The Provinces of the Roman Empire, from Caesar to Diocletian. v. 1Mommsen, Theodor
History
The Provinces of the Roman Empire, from Caesar to Diocletian. v. 1
Mommsen, Theodor
Roman provinces -- Administration; Rome -- History -- Empire, 30 B.C.-476 A.D.
The Romans, however, did not make mere military arrangements in the
newly acquired domain. The Germans were urged, like other provincials,
to have law administered to them by the Roman governor, and the summer
expeditions of the general gradually developed into the usual judicial
circuits of the governor. The accusation and defence of the accused
took place in the Latin language; the Roman advocates and legal
assessors began, on the right as on the left side of the Rhine, their
operations, sorely felt everywhere, but here deeply exasperating to
the barbarians, who were unaccustomed to such things. Much was lacking
to the full carrying out of the provincial organisation; a formal
assessment of taxation, a regulated levy for the Roman army, were not
yet thought of. But as the new cantonal union had just been instituted
in Gaul in connection with the divine adoration of the monarch there
introduced, a similar arrangement was made also in the new Germany.
When Drusus consecrated for Gaul the altar of Augustus at Lyons, the
Germans last settled on the left bank of the Rhine, the Ubii, were not
received into this union; but in their chief place, which, as regards
position, was for Germany nearly what Lyons was for the three Gauls, a
similar altar for the Germanic cantons was erected, the priesthood of
which was, in the year 9, administered by the young Cheruscan prince
Segimundus, son of Segestes.
[Sidenote: Retirement of Tiberius from the chief command.]
Political differences, however, in the imperial family broke down or
interrupted the full military success. The discord between Tiberius and
his stepfather led to the former resigning the command in the beginning
of 748 {6.}. The dynastic interest did not allow comprehensive
military operations to be entrusted to other generals than princes
of the imperial house; and after the death of Agrippa and Drusus,
and the retirement of Tiberius, there were no able generals in that
house. Certainly in the ten years, when governors with the ordinary
powers bore sway in Illyricum and in Germany, the military operations
there may not have undergone so complete an interruption as they
appear to us to have done, seeing that tradition, with its courtly
colouring, does not in its report deal out equal measure to campaigns
conducted by, and to those conducted without, princes; but the arrest
laid on them was unmistakable, and this itself was a retrogression.
Ahenobarbus, who, in consequence of his alliance by marriage with the
imperial house--his wife was the daughter of a sister of Augustus--had
greater freedom of action than other officers, and who in his Illyrian
governorship had crossed the Elbe without encountering resistance,
afterwards as governor of Germany reaped no laurels there. Not merely
the exasperation, but the courage also, of the Germans was again
rising, and in the year 2 the country appears again in revolt, the
Cherusci and the Chauci under arms. Meanwhile at the imperial court
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