Part 11 (2/2)
The extortions of the Roman governors had been so great, that Ionia, Lydia, and Caria, with all the islands near Asia Minor, gladly revolted from Rome, and accepted his protection. All the Roman residents with their families were ma.s.sacred on a single day. It is said that 80,000 persons perished. Mithradates himself next crossed the Bosphorus, and marched into Northern Greece, which received him with open arms.
Such was the condition in the East when Sulpicius Rufus carried the bills mentioned in the last chapter. One of these bills was that Marius have charge of the war against Mithradates. This was not to Sulla's liking. He was in Campania with the legions that had served in the Social War. The soldiers were devoted to him, and ready to follow him anywhere. Sulla, therefore, taking matters into his own hands, marched into the city at the head of his troops. The people resisted; Sulpicius was slain; Marius fled for his life, and retired to Africa, where he lived for a time, watching the course of events.
Sulla could not remain long at the capital. The affairs of the East called him away; and no sooner was he gone than the flames of civil war burst out anew (87).
LUCIUS CORNELIUS CINNA, a friend of Marius, was Consul that year. He tried to recall Marius, but was violently opposed and finally driven from the city. The Senate declared him deposed from his office. He invoked the aid of the soldiers in Campania, and found them ready to follow him. The neighboring Italian towns sent him men and money, and Marius, coming from Africa, joined him with six thousand troops. They marched upon Rome. The city was captured. Cinna was acknowledged Consul, and the sentence of outlawry which had been pa.s.sed on Marius was revoked.
The next year Marius was made Consul for the seventh time, and Cinna for the second. Then followed the wildest cruelties. Marius had a body-guard of slaves, which he sent out to murder whomever he wished. The houses of the rich were plundered, and the honor of n.o.ble families was exposed to the mercy of the slaves. Fortunately Marius died sixteen days after he entered office, and the shedding of blood ceased.
For the next three years Cinna ruled Rome. Const.i.tutional government was practically suspended. For the years 85 and 84 Cinna himself and a trusty colleague were Consuls, but no regular elections were held. In 84, he was murdered, when on the eve of setting out against Sulla in Asia.
Sulla left Italy for the East with 30,000 troops. He marched against Athens, where Archelaus, the general of Mithradates, was intrenched.
After a long siege, he captured and pillaged the city, March 1, 86. The same year he defeated Archelaus at CHAERONeA in Boeotia, and the next year at ORCHOMENOS.
Meanwhile Sulla's lieutenant, LUCULLUS, raised a fleet and gained two victories off the coast of Asia Minor. The Asiatic king was now ready to negotiate. Sulla crossed the h.e.l.lespont in 84, and in a personal interview with the king arranged the terms of peace, which were as follows. The king was to give up Bithynia, Paphlagonia, and Cappadocia, and withdraw to his former dominions. He was also to pay an indemnity amounting to about $3,500,000, and surrender eighty s.h.i.+ps of war.
Having thus settled matters with the king, Sulla punished the Lydians and Carians, in whose territory the Romans had been ma.s.sacred, by compelling them to pay at one time five years' tribute. He was now ready to return to Rome.
The same year that Cinna died, Sulla landed at Brundisium, with 40,000 troops and a large following of n.o.bles who had fled from Rome. Every preparation was made by the Marian party for his reception; but no sooner did he land in Italy than the soldiers were induced to desert to him in immense numbers, and he soon found himself in possession of all Lower Italy. Among those who hastened to his standard was young POMPEY, then but twenty-three years old, and it was to his efforts that Sulla's success was largely due. The next year, 83, the Marian party was joined by the Samnites, and the war raged more fiercely than ever. At length, however, Sulla was victorious under the walls of Rome. The city lay at his mercy. His first act, an order for the slaughter of 6,000 Samnite prisoners, was a fit prelude to his conduct in the city. Every effort was made to eradicate the last trace of Marian blood and sympathy from the city. A list of men, declared to be outlaws and public enemies, was exhibited in the Forum, and a succession of wholesale murders and confiscations throughout Rome and Italy, made the name of Sulla forever infamous.
Having received the t.i.tle of Dictator, and celebrated a splendid triumph for the Mithradatic war, he carried (80-79) his political measures.
The main object of these was to invest the Senate, the thinned ranks of which he filled with his own creatures, with full control over the state, over every magistrate and every province.
In 79 he resigned his dictators.h.i.+p and went to Puteoli, where he died the next year, from a loathsome disease brought on by his excesses.
THE REFORMS OF SULLA.
Sulla restricted the power of the magistrates to the advantage of the Senate. Senators were alone made eligible for the tribunes.h.i.+p, and no former Tribune could hold any curule office. No one could be Praetor without having first been Quaestor, or Consul without having held the praetors.h.i.+p. Every candidate for the office of Quaestor must be at least thirty years old. The number of Praetors was increased from six to eight; that of Quaestors, from twelve to twenty. The Consuls and Praetors were to remain at Rome during their first year of office, and then go to the provinces as Proconsuls and Propraetors.
Three hundred new Senators, taken from the Equites, were added, and all who had been Quaestors were made eligible to the Senate.
The control of the courts was transferred from the Equites to the Senate.
On the death of Sulla, in 78, CRa.s.sUS and LEPIDUS were chosen Consuls; but such was the instability of the times that they were sworn not to raise an army during their consuls.h.i.+p. Lepidus attempted to evade his oath by going to Gaul, and, when summoned by the Senate to return, marched against the city at the head of his forces. He was defeated by Cra.s.sus and Pompey in 78, and soon after died.
CHAPTER XXVI. SERTORIUS.--SPARTACUS.--LUCULLUS.--POMPEY AND CRa.s.sUS.
Quintus Sertorius (121-72), a native of the little Sabine village of Nursia under the Apennines, had joined the party of Marius, and served under him in the campaigns against the Cimbri and Teutones. In 97 he served in Spain, and became acquainted with the country with which his fame is chiefly a.s.sociated. In 91 he was Quaestor in Cisalpine Gaul. He was a partisan of Marius during his troubles with Sulla, and on Sulla's return from the East he left Rome for Spain, where he took the lead of the Marian party. His bravery, kindness, and eloquence pleased the Spaniards. Many Roman refugees and deserters joined him. He defeated one of Sulla's generals, and drove out of Lusitania (Portugal) METELLUS PIUS,(Footnote: Son of Metellus Numidicus. He received the agnomen of Pius on account of the love which he displayed for his father, whom he begged the people to recall from banishment in 99.) who had been specially sent against him from Rome.
The object of Sertorius was to establish a government in Spain after the Roman model. He formed a Senate of three hundred members, and founded at Osca a school for native children. He was strict and severe towards his soldiers, but kind to the people. A white fawn was his favorite pet and constant follower. He ruled Spain for six years. In 77 he was joined by PERPERNA a Roman officer. The same year Pompey, then a young man, was sent to co-operate with Metellus. Sertorius proved more than a match for both of these generals, and defeated them near Saguntum.
The position of the Romans was becoming critical, for Sertorius now formed a league with the pirates of the Mediterranean. He also entered into negotiations with Mithradates, and opened correspondence with the slaves in Italy, who were rebelling.
But intrigues and jealousies arose in his camp. The outcome of these was that he was treacherously murdered by Perperna at a banquet in 72, and with his death fell the Marian party in Spain.
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