Tacitus: The Histories, Volumes I and IITacitus, Cornelius
History
Tacitus: The Histories, Volumes I and II
Tacitus, Cornelius
Rome -- History -- Civil War, 68-69; Rome -- History -- Flavians, 69-96
name of Rome, now came flocking out from fields and houses, and
scattered far and wide in transports of joy at this unwonted sight.
Their insulting glee was too much for 'The Picenum Horse'.[405]
Defying all Sanctus' threats and promises, they turned off to Mainz,
and coming by chance upon Longinus, the man who killed Vocula, they
slew him with a shower of javelins and thus made a beginning of future
amends. The legions, without changing their route, came and camped
before the walls of Trier.
Highly elated by their success, Civilis and Classicus debated 63
whether they should allow their troops to sack Cologne. Their natural
savagery and lust for plunder inclined them to destroy the town, but
policy forbade; and they felt that in inaugurating a new empire a
reputation for clemency would be an asset. Civilis was also moved by
the memory of a past service, for at the beginning of the outbreak his
son had been arrested in Cologne, and they had kept him in honourable
custody. However, the tribes across the Rhine were jealous of this
rich and rising community, and held that the war could only be ended
either by throwing the settlement open to all Germans without
distinction or by destroying it and thereby dispersing the Ubii 64
together with its other inhabitants.[406] Accordingly the
Tencteri,[407] their nearest neighbours across the Rhine, dispatched a
deputation to lay a message before a public meeting of the town. This
was delivered by the haughtiest of the delegates in some such terms as
these:--'We give thanks to the national gods of Germany and above all
others, to the god of war, that you are again incorporate in the
German nation and the German name, and we congratulate you that you
will now at last become free members of a free community. Until to-day
the Romans had closed to us the roads and rivers, and almost the very
air of heaven, to prevent all intercourse between us; or else they
offered a still fouler insult to born warriors, that we should meet
under supervision, unarmed and almost naked,[408] and should pay for
the privilege. Now, that our friendly alliance may be ratified for all
eternity, we demand of you that you pull down those bulwarks of
slavery, the walls of your town, for even wild beasts lose their
spirit if you keep them caged: that you put to the sword every Roman
on your soil, since tyrants are incompatible with freedom; that all
the property of those killed form a common stock and no one be
allowed to conceal anything or to secure any private advantage. It
must also be open both for us and for you to live on either
river-bank, as our forefathers could in earlier days. As daylight is
the natural heritage of all mankind, so the land of the world is free
to all brave men. Resume again the customs and manners of your own
country and throw off those luxurious habits which enslave Rome's
subjects far more effectively than Roman arms. Then, grown simple and
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