Dio's Rome, Volume 3. Cassius Dio Cocceianus

succeeded in wounding the latter severely, in killing the majority of his soldiers and confining the rest within their ramparts. He would have annihilated them, had he proceeded to besiege them for any time at all. As it was, after accomplishing nothing at the first assault he began to be alarmed lest while he was delaying he should receive some setback from Caesar and the rest; so he again turned against them. Wearied by the journey both ways and by the battle he was also in doubt whether he should find that his opponents had conquered the force hostile to them; and in this condition he was confronted by Hirtius and suffered a decisive defeat. For when Hirtius and Caesar perceived what was going on, the latter remained to keep watch over the camp while the former set out against Antony. [-38-] Upon the latter's defeat not only Hirtius was saluted as imperator by the soldiers and by the senate, but likewise Vibius, though he had fared badly, and Caesar who had done no fighting even. To those who had participated in the conflict and had perished there was voted a public burial, and it was resolved that the prizes of war which they had taken while alive should be restored to their fathers and sons.

      Following this official action Pontius Aquila, one of the assassins and a lieutenant of Decimus, conquered in battle Titus Munatius Plancus, who opposed him; and Decimus, when a certain senator deserted to Antony, so far from displaying anger toward him sent back all his baggage and whatever else he had left behind in Mutina, the result being that the affection of many of Antony's soldiers grew cool, and some of the nations which had previously sympathized with him proceeded to rebel: Caesar and Hirtius, however, were elated at this, and approaching the fortifications of Antony challenged him to combat; he for a time was alarmed and remained quiet, but later when some reinforcements sent by Lepidus came to him he took courage. Lepidus himself did not make it clear to which of the two sides he sent the army: he thought well of Antony, who was a relative, but had been summoned against him by the senate; and for these reasons he made plans to have a refuge in store with both parties, by not giving to Marcus Silanus, the commander, orders that were in the least clear. But he, doubtless knowing well his master's frame of mind, went on his own responsibility to Antony. [-39-] So when the latter had been thus assisted he became bold and made a sudden sally from the gates: there was great slaughter on both sides, but at last he turned and fled.

      1

      The events, however, run over into the following year.

      2

      Interesting to compare are three citations from an unknown Byzantine writer (in Excerpta cod. Paris, suppl. Gr. 607 A, edited by M.

      Treu, Ohlau, 1880, p. 29 ff.), who seems to have used Dio as a source:

      a) The mother of Au

1

The events, however, run over into the following year.

2

Interesting to compare are three citations from an unknown Byzantine writer (in Excerpta cod. Paris, suppl. Gr. 607 A, edited by M.

Treu, Ohlau, 1880, p. 29 ff.), who seems to have used Dio as a source:

a) The mother of Augustus just one day previous to her travail beheld in a dream how her womb was snatched away and carried up into heaven.

b) And in the same night as Octavius was born his father thought that the sun rose from his wife's entrails.

c) And a certain senator, Nigidius Figulus, who was an astrologer, asked Octavius, the father of Augustus, why he was so slow in leaving his house. The latter replied that a son had been born to him. Nigidius thereupon exclaimed: "Ah, what hast thou done? Thou hast begotten a master for us!" The other believing it and being disturbed wished to make away with the child. But Nigidius said to him: "Thou hast not the power. For it hath not been granted thee to do this."

3

Suetonius in relating this anecdote (Life of Augustus, chapter 5) says that the senate-meeting in question was called to consider the conspiracy of Catiline. Since, however, Augustus is on all hands admitted to have been born a. d. IX. Kal. Octobr. and mention of Catiline's conspiracy was first made in the senate a. d. XII. Kal. Nov. (Cicero, Against Catiline, I, 3, 7), the claim of coincidence is evidently based on error.

4

Compare again the same Byzantine writer quoted in footnote to chapter 1,—two excerpts:

d) Again, while he was growing up in the country, an eagle swooping down snatched from his hands the loaf of bread and again returning replaced it in his hands.

e) Again, during his boyhood, Cicero saw in a dream Octavius himself fastened to a golden chain and wielding a whip being let down from the sky to the summit of the Capitol.

5

Compare Súetonius, Life of Augustus, chapter 94

6

See footnote to Book Forty-three, chapter 42.

7

The senate-house already mentioned in Book Forty, chapter 50.

8

This word is inserted by Boissevain on the authority of a symbol in the manuscript's margin, indicating a gap.

9

Inserting with Reimar [Greek: proihemenos], to complete the sense.

10

See Roscher I, col. 1458, on the Puperci Iulii. And compare Suetonius, Life of Caesar, chapter 76.

11

For further particulars about Sex. Clodius and the ager Leontinus (held to be the best in Sicily, Cicero, Against Verres, III, 46) see Suetonius, On Rhetoric, 5; Arnobuis, V, 18; Cicero, Philippics, II, 4, 8; II, 17; II, 34, 84; II, 39, 101; III, 9, 22.

12

Compare here (and particularly with, reference to the plural Spurii) the passage in Cicero, Philippics, III, 44, 114:

Quod si se ipsos illi nostri liberatores e conspectu nostro abstulerunt, at exemplum facti reliquerunt: illi, quod nemo fecerat, fecerunt: Tarquinium Brutus bello est persecutus, qui tum rex fuit, cum esse Romae licebat; Sp. Cassius, Sp. Maelius, M. Manlius propter suspitionem regni appetendi sunt necati; hi primum cum gladiis non in regnum appetentem, sed in regnum impetum fecerunt.

13

For the figure, compare Aristophanes, The Acharnians, vv. 380-381 (about Cleon):

[Greek: dieballe chai pseudae chateglottise mou chachychloborei chaplunen.]

14

Dio has in this sentence imitated almost word for word the utterance of Demosthenes, inveighing against Aischines, in the speech on the crown (Demosthenes XVIII, 129).

15

Compare Book Forty-five, chapter 30.

16

There is a play on words here which can not be exactly rendered. The Greek verb [Greek: pheaegein] means either "to flee" or "to be exiled."

17

Various diminutive endings, expressing contempt.

18

The MS. reading is not wholly satisfactory here. Bekker, by a slight change, would produce (after "Bambalio"): "nor by declaring war because of," etc.

19

The Greek word is [Greek: obolos] a coin which in the fifth century B.C. would have amounted to considerably more than the Roman as; but as time went on the value of the [Greek: obolos] diminished indefinitely, so that glossaries eventually translate it a