8 Whilst affairs at Ambracia were in this state, Phæneas and Damoteles came to the consul, as ambassadors from the Ætolians, invested with full powers by a decree of the general assembly of that nation. For when their prætor saw on one side Ambracia besieged; on another, the sea-coast infested by the enemy’s ships; on a third, Amphilochia and Dolopia ravaged by the Macedonians, and that the Ætolians were incapable of meeting the three enemies at once, having summoned a council, he consulted the chiefs on what was to be done. The opinions of all tended to one point: “that peace should be solicited on equal terms if possible; if not, on any terms that could be borne. That the war was undertaken in reliance on Antiochus. Since Antiochus was vanquished by land and sea, and driven beyond the mountains of Taurus, almost out of the world, what hope remained of their being able to support it? That Phæneas and Damoteles, since the emergency was so great, should do whatever they might judge to tend to the interest of the Ætolians and their own honour. For what counsel, what option had been left them by fortune?” Ambassadors were despatched with instructions, to beseech the consul to “have mercy on the city, and to take compassion on a nation once acknowledged as an ally; and driven to madness, they would not say by ill treatment, but undoubtedly by their sufferings.” That the Ætolians “had not in Antiochus’ war deserved a larger share of punishment than they had of reward in that against Philip. That neither then was compensation liberally made them, nor ought punishment now to be inflicted on them in an immoderate degree.” To this the consul answered, that “the Ætolians had sued for peace often, rather than ever with sincere intentions. Let them in soliciting peace imitate Antiochus, whom they had drawn into the war. He had ceded, not the few cities whose liberty was the ground of the dispute, but an opulent kingdom, all Asia on this side Mount Taurus. That he (the consul) would not listen to the Ætolians, treating concerning peace, unless they laid down their arms. That, in the first place, their arms and all their horses must be delivered up; and in the next place, one thousand talents[17] of silver must be paid to the Roman people; half of which sum must be laid down immediately, if they wished for peace. To these articles he would add when concluding the treaty, that they must have the same allies and the same enemies as the Roman people.”
9 To which demands the ambassadors having made no reply, both because they were severe, and because they knew the spirit of their country to be unbroken and changeable, returned home, that they might again and again, while the thing was undecided, consult the prætor and chiefs as to what was to be done. They were received with clamour and reproaches, and were asked “how long would they protract the matter, though commanded to bring with them a peace of some kind or other?” But as they were going back to Ambracia, they were caught in an ambuscade, laid near the road by the Acarnanians, with whom they were at war, and carried to Thyrium to be confined. The delay arising from this incident interrupted the negotiations. When the ambassadors of the Athenians and Rhodians, who had come to intercede for them, were now with the consul, Amynander also, king of Athamania, having obtained a safe-conduct, had come into the Roman camp, being more concerned for the city of Ambracia, where he had spent the greatest part of his exile, than for the nation of the Ætolians. When the consul was informed by them of the accident which had befallen the ambassadors, he ordered them to be brought from Thyrium; and on their arrival they began to treat concerning peace. Amynander, as that was his principal object, laboured assiduously to persuade the Ambracians to capitulate. When he made but little progress in this, while he was coming under the walls and conferring with their chiefs, he at last, with the consul’s permission, went into the city; where, partly by arguments, partly by entreaties, he prevailed on them to surrender themselves to the Romans. Caius Valerius, the son of Lævinus, who was the first that had made a treaty of alliance with that nation, the brother of the consul, born of the same mother, eminently aided the Ætolians. The Ambracians, having first stipulated that they might send away the auxiliary Ætolians in safety, opened their gates. Then the Ætolians stipulated that “they should pay five hundred Euboic talents,[18] two hundred of this sum at present, and three hundred at six equal annual payments; that they should deliver up to the Romans the prisoners and deserters; that they should not subject any city to their jurisdiction, which, since the first coming of Titus Quintius into Greece, had either been taken by the arms of the Romans, or voluntarily entered into alliance with them: and that the island of Cephallenia should be excluded from the treaty.” Although these terms were more moderate than they themselves had expected, yet the Ætolians begged permission to lay them before the council, which request was granted. A short discussion about the cities engaged the council. Since they had been for some time under their laws, they bore with pain that they should be torn off, as it were, from their body. However, they unanimously voted that the terms of peace should be accepted. The Ambracians presented the consul with a golden crown of one hundred and fifty pounds’ weight. The brazen and marble statues and paintings, with which Ambracia was more richly decorated than any other city in that country, since it was the royal residence of Pyrrhus, were. all removed and carried away; but nothing else was injured or even touched.
10 The consul, marching into the interior parts of Ætolia, encamped at Amphilochian Argos, twenty-two miles from Ambracia. Here, at length, the Ætolian ambassadors arrived, the consul in the mean time wondered at the cause of their delay. Then, after he heard that the council of the Ætolians had approved of the terms of peace, having ordered them to go to Rome to the senate, and having permitted the Athenian and Rhodian mediators to go with them, and appointed his brother, Caius Valerius, to accompany them, he himself passed over to Cephallenia. The ambassadors found the ears and minds of all the principal people at Rome prepossessed by charges made against them by Philip, who, by complaining both by ambassadors and by letters, that Dolopia, Amphilochia, and Athamania had been forcibly taken from him, that his garrison, and at last even his son Perseus, had been driven out of Amphilochia, had turned away the senate from their entreaties. The Athenians and Rhodians were, nevertheless, heard with attention. An Athenian ambassador, Leon, son of Icesias, is said to have even affected them much by his eloquence. Making use of a common simile, and comparing the multitude of the Ætolians to a calm sea, when it comes to be ruffled by the winds, he said, that “as long as they faithfully adhered to the alliance with Rome, they rested in the calm state natural to nations; but that when Thoas and Dicæarchus began to blow from Asia, Menetas and Damocrites from Europe, then was raised that storm which dashed them on Antiochus as on a rock.”
11 The Ætolians, after being a long time buffeted about, at length prevailed to have articles of peace concluded. They were these:—“Let the Ætolian nation, without fraud or deceit, maintain the empire and majesty of the Roman people; let them not suffer to pass through their territories, nor, in any manner whatever, aid or assist any army that shall march against the allies and friends of the Romans; let them have the same enemies as the Roman people; let them bear arms against them, and take a share in their wars; let them deliver up the deserters, fugitives, and prisoners, to the Romans and their allies, excepting such as were prisoners before, who having returned home, were afterwards captured; and also such as, at the time of their being taken, were enemies to Rome, while the Ætolians were in the Roman army. Let such of the others as can be found be delivered up. without reserve, to the magistrates of Corcyra, within one hundred days; and such as cannot now be found, as soon as they shall be discovered. Let them give forty hostages at the discretion of the Roman consul, none younger than twelve years nor older than forty; let neither the prætor, nor the general of the horse, nor the public secretary, be a hostage; nor any person who has before been a hostage in the hands of the Romans. Let Cephallenia be excluded from these articles.” With respect to the sum of money which they were to pay, and the mode of payment, no alteration was made in the arrangement which had been made by the consul. If they chose to give gold instead of silver, it was agreed that they might do so, provided that one piece of gold should be deemed equivalent to ten of silver of the same weight. “Whatever cities, whatever lands, whatever men have been formerly under the jurisdiction of the Ætolians, and have, either in the consulate of Titus Quintius and Publius Ælius, or since their consulate, been subdued by the arms of the Roman people, or have made a voluntary submission to them, the Ætolians are not to reclaim. The Œnians, with their city and lands, are to belong to the Acarnanians.” On these conditions was the treaty concluded with the Ætolians.
12 Not only in the same summer, but almost at the very time in which these acts were performed by Marcus Fulvius the consul in Ætolia, the other consul, Cneius Manlius, carried on war in Gallogræcia; the progress of which I shall now relate. In the beginning of spring the consul came to Ephesus, and having received the command of the army from Lucius Scipio, and reviewed the troops, he made an harangue to the soldiers; in which, having praised their bravery in having completely conquered Antiochus in a single battle, he encouraged them to undertake a new war against the Gauls, who had supported Antiochus with auxiliaries, and were, besides, of such untractable tempers, that Antiochus was to no purpose removed beyond the range of Mount Taurus, unless the power of the Gauls was broken; he then spoke briefly of himself, in terms neither ill-grounded nor extravagant. The delighted soldiers heard the consul with frequent bursts of applause, considering the Gauls as having been a part of the strength of Antiochus; and that, since that king had been vanquished, there would be no power in the forces of the Gauls, by themselves. The consul judged that Eumenes was absent at an unseasonable time, (he was then at Rome,) as he was well acquainted with the nature of the country and of the inhabitants, and as it was his interest that the power of the Gauls should be broken. He therefore sends for his brother Attalus, from Pergamus, and having exhorted him to undertake the war in conjunction with him, he sends him, away to make preparations, after promising his own exertions and those of his countrymen. A few days after, Attalus with one thousand foot and two hundred horse, having ordered his brother Athenæus to follow with the rest of the troops, and committed the care of Pergamus to persons whom he knew to be faithful to his brother and to his government, met the consul, who had marched from Ephesus to Magnesia. The consul, after highly commending the young prince, having advanced with all his forces, encamped on the bank of the Mæander, for as that river could not be forded, it was necessary to collect shipping for carrying over the army.
13 Having passed the Mæander, they came to Hiera Come.[19] In this place there is a magnificent temple, and oracle of Apollo; the priests are said to deliver their responses in verses by no means inelegant. Hence, in two days’ march they reached the river Harpasus; whither came ambassadors from Alabandæ, entreating the consul, either by his authority or his arms, to compel a fort, which had lately revolted from it, to return to its former allegiance. To the same place came Athenæus the brother of Eumenes, and Attalus, with Leusus, a Cretan, and Corragos, a Macedonian commander. They brought with them one thousand foot and three hundred horse, composed of various nations. The consul, having sent a military tribune with a small party, took the fort by assault, and restored it to the Alabandians. He himself, not deviating from his route, pitched his camp at Antioch on the Mæander. The source of this river is in Celænæ, which city was formerly the metropolis of Phrygia. The inhabitants afterwards removed to a spot not far distant from Old Celænæ, and the name of Apama was given to their new city, from Apama the sister of king Seleucus. The river Marsyas also, rising at a little distance from the head of the Mæander, falls into the latter river, and report so has it, that at Celænæ Marsyas contended with Apollo in the music of the pipe. The Mæander, springing up in the highest part of the citadel of Celænæ, runs down through the middle of the city, then through Caria, afterwards through Ionia, and empties itself into a bay which lies between Priene and Miletus. Seleucus, son of Antiochus, came into the consul’s camp at Antioch, to furnish corn for the troops, in conformity with the treaty with Scipio. Here a small dispute arose, concerning the auxiliary troops of Attalus; for Seleucus affirmed, that Antiochus engaged to supply corn to the Roman soldiers only. This difference was terminated by the firmness of the consul, who gave orders to a tribune despatched by him, that the Roman soldiers should receive none, until the auxiliaries under Attalus should have received their share. From hence the army advanced to Gordiutichos,[20] as they call it: from which place it marched, in three days, to Tabæ. This city stands on the confines of Pisidia, in that part which verges to the Pamphylian sea. Whilst the strength of that country was unimpaired, it produced valiant warriors: and even on this occasion, their horsemen, sallying out on the Roman troops, caused by their first onset no small confusion; then, as soon as it appeared that they were not equal to them either in numbers or bravery, being driven back to the city, they begged pardon for their transgressions, and offered to surrender the city. They were ordered to pay twenty-five talents of silver,[21] and ten thousand bushels of wheat; and on these terms their surrender was accepted.
14 On the third day after their leaving this place, the army reached the river Chaus, and proceeding thence, took the city of Eriza at the first assault. They then came to Thabusios, a fort standing on the bank of the river Indus, to which an elephant’s guide thrown from the animal had given its name. They were now not far from Cibyra, yet no embassy appeared from Moagetes, the tyrant of that state; a man faithless and tyrannical in every respect. The consul, in order to sound his intentions, sent forward Caius Helvius, with four thousand foot and five hundred horse. Ambassadors met this body on their entrance into his territories, declaring, that the king was ready to execute their commands. They entreated Helvius to enter their confines in a friendly manner, and to restrain his soldiers from plundering the land; and they brought with them in lieu of a golden crown fifteen talents. Helvius, having promised to keep their lands safe from plunderers, ordered the ambassadors to go on to the consul. And when they delivered the same message to him, the consul said, “We Romans have not any sign of the tyrant’s good will towards us, and we are agreed that he is such a person that we ought rather to think of punishing him than of contracting friendship with him.” Struck with astonishment at such a reception, the ambassadors requested nothing more than that he should receive the present, and give permission to the tyrant to come to him, and an opportunity to speak and excuse himself. By the permission of the consul, the tyrant came next day into the camp. His dress and retinue were scarcely equal to the style of a private person of moderate fortune; while his discourse was humble and incoherent, depreciating his own wealth and complaining of the poverty of the cities under his sway. He had under his dominion, (beside Cibyra,) Syleum, and the city called Alimne. Out of these he promised (in such a manner as if he were diffident that he could strip himself and his subjects of so much) to raise twenty-five talents.[22] “Truly,” said the consul, “this trifling cannot be borne. It is not enough for you that you did not blush, though absent, when you were imposing on us by your ambassadors; but even when present you persist in the same effrontery. Is it that twenty-five talents would exhaust your dominions? If within three days you do not pay down five hundred talents,[23] expect the devastation of your lands and the siege of your city.” Although terrified by this menace, he persisted obstinately in his plea of poverty; gradually by illiberal advances, (sometimes cavilling, sometimes recurring to prayers and counterfeit tears,) he was brought to agree to the payment of one hundred talents,[24] to which, were added ten thousand bushels of corn. All this was done within six days.
15 From Cibyra the army was led through the territory of the Sindensians, and, after crossing the river Caularis, encamped. Next day they marched along the side of the lake of Caralitis, and passed the night at Mandropolis. As they advanced to the next city, Lagos, the inhabitants fled through fear. The place being deserted, yet filled with abundance of every thing, was pillaged by the soldiers. From this they marched to the sources of the river Lysis, and on the next day to the river Cobulatus. At this time the Termessians were besieging the citadel of the Isiondensians, after having taken the city. The besieged, when they had no other hope of aid, sent ambassadors to the consul, imploring succour; adding, that, “being shut up in the citadel, with their wives and children, they were in daily expectation of suffering death, either by the sword or famine.” An occasion for turning aside to Pamphylia was thereby offered to the consul, who was very desirous of it. By his approach he raised the siege of Isionda. He granted peace to Termessus on receiving fifty talents of silver;[25] and, likewise, to the Aspendians and other states of Pamphylia. Returning from Pamphylia he pitched his camp, the first day, at the river Taurus, and the second at Come Xyline,[26] as they call it. Departing from which, he proceeded, by uninterrupted marches, to the city of Cormasa. The next city was Darsa, which he found abandoned by the inhabitants through fear, but filled with abundance of every thing useful. Ambassadors from Lysinoe, with the surrender of that state, met him while marching along the marshes. He then came into the Sagalassenian territory, rich and abounding in every kind of production. The inhabitants are Pisidians, the best soldiers, by far, of any in that part of the world. This circumstance, as well as the fertility of their soil, the multitude of their people, and the situation of their city, preeminently fortified, gave them boldness. The consul sent a party to ravage the country, because no embassy attended him on the frontiers. Then, at length, their obstinacy was overcome, as soon as they saw their property carried off and driven away. After sending ambassadors, and agreeing to pay fifty talents, with twenty thousand bushels of wheat and twenty thousand of barley, they obtained peace. The consul then marched to the source of the Obrima, and encamped at a village called Come Acaridos.[27] Hither Seleucus came, next day, from Apamea. Then when the consul had sent the sick and the useless baggage to Apamea, having received guides from Seleucus, he marched that day into the plain of Metropolis, and advanced on the day following to Diniæ in Phrygia, and thence to Synnas; all the towns on every side being deserted by the inhabitants through fear. And now, bringing along his army encumbered with the spoil of those cities, after scarcely completing in a whole day a march of five miles, he arrived at a town called Old Beudi. Next day he encamped at Anabura; on the following, at the source of the Alander, and on the third at Abassus, where he halted for several days, because he arrived at the borders of the Tolistoboians.
16 These Gauls, in a very numerous body, induced either by scarcity of land or hopes of plunder, and thinking that no nation through which they were to pass would be a match for them in arms, made their way under the command of Brennus into Dardania. There a dissension arose, and about twenty thousand men under the chieftains Leonorius and Lutarius, a secession being made from Brennus, turned their route to Thrace. Then when, fighting with such as resisted them, and imposing a tribute on such as sued for peace, they had arrived at Byzantium, they held possession for a long time of the cities in that quarter, laying the coast of the Propontis under contribution. Then a desire of passing over into Asia seized them, hearing in the neighbourhood how great the fertility of that continent was; and, having taken Lysimachia by treachery, and possessed themselves of the whole Chersonesus by force of arms, they went down to the Hellespont. When they there beheld Asia separated from them by a narrow strait, their wishes to pass into it were much more highly inflamed, and they despatched envoys to Antipater, governor of that coast, to treat of a passage. And when, business being protracted to a greater length than they expected, a new quarrel broke out between their chieftains, Leonorius, with the greater part of the people, went back to Byzantium, whence they came: Lutarius takes two decked ships and three barks from some Macedonians, sent by Antipater, under the pretext of an embassy, to act as spies. By carrying over in these galleys detachment after detachment, day and night, he transported all his troops within a few days. Not long after, Leonorius, with the assistance of Nicomedes, king of Bithynia, passed over from Byzantium. The Gauls then re-united their forces, and assisted Nicomedes in a war which he was carrying on against Zybœta, who held possession of a part of Bithynia. By their assistance chiefly Zybœta was subdued, and the whole of Bithynia reduced under the dominion of Nicomedes. Then leaving Bithynia, they advanced into Asia; and although, of their twenty thousand men, not more than ten thousand carried arms, yet such a degree of terror did they strike into all the natives, dwelling on this side of Taurus, that those which they visited, and those which they did not visit, the most remote as well as the nearest, submitted to their authority. At length as there were three tribes of them, the Tolistoboians, the Trocmians, and the Tectosagians, they made a division of Asia into three provinces, according to which it was made tributary to each of their states. The coast of the Hellespont was assigned to the Trocmians; the Tolistoboians obtained of the allotment Æolia and Ionia; the Tectosagians received the inland parts of Asia. They levied tribute throughout every part of Asia on this side Mount Taurus; but chose their own residence on the banks of the river Halys; and so great was the terror of their name, their numbers, too, increasing by a rapid population, that at last even the kings of Syria did not refuse to pay them tribute. The first of all the inhabitants of Asia who refused, was Attalus, the father of king Eumenes; and beyond the expectation of all, fortune favoured his bold resolution, and he defeated them in a pitched battle; yet he did not so effectually break their spirits, as to make them give up their pretensions to empire. Their power continued the same until the war between Antiochus and the Romans; and, even then, after Antiochus was expelled the country, they still entertained a hope, that, as they lived remote from the sea, the Roman army would not come so far.
17 As the troops were about to act against this enemy, so terrible to all in that part of the world, the consul, in an assembly, addressed the soldiers for the most part to this effect: “It does not escape me, that, of all the nations inhabiting Asia, the Gauls are pre-eminent for military fame. A fierce nation, after overrunning the face of the earth with its arms, has fixed its abode in the midst of a race of men the gentlest in the world. Their tall persons, their long red hair, their vast shields, and swords of enormous length; their songs also, when they are advancing to action, their yells and dances, and the horrid clashing of their armour, while they brandish their shields in a peculiar manner, practised in their original country; all these circumstances are preconcerted to inspire terror. But let Greeks, and Phrygians, and Carians, to whom these things are unusual and strange, be frightened by such acts: to the Romans, accustomed to Gallic tumults, even these vain efforts to strike terror are known. Once our ancestors fled from them, but it was long ago, when they first met them at the Allia. Ever since that time, for, now, two hundred years, the Romans drive them before them in dismay, and kill them like cattle; there have, indeed, been more triumphs celebrated over the Gauls, than over almost all the rest of the world. It is now well known by experience, that if you sustain their first onset, which they make with fiery eagerness and blind fury, their limbs are unnerved with sweat and fatigue; their arms flag; and, though you should not employ a weapon on them, the sun, dust, and thirst prostrate their enervated bodies and minds when their fury has ceased. We have tried them, not only with our legions against theirs, but in single combat, man to man. Titus Manlius and Marcus Valerius have demonstrated how far Roman valour surpasses Gallic fury. Marcus Manlius, singly, thrust back the Gauls who were mounting the Capitol in a body. Our forefathers had to deal with genuine Gauls, born in their own lands; but they are now degenerate, a mongrel race, and, in reality, what they are named, Gallogræcians; just as is the case of vegetables and cattle, the seeds are not so efficacious in preserving their original constitution, as the properties of the soil and climate under which they are reared, are in changing it. The Macedonians who settled at Alexandria in Egypt, or in Seleucia, or Babylonia, or in any other of their colonies scattered over the world, have sunk into Syrians, Parthians, or Egyptians. Marseilles, owing to its situation in the midst of Gauls, has contracted somewhat of the disposition of its adjoining neighbours. What of the hardy, rugged discipline of Sparta hath remained to the Tarentines? Every thing is produced in higher perfection in its own native soil; whatever is planted in a foreign land, by a gradual change in its nature, degenerates into that by which it is nurtured. Therefore you, victorious, will slay the conquered Phrygians, though laden with Gallic armour, as you slew them in the ranks of Antiochus. I am more apprehensive of our gaining but little honour from the victory, than of the struggle being a severe one. King Attalus often routed and put them to flight. Do you think that brutes only, when taken, retain at first their natural ferocity, and subsequently grow tame, after being long fed by the hands of men; and that nature does not exert the same power in softening the savage disposition of men. Do you believe these to be of the same kind that their fathers and grandfathers were? Exiles from home through scarcity of land, they marched along the craggy coast of Illyricum, then traversed Pæonia and Thrace, in a continual struggle against the fiercest nations, and took possession of these countries. A land which could glut them with plenty of every thing, received them hardened and infuriated by so many evils. By the very great fertility of the soil, the very great mildness of the climate, and the gentle dispositions of the neighbouring nations, all that fierceness with which they came has been quite mollified. You, by Hercules, who are the sons of Mars, ought to guard against the seductions of Asia, and shun them from the very first; so great is the power of those foreign pleasures in extinguishing the vigour of the mind, so strong the contagion from the relaxed discipline and manners of the people about you. One thing has happened fortunately; that though they will not bring against you a degree of strength by any means equal to what they formerly possessed, yet they still retain a character among the Greeks equal to what they had at their first coming; consequently you, when victors, will acquire the same warlike renown, as if you had conquered the Gauls still acting up to their ancient standard of courage.”