In January, February and March the mild Publius Valerius Marinus, whose consulship Vitellius was to defer, had attended the functions of the Brethren of the Fields with exemplary regularity. He was present at each of their consecutive meetings on 30 January, 26 and 28 February, and 5 and 9 March; and in this he resembled the vice-president, Otho Titianus, and him alone. Such remarkable fidelity might be explained as the result of close friendship or alliance between the two men; and this factor in turn could account for Otho’s retaining Marinus, despite his relative unimportance, in the list of consuls. His disappearance from the Arval record after 9 March shows that he was one of the senators who left Rome with Otho six days later. On the day before departure, when there was also a meeting, Marinus was too busy packing to be present, and only one solitary member, Lucius Maecius Postumus, elected vice-president in place of Titianus, now regent, was there to vow a sacrifice, payable if the emperor returned safely from his expedition. After this, the record becomes fragmentary; but if we read the fragments aright, from March to 5 June Marinus was absent; but very shortly thereafter he reappears, at a time when the itinerant senators had scurried back from Bologna to Rome in advance of Vitellius. But it was obvious to Marinus that, as a close supporter of Otho and his brother, he could hope for nothing from Vitellius. When, in late July or early August, news of Vespasian’s acclamation in Alexandria reached Rome, the mild man decided that the moment had come to cultivate a new allegiance. He packed once more, and went on board a ship at Pozzuoli bound for Alexandria in ballast. Heaven smiled on the decision. A Nereid sloped the sea towards the East. The etesian winds blew smoothly and steadily. His vessel made the very respectable average speed of 4.6 knots on the thousand-mile voyage. On the night of the eighth day out, or the morning of the ninth, a great fire burning by night or the glint of a mirror by day was seen in the south-east; then successively a radiate statue, and the white tower of three storeys—round, octangular, rectangular—which every mariner knew to be the Pharos of Alexandria.40
With many men like Marinus private fears and ambitions were hardly separable from the conviction that they were altruistic patriots. About the time that he decided to leave Rome for a more congenial climate, similar calculations were being made in very different circumstances and in a very different place. Tettius Julianus commanded the westernmost of the three legions of Moesia, VII Claudia stationed at Kostolać at the confluence of the Morava and the Danube. Like the other Moesian commanders, he had been decorated by Otho for his part in the successful repulse of the February invasion, and he could hardly now hope to be persona grata to Vitellius also. Moreover, he perhaps felt compromised in Vitellius’ eyes by the injudicious behaviour of his troops at Aquileia in April. Finally, he was on bad terms with his superior, Marcus Aponius Saturninus, governor of Moesia. When in June the allegiance of the Danube troops began to waver—and the neighbouring formation, III Gallica at Gigen, took a leading part in swinging opinion in favour of the Flavian cause—Saturninus found himself in an unenviable position, at first outwardly backing Vitellius, in fact desperately playing for time. To give colour to his attitude of proper loyalty and to gratify a private grudge at the same time, he sent a centurion to Kostolać to assassinate Tettius as a traitor. Warned in time, the legionary commander made his escape across the wild Balkan Range, avoiding the main road that led via Niš to the Bosporus. For the next few months he lay low, awaiting events. After a long and secret journey—purposely loitering, as gossip, and no doubt the incriminated governor, later claimed—he finally hurried forward when the news was favourable, and appeared at Alexandria to court Vespasian. But by that time, in November, he was not alone, or one of two. Many more, risking an autumnal or winter voyage, had made their way to a safe haven in the East.
But that is to anticipate. In the summer, as Marinus sailed into the Great Harbour of Alexandria he could see the simple and proud inscription which the architect of the lighthouse had placed in letters nearly two foot high on the eastern rectangular face of the 400-foot-high Pharos:
SOSTRATOS SON OF DEXIPHANES A CNIDIAN
ON BEHALF OF THOSE WHO SAIL THE SEAS
TO THE GODS WHO GIVE SAFETY
For those who sailed the seas the gods who gave safety were Castor and Pollux: for the storm-tossed ship of state and its troubled navigators might they not be Vespasian and Titus? But here, in the Great Harbour, Marinus’ brief and undistinguished appearance in history comes to an end. Whether the favour of Vespasian secured him one of the suffect consulships of 70 or 71 is not recorded. In any case he seems not to have lived long, for when the minutes of the Order resume in 72 there is no mention of the faithful Brother. Yet it is pleasant to conjecture, from the mention of a Publius Valerius Marinus in the consular list for 91, that Domitian remembered to pay to the son the debt for whose settlement the father had had to wait.
The Alexandria that greeted the elder Marinus in the summer of 69 was a splendid city of more than 300,000 inhabitants, the greatest trading centre in the whole world. Two hundred and sixty years before, it had been founded by Alexander the Great himself on a low ridge between the sea and Lake Mariut; and though its greatest days as a centre of civilization and culture had perhaps passed with the disappearance of the Ptolemies who fostered it, yet it remained the capital of Roman Egypt and a wealthy metropolis, an entrepot between Rome and the Indies, the days of destruction and decay still centuries ahead. Egypt as a whole, moreover, was an exotic jewel in the imperial regalia, the Indian Empire of Rome. The simple phrase in the Res Gestae of Augustus, Aegyptum imperio populi Romani adieci, ‘I added Egypt to the empire of the Roman people’, echoes the inscription upon the 78-foot obelisk of Rameses III which Augustus had already set up in 10 B.C. as a reminder to the Roman people of his and their conquest, visible then on the spine of the Circus Maximus and visible today in the Piazza del Popolo. Mindful of his adoptive father’s experience (and his own) in Egypt, he had given the country a special status. It was governed, though theoretically a domain of the Roman people, by an equestrian prefect directly responsible in all matters to the emperor.41
Senators and the highest class of knights were forbidden to enter the country without the emperor’s permission. Since Egypt commands the sea and land routes from the East to the Internal Sea, from Asia to Africa, there was always the fear that a pretender occupying the country, however small his force and however considerable the opposition, might threaten Italy with starvation by withholding Egypt’s grain supply, one-third of the home country’s import requirement. There was also an internal problem. The country was sprawling, given to strange cults and irresponsible excesses, indifferent to the rule of law—at any rate in Roman eyes—and ignorant of democratic government. The land of age-old autocracy, ossified and stagnant for all the vigour of its trade, Egypt required treatment different from that appropriate to livelier lands now learning for the first time what the Roman peace meant.42
Whatever the rules said, in the summer of 69 a senatorial adherent to the Flavian cause must have been welcome indeed in Alexandria, especially if he came from Rome bearing hot news, as Marinus did. He will have been quickly conducted to the nearby royal palace and interviewed by the governor.
Tiberius Julius Alexander, prefect of Egypt, had reached his fifties and the height of his powers and influence. By birth he was a Jew of Alexandria, by upbringing a Hellenized cosmopolitan, by status a Roman knight, by profession an administrator and general, always a faithful and efficient servant of Rome and of whoever might be Rome’s ruler. His father had been inspector-general of the Egyptian customs, his uncle was the distinguished and eloquent philosopher Philo. From an early age, his ambience had been one of wealth, culture, and close contact with the Roman imperial family and with the Herods. In the forties, after some initial military posts in the army of Egypt of which details escape us, he was (as we know from an inscription at Dendera,* twenty-five miles north of Thebes) lieutenant-governor of the Thebaid, and from A.D. 46 to 48 procurator of Judaea. As such, he commanded auxiliary cohorts and regiments of the Roman army. Then darkness descends for fifteen years; but in A.D. 63–66 he acted as chief-of-staff to Gnaeus Domitius Corbulo, governor of Syria, at a dangerous and critical time for relations between Parthia, Armenia and Rome. By May 66 Nero had given him the post towards which his previous experience obviously pointed the way: the prefecture of his native Egypt.
On arrival he was welcomed by his relative King Agrippa II, who brought news of unrest in Judaea; and almost at once Alexander’s gifts of diplomacy and firmness were put to the test by a serious riot on his own doorstep. Its course is best described in the words of Josephus:
In Alexandria there was perpetual friction between the natives and the Jews, ever since the moment when Alexander the Great had made use of their enthusiastic support against the Egyptians and as a reward given them the right to live in the city on equal terms with the Greeks. This privilege was maintained by the Ptolemies, who indeed allotted them a particular quarter of the city to live in so that they could observe their rituals and way of life with less contact with the gentiles. The Ptolemies even allowed them to call themselves ‘Macedonians’; and when the Romans took over Egypt, neither the first Caesar nor his successors allowed any diminution in the privileges granted to the Jews by Alexander the Great. But there were continual clashes with the Greeks, and despite the punishments inflicted on both sides by the governors, trouble grew worse and worse. At the time of which we speak, when there were disturbances in other parts, the situation of the Jews was inflamed. A public meeting, held by the Alexandrians to organize a deputation to be sent to Nero, brought to the amphitheatre not only the Greeks but a number of Jews. When their opponents spotted them, there were immediately loud cries of ‘Enemies!’ and ‘Spies!’ Then they jumped up and laid hands on them. Most of the Jews took to their heels and fled in all directions, but three men were arrested and carried off to be burned alive. Then the whole Jewish community rose to exact vengeance. At first they stoned the Greeks, then seized brands, rushed to the amphitheatre and threatened a holocaust of the entire audience. This would have happened had not the governor, who was in Alexandria, bestirred himself to allay the frenzy. At first he refrained from using armed force to bring the people to their senses, but sent some leading Alexandrian notables to them with a warning to calm down and avoid the necessity of the Roman army’s intervention. But the rioters replied to the appeal with abuse, and cursed Tiberius.
The latter then realized that only extreme measures would restore order. He therefore sent against them the two Roman legions stationed outside the town and with them 2,000 troops that—unluckily for the Jews—had arrived from the province of Africa. His orders were not only to kill, but to plunder and burn down houses. So the troops attacked the ghetto in the Fourth (Delta) Quarter of Alexandria and carried out their orders, not without some losses: for the Jews had concentrated their forces and put the best-armed men in the front ranks. Their resistance lasted for quite a time. When once they gave way, there was complete havoc. Death overtook them in various forms. Some were caught in the open, others crammed into houses to which the Romans set fire after plundering their contents. They neither took pity on children nor showed reverence for age, but slaughtered indiscriminately until the whole quarter became a blood-bath. Fifty thousand corpses were piled up, and no one would have survived, if the Jews had not appealed for mercy. Alexander took pity on them and ordered the Romans to withdraw. The latter with their usual discipline ceased the killing as soon as they were ordered; but the Alexandrian Greeks, in the excess of their hate, could hardly be recalled from the carnage.43
In its barbarity the incident recalls certain events of our own century more closely than anything we know of in Roman history; but it illustrates well enough the problems of maintaining order in a large, motley and virtually unpoliced city of the East. On the whole Alexander emerges with credit. He acted promptly, attempted conciliation, used force as soon as it seemed inevitable, and used it with full effect, calling off his men as soon as resistance collapsed. Josephus’ estimate of the loss of life is certainly exaggerated but the best that one can say of this drastic bloodletting is that it mercifully guaranteed a long period of peace which milder methods might have failed to secure.
More prosaic and less emotional sources than the Jewish historian grant us another and more typical aspect of the duties of a prefect of Egypt. In the Khargeh Oasis 100 miles west of Thebes in Upper Egypt, a lengthy inscription, 2.45 metres in height and 2 metres in width, comprising sixty-six long lines, is carved on the east face of the north jamb of the outer gateway to the Temple of Hibis. The text, part of which is also reproduced in a papyrus fragment now at Berlin, is the transcript, crudely but clearly carved by a local mason, of a comprehensive decree relating to abuses in the collection of taxes, issued two and a half months earlier by Tiberius Alexander at Alexandria. Its subscription runs:
In the first year of Lucius Livius Galba Caesar Augustus Imperator, Epiphi 12 [6 July 68].
The main portion of the text is highly technical, concerned as it is with a number of quite different fiscal problems and misdemeanours which had come to light (and perhaps already been dealt with successively and administratively as they occurred) in the first two years of Alexander’s tenure of office, much of it inevitably spent in travelling throughout his extensive province. Among other things, we hear of vexatious litigation relating to res iudicatae (a favourite sport where governors came and governors went, and reminiscent of the Sardinian dispute), and the practice, in forbidding which Alexander was swimming against the current of history, of compelling individuals to act as tax farmers against their will. But the opening preambles are of more general interest as throwing light upon the character of the governor:
I, Julius Demetrius, strategus of the Thebaid [Khargeh] oasis, have appended for you herewith a copy of the edict sent to me by the Lord Prefect Tiberius Julius Alexander, so that you may know of it and enjoy his benefactions. Year 2 of the emperor Lucius Livius Augustus Sulpicius Galba Imperator, Phaophi 1, Julian-Augustan Day [28 September 68].
Tiberius Julius Alexander says:
Since I am extremely anxious that the city of Alexandria should preserve the status due to it by enjoying the benefactions which it receives from the emperors, and that Egypt, living in tranquillity, should cheerfully contribute to the grain supply and to the supreme felicity of modern times without being oppressed by novel and unlawful actions; and since furthermore, almost from the moment I set foot in the city, I have been assailed by the clamours of petitioners whether in smaller or larger numbers, the same consisting of the most respectable citizens here and of those that are farmers in the country, complaining about abuses very closely affecting them, I lost no opportunity in the past of correcting such abuses as I had authority to deal with; and now, so that you may with greater confidence expect every concession touching both your well-being and your enjoyment at the hands of our benefactor the emperor Galba Augustus, who has risen like the sun to give us light for the good of all mankind, and that you may know that I personally have taken thought for matters touching your relief, I have published in precise terms, in respect of each and every your requests, all that it is lawful for me to decide and to do; and as for more weighty matters requiring the authority and majesty of the emperor, I shall communicate these to him with all truth. For the gods have reserved for this most solemn moment the duty of safeguarding the inhabited world.44
Beneath the polysyllabic jargon of flaccid official Greek one senses a genuine attitude of benevolence, some sort of concern for honest government, a desire to do one’s duty to emperor and subject. But it was not within the competence, nor congruent with the character, of a Tiberius Julius Alexander to create a new dynasty for Rome. If others gave the word, he would work well for them. In February or March, Otho, and in May, Vitellius were promptly recognized.
The details of the rise of the Flavian cause are hidden in a thick mist. The official view put about after Vespasian’s accession was that he reluctantly submitted to pressure from his advisers and friends to break the oath of loyalty to Vitellius sworn so recently as May 69,* and that he did so when the new régime showed itself in the colours of an incapable and irresponsible tyranny. Yet it was clear to everybody that the declaration of 1 July must have been preceded by extensive diplomatic activity and forward planning. It could be pointed out by later historians, no friends of the Flavians, that at the moment of decision in late May or early in the following month nothing could have been known of the activities of Vitellius in his capital, since he did not reach it until the end of June. Others might retort that the characters and activities of Aulus Vitellius, Fabius Valens and Caecina Alienus were known to their brother-officers long before June. There were confidential contacts between widely separated armies and officials; and the official couriers sent out by Vitellius to announce his accession adopted an overbearing attitude that went down badly everywhere. Valens, the strong man in the triumvirate, had a dubious past. His implication in the murder of Fonteius Capito, Vitellius’ predecessor as governor of Lower Germany, must have caused widespread speculation at the turn of the year. There would be misgivings. Moreover, the senior governors—those of Pan-nonia, Moesia, Syria and Judaea, in whose hands lay half the legionary strength of the empire—must have looked with dismay at the claim of the German garrisons, rapidly staked and rapidly exploited, to appoint an emperor without reference to them or to the Senate and People. If this was to be the new form of succession to the principate, it was not obvious that the credentials of Vitellius were any better than those of Otho. Then there were two evil precedents set by the Vitellian faction: the execution of certain Othonian centurions, and the massive demobilization of Othonian Praetorians designed to make room for men from the German garrisons.
It is therefore not quite impossible, though it cannot be taken as proven on the strength of a statement in Suetonius,* that already in April the Moesian troops, foiled of participation in the spring campaign and looking round at Aquileia for an emperor of their choice, may have thought of Vespasian. After all, Tampius Flavianus and Aponius Saturninus, whom they knew, were old and unpopular, however meritorious their previous careers; Licinius Mucianus, while possessing the gifts and competence of an excellent maker of rulers, lacked the will to be one himself. There remained Vespasian, a no-nonsense professional soldier with two grown-up sons, his efficiency proved by the course of the Jewish War in 67–68.
Titus Flavius Vespasianus, second son of the honest exciseman and banker Flavius Sabinus, was born on the evening of 17 November, A.D. 9 at a tiny village on the Salarian Way near Cittàreale, in the mountains just within the border of the Abruzzi with Umbria. His father was a citizen of Rieti to the south-west, his mother from a good family having property a little to the north, in a most attractive and wild part of the Apennines six miles west of Norcia on the hills above Serravalle and the gorge of the Corno. But as a very young child—presumably while his parents were away on business in Asia—he was brought up by his paternal grandmother on her estate at Cosa on the Tuscan coast. Even after he became emperor he constantly went back to this childhood home which, unchanged, recalled the past and the grandmother to whom he was deeply attached. It was in memory of her that, on high days and holidays, he would drink from a little silver cup which had been hers. Later the parents moved to Avenches, where the father died. It was his mother’s ambition for Vespasian’s future rather than his own that drove him to embark on the senatorial career upon which his elder brother Sabinus was already engaged. He entered the army and served on the staff of a legion engaged in mopping up unruly mountaineers in Thrace, and later as financial secretary in the joint province of Crete and Cyrene. By Flavia Domitilla he had three children: one daughter who died young, Titus (born on 30 December 39 in a humble home at Rome) and Domitian (born in a slightly better house in the sixth region of the capital on 24 October 51). Both his wife and his daughter were dead before he became emperor, and after Flavia’s death he lived with his former mistress Caenis, a freedwoman—secretary of Antonia, daughter of Mark Antony—and treated her virtually as his legal wife. Under Claudius he was given the command of II Augusta which was stationed at Strasbourg in Upper Germany (then governed by Galba), and with his formation crossed to Britain in 43 and took part in the invasion and occupation of the southern part of the country for two or three years. He distinguished himself at the Battle of the Medway, was present at the capture of Colchester, and occupied many sites in southwest Britain, including without doubt Maiden Castle. Vespasian was a born soldier, used to marching at the head of his troops, choosing his camp sites personally, and harrying the enemy day and night and, if occasion required, by personal combat, content with whatever rations were available and dressed much the same as a private soldier. He received the submission of the Belgae of Hampshire and Wiltshire, the Atrebates of Berkshire and the whole of the Isle of Wight. In the last two months of 51 he was consul. After this followed a long period of retirement until his consular appointment as governor of Africa (an annual posting) held around 63 or 64. Here” the honest son of the honest tax gatherer proved too puritanical for his motley subjects, if one can takeseriously the gossip that he was pelted by the people of Sousse with turnips. Vespasian, however, was the kind of man around whom wits tended to invent good stories. What is certain is that he achieved the considerable feat of returning from a rich province no wealthier than he entered it; and a period of impoverishment followed during which he had to borrow money from Sabinus on the security of his own estates. Worse, he suffered the disgrace of going into business: he became a transport contractor, whence his nickname ‘Muledriver’, suitable enough, too, for one who, like Galba, brooked no indiscipline from Marius’ mules, the legionaries of Rome. However, in 66 he was invited to accompany Nero on his trip to Greece as a member of his suite, but when Nero himself was giving a song recital was tactless enough to leave the room repeatedly or fall asleep. For this stupidity or honesty he was banished from the court, and lay low for a while in Greece until Nero relented and, needing an efficient man without pretensions or great birth to deal with the rebellious Jews, selected Vespasian for the command, which he took over in 67.
Vespasian was the perfect example of the virtues of honesty, frugality and sturdiness which Roman publicists like to attribute to the Sabines. His build was powerful. A hooked nose, tightly-compressed lips and arched eyebrows lent him a strained expression. He enjoyed excellent health apart from occasional gout, but took no medical precautions to ensure it except thorough massaging, a simple life and a tendency to return to his Sabine or Tuscan haunts whenever he could. He frequented the spa at Cutilia between Antrodoco and Rieti, some twenty miles down the Velino valley from his birthplace; and it was here, where the local goddess of prosperity, civil and military, had a shrine by the lake with its prickly water and the floating island, that he was to die. The goddess was named Vacuna, and her worship reached as far as Horace’s country, for the poet subscribed one of his letters ‘from beyond the crumbling shrine of Vacuna’, that is from the villa in the Licenza valley. A century after Horace, Vespasian was to restore this building dedicated to his Sabine Lady of Luck, as we know from an inscription prominently displayed to this day in the village of Rocca-giovine. Prosperity, victory and success were certainly gifts for which the Sabine emperor ought to have felt grateful.45
Vespasian’s origins were comparatively humble, and that he fulfilled the Platonic doctrine that rulers should be compelled to rule against their will is clear from his career. Only his mother’s persuasiveness caused him to aspire to be a senator, and even in this career, despite good services, promotion was not notably fast, and clearly not anxiously sought. But it was perhaps this very reluctance to advance his own interests that prompted the jealous Nero to appoint him to a position that in 69 gave him the chance, if he would but take it, to become master of the world. Vespasian obediently recognized Galba, Otho and Vitellius, and there was no particular reason why he should now or later give hostages to fortune by rebellion. That the initiative of revolt, or at any rate the overriding pressure for it, came from the governor of Syria is implicit in the account of our most trustworthy and critical source, Tacitus, and with this verdict we are in no position to disagree.
We know much less about Gaius Licinius Mucianus than his importance in the history of the decade 66–76 makes desirable. Thus his early career is obscure, and we owe to a lead pipe, found inscribed with his name at Genzano in 1877,* the information that Mucianus had an estate near Ariccia, one of the richest and most desirable suburban areas. Prominent and wealthy, he is alleged to have squandered a fortune in his youth on high living, and earned (no difficult task) the disapproval of Claudius. Under Nero his rise begins. Soon after 57 he was promoted—or relegated—to the governorship of Lycia and Pamphylia, and chance has preserved a dedication to him by a beneficiary at Oenoanda in Lycia and another at Antalya in Pamphylia. He attained the consulship around 65, having taken part in Corbulo’s campaigns in the years 58 and onwards; and he then succeeded his superior as governor of Syria, the appointment being roughly contemporary with that of Vespasian to Judaea.46
The relations between the aristocratic dilettante and the son of the banker from Avenches, though, or because, they were now governors of adjoining and interdependent provinces, seem to have been cool at the beginning, and indeed both had to tread cautiously in the last years of the suspicious Nero. Once the megalomaniac emperor had disappeared and a measure of republican freedom was restored in the first months of Galba’s reign, they communicated more freely, Titus, Vespasian’s son, often playing the part of intermediary, his amiable and easy-going character congenial to the childless senator.
An observer delighting in antithesis and paradox saw in Mucianus a compound of self-indulgence and energy, courtesy and arrogance, good and evil. The modern observer cannot deny the Flavians some concern for the welfare of the empire, and Mucianus can hardly be accused of self-seeking. His talent for diplomacy, intrigue and organization was employed to make an emperor of another, not of himself. This indifference to his own advancement coupled with his experience of the East was the reason why Nero had put him in charge of Syria; and though his great services to the Flavian cause earned him two more consulships in 70 and 72, it is noticeable that they, like the first, were suffect and not ordinary: even these distinctions were unobtrusive. He was a fluent orator, in Greek as in Latin, and like many Romans of his class had literary and antiquarian ambitions. After the years of crisis he published a collection of republican historical documents in eleven books, to say nothing of three volumes of an anthology of letters. In a more popular vein his miscellany, the Alirabilia, garnered the curiosities of nature which his career had enabled him to hear of, or see at first hand. He is sure that the source of the Euphrates is twelve miles above Zimara, differing from Corbulo, who had another geographical doctrine. An elephant, he records, learned the shapes of the Greek alphabet, and could laboriously trace a sentence in that language, while monkeys have been known to play draughts; and two sagacious goats, meeting on a very narrow bridge, knew how to solve the traffic problem: one lay down and the other walked sure-footed over him. An inhabitant of Samothrace grew a new set of teeth at the age of 104, and between the island of Ruad and the Phoenician coast fresh water is brought up from a spring under the bottom of the sea, which is seventy-five feet deep, by means of a leather pipe. Lycia’s governor recalled that while travelling through his province he had been shown a local marvel—a plane tree standing by the roadside near a spring with a hollow cavity inside it eighty-one feet across, and had decided to hold a banquet in it with eighteen members of his suite who reclined upon the soft couch of leaves. Afterwards he had gone to bed in the same tree shielded from every breath of wind and delighted by the agreeable sound of rain pattering through the foliage. It was better than a marble palace. A man whose interests covered both political history and scientific trivia clearly had a lively mind; and his more serious activities as a statesman and a soldier show his practical competence when he chose to exert it.47
From July 68, then, if not before, Titus was fully employed as a messenger boy and, potentially, something far greater. We have noticed that in November or December he went off Romewards with King Agrippa, ostensibly to pay his respects to the newly arrived Galba and to begin his candidature for the praetorship, but in fact to explore at the prompting of Mucianus and with the blessing of his father the possibilities opened up by the imminent choice of an heir by the ageing Galba. The news that met Titus and Agrippa at Corinth was crushing. Otho was only seven years older than Titus, so that even if they had been friends, no question of adoption could now arise. But hard on the news of Otho’s accession came full knowledge of the claims of Vitellius, then a conviction that an armed confrontation in northern Italy was imminent. Titus returned quickly to his father with fresh hope. Of course it would be well for the Flavians to hold their hand. But by May the situation was clearer. Vitellius had emerged the victor. But the discontent of the Eastern troops and the growing evidence that the new régime was unlikely to be either lasting or acceptable led to the formulation in Mucianus’ mind of a second plan: the principate should go to Vespasian, if the latter could be persuaded, with reversion to Titus in due course.
But would Vespasian accept nomination? We have no means of knowing his inner thoughts, but Tacitus cannot be far wrong in his imaginative reconstruction, so far as it goes. The factors that told against acceptance were the hazards of an enterprise from which there could be no going back, the unacceptability of further civil war, and indeed, on a purely personal plane, the danger of assassination. The arguments in favour were patriotism, feasibility without much bloodshed, and the fitness of bowing to a popular demand. The predominant characteristic of Vespasian in 69 was caution. It was necessary to take stock of the military situation in all its aspects. The Jewish War, quiescent for the moment, had to be finished off, and this commitment, together with the safeguarding of the eastern frontier as a whole, meant that a strict limit must be placed upon the extent to which troops were committed to a distant campaign, near or in Italy. Luckily, relations were good with Parthia after the settlement of 66, and she and Rome had a common interest in defending Armenia (and hence their own empires) from the encroachments of the Alans, lasso-throwing horsemen pressing down between the Black and Caspian Seas. This was the threat which had stimulated the projected Eastern campaign of Nero and which was soon to materialize in 72 at the expense of Parthia. In 69, therefore, Volo-gaeses I had every inducement to preserve the peace with Rome—especially a Rome governed by Vespasian, to whom the respect the Parthian had felt for Corbulo seems to have been not unreasonably transferred. Nevertheless, safe though the Roman frontier might be, the prospect of fighting fellow-Romans was as unwelcome to the patriot as it was alarming to the legionary commander and military logician. There was, however, another possibility, sure if slow: that of a blockade of Italy by the interruption of the corn supplies from Egypt and Africa, which together supplied the capital with the bulk of the annona. Providing Egypt were secured, Africa could quickly be dominated by an advance along the coast or by a movement engineered in the province itself. The cessation of corn imports would create a shortage in Italy in six months, and it might be possible to secure Vitellius’ downfall without striking a blow in anger. It would be necessary to approach Tiberius Julius Alexander, and put out feelers to the commander of the single legion in Africa, Valerius Festus, with whom, rather than with the governor Piso, the decision would lie.48
Discreetly sounded, the governor of Egypt approved the plan, but pointed out that the summer convoys would soon be sailing, and could not be retained without revealing one’s hand. As for the Danube, by early June it was already clear that the Moesian legions were ready to accept Vespasian, and III Gallica under Titus Aurelius Fulvus (grandfather of the emperor Antoninus Pius) could be relied on to take the initiative in view of its recent service in Syria and its knowledge of Vespasian. These legions, perhaps with some support from Pannonia, could be used to provide a force to re-occupy Aquileia without necessarily moving more deeply into Italy; nor were the governors of Moesia, Pannonia and Dalmatia likely to stand firm against a movement by their legionary commanders. Perhaps quite a small token force from the East would be sufficient support in this area.
These purely rational considerations may have been reinforced by an element of superstition. Had not the priest at Paphos hinted to Titus that a great future awaited him ? That such beliefs had a certain hold on Vespasian is evident from the fact that when he had gained power he kept at his court the astrologer Seleucus and gave special favour to the young renegade Jewish aristocrat, Josephus. In the summer of 67, at Jotapata in Galilee, the latter had been skilled enough to extricate himself from a siege and from a desperate suicide compact among the survivors by going over to the enemy. The incident, confirmed by other witnesses, is told in Josephus’ own words in the Jewish War:
Vespasian gave orders that he should be kept under strict surveillance, since he intended to send him shortly to Nero. When Josephus heard this, he told Vespasian that he wished to have a private conversation with him. Then the Roman commander cleared the room, allowing only his son Titus and two friends to remain. Josephus then began: ‘You imagine, Vespasian, that in Josephus you have merely captured a prisoner, but I bring you greater tidings. If I had not been sent by God, I should have accepted death, for I know well enough the Jewish Law and how generals should die. Are you sending me to Nero ? Why ? Will those that come after Nero, and before you, keep their inheritance for long? It is you who will be Caesar, Vespasian, and emperor, you and your son here. Shackle me now with greater care and keep me under guard for your own sake, for you, Caesar, will be not only my master, but master over land and sea and every nation of mankind, and I ask for the penalty of still harsher captivity if I prove to speak rashly of God’s will.’ At the time Vespasian listened with an air of incredulity to the tale and suspected that Josephus had invented the story to save his skin. But gradually he became convinced that God was already inspiring him with the idea of becoming emperor and was manifesting to him his future dominion by this and other signs.49
Anyway, Vespasian kept Josephus as a prisoner of war, but under mild conditions, and his attitude was reinforced by Titus’ belief. As for the other signs, these were in part old, in part recent. He recalled a moment of his childhood when he was living on his grandmother’s farm at Cosa. A violent storm had uprooted a tall cypress, yet on the following morning it sprang up again greener and stronger than before. There were other stories that Vespasian or his courtiers told, when events gave them significance. A stray dog brought in a human hand from the streets while Vespasian was at lunch, and dropped it beneath the table; and a hand is symbolic of power. Again, when he was at dinner, an ox returning from the plough shook off its yoke, entered the room, scattered the servants and fell at his feet as if suddenly exhausted; then it lowered its neck as if recognizing one to whom sacrifice was due.* So much for the past. But not far from Jotapata lies Mount Carmel, named after a local Baal having neither image nor temple, but only an altar and the devotion of the local people. When Vespasian offered sacrifice here in the summer of 69, the priest Basilides repeatedly examined the entrails of the victim to foretell the future and finally declared, ‘Whatever you are planning, Vespasian—be it the building of a house, an addition to your estate or the acquisition of more servants—this is granted. You shall have a great mansion, wide acres and many people to direct.’ Signs and wonders seemed to confirm the arguments of reason. Everything now hinged on the decision of Vespasian himself, between whom and Mucianus a series of private interviews took place on the frontier between Syria and Judaea. Finally, before a rather larger meeting of senior officers, Mucianus made a formal appeal to Vespasian to accept nomination. It cost Vespasian considerable effort to screw his courage to the sticking point. At sixty, one was really too old for adventures of this kind. Gaius and Nero had been in their twenties when the call came, Augustus and Otho in their thirties, Tiberius, Claudius and Vitellius in their fifties. There was, it was true, Galba, who became princeps in his seventies. But the precedent was scarcely encouraging. Two factors finally overcame the modesty or indolence of Vespasian: he had two adult sons ready and willing, in due course, to take the burden from his shoulders; he had also a sense of duty to his country. He accepted nomination.
It was now the very end of May. It was agreed that the safest course would be an initial declaration in Alexandria. If this were well received, it would commit Alexander and Egypt irrevocably to rebellion and blockade, and give a lead to the Judaean and Syrian legions, whose response was not in doubt. A timetable settled, Mucianus returned to his capital Antioch and Vespasian to his, Caesarea. It seemed desirable to stage a short and effective raid into the hills before the fatal date. On 5 June Vespasian marched south-east from his capital and captured the little towns of Bethel and Ephraim, which he garrisoned. Then, with his cavalry, he advanced towards Jerusalem, inflicting some losses on those who expected no such sudden foray. Meanwhile, a lieutenant, Cerialis, dealt with Idumaea in the south, and captured and destroyed the ancient city of Hebron recently vacated by the zealot Simon ben Giora. All the strong places of Judaea were now in Roman hands except four: Jerusalem; Herodium, rising sharply 100 metres above the plateau, Herod the Great’s palace, fortress and burial place where seventy-three years before he had been laid to rest amid gold and jewels; and the twin strongholds giddily placed to east and west of the Dead Sea—Machaerus, the second strongest place in Judaea (destined with Herodium to fall in 72 to a Lucilius Bassus who may perhaps be the naval commander of 69), and Masada, captured in the famous and desperate siege of 73 by Flavius Silva. By the end of June 69. Vespasian was back at Caesarea, waiting for news.50
On 1 July Tiberius Julius Alexander, prefect of Egypt, addressed a parade of the two Egyptian legions, III Cyrenaica and XXII Deio-tariana, in their camp at Nicopolis three miles east of Alexandria, reading to them a letter from Vespasian in which he spoke of an invitation to assume the principate. The troops, together with the people of Alexandria, enthusiastically acclaimed the new emperor, and the day was officially reckoned as the date of his accession. This remarkable tribute to the initial support of Tiberius Alexander and Egypt must reflect Vespasian’s realization that his whole strategy had depended upon it.51
Some account of the pronouncement of 1 July has survived in a papyrus now at Cairo. Its dreadfully mutilated state makes it difficult to give more than a conjectural version of the document as a whole; but even so what remains is of capital interest. If we confine ourselves to what is probable, it seems that the account states that on the day of days crowds collected and filled the whole hippoDrôme. Presumably the largest structure in Alexandria, this lay on the eastern outskirts of the city, beyond the Canopic Gate and towards Nicopolis, where the legions had their barracks. No doubt by this time the oath had already been administered to the troops. Now comes a gathering of the civil population. In a speech the governor seems to have addressed his ‘Lord Caesar’ in his absence, praying for his health and preservation and describing him, in traditional phraseology as the ‘one saviour and benefactor’. Then comes a word or words recalling the description in Alexander’s edict of Galba’s ‘rising like the sun to shine on mankind’. The fragment continues: ‘Preserve for us our emperor … O Augustus, benefactor, Sarapis … son of Amnion.’ The crowd thereupon seems to reply, ‘We thank Tiberius Alexander.’ Then the governor remarks that ‘the divine Caesar prays for your well-being’. His reference to the emperor is echoed in slightly different terms by the crowd’s exclamation ‘O Lord Augustus Vespasianus’.
Pitiful as the evidence is and hyperbolic though its language may seem, the few words do something to fill in the bald statement of our literary sources that on 1 July 69 Vespasian was proclaimed emperor at Alexandria. The enthusiasm does not seem wholly fictitious if taken in conjunction with the literary evidence for the welcome given to Vespasian personally later in the year. That the papyrus fragment does not in fact allude to that occasion seems clear from the appointment of a successor to Tiberius Alexander in 69, almost certainly as a result of arrangements made at Beirut and before Vespasian’s arrival at Alexandria: thanks expressed by the crowd to Tiberius Alexander exclude a date when the governor of Egypt was Fronto or Peducaeus.52
On 3 July, as soon as the news arrived at Caesarea, the army of Judaea (V Macedonica, X Fretensis, XV Apollinaris)—represented, it seems, by the personal guard—greeted Vespasian as Caesar and Augustus; and the formations followed suit in their camps. To the guard and those who gathered round, Vespasian made a short speech of the kind expected of a soldier and an emperor, and was greeted with acclaim and promises of support. A few days later, Mucianus, who had been waiting for this news at Antioch, his capital, immediately administered the oath to his legions, and then went to the theatre, which was regularly used for political meetings, and made a speech to the civilian townsfolk who had flocked there with ready compliance. As we have seen, Mucianus was quite a graceful speaker, even in Greek, and he had the art, denied to the blunter Vespasian, of displaying to advantage all he said or did. One matter in particular he stressed. He asserted—no doubt in advance of certain knowledge, but plausibly enough—that Vitellius had made up his mind to transfer the legions of Germany to Syria, while those in Syria were to be moved to the bases on the Rhine, where the climate was feared as severe and where conditions were believed to be harsh. Neither civilians nor soldiers wanted this. Local ties of every sort made both sides most reluctant to face a change. IIII Scythica had been in Syria since about 56, XII Fulminata since Augustus’ time and VI Ferrata since 30 B.C.
The Flavians soon received the support of a number of native rulers, among them Sohaemus, sheikh of Horns, a fertile and independent enclave in the province of Syria still ruled by the dynasty of the Samp-sigerami—the outlandish name had been applied in derision by Cicero to the ‘Nabob’ Pompey more than a century before—and also Antio-chus IV Epiphanes, ruler of Commagene east of Cilicia. His little state enjoyed an importance and a wealth which derived from its situation: the capital Samsat commanded both the main road from Antioch to Armenia along the Euphrates, and a major route from the west into Mesopotamia.
For some thirty years Antiochus, a Croesus among client-kings, had ruled his country in friendship with Rome. But the fidelity shown during that time and again now in 69 was soon to be ill-rewarded in obedience to higher necessities. In 72, no doubt to strengthen a frontier now in imminent jeopardy from the Alans beyond the Caucasus, an excuse was discovered by Rome (in the person of the then governor of Syria) to tidy up the map and incorporate Commagene in the empire. The dispirited Antiochus retired into private life, first at Sparta and then at Rome, and Josephus sententiously remarks that despite his riches his latter end illustrated only too well the validity of Solon’s maxim, ‘Call no man happy until he is dead.’ But the chief loser by this adjustment was his son, who at first offered resistance to the takeover, but of course in vain. The prince was none other than Gaius Julius Antiochus Epiphanes, the dashing young warrior wounded at the First Battle of Cremona while fighting for Otho, and later an active supporter of the Romans at the siege of Jerusalem. But at any rate he was given the consolation of Roman citizenship, and in the next generation the grandson of old Antiochus, in formal nomenclature ‘Gaius Julius, son of Gaius, Antiochus Philopappus’, advanced yet further. In 109 he held the Roman consulship by gift of Trajan, and was in addition citizen and archon of Athens, where he still confronts the visitor in suitably vigorous relief upon the hill and monument named after him. It would be hard to find a better example of the rough and ready Mediterranean amalgam achieved by Rome.53
Then Titus’ travelling companion, King Agrippa II, sheikh of Anjar and Golan, arrived after a fast voyage from Rome, where secret emissaries from his people had brought him news of Vespasian’s proclamation in advance of its becoming known to Vitellius. The winds had been as kind to him as to Marinus. Equal enthusiasm for the cause was shown by his sister Berenice, widow of Herod of Anjar and mistress of Titus. She was now in her forties (‘her best years’ as Tacitus puts it), but she preserved her looks, her courage and a certain notoriety. Even Vespasian approved of her, or at any rate of her money. After this, we are not surprised to learn that the governors of all the provinces of Asia Minor, though disposing of no legionary garrisons, had promised such support in supplies, facilities and auxiliary forces as they could give and Vespasian might require. Among them were the proconsul of Asia, Gaius Fonteius Agrippa, and the legate of Galatia-with-Pamphylia, Lucius Nonius Calpurnius Asprenas. Both these senators were to be rewarded by new appointments, though their destinies were to prove very different. In addition, there was Cappadocia, still a procuratorial province governed by a knight without the legionary garrison which Vespasian himself was to give it; its governor in 69 is unknown, and equally unknown is the governor of Pontus, added to Bithynia five years before.
In late July Vespasian, Mucianus, Titus and the commanding and senior officers of the legions, together with the potentates who supported the Flavian cause, met to formulate precise plans at Beirut. The spot was suitable. Neither Vespasian’s nor Mucianus’ provincial capital, it was an agreeable and prosperous town enjoying Latin rights, a mix of East and West, and a suitable starting point for a movement to liberate Rome. The concentration of infantry, cavalry and client-rulers, each outbidding the other in show and protestations, gave the conference the air of a durbar. The setting was imperial.
The strategy of Vespasian must first have been exposed and clarified: it was the blockade of Italy, backed by the eventual appearance on the coast of the Adriatic of an army under Mucianus not inferior in numbers to the force which an optimistic calculation would expect to be forthcoming from the Danube armies. Assuming drafts of 2,000 men from each of the six legions of Moesia, Pannonia and Dalmatia, Vespasian believed that 12,000 might without risk be poised in the spring on the north-eastern frontier of Italy by the Balkan armies, and that for political reasons these numbers should be equalled, and preferably more than equalled, by the contribution of the East threatening Italy from Epirus. The expeditionary force would therefore consist of VI Ferrata from Syria (the longest-serving legion in the province), together with 13,000 legionaries drawn from the remaining formations (for example, 2,000 each from IIII Scythica, V Macedonica, X Fretensis, XV Apollinaris, III Cyrenaica and XXII Deiotariana, with 1,000 from XII Fulminata which had suffered severely in 66). The size, therefore, of the Flavian force available to occupy Italy would be more than 30,000 legionaries, almost exactly equivalent to the nominal effective of the Vitellian legionary force in Italy which it would face. The reason for what appears at first sight the very heavy demands on legions still saddled with the task of ending the Jewish War and capturing Jerusalem now becomes clear. By confronting the Vitellians with an army in good heart, numerically equal or superior to their own and capable of invading Italy if the blockade proved ineffective, Vespasian hoped to offer every inducement to the demoralized enemy to capitulate without a fight. That this highly desirable upshot was not in fact realized is no criticism of the strategy of Vespasian and his officers.
A policy which catered for a possible crossing of the Adriatic demanded the neutralization of the Italian fleets. Vespasian could count on the naval forces based in Egypt and the Black Sea (respectively at Alexandria, and at Trabzon in Pontus), and perhaps on detachments of the Italian fleets in the Sea of Marmara. The Syrian fleet based near the mouth of the Orontes, certainly in existence in Vespasian’s reign, may well have owed its creation to the preparation of autumn 69. Later events, as well as the strategy outlined above, strongly suggest that Vespasian had made, or was making, approaches to the commanders at Ravenna and Miseno which were well received.*
Next, recruiting arms and supplies. The availability of veterans in the East sprang from the close ties between the long static legions and local communities. Time-expired soldiers were naturally content, whether of Eastern origin themselves or not, to spend their retirement in a familiar setting, where the climate was acceptable, in contact with younger fellow-soldiers still serving; and on the other hand there are indications of local recruiting in the past, though of course Roman citizenship was a prerequisite. No such restriction applied to the auxiliary forces, who would also need to be expanded to make good the drain upon the legions. As for arms, a number of prosperous cities were selected for their manufacture, and at Antioch there was a mint which had duly struck coins of Galba and Otho, though not (owing to the short period between the news of Vitellius’ accession known in May and the beginning of the anti-Vitellian movement soon after) of Vitellius. This mint was soon busy striking Vespasianic gold and silver currency to pay for war expenses. The coins showed an emblem already familiar at Antioch, the prow of Astarte’s ship, which to a Roman observer might perhaps suggest the comfortable thought that the Eastern Mediterranean was already in Vespasian’s control, as indeed it was.
Once the conference was over, all these preparations were rapidly put in hand in the various localities under the supervision of appropriate officials. But Vespasian himself, aware of the value of publicity, personally assumed the task of inspection and encouragement, praising the efficient rather than reproving the idle. As for his courtiers, he preferred to hide their weaknesses and not their merits. A number of promotions were made, and more might be hoped for when success was attained. Some men were made prefects and procurators, and a number, somewhat unconstitutionally, were granted senatorial rank. It accords with this that, deficient as our records are, we know of at least four orientals who entered the Senate in Vespasian’s reign, and the trend was accentuated in the following century. But lavish bribery of the troops was avoided, though the emperor-to-be held out the prospect of a modest sum, payment being conditional upon services.54
It remained to cater for the defence of the eastern frontier.* A mission was sent to Parthia and Armenia, and steps taken to safeguard the Euphrates frontier during the confrontation with Vitellius. Vologaeses I of Parthia wrote in friendly strain to Vespasian, calling himself ‘Arsaces, King of Kings’ and correctly addressing the Roman leader merely as Tlavius Vespasianus’. Later, when it became clearer even in Parthia that the Flavian cause was succeeding, Vologaeses was more forthcoming. But it was reasonably clear already that neither Parthia nor Armenia had any interest in either rebuffing a future Roman emperor or, if Vespasian failed, stealing an advantage which they could not hope to retain. The prosecution of the siege of Jerusalem would be resumed in the spring and Vespasian decided that while he himself went to Alexandria, and if need be moved further along the coast to occupy the Roman province of Africa, the honour of delivering the coup de grace in Judaea should go to Titus, assisted, as his relative youth and inexperience made advisable, by Tiberius Julius Alexander.
The latter was therefore relieved of the governorship of Egypt, and replaced, after a stop-gap, by L. Peducaeus. Titus and his chief-of-staff began their preparations forthwith, though the opening of the main campaign would be in April.55
A document was also circulated to all the various armies and commanders throughout the empire which, among other things, urged the stepping-up of the recruitment of ex-Othonian Praetorians, the bait being of course re-admission to the Guard from which they had been ejected by Vitellius. Indeed all competent soldiers and enthusiastic supporters would be welcome. When the message reached Liguria, one officer at least responded with alacrity: he was Gnaeus Julius Agricola of Fréjus.
Early in August, Mucianus moved out of Antioch with the Sixth Legion and the 13,000 assorted legionaries. His way lay through Cappa-docia and Galatia to the Bosporus, and thereafter to the Adriatic. The Anatolian portion of this long march, even by the shortest route via Adana and Kayseri, amounts to 765 miles, at least fifty-one days’ steady foot-slogging. Excessive haste was unnecessary, since what was envisaged was a spring campaign, and Mucianus knew enough about orientals to suppose that as the dust rose over the open plains of the Anatolian plateau, rumour might acceptably magnify his strength. By early October, he was a hundred or so miles west of the Bosporus in Thrace, moving along the Egnatian Way in the direction of Durrës and the Achilles’ heel of Italy.