The History of Rome, Book V: The Establishment of the Military Monarchy — John Shaqi
The History of Rome, Book V: The Establishment of the Military MonarchyMommsen, Theodor
History
The History of Rome, Book V: The Establishment of the Military Monarchy
Mommsen, Theodor
Rome -- History
But even before the democrats moved in the capital, the democratic
emigrants had again bestirred themselves in Spain. The soul
of this movement was Quintus Sertorius. This excellent man,
a native of Nursia in the Sabine land, was from the first
of a tender and even soft organization--as his almost enthusiastic love
for his mother, Raia, shows--and at the same time of the most chivalrous
bravery, as was proved by the honourable scars which he brought
home from the Cimbrian, Spanish, and Italian wars. Although wholly
untrained as an orator, he excited the admiration of learned
advocates by the natural flow and the striking self-possession
of his address. His remarkable military and statesmanly talent
had found opportunity of shining by contrast, more particularly
in the revolutionary war which the democrats so wretchedly and stupidly
mismanaged; he was confessedly the only democratic officer
who knew how to prepare and to conduct war, and the only democratic
statesman who opposed the insensate and furious doings of his party
with statesmanlike energy. His Spanish soldiers called him the new
Hannibal, and not merely because he had, like that hero, lost
an eye in war. He in reality reminds us of the great Phoenician
by his equally cunning and courageous strategy, by his rare talent
of organizing war by means of war, by his adroitness in attracting
foreign nations to his interest and making them serviceable to his ends,
by his prudence in success and misfortune, by the quickness
of his ingenuity in turning to good account his victories
and averting the consequences of his defeats. It may be doubted
whether any Roman statesman of the earlier period, or of the present,
can be compared in point of versatile talent to Sertorius.
After Sulla's generals had compelled him to quit Spain,(15)
he had led a restless life of adventure along the Spanish and African
coasts, sometimes in league, sometimes at war, with the Cilician
pirates who haunted these seas, and with the chieftains
of the roving tribes of Libya. The victorious Roman restoration had
pursued him even thither: when he was besieging Tingis (Tangiers),
a corps under Pacciaecus from Roman Africa had come to the help
of the prince of the town; but Pacciaecus was totally defeated,
and Tingis was taken by Sertorius. On the report of such achievements
by the Roman refugee spreading abroad, the Lusitanians, who,
notwithstanding their pretended submission to the Roman supremacy,
practically maintained their independence, and annually fought
with the governors of Further Spain, sent envoys to Sertorius
in Africa, to invite him to join them, and to commit to him
the command of their militia.
Renewed Outbreak of the Spanish Insurrection
Metellus Sent to Spain
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