FOOTNOTES
[89] [The Roman historian Florus[d] comments on and classifies the wars thus: “This only was wanting to complete the misfortunes of the Romans that they should raise up an unnatural war among themselves and that in the midst of the city and Forum, citizens should fight with citizens, like gladiators in an amphitheatre. I should bear the calamity, however, with greater patience if plebeian leaders or contemptible nobles had been at the head of such atrocity; but even Marius and Sulla (O indignity! such men, such generals!), the grace and glory of their age, lent their eminent characters to this worst of evils. It was carried on, if I may use the expression, under three constellations, the first movement being light and moderate, an affray rather than a war, for the violence prevailed only between the leaders themselves; in the next rising, the victory spread with greater cruelty and bloodshed, through the very bowels of the whole senate; the third conflict exceeded not merely animosity between citizens, but that between enemies, the fury of the war being supported by the strength of all Italy, and rancour raging till none remained to be killed.”
[90] [On this act of Octavius, Beesly[c] cynically comments: “He was an obstinate, dull man; and if the burlesque of the conduct of the senators when the Gauls took Rome was really enacted, theatrical display must have been cold comfort for those of his party on whom his incapacity brought ruin.”]
[91] [Ihne[e] says “the story is absurd,” and credits it to a calumny of his enemies. Long, however, accepts it as possible.]
[92] [See Valerius Maximus[f] and Cicero.[g] Mommsen[h] credits the story, and Dyer[i] calls it “one of those ferocious jokes which find their parallel only amidst the butcheries of the French Revolution.”]
[93] [“The battle of the Colline Gate was one of the few great and decisive battles which are recorded in the history of Rome,” says Ihne.[e] In spite of all this, he says, we know almost absolutely nothing of the position of the armies and the progress of the fight, “and this cannot be vouched for with any degree of confidence, as the two principal authorities cannot be satisfactorily made to harmonise.” Appian[m] says that each side lost 50,000; Orosius[n] sets the number at only 11,000.]
[94] [Mommsen[h] quotes the sale of an estate valued at £61,000 or $305,000 for about £20 or $100; and rates the total proceeds of confiscation at £3,050,000 or $15,250,000.]
[95] [Cicero[g] makes a grim pun which Guthrie Englished thus, “The same gentlemen who knocked down estates, knocked down men.” Later he says in the same oration that the slaughter was so great it reminded one of the battle of Lake Trasimene when Hannibal annihilated a Roman army.]
[96] [The connection with Marius was not by blood but by marriage; Julia, Cæsar’s aunt, was the wife of Marius.]
