Plutarch's Lives, Volume 2 (of 4)

by Plutarch

Waking from sleep, Lucullus called his friends and told them his dream, while it was still night; and there came persons from Ilium, who reported that thirteen of the king's quinqueremes had been seen near the Achæan harbour, moving in the direction of Lemnos. Immediately setting sail, Lucullus captured these vessels and killed their commander, Isidorus, and he then advanced against the other captains. Now, as they happened to be at anchor, they drew all their vessels together up to the land, and, fighting from the decks, dealt blows on the men of Lucullus; for the ground rendered it impossible to sail round to the enemy's rear, and, as the ships of Lucullus were afloat, they could make no attack on those of the enemy, which were planted close to the land and securely situated. However, with some difficulty, Lucullus landed the bravest of his soldiers in a part of the island which was accessible, who, falling on the rear of the enemy, killed some and compelled the rest to cut their cables and make their escape from the land, and so to drive their vessels foul of one another, and to be exposed to the blows of the vessels of Lucullus. Many of the enemy perished; but among the captives there was Marius,[359] he who was sent from Sertorius. Marius had only one eye, and the soldiers had received orders from Lucullus, as they were setting out on the expedition, to kill no one-eyed man; for Lucullus designed to make Marius die a shameful and dishonourable death.

XIII. As soon as he had accomplished this, Lucullus hastened in pursuit of Mithridates; for he expected still to find him about Bithynia, and watched by Voconius, whom he had sent with ships to Nikomedia[360] to follow up the pursuit. But Voconius lingered in Samothrakia,[361] where he was getting initiated into mysteries and celebrating festivals. Mithridates, who had set sail with his armament, and was in a hurry to reach Pontus before Lucullus returned, was overtaken by a violent storm, by which some of his ships were shattered and others were sunk; and all the coast for many days was filled with the wrecks that were cast up by the waves. The merchant-vessel in which Mithridates was embarked could not easily be brought to land by those who had the management of it, by reason of its magnitude, in the agitated state of the water, and the great swell, and it was already too heavy to hold out against the sea, and was water-logged; accordingly the king got out of the vessel into a piratical ship, and, intrusting his person to pirates, contrary to expectation and after great hazard he arrived at Heraklea[362] in Pontus. Now it happened that the proud boast of Lucullus to the Senate brought on him no divine retribution.[363] The Senate was voting a sum of three thousand talents to equip a navy for the war, but Lucullus stopped the measure by sending a letter, couched in vaunting terms, in which he said, that without cost and so much preparation, he would with the ships of the allies drive Mithridates from the sea. And he did this with the aid of the deity; for it is said that it was owing to the anger of Artemis Priapine[364] that the storm fell on the Pontic soldiers, who had plundered her temple and carried off the wooden statue.

XIV. Though many advised Lucullus to suspend the war, he paid no heed to them: but, passing through Bithynia and Galatia, he invaded the country of the king. At first he wanted provisions, so that thirty thousand Galatians followed him, each carrying on his shoulders a medimnus of wheat; but as he advanced and reduced all into his power, he got into such abundance of everything that an ox was sold in the camp for a drachma, and a slave for four drachmæ; and, as to the rest of the booty, it was valued so little that some left it behind, and others destroyed it; for there were no means of disposing of anything to anybody when all had abundance. The Roman army had advanced with their cavalry and carried their incursions as far as Themiskyra and the plains on the Thermodon,[365] without doing more than wasting and ravaging the country, when the men began to blame Lucullus for peaceably gaining over all the cities, and they complained that he had not taken a single city by storm, nor given them an opportunity of enriching themselves by plunder. "Nay, even now," they said, "we are quitting Amisus,[366] a prosperous and wealthy city, which it would be no great matter to take, if any one would press the siege, and the general is leading us to fight with Mithridates in the wilds of the Tibareni and Chaldæans."[367] Now, if Lucullus had supposed that these notions would have led the soldiers to such madness as they afterwards showed he would not have overlooked or neglected these matters, nor have apologised instead to those men who were blaming his tardiness for thus lingering in the neighbourhood of insignificant villages for a long time, and allowing Mithridates to increase his strength. "This is the very thing," he said, "that I wish, and I am sitting here with the design of allowing the man again to become powerful, and to get together a sufficient force to meet us, that he may stay, and not fly from us when we advance. Do you not see that a huge and boundless wilderness is in his rear, and the Caucasus[368] is near, and many mountains which are full of deep valleys, sufficient to hide ten thousand kings who decline a battle, and to protect them? and it is only a few days' march from Kabeira[369] into Armenia, and above the plains of Armenia Tigranes[370] the King of Kings has his residence, with a force which enables him to cut the Parthian off from Asia, and he removes the inhabitants of the Greek cities up into Media, and he is master of Syria and Palestine, and the kings, the descendants of Seleucus, he puts to death, and carries off their daughters and wives captives. Tigranes is the kinsman and son-in-law of Mithridates. Indeed, he will not quietly submit to receive Mithridates as a suppliant; but he will war against us, and, if we strive to eject Mithridates from his kingdom we shall run the risk of drawing upon us Tigranes, who has long been seeking for a pretext against us, and he could not have a more specious pretext than to be compelled to aid a man who is his kinsman and a king. Why, then, should we bring this about, and show Mithridates, who does not know it, with whose aid he ought to carry on the war against us? and why should we drive him against his wish, and ingloriously, into the arms of Tigranes, instead of giving him time to collect a force out of his own resources and to recover his courage, and so fight with the Kolchi, and Tibareni, and Cappadocians, whom we have often defeated, rather than fight with the Medes and Armenians?"

XV. Upon such considerations as these, Lucullus protracted the time before Amisus without pushing the siege; and, when the winter was over, leaving Murena to blockade the city, he advanced against Mithridates, who was posted at Kabeira, and intending to oppose the Romans, as he had got together a force of forty thousand infantry and four thousand horse on whom he relied most. Crossing the river Lykus into the plain, Mithridates offered the Romans battle. A contest between the cavalry ensued, in which the Romans fled, and Pomponius, a man of some note, being wounded, was taken prisoner, and brought to Mithridates while he was suffering from his wounds. The king asked him if he would become his friend if his life were spared, to which Pomponius replied, "Yes, if you come to terms with the Romans; if not, I shall be your enemy." Mithridates admired the answer, and did him no harm. Now, Lucullus was afraid to keep the plain country, as the enemy were masters of it with their cavalry, and he was unwilling to advance into the hilly region, which was of great extent and wooded and difficult of access; but it happened that some Greeks were taken prisoners, who had fled into a cave, and the eldest of them, Artemidorus, promised Lucullus to be his guide, and to put him in a position which would be secure for his army, and also contained a fort that commanded Kabeira. Lucullus, trusting the man, set out at nightfall after lighting numerous fires, and getting through the defiles in safety; he gained possession of the position; and, when the day dawned, he was seen above the enemy, posting his soldiers in a place which gave him the opportunity of making an attack if he chose to fight, and secured him against any assault if he chose to remain quiet. At present neither general had any intention of hazarding a battle; but it is said, that while some of the king's men were pursuing a deer, the Romans met them and attempted to cut off their retreat, and this led to a skirmish, in which fresh men kept continually coming up on both sides. At last the king's men had the better, and the Romans, who from the ramparts saw their comrades falling, were in a rage, and crowded about Lucullus, praying him to lead them on, and calling for the signal for battle. But Lucullus, wishing them to learn the value of the presence and sight of a prudent general in a struggle with an enemy and in the midst of danger, told them to keep quiet; and, going down into the plain and meeting the first of the fugitives, he ordered them to stand, and to turn round and face the enemy with him. The men obeyed, and the rest also facing about and forming in order of battle, easily put the enemy to flight, and pursued them to their camp. Lucullus, after retiring to his position, imposed on the fugitives the usual mark of disgrace, by ordering them to dig a trench of twelve feet in their loose jackets, while the rest of the soldiers were standing by and looking on.

XVI. Now there was in the army of Mithridates a prince of the Dandarii,[371] named Olthakus (the Dandarii are one of the tribes of barbarians that live about the Mæotis), a man distinguished in all military matters where strength and daring are required, and also in ability equal to the best, and moreover a man who knew how to ingratiate himself with persons, and of insinuating address. Olthakus, who was always engaged in a kind of rivalry for distinction with one of the princes of the kindred tribes, and was jealous of him, undertook a great exploit for Mithridates, which was to kill Lucullus. The king approved of his design, and purposely showed him some indignities, at which, pretending to be in a rage, Olthakus rode off to Lucullus, who gladly received him, for there was a great report of him in the Roman army; and Lucullus, after some acquaintance with him, was soon pleased with his acuteness and his zeal, and at last admitted him to his table and made him a member of his council. Now when the Dandarian thought he had a fit opportunity, he ordered the slaves to take his horse without the ramparts, and, as it was noontide and the soldiers were lying in the open air and taking their rest, he went to the general's tent, expecting that nobody would prevent him from entering, as he was on terms of intimacy with Lucullus, and said that he was the bearer of some important news. And he would have entered the tent without any suspicion, if sleep, that has been the cause of the death of many generals, had not saved Lucullus; for he happened to be asleep, and Menedemus, one of his chamber-attendants, who was standing by the door, said that Olthakus had not come at a fit time, for Lucullus had just gone to rest himself after long wakefulness and many toils. As Olthakus did not go away when he was told, but said that he would go in, even should Menedemus attempt to prevent him, because he wished to communicate with Lucullus about a matter of emergency and importance, Menedemus began to get in a passion, and, saying that nothing was more urgent than the health of Lucullus, he shoved the man away with both his hands. Olthakus being alarmed stole out of the camp, and, mounting his horse, rode off to the army of Mithridates, without effecting his purpose. Thus, it appears, it is with actions just as it is with medicines—time and circumstance give to the scales that slight turn which saves alive, as well as that which kills.

XVII. After this Sornatius, with ten cohorts, was sent to get supplies of corn. Being pursued by Menander, one of the generals of Mithridates, Sornatius faced about and engaged the enemy, of whom he killed great numbers and put the rest to flight. Again, upon Adrianus being sent with a force, for the purpose of getting an abundant supply of corn for the army, Mithridates did not neglect the opportunity, but sent Menemachus and Myron at the head of a large body of cavalry and infantry. All this force, as it is said, was cut to pieces by the Romans, with the exception of two men. Mithridates concealed the loss, and pretended it was not so great as it really was, but a trifling loss owing to the unskilfulness of the commanders. However, Adrianus triumphantly passed by the camp of the enemy with many waggons loaded with corn and booty, which dispirited Mithridates, and caused irremediable confusion and alarm among his soldiers. Accordingly it was resolved not to stay there any longer. But, while the king's servants were quietly sending away their own property first, and endeavouring to hinder the rest, the soldiers, growing infuriated, pushed towards the passages that led out of the camp, and, attacking the king's servants, began to seize the luggage and massacre the men. In this confusion Dorylaus the general, who had nothing else about him but his purple dress, lost his life by reason of it, and Hermæus, the sacrificing priest, was trampled to death at the gates. The king himself,[372] without attendant or groom to accompany him, fled from the camp mingled with the rest, and was not able to get even one of the royal horses, till at last the eunuch Ptolemæus, who was mounted, spied him as he was hurried along in the stream of fugitives, and leaping down from his horse gave it to the king. The Romans, who were following in pursuit, were now close upon the king, and so far as it was a matter of speed they were under no difficulty about taking him, and they came very near it; but greediness and mercenary motives snatched from the Romans the prey which they had so long followed up in many battles and great dangers, and robbed Lucullus of the crowning triumph to his victory; for the horse which was carrying Mithridates was just within reach of his pursuers, when it happened that one of the mules which was conveying the king's gold either fell into the hands of the enemy accidentally, or was purposely thrown in their way by the king's orders, and while the soldiers were plundering it and getting together the gold, and fighting with one another, they were left behind. And this was not the only loss that Lucullus sustained from their greediness; he had given his men orders to bring to him Kallistratus, who had the charge of all the king's secrets; but those who were taking him to Lucullus, finding that he had five hundred gold pieces in his girdle, put him to death. However, Lucullus allowed his men to plunder the camp.

XVIII. After taking Kabeira and most of the other forts Lucullus found in them great treasures, and also places of confinement, in which many Greeks and many kinsmen of the king were shut up; and, as they had long considered themselves as dead, they were indebted to the kindness of Lucullus, not for their rescue, but for restoration to life and a kind of second birth. A sister also of Mithridates, Nyssa, was captured, and so saved her life; but the women who were supposed to be the farthest from danger, and to be securely lodged at Phernakia,[373] the sisters and wives of Mithridates, came to a sad end, pursuant to the order of Mithridates, which he sent Bacchides,[374] a eunuch, to execute, when he was compelled to take to flight. Among many other women there were two sisters of the king, Roxana and Statira, each about forty years of age and unmarried; and two of his wives, Ionian women, one of them named Berenike from Chios, and the other Monime a Milesian. Monime was much talked of among the Greeks, and there was a story to this effect, that though the king tempted her with an offer of fifteen thousand gold pieces, she held out until a marriage contract was made, and he sent her a diadem[375] with the title of queen. Now Monime hitherto was very unhappy, and bewailed that beauty which had given her a master instead of a husband, and a set of barbarians to watch over her instead of marriage and a family; and she lamented that she was removed from her native country, enjoying her anticipated happiness only in imagination, while she was deprived of all those real pleasures which she might have had at home. When Bacchides arrived, and told the women to die in such manner as they might judge easiest and least painful, Monime pulled the diadem from her head, and, fastening it round her neck, hung herself. As the diadem soon broke, "Cursed rag!" she exclaimed, "you won't even do me this service;" and, spitting on it, she tossed it from her, and presented her throat to Bacchides. Berenike took a cup of poison, and gave a part of it to her mother, who was present, at her own request. Together they drank it up; and the strength of the poison was sufficient for the weaker of the two, but it did not carry off Berenike, who had not drunk enough, and, as she was long in dying, she was strangled with the assistance of Bacchides. Of the two unmarried sisters of Mithridates it is said, that one of them, after uttering many imprecations on her brother and much abuse, drank up the poison. Statira did not utter a word of complaint, or anything unworthy of her noble birth; but she commended her brother for that he had not neglected them at a time when his own life was in danger, and had provided that they should die free and be secure against insult. All this gave pain to Lucullus, who was naturally of a mild and humane temper.

XIX. Lucullus advanced as far as Talaura,[376] whence four days before Mithridates had fled into Armenia to Tigranes. From Talaura Lucullus took a different direction, and after subduing the Chaldæi and Tibareni, and taking possession of the Less Armenia, and reducing forts and cities, he sent Appius to Tigranes to demand Mithridates; but he went himself to Amisus, which was still holding out against the siege. This was owing to Kallimachus the commander, who by his skill in mechanical contrivances, and his ingenuity in devising every resource which is available in a siege, gave the Romans great annoyance, for which he afterwards paid the penalty. Now, however, he was out-generailed by Lucullus, who, by making a sudden attack, just at that time of the day when he was used to lead his soldiers off and to give them rest, got possession of a small part of the wall, upon which Kallimachus quitted the city, having first set fire to it, either because he was unwilling that the Romans should get any advantage from their conquest, or with the view of facilitating his own escape. For no one paid any attention to those who were sailing out; but when the flames had sprung up with violence, and got hold of the walls, the soldiers were making ready to plunder. Lucullus, lamenting the danger in which the city was of being destroyed, attempted from the outside to help the citizens against the fire, and ordered it to be put out; yet nobody attended to him, and the soldiers called out for booty, and shouted and struck their armour, till at last Lucullus was compelled to let them have their way, expecting that he should thus save the city at least from the fire. But the soldiers did just the contrary; for, as they rummaged every place by the aid of torches, and carried about lights in all directions, they destroyed most of the houses themselves, so that Lucullus, who entered the city at daybreak, said to his friends with tears in his eyes, that he had often considered Sulla a fortunate man, but on this day of all others he admired the man's good fortune, in that when he chose to save Athens he had also the power; "but upon me," he said, "who have been emulous to imitate his example, the dæmon has instead brought the reputation of Mummius."[377] However, as far as present circumstances allowed, he endeavoured to restore the city. The fire indeed was quenched by the rains that chanced to fall, as the deity would have it, at the time of the capture, and the greatest part of what had been destroyed Lucullus rebuilt while he stayed at Amisus; and he received into the city such of the Amisenes as had fled, and settled there any other Greeks who were willing to settle, and added to the limits of the territory a tract of one hundred and twenty stadia. Amisus was a colony[378] of the Athenians, planted, as one might suppose, at that period in which their power was at its height and had the command of the sea. And this was the reason why many who wished to escape from the tyranny of Aristion[379] sailed to the Euxine and settled at Amisus, where they became citizens; but it happened that by flying from misfortune at home they came in for a share of the misfortunes of others. Lucullus, however, clothed all of them who survived the capture of the city, and, after giving each two hundred drachmæ besides, he sent them back to their home. On this occasion, Tyrannio[380] the grammarian was taken prisoner. Murena asked him for himself, and on getting Tyrannio set him free, wherein he made an illiberal use of the favour that he had received; for Lucullus did not think it fitting that a man who was esteemed for his learning should be made a slave first and then a freedman; for the giving him an apparent freedom was equivalent to the depriving him of his real freedom. But it was not in this instance only that Murena showed himself far inferior to his general in honourable feeling and conduct.

XX. Lucullus now turned to the cities of Asia, in order that while he had leisure from military operations he might pay some attention to justice and the law, which the province had now felt the want of for a long time, and the people had endured unspeakable and incredible calamities, being plundered and reduced to slavery by the Publicani and the money-lenders, so that individuals were compelled to sell their handsome sons and virgin daughters, and the cities to sell their sacred offerings, pictures and statues. The lot of the citizens was at last to be condemned to slavery themselves, but the sufferings which preceded were still worse—the fixing of ropes and barriers,[381] and horses, and standing under the open sky, during the heat in the sun, and during the cold when they were forced into the mud or the ice; so that slavery was considered a relief from the burden of debt, and a blessing. Such evils as these Lucullus discovered in the cities, and in a short time he relieved the sufferers from all of them. In the first place, he declared that the rate of interest should be reckoned at the hundredth part,[382] and no more; in the second, he cut off all the interest which exceeded the capital; thirdly, what was most important of all, he declared that the lender should receive the fourth part of the income of the debtor; but any lender who had tacked the interest to the principal was deprived of the whole: thus, in less than four years all the debts were paid, and their property was given back to them free from all encumbrance. Now the common debt originated in the twenty thousand talents which Sulla had laid on Asia as a contribution, and twice this amount was repaid to the lenders, though they had indeed now brought the debt up to the amount of one hundred and twenty thousand talents by means of the interest. The lenders, however, considered themselves very ill used, and they raised a great outcry against Lucullus at Rome, and they endeavoured to bribe some of the demagogues to attack him; for the lenders had great influence, and had among their debtors many of the men who were engaged in public life. But Lucullus gained the affection of the cities which had been favoured by him, and the other provinces also longed to see such a man over them, and felicitated those who had the good luck to have such a governor.

XXI. Appius Clodius,[383] who was sent to Tigranes (now Clodius was the brother of the then wife of Lucullus), was at first conducted by the king's guides through the upper part of the country, by a route unnecessarily circuitous and roundabout, and one that required many days' journeying; but, as soon as the straight road was indicated to him by a freedman, a Syrian by nation, he quitted that tedious and tricky road, and, bidding his barbarian guides farewell, he crossed the Euphrates in a few days, and arrived at Antiocheia,[384] near Daphne. There he waited for Tigranes, pursuant to the king's orders (for Tigranes was absent, and still engaged in reducing some of the Phœnician cities), and in the meantime he gained over many of the princes who paid the Armenian a hollow obedience, among whom was Zarbienus, King of Gordyene,[385] and he promised aid from Lucullus to many of the enslaved cities, which secretly sent to him—bidding them, however, keep quiet for the present. Now the rule of the Armenians was not tolerable to the Greeks, but was harsh; and what was worse, the king's temper had become violent and exceedingly haughty in his great prosperity; for he had not only everything about him which the many covet and admire, but he seemed to think that everything was made for him. Beginning with expectations which were slight and contemptible, he had subdued many nations, and humbled the power of the Parthians as no man before him had done; and he filled Mesopotamia with Greeks, many from Cilicia and many from Cappadocia, whom he removed and settled. He also removed from their abodes the Skenite Arabians,[386] and settled them near him, that he might with their aid have the benefit of commerce. Many were the kings who were in attendance on him; but there were four who were always about him, like attendants or guards, and when he mounted his horse they ran by his side in jackets; and when he was seated and transacting business, they stood by with their hands clasped together, which was considered to be of all attitudes the most expressive of servitude, as if they had sold their freedom, and were presenting their bodies to their master in a posture indicating readiness to suffer rather than to act. Appius, however, was not alarmed or startled at the tragedy show; but, as soon as he had an opportunity of addressing the king, he told him plainly that he was come to take back Mithridates, as one who belonged to the triumphs of Lucullus, or to denounce war against Tigranes. Though the king made an effort to preserve a tranquil mien, and affected a smile while he was listening to the address, he could not conceal from the bystanders that he was disconcerted by the bold speech of the youth, he who had not for near five-and-twenty years[387] heard the voice of a free man; for so many years had he been king, or rather tyrant. However, he replied to Appius that he would not give up Mithridates, and that he would resist the Romans if they attacked him. He was angry with Lucullus because he addressed him in his letter by the title of King only, and not King of Kings, and, accordingly in his reply, Tigranes did not address Lucullus by the title of Imperator. But he sent splendid presents to Appius, and when they were refused he sent still more. Appius, not wishing to appear to reject the king's presents from any hostile feeling, selected from among them a goblet, and sent the rest back; and then with all speed set off to join the Imperator.