A Smaller History of Rome Part 24

[Footnote 78: This mausoleum, begun by Hadrian, is now the Castle of St.

Angelo.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Reverse of a bra.s.s Coin of Antoninus Pius.]

REIGN OF ANTONINUS PIUS, A.D. 138-161.

This excellent man was born at Lanuvium, September 19th, A.D. 86, but his family came from the town of Nemausis (Nismes), in Gaul. Soon after his accession to the empire he married his daughter Faustina to Marcus Aurelius, procured for him the tribunitian and proconsular power from the Senate, and made him his a.s.sociate in the labors of the government.

His tranquil and prosperous reign is the most pleasing period in the history of the Roman Empire. The world enjoyed a general peace, and the emperor endeavored, by every wise measure, to secure the prosperity of his subjects. Like Numa, to whom he has often been compared, Antoninus was the peacemaker between distant nations, who were accustomed to submit their differences to him, and to abide implicitly by his award.

He checked the persecutions to which the Christians had been exposed in former reigns, and to him Justin Martyr addressed his apology for Christianity. He watched carefully the conduct of the provincial governors, and applied the public revenues to founding schools, repairing roads and harbors, and encouraging every where industry and trade. When Asia and Rhodes were devastated by an earthquake, Antoninus expended large sums in relieving the sufferers by that calamity, as well as those who were reduced to indigence by the great fires which nearly destroyed Carthage, Narbonne, and Antioch, in A.D. 153. He appointed teachers of rhetoric in various cities of the empire, conferred honors and emoluments upon men of letters, and in A.D. 141 founded a charity-school for orphan girls, whom he styled _Puellae Alimentariae Faustinianae_, in memory of his wife Faustina, who had died the year before. Faustina, however, does not seem to have merited his esteem, and the emperor was well acquainted with her faults; yet he generously overlooked them while she lived, and upon her death paid unusual honors to her memory. His piety, his devotion to the national religion, and his various virtues, seem to have won for him universal love and veneration, and his successors during the next century a.s.sumed the name of Antoninus as their worthiest t.i.tle.

Antoninus made no attempt to extend the boundaries of the empire. The barbarous races who were now beginning to swarm upon the frontiers, the Germans and the Dacians, were held in check; and although the Brigantes made several inroads into Britain, they were defeated by A. Lollius, the Legate, in A.D. 141; and a wall of turf was raised beyond the former wall built by Agricola to check the incursions of the Caledonians. This peaceful reign, however, seems to have increased the general indolence of the people, and the martial spirit of the Roman soldiers declined in the idleness of their stationary camps. After a reign of twenty-three years, Antoninus died, March 7th, A.D. 161, in his villa at Lorium, aged seventy-five years.

REIGN OF MARCUS AURELIUS ANTONINUS, A.D. 161-180.

He was succeeded by Aurelius, who was born at Rome A.D. 121. This prince is known as the Philosopher; and the wish of Plato that philosophers might be kings, or kings philosophers, seems to have been fulfilled at his accession. Aurelius had been from his youth a lover of truth. His morals and his intellect were trained by the purest and wisest men of his age. He had studied under Herodes Atticus and Cornelius Fronto, two famous rhetoricians, and also under the Stoic philosophers Junius Rusticus and Apollonius; and he had been constantly employed by his adopted father Antoninus as an a.s.sociate in all his useful and benevolent designs. His health was, however, delicate, and he now admitted to a share in the empire his adopted brother, L. Verus, who possessed a vigorous const.i.tution, but was addicted to licentious pleasures.

The general peace which had prevailed during the reign of Marcus Antoninus was forever pa.s.sed away, and the world was in future to be desolated by almost perpetual hostilities. The Parthian king Vologeses III. having invaded the eastern provinces, and cut to pieces a Roman legion, L. Verus was sent to oppose his advance; but upon arriving at Antioch, Verus remained there, plunged in dissipation, while his brave lieutenant Avidius Ca.s.sius drove back the Parthians, invaded Mesopotamia, destroyed Seleucia, and penetrated to Babylon. Another Roman general conquered Armenia, and restored the legitimate king Soaemus to his throne. At the close of the war, Verus, A.D. 166, returned to Rome, and triumphed. His army brought the plague with it from the East, which now desolated Italy and Rome. Many ill.u.s.trious men died; but the famous physician Galen (Claudius Galenus), who had come from Pergamus to Rome, was now enabled to exhibit his uncommon professional skill. This pestilence lasted for several years.

Verus died of intemperance A.D. 171, and Aurelius prevailed upon the Senate to rank him among the G.o.ds. He now marched against the Marcomanni, but was defeated in a great battle, and, in order to provide a new army, sold the imperial plate and jewels. He now took up a position at Sirmium (Sirmich), and endeavored to wear out the barbarians by skirmishes and sudden attacks, without venturing far from his strong-hold. At length, however, upon one occasion, having been drawn into a defile, the Roman army was relieved by a fierce storm of thunder and rain, which terrified the barbarians. Tradition attributes this sudden storm to the prayers of a Christian legion. The barbarians now submitted, and withdrew beyond the Danube.

Soon after, an insurrection broke out in Syria, where Avidius Ca.s.sius, at the instigation, it is said, of the emperor's wife Faustina, had proclaimed himself emperor. But Ca.s.sius, by his severity, disgusted his own soldiers, and was a.s.sa.s.sinated by a centurion. Aurelius lamented this event, since it deprived him of an opportunity of showing clemency to an erring friend. He at once set out for the East, and there freely forgave all those who had conspired against him. He took the young family of Ca.s.sius under his protection, and ordered the papers of that officer to be destroyed, lest they might disclose the names of the conspirators. Faustina, who had accompanied her husband to Cilicia, died soon after, it is said, by her own hand.

It is remarkable that this philosophic emperor should have permitted a cruel persecution of the Christians in A.D. 177, perhaps at the instigation of the Stoic philosophers--the only blot upon his general humanity and benevolence. Among the victims of this persecution was Justin Martyr, the author of the Apologies for Christianity, addressed to Antoninus, as well as to Aurelius himself. Toward the close of his reign, having become convinced of the falseness of the charges made against the Christians, Aurelius became once more tolerant and philosophic.

In A.D. 176 the emperor triumphed at Rome for his various successes. He gave a donation of eight pieces of gold to every citizen, and made his son Commodus his colleague. In the mean time the barbarians in the interior of Europe, moved by a general impulse, began to press upon the frontiers of the empire, and from this time seem never to have ceased their inroads until the final destruction of the Roman power. Aurelius marched, A.D. 177, to the frontier, defeated the barbarians in various engagements, and had perhaps proved the savior and second founder of Rome, when he was seized with a fever at Vindobona (Vienna), A.D. 180, and died after a few days' illness. He was the last of the Roman emperors who labored for the welfare of his people. He was, no doubt, the greatest and wisest of them all, and he united the different talents of a man of learning, a fine writer, a skillful soldier, and a benevolent, judicious ruler. His "Meditations," which have made him known to posterity, are among the most delightful productions of the human intellect, while his private character seems to have been no less attractive than his writings.

REIGN OF M. COMMODUS ANTONINUS, A.D. 180-192.

The depraved Commodus succeeded his virtuous father at the age of twenty. He had been educated with singular care, but was wholly given up to coa.r.s.e sensuality. The people, however, still hoped that he might be worthy of his father, and received him, upon his accession, with loud expressions of joy. For a short time he concealed his true disposition; but his sister Lucilla, jealous of her brother's wife Crispina, formed a conspiracy against him in A.D. 182, and he escaped with difficulty from the hand of the a.s.sa.s.sin. From this moment he threw off all disguise, and indulged his natural vices without restraint. He put to death the most ill.u.s.trious men of the time, encouraged informers and false accusations, and filled Rome with terror. In the midst of these cruelties he often sang, danced, or played the buffoon in public, fought as a gladiator in the circus, and ordered the people to worship him as a second Hercules. His lieutenant Marcellus, in A.D. 184, defeated the Caledonians, after they had pa.s.sed the long wall of Hadrian, and had ravaged the northern part of Britain; and in A.D. 191 an invasion of the Frisians was repelled. Commodus, however, paid no attention to the affairs of the empire. In A.D. 189 Italy suffered from a pestilence and famine, when the people of Rome rose against the emperor's praefect, Cleander, and tore him to pieces. Commodus still continued his murders, and was at last a.s.sa.s.sinated by the directions of his mistress, Marcia, whose death he had resolved upon. He died December 31st, A.D. 192. The Senate ordered his memory to be held infamous, and his body to be dragged by iron hooks through the streets, and then to be thrown into the Tiber; but his successor Pertinax prevailed that it should be placed in the mausoleum of Hadrian. Such was the son of Marcus Aurelius.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Commodus.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Pertinax.]

CHAPTER XLII.

FROM PERTINAX TO DIOCLETIAN. A.D. 192-284.

Pertinax, an aged senator of consular rank, and now Praefect of the city, was summoned by the conspirators, who came to his house late at night, after the murder of Commodus, to ascend the vacant throne. He was one of the few friends and ministers of Marcus Aurelius who yet survived, and, having filled many important offices, had always been distinguished for firmness, prudence, and integrity. The rumor was spread that Commodus had died of apoplexy, and that Pertinax had succeeded him; but the Praetorian Guards were dissatisfied at his election. The Senate, however, confirmed the choice of the conspirators, and Pertinax lived among his own order rather as an equal than a master. His manners were simple, his mode of life frugal, and he sought to revive the pleasing simplicity of the early Republic.

Pertinax administered justice with strictness, released those who had been left in prison by Commodus, reformed the finances and introduced economy, redivided the uncultivated lands among those who would till them, removed oppressive restrictions upon trade, and deserved the respect of the wiser portion of his subjects.

But the Praetorians were never reconciled to his rule, and on the 28th of March, A.D. 193, eighty-six days after his election, they broke into the imperial palace, and struck down the emperor with innumerable blows.

His head was separated from his body, and, being placed upon a lance, was carried in triumph to the Praetorian camp, while the people silently lamented the death of this virtuous ruler.

The soldiers, meanwhile, proclaimed from the ramparts of their camp that the throne of the world would be sold at auction to the highest bidder.

Didius Julia.n.u.s, a wealthy Senator, whose age had not quenched his vanity and ambition, offered about a thousand dollars to each man for the possession of the prize. He was declared emperor, and, surrounded by the armed Praetorians, was carried to the Senate, who were forced to accept the selection of the soldiers. But the Senators and the people felt deeply the disgrace of their country, and even the Praetorians were ashamed of their unworthy choice. Julia.n.u.s found himself on the throne of the world without a friend.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Septimius Severus.]

The armies in the provinces, when they heard of these transactions at the capital, rose in revolt, and refused to acknowledge the authority of Julian. Clodius Albinus commanded the legions in Britain, Septimius Severus those in Pannonia, and Pescennius Niger the army of the East.

Severus, more active than his compet.i.tors, was saluted by his soldiers as emperor, and marched rapidly toward Rome. Julian, deserted by the Praetorians, was condemned to death by the Senate, and was executed as a common criminal after a reign of only sixty-six days. Severus was acknowledged as their lawful emperor by the Senate, June 2, A.D. 193, and his first act was to disarm the Praetorian Guards and banish them from the capital.

He next marched against Niger, and defeated him in two battles, while he was also successful in a severe contest with Clodius Albinus at Lyons.

Both of his compet.i.tors were put to death, and Severus, now set free from fear of rivalry, began to show the native cruelty of his disposition. Forty-one Senators, whom he accused of having favored Albinus, were executed, with their wives and children; and many of the provincial n.o.bles of Spain and Gaul shared their fate. Yet Severus was in many respects a useful ruler; strict in the administration of the laws, careful to correct abuses, and restraining his subjects with stern impartiality. Peace returned to the provinces, cities were repeopled, roads repaired, Rome abounded in provisions, and the people were satisfied. Severus changed the const.i.tution of the Praetorian Guards, and filled up their ranks with the bravest soldiers of the legions of the frontier. These barbarians, he thought, would be able to suppress any rebellion that might arise; and he increased the number to fifty thousand men. The Praefect of the Praetorians, who had at first been a simple soldier, now became the chief minister of the emperor, and was at the head of the finances and even of the law. The celebrated lawyer Papinian was appointed Praefect after the fall of Plautia.n.u.s; and several great jurisconsults, particularly Paulus and Ulpian, flourished under the reign of Severus or his family.

Severus, however, was a military despot, and, despising the feeble Senate, a.s.sumed both the legislative and the executive power. The jurisconsults, in fact, from this reign, begin to treat the emperor as the source of all law, the Senate and the people being no longer considered in the state. But this arbitrary rule, introduced by Severus, is thought to have tended more than any thing else to destroy the vigor of the Roman Empire, by leading the people to an abject dependence upon their rulers.

The wife of Severus, Julia Domna, a Syrian lady of great beauty and various accomplishments, became the mother of two sons, Caracalla and Geta, and the emperor hoped that they would prove worthy of the high office to which they were born. They soon, however, showed themselves incapable of any serious study or employment, and were chiefly remarkable for the hatred they bore toward each other. The court was already divided into two factions, composed of the adherents of either son; and the emperor, who in vain strove to remove their rivalry, foresaw that one must fall a victim to the hatred of the other.

In A.D. 208 a war broke out in Britain, and Severus, although now more than sixty years of age, and afflicted with the gout, so that he was carried on a litter, set out at the head of his army, attended by his two sons, and penetrated into the interior of Scotland. This was his last enterprise, for he died at York, February 4, A.D. 211. He left his empire to his two sons, who returned to Rome, and were acknowledged by the Senate and the army.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Caracalla.]

Their discord, however, still continued, and they planned a division of the empire, a measure which was then distasteful to all the Romans, and which was only prevented from taking place by the tears and entreaties of their mother, Julia Domna. Geta, the younger son, who was of a gentle disposition, soon after, in A.D. 212, February 27th, was murdered by the cruel and relentless Caracalla. Twenty thousand of his friends are said to have been put to death at the same time, and his unhappy mother, Julia Domna, was forced to receive her guilty son with feigned smiles and words of approbation. Remorse, however, fastened upon Caracalla, and the shade of Geta haunted him wherever he went. His cruelties now redoubled. He put to death Papinian, the Praetorian Praefect, the splendid ornament of the Roman bar; and his ma.s.sacres filled every part of the empire with mourning and terror. In A.D. 213 he left the city of Rome, and never returned thither again; the rest of his reign was pa.s.sed in the provinces, and wherever he came he indulged himself in endless murders, confiscations, and acts of violence. "He was," says Gibbon, "the common enemy of mankind." He directed a general ma.s.sacre of the people of Alexandria, who had lampooned him, and viewed the scene from a secure post in the Temple of Serapis. To retain the affections of his army, he lavished upon them immense sums, the plunder of his empire; and he was at length a.s.sa.s.sinated, March 8, A.D. 217, at the instigation of Macrinus, one of the Praetorian Praefects, who had discovered that the tyrant had planned his own death.

Macrinus, Praefect of the Praetorian Guard, was elected emperor March 11, A.D. 217, and the Senate and the provinces submitted without a murmur.

But the new emperor was disliked by the n.o.bles on account of his humble origin, and soon offended his army by endeavoring to reform their discipline. The Empress Julia now withdrew by a voluntary death from the sorrow which surrounded her, and the family of Severus became extinct. A rebellion broke out in the Syrian army, who proclaimed Ba.s.sia.n.u.s, the grandson of Julia Maesa, sister of the late empress, and who a.s.sumed the name of Antoninus. He pretended that he was the natural son of Caracalla. A battle took place, in which Macrinus was defeated, and soon after put to death; and Elagabalus, for that is the name under which this monster is commonly known, ascended the throne.

He at once plunged into every vice. The sun was worshiped at Emessa under the name of Elagabalus, from whence the new emperor derived his surname, having been a priest in the temple; and he now introduced the lascivious rites of the Syrian deity into the capital of the world. A magnificent temple of the G.o.d Elagabalus was raised on the Palatine Mount, and the grave and dignified n.o.bles of Rome were forced to take part in the ceremonies, clothed in long Phoenician tunics.

It would be impossible to describe the vices of this wretched being, who seems to have sunk to the very extreme of depravity. His cousin, however, Alexander Severus, as if to show that human nature had not wholly declined, was amiable, virtuous, and learned. Elagabalus was murdered by the Praetorians March 10, A.D. 222, and Alexander placed upon the throne.

Alexander Severus seems to have inclined toward the Christian faith, which was now very widely extended throughout the empire. He revoked all former edicts against the Christians, and ordered the words "Do unto others as you would have them do to you" to be inscribed upon his palaces and other buildings. The Persian Empire was now arising in new strength under the house of the Sa.s.sanides, and a war having broken out with them, Alexander marched against the Persians, and gained a considerable victory. He returned to Rome in triumph, and entered the city in a chariot drawn by four elephants. Soon after, the Germans having invaded Gaul, he led his army to the defense of the frontier; but, while attempting to reform the discipline of the Gallic legions, he was a.s.sa.s.sinated by a band of discontented soldiers, and Maximin, a Thracian peasant of great personal strength, who had risen to a high command in the army, was raised to the throne.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Alexander Severus.]

Maximin, A.D. 235, began his reign by ma.s.sacring many of the friends of the late emperor, and even all those who showed any regret for his death. He was a fierce, ignorant barbarian, but was very successful in his wars against the Germans, having ravaged their country, and sent great numbers of them to be sold as slaves in Italy. He also defeated the Dacians and Sarmatians. But his severities produced a revolt in Africa, where the legions proclaimed their proconsul Gordian emperor, then in the eightieth year of his age. The Senate now revolted against Maximin, and ordered all his friends in Rome to be put to death. Maximin now made peace with the barbarians, and marched toward Italy, while, in the mean time, Gordian and his son were defeated and slain in Africa.

The Senate immediately elected Papia.n.u.s and Balbinus emperors, to whom, in order to gratify the people, they joined the younger Gordian, then only twelve years of age. Maximin entered Italy and besieged Aquileia, but his soldiers, weary of the length of the siege, put him to death, A.D. 238. The Goths on the Danube and the Persians in the East now a.s.sailed the empire, and at the same time the Praetorian Guards murdered his two a.s.sociates, leaving Gordian sole emperor of Rome. Gordian was married to the daughter of Misitheus, Praefect of the Praetorians, an excellent minister and commander. Together they marched to the East, and defeated the Persians under their king Sapor, in various engagements. Misitheus now died, and Gordian appointed the Arab Philip his prime minister. Sapor was again defeated; but the Arab conspired against Gordian, his benefactor, who was a.s.sa.s.sinated in A.D. 244.

Philip, having made peace with the Persians, returned to Rome, where he won the favor of the people by his mild conduct. In his reign the secular games were celebrated, it being reckoned one thousand years since the foundation of the city. Philip ruled with mildness, and was an enemy to persecution. In A.D. 249, however, the Illyrian army revolted, and proclaimed their commander, Traja.n.u.s Decius, emperor, who defeated Philip near Verona, and put him to death. His son, who had remained at Rome, was slain by the Praetorian Guards.

In A.D. 250 the Goths invaded the empire. These fierce barbarians came from the north of Europe, and were among the chief instruments of the fall of Rome. Decius, who does not seem to have wanted skill and courage, was finally defeated and slain by them, together with his son.

Decius is remembered as one of the most cruel persecutors of the Christians. The innocent victims of his rage were subjected to torture, driven to hide in the wilderness among rocks and forests, and were glad to live among the wild beasts, more humane than man. The Bishop of Rome, Fabian, the bishops of Antioch and Alexandria, and many more eminent in the Church, suffered from the unrelenting severity of this persecutor.

A son of Decius, Hostilia.n.u.s, together with Gallus, an experienced soldier, were now made emperors. They concluded a disgraceful, but probably necessary peace with the Goths. But Hostilia.n.u.s soon after died, and Gallus was defeated and slain by aemilia.n.u.s, who was himself a.s.sa.s.sinated, and Valerian, the Censor, in A.D. 253, was made emperor. A very high character is given of this ruler, whose reign, however, was filled with disasters. Having joined his son Gallienus with him, Valerian vainly sought to repel the attacks of innumerable enemies on every side of the empire--the Goths, the Franks, the Scythians, and the Persians. In a campaign against the latter Valerian was taken prisoner, and for nine years languished in captivity, his unnatural son making no effort for his liberation.

The Allemanni, meanwhile, had entered Italy, ravaged its northern territory, and even threatened Rome. They withdrew, loaded with plunder.

To gain allies among the barbarians, Gallienus now married the daughter of the king of the Marcomanni. Every part of the empire seems now to have been laid open to the invaders. Greece was ravaged by the Goths; the famous Temple of Diana at Ephesus was burned by them, together with that fine city; and Sapor, king of the Persians, overran Syria and Asia.

He was, however, finally repelled by the brave Odenatus, who, with his queen Zen.o.bia, ruled at Palmyra.