Augustus: Managing an Empire Part 2

During roughly the same timeframe as the previous article, adjustments of some magnitude were happening in the family of Augustus. There were consequences for its members and also for Rome. Julia, the daughter of Augustus had married Agrippa in 21 BC and had two sons: Gaius, born in 20 BC and Lucius in 17 BC. Augustus and Livia didn't have any male children, so upon the arrival of Lucius, Augustus adopted them both--"an heir and a spare." After this they were known as Gaius Caesar and Lucius Caesar. The situation was reminiscent of Julia acting as nothing more than an incubator for the offspring of two fathers.

This was an obvious move to secure the chances of an Augustan dynasty. This move also seemed at the time to leave Livia's sons, Tiberius and Drusus, of the running permanently. It was largely thought at the time that Livia would do just about anything to advance her sons' standing. However, there is no historical evidence to suggest she ever did anything impudent in this regard. The sheer fact that Livia remained in high favor and regard by Augustus throughout his life would seem to support this--rumours of stepmother-like doings not withstanding.

Whatever Livia, Tiberius, and Drusus thought privately, the lives they led left no room for complaint. Tiberius, aged 25 and Drusus, aged 21, had already shown talent and ambition and were well rewarded fo it. Augustus arranged for both his stepsons to be able to hold office before the minium ag and he trusted them with multiple challenging duties. Tiberius was known as somewhat dour and withdrawn, but Drusus was overwhelmingly popular and outgoing.

Undated letters of Augustus speak of affection for them both. Both Tiberius and Drusus had an aptitude for military life and leadership--qualities that Augustus expanded upon and exploited.

Events in Gaul soon caused or supplied the pretext to begin the imperial grand strategy. Germanic tribes had won a battle over Marcus Lollius in 17 BC in Gaul. Although the battle wasn't essential, and was even redressed, a legionary standard had been lost. But, out of all proportion, Augustus acted as if this attack was an extreme emergency. He left for Gaul immediately and brought Tiberius with him.

However, upon arrival, there wasn't anything for him to do. Marcus Lollius, a corrupt, status-seeking man who was also a favorite of Augustus, was already preparing a military strike. In addition, when the tribes learned Augustus himself was coming to Gaul, they vanished into their own territory. Still, Augustus would stay in Gaul for three years. Why?

There are not enough historical records left to us to answer definitively. One rumor circulating at the time in Rome was that he left the capitol to cultivate an affair with Marcenas' wife Terrentia. This is possible but would be strange, because it is most probable that Livia traveled with her husband on this campaign as she did on his other jaunts around the empire.

There was news of a plot against Augustus while he was in Gaul. The plot implicated a grandson of Pompey the Great, and a young man named Gnaeus (possibly Lucius) Cornelius Cinna. Cassius Dio wrote that Augustus spent many sleepless nights trying to decide if he should execute the young men or not. Apparently Livia convinced him that he should show clemency to quiet his critics and dissuade future machinations against him.

It is most probable that Augustus spent this time planning future military campaigns. Aggression began in 16 or 17 BC when the governor of Illyricum launched an assault against two Alpine tribes. After this, in 15 BC, Tiberius and Drusus commanded a two-pronged maneuver into what would become the modern Switzerland, Lichtenstein, western Austria, and southern Bavaria. Drusus and Lucius must have achieved an overwhelming victory, for their goals were met in one summer campaign. The following year, Roman forces annexed the maritime Alps. Thus the province of Raetia was born.

One of the ways that the peace was kept here, was that Tberius and Drusus deported thousands of men of fighting age from the area. Although the humanity of this move can obviously be argued--there was a definite
"method to their madness." When Roman armies achieved victory over 'barbarian" tribes it was most often with an overwhelming amount of force. However, there were always enough men left to hide and then proceed to launch future guerilla attacks. So when the geographer Strabo visited the area a generation later, he reported a "state of tranquility," --it was likely the "tranquility" of being barren.

During the time he was in Gaul, Augustus also reorganized the army by demobilizing a great number of men whose period of service was up and settled them in Gaul and Spain. As these men were rewarded fo their years of service, there would probably have a recruitment campaign to make up for the retired men. The length of a legionary's duty was extended to sixteen years and to twelve years for a member of the Praetorian Guard. It was alos during Augustus' time spent in Gaul that the mint in Lugdunum (modern Lyon) appears to have begun operating as a major mint issuing both gold and silver coins to pay legions in campaigns in Gaul and Germany.

"Not only had stage one of the military strategy been swiftly and brilliantly completed, but in the process stage two had been launched. This was because Raetia's northern border was the river Danube, and a little additional fighting led to the acquisition of the neighboring territory of Noricum to the east (roughly the rest of Austria). Noricum abutted Pannonia, whose tribesmen had been defeated in Octavian's Illyrian wars; although the Pannonians had been neither conquered nor occupied, for the time being they were quiet." Anthony Everitt, Augustus, p,266.

Moesia, on Pannonia's eastern border had already been conquered--although another generation (perhaps a little more) passed before it was deemed beneficial to make it a formal province. Pannonia was still very much an issue. In fact, control of Pannonia was still tenuous at best in 14 AD-the year Augustus died. The three Pannonian legions were headquartered to the south-west of the province; fairly close to the border of Italy. There were auxiliary detachments in the forts of Aquincum (Budapest) and Arrabona on the Danube, however, the first legionary camp was set-up at Carnuntum, just about the time Augustus left this mortal coil--14-15 AD.

It was not until the wars of Domitian (r. 81-96 AD), that the Pannonian Danube frontier was strengthened. To do this, client kingdoms were once again relied upon just as they had been on the Rhine. The Suebi had taken control of the area north of the upper Danube, when the Marcomannic king, Maroboduus, sought exile in Rome in 19 AD. The Romans installed a king over the Suebi who lasted until 50 AD, and his successors still showed allegiance to Rome in 69-70 AD. The legions were also stationed well south of the Danube in Moesia; but here the first legionary camp on the Danube, installed in 15 AD, was followed by three others in the middle of the century.

However, the things that Drusus and Tiberius had achieved were real and permanent. Augustus was very happy with his adopted sons and commissioned a huge celebratory monument, the Tropaeum Alpium (Treaty of the Alps) to distinguish this accomplishment. This monument was a great stone edifice, fifty feet tall, and supported a wide circular tower that was surrouned by columns and had a large stepped roof. A statue of Augustus would probably have been placed at the apex--looking out over his conquered territory like a god surveying his mortal charges from on high. The remains of this monument can be viewed at La Turbie, near Monaco, still remarkable after the passage of more than 20 centuries. More here . The image is of the remains of the Tropaeum Alpium. The research resources I used for this article were Anthony Everitt's, Augustus, 2006 and Fergus Millar's The Roman Empire and its neighbours, 1967. Peace and be well to anyone stopping by!

Augustus: Managing an Empire Part 1

In his official autobiography, Res Gestae, Augustus pridefully stated: "I englarged the territory of all provinces of the Roman People on whose borders were people who were not yet subject to our imperium. This line of thinking does not quite gibe with what he said after returning to Rome from his negotiations with King Frahata of Parthia in the east in 20 BC., which was that he had no intentions of adding to Rome's provinces. Augustus declared "the existing number was exactly sufficient," also writing his judgment of this to the Senate.

We can see that the statement made in his autobiography is much closer to the truth. For Augustus was truly an aggressive imperialist and expanded Rome's imperium more than any other ruler in a comaparable timeframe in all of Rome's previous history.

And the Roman people gave their blessing to this imperial expansion--even expected it. It is true that Republican law had made it illegal for the Senate to declare war without a provocation. Also Rome had secured much of its eastern empire without totally meaning to do so, such was the case in 133 BC, when the king of Pergamum died and willed his entire kingdom to Rome. The conviction that Rome had an imperial destiny was fixed in the minds of the Roman people, much like "Manifest Destiny" in the United States and British imperialism 2,000 years later. Indeed, empire was one of the methods that the Augustan regime legitimized its existence in the Roman mind.

The reign of Augustus was actually the last great age of Roman expansion. Slightly before he died, Augustus left his successor (and stepson) Tiberius the advice not to expand the frontiers of the empire. After Augustus there were only two major military campaigns that led to permanent acquisitions. These were Britain in 43 AD under Claudius and Dacia in 105-106 AD under Trajan. Trajan's other conquests in Armenia, Mesopotamia and south to the Persian Gulf in the campaigns of 113-117 AD were falling apart before his death, and were formally renounced after his death. However, a new province--Mesopotamia (again) was finally brought into the orbit of Rome after the Parthian wars of Marcus Aurelius' co-emperor, Lucius Verus, in 162-166 AD and of Septimius Severus in 194-198.

"But even the relativlely peaceful period up to the 220s was filled with constant change and development in the disposition and function of the army, and the nature of the frontiers. At the beginning of the period indeed it could hardly be said that recognizable frontiers existed. In the West there were still three legions in the interior of Spain, finally conquered only in 26-19 BC. Legionary camps were grouped along the Rhine, but no permanent forts had yet been established beyond it. The land between the headwaters of the Rhine and Danube was not yet occupied, while the first legionary camp on the Danube itself-Carnuntum in Pannonia-was established only in about AD 15; on the lower Danube towards the Black Sea, Roman control was still episodic in the early years of Tiberius." Fergus Millar, The Roman Empire and its neighours, p.104.

As far as the idea of Roman frontiers is concerned, this brings to to mind how very blurry and indefinite those frontiers must have seemed at the time. There was no accurate navigational equipment at the time, and most explorers (who were usually merchants and traders) didn't quest very far from the Meditteranean.

The Romans thought that all of the world's landmass was contained in a semi-circular disk made up of only Asia and Europe. They thought the island of Britannia to be at the northwestern edge of this disk and that the whole landmass of the world was completely encompassed by a vast sea--Oceanus. As the Roman Empire already took such a great portion of the land, they believed was all that was there, it must have been greatly enticing for Roman rulers to believe that they would one day be the masters of it all.

The first world maps that we know of came from fifth-century Athens. The Romans, with their imperial obligations valued the importance of cartography. Julius Caesar had commissioned a world-map that most likely was a part of a triumphal monument he had constructed on the Capitoline Hill. Augustus wanted a more refined and detailed map, so he commissioned his indispensible deputy, Agrippa, to make the orbis terrarum or "globe of the earth." This depicted hundreds of cities linked together by Rome's marvelous network or roads. It was fashioned from reports by Roman governors, generals and travelers. The result that emerged from this was a largely recognizable picture. However, the distances between places and the shapes of them became less accurate the further they were from Rome.

The most important job of the orbis terrarum was to assist military commanders, imperial governors and administrators. It was also an impressive synbol of Roman power. The map was displayed--either by painting or engraving--on the wall of the Porticus Vipsania, a collonade erected by Agrippa's sister as a permanent public display. Papyrus or parchment copies of the orbis terrarum were also made for travelers.

It would appear that a well-defined "program" was also mapped out in the years after Actium by Augustus and Agrippa. The two spent many years abroad putting down revolts, inspecting (and reforming if necessary) local administrations, and superseding these tasks, consolidating and expanding the empire. Augustus was in Gaul and Spain from 27 - 24 BC, in Greece and Asia between 22 and 19 BC, and again in Gaul from 16 to 13 BC. Agrippa went east from 23 to 21 BC and Gaul and Spain in 20 to 19 BC. During this time the eastern provinces and client kingdoms were reorganized, and the frontier of Egypt was expanded southwards; contact with the Ethiopians resulting from this. Gaul and Spain were pacified, and negotiations with the Parthians were successfully concluded.

The orbis terrarum revealed three problems that had yet to be vanquished. 1) With the Alps being controlled by a group of untamed tribes, it was impossible to reach the eastern provinces by land around the top of the Italian peninsula. 2) Macedonia's frontier was hard to defend and ill-defined. 3) The Germanic tribes were putting up constant challenges along the river Rhine which formed the Gallic frontier from the North Sea to the Alps from the western side.

The best solution to these problems would be to gain control of the Alps and then proceed north and create a defensible frontier lined with legions along the river Danube. By doing this Italy and Macedonia would be protected from direct assault from buffer provinces in the north.

There was a problematic area if the Rhine and Danube rivers were to indicate the empire's permanent boundary. A salient was created by the heads of the two rivers at the apex, where modern Basel, Switzerland is. Germanic tribes hostile to Rome could use the salient to run interior lines, allowing them a huge military advantage. Thus the final procedure of the plan would be to invade Germany and create a new frontier at the river Elbe. This would take care of the salient and form a border that would be a roughly straight line between the North Sea and the Black Sea. There was an added advantage to this plan because the annexed territory would protect Gaul from eastern invaders. The well-thought out completeness and the interdependent elements of this three part plan would suggest that it was the brainchild of the steadfast, loyal Agrippa--the man solely responsible for winning all of Augustus' wars for him.

The link here will explain the image--I tried to find what some scholars think the actual orbis terrarum may have looked like and will continue searching. I think I have enough time to do one more article here on my new "schedule"--hopefully it will be here in a two or three days. Peace and be well to anyone stopping by! The research materials I used for this article are Anthony Everitt's Augustus published in 2006 and Fergus Millar's The Roman Empire and its neighbours published in 1967.

Empires: Rome -Winners and Losers Part One

Anyone stopping by might want to read the post below-I did that post in the early evening yesterday and it did not update on MFMs page and the posting time is wrong-just wanted to let anyone reading this blog that it is there. The divisions of class and status in Rome had roots in the myths of the city's beginning. The Aventine Hill, on the far side of Rome's southernmost valley was where the immigrants to the city lived. Facing the Aventine was a second hill called the Palatine. The differences between the two hills were like night and day. The Palatine, was by far the most exclusive of Rome's seven hills. In the midst of this most expensive of the world's real estate of the time, stood a humble shepherd's hut. This little hut was said to be the childhood home of Romulus, Rome's first king, and Remus, his twin. The ancient legend of the brothers said that both of them had decided to found a city. Romulus had decided to stand on the Palatine Hill, Remus on the Aventine. Remus had seen six vultures flying overhead, but Romulus had seen twelve. Romulus took this as a sign that the gods approved of his spot, and fortified the Palatine and name the new city after himself. Remus was overcome with jealousy and rage, and had ended up being murdered by his brother in a fight. From this time on the two hill's destinies were unalterable. The Palatine Hill was for winners, the Aventine for losers.

The polar opposites of success and failure were made manifest in the very geography of the city. These were also the poles around which Roman life revolved. There was nothing remotely like a modern middle class in ancient Rome. There were not the socioeconomic divisions that we see in many countries in the modern world in the ancient Republic. However, despite the vast chasm that divided the rich and the poor; the patrician and the plebian, there was a unique quality that Rome had. This ideal or quality could be symbolized by the Circus Maximus. The Circus Maximus ran the length of the entire valley between the Aventine and Palatine hills. The site had been used for chariot races since the time of the kings. Two hundred thousand citizens might fill this enormous place, its capacity is not equalled by any arena to this day. The spectacles viewed in this immense arena gave a sense of shared community to the citizens of Rome. Because of the nature of the two hills surrounding it, a senator might look down at the Circus from his sumptious villa and a shopkeeper from his humble shack and be reminded that whatever their differences in wealth and status, they were still citizens of the same republic.
I hope to have the next post here very soon, the information is actually ready to go-so it is more a question of computer connection-I also have a post at my other blog I would like to start today also, so I will see how time goes. Peace and be well to anyone stopping by!

Rome: Republic to Empire

For some background to the posts that I hope to have here in the very near future, I thought it would be good to talk about a little Roman history. Rome was initially similar to other Meditteranean cities. It became a state by absorbing the surrounding areas of Italy. Rome grew into an empire by expanding its reach to the limits of the known world at the time. The political center of that empire grew, and for the ancients was the greatest city ever known. Greek commentators like Polybius and others praised the excellences of it's constitution and the cohesiveness of it's social order. In Rome, all of it's citizens served in the legions, paid taxes, elected the magistrates, made the laws and even decided on such questions as peace and war. Politics was everyone's business it was the res publica.

The reality of the situation was that it was easy to see that a certain class of privileged individuals held more political power than the mass of the citizenry. This class would have excluded foreigners, women and slaves. The censors kept an eye on the fortune and honor of each citizen; regulated his role in political life along with his military and fiscal contributions. The wealthiest citizens and those fortunate enough to be born into Rome's aristocratic families formed an oligarchy which split among itself the offices of magistrate, military commander and priest. The power struggles between patricians and plebeians in the early years of the republic had led to an expansion of this 'nobility'. In the later republic it was very rare for this class to open itself up to 'new men'. These were usually men who had shown great military talents and sometimes political ones.

The Roman city-state was first and foremost a community of warriors. The existence of universal military service meant that citizens could be mobilized between the age of seventeen and sixty. This distinguished Rome in a very important way from Carthage and the Hellensitic kingdoms who only had mercenaries. The defeated powers also provided soldiers for Rome's further conquests.

The Senate intially controlled Rome's expansionist tendencies, which were bound up with it's desire to ensure it's own security. The Senate during the republic was sort of a permanent council made up of former magistrates. The Senate's duties also included receiving ambassadors and ruled over allocation of the budget. Rome's early conquests were confined to Italy. Through the elaboration of a variety of diplomatic contacts with thee Italian peninsula's ethnically and culturally heterogenous communities, and in organizing the Italian geographical area by building roads and founding colonies, Rome laid the groundwork for unification which Hannibal's political strategy did little to damage. When Hannibal presented himself as the liberator of Italy, he was only able to win the support of a section of the Campanians. More than a million Italians acceded to Roman citizenship after the Social War. This revolutionized the structures of the city for good.

When Rome attacked Carthage, which controlled the western Meditteranean, it was entering a conflict with incalculable consequences. It was the first military intervention as a sea power and it's first outside of Italy. The Second Punic War extended the field of battle to Sicily, Spain, Africa, parts of the Greek world and Italy. The Third Punic War showed that Rome was capable of destroying anyone who fought her power. Rome conquered Carthage and also established her power over the Hellenistic kingdoms. The profits from these conquests were so great that after 167 B.C., Romans no longer paid any direct taxes. However, social tensions were growing. Rome had to modify it's conditions for recruiting soldiers under Marius, and the way in which Rome allocated important military commands were also changed in the first century B.C. The economic and social system began to come under a great deal of strain and the cohesion of the political system diminished, despite attempts at reform such as those of the Gracchi. The clash of ambitions between the military leaders who had dominated parts of the East(Sulla,Pompey) and the West (Julius Caesar) led to the Empire. This was just a very, very short bit about Roman history. I want to do a lot more with Roman history in the future and the coming series touches on quite a bit of it. Peace and be well to anyone stopping by!