And then, since he had not anticipated anything, Sabinus panicked, and rushed here and there deploying the cohorts, but even this he did timidly and in confusion - as is usually the case when a man is forced to decide everything in the heat of the action. In contrast Cotta, who had guessed that this might happen on the march and because of this had spoken against setting out, did everything to ensure the safety of the force - and in challenging and inspiring the legionaries he did the duty of a general, while in the fighting he played the part of a soldier.' - Caesar'
While Caesar was in Britain in August 54 BC, his daughter Julia died in childbirth. The infant - a girl in some accounts and a boy in others - survived her by just a few days. For the Roman aristocracy, as indeed for most of humanity until the modern age, such deaths were all too common. Julia had become pregnant at least once before during her marriage, but had miscarried, shocked, it was said, by the sight of her husband coming back from the elections spattered in blood - someone else's blood as it turned out. Since we do not know her date of birth we cannot calculate Julia's age when she died, but at most she was in her mid twenties. Caesar's mother Aurelia also died in 54 BC. The cause is unknown, but she was by this time in her sixties, and had been a widow for three decades. In one year Caesar lost the two members of his family who were closest to him. It was his mother to whom he had declared that he would come home as Pontifex Maximus or not at all, and who had presided over the Bona Dea celebrations in his house. She was a formidable woman who had had a great influence on her only son, and had lived long enough to see some of his great successes. Now she was gone. The news of both deaths reached Caesar by letter. There is no evidence that he had seen either his mother or daughter in the four years since he had left Rome. These were bitter personal blows, most especially the loss of his child. Cicero wrote an earnest letter of condolence to Caesar - he was devoted, perhaps excessively so, to his own daughter Tullia and heartbroken when she also died some years later. There was genuine grief and emotion and not mere political bonding on such occasions. Pompey, too, was deeply sorrowful at the death of his young wife. The couple had been very much in love in spite of the great difference in age and the political inspiration of their union. In recent years Pompey had often been criticised for spending too much time with his wife on his grand estates, enjoying himself when he ought to have been attending to the Republic's affairs. Plutarch claims that he had not even had any affairs while married to Julia.'
For all the real emotion of father and son-in-law at Julia's death, the concerns of public life were never far away for a senator. Pompey arranged to have her ashes interred in a tomb on one of his Alban estates near Rome, but after her public funeral in the city the great crowd of onlookers carried her remains onto the Campus Martins and buried her there. They were said to have been moved more by sympathy for Julia than particular fondness for either Caesar or Pompey, but as ever it is difficult to know whether this was genuinely spontaneous or orchestrated. A monument was subsequently erected and remained visible for centuries. Caesar announced that he would stage funeral games for her, although it would be a decade before these actually took place. Julia's death removed the closest bond between Pompey and Caesar. Over subsequent months Caesar searched around for another female relative to renew the marriage alliance. He proposed that Pompey should marry his great niece Octavia, while he should in turn marry Pompey's daughter Pompeia. This would have required Caesar, Octavia and Pompeia all to divorce their current spouses - Pompey's daughter was married to Sulla's son Faustus. Pompey turned the idea down, and showed no inclination to marry again for some time, perhaps because he wished to wait for a more advantageous situation. Political concerns were never wholly absent from the mind of a Roman senator, but it is quite possible that emotion also played a part in his decision. His love for Julia had been deep, and Pompey's grief was real and powerful.
Although the bond between Pompey and Caesar was weakened it was certainly not broken, and both men for the moment realised that it was to their advantage to remain in alliance. By 54 Bc all three triumvirs were proconsuls and so unable to enter Rome itself without laying down their office. During their consulship in 55 BC Pompey and Crassus had arranged for the tribune Trebonius to pass a bill granting them each a five-year command in enlarged provinces much like the one Caesar had received in 59 BC. Pompey was given charge of the two Spanish provinces. There was the prospect for a campaign there, taking Roman rule right up to the north and the Atlantic coasts, but the fifty-one-year-old Pompey had no desire for a return to campaigning, especially while Julia was alive. He had already triumphed three times and believed that no other commander could hope to match his glory. Therefore he sent legates to govern the provinces and lead the legions there, while he himself remained in Italy, usually hovering just outside Rome in one of his comfortable villas. Pompey was still in charge of the grain supply, and this provided an excuse for his unorthodox conduct, for no Roman governor had ever acted in this way before.'
Crassus was in a different position. He had fought well for Sulla, but believed that he had not received full credit for his deeds. The defeat of Spartacus had been a major operation, during which he had shown his competence as a commander after a string of humiliating Roman defeats. Yet once it was over it was all too easy to forget the danger and dismiss the campaign as just fought against slaves. By 55 BC Crassus had decided that he wanted a major command in a foreign war and was allocated Syria. The current governor of that province completed a campaign in Egypt before Crassus could replace him, robbing him of one obvious chance for glory and profit. Instead he planned to conquer Parthia, the great kingdom lying beyond Armenia. Even by Roman standards, there was no good pretext for attacking the Parthians. Pompey in his eastern campaigns and Caesar in Gaul had pushed to the very limit their interpretation of what was in Rome's interests, but they had never quite gone beyond that to fight wars from purely personal motives. With Crassus it was blatantly obvious that his own ambition had little to do with the needs of the Republic. As word spread of his plans there were public protests from two of the tribunes. One went so far as to shadow Crassus' entourage as he left the city in November 55 BC, calling down terrible curses on his name for involving the Republic in a needless and unjust war. As Cicero dryly remarked, it was not an impressive beginning, and there was much that was incongruous about the expedition.
Crassus was in his late fifties, which was very elderly for a Roman field commander, and had not been on active service for sixteen years. In the past elderly men had been recalled to serve the Republic as generals, but normally only at times of crisis. This time there was no dire threat to Rome, and Crassus' conduct of the war seemed slow and uninspired. He spent most of 54 BC in Syria, levying taxes ostensibly to fund the planned invasion, but malicious tongues suggested that he was also lining his own pockets. The prospect of a lucrative campaign was clearly one of the main reasons why Crassus had wanted a command. There was also an element of balance, since if both Pompey and Caesar had provinces and legions to control then the third triumvir needed a command to match them if he was not to be placed at a severe disadvantage. Yet in most respects Crassus had already achieved his main objectives in life - prominence, two consulships, a huge fortune, massive influence and, as the Catilinarian debates had shown, virtual freedom from political attacks or prosecution - and it is hard to avoid the conclusion that rivalry with his political allies was his main reason for craving a military command. He and Pompey had been jealous of each other since they had both served Sulla, and Crassus had always resented the fame the other man had won. Now Caesar too was proving himself to be a great general, and Crassus, the oldest of the three triumvirs, does not seem to have wanted to be overshadowed.4
With all three triumvirs away from Rome from 54 BC onwards, they were all reliant to a great extent on agents acting on their behalf. They remained dominant, but as in the past could not control everything. Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus made it to the consulship for 54 BC, and
had Clodius' eldest brother Appius Claudius Pulcher as his colleague. At the same time Cato was one of the praetors. Both consuls complained that they were unable to make appointments even to such junior ranks as that of military tribune. Between them the triumvirs commanded over twenty legions, the overwhelming majority of the Roman army in existence at that time. Appius even travelled north to visit Caesar in Cisalpine Gaul in order to secure a tribune's commission for one of his clients. Pompey hovered close to Rome, and probably had little cause to miss regularly attending the Senate for he had never been a particularly gifted speaker. Crassus was less of a force when he was away from the city, since he was no longer able to keep himself in the public eye and do favours by appearing as an advocate. Caesar was already used to the problems of maintaining his interests in Rome while he was away from Italy. His agents, particularly Balbus, were active, and we get some glimpse of the flood of correspondence that went back and forth between Caesar's headquarters and the leading men of Rome from Cicero's letters. His brother Quintus had served as one of Pompey's legates supervising the grain supply to Rome, and then went to Gaul as one of Caesar's legates in 54 BC. This was a mark of the goodwill that his brother owed to both men for his recall. Cicero himself was reluctant to leave Rome, and was anyway more useful to the triumvirs there, and so Quintus was obliged to undertake this service for the good of the family. In his letters to his brother Cicero makes constant inquiries about Caesar's mood, and signs of favour towards them. He mentions sending poetry and other literary compositions to Caesar for his opinion. Much of this communication was not overtly political, but informally cemented the bonds between them. We know that Caesar wrote at least three letters to Cicero in Rome during the course of the second expedition to Britain.'
Several letters have also survived written by Cicero to one of his clients, Caius Trebatius Testa, who had been given a post on Caesar's staff at the orator's request. The young man would later become a famous jurist and was already committed to pursuing a career in law. We have the original letter of recommendation sent to Caesar, which brought the appointment about. The orator later told Quintus how Caesar `expressed his thanks to me very politely and wittily. He says that in all his huge staff there was no one able to put together properly even a form of recognizance'. Trebatius was not given a military post - although Cicero did secure a commission as military tribune for another client - and was employed on administrative and legal duties. Even so, Trebatius was for a long time unenthusiastic about his new post and missed Rome intensely. By August 54 BC Cicero was writing to tell him that he had just heard from Caesar, who had written to him `very politely' to say that he had not yet had much chance to get to know Trebatius, but assuring him that he would do so. Cicero informed his young client that he had spoken to the proconsul on his behalf asking for further favours. In this and other letters he expresses more than a little exasperation at the impatience and lack of initiative he perceived in his client. A man's own prestige was weakened if his recommendations proved inadequate, and although Caesar was probably willing to accept anyone so long as it strengthened the obligation that Cicero felt towards him, the orator was keen to play his part in the relationship. What is most striking is that both men were in contact and discussing the normal preoccupations of Roman senators even while Caesar was engaged in active campaigning. Most of the letters between Cicero and Caesar have failed to survive even though they were published. We can safely assume that Caesar was engaged in equally copious correspondence with many other senators.6
REBELLION
Although Caesar never neglected his political concerns, in the coming months he was to have little break from active service. On his return from Britain he had called the leaders of the Gaulish tribes to a meeting and then supervised the movement of his army into winter quarters. The harvest had been poor, and Caesar blamed this on an unusually dry summer, but it seems likely that the campaigns he had fought in the last years had also disrupted the agriculture of many regions. As a result his eight legions would camp separately and were dispersed over a very wide area. Most were amongst the Belgic tribes whose commitment to the new alliances with Rome remained uncertain. In other years he had set out for Cisalpine Gaul very quickly, but this time Caesar waited longer than usual, wanting to make sure that the army was securely placed before he left. Each legion was placed under the command of either a legate or his quaestor, who in this year was Crassus' eldest son Marcus. One of the new legates was the same Trebonius who as tribune in 55 Bc had secured five-year commands for Pompey and Crassus and a similar extension for Caesar (see p.263). Each of these officers was instructed to send a report as soon as they were in position and their camp suitably fortifed. We know that Quintus Cicero was allowed to choose the exact location of his legion's camp, and it may well be that other legates were given similar freedom of action. While this was underway, Caesar became aware of unrest in a number of tribes. The king he had imposed on the Carnutes was killed by other chieftains, prompting him to change his dispositions and move one legion from amongst the Belgae to winter amongst this tribe.7
Some chieftains had benefited from Caesar's arrival in Gaul, but for others it had meant seeing their rivals elevated. The summary killing of Dumnorix when he became inconvenient had shown such men that Caesar needed little provocation to dispose of anyone who did not behave as he wished. Yet Roman domination did not end the fierce competition for power between the aristocrats of a tribe, and if they were not doing well under Caesar, then successfully opposing him offered a path to fame and power. Before leaving for Britain in the summer of 54 BC, the proconsul had intervened in a dispute between rival leaders of the Treveri. The man who lost out to an opponent with Roman backing was Indutiomarus. At the time he had made his peace with Caesar, going to his camp and handing over 200 hostages. During the winter he saw an opportunity to strike at the Romans while their army was dispersed and vulnerable. Indutiomarus planned to raise all the Treveri who were loyal to him and attack the legion commanded by Labienus, which was camped on tribal lands. Yet he knew that the Treveri on their own could not defeat Caesar, and had spent time encouraging chieftains of neighbouring tribes who similarly resented Roman dominance to join him in the rebellion. This was not a well co-ordinated revolt directed by a single leader, but a series of separate outbreaks occurring at roughly the same time and feeding off each other by dividing the Roman forces. It began not with the Treveri and Indutiomarus, but amongst the Eburones, who lived in what is now the Ardennes. The tribe appointed two war-leaders, Ambiorix and Catuvolcus, who then proceeded to inflict on Caesar's army one of the only three serious defeats it ever suffered.'
Fifteen cohorts were quartered amongst the Eburones at a place called Atuatuca (perhaps somewhere near modern Liege or Tongres, but its precise location is unknown). The force included the entire Fourteenth Legion, but it is not clear whether the remaining five cohorts were detached from other legions or independent units - Caesar was to raise at least twenty cohorts in Transalpine Gaul, where the recruits did not even have Latin status like those from the Transalpine province. Caesar mentions that some Spanish cavalry were with the legionaries, and there may have been other auxiliaries as well, so that the force probably numbered between 6,000 to 8,000 men. It was commanded by two of Caesar's legates, Cotta and Sabinus, both of whom had held independent commands in the past and proved reasonably competent, if uninspired. They had also worked together against the Menapii in 55 BC. Caesar does not say whether one of the men held overall authority, but his narrative implies that they were jointly in command. The first attack on their camp was repulsed without difficulty, but then Ambiorix came forward to parley and claimed to have been forced to go to war by his people. He told the Roman representatives that there was a conspiracy throughout Gaul for each tribe to attack the legions on this set day. In honour of favours he had received from Caesar in the past, he then offered to give the Romans free passage to march and join either of the other two legions that were camped withi
n 50 miles. Late into the night, the legates argued over what they should do. Sabinus wanted to accept the offer, while Cotta said that they should not disobey Caesar's orders but remain in the camp, where they had plenty of food and could reasonably hope to hold out until relieved. In the end Sabinus prevailed, and at dawn on the next day the Roman force marched out. The Eburones knew the ground and were waiting in ambush where the track passed through a ravine. The Romans were surrounded and gradually whittled down. Cotta was wounded by a slingstone early on, but still kept on encouraging the men and trying to organise resistance. Sabinus despaired and was surrounded and killed while negotiating with Ambiorix. Cotta fell when the final charge swept over the rough circle of men he had formed into the last organised resistance. A handful of survivors straggled into the camp of Labienus over the coming days, but the fifteen cohorts had effectively been wiped out.'
In the Commentaries Caesar places all the blame for the disaster on Sabinus. Cotta is shown arguing sensibly and behaving as a Roman aristocrat should during a crisis. Neither man came from an especially influential family and therefore Caesar did not have to worry too much about upsetting powerful interests in the Senate. He claims to have reconstructed events from the stories of survivors and interrogation of prisoners captured in later actions. There is nothing inherently implausible about the version given in the Commentaries, which has similarities with other military disasters in other periods - Elphinstone and Macnaughten at Kabul during the First Afghan War spring to mind. It may genuinely have happened that way, but the narrative was obviously intended to soften the impact of the disaster and distance Caesar himself from blame. The account is very detailed, describing the debate between the commanders, and the confusion in the column when the ambush was sprung. Apart from Cotta's stirring but futile efforts to hold the men together, there are heroic cameos, such as the centurion who died trying to rescue his son, or the eagle-bearer - this time named, unlike the hero of the landing in Britain - who threw his standard to safety before he was killed himself. (The eagle was presumably captured anyway when the last survivors who had taken refuge inside the camp all committed suicide during the night.) Caesar tried to shift the blame onto his legate, but few if any of his contemporaries were fooled and all our sources see this as his defeat. As the proconsul with imperium, he was responsible for the entire army under his command - hence the conventional opening for any letter from a Roman governor to the Senate, `I am well, and so is the army.' Both Sabinus and Cotta were his legates or `representatives', chosen by him and acting under his orders. If they held joint command then it was Caesar's fault for permitting such an untidy situation to exist. Napoleon was later to comment that it was better to have one bad commander than two good ones with shared authority. Sabinus may have been disobeying Caesar's orders when he chose to march out of his camp, but even this suggests that the proconsul had either not made his intentions sufficiently clear or had failed to accustom his legates to strict obedience. Ultimately Caesar was responsible, and even if the mistakes had been made by his subordinates, the defeat was still his. A substantial part of his army had been destroyed by one of the least prestigious tribes of Gaul. It was the first time that such a thing had happened, and it challenged the illusion of Roman invincibility created by his constant success up to this point.10
Caesar: Life of a Colossus Page 40