 Chapter 23, sections 1 and 2 of J. B. Burie's The Student's Roman Empire, Part 2. Chapter 23, Nerva and Trajan in the Conquest of Dacia, 96-117 A.D., sections 1 and 2. Section 1, Nerva. With the death of the Mission, the Second Imperial Dynasty came to an end. But no disturbances took place like those which had followed the death of Nero. The new Princeps, M. Cossayas Nerva, who acceded on October 1st, 1896, was not, like Galba, set up in the provinces or chosen by the soldiers. He was the elect of the Senate. He had no claim to the Principate, either by lineage or by proeminent personal qualities. He was a clever jurist, an accomplished writer, and had been twice consul, but he owed his elevation to the fact that he was colorless. The senators, most of whom were doubtless, privy to the conspiracy which overthrew the Flavian House, wanted an emperor who would be ready to concede a due share of government to themselves, but who at the same time would not be obnoxious to the army. Such a one they found in the inoffensive Nerva. He had never stood in the ranks of the senatorial opposition. On the contrary, he had taken part in suppressing the conspiracy of Piso, and had kept in favor with the Flavian emperors. Over sixty years of age, he was self-indulgent, tolerant, and mild, and the Senate expected to find him subservient to their guidance. His reign was greeted by the aristocrats as a new epic. Coins were issued with the inscription Libertas Pública and Roma Renascans. At length, it seemed to the most bitter adversaries of Caesarism that liberty and the Principate, things formerly irreconcilable, had been happily blended. If Cato himself were restored to life, says an epigrammatist, he would be a Caesarean. It is to be observed that Nerva, like Vespasian, adopted as a matter of course the name Caesar, which by this time had become as necessary a part of the imperial nomenclature as Imperator itself. From Nerva the Senate obtained the guarantee which they had sought in vain from the Flavians. The new Princips took a solemn oath that he would put no member of that order to death. The Senate had good reason to be satisfied with his administration, for he consulted it on every matter. The measures taken against the instruments of the mission's cruelty were mild, owing to the moderate character of Nerva, who would not satisfy the general outcry for revenge. The exiles, including the philosophers, were recalled, and the sufferers and their friends were eager to punish the delators who had been the cause of their wrongs. Gaius Plinius Secundus, the younger Plini, as he is generally called, thought it a good opportunity to assail the guilty, avenge the unfortunate, and advance himself. Accordingly he attacked Cirtus, one of the mission's ministers in the Senate. Cirtus had laid hands on Helvidius Priscus in the Curia, and Helvidius was a friend of Plini. But Nerva did not permit a process to be instituted against Cirtus, though he went so far as to refuse him the consulship and supersede him in the pretership. The suits which the injured were bringing against the delators were stopped at the instance of a senator named Fronto, who proposed a general act of pardon. He said to have used words which, epigrammatically, expressed the weakness of Nerva. It is bad to have a princeps under whom no one may do anything. It is worse to have one under whom everyone may do anything. The oath of security which Nerva gave to the Senate implied the abolition of processes for mayestas. Moreover, slaves were forbidden to accuse their masters of impiety, or of leading a Jewish life, which seems to have been a frequent charge in the reign of the mission. But though the Senate had condemned the memory of the mission, Nerva did not allow all his acts to be abolished. That, for example, against mutilation was confirmed, and the marriage of uncles and nieces was forbidden, a principle acknowledged by the mission when he refused to marry Julia. Moreover, the beneficia granted by him were confirmed. In the public finances, Nerva, like Vespasian, had difficulties to contend with. The tyranny of the mission's later years was, as we have seen, partly due to the needs of an exhausted treasury. Nerva was obliged to suspend temporarily the celebration of games and the distributions of corn in Rome. A senatorial commission was appointed for considering the question of ways and means and the best manner of economizing. The emperor sacrificed a large amount of imperial property, and the crisis was, at length, tied it over. Then Nerva set himself to relieve his subjects of some of the most unpopular taxes. He abolished the tax which Vespasian had levied on the Jews, and which had called forth bitter discontent. He relieved Italy of the cost of supporting the imperial post, the cursus publicus, within her own borders, and transferred the burden to the fiscus. This tax was called vehiculatio, and it continued to remain in force for the provinces. He also reduced the 5 percent duty on inheritances. From an economical point of view, the short reign of Nerva was retrogressive. It was characterized by an exclusive and narrow attention to the interests of Italy. This was to be expected from a government which was so much under the influence of the senate. The ideal of the senate was to maintain the supremacy of Rome and Italy, and to keep the provinces in a subordinate place, whereas one of the chief tenancies of imperial policy, the policy inaugurated by Caesar himself, was to raise the provinces to the position of importance which they had a right to claim. But Italy perhaps had been too much neglected by previous rulers, and it was only fair that she should have her turn now. The decline of Italian agriculture was a serious disaster which had attracted the attention of the mission, and he had sought to remedy it by forbidding land to be drawn from the cultivation of corn, and appropriated to the produce of wine. Nerva's plan was to send out colonies of agriculturists, but he had not enough money at his disposal to make this remedy really effective. He bought up large lots of land, and appointed a commission of senators, Quattu Warui di Agro di Vidundo, to divide it. It is important to observe that the agrarian law of Nerva was a true lex past at the commission of the people. Nerva, like Claudius, revived the old republican form for the last time. More effectual and important for the welfare of Italy than his attempt to heal the irremediable agrarian evil, was Nerva's system of elementary institutions. These were designed to help the education of the children of poor parents. For each town which received the benefit of this endowment, a certain sum of money was set aside at once, and land to landed proprietors, and the annual interest which it produced formed the support of the elementary institution. As the investment rested on land, it was secure, and the state on its part undertook not to withdraw the loan. The control of the administration of this charity was probably placed in the hands of men of senatorial rank, the curatoris viarum. Nerva's successors carried out the organization of the institution more thoroughly. The brevity of Nerva's reign gave him little time for executing public works, but he completed the forum transitorium which the mission had left unfinished, connecting the Templum Pachis with the Forum of Augustus. This new forum was marked by the Temple of Minerva, and was called the Forum of Nerva. The policy of Nerva was marked by mildness, even by weakness. He boasted that he had done no act which could prevent him from resigning the Principate if he chose with perfect security. His clemency, however, was the one feature which did not satisfy the senatorial party. A story is told that Morricus, who had returned from exile, was supping one evening with Nerva, and the prudent Viento, a notorious creature of the mission, was also present, reclining in a place of honor next to the Emperor. The conversation chanced to turn on the blind the later Catelas, who had lately died. If he were still living, said Nerva, what would his fate be? He would be supping with us, replied Morricus, glancing at Viento. But though Nerva was mild, perhaps because he was so mild, conspiracies were formed against him. That of Culperneus' crosses, a descendant of the Triumvir, was easily put down, and crosses was banished, not to an island, but to the pleasant city of Tarentum. A more dangerous movement originated in the Praetorian camp. Casparius Illianus, one of the Praetorian prefects under the mission, and retained in the pose by Nerva, excited the soldiers to demand the execution of the murderers of the mission, especially the freedmen Parthenius and the other prefect Petronius Cicundus, although more than a year had passed since the event. Nerva indeed bared his own neck, and offered to die himself instead of the victims, but he was forced to comply about October 97 AD. This experience decided Nerva, who was weak in health, and felt himself unable to cope with the difficulties of government or manage the soldiers, to follow the example of Augustus, Galba and Vespasian, and chose a consort who should also be his presumptive successor. He had kinsfolk of his own, but he passed them over, and regarded the interests of the state, not those of his own family. His choice, guided by his advisor, Lucius Licinius Sura, fell on Marcus Opius Trujanus, the legatus of Upper Germany, and the result proved that they could not have fallen upon anyone better fitted for the post. Trujanus was a Spaniard of Italica, a municipality close to his police in Betica. His father had served with distinction in the Jewish war, and held the pre-consulate of Asia. The son, born on September 18, 52 AD, had been brought up as a soldier, and seen ten years active service as a military tribune. He then went through the cursus honorum, and obtained the pretership in 85 AD. We next meet him in Spain, when, on the outbreak of the revolt of Antonius Saturninas, he was ordered by the mission to lead one of the Spanish legions, first adiutrics, of which he was clearly legatus to Upper Germany, with the rising of suppress before his arrival. His promptitude was rewarded by an eponymous, or ordinary consulship, in 91 AD, a great honor coming from the mission, who was usually first consul of the year himself. He was afterwards appointed legatus of Upper Germany. He was probably at Vindanissa, when Nerva addressed a letter to him, offering him a share in the Imperium, explaining his own difficulties, and calling upon him to take vengeance on those who had tormented him with a Homeric lion. May the Donnae pay for my tears beneath thy shafts. But without waiting for the consent of Trajan, Nerva proceeded without delay to perform the ceremony of adoption in his absence. The Pannonian legions had gained a victory over the Saviants, who were still hostile, and to celebrate it the citizens had assembled on the summit of the capital, in front of the temple of Jove. There Nerva declared the adoption of his son and consul in these words. I adopt Marcus Olpius Nerva Trojanus, made proof fortunate to the senate, the Roman people, and myself. Thus Trajan became the son of Nerva, and like Nerva himself Caesar. It remained to confer upon him the proconsular power, and this was done in due form by a decree of the senate. But he was not only made Imperator. He also, like Titus, received the Tribunician power at the same time. This probably means that the Tribunician legs was proposed in the senate at the same time, and then, after the due interval, brought before the commission. The elevation of Trajan to the second place in the empire took place on the 27th of October 97 AD, and from this day Trajan dated his Tribunician years. In consequence of the Pannonian victory mentioned above, both Nerva and Trajan assumed the name Germanicus. They were designated as colleagues in the consulship for the following year. Nerva died on January 27th 98 AD. His acts were confirmed, and he was enrolled among the gods as a matter of course. And Trajan, son of the divine Nerva, was elected Princeps and Augustus. Section 2. Trajan on the Rhine A new epoch in imperial history may be said to begin with the accession of Trajan. Hitherto, all the emperors had been of Roman or Italian origin. The elevation of the first Italian, the Sabian Vespasian, had been a novelty. But this was a small innovation compared with the raising of a provincial to be head of the Roman world, master of Rome herself. Not a murmur was heard at the election of Trajan, the Spaniard, though his birthplace, Italica by the Bettys, was not even a Colonia. How far Roman opinion had progressed during the past century in regard to the provinces may be estimated if we recollect that Augustus had hesitated to admit inhabitants of Transpatan Italy into the Praetorian Guards. Trajan was not required to return to Rome on his adoption by Nerva. He seems to have continued to hold the post of Legatus of Upper Germany, combining it as Titus combined the Praetorian Prefecture with his imperial position. But it is probable that by virtue of his proconsular power, perhaps by the special ordinance of Nerva, he exercised beyond his own province control over Lower Germany as well. He would have held the position somewhat similar to that held by Dresis, Tiberius and Germanicus. This will explain the fact that the news of Nerva's death reached him not in the upper but in the lower province at Colonia Agrippinensis. The new emperor did not immediately return to Rome. He saw that there was work to be done on the Rhine and he stayed to do it. Some time before, intestine quarrels had broken out among the Bruteri. A chieftain was expelled from their land and had returned with the help of neighboring tribes. The governor of Lower Germany, Vastricius Perina, also assisted in the restoration of the Bruterian king, who after his victory, settled a large number of the Cemevii and Angriveriai in Brutieran territory in order to maintain his position with their help against his own countrymen. Trajan seized the opportunity of these domestic dissensions to strengthen the fortifications of the Rhine to complete and improve the work begun by the Flavians. Some ascribed to him the erection of the rampart and forts in the Agri de Comates, which in the foregoing chapter was described as the work of the Flavians. In any case, Trajan went on with work which was begun by them. It is certain that a road on the right bank of the Rhine leading from Moguntiakum southward crossing the Nizer near the present Heidelberg and passing Aqway in the direction of Offenberg was constructed under the auspices of Trajan in 100 AD. To him also, Aqway, Baden, may attribute the beginning of her prosperity as well as other towns in the same region such as Sumelokena, Rottenberg on the Nizer and Lopodunum, Ladenberg. On the Minas, not far from Moguntiakum, he constructed a castellum called after himself, but its site cannot be identified. About a mile lower than the old vetra, he founded a new fortress which was afterwards called Colonia Trajana. Having spent the summer of 98 AD in the German provinces, Trajan proceeded to the Danube and spent the ensuing winter in making preparations for the Dacian War, which, as he foresaw, was inevitable. At this time, a road on the right bank of the Danube was made in the neighborhood of Tierno near the present Orsova. Public interest at Rome was awakened in the operations of Trajan by the timely appearance of the Germania of Tacitus, giving a picturesque account of the manners and customs of the Teutonic peoples with which Rome had been brought in contact. Tacitus personally had some local knowledge of the subject as he had been either Legatus of a legion in Germany or Governor of Belgica from 90 to 94 AD. His interest in Germany was stimulated by an instinctive perception that Rome's greatest danger lay in that quarter. The liberty of the Germans is more active than the kingdom of the Atresids. Reviewing the past history of the relations between Roman and Teuton, he makes use of that pregnant expression, Tam di Germania Winkitur, so long as Germany in the process of being conquered. The Germania contains an account of the Teutons in general and also notices of the particular tribes. The Germans have now reached a more advanced stage of civilization than that which Caesar described 120 years before. The communities no longer migrate from one part of the territory to another, but each community of the tribe has a permanent village settlement and a certain area of arable land, although their wealth still consists chiefly in cattle, and there is a considerable advance in local organization. Caesar has become general, and each man has a fixed home. The love of hunting has declined, perhaps owing to the decrees of beasts of chase and the warriors during times of peace devote themselves to the wine-bowl and to gambling. The arrangement which formerly held for the communities or families now held for the individual freemen. Each freeman receives an allotment of land from the community, and his allotment is changed every year. As there is a large quantity of waste land available, the arable area is changed annually, and nothing has grown on it but corn. But though the freeman has no permanent landed property, he has a permanent right to a share in the land of the community, and he has complete ownership of his homestead. He has also a right to a share in the common pastridge. But though these facts testify to a considerable development since the days of Caesar and Ariovistus, there are many social features which still survive. They are still without cities, and their buildings are very rudely put together. They are still chased. They are still plain and simple in dress, and they are still indifferent to merchandise. As in social rank and dignity seem to have been of three kinds. One, some were more wealthy, that is, possessed more cattle than others, and those who were more wealthy must have had a larger share of pasture and arable land. It is true that all the allotments of land were equal, but then one man may have held more than one allotment. Two, some were noble by race, or descendants of kings or gods or great chieftains, and others were not. Those tribes which adopted monarchy chose their kings on account of nobility. This distinction of nobleness and ingenuity probably involved no inequality in political rights. Three, besides the freeborn, including the nobles, who possessed political rights, were the freedmen and survey. There were two kinds of survey. A, the slaves consisting of those who lost their freedom by gambling, and perhaps prisoners of war, and B, the cultivators of the land corresponding to the Roman colonai. The second class was far the more important and probably consisted of the original occupiers of the land who had been subdued by the German tribe when it took possession. The German colon, as we may call the slave of this class, possessed a home of his own, and was personally free, except in relation to his lord, whom he could not deserve, and his land, which, like the medieval surf, he could not forsake. He paid to his lord a fixed quantity of corn or cattle or clothing. His lot was not hard, but his lord might kill him with impunity. The administration of the tribe resided in the tribe or cuitas itself, whether the tribe adopted monarchy or not. The national assembly which met at the Nu or Fu Mu wielded the power. All the freeborn members of the community attended it in arms, without distinction of seat. In their assemblies questions of war and peace were determined. The magistrates who administered justice were elected, and it acted as a court of justice itself. The magistrates, or prinkipes, as Tacitus calls them, had the right of keeping a comitatus. This characteristic German institution was a body of warriors attached to a chieftain who provided them with their equipment and entertained them. They fought for him in war, and were bound to defend him and attribute to him their own brave deeds. Their chief employment was war, and the dignity and fame of the chieftain depended largely on the number and efficiency of his companions. The principal acted independently of each other, each in his district in time of peace, but in war all obeyed a leader chosen by the common council. Royalty, in those tribes where it existed, was of a very limited nature and involved rather honorary privileges than political power. The host or military force of the tribe consisted of both cavalry and infantry. The cavalry was composed of the comitatus of the principus. The infantry was of two kinds. Each district, Pagus, sent a hundred chosen champions or fighting men who fought in front in battle, and besides these there was the mass of the free men who were arranged in families. At the beginning of 99 A.D. Trajan returned from the Danube to Rome, where he was received with warm and unfaithful enthusiasm and became consul for the third time. He renewed the pledge which he had already given to the senate in writing that he would not condemn a senator to death, and this oath he always respected. He had received from the fathers the title of Pater Patriae. He avenged the tears of Nerva by punishing the mutineers of the Praetorian Garden, and he was so confident in his own military authority that he restored by one half the usual donative to the soldiers, and no murmur was heard. In handing to the Praetorian Prefect the dagger which was a sign of his office, Trajan employed the celebrated words, use this for me if I do well, against me if I do ill. His moderate demeanor conciliated the senators, and his wife Platina conducted herself with the same modesty. As she entered the palace, she is reported to have turned to the multitude, and said that she entered it with a perfect equanimity, as she would wish to leave it, if fate required. General satisfaction was felt when Trajan punished the delators whom Nerva had spared. Some were executed, others banished. Trajan only remained two years at Rome, and then proceeded to deal with the Dossian question which the mission had not settled. Of his work in administration and legislation during those two years, some account will be given in the following chapter. Please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Leni. The Students' Roman Empire, Part II, by John Buniel-Giri, Chapter 23, Nerva and Trajan and the Conquest of Dossia, 96-117 A.D., Sections 3 and 4. First Dossian War, 101-102 A.D. In making war against the Dossian King Decebelus, Trajan had no thought of extending the limits of the Empire. Its natural border in that quarter was the Danube, just as its natural border in the east was Euphrates. His object was to prevent the consolidation of a great rival power on the Roman frontier by reducing the Dossian state to a position of dependence on Rome, somewhat like that of Armenia. Formally, indeed, the mission had been acknowledged overlord by Decebelus when he set the diadem on the brow of Diages. But the gifts which he had consented to send to the Dossian King at certain times were too much like a tribute and seemed dishonorable to the mistress of the world. Trajan was determined to war down the proud and teach the Dossian his place. On the 25th of March of 101 A.D., sacrifices were offered at Rome for the success of Trajan's expedition, and perhaps on that very day, certainly soon after, he set out from the city for the Danube. Besides the eight legions stated in the Illyric provinces, three in Pannonia and five in Messia, the emperor brought the 21st Rapax from lower Germany to take part in the war. It has been supposed that the forces which he led into Dacia amounted to about 60,000 men. The German and Mauritanian cavalry, the latter led by Lucius Quietus, played a conspicuous part in the campaign. Tiberius Claudius Livienus, the Praetorian prefect, and Liberius Maximus, governor of Messia, were the most prominent among the officers, but Trajan directed all the operations himself. The future emperor, Hadrian, who had married Trajan's niece, Julius Sabaina, was among the imperial comites. The object of the invading army was Sarmis Egithusa, the chief city of Dacia. It seems probable that the Sebalus first made this place the capital, and that previously, pluralism in the northwest of the country held that position. The policy of Biribistus had tended rather towards the west, whereas that of the Sebalus looked southwards. It is possible that the complete occupation of Pannonia by the Romans may have had something to do with this shifting in Dacia. The choice of the Sebalus was a happy one. Sarmis Egithusa, now called Varhili by the Hungarians, Gradistia by the Slavs, is easy to get at from other parts of the land, and at the same time easy to defend. It is connected with the northern regions of the river Morissus, Marus, by the Strigi Valley, while westward the pass of the Iron Gate leads to the valleys of a river whose ancient name is unknown, but which is now called the Bistra and of the Tabiscus, Thames. The plains of the lower Danube can be reached either through the Vulcan Pass or by the defile of the Red Tower. Thus three routes were open to Trajan. One, he might cross the Danube at Viminasian, opposite to which, on the left bank, was the Dacian Fortress of Lederata. From Lederata a road led northwards across the Bersava to the valley of the Tabiscus ascended this valley, and then, turning eastward, led up the valley of its tributary to the Bistra, and so reached the Iron Gate. Two, lower down the river, the Roman Fort of Salietis was confronted by Tierno on the Dacian bank, from which a road led past Admedium, Mehadia, to the confluence of the Thames and the Bistra. Three, a third road led from Drobete, opposite to Agheta, near the modern Turnus Severin, and proceeded by the valley of the Olatis and by the pass of the Red Tower. The first of these routes was chosen by Trajan. Viminasium Castalets had two evident advantages as a starting point. Being equally distant from Pannonia and Misia, it was a convenient center for gathering the troops together, and its strong fortifications made it a good base in the rear of the advancing army. It was also nearer Italy than the other possible starting points. Transport vessels were actively engaged in bringing corn, wine, vinegar, and other provisions to the place of assembling. The boats coming from Misia had to pass through the Iron Gate of the Danube. Here, the river, close towards Sova, as enclosed between two walls of rock rising directly from the water, and of immense height. In the narrowest part, where the stream can hardly win its passage, there is an inscription of Trajan cut in the rock, and recording how he made a path on the side of the steep mountain of stone. This path was for the purpose of towing the boats of provisions. At Viminasium, then a bridge of boats was thrown across the Danube for the transit of the army, and on the other side, Trajan performed the due sacrifices. Their march lay by Bersovia on the river now called Bersava, an axis on a more northerly river. As the Romans approached the Tabiscus, an embassy arrived from the Bury, a Swithian tribe who dwelled north of the Jazziges in the neighborhood of the Quadi. Their earned, which it is said, was in some manner inscribed on an enormous mushroom, was to counsel the emperor to abandon his project and make peace with the Dacians. This incident can hardly be regarded as anything but a piece of insolence. The Bury fought in the army of the Sevalas, and his advance Trajan neglected no precautions and fortifying camps and sending forward scouts, but the enemy had retreated into the recesses of the country and left the road free. At length, when the Romans reached Tapia on the Tabiscus, a place which commands the entrance to the Bistra valley, they found the Dacians drawn up in a strong position between the river and wooded hills. This place had been the scene of Julian's great victory thirteen years before, and it proved auspicious again to the arms of Trajan. The Romans were assisted by a thunderstorm which threw the ranks of the enemy into disorder. In this, the First Battle, the infantry on both sides seemed to have been chiefly engaged. Though the legions conquered, the victory cost them dear. It is probable that one legion, the 21st Rapax, perished almost entirely in the battle. It is related that the emperor gave his own clothes for bandages to bind up the wounds of the injured. He built an altar to the manes of those who had fallen and instituted a yearly sacrifice in their memory. Not far from Tapia was the town of Tabiscus, which was taken and set on fire, and then the legions advanced up the Bistra valley. A deputation from Decebelus, suing for peace, soon arrived. It consisted of three men on horses without saddles, followed by a number of men on foot, all of inferior rank, not belonging to the nobility, from the Romans called Peleatei, or Men of the Cap. Trajan refused to listen to such envoys. The war, however, was soon suspended, owing to the approach of winter, when the invaders had only penetrated halfway up the Bistra valley. Trajan returned to winter in Pannonia, with the greater part of his army, but left all the fortresses he had occupied strongly garrisoned. In the following spring, 102 A.D., Trajan and his legions descended by boat to Viminassium, the emperor himself rowing or steering along with the men, and retraced the road which they had traversed the year before. They found all their posts safe. Two small encounters took place now, and resulted in Roman victories, which were followed by the submission of one of the Dacian tribes. Then Trajan continued his advance on the capital. The way was difficult. The soldiers had to hew their way through forests with the axe, and they were constantly hindered by ditches and precipices. The defense of the Dacians now became more active as the enemy was approaching the heart of their country. Their belief in immortality aided their bravery, and made them unsparing of their lives. They were now assisted by reinforcements of Sarmatian mounted archers, whose steeds as well as the riders are represented on Trajan's column as clad completely in male. The fury of the struggle may be measured by the horrible tortures which the Dacian women inflicted on Roman prisoners by burning parts of their bodies with lighted brands. At length the last fortress, defending the approach to Sarmizegethusa, fell before the attack of Trajan, while his general, Liberius Maximus, at the same time captured the sister of the Sebalus in another town. Some high mountain fastnesses were also taken, and the Roman eagle was recovered which had been lost by the mission's general, Cornelius Fuscus. After these successes the Sebalus once more sued for peace, but this time his messengers were Pileatae. Their supplication was humbler, they bent the need to Trajan and implored pardon. They asked him to consent to meet their king, professing that he was ready to submit to any conditions, and if he would not agree to this, at least to send deputies to the Sebalus. The Siniasura, Trajan's friend, in Lovianus the prefect were sent, but the negotiations came to nothing and the struggle was resumed. A tract of forest still separated the Romans from the Dacian capital. The Mauritanian cavalry, with Lusius Quietus at their head, attacked several detachments of the enemy and drove them into the recesses of the woods where they barricaded themselves by trees and their position had to be stormed like a regular fortress. The way was thus repaired for the main body of the Roman army, and on emerging on the other side of the forest they found themselves in front of Sarmizegethusa. The Dacians did not wait to endure the slow course of a siege. They came forth to fight and were conquered. Then, in order to save his capital from destruction, the Sebalus submitted to whatever terms the victor deemed fitting to impose and came himself along with two of his chief officers into the presence of the Roman emperor to implore mercy. He was required to surrender all his military engines, all Roman deserters, and the workmen who had been placed at his disposal by the mission. He undertook either to destroy or to hand over to the conquerors all his fortresses. Dacia became a dependent state, and the king was bound neither to make war nor to conclude peace without the consent of Rome. Having left garrisons in some of the Dacian fortresses, and especially in Sarmizegethusa itself, Trajan returned to Rome, accompanied by Dacian deputies, who went through the form of submitting themselves to the senate, and the peace was not regarded as finally concluded until the senate ratified the terms which the emperor had imposed. Trajan had been proclaimed Imperator three times during this war, once in the first campaign after the battle of Tappe, and twice in the second campaign. The senate decreed him the title of Dachicus, and he was designated consul for the following year. Out of the large booty a congiarium was distributed to the people. Section 4, 2nd Dacian war, 105-106 AD. It soon became evident that the Sebalas did not intend to carry out the terms which his conqueror had imposed upon him. He had accepted them in order to gain a respite and make preparations for another struggle for the liberty of Dacia. But in attempting to shake off the lesser yoke of federation, he was destined only to bring upon his country the heavier yoke of direct subjection to Rome. When the emperor learned that his vessel was playing false, was receiving deserters, building and renovating fortresses, collecting the instruments of warfare and carrying on suspicious negotiations with the neighboring tribes, he determined to overthrow the Sebalas altogether and convert Dacia into a Roman province. In taking this resolve, he departed from the recognized policy of the Roman government to abstain from extending the borders of the empire. He transgressed the precept of Augustus as Claudius had already done in the case of Britain. He has been accused of unwisdom in taking this step of sacrificing the interests of the empire to the ambition of military conquest. But we do not know the full circumstances of the case and it would be rash to say that the continuance of the dependent Dacian kingdom would have been less dangerous to the empire than the creation of the Dacian province. If merely a military ambition prompted Trajan in the Second War, why did it not prompt him to the same policy in the first? In 104 AD the Sebalas was decreed by the senate to be an enemy of the Roman people and Trajan set out for Misia to superintend the preparations for invading Dacia in the following year. He chose a different route from that which he had followed in the former war. Instead of starting from Viminasium, he started from Egeta, at which place he caused a permanent stone bridge to be built across the Danube. The architect was Apollodorus of Damascus and bricks used in the construction of the pillars have been found which show that soldiers of the 13th Legion were employed in the work. The construction of the solid bridge, a wonderful work of engineering, was a sign of Trajan's resolve to make Dacia a province of the empire. For the Second War, more troops were mustered than for the first. To the eight Illyric legions, four were added from the two German provinces. The Sebalas on his side had also made great preparations, especially in building fortresses, which seemed to have played a greater part in the Second than in the First War. But perhaps he did not fully believe in his own powers ultimately to resist the invader, for we find him, while Trajan was still in Misia, suborning two deserters to take the life of the emperor by poison. One of the traitors was arrested on suspicion and revealed under torture the name of his accomplice. This episode casts a slur on the career of the Dacian hero. From Drobete, Trajan might follow either of two routes to reach the Dacian capital. The shortest was by the Pass of Vulcan, but shortness was not Trajan's aim, otherwise he would have gone as before by Viminasium and the Bistra Valley. His object seems to have been to cut off the retreat of the enemy towards the eastern parts of Dacia, and therefore he took the other route by the Red Tower. Marching eastward from Drobete, he reached the river Allotus at Pons Allutai, but without crossing the river moved up the valley on the right bank. During his march several Dacian and Josijic tribes sent messages of submission. Of the details of the march, of the points at which the Dacians offered resistance, of the length of time which elapsed before Sarmizegetusa was reached, we know nothing certain. The Pass of the Red Tower was, doubtless, staunchly defended. One instance of noble self-sacrifice has been preserved. A valuable officer of Trajan, Cassius Lunginus, a camp prefect, had somehow been enticed into the power of Decebalus, who kept him a prisoner, and sent a message to Trajan that he would not release his captive unless Dacia were evacuated and the expenses of the war paid. The Emperor, unwilling to seal the doom of Lunginus, did not flatly refuse, but the prisoner freed his Imperator from the dilemma by swallowing poison. The movements of the Romans were slow but sure. At length, probably in 106 AD, they approached the capital of Decebalus from the eastern side and laid siege to it. A battle was fought in which the Dacians were worsted and then Decebalus caused his followers to set fire to their city. A number of Dacian nobles, thinking further resistance useless and not wishing to fall alive into the hands of the victor, assembled for a last banquet and drank a poisoned cup. Most of the common people submitted to the Romans. Decebalus himself, with a few devoted followers, fled, but was followed by Roman troops and, after a combat, dispatched himself with his sword. His head was brought to Trajan and sent to Rome. His followers resisted to the last and were not taken until the Romans set fire to the fortress in which they had shut themselves up. Trajan was saluted Imperator for the sixth time. Having arranged the organization of the new province, Trajan returned to Rome, end of 107 AD, and celebrated his triumph by a feast which lasted 123 days. Ten thousand gladiators fought in the spectacles. The people received a congiarium and the emperor, as one who had extended the boundaries of the Roman territory, extended also the pomerium of the city. The great memorial of these Dacian wars is the column of Trajan, erected by the senate in the new Forum Traiani, where it stands to this day. This column, 100 feet high, is decorated by sculptures and low relief of scenes from both the wars. It is a picture book of the Dacian campaigns, but unluckily to most of the pictures we have no text. The Caesar who conquered Dacia, like the Caesar who conquered Gaul, wrote an account of his conquest, but the commentaries of Trajan have not survived, and this is perhaps one of the greatest losses that history has to the plur. Nor have we in its place any other full account of the wars, nothing but a laid and meager epitome. In these circumstances the pillar of Trajan is of the greatest value. It is possible from the vivid illustrations whose meaning is generally clear to supplement in many important particulars the one very deficient written record which we possess. Just as the Beiu Tapestry helps the historian to understand the story of the Norman conquest of England, so the pillar of Trajan helps him to follow the Roman conquest of Dacia. It does not indeed throw light on the chronology and geography of the campaigns, as to which we are almost hopelessly in the dark, and it does not give a complete view of the war, for only those episodes are represented in which Trajan himself took part. Its value perhaps is ethnographical rather than strictly historical. It teaches us what the bearded Dacians were like with their long hair, loose drawers, and long-sleeved jerkins. We see them fighting under their dragons, the Dacian standard. We see the Sarmatian archers on horseback clad in complete mail. The various events of the march as well as battle scenes and sieges passed before us. We see the Roman soldiers following their standard bearer across the bridge of boats at Viminasium, and the river gods, the Danube, rising from his bed to behold them. Then we see the Emperor performing sacrifices in front of the camp, the cutting down of trees, the construction of camps, the making of bridges. The Emperor addressing the troops are all represented. We see Dacian spies dragged by the hair into Trajan's presence. Soldiers displaying to the Emperor the bloody heads of enemies they have slain, the Dacians carrying their wounded into a wood. A village built on stakes in a lake is set on fire, the women and children implore mercy. The houses of the barbarians are around with pointed roofs. Here is portrayed the distribution of distinctions to brave soldiers. They are the tortures which Dacian women inflict on Roman captives. In the sculptures of the Second War we have a view of the capital city of the Sebalus, Hispalus, and probably the Temple of Zolmoxes. We see the Dacian chiefs sitting in a circle and emptying the bowl of poison in front of the burning town. Then we see the head of the Sebalus presented to Trajan on a dish. The sculptures are arranged in a spiral band round the column which supported a colossal statue of the Imperator. Chapter 23 Nerva and Trajan and the Conquest of Dacia 96-117 AD Sections 5 and 6 Section 5 Organization of Dacia Dacia differed in one important respect from the other provinces of the Empire. It was bounded on three sides by territory that was not Roman and thus resembled a peninsula of civilization jutting out into a barbarian sea. The land between the Danube and the Thais was left to the Jazzages and never formed part of the Empire so that Dacia was thus separated from Pannonia. In fact, Dacia was an eccentric position thrown out from the natural Danube frontier. It is generally thought that Trajan was guilty of a political error in occupying it, but perhaps the error rather consisted in not going further. Certainly the annexation of Jazzagia seemed called for in order to complete a continuous line of frontier from the Rhine to the Pruth or Dniester. It is to be observed that the Dacian province did not extend as far east as the Pruth. It included Transylvania, the Bannet, and Western Wallachia. In Eastern Wallachia and Moldavia there are no remains of Roman civilization and, while they were included in the Roman sphere of influence, they can hardly have belonged to the province. The remains of fortifications between the Pruth and the Dniester in modern Bessarabia have been discovered, but do not necessarily imply that the Dacian province extended so far. The native population of Dacia was exhausted by the wars, and the greater part of what remained was driven out by Trajan, probably into the eastern regions beyond the Iludas. One of the scenes on the pillar represents the fugitives going forth from their homes. A few were allowed to remain in Transylvania, but they were isolated and gradually disappeared. The land was repopulated by colonists from all parts of the Roman world, especially from Asia Minor, and thus the province of Dacia never represented a nationality. Dalmatians, skilled in mining operations, were settled in the northern districts in order to work the valuable gold mines, which were probably a considerable motive in inducing Trajan to conquer the country. They not only rendered Dacia self-supporting, but were a source of additional wealth to the Fiskus. The province was placed under a Legatus Augusti Propraitore. The first governor, Diet Rensius Corianus, was remembered as the founder of the colony of Sarmis Egithusa, under the name Uphiatraiana. Apollum, however, further north, corresponding to the present Carlsberg, was more important than the capital of the Sibilus. It was the center of the road system of the province. Besides, these two cities, Nepeka in the north and Tierno on the Danube, received Jus Italicum. It is probable that Trajan left two legions as a garrison of his new province. Both Misia and Pannonia were guarded more strongly than ever, eight legions being distributed between them. One of the great consequences of the Dacian War was the shifting of the military center of gravity in Europe from the Rhine to the Danube. The legions which were taken from the German provinces were not sent back, except first Minervia, but were kept in the Illyric provinces. Here Trajan made a new administrative arrangement. As the mission had divided Misia, so he broke up Pannonia into an upper and lower province, each under a legatus. In lower Pannonia, he established a military station at Akiminkum, close to the confluence of the Thies and the Danube, in order to be a check on the Jesyges. In connection with Trajan's reorganization of these provinces, some new towns were founded, for example, Marcianopolis, called after his sister Marciana, and Ecopolis on the Danube. Many old towns were enlarged or improved, such as Poitowio in Pannonia, Ratiaria near Widen, Sérdica, Sofia, Oescus. The stations of the army of lower Misia were now fixed at Noe and Durastorum, Cilistria. The Dobrucha district at the mouth of the Danube seems to have been excluded by Trajan from the province, though it was included in the following reign. The remains of a threefold system of ramparts of earth and stone running eastward from the Danube below Durastorum to the sea near Tomai have been discovered, and there are reasons for attributing the fortification to Trajan. One of the most distinct results of the Dassian conquest was that it stifled all thoughts of insurrection among the Thracians, whose restless spirits were no longer fomented by free kinsmen in the north. Trajan made Thrace, hitherto, a procuratorial province dependent on Misia, a province of the first rank under a Legatus Augusti Propraitore. While the emperor was himself reducing the newly conquered client state of Dassia into the form of a province, the governor of Syria, Cornelius Palma, was also bringing under the direct rule of Rome the elder client state of the Nevatians. Malkus, king of the Nevatians, had supported Vespasian in the Jewish war and was succeeded by his son, Dabel, who was destined to be the last of the line. The change introduced, doubtless for commercial reasons, by Trajan, was really administrative, but was not accomplished without resistance on the part of the Arabs, and Palma was considered a conqueror of Arabia. Some outlying regions possessed by the Nebatian king were abandoned, Damascus was annexed to the province of Syria, and the rest of the kingdom was organized as an imperial province under a Legatus Augusti Propraitore. He commanded a legion which was stationed at Bostra. The province is often called Petraia from the important city of Petra. The country was protected by military stations. A line of fortresses protected the road from Damascus to Palmyra. Under direct Roman rule, which by its permanent military strength ensured peace, Greek civilization began to penetrate into these regions on the border of the desert. Hitherto, Hellenism, opposed by Jewish influences, had made little way here. Trajan's innovations made a new epoch. It is significant that no Greek monument dating from the time before Trajan has been found within the limits of the Nebatian kingdom, while on the other hand there are no inscriptions in the native tongue after Trajan. The commercial importance of Bostra, the new Bostra of Trajan as it was called, dates from the time when it became the center of the Roman province. Its good position made it the great market for the Syrian desert, the Arabian highlands, and Persia. It became the rival of Damascus. Buildings strang up rapidly in this land under Roman rule. New towns arose, symmetrically built, adorned with palaces and temples, theaters and baths, aqueducts and triumphal arches. The architecture, owing to want of wood, developed some peculiar features, especially in the treatment of the stone ark and the dome, which give the buildings of this region a place of their own among Greek buildings of the imperial period. Another client state had ceased to exist a few years before. On the death of Agrippa II in 100 A.D., the last remnant of the kingdom of Herod was annexed to the province of Syria. In consequence of this enlargement and the subsequent addition of Damascus, Syria reached under Trajan its widest limits as a province, and as the Legatas exercised control over the secondary province of Judea, his sphere of government was a very large one. End of Chapter 23, Section 6. Chapter 24, Section 1 of J. B. Buri's The Student's Roman Empire, Part 2. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Student's Roman Empire, Part 2 by J. B. Buri, Chapter 24, Trajan's Principate, continued, 98-117 A.D., Section 1, Trajan's Administration, Rome and Italy. Trajan ranks among the greatest empires of Rome, but he stands alone. He boldly inaugurated a new policy of conquest, but his successors refused to walk in the path which he marked out. His originality was fruitless. He did not influence the ages which succeeded him. The province of Dacia, his only work that was in any way abiding, ceased to be Roman before two centuries had elapsed. Trajan was, above all, a soldier, and his aggressive policy was largely due to this fact. His military undertakings were successful, but the reports of them which have come down are not sufficient to let us judge whether his strategy was original. He was robust in mind and body. He had a clear understanding, but one of a thoroughly practical turn, and he had no taste for literature. He was not averse to pleasures, but was careful not to indulge in them to the hurt of others. He was genial and popular in his manner and used to play the part of a comrade to his soldiers. His chief foieble was vanity. He was fond of naming places after himself and members of his family. He caused the title of Augusta to be comforted not only on his wife Plotina, but on his sister Marciana and her daughter Matidia. Trajan's personal appearance was noble and impressive. He was tall of stature, and his features were regular. He had an equiline nose, a broad and low forehead, thick, straight cut hair. He was the first emperor to whom a special name was given to designate his personal qualities. In 100 AD the senate comforted on him the name Optimus, which, however, he did not adopt as one of his titles until the later period, 114 AD. In his relations with the senators, Trajan was studiously moderate in language and demeanor. He was careful to maintain the fiction that the senate was a free body, as in the days of the republic he proposed to be a pinkips, not like the mission of Dominus. You better be free, says Pliny. We will be free. He faithfully capped his oath never to take the life of a senator. When his friend Lysinia Sura was secretly charged with a treasonable conspiracy, he sent for Sura's physician to anoint his eyes and let himself be shaved by Sura's barber. Next day he said, if my friend proposed to take my life, he might have compassed his design yesterday. Copernius Crosses, who had been pardoned by Nerva, afterwards conspired against Trajan and was put to death, not, however, by the emperor, but by his own senatorial colleagues. But while Trajan disarmed a position and won golden opinions by outward respect for the fathers and by the observance of superficial forms, he avoided having to restore to the senate any real powers. He retained the substance of monarchy and endeavored to render it plattable by a show of equality between the monarch and the other senators. He made no objection to the expression of republican sentiments and allowed the followers of Thratia and Helvides to indulge in their harmless hero worship of Brutus and Cassius. Yet men like Pliny did not disguise from themselves that they were under the absolute rule of a single man, but they recognized that he worked for the public wheel. Thus the policy of Trajan resembled that of Vespasian, except that Trajan was more affable and more tolerant. But he developed the monarchical principle in at least two ways. One, he did not assume a perpetual censorship like the mission, but he did what was more unconstitutional. He created new patricians without assuming the censorship at all. This was equivalent to claiming sensorial power as part of the imperial prerogative. Two, he instituted an imperial control over the local administration of the towns of Italy, of the three cities in the imperial provinces, and of the cities which were subject to the administration of the senate. These three classes of the community were hitherto exempt from the interference of the emperor, and the appointment of an imperial officer called Curator Repubblica, with control over the affairs of such a community, was a distinct stab in the growth of monarchy. The Curator was of equestrian or senatorial rank, and was chosen from some neighboring community. He had control over the municipal administration, especially in regard to the public buildings and the town rent roll. In many cases, doubtless, and especially in the senatorial provinces, there had been financial mismanagement, and the intervention of the state was beneficial. But the political tendency of the measure was to increase the sphere of the emperor's influence on the one hand, and to level the distinction existing between the various communities of the empire on the other. The control of the emperor in Italy tended to reduce the mother country to the position of the subject lands, and the intervention of imperial officers to correct the state of the free communities seriously diminished the value of their privileges. Otherwise, Trajan's policy in domestic and civil administration was not marked by any particular tendency. He does not appear to have been guided much by general principles, but rather to have dealt with each question as it arose on its own merits. Many beneficial results in special departments of law were achieved by his legislation. Like Claudius, he used personally to deal out judgment in the tribunals of Rome, and used himself to try all cases of appeal to the imperial court. His spirit of moderation and equity is expressed in the sentiment which is attributed to him, that it is better that the guilty should escape unpunished than that the innocent should be condemned. The state finances seem to have been managed by Trajan with discretion and success, for notwithstanding the large expenses incurred by his wars and his buildings, no increase of taxation was found necessary. On the contrary, the duty on inheritances, weakesima hereditatum, was alleviated in certain cases. Trajan published a budget with the details of the public expenditure, a popular measure, but also a political move, as showing how favorably his administration compared with that of his predecessors. He also established a special court to deal with fiscal lawsuits. The secret of Trajan's financial success lay partly in the strict economy of his court, but also in the large increase of revenue derived from the province of Dacia and its rich minds. One feature of his reign has received severe condemnation. He adopted from his predecessors the practice of giving congiaria to the people of Rome, but increased the amount of the donation to an extravagant height. His first congiarium, 99AD, was probably no larger than that of Nerva, 75Deneriae, two pounds Tenchillings ahead, but his second and third distributions of money, after each Dacian war, amounted to 650Deneriae ahead. He thus introduced a precedent of extravagant charity which became a serious tax on his successors. Though it was the general tendency under the Empire to alleviate the conditions of slavery, Trajan inclined in a contrary direction and passed some laws which made the discipline of servitude harder. By the existing legislation, when a master was assassinated, all his slaves were condemned to death. Trajan introduced a new regulation by which not only the testamentary freedmen, but those freedmen who had received their liberty during their master's life and possessed either holy or partly Roman citizenship were subjected to torture. He also issued an edict that a freedman or slave who had obtained from the Emperor Roman citizenship in its complete form without the knowledge of his patron or master and possessed thereby the right of freely disposing of his property, should retain the right during his lifetime, but should on his death be regarded as a freedman possessing only the used latinum so that his fortune might revert to his patron. Trajan followed the example of Nerva in paying special attention to the welfare of Italy. The possibility of an invasion by the barbarians beyond the Danube, which in the mission's reign may have seemed near enough, may have awakened the minds of statesmen to the importance of maintaining the population and encouraging agriculture in Italy if only for the purpose of strengthening her against a hostile attack. In four ways, Trajan came to the rescue of Italy. In the first place, he carried on, extended and modified the elementary institutions which Nerva had founded. This policy directly contributed to encourage marriage and raise the population. Secondly, the state further encouraged small proprietors by advancing loans at small interest. Thirdly, Trajan knew the law of Tiberias that all provincials who became senators must invest a third of their property in Italian land. Fourthly, he tried to hinder emigration from Italy by an ordinance that no Italians should take part in the foundation of new colonies. This Italian policy involved the principle that the provinces were to contribute to the maintenance of the mother country. It was a principle which was not then disputed, but which was manifestly unfair in as much as the legions which defended the provinces were no longer recruited from Italy. On the other hand, as we have seen, the institution of Curatoris tended to deprive Italy of political privileges. Trajan concerned himself with the improvement of Italian traffic both by sea and land. He restored the harbors of Ostia and Santumsele, Civitavecchia, on the west coast, and enlarged that of Ancona on the east. At Ostia he excavated a very large hexagonal basin, still called the Lago Trajano, and connected it with the port of Claudius by two smaller basins. This new port was surrounded with quays and buildings for magazines. He constructed a road through the palm-time marshes on the coast of Lausium, and converted the mule path which led directly from Beneventum to Brindisium into a regular road called Uia Trajana. Nor did he neglect the welfare of Rome. He improved the water supply by executing important repairs of the aquamarca and the agnonous, and conferred a great benefit on the inhabitants of the transtyberine quarter by building an aqueduct to supply them the aqua trajana. This aqueduct derived its waters from the Lacus sabbatinus, and is used at the present day under the name of the aqua paola. Trajan built two public baths, the Terma Trajanae near the baths of Titus, intended exclusively for the use of women, and the Terma Trajanae, in memory of his friend with Sinisura. He arranged for a cheaper supply of bread in Italy and Rome by reorganizing the guild of bakers, a considerable concession on Trajan's part, as he always manifested great jealousy of collegia and corporations. The list of those who received corn was revised, and 5,000 poor children were placed among the recipients. The great monument of Trajan in Rome was his new forum, which was confessed by posterity to be one of the most striking sites of the city. It lay in a narrow valley, which he formed by cutting off a spur between the cavita line and the querinal hills, and was designed to form a connecting link between the other fora and the compass marshes. It was, in fact, a northerly continuation of the Forum of Augustus. The execution of the design was entrusted to epilodoras of Damascus, the skillful architect who built the bridge of the Danube at Turnus Severin. The western and eastern sides of the forum were formed by semi-circles, hewn out of the hills, in front of which were rectilineal porticoes enclosing the area. In the middle of the space was an equestrian statue of the emperor. The southern side was occupied by a magnificent entrance, and the northern by the Basilica opiana, a large edifice. Behind it was the pillar of Trajan, which has been already described, in the center of a small place, whose sides were formed by two libraries, one of Latin, the other of Greek works. Beyond this space was a temple completed after Trajan's death, and consecrated to him by his successor. End of Section 1 Section 2 The corruption of the governors of the sanatorial provinces is illustrated by the cases of Marius Priscus and Cicilius Clasicus, which occurred at the beginning of Trajan's reign. Marius Priscus, who had been proconsul of Africa, was accused in 99 A.D. by the provinciales, and prosecuted by Pliny and the historian Tastus. The case came before the senate in the following year, Trajan his consul presiding. It was proved that Marius had indeed fleeced the Ephrae. For a bribe of three hundred thousand sisterces, he had banished a knight, and put to death seven of his friends. He flogged, sentenced to the mines, and finally strangled another knight for a bribe of seven hundred thousand. The sentence of the court was that the seven hundred thousand should be paid to the Errarium, and that Marius should be exiled from Italy. This was a poor compensation to the province for its sufferings. Soon after this, Pliny prosecuted Clasicus, formerly Governor of Bittica, at the instance of the inhabitants. His guilt was proved, but he died before the trial. In the administration of the provinces, Trajan's reign offers nothing noteworthy, except liberality in the construction of new roads, and the policy, already mentioned, of intervening in the affairs of free communities by means of a curator-republicae, and sending special commissioners to senatorial provinces. Thus, sexist Quinthirius Maximus was sent to Uchaia, probably to supervise the affairs of the free states of Greece. In this policy Trajan did not aim at uniformity. He only adopted it in cases where special circumstances seemed to demand his intervention. The wretched condition to which the province of Bithynia had been reduced by the incompetent rule of the senatorial pro-consuls was a case which called for the emperor's interference, and he saw good to make it temporarily an imperial province. He probably made the lost good to the senate by assigning to it the province of Panphilia instead. He appointed Pliny as Legatus Augusti proprietori to restore order in the demoralized province. The provincials had instituted suits against corrupt pro-consuls, and while the proceedings had dragged slowly on, the finances had fallen into disorder, the public buildings remained unfinished, and social life had been completely paralyzed. Pliny, who had had no previous experience of provincial government, referred to the emperor for instruction on every question which arose, and their correspondence has come down to us. It shows us that Trajan was averse to treating different cases in the same way, or applying a general rule, as Pliny suggested to do, to the whole province. He adopted the more equitable and more troublesome plan of paying regard to the local usages and special traditions of each community. It would be a great mistake to infer from the minute details with which the emperor concerned himself in the case of Pithinia that he devoted the same attention to the minor affairs of all the other provinces of the empire. On the contrary, he seems to have laid a great deal of responsibility on the shoulders of the governors. Pithinia was a special case. Its condition at this time is one among many pieces of evidence that the government of the imperial provinces was far better than that of the senatorial. The correspondence of Trajan and Pliny gives a most interesting glimpse of the questions and affairs which the emperor had to deal with in governing the provinces, and it is all the more valuable as our record of Trajan's reign is otherwise meager. The following abbreviated extracts from the correspondence will serve to give an insight into some sides of Roman provincial government. They will also illustrate the practical judgment of Trajan, and the narrow limits within which Pliny was permitted to decide for himself. 1. Imperial Authorization of Public Works Pliny. May the people of Prusa be authorized to replace their bathhouse which is old and dilapidated with new termy. Money will be forthcoming for the work. Trajan? Yes, if the construction will not be too great a burden for their strength or necessitate the imposition of a special tax. 2. Pliny. Senopy, Lex Water. I have found a copious spring of good quality 16 miles away, but the aqueduct will have to pass for a distance of about a mile over soft and uncertain ground. I can easily raise the money required, it only remains for me to secure your approval. Trajan? Make this aqueduct, but first carefully examine whether the suspicious locality can bear it and whether the expense does not exceed the ability of the town. Pliny? Nicomedia has expended over three million cisterces, 24,000 pounds, on an aqueduct which has been abandoned and is now in ruins, two million, 16,000 pounds, on another which has also been abandoned. I've means for making a third which will stand if you will send an inspector of aqueducts or an architect. Trajan? Supply Nicomedia with water, but investigate by whose fault so much money has been wasted. Pliny? Nicia has expended 10 million cisterces, 80,000 pounds, on a theater which is tottering and grades sums on a gymnasium which was burned and which they are rebuilding. At Claudiopolis they are excavating a bath house at the foot of a mountain with the money which the jacurians appointed by you pay for their admission to the curia. What am I to do with respect to all these works? Send me an architect to advise. Trajan? You are on the spot, decide. As for architects, we at Rome send to Greece for them. You will therefore find them about you. Pliny? Amastras is infected by a sewer which ought to be covered. If you permit the work to be executed, I have the money required. Trajan? Cover this infectious stream. Pliny? There is a great lake on the confines of the territory of Nicomedia, lakes off on about ten miles east of that city. It would be highly advantageous to connect it with the sea by a canal. Send me an engineer. Trajan? Take care that the lake in uniting with the sea does not run out entirely. I will send you from here men conversant with this kind of work. 2. Supervision of municipal finances Pliny? The money due to towns of the province has been called in, and no borrowers at twelve percent are to be found. All died to reduce the rate of interest, or, if that fails to attract borrowers, compel the jacurians to borrow the money in equal shares on suitable security. Trajan? Put the interest low enough to find borrowers, but do not force anyone to borrow against his will. Such a cause would be inconsistent with the temper of our century. Pliny? In the free and feathered city of Amisus, which, thanks to you, is governed by its own laws, a request has been handed to me concerning societies for mutual aid. Errani? I mention the circumstance that you may consider how far they may be tolerated, and how far they must be forbidden. Trajan? Allow them their societies, which the Treaty of Federation gives them, especially if, instead of spending their contributions on illicit assemblies, they employ them to assist their poor members. In the other towns, which are subject to our dominion, it should not be permitted. Pliny? Most of my predecessors have accorded to the towns of Pontus and Pithinia a priority of claim upon the property of their debtors. It would be well if some permanent regulation were made on this matter. Trajan? Let it be decided according to the special laws of each town, if they have not a privilege over other creditors, I ought not to grant it to them at the expense of private individuals. Pliny? The inhabitants of the colony of Apremia request me to examine their accounts, despite their ancient privilege of administering their own affairs, all tied to comply. Trajan? Yes, since they themselves desire it. Assure them that your inspection is by my desire and will not prejudice their privileges. Pliny? Julius Piso received 40,000 denarii twenty years ago as a public gift from Amesis. The public prosecutor, Acticus, claims this sum in accordance with your edicts which forbid such acts of liberality. Piso urges the length of time that has elapsed and professes that repayment would ruin him. Trajan? If the gift dates back more than twenty years, let it not be revoked, for you must regard the security of the individual citizens while taking care of the public funds. Pliny? I enclose a memorial of the Nicheans. Trajan? They pretend to have received from Augustus the privilege of collecting the inheritance of all their fellow citizens who die in testate, examine this affair and the presence of the parties, along with the procurators Gamelinas and my freedmen Epimachus, and decide what may appear to you just. Pliny? I've been examining the expenses of the Byzantines. They spent annually twelve thousand Cisterces, ninety-six pounds, on the travelling expenses of a legatus bearing to you a formal honoree decree, and three thousand, twenty-four pounds, in sending an envoy to salute the governor of Musia. Have I done right in cutting down both expenses? Trajan? It is enough for them to forward to me through your hands their decree of homage. As for the governor of Musia, he will pardon them if they make their court to him cheaper. Three. The Decurians. Pliny? In certain towns of the province, the Decurians' supernumerum are obliged on their admission to the Curia to subscribe some thousand, about thirty-five pounds, others two thousand Denari. It pertains to you, Sire, to make a general law. Trajan? No, it is safest to follow the custom of each town, especially regarding those who are made the Curians against their wish. Pliny? The law of Pompey is observed in Bithynia, requires the age of thirty years for exercising the function of the majestacy and entering the senate. But an edict of Augustus permits the inferior majestacies to be held at the age of twenty-two. I have concluded that those who become magistrates under this edict ought to have seats in the municipal senate, although under thirty years of age. But what about those who, being of the prescribed age for holding majestacies, have not obtained them? Trajan? Close the senate house to them. Four. Right of Citizenship. Pliny? To obtain the right of citizenship in a Bithynian town it is necessary, by the law of Pompeyus, not to be a citizen of any other Bithynian community. Many of the Curians in every community are in this position. Should they be excluded from the senate house? Trajan? No, but see to it that in future the law of Pompeyus be better observed. Five. Protection for the Towns. Pliny? Byzantium has a legionary centurion sent by the Legatas of lower Musia, according to her directions, to watch over its privileges. Giulio Polis, on the frontier of Bithynia, requests of you the same favour. Trajan? Byzantium is a great city, where a large number of strangers land. Its magistrates require some military assistance. But if I give such help to Giulio Polis, all the small towns will want the same thing. It evolves upon you to watch that no injury be done to the cities under your government. Six. Religious Matters. Pliny, may a temple of Sibili, at Nicomedia, be removed to a more convenient site? Trajan? Yes, the proceeding cannot violate a lax dedicaciones, as provincial soil is not capable of receiving consecrations according to Roman law. Pliny? I've been asked for permission to transfer some dead bodies from their present tombs. At Rome the decision of the Pontus is required. What shall I do here? Trajan? Grant or refuse, according to the merits of the case. It would be too hard to require provincials to come and consult the Pontus at Rome in this better. Pliny? I have found a ruined house, suitable for the bath to be built at Prusa. The proprietor built a temple to Claudius in the Pristillium, but nothing is left of it. Is there any objection? Trajan? Put the bath in this house, unless the temple was actually completed, for even though it may have disappeared the soil remains sacred to him. Pliny? It is said that a woman and her sons were buried in the same place where your statue is set up. The statue is in a library, the burial place is in a large court surrounded by a colonnade. I pray you to enlighten me as to the decision of this affair. Trajan? You should not have hesitated about such a question, for you know very well that I do not propose to make my name respected by terror and judgements of Maestas dismiss the accusation. 7. Military Discipline Pliny? Should the prisoners be guarded by soldiers, or according to custom, by public slaves? I have stationed some of both. Trajan? It is better to adhere to usage, and the soldier must not be called away from his flag. Pliny? Two slaves have been found among their recruits. What shall be done with them? Trajan? If they have been enlisted, the fault lies with the recruiting officer. If they have been furnished as substitutes, you must punish those whose places they fill. If, knowing their condition, they have come and offered themselves, execute them. 8. Civil Discipline Pliny? In many towns, persons condemned to the mines or to fighters gladiators are serving as public slaves and receiving wages. What is to be done? Trajan? Execute the sentences, except where the condemnation dates back more than ten years, and, in the latter case, calls the convicts to be employed in such menial offices as are nearly penal, such as cleaning the public baths in the sewers. Pliny? A man who was sentenced to perpetual banishment by buses, proconsul of Pythinia in 98 A.D., has remained in the province, though he has not made use of the right given him by the senate after the rescinding of the acts of buses to claim within two years a new trial. Trajan? He has disobeyed the law, sent him in chains to my Puritorian prefects for a more rigorous punishment. Pliny? Those assuming the toga virilis, celebrating a marriage, inaugurating some public work or entering on a majestacy, are accustomed to invite the decurients in many of the plebs, sometimes more than a thousand persons, and to give each one at the nareas or two. I am afraid that the numbers at these gatherings are excessive, though you have yourself allowed invitations on special occasions. Trajan, you are right, but I have made choice of your wisdom for the express purpose of reforming all the abuses of the province. Pliny? A great fire has devastated Nicomedia, would it not be well to establish a society of 150 firemen? Trajan? No. Corporations, whatever the name they bear, are sure to become political associations. Supply the apparatus of buckets, warn the proprietors, and, in case of need, employ the populace. The letter of Pliny, in the reply of his master, which have excited most interest and led to most discussion, are those concerning the punishment of Christians. Until the missions reign, the Christians have been regarded as a Jewish sect and have been treated as Jews. Since the death of Gaius, the Jews had never been forced to take part in the divine worship of the emperors, and the Christians shared in this immunity, as the state did not recognize their distinction from the Jews. But the fall of Jerusalem brought about a change in the position of Christianity, by emancipating it from its home in Palestine and leading to its wider propagation among the Gentiles. This propagation led to the recognition of the distinction between Jews and Christians. It was observed that the proselytizing efforts of the Jews proper were attended with unimportant results, whereas the Christians sect increased rapidly. The Roman government was only ready to tolerate the opposition of the Jews to the state religion, so long as there was no danger of Jewish doctrines spreading among subjects of other races. The question, therefore, was whether they should suppress the Jewish religion altogether, including Christianity as a species of Judaism, or should deal with the Christians separately. The mission chose the letter alternative towards the close of his reign. A refusal to worship the emperor's image was regarded as an act of sacrilege, and such worship was required from Christians, though not from Jews. A Christian named Antipas suffered death at Pergamum for refusing to comply with this requisition. At Rome, Flavius' claimants was put to death, and Domitila banished on a charge of sacrilege, and it seems probable that they were Christian converts. The year 95 in which these things happened may be regarded as a date at which Christianity came into conflict with the state religion and was forbidden. As the Christian faith compelled those who professed it to set at nought the established religion, Christians were regarded by the law as sacriligious, and to be suspected of Christianity was equivalent to being suspected of sacrilege. An important consequence followed. It was one of the duties of every provincial governor to seek out and punish all sacriligious persons, brigands, robbers, and others who infested his province. As the Christians came under the head of sacrilege, the governor was not only able, but was required to deal with them according to his own discretion without receiving any special imperial instructions. It was part of nervous reaction against the policy of the mission that accusations of this kind of sacrilege were not encouraged, but the principle was not changed. Christians were still punishable, and this was an acknowledged fact when Pliny was Governor of Bithynia. The wide diffusion of the forbidden religion in this province became known to Pliny in 112 A.D. when he issued Trajan's rescript Forbidding Societies, Heteriae. The enemies of the Christians took the opportunity of pointing out that they were under habit of holding illicit assemblies. Pliny describes his investigation of the question in this letter to Trajan, of which the tenor is in brief, as follows, I have never been present at the resolutions taken concerning the Christians, therefore I know not for what causes or how far they may be objects of punishment, and I have hesitated considerably in considering whether the difference of age should make any difference in our procedures. Are those who retract their belief to be pardoned? Must they be punished for the profession alone, although otherwise innocent? I have pursued the following method. I have asked them whether they were Christians, and to those who avowed the profession I have put the same question a second and a third time, and have enforced it by threats of punishment. When they have persevered I have ordered them to be led to execution. For whatever their confession might be there are audacious behaviour and immovable obstinacy undoubtedly demanded punishment. I have reserved some who shared in the same kind of madness that were Roman citizens to be sent to Rome. An anonymous information was put into my hands containing a list of many persons who deny that they are or ever were Christians. For, repeating the form of invocation after me, they called upon the gods and offered incense and made libations to your image, and they uttered imprecations against Christ to which no true Christian, as they affirm, can be compelled by any punishment whatever. I thought it best therefore to dismiss them. Others of them said at first that they were Christians, and then immediately afterwards denied it, and said that they had entirely renounced the error several years before. All these worshipped your image and the images of the gods, and they even vented imprecations against Christ. They affirmed that the sum total of their fault or their error consisted in assembling upon a certain stated day before it was light to sing alternately among themselves hymns to Christ as to a god, binding themselves by oath not to steal nor to rob, not to commit adultery nor break their faith when plighted, nor to deny the deposits in their hands whenever compelled to restore them. These ceremonies performed they usually departed and came together again to take a repast, the meat of which was innocent, and eaten promiscuously. But they had desisted from this custom since my edict wherein by your command I had prohibited all associations, heteriae. From these circumstances I thought it more necessary to try to gain the truth even by torture from two women who were said to officiated their worship. But I could discover only an obstinate kind of superstition carried to great excess, and therefore postponing any resolution of my own I have waited the result of your judgment. To me an affair of this sort seems worthy of your consideration, principally from the multitude involved in the danger. For many persons of all degrees, of all ages, of both sexes, are already and will be constantly brought into danger by these accusations. Nor is this superstitious contagion confined only to the cities. It spreads itself through the villages and the country. It is clear from this letter that Pliny had no doubt in his mind that Christianity was forbidden and punishable. It is also clear that although this was recognized in principle, yet in practice Roman governors did not attempt to discover Christians and did not concern themselves with the prohibited faith unless it was specially brought under their notice. On the first occasion on which Christians were accused before Pliny he dealt with them as with persons guilty of sacrilege on his own responsibility. But on the second occasion when an anonymous letter reached him containing a long list he investigated the question more fully and made two discoveries. One that the number of Christians was very large, and two that they seemed to be innocent of the crimes of incest and Thaestian banquets which were popularly ascribed to them. Consequently he hesitated to deal with the superstition as similarly as he had dealt with it before and referred the matter to the emperor. In reply Trajan refused to adopt any general measure. The Christians, he wrote, need not be sought out. If they are brought into your presence and convicted they must be punished. But anonymous information ought not to have the least weight in any charge whatever. Thus Trajan upheld the principle that Christianity, being a form of sacrilegium, was punishable. But on the other hand he prescribed that Christians were only to be punished when they were accused and convicted. They were not, like robbers or sacrilegious persons of other kinds, to be sought after or hunted down. This was an inconsistent position. It was hardly logical to leave in peace the Christian whom no one happened to accuse and condemn to death the Christian against whom an ill-wisher brought the charge of belonging to the forbidden sect. But the great significance of Trajan's rescript is that it affirmed clearly the attitude of the Roman government to Christianity and laid down a principle which set Christians outside the pale of the law. This principle formed the basis of the religious policy of the emperors for the two following centuries. It is important to observe that the crime for which a Christian was punished, according to this rescript, was not that of belonging to an illegal association, a transgression which would have come under the head of Maestas. Nor was the Christian punished because he had hitherto abstained from taking part in the worship of the emperor or the gods. When a man was accused of Christianity, his judge required him to make a supplication to the emperor's image and if he refused, punishment was inflicted for this refusal which was accounted sacrilege. End of chapter 24 sections 2 and 3.