History of Julius Cæsar, Vol. 1 of 2

by Emperor of the French Napoleon III

Kingdom of Pergamus.

XIII. The western part of Asia Minor is better known. It had seen, after the battle of Ipsus, the formation of the kingdom of Pergamus, which, thanks to the interested liberality of the Romans towards Eumenes II., increased continually until the moment when it fell under their sovereignty. To this kingdom belonged Mysia, the two Phrygias, Lycaonia, and Lydia. This last province, crossed by the Pactolus, had for its capital Ephesus, the metropolis of the Ionian confederation, at the same time the mart of the commerce of Asia Minor and one of the localities where the fine arts were cultivated with most distinction. This town had two ports: one penetrated into the heart of the town, while the other formed a basin in the very middle of the public market.[368] The theatre of Ephesus, the largest ever built, was 660 feet in diameter, and was capable of holding 60,000 spectators. The most celebrated artists, Scopas, Praxiteles, etc., worked at Ephesus upon the great Temple of Diana. This monument, the building of which lasted two hundred and twenty years, was surrounded by 128 columns, each 60 feet high, presented by so many kings. Pergamus, the capital of the kingdom, passed for one of the finest cities in Asia, longe clarissimum Asiæ Pergamum, says Pliny;[369] the port of Elæa contained maritime arsenals, and could arm numerous vessels.[370] The acropolis of Pergamus, an inaccessible citadel, defended by two torrents, was the residence of the Attalides; these princes, zealous protectors of the sciences and arts, had founded in their capital a library of 200,000 volumes.[371] Pergamus carried on a vast traffic; its cereals were exported in great quantities to most places in Greece.[372] Cyzicus, situated on an island of the Propontis, with two closed ports forming a station for about two hundred ships,[373] rivalled the richest cities of Asia. Like Adramyttium, it carried on a great commerce in perfumery,[374] it worked the inexhaustible marble-quarries of the island of Proconnesus,[375] and its commercial relations were so extensive that its gold coins were current in all the Asiatic factories.[376] The town of Abydos possessed gold mines.[377] The wheat of Assus was reputed the best in the world, and was reserved for the table of the kings of Persia.[378]

We may estimate the population and resources of this part of Asia from the armies and fleets which the kings had at their command at the time of the conquest of Greece by the Romans. In 555, Attalus II., and, ten years later, Eumenes II., sent them numerous galleys of five ranks of oars.[379] The land forces of the kings of Pergamus were much less considerable.[380] Their direct authority did not extend over a great territory, yet they had many tributary towns; hence their great wealth and small army. The Romans drew from this country, now nearly barren and unpeopled, immense contributions both in gold and wheat.[381] The magnificence of the triumph of Manlius and the reflections of Livy, compared with the testimony of Herodotus, reveal all the splendour of the kingdom of Pergamus. It was after the war against Antiochus and the expedition of Manlius that extravagance began to display itself at Rome.[382] Soldiers and generals enriched themselves prodigiously in Asia.[383]

The ancient colonies of Ionia and Æolis, such as Clazomenæ, Colophon, and many others, which were dependent for the most part on the kingdom of Pergamus, were fallen from their ancient grandeur. Smyrna, rebuilt by Alexander, was still an object of admiration for the beauty of its monuments. The exportation of wines, as celebrated on the coast of Ionia as in the neighbouring islands, formed alone an important support of the commerce of the ports of the Ægean Sea.

The treasures of the temple of Samothrace were so considerable, that we are induced to mention here a circumstance relating to this little island, though distant from Asia, and near the coast of Thrace: Sylla’s soldiers took in the sanctuary the Cabiri, an ornament of the value of 1,000 talents (5,820,000 francs [£232,800]).[384]

Caria, Lycia, and Cilicia.

XIV. On the southern coast of Asia Minor, some towns still sustained the rank they had attained one or two centuries before. The capital of Caria was Halicarnassus, a very strong town, defended by two citadels,[385] and celebrated for one of the finest works of Greek art, the Mausoleum. In spite of the extraordinary fertility of the country, the Carians were accustomed, like the people of Crete, to engage as mercenaries in the Greek armies.[386] On their territory stood the Ionian town of Miletus, with its four ports.[387] The Milesians alone had civilised the shores of the Black Sea by the foundation of about eighty colonies.[388]

In turn independent, or placed under foreign dominion, Lycia, a province comprised between Caria and Cilicia, possessed some rich commercial towns. One especially, renowned for its ancient oracle of Apollo, no less celebrated than that of Delphi, was remarkable for its spacious port;[389] this was Patara, which was large enough to contain the whole fleet of Antiochus, burnt by Fabius in 565.[390] Xanthus, the largest town of the province, to which place ships ascended, only lost its importance after having been pillaged by Brutus.[391] Its riches had at an earlier period drawn upon it the same fate from the Persians.[392] Under the Roman dominion, Lycia beheld its population decline gradually; and of the seventy towns which it had possessed, no more than thirty-six remained in the eighth century of Rome.[393]

More to the east, the coasts of Cilicia were less favoured; subjugated in turn by the Macedonians, Egyptians, and Syrians, they had become receptacles of pirates, who were encouraged by the kings of Egypt in their hostility to the Seleucidæ.[394] From the heights of the mountains which cross a part of the province, robbers descended to plunder the fertile plains situated on the eastern side (Cilicia Campestris).[395] Still, the part watered by the Cydnus and the Pyramus was more prosperous, owing to the manufacture of coarse linen and to the export of saffron. There stood ancient Tarsus, formerly the residence of a satrap, the commerce of which had sprung up along with that of Tyre;[396] and Soli, on which Alexander levied an imposition of a hundred talents as a punishment for its fidelity to the Persians,[397] and which, by its maritime position, excited the envy of the Rhodians.[398] These towns and other ports entered, after the battle of Ipsus, into the great commercial movement of which the provinces of Syria became the seat.

Syria.