While the history of Roman Britain is dominated by the Romans, every now and then the British opposition is allowed more than a few lines of generic statements, usually stressing their courage, but lack of discipline; and the Roman sources, especially of the first century introduce the names of individual ‘players’. The way the British opposition is usually portrayed, one would expect that they are presented as ‘the enemy’ and thus the bad guys in the Roman sources, but some of these names acquire enough detail that it is permissible to treat them as characters in a literary sense, instead of bit parts, and one is left with the impression that they were meant to engage the sympathies of the readers, as much as their eventual defeat was seen as inevitable: after all they are the enemies of Rome.
The first example of this dates from the Caesarian invasions, but is not Mandubracius, as one might expect, but Commius of the Atrebates. Caesar first mentioned him on the eve of the first British invasion (BG IV, 21) when he is described as a king of the Gallic Atrebates of Caesar’s making, apparently because of his courage and discretion. Caesar sent him as an envoy to the various British tribes, to encourage their surrender in advance of the planned invasion. However this plan did not succeed; after the battle on the beach, Commius is found a captive and released as part of the exchanges of hostages by the defeated British tribes. During the chariot battle (BG IV, 35) at the end of the first season, Commius, or rather his accompanying horsemen prove decisive. As a result, Caesar rewarded him with tax exemption and made another tribe in Gaul tributary to him.
However, during the Gallic uprising under Vercingetorix, we find Commius suddenly on the side of the uprising, acting as the commander of the relief force at Alesia. However, he managed to escape, and in the aftermath of the battle and lost uprising he continued to offer further resistance to the Romans in the north of Gaul, especially amongst the Bellovaci and the Atrebatic territory. After a considerable time as a ‘freedom fighter’, eventually he surrendered to Mark Anthony on terms, offering hostages for his good behaviour and on condition of him being left alone by the Romans, to the extent that in future he would not have to meet another Roman face to face (Caesar/Aulus Hirtius BG VIII, 47).
The reason for this change of allegiance is never explained by Caesar, who just stated that he changed sides; but his successor as author Aulus Hirtius, who wrote the 8th book of the Gallic Wars, offered very different insights. Throughout the first seven books Labienus, one of Caesar’s senior generals is described as a trusted legate of the Caesar and frequent excuses, or at least alleviated circumstances, are found for his occasional failures. Aulus Hirtius, writing after Labienus defected to the opposite side in the Roman Civil War, is a lot less charitable about the general’s attitudes and abilities. He informed us that Commius changed sides after Labienus ordered Volusenus (the man who reconnoitred the British coast before Caesar’s first landings) to assassinate Commius upon hearing that Commius had apparently talked to some of the future leaders of the uprising (Caesar/Aulus Hirtius, BG VIII, 23). The assassination attempt failed, but left Commius seriously wounded (and it seems disenchanted with the Romans). Commius vowed revenge, which he eventually achieved by seriously wounding at least Volusenus. Despite being described only in the 8th book, and thus years after the uprising, Aulus Hirtius made it clear that this event happened at the eve of the Gallic uprising, thus shortly after having been rewarded by Caesar himself and thus provides a context for the unusual lenient treatment of Commius (he appears to be the only one of the leaders of the uprising who is offered terms and survives).
However, c. 100 years later, Frontinus (an experienced Roman general of the Flavian period, about whom we will have to talk more later) wrote a compendium of ‘Stratagems in War’ and included an episode relating how Commius escaped from Gaul to Britain, by hoisting sail, despite being stranded on a sandbank, thus fooling the pursuing Caesar into thinking that he was already out of reach (Frontinus, Strat 2,13).
There is clearly a story missing between the surrender to Mark Antony and the Frontinus episode, and we are at a loss to explain why Commius would have wanted to escape Gaul. Either way, this incident is the last time we hear of the historical Gallic Commius the Atrebate.
Archaeology, or more exact numismatics provide at the same time a different type of evidence. Here we see a series of coins, which seem to date to after the Caesarian invasion, bearing the name of Commius, and later on several other series of coins, which name Tincomarus, Epillus and Verica, all ‘sons of Commius’. As space on coins is restricted most of the names are abbreviated and there are several variations in spelling, but they appear to belong to the same four individuals. Their distribution through Southern Britain varies in detail, but appears to centre on the later Romano-British civitas of the Atrebates, which is why they are frequently named Atrebatic coinage, and the four names are occasionally referred to as the Atrebatic dynasty.
At this point the numismatic evidence ends and interpretation begins: it has until recently become enshrined in Roman military history to see in the Gallic man discussed above, the same Commius who strikes the coins in Britain, and the father of Tincomarus (also sometimes, confusingly, known as Tincommius), Epillus and Verica. He is seen as the founder of one of the two great British dynasties, establishing the British kingdom of the Atrebates (and sometimes also of the Regnii). In older literature, he and his followers were credited with the ‘Second Belgic invasion’, thus explaining the strong cultural affinities between southern Britain and the Gallic Continent. In more recent years John Creighton (2006, 24) even suggested that Commius may have been made king of the British Atrebates on the say-so of Caesar; and that his sons, who Creighton equated with the hostages handed over to Mark Antony, were raised in Rome, as they copied later in life Roman coin types and used coin types similar to friendly kings in other parts of Rome.
So, how sure can we be of this interpretation? As was pointed out in the introduction, there is simply no way of knowing. The poverty of the records for the Roman period precludes even in the best-case scenarios any hope of accurate reconstruction. The best we can hope for are valid scenarios, scenarios that fit all the available evidence and information. However, as stated earlier, the big difference between the two is the fact that there is the possibility of more than one valid scenario, especially if there is only limited material available.
So, is the above a valid scenario and is it the only one? What problems would a critical assessment of the current evidence point out? The problems start with the name of the person in question. How common was the name Commius? No medieval European historian would assume that any two Henrys are likely to be the same, unless there is a lot of circumstantial evidence. In fact, Commius is not a unique name; in a period when we probably have fewer than 200 individuals known with Celtic names in Britain, we have at least two ‘Commius’; one who is striking coins in the Dobunnic territory and the other in the Atrebatic territory (Van Arsdell 1989, 279 cited via Braund 1996,73).
There is also an issue of chronology: Verica, Commius’ son was alive in the reign of Caligula and the beginning of Claudius’ (c. 30/40AD) when he apparently came for help to Rome. His brother Tincomarus/Tincommius came to Rome in the reign of Augustus, probably between 10BC/10AD. We have little indication how long their individual reigns lasted, but the Gallic Commius was, in the late 50s BC, a seasoned warrior and even five years earlier a man of great influence, so the assumption that he was in his thirties might not be too far fetched. Assuming that Commius started a new family on arrival in Britain, that would see Verica in his seventies. This is not impossible by modern standards, but would be unusual in view of the much-reduced life expectancies of the later Iron Age. The royal Atrebatic family tree would actually work better if there were another generation interpolated: Commius the Gaul the grandfather, the British Commius, being the father, followed by his three sons.
Russell (2009, 56) actually goes further by suggesting that rather than a blood relationship the expressed filiation might signify adoption (not unknown in other cultures, such as the contemporary Romans across the Channel), thus creating a political stability through the expression of a putative family bond. However, this all still assumes that the Gallic Commius and the British Commius are the same person. A more radical assumption would be that the two are not related, but just two rulers who happen to share the same name.
Creighton (2006) argues that Commius the Gaul was appointed as a ‘friendly king’, a king that was a close political ally of the Roman; depending on the ruling Emperor at the time, sometimes little more than a puppet, administering his area in Rome’s interest at arms length. Again this cannot be ruled out, but there is no evidence to support it either. In fact it could be argued that somebody with the burning hatred ascribed to the Gallic Commius after the assassination attempt (he specifically stipulated to be allowed not ever to see another Roman, and Mark Antony deemed that reasonable), would be a strange choice for a friendly king in a newly acquired territory. It is also more common to appoint friendly kings from within the tribe. In Gaul Caesar appears predominately to choose candidates from inside the ruling families of their own tribes, so the sudden choice of a foreigner, not only not from the same tribe, but not even from the same area, appears to be somewhat far fetched.
But as Creighton points out he is not only Commius, but Commius the Atrebate, thus from the same tribe; and indeed other scholars have credited him with the creation of the Atrebatic kingdom, that eventually becomes the Atrebatic civitas, centred around Silchester. But again, in this case the evidence is actually arguing against it: Caesar (BG V.12) describes the population of Britain thus:
The interior of Britain is settled by those, who according to their own traditions, say that they are indigenous to the island. The coastal stretches (are settled) by those who came from Britain for loot and war (and nearly all of those are named after the names of the tribes, from which they came here) and having brought war, they remained here and began to work the fields.
This description described the situation before the second Caesarian invasion and recounts facts that appear to have happened some time before the arrival of Caesar, although the timeframe is unclear. What is important is that it is just as likely that the Atrebates were already a recognizable entity (and independent from the Gallic Atrebates) on the British side in 55/54BC. There would be no need for a foreign founder of a state to explain the existence of a tribe of the same name in Britain. Similar identities of tribal names are not uncommon: within Britain there are the Parisi, which have a parallel in Gaul (as the tribe in the area of modern Paris) and there appears to be a Brigantian tribe both in Ireland and northern Britain (as well as elsewhere in the Empire).
But if the name could occur more than once and there was already an explanation for the existence of British Atrebates, then Creighton’s ‘irresistible temptation’ to equate the name on the coins with the Gallic Commius just does not exist (2006, 22). In fact in many ways it would make for a more coherent argument for the existence of a client kingdom in the south of Britain before the Claudian conquest, if the Gallic resistance leader were just removed from the equation. Then the British Commius becomes an apparently influential but otherwise unknown king, who adopted new minting habits that made it easier for him to deal with the Roman traders.
Creighton proposed for Commius’ sons a Roman upbringing, as they are later able to adopt the same coin reverses as other client kings in the Roman Empire (2006, 24). This upbringing was apparently brought about by becoming the hostages demanded by Mark Antony in return for Gallic Commius’ good behaviour. Unfortunately, if we trust our historical sources, then the last view of Commius is that of somebody running away from the Romans, this does not come under good behaviour and would have seriously risked the life of any hostages that may have been given.
If on the other hand the Commius in question was an unrelated British king, then the hostage scenario would be a much more benign one, of the hostage-giving at whatever point Rome and the British Commius agreed to enter into a treaty, and leaves us without the need to apply special circumstances in the fraught situation of Commius’ escape.
Whichever scenario one prefers for the origin of the hostages, it is also the case that it was not beyond the power of Rome to suggest through their messengers and diplomats a suitable expression of loyalty, e.g. the striking of a specific coin type. This would completely remove the need for an expensive education of the British princes in Rome during the height of the Roman Civil War.
In conclusion, after reviewing the evidence it seems it cannot be ruled out that the two Commii may have been identical. But the balance of probabilities and the principle of Occam’s razor (which, put in simplified terms, suggests that all other things being equal the easiest explanation is usually the right one), makes the author wonder about the continued insistence on equating the two individuals, when two separate Commii, who happen to share the same name, would make the chronology and the ensuing events much easier to explain.