The Histories of Polybius, Vol. 2 (of 2)

by Polybius

The rest of the procession was almost beyond description, but I must give a summary account of it. It consisted of eight hundred young men wearing gold crowns, about a thousand fine oxen, foreign delegates to the number of nearly three hundred, and eight hundred ivory tusks. The number of images of the gods it is impossible to tell completely: for representations of every god or demigod or hero accepted by mankind were carried there, some gilded and others adorned with gold-embroidered robes; and the myths, belonging to each, according to accepted tradition, were represented by the most costly symbols. Behind them were carried representations of Night and Day, Earth, Heaven, Morning and Noon. The best idea that I can give of the amount of gold and silver plate is this: one of the king’s friends, Dionysius his secretary, had a thousand boys in the procession carrying silver vessels, none of which weighed less than a thousand drachmae;[179] and by their side walked six hundred young slaves of the king holding gold vessels. There were also two hundred women sprinkling unguents from gold boxes; and after them came eighty women sitting in litters with gold feet, and five hundred in litters with silver feet, all adorned with great costliness. These were the most remarkable features of the procession.

[4.] The festival, including the gladiatorial shows and hunting, lasted thirty days, in the course of which there was continual round of spectacles. During the first five of these everybody in the gymnasium anointed himself with oil scented with saffron in gold vessels, of which there were fifteen, and the same number scented with cinnamon and nard. On the following days other vessels were brought in scented with fenugreek, marjoram, and lily, all of extraordinary fragrancy. Public banquets were also given, at which couches were prepared, sometimes for a thousand and sometimes for fifteen hundred, with the utmost splendour and costliness.

The whole of the arrangements were made personally by the king. He rode on an inferior horse by the side of the procession, ordering one part to advance, and another to halt, as occasion required; so that, if his diadem had been removed, no one would have believed that he was the king and the master of all; for his appearance was not equal to that of a moderately good servant. At the feasts also he stood himself at the entrance, and admitted some and assigned others their places; he personally ushered in the servants bringing the dishes; and walking about among the company sometimes sat down and sometimes lay down on the couches. Sometimes he would jump up, lay down the morsel of food or the cup that he was raising to his lips, and go to another part of the hall; and walking among the guests acknowledge the compliment, as now one and now another pledged him in wine, or jest at any recitations that might be going on. And when the festivity had gone on for a long time, and a good many of the guests had departed, the king was carried in by the mummers, completely shrouded in a robe, and laid upon the ground, as though he were one of the actors; then, at the signal given by the music, he leapt up, stripped, and began to dance with the jesters; so that all the guests were scandalised and retired. In fact every one who attended the festival, when they saw the extraordinary wealth which was displayed at it, the arrangements made in the processions and games, and the scale of the splendour on which the whole was managed, were struck with amazement and wonder both at the king and the greatness of his kingdom: but when they fixed their eyes on the man himself, and the contemptible conduct to which he condescended, they could scarcely believe that so much excellence and baseness could exist in one and the same breast.[180]...

[5.] After the completion of the festival, the envoys with Tiberius Gracchus arrived,Roman envoys at Antioch. Antiochus affects extreme cordiality. who had been sent from Rome to investigate the state of affairs in Syria. Antiochus received them with such tact and with so many expressions of kindness, that Tiberius not only had no suspicion that he was meditating any active step, or cherishing any sinister feeling on account of what had happened at Alexandria, but was even induced by the extraordinary kindness of his reception to discredit those who made any such suggestion. For, besides other courtesies, the king gave up his own hall for the use of the envoys, and almost his crown in appearance; although his true sentiments were not at all of this kind, and he was on the contrary profoundly incensed with the Romans....

[6.] A large number of ambassadors from various quarters having arrived at Rome, the most important of whichB.C. 164. Complaints against Eumenes at Rome from Prusias of Bithynia, and other parts of Asia. were those with Astymedes from Rhodes, Eureus, Anaxidamus and Satyrus from the Achaeans, and those with Pytho from Prusias,—the Senate gave audience to these last. The ambassadors from Prusias complained of king Eumenes, alleging that he had taken certain places belonging to their country, and had not in any sense evacuated Galatia, or obeyed the decrees of the Senate; but had been supporting all who favoured himself, and depressing in every possible way those who wished to shape their policy in accordance with the Senate’s decrees. There were also some ambassadors from certain towns in Asia, who accused the king on the grounds of his intimate association with Antiochus. The Senate listened to the accusers, and neither rejected their accusations nor openly expressed its own opinion; but acted with close reserve, thoroughly distrusting both Eumenes and Antiochus: The Senate’s policy in Galatia. and meanwhile contented itself by continually supporting Galatia and contriving some fresh security for its freedom. But the envoys under Tiberius Failure of the mission of Gracchus.Gracchus, on their return from their mission, had no clearer idea themselves in regard to Eumenes and Antiochus than before they left Rome, nor could they give the Senate one either. So completely had the kings hoodwinked them by the cordiality of their reception.

[7.] The Senate next called in the Rhodians and heard what they had to say.Rhodians appeal against the injury done to their trade, B.C. 165. When Astymedes entered, he adopted a more moderate and more effective line of argument than on his former embassy. He omitted the invectives against others, and took the humble tone of men who are being flogged, begging to be forgiven, and declaring that his country had suffered sufficient punishment, and a more severe one than its crime deserved. And then he went briefly through the list of the Rhodian losses.Speech of Astymedes. “First, they have lost Lycia and Caria, which had already cost them a large sum of money, having been forced to support three wars against them; while at the present moment they have been deprived of a considerable revenue which they used to draw from those countries. But perhaps,” he added, “this is as it should be: you gave them to our people as a free gift, because you regarded us with favour; and in now recalling your gift, because you suspect and are at variance with us, you may seem only to be acting reasonably. But Caunus, at any rate, we purchased from Ptolemy’s officers for two hundred talents; and Stratoniceia we received as a great favour from Antiochus, son of Seleucus; and from those two towns our people had a revenue of a hundred and twenty talents a year. All these sources of revenue we have surrendered, in our submission to your injunctions. From which it appears that you have imposed a heavier penalty on the Rhodians for one act of folly, than on the Macedonians that have been continually at war with you. But the greatest disaster of all to our State is that the revenue from its harbour has been abolished by your making Delos a free port; and by your depriving our people of that independence by which the harbour, as well as other interests of the States, were maintained in suitable dignity.[181] And it is easy to satisfy yourselves of the truth of my words. Our revenue from harbour dues amounted in past years to one million drachmae, from which you have now taken one hundred and fifty thousand; so that it is only too true, gentlemen of Rome, that your anger has affected the resources of the country. Now, if the mistake committed, and the alienation from Rome, had been shared in by the entire people, you might perhaps have seemed to be acting rightly in maintaining a lasting and irreconcilable anger against us; but if the fact is made clear to you that it was an exceedingly small number who shared in this foolish policy, and that these have all been put to death by this very people itself, why still be irreconcilable to those who are in no respect guilty? Especially when to every one else you are reputed to exhibit the highest possible clemency and magnanimity. Wherefore, gentlemen, our people having lost their revenues, their freedom of debate, and their position of independence, in defence of which in time past they have been ever willing to make any sacrifices, now beg and beseech you all, as having been smitten sufficiently, to relax your anger, and to be reconciled and make this alliance with them: that it may be made manifest to all the world that you have put away your anger against Rhodes, and have returned to your old feelings and friendship towards them.” Such among others were the words of Astymedes.The Senate is mollified by this speech and by the report of Gracchus, and grants the alliance. He was thought to have spoken much to the point in the circumstances; but what helped the Rhodians to the alliance more than anything else was the recent return of the embassy under Tiberius Gracchus. For he gave evidence, in the first place, that the Rhodians had obeyed all the decrees of the Senate; and in the next place, that the men who were the authors of their hostile policy had all been condemned to death; and by this testimony overcame all opposition, and secured the alliance between Rome and Rhodes....

[8.] After an interval the envoys of the Achaeans were admitted with instructions conformable to the last reply received,B.C. 165. Embassy from Achaia asking for the trial or release of the Achaean détenus, who to the number of over 1000 had been summoned to Italy in B. C. 167. See 30, [13]. Pausan. 7, 10, 11. which was to the effect that “The Senate were surprised that they should apply to them for a decision on matters which they had already decided for themselves.” Accordingly another embassy under Eureus now appeared to explain that “The league had neither heard the defence of the accused persons, nor given any decision whatever concerning them; but wished the Senate to take measures in regard to these men, that they might have a trial and not perish uncondemned. They begged that, if possible, the Senate should itself conduct the investigation, and declare who are the persons guilty of those charges; but, if its variety of business made it impossible to do this itself, that it should intrust the business to the Achaeans, who would show by their treatment of the guilty their detestation of their crime.” The Senate recognised that the tone of the embassy was in conformity with its own injunctions, but still felt embarrassed how to act. Both courses were open to objection. To judge the case of the men was, it thought, not a task it ought to undertake; and to release them without any trial at all evidently involved ruin to the friends of Rome. In this strait the Senate, wishing to take all hope from the Achaean people of the restitution of the men who were detained, in order that they might obey without a murmur Callicrates in Achaia, and in the other states those who sided with Rome, wrote the following answer: “We do not consider it advisable either for ourselves or for your nationalities that these men should return home.” The publication of this answer not only reduced the men who had been summoned to Italy to complete despair and dejection, but was regarded by all Greeks as a common sorrow, for it seemed to take away all hope of restoration from these unfortunate men. When it was announced in Greece the people were quite crushed, and a kind of desperation invaded the minds of all; but Charops and Callicrates, and all who shared their policy, were once more in high spirits....

[9.] Tiberius Gracchus, partly by force and partly by persuasion,Reduction of the Cammani in Cappadocia. reduced the Cammani to obedience to Rome....

A large number of embassies having come to Rome, the Senate gave a reply to Attalus and Athenaeus. For Prusias, not content with earnestly pressing his accusations himself against Eumenes and Attalus, had also instigated the Gauls and Selgians (in Pisidia), and many others in Asia, to adopt the same policy; consequently king Eumenes had sent his brothers to defend him against the accusations thus brought. On their admission to the Senate they were thought to have made a satisfactory defence against all accusers; and finally returned to Asia, after not only rebutting the accusations, but with marks of special honour. The Senate, however, did not altogether cease to be suspicious of Eumenes and Antiochus. They sent Gaius Sulpicius and Manius Sergius as envoys to investigate the state of Greece; to decide the question of territory that had arisen between Megalopolis and the Lacedaemonians; but, above all, to give attention to the proceedings of Antiochus and Eumenes, and to discover whether any warlike preparations were being made by either of them, or any combination being formed between them against Rome....

[10.] Besides his other follies, Gaius Sulpicius Gallus, on arriving in Asia, put up notices in the most important cities,The mission, Sulpicius Gallus in Asia; he collects facts against Eumenes. ordering any one who wished to bring any accusation against king Eumenes to meet him at Sardis within a specified time. He then went to Sardis, and, taking his seat in the Gymnasium, gave audience for ten days to those who had such accusations to make: admitting every kind of foul and abusive language against the king, and, generally, making the most of every fact and every accusation; for he was frantic and inveterate in his hatred of Eumenes....