The latter invaded their territory at many points at once in order that they might not unite and become harder to subdue, and had a very easy time in conquering them because they attacked him only in small groups. Having forced them to capitulate he demanded a fixed sum of money, allowing it to be supposed that he would impose no other punishment. After that he sent soldiers everywhere, apparently to attend to the collection of the indemnity and arrested those of military age, whom he sold under an agreement that none of them should be liberated within twenty years. The best of their land was given to members of the Pretorians and came to include a city called Augusta Prætoria.[8] Augustus himself waged war upon the Astures and upon the Cantabri at the same time. These refused to yield, because of confidence in their position on the heights, and would not come to close quarters owing to their inferior numbers and the fact that most of them were javelin throwers, but they caused him much trouble, whenever he made any movement, by always seizing the higher ground in advance and placing ambuscades in depressions and in wooded spots. He found himself therefore quite unable to cope with the difficulty, and having fallen ill from weariness and worry retired to Tarraco, and there remained sick. Meantime Gaius Antistius fought against them, accomplishing considerable, not because he was a better general than Augustus, but because the barbarians felt contempt for him and thus joined battle with the Romans and were defeated. In this way he captured some points, and afterward Titus[9] Carisius took Lancia, the principal fortress of the Astures, which had been abandoned, and won to his side many towns.
[-26-] At the conclusion of this war Augustus dismissed the more aged of his soldiers and gave them a city to settle in Lusitania,—the so-called Augusta Emerita. For those who were still of the military age he arranged some spectacles right among the legions, through the agency of Tiberius and Marcellus as ædiles. To Juba he gave portions of Gætulia in return for the prince's ancestral domain (for the majority of the inhabitants had been enrolled as members of the Roman polity), and also the possessions of Bocchus and Bogud. On the death of Amyntas he did not entrust the country to the children of the deceased but made it a part of the subject territory. Thus Gaul together with Lycaonia obtained a Roman governor. The regions of Pamphylia formerly assigned to Amyntas were restored to their own district.—About this same time Marcus Vinicius in making reprisals against the Celtæ, because they had arrested and destroyed Romans who had entered their country to have friendly dealings with them, himself gave the name of imperator to Augustus. For this and for the other achievements of the time a triumph was voted to Cæsar; but as he did not care to celebrate it, an arch bearing a trophy was constructed in the Alps for his glory and authority was given him to wear always on the first day of the year both the crown and the triumphal garb. After these successes in the wars Augustus closed the precinct of Janus, which had been opened because of the strife.
[-27-] Meanwhile Agrippa had been beautifying the city at his own expense. First, in honor of the naval victories he built over the so-called Portico of Neptune and lent it further brilliance by the painting of the Argonauts. Secondly, he repaired the Laconian sudatorium. He gave the name Laconian to the gymnasium because the Lacedæmonians had, in those days, a greater reputation than anybody else for stripping naked and exercising smeared with oil. Also, he completed the so-called Pantheon. It has this name perhaps because it received the images of many gods and among them the statues of Mars and Venus; but my own opinion is that the name is due to its round shape, like the sky. Agrippa desired to place Augustus also there and to take the designation of the structure from his title. But, as his master would not accept either honor, he placed in the temple itself a statue of the former Cæsar and in the anteroom representations of Augustus and himself. This was done not from any rivalry and ambition on Agrippa's part to make himself equal to Augustus, but from his superabundant devotion to him and his perpetual affection for the commonwealth; hence Augustus, so far from censuring him for it, honored him the more. For, being unable through sickness to superintend at that time the marriage of his daughter Julia and his nephew Marcellus, he commissioned Agrippa to hold the festival in his absence. And when the house on the Palatine hill, which had formerly been Antony's but was later given to Agrippa and Messala, was burned down, he made a grant of money to Messala and gave Agrippa equal rights of domicile. The latter not unnaturally gained high distinction as a result of this. And one Gaius Toranius also acquired a good reputation because while tribune he brought his father, though some one's freedman, into the theatre and made him sit beside him upon the tribune's bench. Publius Servilius, too, made a name for himself because while prætor he caused to be killed at a festival three hundred bears and other Libyan wild beasts equal in number.
[B.C. 24 (a. u. 730)]
[-28-] Augustus now entered upon office for the tenth time with Gaius Norbanus, and on the first day of the month the senate took oaths, confirming his deeds. When he was announced as drawing near the city (his sickness had delayed him), he promised to give the people a hundred denarii each and issued instructions that the document concerning the money should not be bulletined until the senate also should approve. They had freed him from all compulsion of the laws to the end, as I have stated,[10] that being really independent and possessed of full powers over both himself and the laws he should follow all of them that he wished and not follow any that he did not wish. This right was voted to him while still absent. On his arrival in Rome there were various events in honor of his preservation and return, and Marcellus was accorded the right to be a senator of the class of ex-prætors and to be a candidate for the consulship ten years earlier than was customary. Tiberius was permitted in a similar fashion to be a candidate five years before the age set for each office. The latter was at once appointed quæstor and the former ædile. As the quæstors needed to serve in the provinces were proving insufficient, all drew lots for the places who for ten years previous had been named quæstors without the duties of the office. These, then, were the occurrences in the City worthy of note that year.
[-29-] As soon as Augustus had departed from Spain, leaving behind Lucius Æmilius[11] as governor of it, the Cantabri and Astures made an uprising. They sent to Æmilius before anything about it became known to him and said they wished to give the army grain and some other presents. Then, having secured a number of soldiers, who were presumably to carry the supplies, they led them to suitable places and butchered them. Their pleasure, however, did not last long. When their country had been devastated and some forts burned and, chiefest of all, the hands of every one that was caught were cut off, they were quickly subdued. While this was going on, another new campaign had its beginning and end. It was led by Ælius Gallus, governor of Egypt, against the so-called Arabia Felix[12] of which Sabos was king. At first he encountered no one at all, yet did not proceed without effort. The desert, the sun, and the water (which had some peculiar nature), distressed them greatly so that the majority of the army perished. The disease proved to be dissimilar to any ordinary complaint, and fell upon the head, which it caused to wither. This killed most of them at once, but in the case of the survivors it descended to the legs, skipping all the intervening parts of the body, and wrought injury to them. There was no remedy for it except by both drinking and rubbing on olive oil mixed with wine. This was in the power of only a few of them to do, for the country produces neither of these articles and the men had not provided a large supply of them beforehand. In the midst of this trouble the barbarians also fell upon them. For a while the enemy were defeated whenever they joined battle and lost some places: later, however, with the disease as an ally they won back their own possessions and drove the survivors of the expedition out of the country. These were the first of the Romans (and I think the only ones) who traversed so much of this part of Arabia in warfare. They had advanced as far as the so-named Athlula, a famous locality.
[B.C. 23 (a. u. 731)]
[-30-] Augustus was for the eleventh time consul with Calpurnius Piso, when he fell so sick once more as to have no hope of saving his life. He accordingly arranged everything in the idea that he was about to die, and gathering about him the officials and the other foremost senators and knights he appointed no successor, though they were expecting that Marcellus would be preferred before all for the position. After conversing briefly with them about public matters he gave Piso the list of the forces and the public revenues written in a book, and handed his ring to Agrippa. The emperor became unable to do even the very simplest things, yet a certain Antonius Musas managed to restore him to health by means of cold baths and cold drinks. For this he received a great deal of money from both Augustus and the senate, as well as the right to wear gold rings,—he was a freedman,—and secured exemption from taxes for both himself and the members of his profession, not only those then living but also those of coming generations. But he who assumed the powers of Fortune and Fate was destined soon after to be well worsted. Augustus had been saved in this manner: but Marcellus, falling sick not much later, was treated in the same way by Musas and died. Augustus gave him a public burial with the usual eulogies, placed him in the monument which was being built, and honored his memory by calling the theatre, the foundations of which had already been laid by the former Cæsar, the Theatre of Marcellus. He ordered also that a gold image of the deceased, a golden crown, and his chair of office be carried into the theatre at the Ludi Romani and be placed in the midst of the officials having charge of the function. This he did later.
[-31-] After being restored to health on this occasion he brought his will into the senate and wished to read it, by way of showing people that he had left no successor to his position. He did not, however, read it, for no one would permit that. Quite every one, however, was astonished at him in that since he loved Marcellus as son-in-law and nephew yet he failed to trust him with the monarchy but preferred Agrippa before him. His regard for Marcellus had been shown by many honors, among them his lending aid in carrying out the festival which the young man gave as ædile; the brilliance of this occasion is shown by the fact that in midsummer he sheltered the Forum by curtains overhead and introduced a knight and a woman of note as dancers in the orchestra. But his final attitude seemed to show that he was not yet confident of the youth's judgment and that he either wanted the people to get back their liberty or Agrippa to receive the leadership from them. He understood well that Agrippa and the people were on the best of terms and he was unwilling to appear to be delivering the supreme power with his own hands. [-32-] When he recovered, therefore, and learned that Marcellus on this account was not friendly toward Agrippa, he immediately despatched the latter to Syria, so that no delay and desultory dispute might arise by their being in the same place. Agrippa forthwith started from the City but did not make his way to Syria, but, proceeding even more moderately than usual, he sent his lieutenants there and himself lingered in Lesbos.
Besides doing this Augustus appointed ten prætors, feeling that he did not require any more. This number remained constant for several years. Some of them were intended to fulfill the same duties as of yore and two of them to have charge of the administration of the finances each year. Having settled these details he resigned the consulship and went to Albanum. He himself ever since the constitution had been arranged had held office for the entire year, as had most of his colleagues, and he wished now to interrupt this custom again, in order that as many as possible might be consuls. His resignation took place outside the city to prevent his being hindered in his purpose.