XXIV. Now, when Machares also, the son of Mithridates, who held the Bosporus, sent to Lucullus a crown worth one thousand gold pieces, and prayed to be acknowledged a friend and ally[394] of the Romans, Lucullus, considering that the former war was at an end, left Sornatius in those parts to watch over the affairs of Pontus with six thousand soldiers. He set out himself with twelve thousand foot soldiers, and not quite three thousand horse, to commence a second campaign, wherein he seemed to be making a hazardous move, and one not resting on any safe calculation; for he was going to throw himself among warlike nations and many thousands of horsemen, and to enter a boundless tract, surrounded by deep rivers and by mountains covered with perpetual snow; so that his soldiers, who were generally not very obedient to discipline, followed unwillingly and made opposition: and at Rome the popular leaders raised a cry against him, and accused him of seeking one war after another, though the State required no wars, that he might never lay down his arms so long as he had command, and never stop making his private profit out of the public danger; and in course of time the demagogues at Rome accomplished their purpose. Lucullus, advancing by hard marches to the Euphrates, found the stream swollen and muddy, owing to the winter season, and he was vexed on considering that it would cause loss of time and some trouble if he had to get together boats to take his army across and to build rafts. However, in the evening the water began to subside, and it went on falling all through the night, and at daybreak the bed of the river was empty. The natives observing that some small islands in the river had become visible, and that the stream near them was still, made their obeisance to Lucullus; for this had very seldom happened before, and they considered it a token that the river had purposely made itself tame and gentle for Lucullus, and was offering him an easy and ready passage. Accordingly, Lucullus took advantage of the opportunity, and carried his troops over: and a favourable sign accompanied the passage of the army. Cows feed in that neighbourhood, which are sacred to Artemis Persia, a deity whom the barbarians on the farther side of the Euphrates venerate above all others; they use the cows only for sacrifice, which at other times ramble at liberty about the country, with a brand upon them, in the form of the torch of the goddess, and it is not very easy, nor without much trouble, that they can catch the cows when they want them. After the army had crossed the Euphrates one of these cows came to a rock, which is considered sacred to the goddess, and stood upon it, and there laying down its head, just as a cow does when it is held down tight by a rope, it offered itself to Lucullus to be sacrificed. Lucullus also sacrificed a bull to the Euphrates, as an acknowledgment for his passage over the river. He encamped there for that day, and on the next and the following days he advanced through Sophene[395] without doing any harm to the people, who joined him and gladly received the soldiers; and when the soldiers were expressing a wish to take possession of a fortress, which was supposed to contain much wealth, "That is the fortress," said Lucullus, "which we must take first," pointing to the Taurus[396] in the distance; "but this is reserved for the victors." He now continued his route by hard marches, and, crossing the Tigris, entered Armenia.

XXV. Now, as the first person who reported to Tigranes that Lucullus was in the country got nothing for his pains, but had his head cut off, nobody else would tell him, and Tigranes was sitting in ignorance while the fires of war were burning round him, and listening to flattering words, That Lucullus would be a great general if he should venture to stand against Tigranes at Ephesus, and should not flee forthwith from Asia, at the sight of so many tens of thousands. So true it is, that it is not every man who can bear much wine, nor is it any ordinary understanding that in great prosperity does not lose all sound judgment. The first of his friends who ventured to tell him the truth was Mithrobarzanes; and he, too, got no reward for his boldness in speaking; for he was sent forthwith against Lucullus, with three thousand horsemen and a very large body of infantry, with orders to bring the general alive, and to trample down his men. Now, part of the army of Lucullus was preparing to halt, and the rest was still advancing. When the scouts reported that the barbarian was coming upon them, Lucullus was afraid that the enemy would fall upon his troops while they were divided and not in battle order, and so put them into confusion. Lucullus himself set to work to superintend the encampment, and he sent Sextilius, one of his legati, with sixteen hundred horsemen, and hoplitae[397] and light-armed troops, a few more in number, with orders to approach close to the enemy, and wait till he should hear that the soldiers who were with him had made their encampment. Sextilius wished to follow his orders; but he was compelled to engage by Mithrobarzanes, who was confidently advancing against him. A battle ensued, in which Mithrobarzanes fell fighting; and the rest, taking to flight, were all cut to pieces with the exception of a few. Upon this Tigranes left Tigranocerta,[398] a large city which he had founded, and retreated to the Taurus, and there began to get together his forces from all parts: but Lucullus, allowing him no time for preparation, sent Murena to harass and cut off those who were collecting to join Tigranes, and Sextilius on the other side to check a large body of Arabs, who were approaching to the king. It happened just at the same time that Sextilius fell on the Arabs as they were encamping and killed most of them, and Murena, following Tigranes, took the opportunity of attacking him as he was passing through a rough and narrow defile with his army in a long line. Tigranes fled, and left behind him all his baggage; and many of the Armenians were killed and still more taken prisoners.

XXVI. After this success Lucullus broke up his camp and marched against Tigranocerta, which he surrounded with his lines, and began to besiege. There were in the city many Greeks, a part of those who had been removed from Cilicia, and many barbarians who had fared the same way with the Greeks, Adiabeni,[399] and Assyrians, and Gordyeni and Cappadocians, whose native cities Tigranes had digged down, and had removed the inhabitants and settled them there. The city was also filled with wealth and sacred offerings, for every private individual and prince, in order to please the king, contributed to the increase and ornament of the city. For this reason Lucullus pressed the siege, thinking that Tigranes would not endure this, but even contrary to his judgment, would come down in passion and fight a battle; and he was not mistaken. Now, Mithridates, both by messengers and letters, strongly advised Tigranes not to fight a battle, but to cut off the enemy's supplies by means of his cavalry; and Taxiles[400] also, who had come from Mithridates to join Tigranes, earnestly entreated the king to keep on the defensive, and to avoid the arms of the Romans, as being invincible. Tigranes at first readily listened to this advice: but when the Armenians and Gordyeni had joined him with all their forces, and the kings were come, bringing with them all the power of the Medes and Adiabeni, and many Arabs had arrived from the sea that borders on Babylonia, and many Albanians from the Caspian, and Iberians, who are neighbours of the Albanians; and not a few of the tribes about the Araxes,[401] who are not governed by kings, had come to join him, induced by solicitations and presents, and the banquets of the king were filled with hopes and confidence and barbaric threats, and his councils also,—Taxiles narrowly escaped death for opposing the design of fighting, and it was believed that Mithridates wished to divert Tigranes from obtaining a great victory, merely from envy. Accordingly, Tigranes would not even wait for Mithridates, for fear he should share in the glory; but he advanced with all his force, and greatly complained to his friends, it is said, that he would have to encounter Lucullus alone, and not all the Roman generals at once. And his confidence was not altogether madness nor without good grounds, when he looked upon so many nations and kings following him, and bodies of hoplitae, and tens of thousands of horsemen; for he was at the head of twenty thousand bowmen and slingers and fifty-five thousand horsemen, of whom seventeen thousand were clothed in armour of mail, as Lucullus said in his letter to the Senate, and one hundred and fifty thousand hoplitae, some of whom were drawn up in cohorts and others in phalanx; and of road-makers, bridge-makers, clearers of rivers, timber-cutters, and labourers for other necessary purposes, there were thirty-five thousand, who, being placed behind the fighting men, added to the imposing appearance and the strength of the army.

XXVII. When Tigranes had crossed the Taurus, and, showing himself with all his forces, looked down on the Roman army, which was encamped before Tigranocerta, the barbarians in the city hailed his appearance with shouts and clapping of hands, and from their walls with threats pointed to the Armenians. As Lucullus was considering about the battle, some advised him to give up the siege, and march against Tigranes; others urged him not to leave so many enemies in his rear, nor to give up the siege. Lucullus replied, that singly they did not advise well, but that taken both together the counsel was good; on which he divided his army. He left Murena with six thousand foot to maintain the siege; and himself taking twenty-four cohorts, among which there were not above ten thousand hoplitae, with all his cavalry and slingers and bowmen, to the number of about one thousand, advanced against the enemy. Lucullus, encamping in a large plain by the bank of the river, appeared contemptible to Tigranes, and furnished matter for amusement to the king's flatterers. Some scoffed at him, and others, by way of amusement, cast lots for the spoil, and all the generals and kings severally applied to the king, and begged the matter might be intrusted to each of them singly, and that Tigranes would sit as a spectator. Tigranes also attempted to be witty, and, in a scoffing manner, he uttered the well-known saying, "If they have come as ambassadors, there are too many of them; if as soldiers, too few." Thus they amused themselves with sarcastic sayings and jokes. At daybreak Lucullus led out his troops under arms. Now the barbarian army was on the east side of the river; but, as the river makes a bend towards the west, at a part where it was easiest to ford, Lucullus led his troops out, and hurried in that direction, which led Tigranes to think that he was retreating; and calling Taxiles to him he said, with a laugh, "Don't you see that these invincible Roman warriors are flying?" Taxiles replied: "I should be pleased, O king, at any strange thing happening which should be lucky to you; but the Roman soldiers do not put on their splendid attire when they are on a march; nor have they then their shields cleaned, and their helmets bare, as they now have, by reason of having taken off the leathern coverings; but this brightness of their armour is a sign they are going to fight, and are now marching against their enemies." While Taxiles was still speaking the first eagle came in sight; for Lucullus had now faced about, and the cohorts were seen taking their position in manipuli for the purpose of crossing the river: on which Tigranes, as if he were hardly recovering from a drunken bout, called out two or three times, "What, are they coming against us?" and so, with much confusion, the enemy's soldiers set about getting into order, the king taking his position in the centre, and giving the left wing to the King of the Adiabeni, and the right to the Mede, on which wing also were the greater part of the soldiers, clad in mail, occupying the first ranks. As Lucullus was going to cross the river, some of the officers bade him beware of the day, which was one of the unlucky days which the Romans call black days; for on that day Caepio[402] and his army were destroyed in a battle with the Cimbri. Lucullus replied in these memorable words: "Well, I will make it a lucky day for the Romans." The day was the sixth of October.

XXVIII. Saying this, and bidding his men be of good cheer, Lucullus began to cross the river, and advanced against the enemy, at the head of his soldiers, with a breastplate of glittering scaly steel, and a cloak with a fringed border, and he just let it be seen that his sword was already bare, thereby indicating that they must forthwith come to close quarters with the enemy, who fought with missiles, and by the rapidity of the attack cut off the intervening space, within which the barbarians could use their bows. Observing that the mailed cavalry, which had a great reputation, were stationed under an eminence, crowned by a broad level space, and that the approach to it was only a distance of four stadia, and neither difficult nor rough, he ordered the Thracian cavalry and the Gauls who were in the army, to fall on them in the flank, and to beat aside their long spears with their swords. Now the mailed horsemen rely solely on their long spears, and they can do nothing else, either in their own defence or against the enemy, owing to the weight and rigidity of their armour, and they look like men who are walled up in it. Lucullus himself, with two cohorts, pushed on vigorously to the hill, followed by his men, who were encouraged by seeing him in his armour, enduring all the fatigue on foot, and pressing forwards. On reaching the summit, Lucullus stood on a conspicuous spot, and called out aloud: "We have got the victory! Fellow soldiers, we have got the victory!" With these words he led his men against the mailed horsemen, and ordered them not to use their javelins yet, but every man to hold them in both hands, and to thrust against the enemy's legs and thighs, which are the only parts of these mailed men that are bare. However, there was no occasion for this mode of fighting; for the enemy did not stand the attack of the Romans, but, setting up a shout and flying most disgracefully, they threw themselves and their horses, with all their weight, upon their own infantry, before the infantry had begun the battle, so that so many tens of thousands were defeated before a wound was felt or blood was drawn. Now the great slaughter began when the army turned to flight, or rather attempted to fly, for they could not really fly, owing to the closeness and depth of their ranks, which made them in the way of one another. Tigranes, riding off at the front, fled with a few attendants, and, seeing that his son was a partner in his misfortune, he took off the diadem from his head, and, with tears, presented it to him, at the same time telling him to save himself, as he best could, by taking some other direction. The youth would not venture to put the diadem on his head, but gave it to the most faithful of his slaves to keep. This slave, happening to be taken, was carried to Lucullus, and thus the diadem of Tigranes, with other booty, fell into the hands of the Romans. It is said that above one hundred thousand of the infantry perished, and very few of the cavalry escaped. On the side of the Romans, a hundred were wounded, and five killed. Antiochus[403] the philosopher, who mentions this battle in his 'Treatise on the Gods,' says that the sun never saw a battle like it. Strabo, another philosopher,[404] in his 'Historical Memoirs,' says that the Romans were ashamed, and laughed at one another, for requiring arms against such a set of slaves. And Livius[405] observed that the Romans never engaged with an enemy with such inferiority of numbers on their side, for the victors were hardly the twentieth part of the defeated enemy, but somewhat less. The most skilful of the Roman generals, and those who had most military experience, commended Lucullus chiefly for this, that he had out-generalled the two most distinguished and powerful kings by two most opposite manoeuvres, speed and slowness; for he wore out Mithridates, at the height of his power, by time and protracting the war; but he crushed Tigranes by his activity: and he was one of the very few commanders who ever employed delay when he was engaged in active operations, and bold measures when his safety was at stake.

XXIX. Mithridates made no haste to be present at the battle, because he supposed that Lucullus would carry on the campaign with his usual caution and delay; but he was advancing leisurely to join Tigranes. At first he fell in with a few Armenians on the road, who were retreating in great alarm and consternation, and he conjectured what had happened, but as he soon heard of the defeat from a large number whom he met, who had lost their arms and were wounded, he set out to seek Tigranes. Though he found Tigranes destitute of everything, and humbled, Mithridates did not retaliate for his former haughty behaviour, but he got down from his horse, and lamented with Tigranes their common misfortunes; he also gave Tigranes a royal train that was attending on him, and encouraged him to hope for the future. Accordingly, the two kings began to collect fresh forces. Now, in the city of Tigranocerta[406] the Greeks had fallen to quarrelling with the barbarians, and were preparing to surrender the place to Lucullus, on which he assaulted and took it. Lucullus appropriated to himself the treasures in the city, but he gave up the city to be plundered by the soldiers, which contained eight thousand talents of coined money, with other valuable booty. Besides this, Lucullus gave to each man eight hundred drachmae out of the produce of the spoils. Hearing that many actors had been taken in the city, whom Tigranes had collected from all quarters, with the view of opening the theatre which he had constructed, Lucullus employed them for the games and shows in celebration of the victory. The Greeks he sent to their homes, and supplied them with means for the journey, and in like manner those barbarians who had been compelled to settle there; the result of which was that the dissolution of one city was followed by the restoration of many others, which thus recovered their citizens, by whom Lucullus was beloved as a benefactor and a founder. Everything else also went on successfully and conformably to the merits of the general, who sought for the praise that is due to justice and humanity, and not the praise that follows success in war: for the success in war was due in no small degree, to the army and to fortune, but his justice and humanity proved that he had a mild and well-regulated temper; and it was by these means that Lucullus now subdued the barbarians without resorting to arms; for the kings of the Arabs came to him to surrender all that they had, and the Sopheni also came over to him. He also gained the affection of the Gordyeni so completely that they were ready to leave their cities, and to follow him, as volunteers, with their children and wives, the reason of which was as follows: Zarbienus, the King of the Gordyeni, as it has been already told, secretly communicated, through Appius, with Lucullus about an alliance, being oppressed by the tyranny of Tigranes; but his design was reported to Tigranes, and he was put to death, and his children and wife perished with him, before the Romans invaded Armenia. Lucullus did not forget all this; and, on entering Gordyene, he made a funeral for Zarbienus, and, ornamenting the pile with vests, and the king's gold, and the spoils got from Tigranes, he set fire to it himself, and poured libations on the pile, with the friends and kinsmen of the king, and gave him the name of friend and ally of the Roman people. He also ordered a monument to be erected to him at great cost; for a large quantity of gold and silver was found in the palace of Zarbienus, and there were stored up three million medimni of wheat, so that the soldiers were well supplied, and Lucullus was admired, that without receiving a drachma from the treasury, he made the war support itself.

XXX. While Lucullus was here, there came an embassy from the King of the Parthians[407] also, who invited him to friendship and an alliance. This proposal was agreeable to Lucullus, and in return he sent ambassadors to the Parthian, who discovered that he was playing double and secretly asking Mesopotamia from Tigranes as the price of his alliance. On hearing this Lucullus determined to pass by Tigranes and Mithridates as exhausted antagonists, and to try the strength of the Parthians, and to march against them, thinking it a glorious thing, in one uninterrupted campaign, like an athlete, to give three kings in succession the throw, and to have made his way through three empires, the most powerful under the sun, unvanquished and victorious. Accordingly he sent orders to Sornatius and the other commanders in Pontus to conduct the army there to him, as he was intending to advance from Gordyene farther into Asia. These generals had already found that the soldiers were difficult to manage and mutinous; but now they made the ungovernable temper of the soldiers quite apparent, being unable by any means of persuasion or compulsion to move the soldiers, who, with solemn asseverations, declared aloud that they would not stay even where they were, but would go and leave Pontus undefended. Report of this being carried to the army of Lucullus effected the corruption of his soldiers also, who had been made inert towards military service by the wealth they had acquired and their luxurious living, and they wanted rest; and, when they heard of the bold words of the soldiers in Pontus, they said they were men, and their example ought to be followed, for they had done enough to entitle them to be released from military service, and to enjoy repose.

XXXI. Lucullus, becoming acquainted with these and other still more mutinous expressions, gave up the expedition against the Parthians, and marched a second time against Tigranes. It was now the height of summer; and Lucullus was dispirited after crossing the Taurus, to see that the fields were still green,[408] so much later are the seasons, owing to the coldness of the air. However, he descended from the Taurus, and, after defeating the Armenians, who twice or thrice ventured to attack him, he plundered the villages without any fear; and, by seizing the corn which had been stored up by Tigranes, he reduced the enemy to the straits which he was apprehending himself. Lucullus challenged the Armenians to battle by surrounding their camp with his lines and ravaging the country before their eyes; but, as this did not make them move after their various defeats, he broke up and advanced against Artaxata, the royal residence of Tigranes, where his young children and wives were, thinking that Tigranes would not give them up without a battle. It is said that Hannibal the Carthaginian, after the defeat of Antiochus by the Romans, went to Artaxas the Armenian, to whose notice he introduced many useful things; and, observing a position which possessed great natural advantages and was very pleasant, though at that time unoccupied and neglected, he made the plan of a city on the ground, and, taking Artaxas there, showed it to him, and urged him to build up the place. The king, it is said, was pleased, and asked Hannibal to superintend the work; and thereupon a large and beautiful city sprung up, and, being named after the king, was declared to be the capital of Armenia. Tigranes did not let Lucullus quietly march against Artaxata, but, moving with his forces on the fourth day, he encamped opposite to the Romans, placing the river Arsanias between him and the enemy, which river the Romans must of necessity cross on their route to Artaxata. After sacrificing to the gods, Lucullus, considering that he had the victory in his hands, began to lead his army across the river, with twelve cohorts in the van, and the rest placed as a reserve to prevent the enemy from attacking his flank. There was a large body of picked cavalry opposed to the Romans, and in front of them Mardi mounted archers, and Iberians[409] armed with spears, on whom Tigranes relied more than any of his mercenaries, as being the most warlike of all. However, they showed no gallant spirit; but, after a slight skirmish with the Roman cavalry, they did not venture to stand the attack of the infantry, and separating and taking to flight on both sides they drew after them the cavalry in the pursuit. At the moment when this part of the enemy was dispersed, the cavalry, which was about Tigranes, rode forward, and Lucullus was alarmed when he saw their brave appearance and numbers. He recalled the cavalry from the pursuit, and himself was the first to meet the Satrapeni,[410] who were posted opposite to him with the king's chief officers; but before they came to close quarters, the enemy was panic-struck and turned to flight. Of three kings at the same time opposed to the Romans, Mithridates of Pontus appears to have fled most disgracefully; for he did not stay to hear even the shouts of the Romans. The pursuit was continued for a great distance and all night long, and the Romans were wearied with killing and taking prisoners, and getting valuables and booty. Livius[411] says that in the former battle a greater number of the enemy, but in this more men of rank fell and were taken prisoners.

XXXII. Elated and encouraged by this victory, Lucullus was intending to advance farther into the country, and to subdue the barbarian; but contrary to what one would have expected at the season of the autumnal equinox, they were assailed by heavy storms, generally snow-storms, and, when the sky was clear, there was hoar-frost and ice, owing to which the horses could not well drink of the rivers, by reason of the excessive cold; and they were difficult to ford, because the ice broke, and the rough edges cut the horses' sinews. And as the greater part of the country was shaded and full of defiles and wooded, the soldiers were kept continually wet, being loaded with snow while they were marching, and spending the night uncomfortably in damp places. Accordingly, they had not followed Lucullus for many days after the battle when they began to offer resistance, at first making entreaties and also sending the tribunes to him, and then collecting in a tumultuous manner, with loud shouts in their tents by night, which is considered to be an indication that an army is in a state of mutiny. Yet Lucullus urged them strongly, and called on them to put endurance in their souls till they had taken and destroyed the Armenian Carthage, the work of their greatest enemy, meaning Hannibal. Not being able to prevail on them, he led them back by a different pass over the Taurus, and descended into the country called Mygdonike, which is fertile and warm, and contains a large and populous city, which the barbarians called Nisibis,[412] but the Greeks Antiocha Mygdonike. The city was defended in name by Gouras, a brother of Tigranes, but in fact by the experience and mechanical skill of Kallimachus, who had given Lucullus great trouble in the siege of Amisus also. Lucullus seated himself before the city, and, by availing himself of every mode of pressing a siege, in a short time he took the city by storm. Gouras, who surrendered himself to Lucullus, was treated kindly; but he would not listen to Kallimachus, though he promised to discover concealed treasures of great value; and he ordered him to be brought in chains to be punished for the conflagration by which he destroyed Amisus and deprived Lucullus of the object of his ambition and an opportunity of displaying his friendly disposition to the Greeks.

XXXIII. So far one may say that fortune accompanied Lucullus and shared his campaigns: but from this time, just as if a wind had failed him, trying to force everything and always meeting with obstacles, he displayed indeed the courage and endurance of a good commander, but his undertakings produced him neither fame nor good opinion, and even the reputation that he had he came very near losing by his want of success and his fruitless disputes. Lucullus himself was in no small degree the cause of all this; for he was not a man who tried to gain the affection of the soldiery, and he considered everything that was done to please the men as a disparagement to the general's power, and as tending to destroy it. But, what was worst of all, he was not affable to the chief officers and those of the same rank as himself; he despised everybody, and thought no man had any merit compared with his own.[413] These bad qualities, it is said, that Lucullus had, though he possessed many merits. He was tall and handsome, a powerful speaker, and equally prudent in the Forum and the camp. Now, Sallustius says that the soldiers were ill-disposed towards him at the very commencement of the war before Kyzikus, and again at Amisus, because they were compelled to spend two winters in succession in camp. They were also vexed about the other winters, for they either spent them in a hostile country, or encamped among the allies under the bare sky; for Lucullus never once entered a Greek and friendly city with his army. While the soldiers were in this humour, they received encouragement from the demagogues at Rome, who envied Lucullus, and charged him with protracting the war through love of power and avarice. They said that he all but held at once Cilicia, Asia, Bithynia, Paphlagonia, Galatia, Pontus, Armenia, and the parts as far as the Phasis, and that at last he had plundered even the palace of Tigranes, as if he had been sent to strip kings and not to conquer them. This, it is said, was urged by one of the praetors, Lucius Quintus,[414] by whom they were mainly persuaded to pass a decree to send persons to supersede Lucullus in his province. They also decreed that many of the soldiers under Lucullus should be released from service.

XXXIV. To these causes, in themselves so weighty, there was added another that, most of all, ruined the measures of Lucullus; and this was Publius Clodius, a violent man, and full of arrogance and audacity. He was the brother of the wife of Lucullus, a woman of most dissolute habits, whom he was also accused of debauching. At this time he was serving with Lucullus, and he did not get all the distinction to which he thought himself entitled. In fact, he aspired to the first rank, and, as there were many preferred before him, in consequence of his character, he secretly endeavoured to win the favour of Fimbria's army, and to excite the soldiers against Lucullus, by circulating among them words well suited to those who were ready to hear them, and were not unaccustomed to be courted. These were the men whom Fimbria had persuaded to kill the consul Flaccus, and to choose himself for their general. Accordingly, they gladly listened to Clodius, and called him the soldier's friend, for he pretended to feel indignant at their treatment. "Was there never to be an end," he would say, "to so many wars and dangers, and were they to wear out their lives in fighting with every nation, and wandering over every country, and getting no equivalent for so much service, but, instead thereof, were they to convoy waggons and camels of Lucullus, loaded with cups of gold, set with precious stones, while the soldiers of Pompeius were now living as citizens,[415] and with their wives and children were sitting quiet in the enjoyment of fertile lands and cities, though they had not driven Mithridates and Tigranes into uninhabited wildernesses, nor pulled down the palaces of Asia, but had fought with exiles in Iberia, and runaway slaves in Italy? Why, then, if there is never to be an end of our service, do we not reserve what remains of our bodies and our lives for a general who considers the wealth of the soldiers his chief glory?" By such causes as these the army of Lucullus was corrupted, and his soldiers refused to follow him either against Tigranes or against Mithridates, who immediately made an irruption from Armenia into Pontus, and endeavoured to recover his power; but alleging the winter as an excuse, the soldiers lingered in Gordyene, expecting every moment that Pompeius, or some other commander,[416] would arrive to supersede Lucullus.

XXXV. But when news came that Mithridates had defeated Fabius,[417] and was marching against Sornatius and Triarius, through very shame the soldiers followed Lucullus. Triarius, being ambitious to snatch the victory which he thought was in his grasp, before Lucullus, who was near, should arrive, was defeated in a great battle. It is said that above seven thousand Romans fell, among whom were a hundred and fifty centurions, and twenty-four tribunes; and Mithridates took the camp. Lucullus arrived a few days after, and secreted from the soldiers Triarius, whom in their passion, they wore looking for; and, as Mithridates was not willing to fight, but was waiting for Tigranes, who was already coming down with a large force, Lucullus determined to march back, and to fight with Tigranes before he and Mithridates could unite. As he was on his march the soldiers of Fimbria mutinied, and left their ranks, considering that they were released from service by the decree of the Senate, and that Lucullus had no longer any right to the command, now that the provinces were assigned to others. Upon this there was nothing, however inconsistent with his dignity, which Lucullus did not submit to do—supplicating the soldiers individually, and going about from tent to tent in humble manner, and with tears in his eyes, and sometimes even taking the soldiers by the hand. But they rejected his proffered hand, and threw down before him their empty purses, and told him to fight with the enemy himself, for he was the only person who knew how to get rich from them. However, at the request of the rest of the army, the soldiers of Fimbria were constrained, and agreed to stay to the end of summer, and if, in the meantime, no enemy should come down to fight them, they were then to be released. Lucullus was of necessity obliged to acquiesce in this, or else to be left alone, and give up the country to the barbarians. He therefore kept the soldiers together, without making any further attempt to force them, or lead them out to battle, for he was well content if they would stay with him, and he allowed Cappadocia to be ravaged by Tigranes, and Mithridates to resume his arrogance, as to whom he had written to the Senate, to inform them that he was completely subdued; and the commissioners[418] were now with him who had been sent to settle the affairs of Pontus, on the supposition that the country was completely in the power of the Romans. Indeed, the commissioners were now witnesses that Lucullus was not his own master, but was treated with contumely and insult by the soldiers, who carried their audacity towards their commander so far, that, at the close of the summer, they put on their armour, and drawing their swords, challenged to battle the enemy who were no longer there, but had already moved off. After uttering the war shout, and flourishing their swords in the air, they left the camp, declaring that the time was up which they had agreed to stay with Lucullus. The rest of the soldiers were summoned by Pompeius by letter, for he had been appointed to the command[419] in the war against Mithridates and Tigranes, by the favour of the people, and through the influence of the demagogues; though the Senate and the nobles thought that Lucullus was wronged, inasmuch as he was not superseded in a war, but in a triumph; and it was not the command, but the honours of the command that he was compelled to divest himself of, and to surrender to others.

XXXVI. But it appeared a still greater wrong to those who were with Lucullus in Asia, that Lucullus had not the power either to reward or punish for anything that was done in the war; nor did Pompeius allow any person to go to him, nor to pay any attention to the orders and regulations that he was making in concert with the ten commissioners, but he obstructed him by publishing counter edicts, and by the fear which he inspired from having a larger force. However, their friends agreed to bring them together, and they met in a village of Galatia, where they saluted one another in a friendly manner, and each congratulated the other on his victories. Lucullus was the elder, but Pompeius had the greater reputation, because he had oftener had the command, and enjoyed two triumphs. Fasces, wreathed with bay,[420] were carried before both generals in token of their victories. But, as Pompeius had made a long march through a country without water and arid, the bays upon his fasces were withered, which the lictors of Lucullus observing, in a friendly manner gave them bays out of their own, which were fresh and green. And this the friends of Pompeius interpreted as a good omen; for, in fact, the exploits of Lucullus served to set off the command of Pompeius. But the conference[421] resulted in no amicable arrangement, and they separated with increased aversion towards each other. Pompeius also annulled the regulations of Lucullus, and he took off with him all the soldiers with the exception of sixteen hundred, whom he left to Lucullus for his triumph; and even these did not follow him very willingly: so ill suited was the temper of Lucullus, or so unlucky was he in securing that which, of all things, is the chief and greatest in a general; for, if he had possessed this quality, with the other many and great virtues that he had, courage, activity, judgment, and justice, the Roman empire would not have had the Euphrates for its limit, but the remotest parts of Asia, and the Hyrkanian Sea;[422] for all the other nations had already been defeated by Tigranes, and the Parthian power was not such as it afterwards showed itself to be in the campaign of Crassus,[423] nor so well combined, but owing to intestine and neighbouring wars, was not even strong enough to repel the attacks of the Armenians. But it seems to me that the services of Lucullus to his country were less than the harm he did it in other things; for his trophies in Armenia, which were erected on the borders of Parthia, and Tigranocerta, and Nisibis, and the great wealth that was brought from these cities to Rome, and the display of the diadem of Tigranes in his triumph, urged Crassus to attack Asia, and to think that the barbarians were only spoil and booty, and nothing else. But Crassus soon felt the Parthian arrows, and so proved that Lucullus had got the advantage over the enemy, not through their want of skill or cowardice, but by his own courage and ability. This, however, happened afterwards.

XXXVII. When Lucullus returned to Rome, first of all he found that his brother Marcus was under prosecution by Caius Memmius,[424] for what he had done in his quaestorship at the command of Sulla. Upon Marcus being acquitted, Memmius transferred his attack to Lucullus himself, and endeavoured to excite the people against him, and persuaded them not to give him a triumph, on the ground that he had appropriated to himself much of the spoils, and had prolonged the war. Now that Lucullus was involved in a great struggle, the first and most powerful men, mingling themselves among the tribes, by much entreaty and exertion with difficulty persuaded the people to allow Lucullus to have a triumph;[425] not, however, like some, a triumph which was striking and bustling, from the length of the procession, and the quantity of things that were displayed, but he decorated the circus of Flaminius with the arms of the enemy, of which he had a great quantity, and with the royal engines of war; and it was a spectacle in itself far from being contemptible. In the procession a few of the mailed horsemen, and ten of the scythe-bearing chariots moved along, with sixty of the king's friends and generals, and a hundred and ten brazen-beaked ships of war also were carried in the procession, and a gold statue of Mithridates six feet high, and a shield ornamented with precious stones, and twenty litters loaded with silver vessels, and two-and-thirty loaded with golden cups, armour, and money. All this was carried on men's shoulders; but there were eight mules that bore golden couches, and fifty-six carried silver in bars, and a hundred and seven others carried silver coin to the amount of near two million seven hundred thousand pieces. There were also tablets, on which was written the amount of money that Lucullus had supplied Pompeius with for the pirates' war, and the amount that he had paid to those who had the care of the aerarium; and besides this, it was added that every soldier received nine hundred and fifty drachmae. After this Lucullus feasted all the city in a splendid style, and the surrounding villages which the Romans call Vici.

XXXVIII. After Lucullus had divorced Clodia, who was a loose and unprincipled woman, he married Servilia,[426] the sister of Cato, but neither was this a happy marriage; for he thus escaped only one of the misfortunes that resulted from his union with Clodia, the scandal about her brothers: in every other respect Servilia was as abominable as Clodia and a licentious woman, and yet Lucullus was obliged to bear with her from regard to Cato; but at last he put her away. Lucullus had raised the highest expectations in the Senate, who hoped to find in him a counterpoise to the overbearing conduct of Pompeius and a defender of the aristocracy,[427] inasmuch as he had the advantage of great reputation and influence; but he disappointed these hopes and gave up political affairs, either because he saw that they were already in a difficult position and not in a healthy state, or, as some say, because he was satisfied with glory, and wished to fall back to an easy and luxurious life, after his many contests and dangers, which had not been followed by the most fortunate of results. Some commend him for making such a change, whereby he avoided what had befallen Marius, who, after his Cimbrian victories and that great and glorious success, did not choose to dedicate himself to honour so great and to be an object of admiration, but through insatiate desire of glory and power, though an old man, entered into political warfare with young men, and so ended his career in dreadful acts, and in sufferings more dreadful than acts; and they say that Cicero also would have had a better old age if he had withdrawn from public life after the affair of Catiline, and Scipio after he had added the conquest of Numantia to that of Carthage, if he had then stopped; for there is a close to a political period also, and political contests as well as those of athletes are censured when a man's vigour and prime have failed him. But Crassus and Pompeius sneered[428] at Lucullus for giving himself up to pleasure and extravagant living, as if a luxurious life was not more unsuitable to persons of his age than affairs of state and military command.

XXXIX. Now in the life of Lucullus, as in an ancient comedy, we may read, in the first part, of political measures and military command, and, in the last part, of drinking and feasts, and hardly anything but revels, and torches, and all kinds of amusement; for I reckon among amusements, expensive buildings, and construction of ambulatories and baths, and still more paintings and statues, and eagerness about works of this kind, all which he got together at great cost, and to this end spent profusely the wealth which he had accumulated to a large and splendid amount in his military command; for, even now, when luxury of this kind has increased, the gardens of Lucullus are reckoned among the most sumptuous of the imperial gardens.[429] But with respect to his works on the sea-coast and in the neighbourhood of Neapolis, where he suspended as it were hills by digging great tunnels,[430] and threw around his dwelling-places circular pieces of sea-water and channels for the breeding of fish, and built houses in the sea, Tubero the Stoic,[431] on seeing them, called him Xerxes in a toga. He had also country residences in the neighbourhood of Tusculum, and towers commanding prospects,[432] and open apartments and ambulatories, which Pompeius on visiting found fault with Lucullus, that he had arranged his house in the best way for summer, but had made it unfit to live in during the winter. On which Lucullus said, with a smile, "You think, then, I have less sense than the cranes and storks, and do not change my residence according to the seasons." On one occasion, when a praetor was ambitious to signalize himself in the matter of a public spectacle, and asked of Lucullus some purple cloaks for the dress of a chorus, Lucullus replied, that he would see if he had any and would give them to him; and the day after he asked the praetor how many he wanted. The praetor said that a hundred would be enough, on which Lucullus told him to take twice as many; in allusion to which the poet Flaccus[433] has remarked, that he does not consider a man to be rich, if the property that he cares not for and knows nothing about is not more than that which he sees.

XL. The daily meals of Lucullus were accompanied with all the extravagance of newly-acquired wealth; for it was not only by dyed coverlets for his couches, and cups set with precious stones, and choruses and dramatic entertainments, but by abundance of all kinds of food and dainty dishes, curiously prepared, that he made himself an object of admiration to the uninstructed. Now Pompeius gained a good reputation in an illness that he had; for the physician had ordered him to eat a thrush, and, on his domestics telling him that a thrush could not be found in the summer season except at the house of Lucullus, where they were fed, Pompeius would not consent to have one got from there; but remarking to his physician, "What, if Lucullus were not so luxurious, could not Pompeius live?" bade them get for him something else that could be easily procured. Cato, who was his friend and connected with him by marriage, was so much annoyed at his life and habits that, on one occasion, when a young man had delivered in the senate a tedious and lengthy discourse, quite out of season, on frugality and temperance, Cato got up and said, "Won't you stop, you who are as rich as Crassus, and live like Lucullus, and speak like Cato?" Some say that a remark to this effect was made, but that it was not by Cato.

XLI. That Lucullus was not merely pleased with this mode of living, but prided himself upon it, appears from the anecdotes that are recorded. It is said, that he feasted for many days some Greeks who visited Rome, and that they, feeling as Greeks would do[434] on the occasion, began to be ashamed and to decline the invitation, on the ground that he was daily incurring so much expense on their account; but Lucullus said to them with a smile, "It is true, Greeks, that this is partly done on your account, but mainly on the account of Lucullus." One day, when he was supping alone, a single course and a moderate repast had been prepared for him, at which he was angry, and called for the slave whose business it was to look after such matters. The slave said, that he did not suppose that he would want anything costly, as no guest was invited. "What sayest thou?" said Lucullus, "didst thou not know that to-day Lucullus sups with Lucullus?" Now, this matter being much talked of in the city, as one might expect, there came up to Lucullus, as he was idling in the Forum, Cicero and Pompeius, of whom Cicero was among his most intimate friends; but between Lucullus and Pompeius there was some difference, arising out of the affair of the command in the Mithridatic war, and yet they were accustomed to associate and talk together frequently in a friendly manner. Accordingly, Cicero saluted him, and asked him how he was disposed to receive visitors, to which Lucullus replied, "Exceedingly well," and invited them to pay him a visit. "We wish," said Cicero, "to sup with you to-day, just in the same way as if preparation were made for yourself only." Lucullus began to make some difficulty, and to ask them to allow him to name another day; but they said they would not, nor would they let him speak to his servants, that he might not have the opportunity of ordering anything more than what was preparing for himself. However, at his request, they allowed him just to tell one of his slaves in their presence, that he would sup on that day in the Apollo; for this was the name of one of his costly apartments. This trick of Lucullus was not understood by his guests; for it is said that to every banqueting-room there was assigned the cost of the feast there, and every room had its peculiar style of preparation and entertainment, so that when the slaves heard in which room their master intended to sup, they also knew what was to be the cost of the supper and the kind of decoration and arrangement. Now, Lucullus was accustomed to sup in the Apollo at the cost of fifty thousand drachmas, and this being the cost of the entertainment on the present occasion, Pompeius and Cicero were surprised at the rapidity with which the banquet had been got ready and the costliness of the entertainment. In this way, then, Lucullus used his wealth, capriciously, just as if it were a captive slave and a barbarian.

XLII. What he did as to his collection of books is worth notice and mention. He got together a great number of books which were well transcribed, and the mode in which they were used was more honourable to him than the acquisition of them; for the libraries were open to all, and the walking-places which surrounded them, and the reading rooms were accessible to the Greeks without any restriction, and they went there as to an abode of the Muses, and spent the day there in company with one another, gladly betaking themselves to the libraries from their other occupations. Lucullus himself often spent some time there with the visitors, walking about in the ambulatories, and he used to talk there with men engaged in public affairs on such matters as they might choose; and altogether his house was a home and a Greek prytaneum[435] to those who came to Rome. He was fond of philosophy generally, and well disposed to every sect, and friendly to them all; but from the first he particularly admired and loved the Academy,[436] not that which is called the New Academy, though the sect was then flourishing by the propagation of the doctrines of Karneades by Philo, but Old Academy, which at that time had for its head a persuasive man and a powerful speaker, Antiochus of Askalon, whom Lucullus eagerly sought for his friend and companion, and opposed to the followers of Philo, of whom Cicero also was one. Cicero wrote an excellent treatise upon the doctrines of this sect, in which he made Lucullus[437] the speaker in favour of the doctrine of comprehension[438] and himself the speaker on the opposite side. The book is entitled 'Lucullus.' Lucullus and Cicero were, as I have said, great friends, and associated in their political views, for Lucullus had not entirely withdrawn from public affairs, though he had immediately on his return to Rome surrendered to Crassus and Cato the ambition and the struggle to be the first man in the state and have the greatest power, considering that the struggle was not free from danger and great mortification; for those who looked with jealousy on the power of Pompeius put Crassus and Cato at the head of their party in the Senate, when Lucullus declined to take the lead, but Lucullus used to go to the Forum to support his friends, and to the Senate whenever it was necessary to put a check on any attempt or ambitious design of Pompeius. The arrangements which Pompeius made after his conquest of the kings, Lucullus contrived to nullify, and when Pompeius proposed a distribution of lands[439] Lucullus with the assistance of Cato prevented it from being made, which drew Pompeius to seek the friendship of Crassus and Caesar, or rather to enter into a combination with them, and by filling the city with arms and soldiers he got his measures ratified after driving out of the Forum the partisans of Cato and Lucullus. The nobles being indignant at these proceedings, the party of Pompeius produced one Vettius,[440] whom, as they said, they had detected in a design on the life of Pompeius. When Vettius was examined before the Senate, he accused others, and before the popular assembly he named Lucullus as the person by whom he had been suborned to murder Pompeius. But nobody believed him, and it soon became clear that the man had been brought forward by the partisans of Pompeius to fabricate a false charge, and to criminate others, and the fraud was made still more apparent, when a few days after the dead body of Vettius was thrown out of the prison; for, though it was given out that he died a natural death[441] there were marks of strangulation and violence on the body, and it was the opinion that he had been put to death by those who suborned him.

XLIII. This induced Lucullus still more to withdraw from public affairs; and when Cicero was banished from Rome, and Cato[442] was sent to Cyprus, he retired altogether. Before he died, it is said that his understanding was disordered and gradually failed. Cornelius Nepos says that Lucullus did not die of old age nor of disease, but that his health was destroyed by potions given him by Callisthenes, one of his freedmen, and that the potions were given him by Callisthenes with the view of increasing his master's affection for him, a power which the potions were supposed to have, but they so far disturbed and destroyed his reason, that during his lifetime his brother managed his affairs. However, when Lucullus died, the people grieved just as much as if he had died at the height of his military distinction and his political career, and they flocked together and had his body carried to the Forum by the young men of the highest rank and were proceeding forcibly to have it interred in the Campus Martius where Sulla was interred; but, as nobody had expected this, and it was not easy to make the requisite preparations, the brother of Lucullus prayed and prevailed on the people to allow the funeral ceremony to take place on the estate at Tusculum, where preparations for it had been made. Nor did he long survive; but as in age and reputation he came a little after Lucullus, so he died shortly after him, a most affectionate brother.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 315: The complete name of Lucullus was L. Licinius Lucullus. The Licinii were a Plebeian Gens, to which belonged the Luculli, Crassi, Muraenae, and others. Lucius Licinius Lucullus, the grandfather of Plutarch's Lucullus, was the son of L. Licinius Lucullus, who was curule aedile B.C. 202, and the first who gave nobility to his family. This grandfather of Lucullus was consul B.C. 151 with P. Postumius Albinus. He conquered the Vaccaei, Cantabri, and other nations of Spain, hitherto unknown to the Romans. Appian (Iberica, c. 52) gives an instance of his cruelty and perfidy in his Spanish wars. L. Licinius Lucullus, the father, was praetor B.C. 103. In B.C. 102 he went to take the command against the slaves who were in rebellion in Sicily under Athenion. He conducted the war ill, and on his return he was prosecuted for peculation and convicted. His punishment was exile. It is not known what the offence was that Servilius was charged with.]

[Footnote 316: This Metellus was the conqueror of Jugurtha; he was consul B.C. 109. See the Life of Marius, c. 7. His sister Caecilia was the wife of L. Licinius Lucullus, the father of Plutarch's Lucullus; she was also the mother of Marcus the brother of Lucius Lucullus.]

[Footnote 317: See Life of Sulla, c. 6.]

[Footnote 318: This line is also quoted by Plutarch in his Treatise 'De Sera Numinis Vindicta,' c. 10.]

[Footnote 319: I should have translated the Greek word ([Greek: dikologos]) "orator." Jurist in Plutarch is [Greek: nomodeiktes] (Plutarch, Tib. Gracchus, c. 9) or [Greek: nomikos]. Quintus Hortensius Ortalus, the orator, was a friend and rival of Cicero, who often speaks of him. He began his career as a pleader in the courts at the age of nineteen, and continued his practice for forty-four years. (Brutus, c. 64, and the note in H. Meyer's edition.)]

[Footnote 320: L. Cornelius Sisenna, a man of patrician family, was praetor, B.C. 119, and in the next year he was governor of Sicily. He and Hortensius defended C. Verres against Cicero. He wrote the history of the Marsic war and of the war of Sulla in Italy, which he continued to the death of Sulla. The historical work of Sallustius began where that of Sisenna ended. Cicero (De Legg. i. 2) says that Sisenna was the best historical writer that had then appeared at Rome. He wrote other works also, and he translated into Latin the lewd stories of Aristides the Milesian (Plutarch, Crassus, c. 32; Ovidius, Tristia, ii. v. 443).

See Cicero, Brutus, c. 64, and the notes in Meyer's edition; Krause, Vitae et Frag. Vet. Histor. Roman. p. 299.]

[Footnote 321: It appears from this that the History of the Marsic war by Lucullus was extant in the time of Plutarch. Cicero (Ad Attic. i. 19) mentions this Greek history of Lucullus.]

[Footnote 322: This Marcus was adopted by M. Terentius Varro, whence after his adoption he was called M. Terentius Varro Lucullus. The curule aedileship of the two brothers belongs to the year B.C. 79, and the event is here placed, after Plutarch's fashion, not in the proper place in his biography, but the story is told incidentally as a characteristic of Lucullus. I have expressed myself ambiguously at the end of this chapter. It should be "that Lucullus in his absence was elected aedile with his brother." (Cicero, Academ. Prior. ii. 1.)]

[Footnote 323: See Life of Sulla, c. 13, &c.]

[Footnote 324: Drumann (Geschichte Roms, Licinii Luculli, p. 121, n. 80) observes that this winter expedition of Lucullus was "not after the capture of Athens, as Plutarch, Lucullus, c. 2," states, and he refers to Appian (Mithridat. c. 33). But Plutarch's account is not what Drumann represents it to be. This expedition was in the winter of B.C. 87 and 86. AElian (Var. Hist. ii. 42) tells a similar story of Plato and the Arcadians, and Diogenes Laertius (iii. 17) has a like story about Plato and the Arcadians and Thebans.]

[Footnote 325: This can only be Ptolemaeus VIII., sometimes called Soter II. and Lathyrus, who was restored to his kingdom B.C. 89-8. The difficulty that Kaltwasser raises about Lathyrus being in Cyprus at this time is removed by the fact that he had returned from Cyprus. As to Plutarch calling him a "young man," that is a mistake; or Plutarch may have confounded him with his younger brother Alexander.]

[Footnote 326: Plutarch is alluding to the Pyramids, and to the great temples of Memphis.]

[Footnote 327: Pitane was one of the old Greek towns of AEolis, situated on the coast at the mouth of the Evenus, and opposite to the island of Lesbos, now Mytilene.]

[Footnote 328: See Life of Sulla, c. 12.]

[Footnote 329: See Life of Sulla, c. 21.]

[Footnote 330: This was the consul L. Valerius Flaccus. See the Life of Sulla, c. 20.]

[Footnote 331: Lektum is a promontory of the Troad, which is that district of Asia Minor that took its name from the old town of Troja or Troia, and lay in the angle between the Hellespont (the Dardanelles), and the AEgean or Archipelago. It is fully described by Strabo, lib. xiii.]

[Footnote 332: Kaltwasser has translated this passage differently from his predecessors: "turned his ship aside by a quick movement and made all his men crowd to the stern." But his version is probably wrong. The expression [Greek: epi prumnan osasthai] is perhaps equivalent to [Greek: prumnon krouesthai]. (Thucydides, i. 50.)]

[Footnote 333: See Life of Sulla, c. 24, 25.]

[Footnote 334: It is conjectured by Leopoldus that there is an error here, and that the name should be Manius, and that Manius Aquilius is meant, whom, together with others, the Mitylenaeans gave up in chains to Mithridates. (Vell. Paterc. ii. 18.)]

[Footnote 335: This is a place on the coast of the mainland, and east of Pitane.]

[Footnote 336: Lucullus was consul B.C. 74, with M. Aurelius Cotta for his colleague.]

[Footnote 337: See the Life of Pompeius, c. 20, and the Life of Sertorius, c. 21.]

[Footnote 338: P. Cornelius Cethegus originally belonged to the party of Marius, and he accompanied the younger Marius in his flight to Africa B.C. 88 (Life of Marius, c. 40). He returned to Rome B.C. 87, and in the year B.C. 83 he attached himself to Sulla after his return from Asia and was pardoned. After Sulla's death he had great influence at Rome, though he never was consul. Cicero (Brutus, c. 48), speaks of him as thoroughly acquainted with all the public business and as having great weight in the Senate.]

[Footnote 339: He is commemorated by Cicero (Brutus, c. 62) as a man well fitted for speaking in noisy assemblies. He was a tribune in the year of the consulship of Lucullus.]

[Footnote 340: This was L. Octavius, who was consul with C. Aurelius Cotta B.C. 75.]

[Footnote 341: Q. Caecilius Metellus Pius. See the Life of Sertorius.]

[Footnote 342: This is the closed sea that lies between the two channels, by one of which, the Thracian Bosporus or the channel of Constantinople, it is connected with the Euxine or Black Sea, and by the other, the Hellespontus or Dardanelles, it is connected with the AEgean Sea or the Archipelago. This is now the Sea of Marmora. Part of the southern and eastern coast belonged to Bithynia. The city of Kyzikus was within the Propontis.]

[Footnote 343: See the Life of Sulla, c. 25.]

[Footnote 344: The sophists of Plutarch's time were rhetoricians, who affected to declaim on any subject, which they set off with words and phrases and little more. One of the noted masters of this art, Aristides of Bithynia, might have been known to Plutarch, though he was younger than Plutarch. Many of his unsubstantial declamations are extant. Plutarch in his Life of Lucullus, c. 22, has mentioned another of this class.]

[Footnote 345: The Romans carried on a thriving trade in this way in the provinces. In Cicero's period we find that many men of rank did not scruple to enrich themselves in this manner; and they were unsparing creditors.]

[Footnote 346: The word ([Greek: telonai]) which I have elsewhere translated by the Roman word Publicani, means the men who farmed the taxes in the provences. The Publicani at this period belonged to the order of the Equites. A number of them associated themselves in a partnership (societas) for the farming of the taxes of some particular province. These associations had their agents in the provinces and a chief manager (magister) at Rome. The collection of the taxes gave employment to a great number of persons; and thus the Publicani had at their disposal numerous places in the provinces, which gave them great influence at Rome. (Cicero, Pro Cn. Plancio, c. 19.) The taxes were taken at some sum that was agreed upon; and we find an instance mentioned by Cicero (Ad Attic. i. 17) in which their competition or their greediness led them to give too much and to call on the Senate to cancel the bargain. The Romans at this time derived little revenue from Italy, and the large expenditure had to be supplied out of the revenue raised in the provinces and collected by the Publicani. The Publicani thus represented the monied interest of modern times, and the state sometimes required their assistance to provide the necessary supplies.

It seems probable that the Publicani who farmed the taxes of a province, underlet them to others; which would be one cause of oppression. These Collectors ([Greek: telonai]) are called Publicans in the English version of the New Testament, where they are no doubt very justly coupled with sinners.]

[Footnote 347: Appian (Mithridat. War, c. 71) states that Mithridates invaded Bithynia, for King Nikomedes had just died childless and left his kingdom to the Romans. Cotta fled before him and took refuge in Chalkedon, a city situated on the Asiatic side of the Thracian Bosporus opposite to the site of Constantinople. The consul would not go out to meet the enemy, but his admiral Nudus with some troops occupied the strongest position in the plain. However, he was defeated by Mithridates and with difficulty got again into the city. In the confusion about the gates the Romans lost three thousand men. Mithridates also broke through the chain that was thrown across the harbour and burnt four ships and towed the other sixty off. His whole loss was only twenty men.]

[Footnote 348: See the Life of Sulla, c. 11. Mithridates was much dissatisfied with the terms of the peace that had been brought about by Archelaus, who fearing for his life went over to Murena, who was left by Sulla in the command in Asia. At the instigation of Archelaus, Murena attacked and plundered Comana in Cappadocia, which belonged to Mithridates, and contained a temple of great sanctity and wealth. Mithridates in vain complained to Murena, and then sent an embassy to Rome. Appian considers this conduct of Murena as the commencement of the Second Mithridatic War, B.C. 83. The Third commenced B.C. 74 with the league of Mithridates and Sertorius. (Appian, Mithridat. 64-68; Life of Sertorius, c. 24.)]

[Footnote 349: Kyzikus. The ruins of this ancient city, now Bal Kiz, that is Palaea Kyzikus, lie near to the east of the sandy isthmus which now connects the peninsula of Kyzikus with the mainland. Hamilton (Researches in Asia Minor, &c., London, 1842, ii. 102), says that "the loose and rubbly character of the buildings of Kyzikus little accords with the celebrity of its architects; and although some appear to have been cased with marble, none of them give an idea of the solid grandeur of the genuine Greek style." Yet Strabo (p. 575) describes this city as among the first of Asia. In his time the present peninsula was an island, which was connected with the mainland by two bridges: the city was near the bridges, and had two harbours that could be closed. Under the Romans in Strabo's time, Kyzikus was a Free City (Libera Civitas).]

[Footnote 350: This range is described by Strabo as opposite to Kyzikus, on the mainland. Kaltwasser states that Strabo called the Adrasteia of Plutarch by the name Dindymus; but this is a mistake, in which he is not singular. Dindymus was a solitary hill, and on the peninsula near the town of Kyzikus.]

[Footnote 351: This is a small lake near the coast of the Propontis, at the back of which and more inland are two larger lakes, called respectively by ancient geographers, Miletopolitis (now Moniyas) and Apollonias (now Abullionte). The lake Daskylitis is not marked in the map which accompanies Hamilton's work.]

[Footnote 352: Persephassa, or Persephone, whom the Romans call Proserpina, was the patron goddess of Kyzikus. Compare Appian (Mithridat. War, c. 75).]

[Footnote 353: What he was I don't know. Kaltwasser translates the word ([Greek: grammatiste]) "the public schoolmaster;" but he is inclined to take Reiske's conjecture [Greek: grammatei] because the grammateus was an important functionary in the Greek towns, and a "public schoolmaster" is not mentioned as an ordinary personage at this period. But Kaltwasser has not observed that [Greek: grammatistes] signifies a clerk or secretary in various passages (Herodotus, iii. 123, 128; vii. 100). If [Greek: grammatistes] could only signify a schoolmaster, it would be necessary to alter the reading. One cannot suppose that the goddess would reveal herself to a schoolmaster; or that a schoolmaster could venture to announce that he had received the honour of such a communication. When Romulus after his sudden disappearance again appeared to assure the anxious citizens, Julius Proculus was selected by him as the person to whom he showed himself; or Julius Proculus was one of the few who could claim to have the story of such an appearance believed. (Liv. i. 16.)]

[Footnote 354: I have kept the Greek word ([Greek: stele]), for no English word exactly expresses the thing. It was a stone placed upright, with an inscription on a flat surface, the summit of which sometimes ended with an ornamental finish. There are several in the British Museum.]

[Footnote 355: This river enters Lake Apollonias on the south side of the lake, and issues from the north side of the lake, whence it flows in a general north direction into the Propontis. Apollonia, now commonly called Abullionte, though the Greeks still call it by its ancient name, is situated on a small island which is on the east side of Lake Apollonias and is now connected with the mainland by a wooden bridge. If the battle was fought on the river, the women must have gone a considerable distance for their plunder. (Hamilton, Researches, &c. ii. 88, &c.)]

[Footnote 356: Kaltwasser remarks that Livius (37, c. 40) mentions camels as being in the army of Antiochus. The passage of Sallustius must have been in his Roman History.]

[Footnote 357: This river is to the west of Kyzikus and enters the Propontis by a general north course. On the banks of this river Alexander won his first victory in his Persian Campaign. (Arrian, Anab. i. 14.) Appian, in his account of the defeat of the army of Mithridates (Mithridat. War, c. 76) places it on the AEsepus, a river which lies between Kyzikus and the Granikus, and also flows into the Propontis. He also adds that the AEsepus was then at its greatest flood, which contributed to the loss of Mithridutes. But it appears from Appian that the remnant of the army of Mithridates crossed the Granikus also, for they reached Lampsakus.]

[Footnote 358: The Troad is a district, but Plutarch expresses himself as if he meant a town. It appears that Lucullus was near Ilium. The Achaean harbour, or harbour of the Achaeans, is near the promontory Sigeium.]

[Footnote 359: Appian (Mithridat. War, c. 77) simply says that Lucullus ordered Varius (the Marius of Plutarch) to be put to death.]

[Footnote 360: This town was at the eastern extremity of the long inlet of the Propontis, called the Gulf of Astakus. Mithridates according to Appian (Mithridat. War, c. 76) fled in his ships from Kyzikus to Parium, which is near the western extremity of the Propontis and west of the Granikus. From Parium he sailed to Nikomedia, a fact omitted by Plutarch, which explains the other fact, which he does mention, of Voconius being ordered to Nikomedia to look after the king.]

[Footnote 361: This island lies in the Archipelago off the coast of Thrace. It was noted for certain religious rites in honour of the gods called Kabeiri. (Strabo, p. 472.)]

[Footnote 362: This place was on the coast of Bithynia. Appian (c. 78) says that Mithridates landed at Sinope (Sinab), a large town considerably east of Heraklea, on the coast of the Black Sea; and that from Sinope he went along the coast to Amisus. See c. 23.]

[Footnote 363: This notion is common in the Greek writers; the gods brought misfortune on those whose prosperity was excessive, and visited them with punishment for arrogant speaking and boasting. Among instances of those whose prosperity at last brought calamity on them was Polykrates, tyrant of Samos (Herodotus, iii. 125); a notorious instance of the danger of prosperity. See vol. i. Life of Camillus, ch. 37, note.]

[Footnote 364: Artemis was so called from a town Priapus, which is on the south coast of the Propontis, and is placed in the maps a little west of the outlet of the Granikus. Strabo (p. 587) says that the Granikus flows between the AEsepus and Priapus; and that some say that Priapus was a Milesian colony, others a colony of Kyzikus. It derived its name from the god Priapus, who was in great repute here and in Lampsakus. The soldiers of Mithridates seem to have committed the excesses spoken of by Plutarch in their march through Priapus to Lampsakus.

The word for wooden statue is [Greek: xoanon] which is sometimes simply translated statue. I am not aware that it is ever used by Pausanias, who often uses the word, in any other sense than that of a statue of wood.]

[Footnote 365: The Thermodon is a river of Asia Minor which flows through the plain of Themiskyra into the Black Sea. There is now a small town, Thermeh, on the left bank of the river. Plutarch might be supposed to be speaking of a town Themiskyra, and so some persons have understood him; but perhaps incorrectly, for no town Themiskyra is mentioned by any other writer.]

[Footnote 366: Amisus, now Samsun, is on the coast of the Black Sea, between the Halys, Kizil Ermak, and the Iris, Yechil Ermak. The ruins of the old town are about a mile and a half N.N.W. of the modern town. "The pier which defended the ancient harbour may be distinctly traced, running out about 300 yards to the S.E., but chiefly under water. It consists of large blocks of a volcanic conglomerate, some of which measure nineteen feet by six or eight, and ten feet in thickness; whilst a little farther north another wall extends E.N.E. to a natural reef of rocks." (Hamilton, Researches in Asia Minor, &c. i. 290.)]

[Footnote 367: These tribes were in the neighbourhood of the Thermodon. They were encountered by the Ten Thousand in their retreat (Anab. v. 5). The Chaldaeans, whom Xenophon names Chalybes, were neighbours of the Tibareni: but he also speaks of another tribe of the same name (iv. 5, &c.) who lived on the borders of Armenia.]

[Footnote 368: The great mountain region between the Black Sea and the Caspian.]

[Footnote 369: The position of Kabeira is uncertain. Strabo (p. 556) says that it is about 150 stadia south of the Paryadres range; but he does not say that it is on the Lykus. It may be collected from the following chapter of Plutarch that it was near the Lykus. Pompeius made Kabeira a city and named it Diopolis. A woman named Pythodoris added to it and called it Sebaste, that is, in Latin, Augusta, and it was her royal residence at the time when Strabo wrote.]

[Footnote 370: The reign of Tigranes in Armenia began about B.C. 96. Little is known of his early history. He become King of Syria about B.C. 83, and thus he supplanted the kings, the descendants of Seleukus. He lost Syria after his defeat by Lucullus, B.C. 69; and he was finally reduced to the limits of his native kingdom by Pompeius, B.C. 66. (See the Life of Pompeius, c. 23.)]

[Footnote 371: Some writers read Dardarii. The Dandarii are mentioned by Strabo (p. 495) as one of the tribes on the Maeotis or Sea of Azoff. Mithridates held the parts on the Bosporus. Appian (Mithridat. War, c. 79) has this story of Olthakus, whom he names Olkades, but he calls him a Scythian.]

[Footnote 372: The strange panic that seized Mithridates is also described by Appian (Mithridat. War, c. 81). He fled to Comana and thence to Tigranes.]

[Footnote 373: Phernakia or Pharnakia, as it is generally read, is a town in Pontus on the coast of the Black Sea. It is generally assumed that Pharnakia was the same as Kerasus mentioned by Xenophon in the Retreat of the Ten Thousand, and the place being now called Kerasunt seems to establish this. Arrian in his Periplus of the Euxine states that it was originally named Kerasus. A difficulty is raised on this point because Xenophon says that the Greeks reached Kerasus in three days from Trebizond, and the country is difficult. Hamilton observes (i. 250): "Considering the distance and the difficult nature of the ground, over a great part of which the army must have marched in single file, Xenophon and his 10,000 men would hardly have arrived there in ten days." But it is more probable that there is an error in the "three" days, either an error of Xenophon or of the MSS., than that the site of Phernakia should have got the name of Kerasunt though Kerasus was not there. "The town of Kerasunt, which represents the Pharnakia of antiquity, is situated on the extremity of a rocky promontory connected with the main by a low wooded isthmus of a pleasing and picturesque appearance.—The Hellenic walls are constructed in the best isodomous style. Commencing near the beach on the west, they continue in an easterly direction over the hill, forming the limits of the present town. Near the gateway they are upwards of twenty feet high, and form the foundation of the Agha's konak; a small mosque has also been raised upon the ruins of a square tower; the blocks of stone, a dark green volcanic breccia, are of gigantic size." (Hamilton, Researches, &c. i. 262, &c.)]

[Footnote 374: Appian (c. 82) calls him Bacchus; he tells the same story. These Greek women of western Asia were much in request among the Asiatic kings. (Compare Life of Crassus, c. 32). Cyrus the younger had two Greek women with him when he fell at Cunaxa, and one of them was a Milesian. (Xenophon, Anab. i. 10.)]

[Footnote 375: I have kept the Greek word. The description shows what it was. The diadem was a mark of royal rank among the Asiatic nations. Aurelian is said to have been the first Roman Emperor who adopted the diadem, which appears on some of his coins. (Rasche, Lex. Rei Numariae.)]

[Footnote 376: The site of this place is unknown. Mithridates (Appian, Mithridat. War, c. 115) kept his valuables here.]

[Footnote 377: See the Life of Sulla, c. 14. L. Mummius after defeating the army of the Achaean confederation totally destroyed Corinth B.C. 146.]

[Footnote 378: Strabo (p. 547) quotes Theopompus, who says that the Milesians were the original founders of Amisus, and that after the Athenian colonization it was called Peiraeus. King Mithridates Eupator (the opponent of Lucullus) added to the city. It was a flourishing place when Strabo was writing his Geography.]

[Footnote 379: See the Life of Sulla, c. 14.]

[Footnote 380: See the Life of Sulla, c. 26. Tyrannio is often mentioned by Cicero. He arranged Cicero's library (Ad Attic. iv. 4 and 8), and he was employed as a teacher in Cicero's house (Ad Quint. Frat. ii. 4).

In alluding to Tyrannio being manumitted, Plutarch means to say that by the act of manumission it was declared that Tyrannio had been made a slave, and the act of manumission gave Murena the patronal rights over him. This Murena was the son of the Murena who is mentioned in Plutarch's Life of Sulla (c. 17). Cicero defended him against a charge of Ambitus or bribery at his election for the consulship, and in his oration, which is extant, he speaks highly of him. This Murena was Consul B.C. 62, the year after Cicero was Consul.]

[Footnote 381: This passage is very obscure. Some critics think that Plutarch is speaking of torture. But it is more likely that he is speaking of the debtors being in attendance at the courts and waiting under the open sky at all seasons till the suits about the debts were settled.]

[Footnote 382: This is the Centesimae usurae of the Romans, which was at this time the usual rate. It was one per cent. per month, or twelve per cent. per annum. Caesar (Life of Caesar, c. 12) made a like settlement between debtor and creditor in Spain.]

[Footnote 383: P. Appius Clodius or Claudius belonged to the Patrician Gens of the Claudii. He was a clever, unprincipled fellow, and the bitter enemy of Cicero, whom during his tribunate he caused to be banished. There is more about him in the Life of Caesar, c. 10. He was killed by T. Annius Milo.

This wife of Lucullus, named Clodia, had several sisters of the same name, as usual among the Romans. (Life of Marius, c. 1.) The sister who married Q. Metellus Celer, is accused of poisoning him.]

[Footnote 384: A name formed like Alexandreia from Antiochus, the name by which most of the Greek kings of Syria were designated. Antiocheia, now Antakia, was on the Orontes, the chief river of Syria, and near the small place Daphne, which was much resorted to as a place of pleasure by the people of Antiocheia. (Strabo, p. 749.)]

[Footnote 385: This was a country on the upper part of the Tigris. It probably contains the same element as the modern Kurdistan.]

[Footnote 386: The Skenite Arabians are the nomadic Arabs who live in tents. Strabo (p. 747) speaks of them thus: "The parts of Mesopotamia which are towards the south and at some distance from the mountains, and are waterless and sterile, are occupied by the Skenite Arabs, who are robbers and shepherds, and readily remove to other parts when the pastures fail and booty is scarce," &c.]

[Footnote 387: The embassy of Appius to Tigranes was in B.C. 71. See c. 14, notes.]

[Footnote 388: Compare Appian, Mithridat. War, c. 82.]

[Footnote 389: He is often mentioned by Cicero, De Orat. ii. 88, 90; and elsewhere. He was celebrated for his powerful memory, and he is said to have perfected a certain artificial system which was began by Simonides.]

[Footnote 390: Though Amphikrates intended to say that Seleukeia was small, it was in fact a large city. This Seleukeia on the Tigris was built by Seleukus Nikator. It was about 300 stadia or 36 miles from Babylon, which declined after the foundation of Seleukeia. In Strabo's time, Babylon was nearly deserted and Seleukeia was a large city.]

[Footnote 391: Bacchides, according to Strabo, commanded in the city. Sinope is described by Strabo (p. 545) as one of the chief towns of Asia in his day. It was a Milesian colony. It was the birth-place of this Mithridates, surnamed Eupator, who made it his capital. It was situated on an isthmus which joined the mainland to the Chersonesus (peninsula) which is mentioned by Plutarch in this chapter. There were harbours and stations for ships on each side of the isthmus. The present condition of the town is described by Hamilton (Researches, i. 306, &c.): "The population and prosperity of Sinope are not such as might be expected in a place affording such a safe harbour between Constantinople and Trebizond. I observed also a general appearance of poverty and privation throughout the peninsula."

In Strabo's time Sinope had received a Roman colony, and the colonists had part of the city and of the territory. The word Colonia in Greek ([Greek: koloneia]) appears on a sarcophagus which was seen by Hamilton in a small village near Sinope.]

[Footnote 392: Sthenis was a native of Olynthus and a contemporary of Alexander the Great. He is mentioned by Plinius (34, c. 19) and by Pausanias (vi. 17). Strabo says that Lucullus left everything to the Sinopians except the statue of Autolykus and a sphere, the work of Billarus, which he carried to Rome.]

[Footnote 393: This is the word which the Greeks use for a peninsula. Plutarch here means the Chersonesus, on the isthmus of which Sinope was built. Hamilton says that "the peninsula extends about five miles from east to west and strictly coincides with the description given of it by Polybius (iv. 50)."]

[Footnote 394: Socius et Amicus: this was the title which the Romans condescended to give to a king who behaved towards them with due respect and submission. (Livius, 31, c. 11.)]

[Footnote 395: Lucullus appears to have crossed the Euphrates at a more northern point than Zeugma, where the river was crossed by Crassus. Sophene is a district on the east side of the river between the mountain range called Masius and the range called Antitaurus: the capital or royal residence was Carcathiocerta. (Strabo, p. 527.)]

[Footnote 396: The great mountain range to which this name was given by the ancient geographers commences according to Strabo (p. 651) on the south-east coast of Lycia. The name Taurus was not very exactly defined, but it comprehended the mountain region which runs eastward from the point above mentioned in a general parallel direction to the south coast of Asia Minor; and the name was extended to the high lands of Armenia east of the Euphrates. Its eastern limit was very vaguely conceived, as we may collect from Strabo (p. 519).]

[Footnote 397: This is the Greek word which I have sometimes kept. Plutarch means the soldiers of the Roman legion.]

[Footnote 398: This termination Certa or Cirta is common to many Asiatic towns (See chapter 21). It is probably the same termination as in the Persian Parsagarda; and signified town or inclosure. The site of Tigranocerta is not certain. There appears to be no reason for identifying it with Sert except the resemblance of name. St. Martin contends that Amida on the east bank of the Tigris, occupied the site of Tigranocerta. The modern Diyarbeker is on the west bank of the Tigris opposite to Amida. (London Geog. Journal, viii. 77). Appian (Mithridat. War, c. 84) speaks of the foundation of Tigranocerta.]

[Footnote 399: The Adiabeni occupied a tract that was apparently a part of the old Assyria on the east side of the Tigris. The element diab perhaps exists in the Zab, one of the rivers which flow in the Tigris.]

[Footnote 400: The same name occurs in the Life of Sulla, c. 15. See Life of Alexander, c. 59, note.]

[Footnote 401: This is the river now generally called the Aras, which flows into the Caspian on the south-west side. Before it enters the sea, it is joined by the Cyrus, now the Cur.]

[Footnote 402: See the Life of Sertorius, c. 3. The rout of this large army of Tigranes is described by Appian (Mithridat. War, c. 85). The day was the 6th of October, and the year B.C. 69. The loss that is reported in some of these ancient battles seems hardly credible; but it is explained here. There was in fact no battle: the enemy were struck with a panic and fled. An immense multitude if seized with alarm requires no enemy to kill them. The loss of life that may occur in a frightened crowd is enormous.]

[Footnote 403: See chapter 42.]

[Footnote 404: See Life of Sulla, c. 26, Notes.]

[Footnote 405: This part of Livius is lost; but it belonged to the ninety-eighth book, as we see from the Epitome.]

[Footnote 406: The capture is described by Appian (Mithridat. War, c, 86), and by Dion Cassius (35, c. 2).]

[Footnote 407: Compare Appian, c. 87, and Dion Cassius (35, c. 3). Sallustius in the fourth book of his History has given a long letter, which we may presume to be his own composition, from Mithridates to Arsakes, this Parthian king, in which he urges him to fight against the Romans. (Fragmenta Hist. ed. Corte.)]

[Footnote 408: Lucullus was marching northward, and he had to ascend from the lower country to the high lands of Armenia, where the seasons are much later than in the lower country. He expected to find the corn ripe. Nothing precise as to his route can be collected from Plutarch. He states that Lucullus came to the Arsanias, a river which he must cross before he could reach Artaxata. Strabo (p. 528) describes Artaxata as situated on a peninsula formed by the Araxes (Aras) and surrounded by the stream, except at the isthmus which joined it to the mainland; the isthmus was defended by a ditch and rampart. The ruins called Takt Tiridate, the Throne of Tiridates, which have been supposed to represent Artaxata, are twenty miles from the river, and the place where they stand owed its strength solely to the fortifications. Below the junction of the Zengue and Aras, which unite near Erivan, "the river (Aras) winds very much, and at least twenty positions nearly surrounded by the river presented themselves." Colonel Monteith, who makes this remark (London Geog. Journal, iii. 47), found no ruins on the banks of the river which answered to the description of Artaxata; for what he describes as near the remains of a Greek or Roman bridge over the Aras do not correspond to the description of Strabo. The remains of Artaxata, if they exist, must be looked for on some of the numerous positions which are nearly surrounded by the river.

The Arsanias is described by Plinius (Hist. Nat. v. 24) as flowing into the Euphrates, and, it appears, into the Murad or eastern branch which rises at no great distance S.W. of Ararat. It is probable that Lucullus entered Armenia by some of the passes west of Lake Van; but his route can hardly be conjectured.]

[Footnote 409: The Mardi were a nation that lived south of the Caspian and bordered on the Hyrkani. As to the Iberians of Asia, see the Life of Tiberius Gracchus, c. 7, Notes. It is incorrectly stated there that Lucullus invaded the country of the Iberians.]

[Footnote 410: This word is probably corrupted. See the note of Sintenis. The simplest correction is "Atropateni."]

[Footnote 411: Appian (Mithridat. War, c. 87) gives a very confused account of this campaign. It is briefly described by Dion Cassius (35, c. 5).]

[Footnote 412: This is the modern Nisibin in 37 deg. N. lat. on the Jakhjakhah, the ancient Mygdonius. The Mygdonius is a branch of the Chaborras, which flows into the Euphrates. Nisibin is now a small place with "about a hundred well-built houses, and a dozen shops kept by Christians" (Forbes, London Geog. Journal, ix. 241). Two tall columns of marble and the church of St. James, which is built from fragments of Nisibis, are the only remains of a city which is often mentioned in the ancient history of the East.

The town is mentioned by Tacitus (Annal. xv. 35) under the name of Nisibis, and he places it thirty-nine Roman miles from Tigranocerta. Nisibis is also the name in Ammianus Marcellinus. Dion Cassius (36, c. 6, 7) describes the siege and capture of Nisibis. This event belongs to the year B.C. 68.]

[Footnote 413: Compare Dion Cassius (36, c. 16) as to the behaviour of Lucullus. He was too strict a disciplinarian for soldiers who were accustomed to licence; and he did not even attempt to win the love of his men by kindness. The mutinous army that he could not control was quiet and obedient to Pompeius.]

[Footnote 414: This is the same person who is mentioned in c. 5. The Roman name is Quinctius, which is corrupted in the MSS. of Plutarch. This Lucius was tribune of the Plebs B.C. 74, the year of the consulship of Lucullus. In this chapter Plutarch calls him one of the Praetors ([Greek: hena ton strategon]), which Kaltwasser has translated "one of the tribunes of the people."]

[Footnote 415: This, I think, is the sense of the passage, to which Reiske gives a very different meaning. I have given the same meaning that Kaltwasser and Coraes have. See the note in Schaefer's edition.]

[Footnote 416: Manius Acilius Glabrio, consul B.C. 67, was first appointed to succeed Lucullus; but Pompeius contrived to get the command given to himself B.C. 66. "Plutarch, who refers elsewhere to the appointment of Glabrio (Pomp. c. 30) has not here (c. 33, 34) sufficiently distinguished it from that of Pompey, which he has anticipated. For Pompey was not appointed till the following year" (Clinton, Fasti Hellen.).]

[Footnote 417: Compare Dion Cassius, 35, c. 10, &c.; and Appian, c. 88, &c.]

[Footnote 418: When a country was conquered and it was intended to make of it a Roman province, commissioners were sent out, usually Senators, to assist the general in organizing the provincial government. Compare Livius, 45, c. 17.]

[Footnote 419: Pompeius was appointed by a Lex Manilia, in favour of which Cicero spoke in an oration, which is still extant, Pro Lege Manilia. See the Life of Pompeius, c. 30.]

[Footnote 420: This is the Greek [Greek: daphne], and the Roman Laurus, which is incorrectly translated "laurel."]

[Footnote 421: Compare Life of Pompeius, c. 31, Dion Cassius, 36, c. 29. and Velleius Patercules, ii. 33.]