CRISTO RAUL.ORG

READING HALL

THE DOORS OF WISDOM

OCTAVIUS CAESAR AUGUSTUS :

THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THE FOUNDER OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE

CHAPTER IX

THE FIRST PRINCIPATUS, B.C. 27-23

The settlement of his official status at Rome left Augustus free to turn to other parts of the Empire. He had spent the greater part of two years after the victory at Actium in organising the East. His face was now turned northward and westward. In the spring of BC27, he set, out for Gaul to reorganise the provinces won by Iulius in BC 58-49, and farther secured by the operations of Agrippa in BC 37 and Messalla in BC29. It was understood that he meant also to cross to Britain, and the court poets are dutifully anxious as to the dangers he will incur, and prophetically certain of the victories he will win. A British expedition had been for some years floating in Roman minds. It is true that Iulius Caesar had invaded the island and imposed a tribute on some of the tribes. But the tribute does not seem to have been paid. The Briton was still intactus, and was classed with the Parthian as a danger to the frontier of the Empire. He was chiefly known at Rome by the presence of certain stalwart slaves, and by the determination he displayed not to admit adventurous Roman merchants. But, after all, Augustus found enough to do in Gaul, and saw good reason for abstaining from such a dangerous adventure. The Britons, though they neglected the tributum, yet paid a duty on exports and imports to and from Gaul, principally ivory ornaments, and the better sorts of glass and pottery; and it was pointed out that the danger of a British invasion of Gallia was small, that a military occupation of the island would cost more than the tribute would bring in, and that the portoria would be rather diminished than increased by it. Augustus, at any rate, professed to be satisfied by certain envoys sent to him from Britain. They dedicated some offerings on the Capitol, and received for their countrymen the title of “Friends of Rome!”

Augustus spent the summer and winter of BC 27-6 in Narbo, finding enough to do in holding a census of the rest of Gaul for purposes of taxation, and regularly organising the country annexed by Iulius to that ancient province, which had been Roman long before his time. Four provinces were created with separate legati. The original “province” was now called Gallia Narbonensis; the south-western district, extending from the Pyrenees to the Loire, retained its old name of Aquitania; the Central or “Celtic” Gaul was called Lugdunensis, from its capital Lugdunum, made a colonia in BC43; the northern country up to the Rhine was Belgica, including the districts on the left bank of the Rhine, in which Agrippa had settled certain German tribes who had crossed the river. Augustus was not content with a merely political organisation. He established schools to spread the use of the Latin language, and everywhere introduced the principles of Roman law. He took especial pains to adorn and promote the towns in Narbonensis, where traces of his buildings are still to be seen. The effect of his work now and ten years later was that Gaul became rapidly Romanised both in speech and manners, and that in learning and civilisation it soon rivalled Italy itself.

This was a work thoroughly congenial to Augustus, and in which his ability was conspicuous. But he now had to engage again in war, for which his genius was by no means so well suited. Ianus Quirinus was again open. The surrounding barbarians were again threatening Macedonia; the Salassi of the Val d’Aosta were again making raids, and there was imminent danger in Northern Spain.

The Salassi, who had for the last 100 years given much trouble, had twice in recent years been in arms: in BC35 they defeated C. Antistius Vetus, and, in BC34, had, with great difficulty, been partly subdued by Valerius Messalla. Their command of the principal Alpine pass made it important that they should be kept in check.

The governor of Macedonia, M. Crassus (grandson of the triumvir) had been so successful over the Thracians and Getae, that he was allowed a triumph in July, BC27, but it appears that their incursions did not cease in spite of these victories. The war with the Salassi was entrusted to Terentius Varro Muraena, who, after winning some victories in the field, sold many thousands of their men of military age into slavery, and established a colony of 3,000 veterans to overawe them, called Augusta Pretoria, the modern Aosta.

From Narbo, Augustus next proceeded to Spain in the early part of BC26, and spent the rest of the year in peaceful reforms and in the organisation of the province. But in BC25 he was forced to enter upon a campaign against the Cantabri and Astures, those warlike tribes in the north-west, who, nominally included in the upper province, were continually harassing the more obedient peoples, and showing their dislike of Roman supremacy. The war was tantalising and difficult. The hardy highlanders knew every forest, mountain, and valley, and the Roman soldiers could neither provide against sudden attacks, not get at the enemy in their fastnesses. From fatigue and anxiety Augustus fell ill and was obliged to retire to Tarraco, leaving the conduct of the campaign to Gaius Antistius Vetus, who was able to win several engagements, because after the retirement of Augustus the natives ventured more frequently to appear in the open. Another of his legates, Titus Carisius, took Lance (Sallanco); and finally Augustus founded a colony of veterans among the Lusitani, called Augusta Emerita (Merida), and another called Caesar-Augusta (Zaragossa) among the Editani, on the site of the ancient Salduba, from which all the great roads to the Pyrennees branch off. The Cantabri were not crushed, but they were quiet for a time. Ianus was closed, and Augustus returned at the beginning of BC24; and the courtier Horace is again called on to celebrate a success, and to welcome the Emperor’s home-coming as of a victor. The Senate voted him a triumph, partly for the Spanish campaign and partly for some successes of his legate, M. Vinicius, in Gaul, who had caused his soldiers to proclaim Augustus imperator for the eighth time. Augustus refused the triumph, but accepted the acclamation of imperator—thus assuming as head of the army that what was everywhere done was, to use the technical expression, done “under his auspices,” and was to be reckoned to his credit. He also accepted honours for his young nephew Marcellus, and his stepson Tiberius. The former was admitted to the Senate with praetorian rank, and with ten years seniority for office, in virtue of which he was at once elected aedile, though only in his twentieth year; the latter was allowed five years’ seniority, and at once elected quaestor in his nineteenth year. A triumphal arch was also erected in honour of Augustus in the Alpine region. The temple of Ianus did not remain long closed, however. Soon after Augustus left Spain the Cantabri and Astures again rose; and in BC24 took place the ill-judged and unfortunate expedition of Aelius Gallus into Arabia. A march of six months’ duration, in which large numbers perished from heat and disease and only seven men in actual fighting, was followed by a retreat lasting sixty days. Gallus had been misled and duped by the satrap of the Nabataeans, and all the hopes of splendid booty were baffled. The expedition had been approved, if not suggested, by Augustus, partly on the pretext of preventing incursions into Egypt; but more, it would seem, because Arabia was regarded as an El Dorado, where vast treasures of gold and jewels were to be found, accumulated from the export of the rich spices of the country, which the inhabitants were believed to keep jealously in a country as yet never pillaged by an invader. As usual, the court poets echo the popular delusions, and eulogise the certain success of the Emperor; Horace harps on the rich “treasures of the Arabians,” their “well-stocked houses,” their “virgin stores.” The Roman arms are to strike terror in the East and the Red Sea, and are at length being employed on what is their proper and natural foe: Augustus, says another poet, is now a terror to the “homestead of the yet unplundered Arabia.” Happily this was an almost solitary instance of such wild schemes, prompted by greed, and promoted by ignorance and delusion. Augustus came to see that the frontiers of his great empire afforded sufficient work for its military resources; but it was not till near the end of his long life that a great military disaster gave him a sharp reminder of the impolicy of pushing beyond them.

During these years the process of adorning Rome with splendid buildings or restorations of old ones had been steadily going on. For the largest number of these Augustus himself was responsible. In BC28 the temple of Apollo on the Palatine, with its colonnades and libraries, had been dedicated. In the same year the restoration of 82 temples was begun on his initiative, and apparently at his expense. The new temple of Mars Ultor, vowed at Philippi, with its surrounding forum Augustum, was in process of erection, as well as another to Iupiter Tonans on the Capitol, vowed in the course of the Cantabrian expedition to commemorate a narrow escape from being struck by lightning. He also completed the forum and basilica partly erected by Iulius, had begun or projected the porticus Livia et Octaviae, and had erected the imposing rotunda intended as the mortuary of the ulIian gens: while Statilius Taurus had built the first amphitheatre, Plancus a great temple of Saturn, and Cornelius Balbus was about to begin a new theatre. But most splendid of all were the benefactions of Agrippa. Baths, bridges, colonnades, gardens, aqueducts, were all dedicated by him to the use of the public. Above all, by BC25 he had completed the magnificent Pantheon, still in its decline one of the most striking buildings in the world. It was dedicated to Mars and Venus, mythical ancestors of the Iulian gens, but its name may be derived either from its numerous statues of the gods, or from the supposed likeness of its dome to the sky. Its purpose—beyond being a compliment to Augustus—is still a subject of dispute. Nor have we any record of its use except as the meeting-place of the Arval brothers.

Great way, therefore, was already made towards justifying the boast of Augustus that he found Rome brick and left it marble. For these buildings were lined or paved with every kind of precious marble and stone. But  the year following his return from Spain witnessed a crisis in his life as well as in his political position. He seems to have been in a feeble state of health all through BC 24, the effect probably of his fatigues and anxieties in Spain. But soon after entering on his eleventh consulship in BC23, he became so much worse that he believed himself to be dying. It became necessary, therefore, to make provision for the continuance of the government. Augustus had no hereditary office, and no power of transmitting his authority. Still it was supposed that he was training his nephew and son-in-law Marcellus, or his stepson Tiberius, to be his successor. The former was curule-aedile, and seems to have conceived the ambition of succeeding his uncle. But when he thought death approaching, Augustus did not designate either of these young men. He handed his seal to Agrippa, and the official records of the army and revenue to Cn. Calpurnius Piso, his colleague in the consulship. He would play his part as constitutional magistrate to the last. To speculate on what might have been is not very profitable. Agrippa had advised a restoration of the republic in BC30. But every year since then had made it more difficult; and, if he had wished to do it, he would probably have found it as impossible as his master had done, and would have had to choose between supporting Marcellus and taking the direction of affairs into his own hands. The difficulty, however, did not arise; for owing either to the goodness of his constitution, or the skill of his physician, Antonius Musa, Augustus recovered.

When he met the Senate once more he offered to read his will to prove that he had been true to his constitutional obligations, and had named no successor, but had left the decision in the hands of the Senate and people. The Senators, however, declined to hear it, but insisted that the powers which he had been exercising should be more clearly defined and placed on a better legal footing. Accordingly a Senatus-consultum was drawn up, to be afterwards submitted to the centuriate assembly, giving him a variety of powers, and forming a precedent which was followed in the case of subsequent emperors. It began with a confirmation of the tribunicia potestas, for life and unlimited as to place, with the right of bringing business of any kind before the Senate (ius relationis). It next gave him the far proconsular, both within and without the pomaerium, involving a maius imperium in all provinces. Further, it gave him the right of making treaties; the right of summoning, consuming, and dismissing the Senate (ius consular); the confirmation of all his acta, “Whatever he shall think to be for the benefit and honour of the republic in things divine and human, whether public or private”; finally, exemption from the provisions of certain laws and plebiscita. Some legal difficulty was apparently discovered afterwards as to the right of proposing laws to the centuriate assembly, which was remedied in BC19 by his receiving the full consular power for life, with the right of having lictors, and sitting on the consular bench. This seems to have been a concession to legal purists. He doubtless exercised the full consular powers before; but a distinction was drawn by some between the ius consular and the imperium consulare, and whatever doubt there might be was now set at rest.

As the imperial powers may now be considered as fully developed, future extensions being merely logical deduction from the constitution as now established, it will be convenient here once for all to point out their nature and extent. They may be classed under two headings—(1) imperium; (2) potestas tribunicia.

The first—imperium—embraces all those powers which Augustus obtained as representing the curule magistrates, or from special law and senatorial decrees. As imperator, then, he had supreme command of all forces by land or sea. The military oath was now taken in his name, no longer to individual officers raising legions. He alone had the right to enrol soldiers; he nominated the officers; his procurators paid the men in his name; from him proceeded all rewards. The Senate, indeed, still awarded triumphs and triumphalia ornamenta, but it was at his suggestion, and the tendency was to confine the right of triumph to the Emperor himself.

By the same imperium he decided on questions of peace or war; on the distribution of the ager publicus, and the assignation of lands to veterans and coloni generally.

Finally, the right of conferring the citizenship, complete or partial, and settling the status of all colonies and municipia, and of interpreting the laws by a constitutio principis, expressed in an edict or decree, which amounted, in fact, to legislative power.

The second—potestas tribunicia—was superior to the ordinary powers of the tribunes, because by it he could veto their proceedings, while they could not veto his. “It gave him”—to use Dio’s words—“the means of absolutely putting a stop to any proceeding of which he disapproved; it rendered his person inviolable, so that the least violence offered him by word or deed made a man liable to death without trial as being under a curse.” From the ancient constitution of the office also it made him president of the comitia tributa(representing the old consilia plebis), gave him the right of interposing in all decisions of magistrates or Senate affecting the persons or civil status of citizens (auxilii latio), and that of compelling obedience by imprisonment or other means, as in the republic the tribunes had done even to the consuls in extreme cases (coercitio). Though this power was given the Emperor for life, it was also in a sense annual; and it was in effect so much the most important of all his powers, while at the same time in origin and professed object so much the most popular, that it became the custom from henceforth to date all documents, inscriptions, and the like, by the year of the tribunician power from 27th of June this year (BC23). The imperium was renewed at intervals of ten or five years, the tribunician power of Augustus went on from year to year without break. It was now unnecessary any longer to hold the consulship, for the imperium given him in other ways covered all, and more than all, which the consulship could give. It was convenient to use it for rewarding others, as it retained all its outward signs of dignity, and still in theory made its holder head of the state, though in reality its duties had become almost wholly ceremonial. He therefore abdicated the consulship, which he did not hold again till BC5, when he desired to give éclat to his grandson’s deductio in forum.

The clause in the lex, quoted above, also gave Augustus supreme control of all religious matters, and made him able, among other things, to nominate most of the members of the sacred colleges. He did not become Pontifex Maximus till the death of Lepidus (BC13). When that took place he became official, as well as real, head of the Roman religion.

Certain other arrangements in regard to the city of Rome itself followed, all in the direction of centralisation. Thus Augustus presided at the review of the equites, which used to be held by the censors. Public works were mostly entrusted to curatores appointed by him; for the supply of corn he named a annonne; and for police a praefectus urbi, under whom were the cohortes urbana, the night-watch and fire brigade (nocturni vigiles). Each of these bodies had their own officers or praefecti; but Auguustus from time to time appointed some one as praefectus urbi, to whom all alike would be subject. Such an officer, however, did not always assume the name, and really as well as theoretically the ultimate authority was Augustus himself, who later on, by dividing Rome into regiones and vici, made elaborate arrangements for the effective policing of the city.

Augustus might pose as a constitutional magistrate enjoying a life-tenure of his office, without the right of transmitting it to an heir. This view was strictly legal, but it was evident that such a power could not safely be left by its holder without any understanding as to a successor. The matter was indeed in the hands of Senate and people; but in the minds of possible heirs, as well as of the Senate and people themselves, it began to be thought natural and necessary that some arrangement of the sort should be made. The cases are numerous in all history of rulers, whether new or hereditary, who have wished to found or continue a dynasty, or who have thought to prevent confusion and danger after their own death by naming a successor, or by taking him into present partnership. Such a scheme was not as yet fully developed, even if it was contemplated. But Marcellus, who had been adopted by Augustus on his marriage to Iulia, betrayed his hopes by protesting against the preference shewn by the apparently dying Emperor to Agrippa; and Augustus yielded so far as to send Agrippa from Rome as governor of Syria.

A sudden disaster, however, put an end to any intention that may have been formed in regard to Marcellus. In the summer of BC23, he was attacked by fever, and Antonius Musa, who had successfully treated Augustus by a régime of cold baths, tried a similar treatment on the young man with fatal effect. His death was a great grief to Augustus and so severe a blow to Octavia, that she lived afterwards in complete retirement. It produced a sensation in Rome such as has been witnessed more than once among us at the death of an heir to the throne; and has been immortalised by a celebrated passage inserted by Vergil in the sixth book of the Aeneid, a work in which Augustus was specially interested as a consecration of the greatness of Rome and the hereditary dignity of the Iulian gents. It is skilfully placed at the end of the catalogue of Roman heroes whose souls are being reviewed by Anchises in the Elysian realms, where they are waiting their time for entering the bodies of men destined to make Roman history. The Marcellus of the Punic war naturally introduces the younger shade, whose brief tenure of life is even now foreshadowed by the cloud that hangs about his brow. When Vergil recited the lines to the Emperor and his sorrowing sister, Octavia fainted from emotion, and Augustus bestowed a splendid reward upon the poet. It may help us to realise the scene if we once more read the familiar lines. Aeneas notices the mysterious and melancholy shade and eagerly questions his father :—

“What youth is this of glorious mien

The noblest and the best between,

 Cheered to the echo ? See, a cloud

(The darkening shadow of the shroud)

Hovers about him even now,

And black night broods upon his brow.

Is he some scion of the race,

Destined our mighty line to grace ?

Thus spake the son, the father sighed.

And thus with rising tears replied :

‘Seek not, my son, to learn the woe.

Your progeny is doomed to know.

The fates will show and then withdraw

The gift men loved but hardly saw.

Too mighty, gods ! for so you deemed,

With such a prince Rome's race had seemed !

What sobs shall thrill the Martian plain !

Ah, Tiber, what dark funeral train

Your waves shall see, as past the Mound

New-built you sweep your waters round!

No scion of the Ilian stock

Shall raise such hopes, such hopes shall mock.

Ah, Romulus, thy land shall see

No son to fire thy pride as he.

Oh loyalty ! Oh faith unstained !

Oh strong right hand to yield untrained !

Whether on foot he grasped the sword,

Or charger's flank with rowel scored,

No foe would e'er have faced his steel

Nor learnt what 'tis the vanquished feel.

Oh child of many tears, if fate

Shall not prevent your living date,

Thou art Marcellus ! Lilies fair

Scatter in handfuls on his bier !

Oh let me but his herse bestrew

With flowers bright with purple hue.

Vain gift ! but let it still be paid

To grace my far-off grandson’s shade. ”

The death of Marcellus had occurred in an unhealthy season when many shared the same fate. Yet there were found people who attributed it to Livia’s jealousy on behalf of her son Tiberius, and her anger at the preference shown to the Emperor’s nephew. Scarcely any death occurred in the imperial family that did not give rise to some such idle and malevolent gossip. But the Emperor soon had cause to regret the absence of Agrippa, who was living in Lesbos and administering Syria by his legate. The next year was a year of sickness and scarcity at Rome, and was also disturbed by more than one outbreak of political unrest, one of the few conspiracies against the life of Augustus being detected and punished. We do not know why Muraena and Fannius Caepio plotted to kill Augustus, if they really did so. It may be that the change made in the principate in BC23 seemed to them to be too much in the direction of autocracy, or that the consulship without Augustus as colleague suggested some idea that its old supremacy might be recovered. The violent party strife which occurred later at the election for BC21, may have had some connection with the same feeling. Muraena had had a successful career, had been rewarded by an augurship and a consulship in BC23, and there is nothing known which explains his conduct. It may be that his offence was chiefly intemperance of language. Dio says that he had a sharp tongue which spared no one, and Horace perhaps meant to give him a hint in the ode addressed to him. Velleius tells us that, unlike his fellow conspirator Fannius Caepid, he was a map of high character. At any rate their execution—for both are said to have been put to death—is one of the few instances of severity on the part of Augustus since the civil war. This trouble was followed by others—a renewed outbreak in Spain, riots at the elections, and a coldness between himself and his devoted friend and minister Maecenas, caused, it is said, by his being supposed to have communicated to his wife Terentia, the sister of Muraena, some secret as to the detection of the plot. All these things must have caused Augustus much uneasiness. He had left Rome in the summer of BC 22 for Sicily, intending to start thence on another progress through the Eastern Provinces. There urgent messages came to him to return and put a stop to the disturbances. He did not wish to give up his Eastern journey and yet did not venture to leave the city without some control. His thoughts turned naturally to the support that had never failed him—to Agrippa. He was summoned home primarily to take charge of Rome; but he came back to what seemed the highest possible position next to that of the Emperor, and one that promised a still greater one in the future. Augustus insisted on his divorcing Marcella (daughter of Octavia) and marrying his own daughter Iulia, left a widow by Marcellus. As usual Agrippa did all that was imposed upon him well and thoroughly (BC 21-20). Having restored order in the city, he next went to Gallia Narbonensis, where he not only put a stop to some dangerous disturbances, but initiated great public works in the way of roads and aqueducts. Passing to Spain he finally crushed the Cantabri adn Astures, who were again in arms. He seems indeed to have suffered reverses in this war, as his master had done before, but in the end he reduced them to submission. All this good work was done while Augustus was in the East (BC 21—19), and for it he refused the triumph offered him by the Senate at the instigation of the Emperor. But his succession, should he survive the Emperor, was now secured by his being associated with him in the tribunicia potestas and other prerogatives for five years at the first renewal of his powers in BC7. Agrippa had now two sons by Iulia, Gaius born in BC20, Lucius in BC7; and Augustus adopted both of them by the ancient process of a fictitious purchase. He had now legitimate heirs and nothing farther was done about the succession for some years. Agrippa died in March, BC12, just as his period of tribunicial power was expiring. But during these years the two sons of Livia, Tiberius and Drutss, had begun those services on the German frontier and among the Rhaeti and other powerful tribes which proved their vigour and ability. These services were renewed, after a few months’ interval of quiet, in BC13 and following years. Accordingly Augustus seems to have meditated putting Tiberius in much the same position as Agrippa had held. In BC11 he compelled him to divorce his wife Vipsania (a daughter of Agrippa) and marry Agrippa’s widow Iulia, the Emperor’s only daughter. He thought still farther to secure a line of descendants to succeed if necessary to his power. But he made the mistake of neglecting sentiment. Tiberius was devotedly attached to Vipsania, by whom he had a son, and could feel neither affection nor respect for Iulia, who fancied that she lowered herself in marrying him.

The only thing that could compensate him for such a marriage was the chance of succession, and that was barred by the existence of Gaius and Lucius Caesar. His only son by Iulia died, and before long her frivolity and debaucheries disgusted him, and therefore, though associated in the tribunician power for five years in BC7, he sought and obtained permission in the next year to retire to Rhodes, where he stayed seven years in seclusion.

Meanwhile the boys were being brought up with a view to their splendid future under the eye of Augustus, when he was at home, and often under his personal instruction, accompanied him as they grew older on his journeys, in a carriage preceding his own or riding by his side, and in fact were treated in every way as real and much beloved sons. In the year in which they assumed the toga virilis(BC5 and BC2) Augustus again entered upon the consulship, that the deductio in forum should be as brilliant and dignified as possible. The Senate was not behindhand; from the day of taking the toga virilis it voted that they should be capable of taking part in public business, and each of them in turn was designated consul, Gaius to enter upon his office that time five years. A new dignity moreover was invented, each in turn being named by the equites princeps iuventutis. As Augustus was princeps senatus as well as princeps civitatis, each of these young men was to be the head of the next ordo, the original condition for belonging to which was that a man must be iuvenis. Both were members of the College of Augurs. They were, in fact, treated as we expect to see princes of the blood and heirs-apparent treated. But whatever was the intention of Augustus or the expectation of the people, fate interposed ruthlessly. The younger—Lucius—died first, on the 20th of August, A.D. 2, at Marseilles, before he could enter on the consulship to which he had been designated; the elder Gains was sent into Asia in BC 1, where he entered upon his consulship of A.D. 1. The object of his mission was to force Phraates IV, king of the Parthians, to evacuate Armenia which he had invaded. This was accomplished without fighting and by personal negotiation with the Parthian king; but when he entered Armenia to take possession and arrange for its restoration to its recognised king, he was wounded by an act of treason under the walls of Artagera. Weakened by this wound, and being in other respects in a feeble state of health and spirits, he obtained leave from Augustus to lay down his command. He started on his homeward journey, but died on the way at Limyra in Lycia the 23rd of February, A.D. 4.

The succession was once more uncertain. The members of the imperial family at this time were few. Of the children of Agrippa and Iulia Agrippa Postumus was barely sixteen, and his two sisters, the younger Iulia and Agrippina a few years older. Drusus, the younger brother of Tiberius, had married Antonia, daughter of Marcus Antonius and Octavia, and had left three children, Germanicus, born BC15, Livia born BC 12, and Claudius (afterwards Emperor) born BC 10.

Augustus meant to provide a new line of descendants by marrying Agrippina to Germanicus, but that did not take place till about A.D. 5. Meanwhile, probably on Livia’s suggestion, he turned his thoughts to his stepson Tiberius, who had divorced Iulia and had a son (Drusus) by his former wife Vipsania, who was married to his cousin Livia. There is no good evidence that Augustus entertained any but warm feelings for Tiberius, and he certainly had had good reason to respect his military abilities and energy. He seems to have been hurt at his prolonged stay at Rhodes and to have regarded it as a sign that Tiberius cared nothing for him and his family. He had therefore discouraged his return two years before, though he had given him the position of legatus as a colourable pretext for staying abroad without loss of dignity. Upon the death of Lucius, however, he seems to have wished him to return to Rome. Tiberius did so, partly on the instigation of his mother, and partly, perhaps, because he had reason to expect the hostility of Gaius, and yet had judged from the latter’s visit to him on his way to Syria that he was not likely to be a formidable rival; for he was at once somewhat arrogant and weak, and was surrounded by injudicious and dishonest advisers. On his return he for some time lived in retirement and refrained from all public business. But when the death of Gaius was announced (A.D. 4) Augustus adopted Tiberius and Agrippa Postumus, having first arranged that Tiberius should adopt his nephew Germanicus. The adoption of Agrippa Postumus was shortly afterwards annulled, and he was banished to an island under surveillance.

There was now therefore a regular line of succession. Tiberius indeed had no drop of Iulian blood in his veins, but adoption according to Roman law and sentiment placed him exactly in the same position as that of a naturally born son, and by his son’s marriage to Antonia, his adoption of Germanicus, and the marriage of the latter to Agrippina, it seemed that there was security that after him must come someone who was collaterally or directly descended from Augustus. In the same year (A.D. 4) Tiberius was once more associated with Augustus in the tribunician power for ten years. There could be no longer any doubt who would succeed. At the death of Augustus there would be, if Tiberius survived, a man already possessed of the most important of his functions; and his position was still farther strengthened in the last year of the Emperor’s life by being associated also in his imperium proconsulare. This gave him authority in the provinces and the command of all military forces; and we find him, in fact, upon the death of Augustus giving the watchword at once to the praetorian guard.

Augustus therefore is responsible for the principate of Tiberius, though some of its powers had to be formally bestowed by a decree of the Senate. Did he do ill or well in this? Hardly any emperor left behind him such an evil reputation as Tiberius. His funeral procession was greeted with shouts of “Tiberius to the Tiber”, the Senate did not vote him the usual divine honours, and Tacitus has exerted all his skill to make his name infamous. A gallant attempt has been made by Mr. Tarver to plead for a rehearing of the case, and to show that Tiberius was pure in private life and admirable as a ruler. I for one agree with him in rejecting as unproved slander and often as physically impossible the charges of monstrous immoralities raked up both by Tacitus and Suetonius, often, no doubt, from the prurient gossip of Rome, which has never been surpassed for foulness. The same summary rejection cannot, I think, be applied to the formidable list of his cruelties. But these mainly fell upon members of the imperial family and their adherents; they did not affect the Empire at large. Augustus could not foresee these family and dynastic tragedies; but he judged, and apparently judged rightly, that he was leaving a successor whose prudence and sagacity, in spite of what seemed a sullen reserve, would secure the peace and prosperity of the Empire as a whole. There is nothing to prove that Augustus regarded him otherwise than affectionately. If he turned out to be the monster represented by his enemies, Augustus no doubt made a grave mistake. It is a ridiculous suggestion that he deliberately designated him his successor in order that people might regret himself. Such recondite snares for posthumous fame are more like the cunning of a madman than the motives influencing a reasonable being. Suetonius, who reports the suggestion, says that after mature reflection he is convinced that a man so careful and prudent as Augustus must have acted on better motives; must have weighed the virtues and faults of Tiberius and decided that the former predominated. As a matter of fact Augustus had little choice. Agrippa Postumus was impossible; Germanicus might have served, but he could never have displaced his uncle without a struggle. At the time of Tiberius’ adoption he was only nineteen, and Augustus could not reckon on the ten more years of life which in feet remained for him. No doubt in these last years of his life Augustus had come to see that some sort of hereditary principle was necessary to prevent civil war at every vacancy. In BC23 he had ignored that principle altogether, and as far as he could without naming an heir had put Agrippa in the way of the succession. But Agrippa had now been dead nearly sixteen years, and Augustus had had no minister since either so able or so faithful. Like Cromwell in his last hours, he was driven to recognise the conveniency of the hereditary principle; and though the practical designation of Tiberius was apparently a breach of it, yet by means of the adoptions and marriages which he had arranged, it best prepared for its continuance hereafter. It was one of those politic compromises which had characterised his whole policy. It moreover best secured the position and safety of the beloved Livia; and it set a precedent which was often followed with advantage in after-times, when military arrogance and violence did not overpower every other consideration, that an Emperor’s natural heir should be his successor, or at any rate someone closely allied to him; and that in case of the failure or complete unworthiness of such an heir a prudent emperor should provide for the succession by adoption.

CHAPTER X

THE IMPERIAL AND MILITARY POLICY OF AUGUSTUS