Legions of Rome

by Stephen Dando-Collins

  With the Roman military still confined to their outposts by the unadventurous governor, Tacfarinas continued his raiding. He had learned his lesson after being repulsed at Thala. Now, if a legionary cohort gave chase, Tacfarinas sped away without giving battle. Then, when the exhausted legionaries turned around and marched back to their camps, the Numidians hung on their tail and stung their rearguard. This was all most humiliating for the Roman troops, with two legions now being made to look foolish by the rebels. Tacfarinas, said Velleius Paterculus, one of Tiberius’ officers, meanwhile “caused great consternation and grew more formidable every day.” [Velle., II, CXXIX, 3]

  Filled with confidence by the success of his tactics and the failure of the fort-bound Romans to trouble him, Tacfarinas, weighed down with booty, advanced toward the Mediterranean coast and set up a fortified camp where his men could enjoy a little rest and recreation. When the governor learned of this, he put together a mobile expeditionary force under the command of his son Caesianus Apronius, then a young prefect with an auxiliary command in the province. This appointment was not unusual. Just as Junius Blaesus, the governor of the 9th Hispana’s last province, had his son on his staff, and the disgraced propraetor Piso of Syria, the 9th’s companion on the march to Rome the previous winter, had his son Marcus on his staff in the East, governors frequently took along their sons to share their provincial postings when the youths were tribunes and prefects learning their military craft.

  With a force of auxiliary cavalry and light infantry, plus 1,000 or so of the younger, fitter legionaries of the 9th Hispana’s cohorts, Caesianus Apronius the prefect quickly advanced on Tacfarinas’ camp. Young Apronius forced the Numidians to abandon their position, and drove them south, into the desert. For this apparent success, Tiberius awarded the governor Triumphal Decorations. But again, the celebrations were premature.

  Most provinces garrisoned by the legions were imperial provinces, with their governors appointed by the emperor. At this time, the governors of the province of Africa were appointed on the vote of the Senate. In fact, Africa was one of the few senatorial provinces where the governor controlled legionary forces. Their commands only covered auxiliary troops as a rule. Being a senatorial province, Africa’s governors could only hold their appointment for one year. Together with the governorships of Asia and Syria, Africa was the most highly paid of all the gubernatorial offices, and was always considered a prestigious step for ambitious Romans. Several later emperors would serve there in the early stages of their careers.

  By the spring of AD 21 the year-long tour of duty of Lucius Apronius came to an end, and he and his son returned to Rome. But news of an outbreak of further trouble led by Tacfarinas in Africa caused the Senate to ask the emperor to appoint the next governor personally. Apronius’ replacement was a familiar face to old hands of the 9th Hispana Legion—Junius Blaesus, who had governed Pannonia, the 9th Hispana’s home province, at the time of the AD 14 mutinies. Blaesus was considered “an experienced soldier of vigorous constitution who would be equal to the war.” [Tac., A, III, 32] He was also the uncle of Sejanus, Tiberius’ powerful prefect of the Praetorian Guard.

  Not long after Blaesus arrived at Carthage, Tacfarinas cheekily sent envoys to the emperor at Rome, demanding a settlement involving land and money for his men and himself in return for peace. If his demands were not met, his envoys told Tiberius, then Tacfarinas would wage interminable war on the Roman forces so that the provinces of North Africa would never know peace. “Never, it was said, was the emperor so exasperated by an insult to himself and the Roman people as by a deserter and brigand assuming the character of a belligerent.” Even Spartacus, Tiberius said, when ravaging Italy with his slave army ninety-five years before, had never been offered an amnesty by Rome, so a bandit such as Tacfarinas stood no chance of having his demands met. Tiberius instructed Blaesus to offer full pardons to followers of Tacfarinas who laid down their arms, but he was to pursue Tacfarinas himself with all the resources at his disposal. [Ibid., 73]

  A number of Numidians did take advantage of the amnesty. But deep in the North African interior, sheltered by the Garamantes tribe, Tacfarinas was able to recruit new followers with promises of booty. Throughout the summer of AD 21, Tacfarinas emerged from hiding and employed his tested guerrilla tactics to great success, preying in particular on the peaceful Leptitani tribe. Dividing his forces into a number of detachments, he would strike at several places at once, then dash away. He would elude pursuit, and then ambush Roman troops sent out after him. The hit-and-run tactics suited the temperament and skills of his nomadic followers, and left the Romans in their static formations at a disadvantage.

  Blaesus, a no-nonsense man, decided that enough was enough. With just one year in which to show what he could do, he mounted a major operation to track down and eliminate Tacfarinas. Three columns were put together, comprising the 3rd Augusta Legion, 9th Hispana Legion and auxiliary units. Up to this point, both the 3rd Augusta and 9th Hispana had been commanded by their senior tribunes, but for this latest campaign Cornelius Lentulus Scipio, an able legate of senatorial rank, was sent to Africa to take over the command of the 9th Hispana Legion. He would subsequently become one of the emperor Claudius’ most trusted military advisers. Under the newly arrived general, the 9th Hispana formed one of Blaesus’ three divisions. Another force, made up of the auxiliaries, was headed by Governor Blaesus’ son, a prefect. Blaesus himself would command the third column, comprising the 3rd Augusta Legion.

  Each column had a specific task. Lentulus Scipio and the 9th Hispana took the left flank, pushing southeast to end enemy attacks on the Leptitani tribe, which remained loyal to Rome. The 9th Hispana was then to sweep around and cut off Tacfarinas’ retreat into friendly Garamantian territory. Prefect Blaesus led the column which took the right flank of the offensive, driving west to protect villages around Cirta (modern Constantine), capital of Numidia, and preventing Tacfarinas’ escape to the west. At the same time, Governor Blaesus would be slicing down through the middle of the province with the 3rd Augusta.

  With machine-like efficiency, all three forces achieved their objectives then linked up deep inside southern Tunisia. There, Blaesus set up a series of forts, walls and trench lines at prime locations. From these he sent out small detachments under first-rank centurions on search-and-destroy missions. From now on, no matter which direction Tacfarinas’ men turned, they found Roman troops in front of them, on their flanks, suddenly appearing behind them. It was an uncomfortable time for the rebels.

  No doubt Tacfarinas told his followers to hold on until the Romans withdrew for the winter, as they always did. But as the autumn arrived, Blaesus defied tradition. His troops stayed in the field, and from his forts he sent out lightly equipped flying columns with local guides who knew the desert. Tacfarinas’ rebels were forced to scatter across the sandy wastes. As for Tacfarinas himself, he was chased through the wilderness from one group of miserable huts to another. The Roman detachments came back with a number of prisoners, including the brother of Tacfarinas. But Tacfarinas himself again eluded capture.

  This success was good enough for Blaesus. In early AD 22, with his term as governor due to end in the spring, he withdrew to Carthage and prepared to hand over to his successor. It was also good enough for the emperor; in addition to the now customary and almost annual award of Triumphal Decorations to the governor of Africa, Tiberius accorded Blaesus the added distinction of being hailed imperator for his “victory.” Now, as the historian Tacitus was to note, there were statues of three ex-governors of Africa standing in Rome bearing the laurel wreath of the Triumphal Decorations for conquering Tacfarinas. Yet Tacfarinas was still at large. [Tac., A, IV, 23]

  With the award of the exalted title of imperator to Blaesus, Tiberius backed himself into a corner. Questions were asked in the Senate. Why, if Tacfarinas had been dealt with, was the 9th Hispana Legion still in Africa? The emperor had no real answer to this. So, shortly after the newly appointed proconsul of Afri
ca, Publius Dolabella, arrived at Carthage to take up his post, he received a dispatch from the emperor instructing him to send the 9th Hispana back to its “home” station in Pannonia. Governor Dolabella, said Tacitus, did not dare to retain the legion, “because he feared the emperor’s orders more than the risks of war.” [Ibid.]

  Dolabella knew that Tacfarinas was far from subdued. He would have desperately wanted to retain the 9th Hispana for continued operations against the Numidians, doubting his ability to contain Tacfarinas with a reduced army. Just the same, orders went out to the 9th Hispana to prepare to return to the Balkans. In AD 23, as soon as the spring arrived, the 9th Hispana was shipped back across the Mediterranean to Sicily. The men of the legion then retraced their steps of three and a half years before, to their former Pannonian base.

  Tacfarinas would not have been able to believe his luck. When he heard of the withdrawal of the 9th Hispana, he spread a rumor around the region that the forces of Rome were in trouble throughout the empire and it would only be a matter of time before they pulled out of North Africa altogether. With this apparent success the bandit genuinely took on the aura of a freedom fighter. More tribesmen flocked to his banner, inspired by the fact that he had already sent one legion back where it came from, and with the hope of throwing Rome out of their homeland.

  With his new army, Tacfarinas boldly besieged the town of Thubuscum, but, as before, his followers had no taste for long sieges. Governor Dolabella marched to the rescue of the troops at Thubuscum, and as his column approached, the rebels withdrew. Dolabella, pulling in every Roman legionary, auxiliary, ally and mercenary he could muster, then followed the lead of Blaesus the previous summer and divided his force. He created four columns, commanded by “his deputies and tribunes,” and went looking for the enemy, with “Dolabella in person directing every operation.” He even sent hand-picked Moorish cavalry marauding parties to cause problems for the rebels in their rear. [Ibid., 24]

  Perhaps through an informant, the retreating Numidians were tracked to the partly destroyed fortress of Auzea. Tacfarinas’ men did not build marching camps for the night as the legions did. There at Auzea, with the Africans mostly sleeping in the open, as was their custom, they were surprised in a dawn attack by Dolabella’s troops. “With the sound of trumpets and fierce shouts” the Romans surged into the undefended camp in “close array.” They cut down Numidians and Moors in their thousands as they ran for their weapons and for the horses they had allowed to roam and graze. The rebels, “without arms, order or plan, were seized, slaughtered or captured like cattle.” [Ibid., 25]

  “The word went through the units that all were to aim at securing Tacfarinas,” and in the early morning light Tacfarinas was located and surrounded. His son was captured, his bodyguards slain around him. Tacfarinas knew how badly the Romans wanted to take him alive, to drag him through the streets of Rome in a Triumph. But he would not give them that pleasure. Determined to avoid the humiliation of capture, he raised his sword and ran at the Roman troops encircling him. He was felled by a swarm of flying javelins before he could reach his attackers. [Ibid.]

  Tacfarinas’ revolt died with him. Africa was once more at peace, and the 3rd Augusta Legion was able to stand down from the condition of high alert that it had been in for almost a decade. Governor Dolabella, the man who had succeeded in terminating Tacfarinas and his seven-year uprising, applied to the emperor for the award of Triumphal Decorations, the same honor accorded the three previous governors, none of whom had actually succeeded putting an end to the revolt. Tiberius declined to award Dolabella the Triumphal Decorations his deed deserved. This was because, said Tacitus, the emperor was influenced by his Praetorian prefect Sejanus, who did not want the so-called glory of his uncle Blaesus diminished by Dolabella receiving an award for completing Blaesus’ unfinished work, and with a smaller army at that. [Ibid., 26]

  The fact that Dolabella failed to receive the award actually increased his fame, said Tacitus, for it was he who brought Tacfarinas’ son and surviving lieutenants back to Rome as prisoners and received the plaudits of the people. As for Blaesus, both he and Sejanus would perish within several years after the Praetorian prefect was convicted of plotting to overthrow the emperor. [Ibid.]

  AD 42

  XVI. SCRIBONIANUS’ REVOLT

  The Claudian legions make their names

  Ever since the Praetorian Guard and German Guard had proclaimed Claudius Caesar, the crippled uncle of Caligula, emperor of Rome in January AD 41, there had been an undercurrent of unrest among leading senators who felt they were better qualified to occupy the throne. One of those men, Annius Vinicianus, had actually been proposed as a potential emperor by fellow senators, following the assassination of Caligula. Claudius had not been in power a year before Vinicianus and a number of his friends formed a plot to overthrow the timid, scholarly emperor whose only claim to the throne, to their mind, was his blood as a member of the Julio-Claudian line.

  As Vinicianus had no troops of his own, and with the men of the various Guard units in Rome expected to protect Claudius, the plotters made contact with the governor of the province of Dalmatia, just across the Adriatic Sea from Italy, who they were sure would be in sympathy with them. According to Cassius Dio, that governor, Marcus Furius Camillus Scribonianus, already had his own plans for a revolt, because he too had been spoken of as a potential emperor. [Dio, LX, 15]

  A descendant of Pompey the Great, Scribonianus (also variously referred to as both Furius and Camillus by Roman historians) had two legions under his command in Dalmatia. The 7th Legion was based at Tilurium, near modern-day Split in Croatia, while the 11th Legion had its winter quarters at Scribonianus’ provincial capital, Burnum, today’s Croatian city of Kistanje. In addition to the roughly 10,000 legionaries of the two legions, the province’s garrison included a similar number of auxiliaries, giving Scribonianus a force of 20,000 men.

  At the beginning of the third week of March AD 42, after hearing from Vinicianus at Rome, Scribonianus called an assembly of his troops and announced that he intended to dethrone Claudius. According to Dio, Scribonianus “held out the hope” to his troops that he would restore the Roman Republic, something many Romans still dreamed of ninety years after Julius Caesar launched the rebellion that had brought about its end. On this false promise, Scribonianus ordered his legions to prepare to march on Rome. [Dio, LX, 15]

  Meanwhile, Scribonianus sent Claudius an “impudent, threatening, and insulting letter” which caused the terrified emperor to call a meeting of his chief advisers. At this meeting, Claudius canvassed the prospect of him abdicating and going into retirement. Vinicianus and his supporters were in fact convinced that Claudius would be scared into abdicating once he received this letter from Scribonianus, and a number of leading senators and Equestrians flocked to Vinicianus’ cause. But, buttressed by the opinions of his leading freedmen, who were determined that he would not be bullied from office, Claudius did not step down. [Suet., V, 35]

  On the other side of the Adriatic, there were a number of soldiers in the ranks of Scribonianus’ two legions who were not enamored with the idea of overthrowing their emperor. Claudius was of the imperial line, he was the brother of the late, revered general Germanicus Caesar, and it had been little more than a year since Claudius had been installed. For many legionaries, the idea of replacing him was repugnant.

  Between March 19 and 23 each year, across the empire, the legions removed their sacred golden eagle standards from the shrines where they stood in camp and took them to assembly, where, in front of the legions, priests anointed the eagles with perfumes and dressed them with garlands of flowers, in an ancient ceremony called the lustration exercise. In the third week of March in the camps of the 7th and 11th legions in Dalmatia, word swept through the ranks that when the eagle-bearers had gone to remove their eagles from the ground in their shrines, they would not budge. [Dio, LX, 13]

  All Romans were superstitious, legionaries more than most; with their lives frequ
ently on the line, they would always look for omens good and bad to guide them and keep them out of harm’s way. This tale of eagles that could not be removed from the ground had an electrifying effect on the men of the two Dalmatian legions. This, to them, signified that they were not meant to march on Rome with Scribonianus, and “because of a superstitious terror which caused his legions to repent,” the revolt crumbled to dust overnight. [Ibid.]

  Experienced rank and file soldiers conferred, and, agreeing that they must strike against Scribonianus and his supporters, they sought out the senior officers who backed the governor’s seditious scheme and put them to the sword in their quarters. Scribonianus, alerted to the fact that his own legions had turned against him, fled from Burnum to the Adriatic coast, and from there to Issa, today’s Croatian island of Vis. Seeing no other option, Scribonianus took his own life there on Issa. From the moment that he had addressed his legions and announced that he was acting against Claudius until the time of his death, Scribonianus’ revolt had lasted just five days. [Ibid., 15]

  Once word of the swift end of the rebellion reached Rome, several of the conspirators, including Vinicianus, initiator of the plot, followed the lead of Scribonianus and committed suicide. A number of others, both men and women, were rounded up by the Praetorian Guard. Some were tortured for confessions. Senators were tried in the Senate in the presence of Claudius, the prefects of the Guard, and the emperor’s freedmen advisers. Convicted, the accused were executed, with their decapitated heads exhibited on the Gemonian Stairs. [Ibid., 16]

  One of the conspirators was the senator Caecina Paetus. His wife Arria was “on very intimate terms” with the empress Messalina, and might herself have escaped punishment for involvement in the plot had she sought Messalina’s intervention. But Arria loyally chose to share her husband’s fate. Dio tells the story that, with both of them having resolved to die, Arria and Paetus sat in a room of their house at Rome, he with his sword in his hands. But Paetus did not have the courage to go through with the deed. So, Arria took the sword from him and plunged it into her own body. Alive still, she withdrew the blade, saying, as she handed the sword back to her husband for him to follow suit, “See, Paetus, I feel no pain.” [Ibid.]