Antony and Cleopatra

by Adrian Goldsworthy

  When he heard of the threat, Antony took a strong force away from the siege of Phraata and force-marched it to rescue the baggage train. He arrived to find only corpses and the ash and debris of destruction. Phraata continued to hold out and without the irreplaceable siege train there was very little prospect of taking it. Capitulation seemed extremely unlikely, now that a substantial Parthian army was operating in the area. More immediately, Antony had also lost the greater part of his reserves of food. Foraging parties were extremely vulnerable unless sent out in great strength. Casualties began to mount as a succession of small columns were caught and destroyed by the Parthian horse archers. Artavasdes of Armenia had already decided to lead his own contingent home.16

  Antony decided to take yet another gamble. Leaving only a skeleton force to protect his siege lines, he led ten legions, three cohorts of praetorian guard and all his cavalry on a march through the surrounding countryside. At the very least, they were to gather food and forage, but the hope was that the Parthians would be drawn into fighting a battle. A clear battlefield victory could easily change the course of the campaign, forcing King Phraates to retreat or seek terms and perhaps breaking the will of the defenders of the city of Phraata.17

  A strong Parthian force was soon shadowing the Roman column on the first day of its march. The enemy did not attack, impressed by the discipline of Antony’s men, each formation keeping in place to offer mutual support. The Roman commander pretended to retreat, marching his men close in front of the wide crescent formed by the enemy, who continued simply to observe. Orders had been issued for the units in the column to wheel into line and attack as soon as Parthians were close enough for the legionaries to charge them. Trumpets sounded to give the signal and the Roman army surged into the attack, the legionaries shouting and banging their weapons against their shields to frighten the enemy horses. The onslaught panicked the enemy, but as the Parthian horsemen fled it proved difficult for the Romans to catch them. Perhaps the order had been given too soon. More probably the enemy cavalry were difficult to catch unless they were strongly committed to an attack, as in the battles against Ventidius. The Romans killed eighty men and captured a mere thirty.

  Antony had failed to get the decisive battle he needed. On the next day he led his troops back to Phraata and the enemy showed their continued confidence by harassing the Roman column every yard of the way. In the meantime – or perhaps just after his dispirited men had returned – the defenders of the city launched a sally. The legionaries stationed as outposts panicked and the enemy was able to reach the Roman mound and do some damage to the siege works. Antony ordered the units involved to be decimated, executing one in ten and feeding the survivors with a ration of barley rather than wheat. As supplies grew shorter, this last measure may have extended to the army as a whole.18

  It was now well into autumn and the Romans were making no progress in the siege. Food was running short for both sides and Phraates realised that he would soon find it difficult to keep the semi-feudal contingents within the Parthian army together. Like Antony before him, he now chose to deceive his opponent. Attacks on Roman foraging parties were deliberately reduced. Parthian patrols were encouraged to talk to their opponents – perhaps especially the allied contingents – praising their courage and speaking of the king’s desire for an end to hostilities. It was just what the Romans and their commander wanted to hear. An embassy was sent to the Parthian camp. Dio provides a vivid portrait of Phraates sitting on a golden throne to receive them, all the while toying with a strung composite bow – a symbol of continuing hostilities. An unstrung bow was a sign of peace. A renewed plea for the return of Crassus’standards and prisoners was brusquely refused, but the Romans were assured that if they now retreated, then they would not be pursued. The truce was limited. The defenders of Phraata sallied out again and destroyed the Roman siege works and there were further attacks on foragers.

  Perhaps Antony and his senior officers believed, or wanted to believe, the king’s pledge. In many ways it did not matter. If Phraata had fallen they might have captured enough food to supply the troops and spend the winter in Media. It had not, and an undefeated enemy army hovered menacingly around them. Staying where they were offered no prospect of success and a strong chance of utter disaster. The decision was made to retreat to Armenia. Antony was unwilling to make a speech informing the army of the new orders and instead delegated the task to Domitius Ahenobarbus, the former ardent Republican whose son was now betrothed to Antony’s elder daughter by Octavia. Given the size of the army, it is likely that the speech had to be made several times, unless it was simply addressed to a gathering of the centurions and other officers, who then passed the essence on to their men. Many of the soldiers were moved by their commander’s evident shame about his bad decisions. Antony remained popular.19

  RETREAT

  Withdrawing in the face of the enemy is one of the more difficult manoeuvres for any army. When that enemy is far more mobile, the risk of serious loss, even disaster, becomes all the greater. Antony decided not to use the same route taken during the advance. A Mardian, who had managed to survive the massacre of the heavy train, advised him that the country was too open. It would be better to stick closer to the hill country, passing villages and fields not already stripped bare. The man had already given proof of loyalty and now willingly submitted to riding in chains and under escort as he guided the column.

  The Mardian may have been right to say that King Phraates had no intention of giving the Romans safe passage, or perhaps Antony’s change of route made him suspect treachery. On the third day’s march there were signs that the enemy had deliberately broken a dam and flooded one section of road. Antony re-formed the army into an agmen quadratum – a rectangular formation where the remaining baggage was kept in the middle and surrounded on all sides by formed troops ready to deploy into battle order. They were in the process of doing this when the first Parthian patrols appeared.

  The enemy cavalry were soon streaming into the attack, trying to overwhelm the Romans before they could complete the new deployment. Antony’s light infantry engaged them, but were eventually forced to withdraw behind the shelter of his legionaries. Finally, a formed charge by Gallic auxiliary cavalry drove off the main body of Parthians. There were no more attacks for the remainder of the day. Overnight, Antony and his officers made sure that the whole army was familiar with its places in the new formation. Strict orders were given for any cavalry counter-attack to be limited, so that no unit could be lured away from the main army and isolated –the fate of Crassus’son Publius and his Gallic horsemen at Carrhae.20

  For four days the Romans kept to the plan. Progress was slow, for the formation was cumbersome, but although there was a steady trickle of casualties, they were able to inflict similar losses on the enemy. Horse archers relied on speed to make themselves less of a target and that reduced the effective range of their bows if they wanted to hit an enemy formation, let alone an individual. Archers and slingers on foot had a longer effective range than bowmen on horseback. Sling bullets had the added advantage that they were difficult to see in flight and could cause concussion if they struck a helmet, making even armour no certain protection.21

  There was frustration at the slow pace and passive defence, prompting an officer named Flavius Gallus to ask permission to form a special force of skirmishers and cavalry. Antony was persuaded by the promise that he would hurt the enemy more seriously. On the next day Gallus achieved a local success at the rear of the column, but then followed up until he was too far away from the nearest legionaries to gain any support. As his men and horses grew tired, the Parthians closed around him, but Gallus remained confident or simply stubborn and refused the order to withdraw. Reinforcements were sent up in dribs and drabs by Canidius Crassus, not enough to make any real difference and so just adding to the scale of the potential disaster. Eventually, a counter-attack by the Third Legion and the arrival of Antony himself leading troops from the advance guard,
drove the enemy back and allowed the detachment to return to the safety of the army. Gallus had four arrows in his body and would die in the coming days.

  Arrows were more likely to wound than to kill outright, and the action had substantially added to the number of wounded men in the army. Plutarch says 5,000 wounded were rescued and 3,000 men killed. Antony visited the injured, tearfully taking their hands, as soldiers asked him not to worry and assured him that things would work out as long as he was in charge. Dramatic displays of emotion were quite acceptable in Roman society and he had been with the army long enough to win their affection and trust. When he made a formal speech to the troops on the next day, the response was enthusiastic, with some of the troops who had been beaten ‘begging him’ to decimate them. Dio claims that many men were ready to desert and only held back because they had seen the Parthians shoot down anyone who tried to surrender. Phraates’ men did not have enough food to take too many prisoners, so there may have been a practical reason for this as well as the desire to spread terror.22

  The Parthians were even more encouraged by their success and their army had grown as Phraates sent the royal troops to join the next attacks. Plutarch says there were 40,000 men in the enemy camp, but it seems unlikely that the Romans had an accurate count either at the time or later. With their mobility, and the need of the Romans to stay in formation, the Parthians could always be sure of a local superiority in numbers whenever they attacked. They were surprised to see the column once again marching in good order. Even so they quickly began to launch probing attacks, which grew larger and more frequent as the day progressed. At one point, the horse archers drew so close to some legionaries that the latter formed the famous testudo – front rank kneeling behind their shields and those in the rear holding their overlapping shields over their heads. The movement in the ranks as they took up the formation was seen as a sign of disorder and imminent flight. The enthusiastic horse archers charged home, for fleeing infantry were at the mercy of men on horseback. They were surprised when the legionaries proved steady and eager to fight at close quarters. More than usual were caught and killed when the horse archers turned to flee.23

  For a while the enemy was deterred, but the food situation was becoming desperate. Many pack and draught animals had died or were now being used to transport the substantial numbers of wounded. This was good for morale, but the health of the remaining soldiers was also suffering. Small quantities of wheat changed hands at an exorbitant rate. The soldier’s ration was normally issued unprepared, but there were now very few handmills left to grind the grain into flour. Men scrabbled desperately to find edible herbs and vegetables, and some fell ill and died as a result of these experiments. Men continued to perish even though the Parthian attacks had slackened a little.24

  King Phraates again showed himself willing to negotiate and tried to persuade the Romans to turn onto an easier, lowland route, promising that they would be merely observed by the locals and not attacked. Antony received a message from Monaeses claiming that this was a trap. Apart from gratitude for Antony’s past generosity, the former exile may not have been keen on the king winning such an overwhelming victory and so cementing his hold on power. The Mardian guide echoed these suspicions, and Velleius tells a story of one of Crassus’ legionaries who was still in captivity, but somehow managed to slip across to the Roman outposts and warn them of the treachery. Antony ordered the army to move out under cover of darkness, in the hope of gaining some breathing space from the pursuit, and stuck to the more difficult route. The soldiers were ordered to carry water, so that there would be no need to halt and distribute this. The principle was sound, but by this time many had no vessel suitable for carrying.25

  The Romans marched a thirsty 30 miles, but were caught by the Parthians before the day was too far advanced. Some were so desperate that in spite of warnings they drank from a polluted stream and were prostrated by stomach cramps as Antony rode amongst them, begging them to keep going until the next river. That night, discipline broke down altogether. What was left of the baggage train – and some officers seem to have still possessed substantial personal equipment and luxuries – was plundered and men murdered for their money. Dellius, the probable source for the surviving accounts, was with the army and said that at this time Antony even warned one of his bodyguards that he might need help to commit suicide.26

  Order was eventually restored at daylight. They moved on and again fought off a series of Parthian attacks. It was the last day of fighting, as the pursuit was then abandoned. In a few days’ time Antony’s men reached the River Artaxes, the border with Armenia, twenty-seven days after they had left Phraata. Plutarch says that when Antony paraded his army he found that he had lost 20,000 infantry and 4,000 cavalry, which does not seem to include the legions wiped out with the heavy baggage train. Armenia was an ally, but for the moment the lacklustre performance of its king was overlooked.

  The army’s ordeal was not yet over. It was now late autumn and there was not enough food available to permit the soldiers to spend the winter until they had marched a considerable distance into Armenia. They had to keep moving, marching through the mountainous country in the teeth of snowstorms. Plutarch says another 8,000 men died of exhaustion, disease and exposure. As ever with numbers in our ancient sources, some caution is required. Velleius says that a quarter of his legionaries perished in the expedition and a third of the camp followers, along with virtually all the baggage. A loss of between one-quarter and one-third of Antony’s entire army seems plausible, and fewer than half of these had fallen to enemy action. The bulk of the survivors can only have been exhausted and many probably in poor health. On top of the human casualties were the animals, lost with the heavy train or on the long march home. Horses, mules and oxen will tend to break down before men, or may simply be eaten when food supplies run out. Finally, there were the lost wagons and specialised equipment from the siege train. For the moment, Antony’s army was crippled, incapable of launching another major operation and needing time to recover.27

  Damage to his prestige would be even harder to repair. The Parthian War was supposed to bring him glory and wealth. Unlike Crassus, Antony had survived and brought away more than half of his army. Yet the Romans expected victory, not simply survival or feats of endurance. There was plenty of scope for criticising Antony’s generalship. The initial plan seems to have been unclear about the objectives and how to achieve them. At best, it was probably too ambitious given the time scale, while the decision to let the siege train and heavy baggage follow on behind was predictably disastrous. Mistakes could be forgiven and excused if the outcome of the war was successful. Good Roman generals paraded their luck, since in the end it was winning that counted.

  Antony had not won and clearly failed in all of his objectives. No territory had been taken and not only had no eagles or captives been recovered, but the Parthians had also gained fresh trophies of victory. He stayed with his army until the troops were safely back in billets in Syria. His personal courage had been exemplary throughout the campaign and he had shared the danger and the hardship with his men. Antony was still popular, but then so was Lord Raglan in the British Army he led so badly in the Crimea. A general needs to be far more than just physically brave to do his job well. Antony had failed in the one field of endeavour most central to the identity of a Roman aristocrat.28

  His men safe, Antony hurried to the coast of Syria and sent for Cleopatra.

  [XXV]

  QUEEN OF KINGS

  Antony chose an obscure location for his rendezvous with Cleopatra. Leuce Come – literally, ‘the white port’ – lay between Berytus (modern-day Beirut) and the old Phoenician city of Sidon. Both of the latter were substantial cities, but instead of going to them he waited in what was little more than a village. Perhaps he was afraid that the Parthians would take advantage of his retreat to counterattack into Syria and so felt the major cities were more attractive targets to the enemy. Yet it was probably December 36 BC or Janu
ary 35 BC by the time he reached the coast and at such a season a major raid was unlikely. Apart from that, the walls of somewhere like Tyre were far more likely to offer safety than a small place like Leuce Come.

  More probably he chose such a minor port because this was not to be a great occasion of ceremony and pomp, but a private reunion –or at least as private as was possible when a Roman triumvir met such an important client monarch. He instructed her to bring money and supplies for his troops, so that there was an element of business, but if that had been the main issue there was no need for him to summon the queen in person. That need was personal.

  Antony was mentally and physically exhausted. In less than a year he had travelled well over 2,000 miles, prosecuted a siege and fought a succession of skirmishes and other engagements. During the retreat, he had driven himself hard to keep his army going and had at least once seriously contemplated suicide. As commander, he had made the key decisions and was responsible for their disastrous consequences. He had failed, and this failure would overshadow the rest of his life.

  Cleopatra offered a chance to forget this for a while. Antony could rely on her to be lively, entertaining and uncritical company. She would listen when he wanted to talk and her comments would be plausibly encouraging. They could feast and celebrate, continuing to live ‘inimitable’ lives, as well as making love. The queen was a mistress who needed to keep his backing. It is also hard to believe that there was not at least a degree of genuine love on both sides. Most important of all, Cleopatra was not Roman. With her, Antony could pretend to be a Hellenistic ruler, or Hercules or Dionysus if he preferred. He did not have to be the Roman noble who had fallen short of the military prowess so important to his class.