Roman Empire: New Wars Old Enemies Part Fifteen

This feat was done also by a painful march across an expanse of old cooled lava near Mount Etna. Again, after just a few days Octavian had gone from the most desperate of situations to being in the driver's seat. He had twenty-three legions, 20, 000 cavalry and more than 5,000 light armed troops under his command in Sicily. Sextus recalled all of his men back from the west to the northeastern part of the island which was all he had left. Sextus knew that the only way out know was to engage the enemy at sea. On 3 September, his fleet sailed out of Messana and met Agrippa's in the sea between the ports of Mylae and Naulochus. If Suetonius can be relied on it seems that Octavian again was having an acute psychological crisis, similiar to what had happened at Philippi: "On the eve of the battle he fell so fast asleep that his staff had to wake him and ask for the signal to begin hostilities. This must have been the occasion of Antony's taunt: "He could not face his ships to review them when they were already at their fighting stations; but lay on his back in a stupor and gazed up at the sky, never rising to show that he was alive until his admiral Marcus Agrippa had routed the enemy." Slowly, as time passed, what were at first a few setbacks for Sextus became a rout.

One of Sextus' admirals took his own life, the other surrendered to Agrippa along with individual ships. Sextus had only 17 warships left. Sextus was so dumbstruck by what had happened that he forgot to give orders to his infantry. The result of this being that they immediately surrendered. Sextus gathered his money and anything else of use, took his daughter and some of his entourage and set sail towards the east with the remainder of his fleet. He intended to seek support from Mark Antony. We can wonder if Sextus was unconsciously following in his father's footsteps, who after his final defeat at Pharsalus had also sought safety in the east. Lepidus was about to do something extremely stupid. After being in the background so long he proclaimed himself the master of Sicily. This because he had landed on the island first and captured the largest number of cities. Of course Octavian was enraged by this. He sent some of his agents out. They found that Ledpidus' soldiers had little respect for him, applauded Octavian's courage (apparently they hadn't heard all of the stories about Octavian's crisis moments) and absolutely abhored the thought of another civil war. Then a very instructive incident took place that hwoed the courageous side of Octavian's personality.

Octavian took some cavalry to Lepidus's camp. Then unarmed he went into the camp with only a small number of companions. It was quite a scene, reminescent of the times Octavian put his life in mortal danger in front of large crowds. Naulochus had shown yet again that Octavian still found it very hard to deal with the experience of battle. However, when he was hurt or betrayed by opposition to himself he did not hesitate to put his life on the line. Lepidus ordered that the intruder be put out by force. Appian tells us that Octavian "was hit on the breastplate but the weapon failed to penetrate to the skin and he escaped by running to his cavalry. The men in one of Lepidus' outposts jeered at him as he ran." The experience must have been quite humiliating for Octavian but it had the desired effect. For in the next few hours Ledpidus' men began to desert him, even after he begged them to remain loyal. Lepidus even grabbed hold of a standard saying he would not release it. "You will when you're dead!" one of the standard-bearers replied. Now he knew it was over. Lepidus changed out of uniform and ran to Octavian as fast as possible, with spectators following along beside him like the event was public theater. Here a sea change occurred with the way Octavian treated some who betrayed him.

This could have been because for the first time in eight years Octavian didn't have a visible threat to his position on the horizon. Octavian also knew that people desperately wanted peace and a return to the rule of law. So when Lepdius came before him, Octavian stood and didn't let Lepidus fall to his knees. Octavian didn't punish Lepidus in any way and sent him to Rome as a private citizen. Octavian even let Lepidus keep his highly prestigious position of pontifex maximus. Lepidus was no longer allowed in the Triumvirate (he was probably grateful to be breathing). So Lepidus left public life and spent the remaining years of his life in a nicely comfortable retirement at the seaside resort of Circeii, about fifty miles south of Rome. This town was built on the side of a steep crag. The town also sported a temple of the sun and a lighthouse. Circeii was originally an island, and the malarial Pomptine Marshes were on its landward side. Legend had it that the witch Circe lived in one of the caves on its slopes. Circe had the ability to change visitors into swine. Circe with the rather porcine legend attached to it was a rather appropriate place for one of Rome's most loathsome politicians to spend his last years in. Now Octavian had 45 legions. 25,000 cavalry, about 37,000 light-armed troops and six hundred warships under his command. To find land for these men to settle on would take time; so it was very impractical to demobilize all of them immediately.

The image is a bust of Octavia, Octavian's loyal sister, with whom he was close to all of his life. Thanks again to anyone following or commenting on this blog! I hope to have the next article here soon.