyric, 15, eulogizes Trajan as et laudator et testis of the gallantry of the individual soldier.

17. ut . . . ita: while . . . yet. This is the only passage which contains even a slight criticism of Agricola's character. The censure is so tempered that it almost amounts to praise.

18. nihil supererat secretiun: it is possibly intended that the reader should contrast Domitian's fondness for harboring resent- ment. Cf. chapters 39. 12; 42. 15.

19. timeres: potential. Cf. internoscas, chapter 12. 12.

Chapter 23.

In the fourth campaign a line of fortifications is extended be- tween the Clyde and the Forth.

1. Quarta aestas: 81 a.d. In this year Titus was succeeded by Domitian. — obtinendis: the dative of the gerund and gerundive is used by Livy and Tacitus with adjectives and verbs with a free- dom unmatched by Cicero and Caesar.

2. pateretiir: the imperfect denotes that expansion was a standing feature of Roman procedure. Render : if such were the practice approved by, etc.

3. inventus: supply erat, not esset. The indicative expresses actuality, the terminus being a natural boundary. — ipsa Britannia: i.e. citra Caledoniam.

4. diversi maris aestibus: by the tides of two opposite seas, the North and the Irish. On the notion of the tide carrying the ocean inland, cf. chapter 10.

5. angusto terrarum spatio: the distance is about thirty-seven English miles.

6. praesidiis: a line of castella was run across by Agricola. About 140 A.D., during the reign of Antoninus Pius, these fortresses were connected by an earthen rampart and a ditch; thereby was formed the famous Wall of Antoninus. At Bar Hill near Kir-

Chaps. 23, 24,] NOTES 73

kintilloch in Dumbartonshire excavations carried on during the years 1902-1905 brought to light within one of the fortifications of Antoninus the remains of an older stronghold which doubtless emanates from the intrenchments of Agricola. propior sinus: tract of land lying on our side. Sinus passes from its meaning of gulf to that of a body of land indented by or projecting into the water. The locality here referred to is that part of Scotland which lies between the Friths of Forth and Clyde on the north, the Solway and the Tweed on the south.

7. in aliam insulam: the enemy was shut off as effectually from the conquered territory as if England and southern Scotland had been entirely separated by water from the country north of the Clyde and the Forth.

Chapter 24.

Agricola extends his conquests to the north; he takes steps with a view to a future invasion of Ireland, an operation which he re- gards as expedient and easy of accomplishment; natural features of Ireland.

1. Quinto . . . anno: 82 a.d. — nave prima transgressus: the meaning of these words has been much disputed. In the want of a certain explanation we may take prima as equal to primum. Thus Vergil says of the first steps of a child, Aeneid, 11. 573, "she planted footprints with her first feet," primis plantis. Translate: taking ship, he crossed for the first time. Hitherto Agricola had not passed the natural boundary referred to in chapter 23. In the next chapter we learn why he employed his fleet instead of pro- ceeding by land.

3. quae Hiberniam aspicit: which faces Ireland.

4. in spem magis quam ob formidinem: his aim in establishing garrisons here was not, as had previously been the case in locating castella, to secure his conquests from attack.

6. si quidem: inasmuch as.

7. magnis in vicem usibus: with great profit to all concerned. Tacitus is thinking especially of commercial advantages.

8. miscuerit: future perfect.

9. caelum: climate.

10. a Britannia: with Latin brevity for "those of Britain." Cf. chapter 12. 10, note.

74 NOTES [Chaps. 24, 26.

11. nee in melius: i.e. the slight diflFerences which do exist are not in favor of Ireland. The text is uncertain here. — per com- mercia et negotiatores: the Roman trader had doubtless "pre- ceded the flag" to Ireland as he frequently did elsewhere, e.g. over the Alps. Cf. Caesar, B. G. 3. 1. 2. Caesar's preliminary knowledge of Britain was derived from merchants. Cf. B. G. 4. 20. 4.

14. in occasionem: he would use the prince not only as an in- formant in case the invasion should actually be carried out, but as a means of acquiring a foothold for Rome in the manner already mentioned in the note on chapter 14. 8. — ex eo: Agricola. Vari- ous data for the treatise were doubtless acquired by Tacitus from his father-in-law. Agricola, however, is alluded to directly as a source of information in only two passages besides the present context, chapters 4. 15 and 44. 17.

17. si . . . arma: supply essent in consonance with the usage noted on chapter 6. 9. — velut e conspectu: in chapter 30. 11, the Scottish chieftain regards the fact that the Caledonians' eyes have never been defiled by the sight of enslaved nations as a point in favor of victory.

Chapter 25.

In the sixth campaign army and fleet cooperate in a hostile demonstration along the eastern coast of Scotland; the Cale- donians, in several divisions, begin offensive operations.

1. ceterum: used to denote a return to the narrative proper after the digression, precisely as in chapter 11.1. — sexttim officii annum: 83 a.d.

2. amplezus: animo is understood; conceived a purpose to invade. In chapter 17. 7, the word is used of hostile operations actually performed. — trans Bodotriam: the campaign was trans- ferred from the west to the east.

3. infesta hostilis exercitus itinera: hostilis exercUus refers to the Romans. Translate : marches by land which are fraught with peril for an attacking army. Thus the Britons harassed Caesar by ambuscades and surprises. Cf. B. G. 5. 15 ff.

5. primum adsumpta in partem viritun: a Roman army could not have maintained itself in Britain without the support of a

Chap. 25] NOTES 75

fleet, and, as a matter of fact, a fleet had been stationed there many years before Agricola's coming. Tacitus means that hereto- fore the fleet had not been utilized in conjunction with the army in offensive warfare.

6. egregia specie: with impressive effect. — belliun impellere- tur : a more graphic helium inferri ; hostilities were pushed forward.

7. pedes equesque: closely joined as together constituting the land forces.

8. mixti copiis et laetitia: pooling rations and merrymakings; in other words they messed together and made merry. Such combinations of the abstract and concrete illustrate the taste of Tacitus for the unusual in expression. Cf. Introduction, p. xxiii. Similar turns are used both in English and in Latin for comic effect. Thus Catullus says he was " cured of a cold by rest and nettles." Cf. Irving, Knickerbocker's History of New York, Book VI, chapter VIII: "Brimful of wrath and cabbage." Lewis Carroll, Hunting of the Snark: "pursued him with forks and hope."

9. attollerent: vaunt. — profunda: /asfnesses where the enemy might lurk in ambuscade. This bit of genre description well illustrates Tacitus's insight into human nature. He is particu- larly sympathetic in his portrayal of features of military life and character.

11. victus: to be joined also with terra and hostis. Render by a substantive.

12. Britannos: Tacitus uses the word in a broad sense to include the Caledonians. — quoque . . . obstupefaciebat: obstupefaciebat overstates the effect on the Romans, to whom the progress of the fleet was a source of exultation, not of awe. Quoque signifies that the Britons, as the Romans, were affected, although with different emotions.

13. tamquam: the thought of the Britons. — aperto . . . clauderetur: imitate in English the oxymoron, i.e. the verbal play involved in the connection of contradictory terms.

14. ad manus et arma: to armed conflict, the second word de- fining the first.

16. utimos est deignotis: on the principle that —

76 NOTES [Chaps. 25, 26.

" Rumour doth double, like the voice and echo, The numbers of the feared." — Henry IV, Part II, Act III, Sc. 1.

The sentiment is repeated in chapter 30. 14.

17. ultro: they took the initiative in assuming the offensive; uUro possesses the underlying meaning of that which is beyond what one would naturally expect. — adorti: here, having ventured; more frequent in the sense of attack.

19. quam pellerentur: the subjunctive to denote an act which is anticipated and deprecated. H.B. 507. 4. d. Quam ut is another possible expression.

21. superante numero at peritia locorum: super ante goes with both nouns, because of the superiority of the enemy in number and in acquaintance with the country.

Chapter 26.

The enemy in full force fall on the Ninth Legion by night; Agricola hastens to the rescue and the foe is repulsed.

1. universi: having combined the several columns mentioned above.

2. nonam legionem . . . invalidam: this peculiarly ill-starred legion had been well-nigh annihilated in 61 in the uprising headed by Boudicca, but the losses then incurred had been made good by new levies from Germany. The weakness referred to may have been due to subsequent misfortunes or may have been caused by the detachment of some of its cohorts for duty in Germany.

3. inter somnum ac trepidationem: join with irrupere.

6. iter . . . edoctus: the accusative of the thing is retained in the passive.

7. adsultare tergis: graphic expression for a rear attack. Taci- tus's liking for novel expressions is especially apparent in military and technical parlance.

8. clamorem: to alarm the Britons and to apprise the besieged of the arrival of relief . — signa: the eagles of the legions; the heavy- armed infantry had proceeded more slowly to the scene of action.

9. territi . . . redit . . . certabant: a noteworthy shift in tenses; such changes are, however, possible in vivid description,

Chaps. 26-28.] NOTES 77

such as the present context. There is a very similar tense series in Livy's word picture of Trasimene, 22. 6. 1-2.

10. pro: = de. — certabant: they began to fight. — ultro: cf. chapter 25. 17.

12. utroque exercitu: each division of the Roman army. Exer- citus is often used of a single legion. 14. quod nisi: as in chapter 16. 6.

Chapter 27.

Emboldened by this success, the army clamors for more fields to conquer; the Britons, undaunted, retain their belligerent attitude.

1. fama: the prestige consequent on the victory. — ferox: emboldened.

4. fremebant: they kept vociferously asserting. The plural verb is common in Livy and Tacitus with many collective nouns. — illi mode cauti: the ignavi specie prudentium of chapter 25. 19.

6. condicio: terms.

8. occasione et arte: a lucky chance and the address of the leader, in making the most of the opportunity.

9. quominus: but. Cf. on chapter 20. 7.

11. conspirationem: covenant.

Chapter 28.

The desertion of a cohort of the Usipi ; they sail around the coast of Britain, and make good their escape to the Continent.

1. eadem aestate: 83 a. d. This episode of the Usipi is a digres- sion pure and simple, introduced for its intrinsic interest. — cohors: a cohort of auxiliary troops numbered theoretically five hundred men {quingenaria) or one thousand (miliaria). These numbers were variable, as is the case with units of organization in modern armies. By far the greater number of cohorts known to us be- longed to the former class. — Usiporum : the Usipi, called also Usipetes, that tribe which Caesar foiled in their attempt to settle south of the Rhine. B.G. 4. 1-15. In the time of Tacitus they lived near the confluence of the Lippe and the Rhine,

3. militibus: experienced soldiers of the legion who were aligned with the recruits to instruct them in the drill and in the use of arms.

5. habebantur: were serving. — libumicas: the Liburnicae naves

78 NOTES [Chap. 28.

or Liburnae, light galleys fitted with two banks of oars; they were adopted by the Romans from the Illyrian pirates and rendered yeoman's service at Actium. Cf. Horace, Odes, 1. 37. 30. In imperial times the Lihurna was the favorite type of ship in the Roman fleets.

6. uno regente remigantes: a con]ecture for the Mss. reading uno remigante. We cannot tell surely what Tacitus wrote. Trans- late: rowing under the guidance of one steersman.

7. suspectis: they were doubtless suspected of intentions to escape or to steer the vessels to some Roman port so that the deserters might be recaptured.

8. ut miraculum: people on the coast who had not heard of the mutiny were unable to account for the presence of the ships in those waters.

9. utilia: necessaries of life.

11. ad extremum: finally. — inopiae: partitive genitive.

12. vescerentur: Tacitus also uses fungor and potior with the accusative. This construction, which was characteristic of early Re- publican Latin, was rehabilitated by the prose writers of the Empire.

13. circumvecti: their point of departure was on the western coast. They may have been quartered with the troops which Agricola had massed as a preliminary to the invasion of Ireland. Although Tacitus does not tell us whether they sailed north or south, the former conclusion is more tenable. The survivors reached the western bank of the Rhine (line 16, in nostram . . . ripam) at the end of their wanderings, a fact which indicates that they came from the north. Also we are told elsewhere that Agricola took the hint of the insular character of Britain from their voyage. Vessels of the Roman fleet must have sailed around southern England long before. Indeed these very Liburnae must have performed the voyage unless we suppose that they were built on the western coast — an unlikely surmise. The adjectives mag- num ac memorabile also accord better with the supposition of a northern route. — per inscitiam regendi: at the most they had but one pilot for the three ships, and he may not have been familiar with the German coast. Or possibly he had not survived the various perils of the voyage.

14. a Suebis: literally, wanderers, a generic name applied by

Chaps. 28, 20.] NOTES 79

Tacitus to many different tribes inhabiting the greater part of Germany. The reference here is to some stock settled in north- western Germany near the mouth of the Elbe.

15. mox a Frisiis: those who escaped the Suebi fell foul of the Frisians, who lived on the coast between the Rhine and the Ems.

16. in nostram usque ripam: the Gallic bank. — mutatione ementium: by passing through the hands of different purchasers.

17. indicium: recital. — inlustravit: made famous ; fuere quos is followed by the indicative because Tacitus had several definite survivors in mind.

Chapter 29.

Death of Agricola's infant son; he bears his affliction with becom- ing moderation; he advances against the enemy who have mus- tered in force at the Graupian Mountains under the leadership of Calgacus.

I. initio aestatis: 84 a.d. — ictus: supply est.

3. ambitiose: with an eye to effect. Fortium is not ironical, but is meant in good faith. Just as good men are not indifferent to fame (cf. chapter 9. 15), so they might not be blind to the fact that self-control in time of affliction excites admiration; desire to win praise for a show of fortitude might well govern their behavior to some extent. — rursus: on the other hand.

6. incertum: perplexing, because they did not know where the enemy would strike next.

7. longa pace exploratos: these would be the inhabitants of southern England. By a rule of procedure ordinarily observed by the Romans, recruits of one province were sent to another to serve. Thus German troops were largely used in Britain.

8. Graupium: the locality is not elsewhere mentioned and can- not be identified. We know only that it was somewhere north of the Clyde-Forth lines.

10. pugnae prioris: the night attack described in chapter 26.

II. exspectantes: prepared for.

12. Concordia propulsandum: a departure from their usual policy. Cf. chapter 12. 6.

14. triginta milia: a more conservative estimate of a barbarian army than one usually finds in the Roman historians. Before the

80 NOTES [Chaps. 29, 30.

battle the strength of the enemy was somewhat increased. — adhuc: and still.

15. cruda ac viridis senectus: a reminiscence of Vergil, Aeneid, 6. 304 : cruda deo viridisque senectus. On Tacitus's admiration of Vergil, cf. Introduction, p. xxiv.

16. decora: insignia of valor.

19. in hunc modum locutus fertur: Tacitus frankly disclaims authenticity for the following speech, although there was no danger that his readers might be misled as to its fictitious character. The student will recall in this context the speeches of Scipio and Hanni- bal before the battle of the Ticinus. Livy, 21. 40-44.

Chapter 30.

" ' Now's the day and now's the hour; ' battle is our only recourse; we must conquer or die, for we have no place of refuge or hope of mercy."

1. causas belli: the oppressions and outrages to which we are subjected. — necessitatem nostram: the exigencies of our situation. These points are developed in inverse order. The speaker deals with their necessitas in this chapter and takes up the causae belli in chapter 31.

2. hodiernum diem: this selfsame day. The speaker chooses a more emphatic expression than hunc diem. The French aujourd'hui is derived from a similar redundancy — hodie + di{em).

4. universi colitis: you dwell as a people. The chapter contains two reasons for confidence in success: (1) Owing to their situation, they have not been demoralized by the sight of servitude; (2) lack of refuge forces them to fight. — nullae ultra terrae: supply sunt.

6. securiun: in the sense of tutum, the ordinary meaning of the English derivative.

7. priores pugnae: personification. It was actually the British combatants who cherished the hope of assistance.

10. nobilissimi: a natural boast in the mouth of a savage chief- tain. — eoque: because of their high lineage they are conceived of as having been placed to dwell in a territorial "holy of holies."

11. litora aspicientes: the sight of subjection begets servility, just as in chapter 24. 17 it is assumed that the sight of free peoples elsewhere arouses desire for liberty.

^ Chaps. 30, 31.] NOTES ^ '^>'»^^2i^^^ftH ^

12. quoque: much less had they personally experienced slavery. \

14. sinus famae: a perplexing expression, but probably a me ta- I

phor suggested by sinus in its meaning of the fold of a garment. '

The Caledonians were, so to speak, "pocketed" apart from pub- licity; the outside world knew little about them and hence stood in awe of them. Translate: our isolation and the 'privacy which cloaks our name. — omne ignotum pro magnifico: the same senti- ment as in chapter 25. 16.

16. infestiores Romani: i.e. than the rocks; a kindred senti- i

ment, though with different simile, in Goldsmith's lines from The Deserted Village: —

" Where crouching tigers wait their hapless prey And savage men more murderous still than they."

19. mare scrutantur: rhetorical exaggeration of the operations of the fleet.

20. ambitiosi: lustful for glory. I

22. auferre: pillage of property. j

23. rapere: executed on men and property. Cf. Burns's lines • in Caledonia : — _^^^

"Their pounces were murder and terror their cry; They'd conquered and ruined a world beside."

ubi solitudinem faciimt, pacem appellant: recall Caesar's favorite euphemism Gallia pacata. This sentence of Tacitus is one of the most famous utterances in Latin literature. Byron renders it as follows: —

" Mark, where his carnage and his conquests cease He makes a solitude and calls it peace."

— Bride of Abydos, Canto 11, Stanza 20.

Chapter 31.

" Our persons and our property are the spoils of our conquerors ; we are slaves who buy the privilege of serving and supporting masters who are indifferent to our existence; courage, ye Scots 1 what the Brigantes so nearly accomplished, we can do."

82 NOTES [Chap. 31.

2. voluit: ha^ ordained. — alibi servituri: cf. note on chapter 29. 7. Calgacus has in mind the usual procedure of the Romans, hence makes no exception of the fact that trusted Britons were serving with Agricola. Cf. chapter 32. 6. British recruits are on record as having served in Algeria, Pannonia, Dacia, and Italy.

6. annus: in the sense of annona, the annual yield of the fields.

6. silvis . . . emimiendis: in building roads through forests. The usual idiom for making a road is viam munire.

7. inter: midst; descriptive of external conditions. — conterun- tur: means both expended and worn out, hence may be appropri- ately joined to all three nominative couplets.

8. ultro: to boot.

10. emit: by paying tribute. — pascit: by suppljdng the Romans with grain. — familia: a household establishment.

11. etiam conservis: to say nothing of their masters.

12. viles: their worthlessness is explained by the following sentence. — in excidium petimur: the comparison is heightened unexpectedly. The Britons have not simply to fear the mockery visited upon new members of the slave household, but they are regarded as so worthless that their owners would rather kill than support them.

13. arva aut metalla: here the allusion is simply to the Cale- donians. Throughout the speech it will be noticed that the con- ditions true of the conquered Britons are sometimes extended also to the Caledonians; elsewhere, as here, the Caledonians are distinguished from the general lot.

15. ferocia: do not use the English derivative.

18. quibus . . . quibus: the effect of the appeal is heightened by the anaphora.

19. Brigantes: the Brigantes are not specifically mentioned else- where as participants in the revolt of Boudicca. However, we are told that besides her chief supporters, the Iceni and the Trino- bantes, other tribes yet unsubjugated flocked to her standard. The Brigantes are cited by Calgacus because they were near neighbors to the Caledonians, and hence furnished a conspicuous example.

21. potuere: governs the three infinitives. With the last there is an ellipsis of an apodosis et exuisserU: They were able to throw off the yoke and toovld have done so if.

Chaps. 31, 32.] NOTES 83

22. non in paenitentiam arma laturi: soon to close in conflict . . . not with the thought of a (future) change of heart. They were so to acquit themselves that they would have no reason to regret their action.

Chapter 32.

"The previous successes of the Romans have been due to our dissensions. Their army will disintegrate at the first blow. Everything favors our victory; afterwards we have nothing to fear. It is yours to choose between vengeance and death. "

2. dissensionibus: Tacitus utilizes rhetorically the criticism expressed in chapter 12. 5-6.

5. nisi si: ironical; equals nisi forte.

6. Gallos et Germanos: in Histories 4. 17, Tacitus makes a rebel chieftain say: "It is by the blood of the provinces that the provinces are conquered."

7. licet: concessive. — commodent: put at the service of.

9. infinna: a sarcastic understatement ; metu^ ac terror do not cement aflfection at all.

10. qtii timere desierint, odisse incipient: a variation from a common proverb of the Romans : quern metuunt, odere. Cf . Shake- speare, Antony and Cleopatra, Act I, Sc. 3: "In time we hate that which we often fear."

12. nullae . . . coniuges accendunt: cf. Caesar's (B. G. 1. 51. 3) description of the behavior of the German women: in proelium proficiscentes passis manibus flentes implorabant ne se in servitutem Romanis traderent; also Germania, chapter 7.

13. nulla . . . patria: they were soldiers of fortune.

14. alia: true of the cohorts of auxiliaries, such as the Batavi and the Tungri. The soldiers of the legions were actually re- cruited at this time from all corners of the Roman world.

17. vanus aspectus: the empty show.

18. quod: the antecedent is the combined idea of externality.

19. nostras manus: the sympathizers who will become coad- jutors.

21. tarn quam: in the same way as.

23. coloniae: probably as before, chapter 5. 11, a rhetorical generality, since it cannot be shown that any other colony than

84 NOTES [Chaps. 32, 33.

Camulodunum was in existence at this time. Lindum (Lincoln) may have been founded in the Flavian period.

24. aegra: disordered; in this metaphorical sense frequently applied to the " body politic." Cf . Livy's description of the condi- tion of Rome after the battle of Trasimene, aegra et adfecta civitas, 22. 8. 4. — municipia: there is only one town known to have had this political status at this time, VenUamium, now St. Albans. Explain the plural as above.

26. metalla: they would be transported to work the mines in England or elsewhere.

27. proinde: marking the climax of the appeal as is often the case in speeches. Cf. Livy, 21. 18. 12; 21. 30. 11.

Chapter 33.

The effect of the speech of Calgacus; Agricola on his side exhorts his men: "For six years we have been associated as general and army to our mutual satisfaction; you have been longing for a chance at the foe; now he is before you; there is no safety in retreat; victory is our only hope."

1. alacres: enthusiastically; a standing description for the effect of a general's exhortation. Cf. chapter 35. 2. Caesar, B. G. 1. 41. 1, before the battle with Ariovistus, hoc oratione habita . . . summa alacritas innata est. — ut barbaris moris: equals mos est. The clause limits the following words. — fremitu . . . clamoribus dissonis: a typical Roman description of the noisy onset of barbarians. Cf. Livy, 21. 28. 1 : Galli occursant in ripa cum variis ululatibus cantuque moris sui.

2. agmina: marching hands. The Caledonians did not preserve formal alignment, i.e. odes, as did the Romans. A similar con- trast in Livy, 21. 57. 12: magis agmina quam acies . . . con- currerunt.

3. audentissimi cuiusque procursu: as the most daring leapt ahead of the lines.

6. eidhuc: further. — ita disseniit: Tacitus might have obtained

a report of what was actually sfMjken on this occasion. Such,

however, was not the practice of the rhetorical historians. The

speech reveals the conventional features of its kind. — septimus:

" Roman computation included the year reckoned to. — 6. commili-

Chap. 33.] NOTES 85

tones: comrades; an intimate mode of salutation affected by Julius Caesar in addresses to his army. We are told that for the sake of discipline Augustus restored to currency the more distant term milites. Soldier-emperors, such as Galba and Trajan, revived the conciliatory commilitones.

7. auspiciis imperii Romani: under the direction of the Imperial Government of Rome; a more general way of saying, under the direction of Roman emperors. Agricola's tenure of the command of Britain extended from the reign of Vespasian through the reign of Titus and into the reign of Domitian.

8. fide: at first thought a word used more fittingly to describe the attitude of the army. Here it has the meaning of protection or guardian care exercised by a commander. In a senatorial decree which has been preserved in the works of Macrobius, a grammarian of the fifth century a.d., the legions are said to have followed auspicia ac fidem of Augustus. Saturnalia, 1. 12. 35.

10. ipsam rerum naturam: creation itself. Recall the tempes- tates, chapter 22 ; other obstacles to the advance are mentioned in the present chapter.

13. non fama nee nimore: our occupation is not a matter of reputed achievement or vagu^ report.

14. inventa: disclosed to view.

18. adimus: come at, them. Adimus is a conjecture for the meaningless animus of the Mss. The present is used vividly for the future, as is often the case in English. In Latin this usage is very frequent in questions and in colloquial sp)eech generally. Tacitus thus makes the soldiers speak in a fashion grammatically true to life. — vota virtusque in aperto: prayers and prowess have free play. The meaning, expressed with Tacitean brevity, is that their wishes are now realized and they have a chance to display their valor in a pitched battle.

20. superasse: subject of est understood.

21 . in f rontem : when the foe is ahead, contrasting with fugientibus. 23. neque . . . eadem notitia: the point of Calgacus that the

Romans' ignorance of the country puts them at a disadvantage is thus admitted. Cf. chapter 32. 14.

26. decretum est: it is my long-standing conviction. On the sen- timent, cf. Horace, Odes, 3. 2. 14 ff. : —

86 NOTES [Chaps. 33, 34.

"And death the coward slaves that fly Pursues with steps as fleet, Nor spares the loins and backs of those Unwarlike youths who shun their foes."

— (Sir Theodore Martin's translation.)

26. proinde: cf. note on chapter 32. 24. Logically the word introduces incolumitas . . . sunt ; the sentence honesta . . . potior being in thought equivalent to a causal clause, explaining decus.

28. in ipso terrarum ac naturae fine: at the very limit of the land, yes, of the world. The end of the land is thought of as mark- ing the " jumping-off place" of the earth.

Chapter 34.

" This is no new enemy; you have conquered him before. These are the cowards 'who ran away and lived to fight another day.' Fear has glued them to their tracks. Up and at them ! "

1. si novae gentes: this vein of exhortation is typical of speeches of this kind. Caesar, B. G. 1. 40. 5 and Scipio, Livy, 21« 41. 6, each reminds his soldiers that Romans have vanquished before Germans and Carthaginians respectively. Thus Octavius spoke to his sol- diers about Antony before Actium. Butler, Hudibraa, Part I, Canto 3, humorously burlesques the motive : —

"This is the same numeric crew Which we so lately did subdue. The selfsame individuals that Did run as mice do from a cat."

4. legionem: the Ninth. Cf. chapter 26. — furto noctis: by stealth at night. The development of furtum from its original meaning of theft into that of a clandestine act or a trick is neatly paralleled by our stealth, originally signifying theft.

5. clamore: hy a mere shout. — ceteronim: a Latin imitation of a common Greek construction which is found from Homer down and is a blending of a superlative followed by a genitive

Chaps. 34, 35.] NOTES 87

of the whole (omnium or wdtn-uv) and a comparative followed by an ablative (ceteris) or a genitive (iWuv).

7. penetrantibus: a concise ablative absolute. As agmen following shows, Tacitus had in mind actual experiences of the advance, not a general case of hunters entering a forest ; hence, supply nobis. — mere: charged against ; prohahly a perfect indica- tive. Some prefer to explain it as an historical infinitive.

10. numerus: in a depreciatory sense, pack, crew.

11. novissimae res: desperate straits.

12. corpora defixere: have planted their bodies fast. Corpora, instead of eos, heightens the contemptuous force of the remark. In their minds they would fain be elsewhere, but they are too dazed by fear to set their limbs in motion.

14. ederetis: read a final sense into the subjunctive.

15. quinquaginta: with a note of exaggeration for rhetorical effect. Actually Roman domination had extended over forty-two years.

16. moras belli aut causas rebellandi: if the army acquits itself with honor, it will be evident that the blame for the delay in paci- fication rests upon those in authority. In Livy, 3. 61. 2, a consxil says to his soldiers, ostenderent prioribus proeliis per duces, non per milites, stetisse ne vincerent.

Chapter 35.

Agricola's speech is received with enthusiasm; alignment of the Roman army; Agricola takes command in person.

1. adhuc: equals etiam nunc.

2. alacritas: cf. note on chapter 33. 1.

5. firmarent: formed a strong, etc. Cf. chapter 14. 13. — adfunderentur: the word is used metaphorically to express the dispatch with which the cavalry was moved into position. Translate: were thrown into position on.

6. legiones: Agricola had with him three legions, and possibly four. In either case, however, they were not present in full strength, since contingents must have been left in England to guard the camps. A conservative estimate would allow him 15,000 legionaries and a total army of about 28,000. — pro: in front of. — victoriae: dative; in case of victory. — decus: in apposition

88 NOTES [Chaps. 35, 36.

with the whole idea of the preceding sentence; an arrangement which would secure him the honor.

7. citra: cf. chapter 1. 12. — Romaniun: of Roman citizens, since the legionaries were Romans in a political sense merely. — bellandi: explanatory genitive, telling in what the glory consists.

10. conezi: in solid ranks. — velut insurgerent: because of the close formation the rising ground on which the enemy stood was invisible, so that it seemed to the Romans as if they were con- fronted by a hill of men. Translate: the rest . . . towered on high as it were.

11. media campi: the space between the two armies. — covinnarius eques: the chariot corps; Caesar's essedarii.

13. diductis ordinibus: deploying his ranks.

15. promptior in spem: more sanguine than his advisers.

16. ante vexilla: the standards of the auxiliary troops. Cf. Agricola's procedure in chapter 18. 14,

Chapter 36.

The Britons stand their ground under a galling fire; preceded by six cohorts, the Romans rush to close quarters ; the Roman cavalry precipitates itself into the conflict to the confusion of both friends and foes.

2. arte: the skill with which they rendered the missiles inefifec- tive. — ingentibus gladiis et brevibus caetris: so in comparatively modern times the large claymore and the small round target were the national weapons of the Highland Scotchman.

3. excutere: parry. The infinitives are arranged chiastically with reference to the preceding ablatives.

5. Batavorum: the Batavians were a German tribe who dwelt on the island of the Lower Rhine and in the adjacent regions. Troops of this nationality played an important part in the Roman army from the campaigns of Germanicus on. They were particu- larly noted for their skill in swimming. Cf. note on chapter 18. 22. — Tungrorum: this people crossed the Rhine and settled in what is now Belgium, near Lifege.

7. vetustate militiae: by long service in warfare. — exercitatum: had been rendered adept. The usual construction with exercitari requires a subject denoting the person trained.

Chaps. 36, 37.] NOTES 89

8. hostibus inhabile: the short Roman gladius was adapted to the thrust; hence, the legionary shone at close quarters.

9. sine mucrone: an attributive phrase.

11. miscere: the idea is of blows inflicted in such rapid succes- sion that the intervals between them were scarcely perceptible. Cf . Vergil, Aeneid, 5. 459 : densis ictibus . . . pulsat. — ferire umbonibus: at close quarters the shield was sometimes utilized both by the Greeks and the Romans as a weapon of offense. Cf. Livy, 5. 47. 4; 8. 38. 11; Tacitus, Annals, 4. 51; 14. 36; Xeno- phon, Cyropaedia, 7. 1. 33.

12. erigere . . . aciem: cf. chapter 18. 15.

16. interim: the narrative turns to the cavalry who had en- gaged the chariot corps apparently while the fight between the opposing bodies of infantry was in progress. It is difficult to see how the infantry could have closed until after the chariots had been dislodged from the middle of the field. Tacitus does not concern himself with this detail.

17. at: and yet; cf. note on chapter 3. 1. — recentem: from the point of view of the Britons, hard pressed by the Roman foot.

20. ea pugnae facies: cavalry require space and a level country for effective maneuvers. Conditions at this juncture of the combat did not meet either of these demands. — aegre clivo in- stantes: the text at this point is so mutilated that we can only guess what Tacitus really wrote. For the subject of impellerentur supply, as a makeshift, nostri.

22. sine rectoribus equi: riderless horses; a final touch to the portrayal of the difficulties attending the Roman advance.

23. transversos aut obvios: supply Romanos. The frightened animals ran either across the line of the advance or straight toward it.

Chapter 37.

The British reserves attempt a flank movement, but are put to flight by a counter attack of cavalry; the rout becomes general; the Britons make a stand in the woods, but are speedily dislodged; they flee in utter demoralization; the loss on each side.

2. vacui: standing at ease.

4. ni: supply an apodosis from circumire.

90 NOTES [Chaps. 37, 38.

6. subita belli: the emergencies of conflict.

10. spectaculum: thefollowing word picture falls into two parts; (1) The rout on the battlefield; (2) the pursuit in the woods,

11. eosdem: the disabled captives. 13. praestare: = praebere.

16. victis: those who had fled with their arms (catervae armor torum) when in the open, made a stand in the shelter of the forest.

18. frequens ubique: cf. multus in agmine, chapter 20. 4.

19. indaginis mode: the hunters' cordon in which wild beasts were "rounded up."

20. rariores: the more open parts; balancing sicubi . . , erant.

21. persultare: to range; in this sense applicable both to horse and foot.

22. composites: supply Romanos.

24. rari: adversative asyndeton. Insert hut in translating.

26. nox et satietas: cf. on chapter 25. 8. — decern milia . . . trecenti sezaginta: the great disparity is probably due to the fact that the number of Roman slain rested on official reports, that of the enemy largely on a rough estimate.

27. quis: an archaic form for quibus.

Chapter 38.

The night after the battle; sceneson the day following; Agricola withdraws to the country of the Boresti; he sends the fleet on a voyage of exploration.

2. palantes: in straggling bands.

6. consilia aliqua: tentative plans, adopted only to be aban- doned for others.

6. pignorum: loved ones, a poetic term applied especially to children.

7. saevisse: cf. chapter 2. 4.

8. tamquam miser erentur: in the thought that they were shounng them compassion.

9. vastum ubique silentiiun: a dreary and all-pervasive silence.

10. secreti: this word, which regularly means remote, here passes into the meaning of lonely, deserted by man, loneliness being a natural accompaniment of seclusion.

13. et . . . spargi bellum nequibat: likewise operations could

Chaps. 38, 39.] NOTES 91

not be diffused through the country; an independent sentence ex- pressing an additional reason, as in chapter 10. 20: et hiems adpetebat.

14. Borestoruin: what we know of this tribe is confined to this reference. Evidently they were near the seacoast since Agricola was able to put himself in communication with the commander of the fleet.

16. circumvehi Britanniam: the expedition referred to in chapter 10, from which we learn that circumvehi refers not to the whole island, but only to the northern coast. The fleet doubled John o' Groat's and sailed far enough down the western coast to establish the insular character of Britain.

17. lento itinere: ablative of manner, somewhat loosely used with locavit. We should expect in hiberna reduxit or a kindred expression denoting motion toward.

19. secunda tempestate ac fama: a characteristic expression; secunda limits both nouns.

20. Trucculensem portum: somewhere on the eastern coast. — unde: to be connected only with praelecto ; from which (setting sail) it coasted along, etc. — proximo : the adjacent, supposedly the eastern coast.

21. redierat: the pluperfect with reference to tenuit; the fleet put into the harbor and thus had returned to its point of departure.

Chapter 39.

Domitian's jealousy is aroused by the news of Agricola's success ; however, for the time being, the emperor does not dare to display his hatred openly.

2. epistulis: used by Tacitus and his contemporaries of one missive, on the analogy of litterae. — auctum: modest reticence on the subject of his own achievements is a trait of Agricola which Tacitus never tires of mentioning. Cf. chapter 8. 9 ff.; chapter 18. 31 ff. — ut erat Domitianus: in translation make Domitianus subject of excepit.

4. falsiun . . . triumphimi: modern historical and topo- graphical research has shown that as a result of Domitian's campaign in Upper Germany, in 83-84, the Roman frontier was

92 NOTES [Chaps. 39, 40.

advanced considerably and a bulwark was erected against the for- midable Chatti. He laid himself open to popular criticism simply because he celebrated a triumph without having won a decisive victory in the field. Tacitus and other writers who belonged to the persecuted senatorial party have heaped ridicule upon Domi- tian's achievement somewhat unfairly.

5. crines in captivorum speciem: with reference to color and length. Cf. chapter 11. 4. We are told that the Germans them- selves sometimes intensified the natural hue of their hair by arti- ficial means.

8. id sibi: supply esse. — privati hominis: a subject. — supra principem: above that of the emperor.

9. studia fori: the activities of the forum, with especial reference to oratory. — civilium artium decus: the honorable pursuits of politi- cal life.

10. occuparet: the word has, as often, the sense of forestalling another in the possession of something. Agricola usurped the renown which Domitian felt was rightly his own.

11. dissimulari: one's eyes could be closed to.

12. imperatoriam: predicate.

13. secrete sue satiatus: having indulged himself to the full in his wonted privacy. Tacitus has given us in the Annals an unforget- table picture of Tiberius as a taciturn, distrustful man, given to secret broodings and gloomy imaginings. The same traits are bestowed upon Domitian.

15. impetus: the onward sweep.

16. nam . . . obtinebat: an explanation of Domitian's resolve to temporize. Agricola was master of Britain and, if balked in his ambitions, might follow in the footsteps of Vitellius and Vespasian, who had likewise held control of provinces, and try to make himself emperor.

Chapter 40.

Triumphal honors are decreed to Agricola; his recall; he is slighted by the emperor; his unostentatious deportment.

1. triumphalia omamenta: under the Empire the right to triumph came to be regarded as the prerogative of the emperor, as the supreme head of the army, or of a member of his family.

Chap. 40.] NOTES 93

Hence, it was usual to bestow on a victorious general, by way of a substitute, the right to the insignia of triumph, viz. the crown of laurel, the embroidered toga and tunic, and the curule chair. — inlustris statuae: a bronze statue of Agricola in triumphal garb, together with an inscription recounting his deeds and honors, was set up in one of the Fora. The erection of a statue of a private citizen, especially in his lifetime, was a privilege carefully restricted.

2. quidquid: whatever else; by a common idiom else is omitted in Latin. Cf. note on chapter 6. 17, ludos et inania honoris. The added honors would include a supplicatio because of the victory. — multo verborum honore: a decided tinge of irony.

3. cumulata: either heaped one on the other or simply crowned with. In the latter case honore is instrumental. — in senatu: the regular procedure; triumphal rights were decreed by the senate on recommendation of the emperor. — add! . . . opini- onem: a vague reference to higher honors in store for Agricola was doubtless embodied in the decree.

5. Atilii Rufi: the year of his consulship is unknown. He was governor of Pannonia in 80 a.d. — maioribus reservatam: kept for men of high position. On gradation in importance of posts, cf. note on chapter 9. 3. The governor of Syria had four legions under his command and had to deal with the always complex Eastern situation. The office was conferred on distinguished ex-consuls, at a considerable interval after the consulship.

6. ex secretioribus ministeriis: a member of one of the confidential bureaus. The influence wielded by freedmen in the households of various emperors and their frequent abuse of their power were among the social and political phenomena of the Empire. See Dill, Roman Society from Nero to Marcus Aurelius, Book I, chapter III. Domitian employed both freedmen and knights in minor functions.

7. codicillos: an imperial patent.

9. freto Oceani: the Channel. Agricola had been recalled by a previous order, a fact which Tacitus did not deem necessary to mention because the Roman reader would infer as much. A governor, unless he were in revolt, would not leave his province without the emperor's order.

11. ex ingenio: to suit the character,-

94 NOTES [Chaps. 40, 41.

12. successor!: his identity is uncertain. 14. celebritate: concourse.

16. brevi osculo: a careless kiss. Kissing was a common mode of friendly salutation amongst men in ancient Italy as it is nowa- days. It was also the usual form of ceremonial greeting bestowed by the emperor on senators and those high in his favor.

17. tiu-bae servientium inmiztus est: he was relegated to the ranks of the courtier throng.

18. grave inter otiosos: because jealousy would be aroused among civilians.

20. hausit: in the metaphorical sense of chapter 4. 17.

22. ambitionem: ostentatious display. — vise aspectoque: the former act may be due to chance; the latter word denotes a de- liberate survey.

23. interpretarentur : put the proper construction (on his conduct).

Chapter 41.

Agricola repeatedly becomes the object of accusation; defeats inflicted on Roman arms create a popular demand for his services as leader; the notoriety thus thrust upon him puts him in jeopardy.

1. per eos dies: after his return.

4. inimicorum genus, laudantes: thereby the jealousy of Domi- tian was increased.

7. Moesia Daciaque: in the years 86-88 a.d. Decebalus, king of the Dacians, inflicted severe defeats on the Roman armies and killed two Roman generals. He was finally conquered by Trajan. — Germania et Pannonla: Domitian attempted to chastise the Marcomanni for their refusal to support the cause of Rome against the Dacians. The Romans suffered a serious reverse, one legion being annihilated in Pannonia by the Sarmatians. — temeritate aut per ignaviam: note the variation in construction.

8. militares viri: a term u.sed frequently for men who are soldiers by profession and training. Here apparently the officers of the cohorts are referred to.

9. expugnati: here of those dislodged from a fortress. — de limite imperii: recent explorations along the line of the Roman frontier in Germany and Austria have revealed many interesting

Chaps. 41, 42.] NOTES 96

relics of the occupation, such as camps, fortresses, graves, weapons, and articles for household and personal use. The Austrian limes is at present being mapped out and various sites upon it exca- vated by the Royal Academy of Vienna.

11. continuarentur: followed in quick succession. — omnis annus: there was a series of defeats extending from 86 to 92, in- terrupted only by one victory won by Tettius Julianus over Dece- balus in 89.

12. funeribus: mortalities.

15. ceterorum: the other generals.

17. amore et fide . . . malignitate et livore: both pairs of ablatives may be explained as causal. Some were impelled by real loyalty to Domitian to urge him to stem the tide of disaster by putting Agricola in command. Others, out of envy of Agricola's renown, kept playing on the worst impulses of the emperor and arousing his resentment against the popular idol. " Invidia gloriae comes est."

18. ezstimulabant: kept goading on to open display of his hostility.

19. vitiis aliorum: i.e. malignitas et livor pessimorum. — in ipsam gloriam praeceps agebatur: some see in praeceps the notion of being hurried to destruction, glory being in Agricola's case an abyss. Praeceps connotes rather the blind haste with which Agricola was swept away in the stream of events. Translate: was rushed amain to the summit of glory.

Chapter 42.

Agricola becomes eligible for the proconsulate of Asia or Africa; he is intimidated into relinquishing his rights; his self-effacement assuages Domitian 's resentment; such a course is more laudable than futile opposition to a tj^ant; let his example be taken to heart 1

1. annus: conjecturally 89 or 90 a.d. — proconsulatum Africae et Asiae: in the regular annual assignment of senatorial provinces the high posts of Asia and Africa were reserved for the two senior ex-consuls. The choice was made by lot.

2. sortiretur: was due to draw lot for. — occiso Civica: C. Vet- tulenus Civica Cerealis, governor of Moesia in 82 a.d.; while he

{^^^ h^/tiyK^

96 NOTES [Chap. 42.

was holding oflBce as proconsul of Asia, he was executed by Domitian on a charge of treason.

3. exemplum: a precedent.

6. occultius: dissembling their motives.

6. in adprobanda excusatione: in justifying his withdrawal.

7. non iam obscuri: now in no equivocal fashion.

8. pertraxere: actual physical violence is not implied. — paratus simulatione: accoutered with hypocrisy.

9. compositus : assuming an air of.

11. beneficii invidia: Domitian permitted a piece of spite work to pass as an act of condescension. — salaritim: Augustus insti- tuted salaries for provincial governors according to rank and thereby abolished one of the chief causes of extortion. At the beginning of the third century a.d. a certain proconsul of Africa who did not assume oflBce received a stipend of 1,000,000 sesterces, or about $43,000.

13. ex conscientia : from a sense of guilt.

15. odisse quem laeseris: a sentiment often repeated in English literature, e.g. by Davenant in the following lines: —

" It is the wit, the policy of sin To hate those men we have abused."

Cf. Herbert, Jacvla Prudentum, "The offender never pardons," and Dryden, —

" Forgiveness to the injured does belong, But they ne'er pardon who have done the wrong."

— Conquest of Granada, Part II, Act I, Sc. 2.

16. vero: in fact; the principle of human conduct just enunci- ated holds good naturally of such a character as Domitian.

18. inani iactatione libertatis: Tacitus regarded the principate as a political necessity, hence had no sympathy with the idealists and the irreconcilables who wished to restore the republic.

19. famam fatxunque: the point is driven home by the allitera- tion, a distinction which spelled doom. — sciant: this ringing sen- tence is an attempt to justify in the face of possible criticism

Chaps. 42, 43.] NOTES 97

that passivity which was the political creed of Agricola and incidentally of Tacitus himself,

20. inlicita: behavior which was illegal because it defied the existing order of things in the state.

21. obsequium: conformity, the opposite of contumacia.

22. eo laudis excedere: attain to that height of glory. — quo , . . per abnipta: quo is a relative adverb; supply in thought some such expression as iter pergentes. The metaphor of a journey or an ascent was flitting through Tacitus's mind as he wrote.

23. in nullum rei publicae ustun : it had been otherwise with the career of Agricola. — ambitiosa morte.: theatrical death. This caustic criticism is somewhat tempered by the pathetic and appreciative sketches which Tacitus gives elsewhere in his works of the deaths of political recalcitrants whose ends he here affects to believe were plays to the galleries rather than the results of lofty conviction.

Chapter 43.

The death of Agricola; he is universally mourned; suspicious circumstances attending his last hours; Domitian's reception of the news.

1. finis vitae: Agricola died in 93 a.d. Three years or there- abouts elapsed between the last act of his public life, the relinquish- ment of the proconsulship, and his death. — extraneis: ordinarily used like the Greek idveioi of a person who is not of one's family or kin. Here it denotes acquaintances who were not amici.

2. vtilgus . . . et populus: often joined by Tacitus — the com- mon herd and the masses in contemptuous contrast with the official classes and the aristocracy.

3. hie: this . . . of ours. — aliud agens: irresponsible; they were indifferent to public affairs.

4. circulos: social gatherings.

5. statim oblitus: a touph of worldly wisdom; his death was bound to be forgotten by the average person sometime, but he was not lost to memory at once.

6. interceptum: carries with it the idea of being cut ofiF in the middle of his career before his natural time.

7. nobis nihil comperti: nobis is emphatic and may refer to

98 NOTES [Chap. 43.

the whole family, as in chapter 45. 21. Tacitus speaks both for himself and his wife. Some prefer to regard it as an editorial plural. — adfirmare ausim: / might hazard the statement that. Tacitus acknowledges that the family did not possess indubitable evidence to substantiate the rumor. However, in the next two sentences he contrives to leave with the reader the impression that Domitian was not innocent of wrong-doing. — ceterum : passing on to the known facts.

8. ex more principatus : we should say, according to the fashion of royalty. The democratic Trajan used to call in person on sick friends.

10. medicorum intimi: confidential physicians. The adjective is regularly used of liberti and amici; however, it is perfectly appli- cable to medici. The Roman court physicians were generally Greek freedmen and might be on intimate terms with their patrons. Cf. Annals, 4. 3 : Eitdemus, amicus ac medicus Liviae. Tiberius had a similar relation with Charicles. — sive cura . . . sive inquisitio: Tacitus allows the reader to choose between the only two possible motives that would explain the interest displayed by Domitian.

11. supremo quidem die: quidem implies a contrast between supposition and fact. — momenta: phases.

12. dlspositos ctirsores: relays of couriers, stationed at intervals along the road. Domitian must have been at his palace in the Alban hills, else relays would have been unnecessary. Cf. chap- ter 45. 4. Domitian's villa was near Locus Albanus, some eighteen miles from Rome. At a site near the modern village of Albano are ruins in which have been found water pipes inscribed with the name of Domitian. — constabat: the tense refers the report to the time of Agricola's death. Tacitus quotes hearsay evidence because he was then absent from Rome.

13. doloris nimii: extravagant grief . The Mss. read here animo vultuque.

14. vultuprae se tulit: he carried on his countenance a show of . — securus iam odii: free from concern now as to hatred. The object of his resentment being dead, Domitian was freed from the strain incident to disguising his hate.

16. coheredem: in order to avoid confiscation of'his estate. —

Chaps. 43, 44.] NOTES 99

optimae uxori et piissimae filiae: an echo of the conventional phrase- ology of the will. There have come down to us fragments of the will of one Dasumius Tuscus, in which the daughter Dasumia is called pientissima. Tacitus and Pliny, curiously enough, are also remembered in this will.

18. iudicio: in its frequent technical sense of a favorable judg- ment expressed in a bequest. Cf. Suetonius, Augustus, 66: Pliny, Correspondence with Trajan, 94; Panegyric, 50. Translate by testamentary approval or honorary bequest.

20. nisi malum principem: an exaggeration inspired by his ani- mosity toward Domitian. Trajan, in the eyes of Tacitus an ideal emperor, was treated in the matter of bequests like any citizen, being "named as heir by his friends and passed over by strangers." Pliny, Panegyric, 43. A codicil attached to the will of Dasumius bequeaths a legacy to Trajan.

Chapter 44.

Dates of Agri cola's birth and death; his personal appearance; he died in his prime, yet fortune had so blessed him that he would have gained nothing by living longer.

1. Gaio Caesare . . . Idibus Itmiis: June 13, 40 a.d.

3. decimo . . . consullbus: August 23, 93 a.d. The ancient biographer generally followed the natural arrangement now prevalent of introducing the date of birth near the beginning of a work. For convenience chronologically the date of death was often mentioned in the same place. In only two or three other biographies are the two dates coupled near the close as here.

4. habitum: descriptions of personal appearance form atypical feature of ancient biography. In the specimens in Latin literature best known to us this rubric more frequently precedes the account of the death.

6. decentior qtiam sublimior: graceful rather than imposing. On the double comparative, cf. note on chapter 4. 20. — nihil impetus: nothing to betoken a vehement naiure.

7. et ipse: marking the beginning of a new topic.

8. integrae aetatis: rhetorical circumstances alter cases. In chapter 3. 15, Tacitus at the age of forty-two classes himself with the senes. — quantum ad gloriam: supply pertinet.

100 NOTES [Chap. 44.

9. vera bona ... in virtutibus: the doctrine of the Stoics which, however, Tacitus here interprets practically, not in its theoretical extreme. To the true Stoic political preferment and power were neither good nor bad — they were non-essentials; whereas Tacitus counts oflBcial honors as a part of the sum total of Agricola's good fortune.

10. impleverat : had achieved completely.

11. quid aliud adstruere fortuna poterat: assurance on points about which a Roman reader would desire to be informed before agreeing to the statement — put as a rhetorical question — that Agricola was completely blessed, is contained in the two sentences following.

12. opibus nimiis, etc.: forestalling the natural question — Did he have money enough to free him from care ? That at least a competence was necessary to a happy life was a practical view characteristic of the Roman. The paupertas extolled by Horace implied the possession of moderate means. — non gaudebat: he did not delight in. — speciosae : splendid wealth.

13. filia atque uxore superstitibus: the following sentence an- ticipates the objection that Agricola's death at a vigorous age was a misfortune. (1) Agricola died without regrets. (2) He was fortunate to escape the future. Both Greeks and Romans deemed the death of a child before the parent an unnatural and deplorable event. Tomb inscriptions frequently convey this thought, e.g.

" Quod par parenti fuerat facer e filium Mors immatura fecit ut faceret pater."

Conversely, the survival of offspring tempered the sting of death. Likewise it was a consolation in death to precede a helpmeet and so receive the last rites from a conjugal hand. Thus, a certain Julia says in her epitaph that she carried no grief to the grave because she pleased her husband and died before him (et decessi prior).

14. dignitate: rank.

15. sicut . . . ita: although . . . yet.

16. principem: as emperor.

17. quod . . . ominabatur: an event which in my hearing he

Chaps. 44, 45.] NOTES 101

more than once made the object of prophecy and prayerful wish. This may be a prophecy manufactured by Tacitus ex eventu and intended as a compliment to Trajan. However, as Trajan was a rising man several years before the death of Agricola and had acquired a military reputation, there is no wild improbability in the story.

18. solacium tulit: he gained by way of consolation.

19. illud : well remembered by the reader. The end of Domi- tian's reign, like that of Tiberius, was marked by wholesale blood- shed, in each case a reprisal for conspiracy fomented by members of the aristocracy.

20. spiramenta: literally, pauses /or fereoiA. — continuo: take as an adverb.

21. velut uno ictu: because blow followed close on blow. The thought is suggestive of the famous wish of Caligula that the Roman people had but one neck. — exhausit : continuing the metaphor of the weapon; exhaurire here means to deal a death-blow.

Chapter 45.

Happy Agricola to escape the bloody days of the Terror when a glance from the tyrant blanched our cheeks and we were the tools of his cruelty; magnanimous wast thou even in death; sorrow is thy daughter's lot and mine because we could not hear thy last "Good-by."

1. obsessam curiam et clausum . . . senatum: on some occa- sion about which we are not otherwise informed. Nero overawed the Senate in a similar fashion at the trial of Thrasea.

2. tot consulariiun caedes: Suetonius, Life of Domitian, 10. 2, says aliquot.

3. nobilissimanun feminarum: such as Arria, wife of Thrasea Paetus, and Fannia, his daughter.

4. Cams Mettius: Mettiu^ Carus, Senecio's accuser (cf. on chapter 2. 1), mentioned by other writers as a notorious informer. He filed with Domitian an accusation of the Younger Pliny. Action, however, was frustrated by the emperor's death. — censebatur: ironical; his rating as an informer was not what it afterwards became. — intra: emphasize in translation. — Albanam arcem: cf. on chapter 43. 12.

102 NOTES [Chap. 45.

5. Messalini: L. Valerius Catullus Messalinus, a blind man; according to contemporary literature one of the most bloodthirsty advisers of Domitian. — Massa Baebius: Baebius Massa, prose- cuted by Pliny and Senecio for maladministration of Baetica. The action was pending at the time of Agricola's death.

6. etiam turn: even at the time of Agricola's death Massa as the object of accusation was still acting on the defensive, although soon afterwards the worm turned; he eluded punish- ment by a countercharge of impietas directed against Senecio and resumed his noxious activities as a delator. — Helvidium: Helvidius Priscus, the son of the Helvidius Priscus mentioned in chapter 2. 2. He was condemned to death on a charge of Ikse majesty, brought because of a supposed slighting allusion to Domi- tian inserted in a dramatic work.

7. Maurici: lunitis Mauricus, a friend of Pliny and the brother of Rusticus, chapter 2. 1. He was banished by Domi- tian, but was recalled by Nerva. — visus: a very bold zeugma if the text be correct; supply some word like foedavit. The mean- ing is that the sight of the punishments meted out to the brothers disgraced the senators in that they had acquiesced in the outrage.

8. Senecio: cf. on chapter 2. 1.

11. subscriberentur: noted down by the informers to form the basis of subsequent accusation. — denotandis tot hominum pallori- bus: gerundive of purpose, for marking out so many blanched cheeks. A glance from Domitian would strike pallor to the counte- nances of the senators, who were thus made to appear culpable; the watchful spies would then take the hint as to whom they should proceed against.

13. rubor: conveniently rendered by an adjective joined to wltu^. This is the standing description in contemporary writers of the complexion of Domitian. — contra pudorem muniebat: Tacitus pretends that Domitian made the most of his natixral complexion by which blushes were rendered imper- ceptible.

14. tu vero: turning now in the conventional manner of lament and epitaph to an apostrophe of the dead. Thou in translation best conveys the effective solemnity and pathos of the original.

Chaps. 45, 46.] NOTES 103

16. opportiuiitate mortis: Seneca in a consolatory discourse (ad Marciam, 20. 4) says: cogita quantum boni opportuna mors habeat, quam multis diutius vixisse nocuerit.

17. tamquam . . . donates: the interpretation put by those present at Agricola's bedside upon his heroic behavior. A gen- eral belief on the part of Agricola's friends in Domitian's culpa- bility is thus implied.

21. vultu: farewell looks.

22. animo: poetic ablative of place equivalent to in animo.

23. noster: imitate in translation the emphasis of the Latin.

24. condicione: as a consequence. — ante quadriennium: from this sentence we learn that Tacitus left Rome soon after his prae- torship in 88 for service in a province.

26. superfuere honori tuo: more than filled the requirements of the respect due you.

27. desideravere: expressed an unsatisfied longing.

Chapter 46.

" Death makes no conquest of this conqueror : For now he lives in fame but not in life."

1. si quis piorxun manibus locus: expressed as a hypothesis, not as a conviction. This sceptical attitude was typical of the culti- vated classes in the late Republic and the early Empire. Often downright negation took the place of agnosticism. Probably amongst the masses the majority clung to the old beliefs, although such expressions as si quid Manes sapiunt, si quis post funera sensus are commonplaces in epitaphs. See on the whole subject: Dill, Roman Society from Nero to Marcus Aurelius, Book IV, chapter II; W. R. Hardie, Lectures on Classical Subjects, Lecture II, The Beliefs of the Greeks and Romans concerning a Life after Death. — sapientibus: the philosophers.

2. magnaeanimae: the belief in a future life for the good and great had been held by the Stoic Chrysippus, although it was not a universal doctrine of his school.

3. nosque domum tuam: himself as well as his wife and his mother-in-law. Legally Tacitus was not a member of the house of Agricola, a fact, however, which affection and sentiment prompt

104 NOTES [Chap. 46.

him to ignore. Thus in chapter 45. 19 and 25 he ranges himself in a filial relation. — muliebribus lamentis: similarly of an extrava- gant manifestation of grief, chapter 29. 3 : per lamenta . . . muli- ebriter tulit.

6. immortalibus laudibus: praise which shall endure as long as life.

7. similitudine: "Imitation is the sincerest flattery."

10. revolvant: i.e. in animo ; hence, meditate upon. — formamque ac figuram: the aspect and attributes.

11. complectantur: cherish. With the sense and the wording of this passage, cf. Pliny, Panegyric, 55: quin etiam leviora haec formam principis figuramque non aurum melius vet argentum quam favor hominum exprimat teneatque.

12. imaginibus: portrait-statues.

15. exprimere: body forth. — alienam: not your own, in contrs&t to tuis ipse moribus.

17. manet mansurum ... est : abides and shall abide. This com- bination of present and either simple or periphrastic future is often affected in stately and impressive assertion. Pliny, Letters, 2. 1, of Verginius Rufus (cf. Introduction, p. xi) : vivit enim vivet semper . . . in memoria ; Panegyric, 93 : manet manebitque honori veneratio sua.

18. in fama return : on the rolls of fame.

20. Agricola: the asyndeton intensifies the effect of the an- tithesis.

21. superstes erit: because of the place he has made for himself in animis hominum, in fama rerum, as already stated, not because his biography will always live. Tacitus is not claiming immortality for his work in the vein of Horace's famous monumentum acre perennius, Odes, 3. 30. 1, an assertive attitude which he could not with propriety assume at the end of his book after the diflSdence with which he entered upon his task. Cf . chapter 3. However, the- fact remains that had the Agricola not been written, the name of the subject would have meant no more to us than the names of a hundred other public men of the Empire. The only other mention of him in literature is found in the Roman history of Dio Cassius, a work written in Greek at the beginning of the third century of our era.

APPENDIX

In view of the contributions that the Jesi manuscript has made to our knowledge of the history of the text, it has seemed advis- able to indicate for the guidance of the teacher the chief deviations from Halm's fourth edition and to state briefly the source of the reading adopted in the present book.

E = the Jesi manuscript.

T = the Toledo manuscript.

A = the Vatican manuscript, no. 3429.

B = the Vatican manuscript, no. 4498.

Chap. 3. 1. et quamquam, mss. Chap. 3. 13. et ut ita, Rbenanus; ms&

ei uti. Chap. 6. 1. degressus, ET. Chap. 6. 12. ac solacium, ET. Chap. 6. 21. fecit, mss. Chap. 7. 3. Intimilios; closer to mss. in

templo. Chap. 9. 12. persona. Tristitiam ; see note

on the passage. Chap. 9. 23. in hoc ipsius sermonibus, ET.

Chap. 9. 24. eligit, ET.

Chap. 10. 13. in universum fatna : sed trans- gressis, Schoemann. E has in universam fama est tranS' gressis and a variant, uni- versis fama sed, Cf. He- raeus-Draeger ad loc, p. 57. 105

HALM set quamquam. ut ita.

et solacium.

efEecit.

Intimilium.

persona; tristitiam.

in hoc suis sermoni- bus.

elegit.

in universam fama est transgressa.

106

APPENDIX

Chap. 11. 12.

Chap. 11. 16. Chap. 12. 3. Chap. 13. 2.

Chap. 14. 4. Chap. 15. 8. Chap. 15. 19. Chap. 16, 5. Chap. 16. 10. Chap. 16. 23.

Chap. 17. 9.

Chap. 19. 17.

Chap. 19. 18. Chap. 19. 19,

superstitionum persuasiones,

an old conjecture for the mss. superstitionum persua- sione.

bellis, ET.

studiis trahuntur, mss.

munia, ET. See note. In favor of this reading are Leuze, PhiloL Supp. VIII, p. 531 ; Gudeman, German ed. p. 112; Lundstrom, Eranos, VII (1907), p. 5; contra cf. Andresen, Jahr. Bericht. d. Phil. Vereins, XXVIII (1902), p. 310.

Britanniae, addita.

manus, E ; abbreviated man*.

felicibus, ET.

in barbaris ingeniis, ET.

proprius, Rhenanus; ET.

pacti, exercitus licentiam, dux salutem, a correction in E by a second hand.

subiit sustinuitque ; suhiit in- serted above line in E by second hand.

luere, ET ; in E the syllable lu- ends a line ; in second line above stands ludi-, also at end of line. Hence the mistake in the source of AB.

divortia, mss.

proximis hibernis, mss.

HALM

superstitionum per* suasione.

in bellis.

studiis distrahuntur.

munera.

Britanniae; addita.

manum.

integris.

in barbaris.

propius.

pacti, exercitus licen- tiam, dux salutem esset.

sustinuit[que].

f ludere.

devortia.

pro proximis hiber- nis.

APPENDIX

107

Chap. 20. 9. incitamenta, Gudeman after a correction in A ; E irri- tamenta, but the first r is corrected from n ; of. An- nibaldi, I' Agricola e la Ger- mania di Cornelio TacitOf p. 91, n. 14. In semi-un- cial, or Carlovingian script, a change from an original c to r is palaeographically easier than a change to v.

Chap. 20. 12. et tanta ratione, mss.

Chap. 21. 1. adsumpta, mss.

Chap. 21. 5. promptos, castigando, ET.

Chap. 21. 11. discessum, mss.

Chap. 22. 8. desertum; crebrae eruptiones, mss. See note.

Chap. 24. 11. nee in melius ; in melius is too frequent in Tacitus to be cavalierly rejected. In- sertion of nee seems the easiest remedy.

Chap. 25. 3. infesta hostilis exercitus iti- nera, mss.

Chap. 25. 15. magno paratu, ET.

Chap. 25. 18. et cedendum, ET; E has excedendum with et on the margin. I do not agree with Annibaldi*s view (p. 119) that the dot above ex indicates insertion of et without omission of ex.

Chap. 26. 9. nonanis, E (text), T.

Chap. 26. 9. redit, mss. Cf. Lundstrom,

HALM

invitamenta.

tanta ratione.

absumpta.

promptos et casti- gando.

descensum.

crebrae eruptiones in- serted after hiems.

interiora paruin, me- lius aditus.

infesta hostibus exer- citus itinera, paratu magno. et excedendum.

Romanis. rediit.

108

APPENDIX

Eranos, VII (1907), p. 11 and my note ad loc. Chap. 27. 7. non virtute se victos sed . . . arte duels rati, ET.

Chap. 27. 10. coetibus et sacrificiis, E.

Chap. 28. 6. uno regente remigantes, con- jecture of W. R. Paton, C.R. XVI (1902), p. 283; mss. uno remigante. Hap- lography would well ac- count for the omission before remigantes of a word resembling it. Cf. the omission in AB of sevic- tos before sedoccasione, 27, 7 ; qualtuor before vataeO' rum, 36, 5. Final s in remigantes dropped out be- fore suspectis.

Chap. 29. 1. ictus: anno.

Chap. 30. 4. universi colitis servitutis ex- pertes, a conjecture of the editor ; universi colitis et servitutis expertes, ET. Cf. note ad loc. Two reasons for confidence in success are developed in the chap- ter. If et is kept, a third reason is broached, only to be dropped at once. An- dresen's coiistis is open to the same criticism; Jahr. Bericht d. Phil, Vereins, XXXII (1907), p. 262.

HALM

non virtute se sed . . . arte ducis victos rati.

coetibus ac sacrificiis.

uno renavigante.

ictus, anno, universi servitutis ex- pertes.

APPENDIX

109

Chap. 30. 11. Chap. 30. 16. Chap. 30. 18, Chap. 30. 19.

Chap. 31. 3. Chap. 31. 22.

Chap. 32. 16.

Chap. 33. 1. Chap. 33. 18.

Chap. 33. 20. Chap. 34. 12.

Chap. 35. 7. Chap. 36. 5.

Chap. 36. 19. Chap. 36. 20.

nee uUa servientium, ET.

fluctus ac saza, ET.

effugias, ET.

terrae, mare, E text ; through a mistaken notion that terrae should be connected with mare in the following clause, the word was cor- rected to terrain and et was written above the line.

effugerunt, ET.

non in paenitentiam arma la- turi, Wex.

vobis, E, also A ; cf. F. F. Abbott, Woch. fur Klass. Phil. XX (1903), col. 83-84.

fremitu cantuque, ET.

adimus, a conjecture of the editor. Cf. note ad loc. Error possibly dittography from an in preceding quando's.

evasisse silvas, ET.

extremus metus corpora defic- ere, Gudeman, C. R. XI (1897), p. 329.

bellandi, mss.

quattuor Batavorum, ET.

i equestris ; ET, equestres.

ea pugnae facies ; E, ea enim

pugnae, ei on the margin.

Is enim a lapse inspired by

minimeque above, and left

•without correction ?

HALM

nee servientium. fluctus et saxa. effugeris. terrae, iam et mare.

effugiant.

non in patientiam

bellaturi. nobis.

cantu fremituque. acies.

silvas evasisse. extremo metu torpor defixere aciem.

bellanti. Batavorum.

aequa.

nostris iam pugnae facies.

110

APPENDIX

Chap. 37. 16. postquam silvis appropinqua- venrnt; nam, ET.

Chap. 37. 21. Chap. 38. 2. Chap. 38. 5. Chap. 38, 10. Chap. 38. 20.

Chap. 38. 21. Chap. 39. 2.

persultare, Rhenanus.

mixto, ET.

aliqua, mss.

secret!, mss.

proximo Britanniae latere praelecto, E text (except by Tnistake praelecto), T.

redierat, mss.

ut erat Domitianus, E text, T.

Chap. 39. 8. supra principem, ET. Chap. 40. 8. cum eo praecepto, ET. Chap. 40.21. ut plerique, all mss. Cf.

Andresen, Woch.Jtir Klass.

Phil. XVII (1900), col.

1300. Chap. 41. 8. totis, ET. (E on margin,

tot.) Chap. 41. 13. vigorem, constantiam, mss.

Chap. 41. 15. formidine ceterorum, Grotius ; mss. eorum.

Chap. 42. 22. excedere, mss.

Chap. 43. 7. nobis nihil comperti adfir- mare ausim, EAB.

Chap. 43. 14. doloris nimii vultu, a conjec- ture of the editor ; mss. doloris animo vultuque. Ni- mius and animus are easily confused. Cf. Lodge, Zez. Plant, pp. 126-127 ; in Taci- tus, Dialogus, 23. 16, Andre-

HALM

Postquam silvis ap- propinquaverunt, f item.

perscrutari.

mixtoque.

[aliqua] .

deserti.

proximo anjio, Bri- tanniae litore lecto.

reditura erat.

ut Domitiano moris

erat. supra principis. cum praecepto. uti (a misprint).

tot.

vigorem et constan- tiam.

eorum quibus exercitus committi solerent.

escendere.

nobis nihil comperti adfirmare ut ausim.

doloris habitu vul- tuque.

APPENDIX

111

HALM

sen corrects nimia of mss. to animi. Chap. 44. 2. quarto, a conjecture for mss. sexto accepted by most re- cent editors. Sexto arose from dittography with pre- ceding lUNIISEXCESSIT.

Chap. 44. 5. impetus, E text, T; the harder reading; the mar- ginal variant mettis is an attempt to simplify.

Chap. 44. 12. non contigerant, mss. ; on margin of E, contigerant.

Chap. 45. 4. Mettius, marginal correction of ET; the correct spell- ing.

Chap. 45. 6. etiam tum, ET; previously conjectured by Gronovius.

Chap. 45. 16. interfuere, ET.

sexto.

metus

contigerant.

Metius.

[iam] turn.

interfuerunt.

MACMILLAN'S

LATIN CLASSICS

PREPARED UNDER THE DIRECTION OF

JAMES C. EGBERT

Professor of Latin in Columbu University

FOR THE YOUNGER STUDENTS IN COLLEGE CLASSES

Although great progress has been made during recent years in the scholarly editing of Latin texts, the result has been books too cumbersome and expensive for the younger students. Not finding helpful information in the elaborate introduction with its extensive data as to usages, quota- tions, and references, the student naturally turns to translations for aid. The volumes in this new series will endeavor to combat this tendency by presenting notes which, while scholarly, shall be brief and concise. Each book will have a short introduction and standard text and a commentary for the interpretation of the text. The series will contain the most useful works available for class use and will be issued at prices sufficiently reason- able to make the adoption of the volumes possible in large general classes. Arrangements for editing the various texts have been made as follows : Tacitus' Agricola, by Mr. Duane Reed Stuart of Princeton Uni- versity. Adelphoe of Terence, by Prof. Helen M. Searles of Mt. Holyoke

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