Augustus: The Life and Times of the Founder of the Roman Empire

by Evelyn S. Shuckburgh

Romane, memento.

The extension of the Empire under Augustus.

At the end of his life Augustus left, among other memoirs, a roll containing certain maxims of state which he thought important for his successors to observe. Among them was an injunction not to seek to increase the Empire, for it would be difficult to guard an extended frontier. His own policy had been directed generally on this principle. Such additions as were made in his time were mainly those rendered inevitable by the necessity of securing the already existing frontiers. When his generals went beyond that they met with difficulties and sometimes with disaster.[256] The additions actually made were (1) in Africa: Egypt was made a province in B.C. 30, at first almost as a private possession of the Emperor, though in B.C. 10 it was, nominally at any rate, put on the same footing as the other provinces. Mauretania, on the other hand, though made a province in B.C. 33, was restored to independence under King Iuba in B.C. 25. (2) In Asia a new province of Galatia was formed in B.C. 25, with a capital at Ancyra, and embracing several districts, such as Lycaonia, Isauria, Pamphylia, and parts of Phrygia. (3) In the West, sometime before A.D. 6, Mœsia, answering to the modern Servia and Bulgaria, was made a province as a barrier of the Empire on the Danube. So also Illyricum, in B.C. 9-8, was extended to the Danube by the addition of Pannonia; Noricum, also on the Danube, was held in subjection, if not fully organised as a province, after B.C. 16; and Rhætia (modern Bavaria) was put under a Roman procurator after B.C. 15. All these additions were clearly rendered necessary in order to protect the line of the Danube as the frontier of the Empire. Lastly, on the reorganisation of Gaul in four provinces (B.C. 16-14), two districts along the left bank of the Lower Rhine, called Germania Superior and Germania Inferior, were also occupied and partly organised, while some minor Alpine districts, Alpes Maritimæ (Savoy and Nice), Alpes Cottiæ (Susa and district), Alpes Penninæ (Canton du Valois) were taken over and administered sometimes independently and sometimes as part of other provinces. In these cases again the extension was merely consequential, the inevitable result of having a long frontier to defend against invading tribes.[257] The Rhine and the Danube then became the limits of the Empire. We shall have occasion to see immediately what dangers awaited an attempt to go beyond them.

The East.

Augustus twice spent periods of between two and three years in the East, engaged in resettling frontiers and re-organising the Roman provinces.

After the victory at Actium (B.C. 31) he remained in the East till B.C. 29. The changes then made chiefly consisted in upsetting most of the arrangements which had been made by Antony with various client kings, and in favour of the children of Cleopatra. Thus Cyprus, which had been restored to Cleopatra, was now separated from Egypt and made a province; the coast towns of Syria and Palestine were reunited to the province of Syria; certain cities of Crete and Cyrene, Iudæa and Ituræa, and of Cilicia, which Antony had assigned to Cleopatra’s son, Cæsarion, were either reunited to the provinces or declared free, as was also the case with other districts and towns assigned by Antony to his own son by Cleopatra. Certain client kings, however, were allowed to retain their territory and dignity, such as Herod in Iudæa, Amyntas in Galatia, Archelaus in Cappadocia. But the eternal question in the East was that of the Parthians. They not only were resolved to maintain the Euphrates as the limit beyond which Roman power was not to pass, but they had frequently made raids upon Syria, and were always attempting to occupy Armenia, which was a Roman protectorate, and the intervening kingdom of Media. The disaster of Crassus in Mesopotamia, and the chequered operations of Antony, had all sprung from these facts. When Augustus arrived in Asia the state of things which had finally resulted from the operations of Antony was that Artaxes (whose father, Artavasdes, had been treacherously captured by Antony and afterwards put to death by Cleopatra) was king of Armenia, and had attacked Media and captured its king Artavasdes; and that Phraates had recovered his kingdom of Parthia. Augustus had two or three advantages in dealing with these complications. He found the brothers of the Armenian Artaxes still prisoners at Alexandria, and sent them to Rome as hostages. Again the captured king of Media managed to escape and appealed to him for help; and, lastly, Phraates of Parthia had only just recovered his throne, from which he had been expelled by a rebellion headed by Tiridates, and the latter escaped to Syria and sent to implore the help of Augustus, while legates from Phraates also arrived soliciting his support. Augustus availed himself skilfully of these complications to assume the position of a lord paramount and arbiter. He allowed Tiridates to remain in safety in Syria; but he treated the legates of Phraates in a friendly manner, and cordially invited a son of that king to accompany him to Rome, where, however, he was kept as a hostage. Artavasdes was set up in Lesser Armenia to form a check upon Artaxes. These diplomatic successes were regarded in Rome, as we have seen, as veritable triumphs over the dangerous Parthians—the only name much known there. The abolition of the arrangements of Antony, which had involved the curtailment of the Roman Empire, was recorded on coins struck in B.C. 29, with a head of Augustus on the obverse, and on the reverse a figure of victory standing on the mystic cista, with the legend Asia recepta. But it is with his second Eastern progress (B.C. 22-19) that the useful public works, such as roads and buildings, of which traces are still found, probably began.

Movements in the East between B.C. 24 and B.C. 22.

Between these two visits there had been only two movements of serious importance—the useless and almost disastrous expedition of Ælius Gallus into Arabia (B.C. 24-3), and the invasion of Southern Egypt at Elephantine by Candace, queen of Æthiopia, encouraged by the diminution of the Roman forces in Egypt during the Arabian expedition. The Æthiopians gained some minor successes over three Roman cohorts stationed near the frontier, but were eventually repulsed by the præfect Gaius Petronius, who pursued them to their capital town Nabata, which he took and plundered.[258]

Second Eastern progress, B.C. 22-19.

The second eastward progress of Augustus began with some months’ residence in Sicily. There he was busied in founding colonies, of which seven are named. The chief town of Sicily was still Syracuse, but it seems to have suffered in the time of Sextus Pompeius, and Augustus placed in it two thousand settlers, probably veterans. It was the object of such colonies to provide for veterans and poor Italians, but also to Romanise countries more completely, and to introduce an industrial class. Sicily needed above all things free cultivators. Its corn trade had suffered from the competition of Africa, Sardinia, and Egypt, and its pastoral farms were largely owned by Roman capitalists, who did not reside, but employed slave-labour directed by bailiffs or villici.[259] One object at least, therefore, of these measures of Augustus was to bring into the country a class of small landowners residing on their property. Land was found for them by purchase, where there was no ager publicus available.