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Ancient Gallia Roman name for the province of Gaul (Latin: Gallia). The boundaries of Roman Gallia included the Atlantic Ocean on the west, the Rhine River and the Insula Batavorum on the north, the Rhenus and the Alps on the east, and the Pyrenees mountains on the south.
Gaul (Latin: Gallia) is a historical name used in the context of Ancient Rome in references to the region of Western Europe approximating present day France, Luxembourg and Belgium, most of Switzerland, the western part of Northern Italy, as well as the parts of the Netherlands and Germany on the left bank of the Rhine. - Wikipedia
Gallia or Gaul.
The southern part was made a Roman province, Narbonensis, 2d cent. B. C. ; the
rest was divided by Augustus, after the conquest by Caesar, into three
provinces, Aquitania, Lugdunensis, Belgica.
Lugdunum, Lyons. Massilia,
Marseilles. Narbo, Narbonne. Aquae
Sextiae, Aix. Tolosa, Toulouse.
Lutetia, Paris. Colonia Agrippina,
Cologne. Nemausus, Nismes.
Mountains: Jura. Vosegus, Vosges. Cebenna,
Cevennes.
Rivers: Mosella, Moselle. Mosa,
Meuse. Scaldis, Scheldt. Sequana,
Seine. Matrona, Marne.
Liger, Loire. Garumna, Garonne.
Rhodanus, Rhone. Arar, Saone.
Lakes: Lemanus, Geneva.
Armonca, Brittany and Normandy. � Allobroges,
Viennois. Arverni, Auvergne.
Aedui, Burgundy. Helvetii,
Switzerland. Sequani, Franche Comte.
Remi, Champagne. Nervii, Flanders.
- Ancient Geography
An extensive and populous country of Europe, bounded on the west by the Atlantic, on the north by the Insula Batavorum and part of the Rhenus (Rhine), on the east by the Rhenus and the Alps, and on the south by the Pyrenees. The greatest breadth was 600 English miles, but much diminished towards each extremity. Its length was from 480 to 620 miles. It was therefore more extensive than modern France before the Revolution, though inferior to the Empire under Napoleon I. Gaul was originally divided among the three great peoples�the Belgae, the Celtae, and the Aquitani. The Romans called the inhabitants of this country by one general name, Galli, while the Greeks styled them Κελταί. (See Celtae.) The Greeks called the country itself Galatia (Γαλατία) and Celtica (Κελτική). Of the three great nations of Gaul, the Celtae were the most extensive and the Belgae the bravest. The Belgae and Celtae were of like blood, though differing in temperament, the Belgae being more staid and less impulsive and vivacious, while the Celtae showed the mercurial disposition of the modern French. The Aquitani, on the south, were of a different (Iberian) stock, unlike the rest of the Gauls both physically and temperamentally, being dark of complexion, less sociable, and somewhat less intelligent, but more tenacious of purpose and enduring� traits which still mark the inhabitants of the Basque provinces to-day. The Celtae extended from the Sequana (Seine) in the north to the Garumna (Garonne) in the south. Above the Celtae lay the Belgae, between the Seine and the Lower Rhine. They were intermixed with Germanic tribes. The Aquitani lay between the Garonne and the Pyrenees, and were intermingled with Spanish tribes. These three great divisions, however, were subsequently altered by Augustus (B.C. 27), who extended Aquitania into Celtica as far as the Liger or Loire; the remainder of Gallia Celtica above the Liger was called Gallia Lugdunensis, from the colony of Lugdunum (Lyons); while the territory towards the Rhine was added to the Belgae under the title of Gallia Belgĭca. Lastly, the south of Gaul, which, from having been the first provinces possessed by the Romans, had been styled Gallia Provincia, was distinguished by the name of Narbonensis, from the city of Narbo (Narbonne). This province was also anciently called Gallia Bracata, from the bracae or trousers worn by the inhabitants; while Gallia Celtica was styled Comata, from the long hair (coma) worn by the natives. These four great provinces, in later ages, were called the four Gauls, and subdivided into seventeen others.
As far back as one can penetrate into the history of the West, we find the race of the Gauls occupying that part of the continent comprehended between the Rhine, the Alps, the Mediterranean, the Pyrenees, and the Ocean, as well as the two great islands situated to the northwest, opposite the mouths of the Rhine and Seine. Of these two islands, the one nearer the continent was called Alb-in, �White Island� (cf. the remark of Pliny , Pliny H. N. xiv. 16, Albion insula, sic dicta ab albis rupibus quas mare alluit�). The other island bore the name of Er-in, �Isle of the West� (from Eir or Iar, �the west�). The continental territory received the special appellation of Galltachd, �Land of the Gauls.� From this word the Greeks formed Γαλατία, and from this latter the generic name of Γαλάται. The Romans proceeded by an inverse method, and from the generic term Galli deduced the geographical denomination Gallia.
The population of Gaul was divided into families or tribes, forming among themselves many distinct communities or nations. Oftentimes they united together, in their turn, and formed confederations or leagues. Such were the confederations of the Celtae, Aedui, Armorici, Arverni, etc.
The Gaul was robust and of tall stature. His complexion was fair, his eyes blue, his hair of a blond or chestnut colour, to which he endeavoured to give a red or flaming hue by certain applications (Pliny , Pliny H. N. xxviii. 12; Mart.viii. 33). The hair itself was worn long (Diod. Sic.v. 28). The beard was allowed to grow by the people at large; the nobles, on the other hand, removed it from the face, excepting the upper lip, where they wore thick moustaches. The attire common to all the tribes consisted of trousers or bracae (Armoric). These were of striped materials. They wore also a short cloak, having sleeves, likewise formed of striped materials, and descending to the middle of the thigh. Over this was thrown a short cloak or sagum (sae, Armoric; cf. Isidor. Orig. xix. 24), striped like the shirt, or else adorned with flowers and other ornamental work, and, among the rich, superbly embroidered with silver and gold (Verg. Aen. viii. 660; Sil. Ital. iv. 152; Diod. Sic.v. 28). It covered the back and shoulders, and was secured under the chin by a clasp of metal. The lower classes, however, wore in place of it the skin of some animal, or else a thick and coarse woolen covering. The offensive arms of the nation were, at first, hatchets and knives of stone; arrows pointed with flint or shells; clubs; spears hardened in the fire, and named ga�s (in Latin gaesum, in Greek γαισόν and γαισός); and others called cate�a, which they hurled while on fire against the enemy. Foreign traffic, however, made them acquainted, in process of time, with arms of iron, as well as with the art of manufacturing them for themselves from the copper and iron of their own mines. Among the arms of metal which thenceforward came into use may be mentioned the long sabre of iron or copper and a pike resembling the halberd, the wound inflicted by which was considered mortal. For a long time the Transalpine as well as the Cisalpine warriors of the Gallic race had rejected the use of defensive armour as inconsistent with true courage, and a point of honour had induced them even to strip off their vestments and engage naked with the foe. This prejudice, however, was almost entirely effaced in the second century when the military costume of Rome and Greece formed a singular combination with the ancient array of the Gaul. To a helmet of metal, of greater or less value according to the fortune of the warrior, were attached the horns of an elk, buffalo, or stag; while for the rich there was a headpiece representing some bird or savage beast, the whole being surmounted by a bunch of feathers, which gave to the warrior a gigantic appearance (Diod. Sic.v. 28). Similar figures were attached to their bucklers, which were long, quadrangular, and painted with the brightest colours. A buckler and casque after this model, a cuirass of wrought metal, after the Greek and Roman fashion, or a coat of mail formed of iron rings, after the manner of Gaul (Varr. L. L. iv. 20); an enormous sabre hanging on the right thigh, and suspended by chains of iron or brass from a belt glittering with gold and silver, and adorned with coral; a collar, bracelets, rings of gold around the arm and on the middle finger (Pliny, xxxiii. 1); trousers; a sagum hanging from the shoulder; and long red moustaches�such was the Gallic warrior.
Hardy, daring, impetuous, born, as it were, for martial achievements, the Gallic race possessed, at the same time, an ingenious and active turn of mind. They were not slow in equalling their Ph�nician and Grecian instructors in the art of mining. The same superiority to which the Spaniards had attained in tempering steel, the Gauls acquired in the preparation of brass. Antiquity assigns to them the honour of various useful inventions, which had hitherto escaped the earlier civilization of the East and of Italy. The process of tinning was discovered by the Bituriges; that of veneering by the Aedui (Pliny , Pliny H. N. xxxiv. 17). The dyes, too, of Gaul were not without reputation (Pliny, viii. 48). In agriculture, the wheelplough and boulter were Gallic discoveries (Pliny , Pliny H. N. xviii. 18; xviii. 11). With the Gauls, too, originated the employment of marl for enriching the soil (Pliny xviii. 6 foll.). The cheeses of Mount Loz�re, among the Gabali; those of Nemausus; and two kinds made among the Alps, became, in time, much sought after by the inhabitants of Italy (Pliny, xi. 49). The Gauls also prepared various kinds of fermented drinks, such as barley-beer, called cervisia (Pliny, xxii. 15); and likewise another kind of beer, made from corn, and in which honey, cumin, and other ingredients were mingled. (See Cervisia.) The froth of beer was employed as a means for leavening bread: it was used also as a cosmetic, and the Gallic women frequently applied it to the face, under the belief that it imparted a freshness to the complexion (Pliny, xxii. 25). It was from the Greeks of Massilia that they learned the process of making wine, as well as the culture of the grape.
The dwellings of the Gauls, spacious and of a round form, were constructed of posts and hurdles, and covered with clay both within and without; a large roof, composed of oak-shingles and stubble, or of straw cut and kneaded with clay, covered the whole (Vitruv. i. 1). Gaul contained both open villages and cities: the latter, surrounded by walls, were defended by a system of fortification, of which we find no example elsewhere. Caesar gives a description of these ramparts (B. G. vii. 23). To the north and east, among the more savage tribes, there were no cities properly so called; the inhabitants resided for the most part in large enclosures, formed of trunks of trees.
It was, as has been already remarked, in war, and in the arts applicable to war, that the genius of the Gauls displayed itself to most advantage. This people made war a regular profession, while the management of arms became their favourite employment. To have a fine martial mien, to retain for a long period strength and agility of body, was not only a point of honour for individuals, but a duty to the State. At regular intervals, the young men went to measure their size by a girdle deposited with the chief of the village, and those whose corpulence exceeded the official standard were severely reprimanded as idle and intemperate persons, and were, besides, punished with a heavy fine. In preparing for foreign expeditions, a chieftain of acknowledged valour generally formed a small army around him, consisting, for the most part, of adventurers and volunteers who had flocked to his standard; these were to share with him whatever booty might be obtained. In internal wars, however, or defensive ones of any importance, levies of men were forcibly made; and severe punishments were inflicted on the refractory, such as the loss of noses, ears, an eye, or some one of the limbs (B. G. vi. 4). If any dangerous crisis arrived, the supreme chief convened an armed council (B. G. v. 66). All persons able to bear arms were compelled to assemble at the place and day indicated, for the purpose of deliberating on the situation of the country, of electing a chief, and of discussing the plan of campaign. It was expressly provided by law that the individual who came last to the place of rendezvous should be cruelly tortured in the presence of the assembled multitude (B. G. v. 66). This form of assembly was, however, of rare occurrence, and was only resorted to in the last extremity. Neither infirmities nor age freed the Gallic noble from the necessity of accepting or seeking military commands. Oftentimes were seen, at the head of the forces, chieftains hoary and almost enfeebled by age, who could even scarcely retain their seats on the horse which supported them (B. G. viii. 12). This people would have believed that they dishonoured their aged warriors by making them die elsewhere than on the field of battle.
To the ferocity of the attack and to the violence of the first shock were reduced nearly all the military tactics of the Gauls on level ground and in pitched battle. In the mountainous regions, on the other hand, and especially in the vast and thick forests of the North, war had a close resemblance to the chase: it was prosecuted in small parties, by ambuscades and all sorts of stratagems; and dogs, trained up to pursue men, tracked out and aided in conquering the foe (Silius Ital. x. 77; Ovid, Met. i. 533; Mart.iii. 47). A Gallic army generally carried along with it a multitude of chariots for the baggage, which embarrassed its march (B. G. viii. 14; B. G. i. 51). Each warrior bore a bundle of straw, put up like a sack, on which he was accustomed to sit in the encampment, or even in the line of battle while waiting the signal to engage (B. G. viii. 15).
The Gauls, like other nations, for a long period were in the habit of killing their prisoners of war, either by crucifixion, or by tying them to trees as a mark for their weapons, or by consigning them to the flames amid cruel rites. Long prior, however, to the second century of our era, these barbarous practices were laid aside, and the captives of transalpine nations had nothing to fear but servitude. Another custom, not less savage, that of cutting off the heads of their slain enemies on the field of battle, was not slower in disappearing. It was long a settled rule in all wars that the victorious army should possess itself of such trophies as these; the common soldiers fixed them on the points of their spears, the horsemen wore them suspended by the hair from their horses; and in this way the conquerors returned to their homes, making the air resound with their triumphal shouts. Each one then hastened to nail up these hideous testimonials of his valour to the gate of his dwelling; and, as the same thing was done with the trophies of the chase, a Gallic village bore a strong resemblance to a charnel-house. Carefully embalmed and saturated with oil of cedar, the heads of hostile chieftains and of famous warriors were deposited in large coffers, and arranged by their possessor according to the date of acquisition. Sometimes the skull, cleansed and set in gold or silver, served as a cup in the temples, or circulated in the festivities of the banquet, and the guests drank out of it to the glory of the victor and the triumphs of their country. These fierce and brutal manners prevailed for a long period over the whole of Gaul. Civilization, in its on ward march, abolished them by degrees, until, at the commencement of the second century, they were confined to the savage tribes of the North and West. It was there that Posidonius found them still existing in all their vigour, when the sight of so many human heads, disfigured by outrages and blackened by the air and the rain, roused in him mingled emotions of horror and disgust.
The Gauls affected, as more manly in its character, a strong and rough tone of voice (Diod. Sic.v. 31). They conversed but little, and by means of short and concise phrases, which the constant use of metaphors and hyperboles rendered obscure and almost unintelligible to strangers. But, when once animated by dispute, or incited by something that was calculated to interest or arouse, at the head of armies or in political assemblies, they expressed themselves with copiousness and fluency.
The Gauls, in general, were accused of drinking to excess�a habit which took its rise both in the grossness of their manners and in the wants of a cold and humid climate. The Massilian and Italian traders were not slow in furnishing the necessary means for the indulgence of this vice. Cargoes of wine found their way, by means of the navigable rivers, into the very heart of the country. Drink was also conveyed over land in wagons (Diod. Sic.v. 26). About the first century, however, of our era, drunkenness began gradually to disappear from among the higher classes, and to be confined to the lower orders, at least with the nations of the South and East.
Milk and the flesh of animals, especially that of swine, formed the principal food of the Gauls. A curious account of their repasts is given by Posidonius (ap. Athen. iv. p. 13). After an excessive indulgence in the pleasures of the banquet, they loved to seize their arms and defy each other to the combat. At first it was only a sportive encounter; but, if either party chanced to be wounded, passion got so far the better of them that, unless separated by their friends, they continued to engage till one or the other of them was slain. So far, indeed, did they carry their contempt of death and their ostentatious display of courage, that they might be seen agreeing, for a certain sum of money or for so many measures of wine, to let themselves be slain by others; mounted on some elevated place, they distributed the liquor or gold among their most intimate friends, and then reclining on their bucklers, presented their throats to the sword ( Posidon. l. c.). Others made it a point of honour not to retire from their dwellings when falling in upon them, nor from the flames, nor from the tides of ocean and the inundations of rivers; and it is to this foolish daring that the Gauls owed their fabulous renown of being an impious race, who lived in open war with nature.
The working of mines, and certain monopolies enjoyed by the heads of tribes, had placed in the hands of some individuals enormous capital; hence the reputation for opulence which Gaul enjoyed at the period of the Roman invasion, and even still later. It was the Peru of the ancient world. The riches of Gaul even passed into a proverb (Ioseph. ii. 28; Caes.; Caes., etc.). Posidonius makes mention of a certain Luern or Luer (Λουέρνιος, Posidon. ap. Athen. iv. p. 13; Λουέριος, Strab. 191), king of the Arverni, who caused a shower of gold and silver to descend upon the crowd as often as he appeared in public. He also gave entertainments in a rude style of barbarian magnificence; a large space of ground was enclosed for the purpose, and cisterns were dug in it, which were filled with wine, mead, and beer.
Properly speaking, there was no domestic union or family intercourse among the Gallic nations; the women were held in dependence and servitude. The husband had the power of life and death over his wife as well as over his offspring. When a person of high rank suddenly died, and the cause of his death was not clearly ascertained, his wife or wives (for polygamy was practised among the rich) were seized and put to the torture; if the least suspicion was excited of their having been privy to his death, the victims perished in the midst of the flames, after the most frightful punishments (B. G. vi. 19). One custom, however, shows that even then the condition of women had undergone some degree of melioration: this was the community of goods between husband and wife. The children remained under the care of their mother until the age of puberty (B. G. vi. 18).
Among some nations of Belgic Gaul, where the Rhine was an object of superstitious adoration, a curious custom prevailed; the river was made the means of testing the fidelity of the wives. When a husband had doubts respecting its paternity, he took the new-born infant, placed it on a board, and exposed it to the current of the stream. If the plank and its helpless burden floated safely upon the waters, the result was deemed favourable, and all the father's suspicions were dissipated. If, on the contrary, the plank began to sink, the infant perished, and the parent's suspicions were confirmed.
Government and Religion.�Two privileged orders ruled in Gaul over the rest of the population �the priests and the nobles. The people at large were divided into two classes�the inhabitants of the country and the residents of cities. The former of these constituted the tribes or clients appertaining to noble families. The client cultivated his patron's domains, followed his standard in war, and was bound to defend him with his life. To abandon his patron in the hour of peril was regarded as the blackest of crimes. The residents of cities, on the other hand, found themselves beyond the control of this system of clientship, and, consequently, enjoyed greater freedom. Below the mass of the people were the slaves, who do not appear, however, to have been at any time very numerous.
When we examine attentively the character of the facts relative to the religious belief of Gaul, we are led to recognize the existence of two classes of ideas, two systems of symbols and superstitions entirely distinct from each other; in a word, two religions�one, altogether reasonable in its character, based on the personification of natural phenomena and recalling by its forms much of the polytheism of Greece; the other, founded on a material, metaphysical, mysterious, and sacerdotal pantheism, presenting at least a superficial conformity with the religions of the East. This latter has received the name of Druidism, from the Druids, who were its first founders and priests; the other system has been called the Gallic Polytheism. (See Druidae.) Druidism was said to have been established in Gaul by Heus or Hesus, a warrior and law-giver who was subsequently deified. The polytheistic system which prevailed, more especially in Southern Gaul, was fundamentally like that of the Greeks and Romans themselves. In its list of deities were Tarann, the god of thunder, the Gallic Zeus, though in parts of Gaul Hesus held this supremacy; Pennin, the god of the mountains (Livy, xxi. 38); Bel or Belew, the sun-god, the Gallic Apollo (Auson. Carm. 2); Teutates, the Gallic Hermes, presiding over the useful arts and commerce (Fel. Minuc. 30; Lactant. Div. Inst. i. 21); Ogmius, represented as leading a train of captives by chains of gold and amber proceeding from his mouth, typifying the power of eloquence; and Arduenna, the goddess of the forests. These deities, as was natural, were identified by Caesar with the gods of the Roman system (B. G. vi. 7).
The God Tarann. (Gadoz, Relig. Gaul.
pl. i.)
This resemblance between the two systems of religion changed into identity when Gaul, subjected to the dominion of Rome, had felt for some years the influence of Roman ideas. It was then that the Gallic polytheism, honoured and favoured by the emperors, ended its career by becoming totally merged in the polytheism of Italy; while, on the other hand, Druidism, its mysteries, its doctrine, and its priesthood, were utterly proscribed. See Druidae.
General History.�The history of Gaul divides itself naturally into four periods. The first of these comprises the movements of the Gallic tribes while yet in their nomadic state. None of the races of the West ever passed through a more agitated or brilliant career. Their course embraced Europe, Asia, and Africa; their name is recorded with terror in the annals of almost every nation. They burned Rome; they wrested Macedonia from the veteran legions of Alexander; they forced Thermopylae and pillaged Delphi; they then proceeded to pitch their tents on the plains of the Troad, in the broad parks of Miletus, on the borders of the Sangarius, and those of the Nile. They besieged Carthage, menaced Memphis, and numbered among their tributaries the most powerful monarchs of the East; they founded in Upper Italy a powerful empire, and in the bosom of Phrygia they reared another�Galatia, which for a long time exercised its sway over the whole of Lower Asia. See Galatia.
During the Second Period�that of their sedentary state�we see the gradual development of social, religious, and political institutions, conformable to their peculiar character as a people; institutions original in their nature, and a civilization full of movement and of life, of which Transalpine Gaul offers the purest and most complete model. One might say, in following the animated scenes of this picture, that the theocracy of India, the feudal system of the Middle Ages, and the Athenian democracy had met on the same soil for the purpose of contending with each other and reigning by turns. Soon this civilization undergoes a change; foreign elements are introduced, brought in by commerce, by the relations of neighbourhood, by reaction from subjugated nations. Hence arose and multiplied a variety of social combinations. In Italy it is the Roman influence that exerts itself on the manners and institutions of the Gauls; in the south of Gaul it is that of the Massiliots; while in Phrygia one finds a most singular compound of Gallic, Grecian, and Phrygian civilization. To this succeeds the Third Period in the history of the Gallic race�that of national struggles and subjugation. By a singular coincidence, it is always by the Roman sword that the power of the Gallic tribes is destined to fall; in proportion as the Roman dominion extends, that of the Gauls recedes and declines. It would seem, indeed, that the victors and the vanquished, in the battle on the banks of the Allia, followed each other over the whole earth to decide the ancient quarrel of the Capitol. In Italy, the Cisalpine Gauls were reduced, but only after two centuries of obstinate resistance. When the rest of Asia had submitted to the yoke, the Galatae still defended against Rome the independence of the East. Gaul eventually fell, but through complete exhaustion, after a century of partial conflicts and nine years of general war under Caesar. Finally, the names of Caractacus and Galgacus shed a splendour on the last and ineffectual efforts of Keltic freedom. It is everywhere an unequal conflict between ardent and undisciplined valour on the one hand, and cool and steady perseverance on the other. The Fourth Period comprehends the organization of Gaul into a Roman province, and the gradual assimilation of transalpine manners to the customs and institutions of Italy�a work commenced by Augustus and completed by Claudius. See Thierry, Histoire des Gaulois (1827, last ed. 1872); the Recueil des Historiens des Gaules et de la France, edited by Bouquet and others, 26 vols. (1738-1885); Marin de Tyr, La France avant C�sar (Paris, 1865); De la Forte Maison, Les Francs (Paris, 1868); Godwin, Hist. of France, vol. i. (New York, 1860), the best account of ancient Gaul in the English language; Martin, Histoire de France (4th ed. 1865); Fauriel, Histoire de la Gaule M�ridionale (Paris, 1836); Coulanges, Histoire des Institutiones Politiques de l'Ancienne France (Paris, 1877); and the authors cited in the articles Celtae and Druidae (q. v.). - Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities. New York. Harper and Brothers.
Gaul (Latin: Gallia) is a historical name used in the context of Ancient Rome in references to the region of Western Europe approximating present day France, Luxembourg and Belgium, most of Switzerland, the western part of Northern Italy, as well as the parts of the Netherlands and Germany on the left bank of the Rhine.
The Roman proconsul and general Julius Caesar pushed his
army into Gaul in 58 BC, on the pretext of assisting Rome's Gaullish allies
against the migrating Helvetii. With the help of various Gallic tribes (for
example, the Aedui) he managed to conquer nearly all of Gaul. But the Arverni
tribe, under Chieftain Vercingetorix, still defied Roman rule. Julius Caesar was
checked by Vercingetorix at a siege of Gergorvia, a fortified town in the center
of Gaul. Caesar's alliances with many Gallic tribes broke. Even the Aedui, their
most faithful supporters, threw in their lot with the Arverni but the ever loyal
Remi (best known for its cavalry) and Lingones sent troops to support Caesar.
The Germans of the Ubii also sent cavalry which Caesar equipped with Remi
horses. Caesar captured Vercingetorix in the Battle of Alesia, which ended the
majority of Gallic resistance to Rome.
As many as a million people (probably 1 in 5 of the Gauls) died, another million
were enslaved, 300 tribes were subjugated and 800 cities were destroyed during
the Gallic Wars. The entire population of the city of Avaricum (Bourges) (40,000
in all) were slaughtered.[7] During Julius Caesar's campaign against the
Helvetii (present-day Switzerland) approximately 60% of the tribe was destroyed,
and another 20% was taken into slavery...
The Gaulish culture then was massively submerged by Roman culture, Latin was adopted by the Gauls, Gaul, or Gallia, was absorbed into the Roman Empire, all the administration changed and Gauls eventually became Roman citizens.[8] From the 3rd to 5th centuries, Gaul was exposed to raids by the Franks. The Gallic Empire broke away from Rome from 260 to 273, consisting of the provinces of Gaul, Britannia, and Hispania, including the peaceful Baetica in the south. - Wikipedia
Gallia GA�LLIA CISALPI�NA
GA�LLIA CISALPI�NA (Caes. Gal. 6.1), also called GA�LLIA CITE�RIOR (Caes. Gal.
1.54; Cic. de Invent. 2.3. 7), and simply GA�LLIA (Cic. ad Farm. 12.5), is the
name which the Romans gave to North Italy as late as the time of the dictator
Caesar and Cicero, and even to B.C. 43. Caesar (Caes. Gal. 1.10, 54; 2.35)
sometimes includes Gallia Cisalpina under the name Italia; but he then uses the
term in a geographical, and not in a political sense. The name Cisalpina denoted
Gallia south of the Alps, as opposed to Transalpina Gallia, or Gallia north of
the Alps; and Citerior is the nearer Gallia, as opposed to Ulterior (Caes. Gal.
1.7, 10; B.C. 1.33) or the further, which in Caesar means the Provincia.
Ulterior Gallia was also used sometimes generally, to signify all Gallia north
of the Alps. The name Gallia Togata, applied to Cisalpine Gallia [1.935] which
occurs in the eighth book of the Gallic War (8.24, 52), and in later writers,
was given at some time after the country was settled by the Romans, and it
indicated the numerical superiority of the Togati or Romans over the Gallic
population. The inhabitants north of the Po were sometimes called Transpadani (Cic.
Fam. 16.1. 2), a term which implies Cispadani, or the inhabitants south of the
Po; but there does not appear to be any Latin authority for the word Cispadani.
Among the various names by which the Greek writers designate this country, some
are simply descriptive of its geographical position, and others represent the
Roman names. Plutarch (Plut. Caes. 100.20) calls it ἡ περὶ Πάδον Γαλατία; but
there is no Latin authority for the name Circumpadana. Walckenaer conjectures
that the names Gallia Circumpadana, Transpadana, and Cispadana are older than
the term Gallia Cisalpina; and if he could prove that all these terms were used,
we might accept his hypothesis. Livy (21.35) calls the plains about the Po
�Circumpadanos campos.�
Polybius names this country both Κελτική and Γαλατία (3.77, 87); but though he
applies the Latin word Transalpini to the Galli north of the Alps, and explains
it (3.15) as a term in use in his time, he does not use the word Cisalpini, or
any equivalent Greek word. He comprehends this Celtice or Galatia in the
geographical term Italia, and describes it as a part of the Italian peninsula.
We may conclude that the term Gallia Cisalpina was not used by the Romans before
they were acquainted with Gallia Transalpina; and that the oldest name of North
Italy among the Romans was simply Gallia. The fact that the Romans gave the name
of Gallia to the chief part of the basin of the Po, and the name of Galli to the
people, would be some evidence of the identity of the Galli north and south of
the Alps. We have no historical evidence of the emigration of the Galli into
Italy before the time that Livy mentions; but there was a tradition, partially
preserved, that this was not the first time that the nation appeared south of
the Alps. Cornelius Bocchus proved that the Umbri were of the stock of the Galli
Veteres. (Solinus, Polyhist. 100.8.) Servius (ad Virg. Aen. 12.753), using
nearly the same words as Solinus, refers to Marcus Antoninus as his authority,
by which name is meant M. Antonius Gnipho. It appears, then, that some of the
Roman men of letters believed that the ancient nation of the Umbri were Galli
Veteres; but we know nothing of the facts which led to this conclusion. Nor do
we know who the Galli Veteres were; but we may suppose that these writers meant
a nation of Galli who were in Italy before the Galli who crossed the Alps at a
later period. There are no means of approximating to a solution of this
question, except by a comparison of the old Italian languages with the existing
Cumri (Welsh), or with the Gaelic, and by an examination of the names of the
mountains, rivers, and other natural features of the Italian peninsula, which we
may assume to be the oldest historical records that exist of the inhabitants of
Italy. There is no ancient language of Italy, except the Latin, of which we have
any competent knowledge; and there is no ancient language now known, with which
we can compare the Latin and the names in the Italian peninsula, except the
Basque, the Cumri, and the Gaelic dialects. This comparison has been made, to
some extent, for the Cumri, by Archdeacon Williams, who is well acquainted with
the Welsh language. (On one source of the non-Hellenic portion of the Latin
language, by the Rev. Archdeacon Williams, Transact. of the Royal Society of
Edinburgh, vol. xiii.) In this essay the author limits himself, as he states,
�to the subject of the original population of Central Italy,� of which he
affirms, �that it was of the Cumrian or Cimbrian race, cognate with the Cumri of
our island, and that their language formed some portion of the non-Hellenic
elements of the Latin tongue.� The question is one that requires great nicety in
dealing with, for resemblances of words are very deceptive; but it is a fair
conclusion that we cannot absolutely reject as a probable hypothesis, the
existence of a people in the peninsula long before all historical periods
commence, whose language was nearly related to some one or all of the languages
which come under the general denomination of Celtic. The great mountain-range
which forms the back-bone of the peninsula has a pure Celtic name, A-penninus;
for whether the A is a euphonic prefix, or whether we prefer the form
Ap-penninus, and consider the Ap to be significant, we have in either case the
root Pen, �a summit,� which appears in the Alpes Penninae, and in numerous
mountain names in Great Britain. The names of rivers in the basin of the Po, and
as far as the limits of Central Italy at least, the Duria, Stura, Tura, Turia,
Athesis, Bedesis, Medoacus, Aesis, Tinia, Ausar, and many others, are either
precisely the same with the names of many rivers in France and Great Britain, or
may be reduced to the same forms by a perfectly fair process. (See Mr.
Williams's Essay.)
The Romans, after they had got a footing in Transalpine Gallia, often recognised
the Aedui, a people once the chief of all Gallia, as their �brethren and
kinsmen� (Caes. Gal. 1.43); and this has been used as evidence that the Romans
thought the relationship to be proved, or they would not have given such a title
to barbarians, and those who were their greatest enemies. If the relationship
did exist, we must of course go a long way back for its origin, to the
ante-historical times when a Roman nation rose out of a mixture of races, one of
which was Celtic. But this fraternising with the Aedui seems as easy to be
explained, as the kinship of the Romans and the Segestani of Sicily through
their common ancestor Aeneas. (Cic. Ver. 2.4 100.33.) It may be observed, that
if we admit the probability of Celtic nations (Galli Veteres) having existed in
Italy before the great invasion which Livy mentions. (5.34), this probability is
not diminished by the fact of the Galli Veteres not having maintained themselves
as a nation; unless they be the Umbri, as to which we shall never make all the
learned agree. For the Galli have not been able to fix themselves permanently
anywhere out of their native limits; and their second settlement in Italy,
recorded by Polybius and Livy (admitting the fact of a prior settlement) was
ultimately unsuccessful. The proof of some Celtic nation having been in the
peninsula long before all historical times, rests on the incorruptible evidence
of the geographical names of the peninsula.
The authorities which Livy followed state that the great immigration of the
Galli into Italy took place in the reign of the Roman king Tarquinius Priscus,
at which time the Bituriges in the basin of the Loire were the dominant people
in Transalpine Gallia. The causes of the emigration were excessive population (Liv.
5.34), or, as Trogus, Justin�s authority, says, civil commotions. The cause is
not very material, [1.936] nor can we with certainty say what it was; but it may
have been both these causes, and something else. The Galli have always been a
military people; and the desire of active employment, the weariness of doing
nothing, and the hope of plunder would at any time be sufficient to put their
fighting men in motion. Two chieftains led the emigrants. Sigovesus conducted
his men into Germany, into the great Hercynian forest. Livy does not mention
what tribes accompanied him; nor is it certain whether he is following the same
authority as Caesar (Caes. Gal. 6.24), who speaks of the Gallic settlements in
the Hercynian forest. Bellovesus, the other chief, led to the conquest of North
Italy, Bituriges, Arverni, Senones, Aedui, Ambarri, Carnutes, and Aulerci, all
which nations belonged to that division of Gallia which Caesar calls the country
of the Celtae (1.1). The invaders entered Italy by the Taurinus Saltus, or the
pass of Mont Gen�vre, and defeated the Tuscans or Etruscans, who then held the
plain of the Po, not far from the banks of the Ticinus. Finding here a people
named Insubres, which was also the name of a pagus of the Aedui, they built a
city and called it Mediolanum (Milan). The Insubres of Gallia Transalpina are
only known from this passage; but there was a Mediolanum near Lugdunum, and it
is supposed that this place may mark the position of the pagus of the Insubres.
Of the names, of all these tribes mentioned by Livy, not one appears in the
geography of Italy except that of the Senones, and the country which the Senones
occupied was south of the Po. Livy, or the authorities that he followed,
probably attempted to explain the origin of the Cisalpine tribe of the Insubres
or Isombri (Ἴσομβροι) as the Greek writers call them, by the clumsy expedient of
supposing all these invading tribes to have changed their name for one that they
found on the spot, which happened to be the name of a small Transalpine pagus.
But Livy has not explained the origin of the Insubres; and if the Insubres were
in North Italy before this invasion, and were a Celtic people, they must have
come in a former immigration; and if Is-umbri is the genuine form of the word,
we may assume that they were Umbri, who had long been settled in the basin of
the Po. Indeed, if we look carefully at Livy's narrative, we shall see that he
does not say that these Insubres whom the invaders found in Italy were Galli;
nor does he say who they were. He lets all the names of the invaders disappear,
and that of the Insubres remain in their place. Yet the Insubres were Galli
beyond all doubt. Polybius merely fixes the position of the Insubres as one of
the Gallic nations of Cisalpine Italy. The name appears in his text in various
forms. Strabo has the Roman form Insubri, and in one place Σύμβροι (p. 218; and
Groskurd's Note, Transl. Strab. vol. i. p. 373).
A new band according to Livy's authorities soon crossed the Alps by the same
pass, the Cenomani (Liv. 5.35) under Elitovius, and occupied the places where in
Livy's time Brixia (Brescia) and Verona were: the Libui were the previous
occupiers of these parts. Livy may not have perceived that he has already
mentioned (5.34) the Aulerci as Gallic invaders of Italy, and that the Cenomani
were a division of the Aulerci. [CENOMANI] Cato found a tradition somewhere (Plin.
Nat. 3.19) that the Cenomani once dwelt near Massilia (Marseille) in the country
of the Volcae, which, if the tradition is true, may have been during their
migration from their original country between the Loire and the Seine. The
Cenomani (Livy) were followed by the Salluvii, who settled near �an ancient
people, Laevi, Ligures,� as some texts have it, �who dwelt about the river
Ticinus.� But here Livy has not observed, though he knew the fact, that the
Salluvii or Salyes were Ligurians, and dwelt between the Lower Rhone and the
Alps. In this passage (5.35) perhaps he may mean the Salassi.
Another band of invaders, Boii and Lingones, crossed the Alps by the Pennine
pass (the Great St. Bernard), and finding all the country occupied between the
Alps and the Po, they passed the river on rafts, and drove out of the country
both Etruscans and Umbri; but they did not advance beyond the Apennines. (Liv.
5.35.) The position of the Gallic Lingones of Caesar's time is marked by the
site of Langres, in the country at the head of the Sa�ne; but the original
country of the Boii [BOII] is uncertain. The Senones (Liv. 5.35) were the last
invaders, and they occupied the coast of the Adriatic from the river Utis (Montone)
to the Aesis (Esino), which is a little north of Ancona. Livy has already
mentioned Senones among the first invaders. The Senones and Lingones were also
Celtae; and the Senones were from the basin of the Seine. All the tribes which
Livy here enumerates appear in Caesar's history of the Gallic War, except the
Insubres, and the Salluvii, who were in Caesar's time within the limits of the
Provincia.
At the time of the Gallic invasion the Tuscans, who were the masters of this
country, had built many towns, cleared the forests, cut canals, and made
embankments; at least, tradition assigned to them the credit of doing this.
Polybius (2.17) assigns a very simple cause to the Gallic invasions of this fine
country. The Galli had often crossed the Alps to trade with the inhabitants of
the plains, and they soon found a pretext for seizing this land of plenty, as
they have done since. Mantua, one of the old Tuscan towns north of the Po (Plin.
Nat. 3.19), survived the Gallic invasion, being probably saved by its position
amidst marshes; but Melpum (as it stands in Pliny's text, 3.17), one of the
richest Tuscan cities, was destroyed by the Insubres, Boii, and Senones, on the
day on which Camillus took Veii. The description which Polybius gives of the
habits of these Transalpine nations (2.17) is just what we might expect. They
lived in unwalled villages,--in houses of some kind, we must suppose, or they
could not have been villages,--but they had no household stuff: their bed was
straw, leaves, or grass, and flesh their food; their only business and all that
they understood was agriculture and war. Their agriculture did not consist in
tilling the ground, but in feeding sheep and cattle, which, with gold, formed
their wealth, because these were the things that they could most easily carry
about with them: the chiefs were most concerned to have a large train of
followers, for a man was feared and respected in proportion to the number of
folk that he had about him. Such a people would not found towns on their first
invasion of Italy: indeed, the founding of towns would have been useless, for
they did not live in them, and if they had chosen that mode of life they might
have been content with the Tuscan cities. Livy's story of the foundation of
Mediolanum, Brixia, and Verona is a fable; and yet Mediolanum at least is an
undoubted Gallic name, for there are several cities in Transalpine Gallia called
Mediolanum; and Brixia and Verona are probably Gallic too.
These audacious barbarians levied contributions on [1.937] all their neighbours.
The most memorable event in the early history of Rome is the capture of the city
by a band of these Italian Galli, who, after threatening Clusium (Liv. 5.33),
turned their arms against the Romans, who had taken this Etruscan city under
their protection. The Galli and the Romans first tried their strength on the
Allia, a small affluent of the Tiber. The Romans were defeated, and this was for
ever a black day in their calendar (B.C. 390). The capture of Rome and the siege
of the Capitol by the Galli were embellished with the fiction that characterises
all the early Roman history. To the Galli this was no more than one of their
ordinary marauding expeditions. An invasion of the lands of the Galli by their
neighbours the Veneti is assigned as the immediate cause of their retreat from
Rome. Domestic quarrels kept them at home for some time; and they had also
enemies around them. The Galli had become possessed of the plains only, and the
mountaineers of the Alps knew the value of plunder as well as the Galli. They
were probably kept fully employed in taking care of themselves for the space of
thirty years that elapsed between the capture of Rome and the next expedition to
the south. But, from the time of their little city being sacked, the Romans knew
that they had an enemy whom they must destroy, or perish themselves. �Gallicus
tumultus,� or simply �tumultus,� was the name that they gave to a hostile
movement of the Gallic tribes of North Italy. This was the signal to prepare for
a desperate fight (Liv. 8.20); for with the Galli, says Sallust, the Romans
fought for their existence, not for glory (Bell. Jug. 100.114). They set apart a
reserved treasure in the Capitol for the emergencies of a Gallic war; for the
fear of the Galli seems to have been the origin of the aerarium sanctius, as it
was sometimes called. (Appian, App. BC 2.41; Liv. 27.10.)
Thirty years after the capture of Rome, as Polybius (2.18, 19) fixes the time,
the Galli came again with a large force as far as Alba, and the Romans were
afraid to meet them. The historian does not say how long they staid in the
neighbourhood of Rome; but, as he says that they came twelve years afterwards
with a great force, we may infer that they staid the first time as long as the
country could maintain them. The second time that they came the Romans with
their allies were ready to meet them; but the Galli fled as the Romans advanced,
and, returning to their own country, remained quiet for thirteen years. Finding
that the Romans were increasing in power, the Galli consented to a treaty of
peace with them, which they strictly observed for thirty years. This dry
narrative of Polybius is enough to show what a dangerous enemy the Gaul was to
the city on the Tiber. We can easily imagine what Latium suffered from these
pitiless barbarians. The Romans had many traditions or fictions about these
Gallic wars; and a marvellous story of Titus Manlius fighting a duel with a
Gallic giant on the banks of the Anio, in presence of both armies, and killing
him. (Liv. 7.10.) Manlius took from the neck of his enemy a blood-stained chain
(torques), and put it on his own neck; and the soldiers gave him the name
Torquatus, which became the distinctive appellation of a noble Roman family. The
narrative of Livy contains two facts worth notice. The Galli made Tibur on the
Anio their strong post in some one or more of these invasions, and the people of
Tibur joined them against the Romans. The Galli also carried their incursions
into Campania (Liv. 7.11), and, either going or returning, plundered the country
about Lavicum, Tusculum, and the Alban territory. The Roman annalists here
repeat the story of Torquatus under another form. A Gallic giant challenges the
Romans, and is killed in a duel by M. Valerius; but his glory was not equal to
that of Manlius, for a raven came to his assistance and pecked and scratched the
face and eyes of the Gaul, till, blinded and frightened out of his senses, he
was pierced by the sword of the Roman. (Liv. 7.26.)
About B.C. 299 some fresh bands of Transalpine Galli crossed the mountains into
the valley of the Po, without being invited. Though we do not know when the
Transalpine people first found their way across the Alps, we know that they have
at intervals, whenever the opportunity has offered, repeated these visits up to
the present time. To get rid of these dangerous kinsmen, the Cisalpine Galli
pushed them on against the Romans, and joined them in an expedition to the
south. In their way through Etruria their numbers were increased by some
Tuscans. They got a good booty within the Roman territory, and returned; but, as
usual with the nation, they had a dispute about the division of the spoil, and
came to blows. They were given to drink and all kinds of excess, and fond of
quarrels. Four years later (B.C. 296) the Galli and the Samnites were leagued
together. (Plb. 2.19.) Livy (10.21) mentions the Umbri and Etruscans also as
joining the league against the Romans. Polybius states that the Romans were
defeated with loss in the territory of the Camertii, as he calls it. (Comp. Liv.
10.26). But in another battle, fought a few days after in the neighbourhood of
Sentinum, on the north side of the Apennines, the Romans defeated the Galli and
their allies. Livy, in his description of this battle (10.28), for the first
time mentions the war-chariots of the Galli (esseda). Caesar, in his Gallic War,
never speaks of the Transalpine Galli using war-chariots; and when he invaded
Britain and found them there, the strangeness of the thing led him to describe
it minutely. These war-chariots of Livy are probably a rhetorical embellishment.
The chariots (συνωρίδες) which Polybius (2.28) speaks of do not seem to have
been war-chariots. Livy is, however, satisfied with fixing the number of the
enemy that fell at 25,000, which later writers raised to 40,000 and 100,000. It
was a victory won after a hard fight, and on Gallic ground. It was a sign that
Rome was growing stronger, and that the latter days of the Galli were
approaching.
About ten years later (B.C. 283) the Galli Senones, with a large force, besieged
Arretium (Arezzo) an Etruscan town under the protection of Rome, The Romans came
to its relief, under L. Caecilius Metellus. Roman ambassadors, however, were
first sent to expostulate with the Senones, and to induce them to retire; but
they were murdered by the Galli, contrary to the law of nations. Polybius tells
the story of the massacre somewhat differently. Upon this the consul P.
Cornelius Dolabella entered the country of the Senones, burnt all before him,
put the men to the sword, and carried off the women and children. He treated the
Galli as they had treated other nations. In the mean time Metellus was defeated
by the Senones before Arretium, with great loss; but it does not appear that the
town was taken by the enemy. (Comp. Polyb, 2.19 with Liv. Epit. 12, and
Freinsheim's Supplement). The quarrel between the Romans and the Senones was
seen decisively settled. The Romans gave them a comPlete [1.938] defeat. Most of
the Senones fell in the battle, and the Romans, driving the remainder out of the
country, at last got a firm footing north of the Apennines, and on the coast of
the Adriatic. This was the first part of Gallia to which they sent a colony. It
was named Sena Gallica (Senigaglia), to distinguish it from Sena in Etruria. The
Epitome of Livy (Ep. 11) places the foundation of Sena Gallica before the
complete conquest of the Senones, which must be a mistake. This occupation of
the country of the Senones alarmed their neighbours the Boii, who, prevailing on
the Tuscans to join them, advanced as far as Lake Vadimon in Etruria, apparently
on their way to Rome. But they were met at the lake by the Romans, who
slaughtered the greater part both of the Tuscans and the Boii. The next year the
Etruscans and Boii mustered all the youth that could bear arms, and again were
defeated by the Romans. The Galli and Etruscans were now glad to accept terms of
peace. �These events,� says Polybius (2.20), �took place in the third year
before Pyrrhus crossed into Italy, and in the fifth year before the destruction
of the Galli at Delphi; for at these times Fortune put into all the Galli a kind
of pestilential disposition for war.� This statement fixes the events at the
year B.C. 282. These wars with the Galli were the Roman apprenticeship to
danger, for they never met with more desperate enemies; and the interval of
forty-five years' rest from all further disturbance from that quarter which
followed the peace, left the Romans leisure to fight with Pyrrhus, who invaded
Italy, and to carry on their first war with the Carthaginians.
The Romans had excited the fears of the Galli by founding the Roman colony of
Sena; but in 268 they went further north, and founded the Latin colony of
Ariminum (Rimini). Polybius (2.21), in a few words full of meaning, shows how
the new war began: �When those of the Galli who had seen the terrible things
departed from this life by reason of their years, and a new race came on, full
of passion, without reason, and having no experience of and never having seen
all kinds of evil and events, they began again to stir the state of affairs, as
is natural, and to be irritated against the Romans by any thing that occurred.�
The chiefs privately sent for a body of Transalpine Galli, who marched to
Ariminum; but there the common sort among the Boii, distrusting the new comers,
and quarrelling with their own leaders, killed their chiefs Atis and Galatus,
and then came to a pitched battle with their Transalpine allies. Five years
after this (B.C. 232) the tribune C. Flaminius carried a bill for the division
of the land in Picenum, from which they had ejected the Senones, and the
distribution of it among Roman citizens. This is the allotment of the �Gallicus
ager� which is often mentioned (Cic. de Sen. 100.4); a measure which Polybius
considers to have been the beginning of a change in the Roman state to the
worse, but which was certainly the cause of a dangerous war; for the Galli now
saw that the Romans aimed at their total destruction. The Boii, who were nearest
to the new Roman territory, and the Isombri (Insubres), the most powerful of the
Gallic peoples in Italy, invited some Galli from beyond the Alps to come and
help them against the Romans. These Galli, who were from the Alps and the Rhone,
were called Gaesati, or �mercenaries,� for that, says Polybius, is the proper
meaning of the word. But though the word might have got that sense in the time
of Polybius, it was apparently not the original meaning; for �gaesum� is a
Gallic name for a javelin. The men from beyond the Alps came under the kings
Concolitan and Aneroest; and never did a larger, more famous, or more warlike
body of troops go out of these parts of Gallia. (Plb. 2.22.) The Romans made
great preparations for this war, which was to decide whether they or the Galli
were to be the masters of Italy. It was eight years after the division of the
lands of Picenum, and in B.C. 225, when the Gaesati came to the Po. They were
joined by the Isombri and Boii; but the Cenomani and the Veneti, having been
visited by some Roman ambassadors, forsook the Gallic confederation for a Roman
alliance, and the Galli were obliged to leave a force behind them to watch these
people. They entered Tuscany with 50,000 foot and 20,000 horse and waggons,
under the command of Concolitan, Aneroest, and Britomar. (Florus, 2.3.)
The alarm of the Italians was shown by their readiness to assist the Romans with
men and all kinds of supplies; for they did not view the Galli simply as the
enemies of Rome, but as the enemies of the whole peninsula, from whom they could
expect no mercy. Polybius (2.24) has given an enumeration of the force of Italy
at this critical time, for the purpose of showing what a bold undertaking
Hannibal's subsequent invasion was. The whole number of men capable of bearing
arms, Romans and Socii, was 700,000 foot, and 70,000 horse. The number that was
called out for the defence of Rome was above 150,000 foot, and 6000 horse. The
Gallic army advanced through Etruria as far as Clusium, plundering all before
them; but learning that there was a Roman army in their rear, they retreated
towards Faesulae, followed by the Romans. A battle was fought, in which the
Romans were defeated. The consul L. Aemilius Papus, who had been sent to
Ariminum to oppose the enemy's march in that quarter, hearing of the advance of
the Galli upon Rome, moved from the upper sea, and came up with the Galli after
their victory over the Romans. The Galli, who wished to save their booty, moved
down to the coast, with the consul after them; and it happened at this time that
C. Atilius Regulus, the other consul, who was returning from Sardinia, had
landed with his troops at Pisae, and was marching towards Rome by the opposite
road to that which the Galli had taken. They were going north, and the consul
was coming south. Thus they were hemmed in between two armies: but, like brave
and skilful soldiers, finding an enemy before and behind, they formed two lines
of battle, and presented two fronts to their enemy's two armies. The Galli were
near Telamo, as Polybius says, on the coast of Etruria, when their foragers fell
in with the advanced troops of Atilius; but it is not easy to see why they had
got so far south, as their object was to retreat as quickly as they could. The
Galli fought with the most resolute courage, being in no respect inferior to the
enemy, except in the quality of their weapons and their armour. It is said that
40,000 Galli perished, and 10,000 were made prisoners. �In this manner, then,
the most formidable of the Celtic invasions was brought to nought, after
threatening all the Italians, and especially the Romans, with great and terrible
danger.� (Polybius.)
In the following year the Boii submitted; and in B.C. 223 the Romans for the
first time crossed the Po with their armies, and invaded the country of the
Insubres, under the command of the consul C. Flaminius, who defeated the enemy
in a great battle. [1.939] Polybius on this occasion states a curious fact about
the Gallic swords: they were made only for cutting, and were so bad that they
were bent by the first heavy blow, and could not be used again till the men had
straightened them on the ground by means of their feet. The Roman sword was
pointed and fitted for a thrust. In the following year (B.C. 222) the consuls M.
Claudius Marcellus and Cn. Cornelius Scipio continued the war against the
Insubres, who sent for a fresh body of Gaesati to help them. The Romans took
Acerrae on the Addua, and Mediolanum, the chief town of the Insubres, by storm.
This ended the war; and the Insubres submitted without terms. Marcellus (B.C.
221) had a triumph in which he carried the Spolia Opima, having killed with his
own hand a Gallic prince, Virdomarus. (Plut. Marcellus, 8.) In B.C. 218 the
Romans planted two Latin colonies in their new conquests, each of 6000
men,--Placentia (Piacenza) on the south side of the Po, and Cremona near the
north bank of the river a little lower down. The Italian Galli, though beaten,
were not disposed to remain quiet, and it was in the hope of rousing this
formidable people against the Romans that Hannibal determined to invade Italy
through their country (B.C. 218). He hoped with the aid of the Galli to destroy
the Roman empire. When Polybius began his history of the Second Punic War, he
wrote as an introduction to it his historical sketch of the history of the
Cisalpine Galli down to B.C. 218, which has often been referred to here. But as
he well knew the value of a geographical description of a country which is the
scene of historical events (3.36), he prefixed to his historical sketch of the
Cisalpine Galli an outline of the geography of the country which they occupied
(2.14, &c.). This is the first attempt that we find at a geographical
description that deserves the name. Polybius (2.14) compares Italy to a
triangle, the apex of which is at the south, in the promontory which he calls
Cocynthus. [COCINTHUS] The base of this triangle is the hill country along the
foot of the Alps (ἡ τῶν Ἄλπεων παρωρεία which, beginning from Massalia
(Marseille) and the parts above the Sardinian sea, extends without interruption
to the innermost recess of the Adriatic; but it does not quite reach the
Adriatic, for it stops short, and leaves a small intervening space. At the base
of this hill country, on the south, lie the most northern plains of Italy, which
were the seat of the Gallic peoples. These plains also form a triangular figure,
the apex of which is at the junction of the Alps and Apennines, not far from the
Sardinian sea above Massalia. The northern side of this triangle, which is
formed by the Alps, is 2200 stadia long; and the southern, which is formed by
the Apennines, is 3600 stadia long. The sea-coast of the Adriatic forms the base
of the triangle, which from the city Sena to the northern extremity of the
Adriatic is 2500 stadia long. Consequently, the text says, the whole circuit of
these plains is not far short of 10,000 stadia. The Ligustini (Ligures) inhabit
the Apennines, from the place where they commence above Massalia and their
junction with the Alps. They inhabit both the slope towards the Tyrrhenian sea
and the slope towards the plains; along the coast as far as Pisae, the most
western city of the Tyrrheni, and inland as far as Arretium (Arezzo), where the
Tyrrheni begin. Next to them, the Umbri occupy both slopes of the Apennines. At
the place where the Apennines are about 500 stadia from the Adriatic, they turn
to the right and run through the middle of Italy. The remainder of this side of
the triangle belongs to the plain country, and extends to the sea and the city
Sena. The Po, famed by the poets under the name of Eridanus, has its sources in
the Alps, about the apex of the triangle described above, and it descends to the
plains by a southern course. Having reached the plain country, the river turns
to the east, and flowing through it, enters the Adriatic by two mouths The
greater part of the plain country, which is divided into two parts by the Po,
lies on the side towards the Alps and the northern part of the Adriatic.
The junction of the Alps and Apennines is an arbitrary point. [APENNINUS.] There
is no branch of the Po which answers the description of Polybius, except the
Duria Major (Dora Baltea); and if he means this branch, he makes the Apennines
extend as far north as the Little St. Bernard. This may seem to explain why he
gives so large an extent (3600 stadia) to the Apennines, from the point of
junction with the Alps to the latitude of Sena. But a place so remote from the
Sardinian sea and from Massalia does not agree with the rest of his description,
which would apply better to the branch of the Po which rises in Mons Vesulus
(Monte Viso). But this branch runs north before it turns to the east. His choice
of Massalia as a point of reference is not exact; but it was the best known
place on the coast between the Var and the Rhone. The conclusion is, that his
knowledge of the western part of the basin of the Po was not very exact; but,
his general description of the great plain is correct, and, with such means and
maps as he had, it is good. [ALPES]
This basin of the Po consists of a hill country, which lies at the base of the
highest ranges, and of a plain country, a fact which Polybius had observed in
his travels; for he says, �On each side of the Alps, the side to the Rhodanus,
and the side to the plains, the hilly and earthy (not rocky) parts, those
towards the Rhone and the north, are inhabited by the Transalpine Galatae, and
those towards the plains by the Taurisci and Agones, and several other barbaric
peoples.� The northern slope of the Apennines is formed by lateral branches,
which run down from the axis of the mountain to the plain. The direction of
these branches is shown by the numerous river valleys, from the Stura in the
west, which flows into the Tanarus, which flows into the Po, to the streams
which enter the sea about Ravenna, which town may be considered near the
southern limit of the basin of the Po. The streams that flow from the Apennines
south of Ravenna as far as the Aesis, which is a little south of Sena, run into
the Adriatic, and are beyond the basin of the Po. The boundary between the plain
and the hill country in the eastern part of the Po is marked pretty nearly by
the road from Ariminum through Modena to Parma.
On the north side of the Po, the valleys which lie within the hill country (ἡ
παρώρεια) along the base of the Alps have a general southern direction, as the
course of the rivers shows by which they are drained. In several of these
valleys there are deep, longitudinal depressions, into which the rivers flow at
the north, and, filling them up, flow out from the southern extremity through
the plain to the Po. The depressions filled with water are the lakes of the
sub-Alpine region,--Verbanus (Lago Maggiore), Larius (Lake of Como), Sebinus (Lago
d'Iseo), Benacus (Lago di Garda), and some smaller lakes. The southern end of
these lakes marks in a general way the limit of the hill country, and south of
this limit [1.940] the great plain begins. The most eastern of these affluents
of the Po is the Mincius, which flows through the great lake Benacus. A ridge of
hills lies between this lake and the river Athesis (Adige), which descends from
the Rhaetian Alps in a long valley, which has a general southern direction. On
reaching the plain, the Athesis turns SE. and E., and, running parallel to one
of the branches of the Po, enters the Adriatic. The Athesis forms a natural
boundary in this great plain, and is the limit of Gallia Cisalpina, considered
as the country of the Galli. The territory east of it, Venetia, or the country
of the Veneti, extended along the Adriatic to the head of the gulf. It is
drained by numerous streams, whose upper courses are in narrow valleys in the
mountain region; and the lower part of their course is through the flat country
which borders the coast of the Adriatic from Ravenna northwards to the bay of
Tergeste (Trieste). The Po, and the numerous streams that enter the Adriatic
through the plains north of it, are described under their several names [ATHESIS,
PADUS, &c.].
The length of the great plain from Augusta Taurinorum (Torino) to the delta of
the Po is above 200 miles; the breadth varies in different parts. Between
Bononia (Bologna) and Verona it is near 70 miles wide. From the towers of
Bologna, a man can see over this wide level as far as the Euganean hills at the
back of Verona.
Gall�a Cisalpina, as already observed, has a narrow meaning, if we limit the
term to the parts which were occupied by the Galli. There is no doubt that the
Romans first used it as a general name for North Italy, without fixing its
meaning exactly, though they meant by it the country of the Cisalpine Galli.
Afterwards they gave the name to all the basin of the Po, and included in it at
least so much of the hill country as they had subdued; but the people within the
Alps (Inalpini) and on the Italian side were not subdued till the time of
Augustus.
The following are the chief Alpine tribes of Gallia Cisalpina, proceeding from
west to east. The Lepontii were both on the north and on the south side of the
Alps, in the country that lies between the sources of the Rhodanus, Rhenus, and
Ticinus. The Focunates were probably on the west side of the Lago Maggiore; the
Mesiates, at the north end of the lake; and the Isarci, on the south-east side.
The Genauni are placed by some writers on the northeast side of the Maggiore.
About the lake Larius, or Como, in the south part, were the Orobii, in whose
country Caesar established the Latin colony of Novum Comum. The Culicones [CULICONES]
were on the NE. side of the lake of Como; and the Vennones are supposed to be
the inhabitants of the Valteline. The Suanetes and Rugusci seem to have been in
the hills north of Bergomum (Bergamo). The Camuni [CAMUNI], a tribe akin to the
Euganei, were in the upper valley of the Ollius (Oglio); and the Euganei, an old
Italian people, were situated, in the historical times, about the lake Benacus
(Garda) and about Edrum (Idro). The Stoni, mentioned by Pliny, may, perhaps, be
somewhere north of the Benacus. The warlike nation of the Rhaeti, who gave name
to a part of the High Alps, were east of the Lepontii, but only a small part
could be within the limits of Italy. The valley of the Adige, which forms one of
the great roads into Italy from the basin of the Danube, contained the
Tridentini, whose position is determined by that of Tridentum (Trento) on the
Adige; and the Brixentes are the people of Brixen, higher up in the valley of
the Adige. The Breuni were still further north [BREUNI]: they are incorrectly
placed by some modern writers east of the Lago Maggiore.
East of the Athesis in the hill country the position of the Medoaci was probably
in the upper valleys of the two rivers named Medoacus or Meduacus; and in the
mountains above the head of the Adriatic were the Carni, a Celtic people,--for
there were Celtae in these parts. [CARNI] The country between the Adige and the
Carni was Venetia, or the country of the Veneti, which is generally excluded
from the descriptions of Gallia Cisalpina in the limited sense; and this is
correct enough, for the Romans had no wars with the Veneti, and their writers
have not told us that they were Galli. This name, one of the oldest national
names of Italy, has subsisted to the present day. If the Veneti were Celtae or
Galli, they belong to some very early migration, and the supposition that they
were Celtae, is at least as probable as any other. The remark of Polybius (2.17)
as to their language, is not decisive against the supposition of their being of
Gallic or Celtic stock. Herodotus (5.9) had heard of the Heneti or Eneti on the
Adriatic, and he speaks of Eneti (1.196) as Illyrians, from which, even if it be
true, we can conclude nothing, except that the Eneti, who are probably the
Veneti, were on the Adriatic in the fifth century before our era. Strabo (p.
212) gives two traditions about the Veneti; one that they were from the Armoric
Veneti in Gallia, and another that they were from the Paphlagonian Heneti. In
another place (p. 195) he has a sensible remark on this matter: he says, �I
think that these Veneti of Transalpine Gallia were the parent stock of the
Veneti on the Hadriatic, for nearly all the rest of the Celtae who are in Italy,
here migrated thither from the country beyond the Alps, like the Boii and the
Senones; but on account of the sameness of name (some) say that they are
Paphlagonians. However, I do not speak positively, for in such matters
probability is sufficient.� This passage contains a good deal. First, it states
that nearly all the Celtae of Italy came from the country beyond the Alps, which
implies that there were some Celtae who did not come from Transalpine Gallia;
secondly, he means to say, that the Veneti are Celtae, for he says, �nearly all
the rest of the Celtae,� which implies that the Veneti were Celtae. Besides, if
they were not Celtae, but something else, he would not have supposed that they
were descendants of the Transalpine Veneti. His text clearly means that they
were Celtae. His argument for their Transalpine origin is not worth much. We
might just as well suppose these Italian Veneti to be the progenitors of the
Transalpine Veneti; for, as Herodotus says, �in a very long time any thing may
take place.�
Polybius (2.17) enumerates the principal Gallic tribes, for he does not profess
to mention all, from west to east; and first, those on the north side of the Po.
He places the Lai and Lebecii or Laevi and Libicii, about the sources of the Po,
which is not very precise. Probably they did not extend farther east than the
Ticinus. Polybius only mentions the Salassi once (Frag. 34.10), and he describes
one of the passes over the Alps as lying through their country. They were north
of the Laevi and Libicii, in the valley of the Duria Major, the Val d'Aosta, in
which was the subsequent Roman settlement of Augusta Praetoria, and lower down
at the entrance [1.941] of the valley was Eparedia, also a Roman settlement;
and, according to Pliny (3.17), a Gallic name. There is no evidence that the
Salassi were Celtae, though the want of evidence does not prove that they were
not. They were mountaineers, not inhabitants of the plains. They took no part in
the wars of the Cisalpine Galli against Rome; and they were not subdued till the
time of Augustus, though Eporedia, at the southern entrance of the great valley,
was settled before that time. [EPOREDIA] Next to the Laevi and the Libicii were
the Isombri, or Insubres, between the hill country and the Po. Their eastern
limit seems to have been the Addua (Adda); and their chief city, Mediolanum, had
a Gallic name, but its origin is unknown. There is a curious confusion in the
MSS. about the name of this people. In the passage already quoted from Polybius
(2.16), where he describes the Apennines next to the Ligurians as occupied by
Umbri, three MSS. (ed. Bekker) have Isombri instead of Umbri; and in 3.86 one
MS. has Isombri. But in both passages the Umbri are meant. Another form of the
name, Sumbri, has been mentioned, which occurs in Strabo. Editors generally take
great pains to get rid of all these troublesome varieties, and to reduce them to
uniformity. The forms Insobares, Insobri, are stated to be the forms in Polybius
by Stephanus (s. v.); and the form Insobri occurs in the Fragments of Polybius,
but this does not prove that it was his genuine form. In the Roman form Insubres,
the n does not seem to be a radical part of the name, and subr is the real
element. There is no authority for the existence of a tribe in Gallia called
Insubres, except the passage of Livy already cited; and this name ought to be
excluded from the maps of Transalpine Gallia. The Isombri are an Italian people,
of whose origin nothing is known; but they were Galli.
The Cenomani or Gonomani, as Polybius writes the name, were due east of the
Isombri along the Po, and their eastern limit was probably the Adige; but we do
not know whether they occupied the country between the Lower Adige and the Po.
Mantua would lie within their territory, and Cremona, the first Romanu
settlement north of the Po (B.C. 218), the choice of which may have been
determined in some measure by the friendly relations between the Romans and the
Cenomani at that time. Verona, east of the Adige, is named by Livy as one of the
towns of the Cenomani, which is certainly not true, unless the territory of the
Cenomani extended some distance east of the Adige; for this river is a natural
and a political boundary. Brixia was one of the towns of the Cenomani, and there
may be no reason to doubt that Bergomum was one also. The northern limit of the
Cenomani was the hill country of the Euganei.
The tribes on the south of the Po were also all in the plain. The most western
were the Ananes (Plb. 2.17), whom Polybius, the only author who mentions them,
describes as about the Apennine, by which he means the base of the hills. They
are otherwise unknown. Their neighbours on the east were the Boii. Polybius
(2.32) speaks of Anamares, who have been identified with the Ananes; but the
name is different enough, and Polybius places the Anamares in Gallia Transalpina
near Massilia. The Boii occupied the country along the south side of the Po to
the foot of the Apennines, and the northern slopes of these mountains. Their
limits can only be approximated to by mentioning the towns within their
territory. Bononia, originally called Felsina, when it was an Etruscan city, was
one of them, and Mutina and Parma were two others. Placentia, near the junction
of the Trebia and the Po, may have been within their limits; if it was not, we
must place it in the country of the Ananes. East of the Boii were the Lingones,
�towards the Adriatic� (Polybius). This would place them in the low flat land
east of Modena and Bologna, in the Ferrarese, a country that cannot be inhabited
without keeping up the canals and embankments any more than many parts of the
Netherlands. If the Lingones really maintained themselves in this place, they
must have been an industrious people. We know nothing at all of their history in
Italy, except what a modern writer says, founding his remark on Livy (5.35),
that the Lingones came into Italy with the Boii, and probably shared all their
undertakings and their fate, since there is no other special mention of them. A
man who has the gift of reason would come to a different conclusion: that the
Lingones shared neither the undertakings nor the fate of the Boii. They were in
their marshes, keeping out the water and looking after their hogs and beasts,
and the Romans would not touch such people till all the rest were subdued. The
last tribe was the Senones, �on the sea� (Polybius). The limits of the Senones
cannot be exactly defined. The river Aesis may have been their southern limit.
Strabo (p. 217) says that the Aesis was originally the boundary of Gallia
Cisalpina (ἐντὸς κελτική), and afterwards the river Rubico.
Thus we see that these Gallic nations, with whom the Romans had so long a
struggle, were all inhabitants of the plains, and only of those parts of the
hilly region which are contiguous to the plains; but not a hill people, nor
mountaineers. Only two nations make a great figure among them, the Isombri and
the Boii. There is no evidence that the Isombri came from Gallia Transalpina;
and very little to connect the Boii with this Gallia. These facts are worth the
consideration of a future historian of ancient Italy. Niebuhr, who rejects
Livy's account of the time of these Cisalpine Galli settling in Italy, supposes
them to have crossed the Alps only some ten or twenty years before they took
Rome, and he affirms this on the authority of Polybius. Diodorus certainly
places the passage of these Galli over the Alps (14.113) immediately before the
capture of Rome; but we cannot infer from Polybius at what time he supposed
these Cisalpine Galli to have crossed the Alps. He says nothing of ten or twenty
years, for he knew nothing of the time, and like a prudent man he leaves the
thing as obscure as he found it. The true conclusion is, that we know nothing at
all of the Gallic settlements in North Italy; and yet there were Galli there,
and the country which they occupied was Gallia in Italy. We cannot suppose that
the Galli exterminated all the people of the plains which they got possession
of. If any were left, they would be Umbri; for as to the Tuscans, they,
probably, during their possession of the Po country, lived in strong towns, and
made somebody else cultivate the ground for them. There is one remarkable place
in the country, Spina, an Hellenic settlement near the sea, and perhaps on the
southern branch of the Po. What effect it had on the civilisation of Cisalpine
Gallia, we do not know; and, indeed, it may have been at an early period reduced
to insignificance. It was fixed in a like position with respect to inland Galli
and barbarous tribes with the Phocaean town of Massalia, on the south coast of
Transalpine [1.942] Gallia; but it had a less fortunate and less brilliant
history. (Strab. v. p.214.)
The other tribes in the plain of the Po, which have not yet been spoken of, are
Ligurians, or else tribes of unknown origin. Polybius (2.15) has already
mentioned Taurisci and Agones as inhabiting the hill country in the basin of the
Po. He does not say that they were Galli, but he seems to mean that they were.
There were Taurisci in the Gallic army at the great battle near the Telamo. (Plb.
2.28.) After mentioning these Taurisci, Polybius adds that the Ligustini inhabit
both sides of the Apennines. As he places the junction of the Alps and Apennines
considerably north, and describes the position of the Taurisci in the terms
already stated, he may intend to place them a great way to the east, and they
may be a people belonging to the Taurisci of Noricum. If this is true, it shows
that the Cisalpine Galli in their contests with the Romans got help from other
Galli besides those within the limits of Gallia Transalpina as determined by the
Romans. It is at least certain, notwithstanding the similarity of name, that
Polybius, when he speaks of the Taurisci does not mean the Taurini, whom he
places in the west part of the basin of the Po, in the higher part of the river
(3.60). We might infer from Polybius that the Taurini were not Galli; and Strabo
(p. 204) and other authorities distinctly state that they were Ligures. Their
chief town, afterwards Augusta Taurinorum (Torino), determines their position in
a general way, which is all that is necessary here. In that angle of the Po
which is drained by the Stura and other branches of the Tanarus were the
Vagienni, whose limits Pliny (3.16) extends to Mons Vesulus. Their chief town
was afterwards Augusta Vagiennorum (Bene). [AUGUSTA VAGIENNORUM] East of the
Vagienni were the Statielli, one of whose places, Aquae Statiellae, is the
modern Acqui in the valley of the Bormida. None of these Ligurian tribes in the
basin of the Po belong to Gallia Cisalpina in its limited sense of the country
of the Galli; but they were included in the political Gallia Cisalpina of a
later period, together with Liguria south of the Apennines. As Ligurians however
they are properly treated under that name. We cannot fix the limit between the
Ligures and Ananes on the south side of the Po. It was probably west of the
Trebia, and certainly east of the Tanarus. Nor can we fix the limit between the
Ligures and Galli on the north side of the Po; but it seems likely that the
Duria Major may have been the limit.
Hannibal arrived in the north of Italy B.C. 218, with his forces diminished and
weakened by a long march and the passage over the Alps. Before he reached Italy
the Boii and Insubres took up arms and invaded the lands of Placentia and
Cremona. The Roman triumviri, who had come to mark out the allotments, fled to
Mutina, where they were besieged by the Galli. (Liv. 21.25; Plb. 3.40.) L.
Manlius, who was hurrying to Mutina to relieve the Romans there, lost many of
his men from the attacks of the Galli in his march through the forests, but at
last he made his way to Tanetum near the Po, where some Cenomani from Brixia
came to him. Manlius was also joined at Tanetum by the praetor C. Atilius, who
was sent to his aid.
Though Hannibal had prepared the Italian Galli for his arrival, and relied on
them for the success of his invasion, he was coldly received at first. The
Cenomani, Veneti, and some of the Ligures, were on the Roman side; and the Boii
and Insubres were; kept in check by the presence of the consul P. Cornelius
Scipio. The victory of Hannibal at the Ticinus, though it was only a fight
between cavalry, determined the disposition of his wavering allies, and from
this time the Galli followed him through his Italian campaigns. In the battle on
the Trebia there were still Cenomani on the Roman side (Liv. 21.55), who fought
against the other Galli who were with Hannibal. The Carthaginian won the battle
of the Trebia, with little loss of his Iberian and Libyan soldiers. His Gallic
auxiliaries lost a great number of men. When he crossed the Apennines he had a
large body of Galli with him, and it required all the prudence of this great
commander to keep his turbulent, discontented auxiliaries in order. The Galli,
however, served him well in the great battle at the Trasymene lake (B.C. 217),
and also at Cannae (B.C. 216), where 4000 of them fell--more than two-thirds of
the whole loss on the Carthaginian side. (Plb. 3.117.)
Though the victory of Cannae brought many of the Southern Italians to the side
of Hannibal, they were not like the desperate fighters who had followed him from
the banks of the Po, and of whom he had now lost the greater part without being
able to get fresh supplies. He never could recover his communication with North
Italy after he had gone to the south. The Romans turned their arms against
Gallia Cisalpina, both to punish the revolted Galli and to cut Hannibal off from
getting recruits. L. Postumius (B.C. 216), consul designatus, was sent over the
Apennines into the country of the Boii, but he and nearly all his army perished
in the great forest called Litana, which was somewhere on the northern slope of
the Apennines which looks to the basin of the Po. The story is told by Livy,
with marvellous circumstances of exaggeration, probably founded on some small
truth (23.24). The consul's head was cut off by the Boii; and the skull, being
cleaned, was lined with gold, after Gallic fashion, and used as a cup in their
great temple on solemn occasions. This barbaric practice of the Galli was not so
inhuman as Roman superstition, for the year before at Rome they had buried alive
a vestal virgin who was accused of unchastity; and among the extraordinary
religious ceremonies performed after their great defeat at Cannae they buried a
Gaul male and female, and a Greek male and fe. male, alive, in a stone vault in
the cow-market. (Liv. 22.57.)
Hannibal was still in South Italy in B.C. 207, near eleven years after he had
crossed the Alps. He attempted to open his communication with North Italy by his
brother Hasdrubal, who marched from Spain through Gallia and crossed over the
Alps into the basin of the Po, by the route that his brother had taken.
Hasdrubal had been joined in Gallia by the Arverni,--the warlike people of the
Auvergne,--and by other Gallic and Alpine tribes (Liv. 27.39); and he got
recruits from the Cisalpine Gauls. One of the consuls, M. Livius Salinator, who
was sent to oppose him, posted himself near the small stream Metaurum, which
flows from the eastern Apennines into the Adriatic between Pisaurum and Sena.
The other consul, C. Claudius Nero, who was watching Hannibal in the south,
intercepted a letter from Hasdrubal to Hannibal. He saw the danger of letting
the two brothers unite their forces, and he determined to prevent it. He hurried
to the north with a division of his army, and joined his colleague, [1.943]
Hasdrubal was compelled to fight, and he made the best disposition of his troops
that he could. Against the right wing of the Romans, where Nero commanded his
picked men, Hasdrubal posted the Galli on his own left,--not so much because, he
trusted them, as because he supposed that the Romans feared them. On the banks
of the Metaurum the Romans got full satisfaction for Trasymenus and Cannae. The
enemy was slaughtered by thousands; and so complete was the victory that Livius
allowed some Ligures and Cisalpine Galli, who either had not been in the battle
or had escaped from the rout, to move off without being followed: �Let some
remain,� he said, �to be the messengers of the enemy's defeat and of our
victory.� (Liv. 27.29.) Hasdrubal perished in the battle; and when Nero returned
to his camp in the south he ordered his head to be thrown before the
Carthaginian outposts, that Hannibal might have no doubt about his brother's
fate.
The Carthaginians made another and last effort to assail the Romans through
North Italy. In the summer of B.C. 205, in the fourteenth year of the war, Mago,
the son of Hamilcar, landed on the Ligurian coast and seized Genua, where the
Galli flocked to him. Here also Mago received twenty-five ships from Carthage,
6000 infantry, 800 horsemen, and seven elephants, a large sum of money to hire
troops with, and orders to move on towards Rome and join Hannibal. (Liv. 29.4.)
Mago maintained himself in Cisalpine Gallia to the year B.C. 203, when he was
defeated in the territory of the Insubres by the Romans, and dangerously
wounded. He was recalled to Africa by the Carthaginians, and he set sail, but he
died on the voyage. Hannibal, who was recalled about the same time, took with
him some of the men who had followed him all through his Italian campaigns; and
in the battle of Zama (B.C. 202), where he was defeated by P. Scipio, one-third
of his men, it is said, were Ligures and Galli. The Second Punic War ended B.C.
201.
Mago left one of his officers, Hamilcar, behind him in Cisalpine Gallia (Liv.
31.10), or he was one of those who escaped from the slaughter on the Metaurum;
it is not certain which. Hamilcar stirred up the Insubres, Boii, and Cenomani,
and some Ligurians, and falling on Placentia took and burnt it. He then crossed
the Po to plunder Cremona. L. Furius Purpureo, the governor of the provincia, as
Livy (31.10) terms it, was near Ariminum with a force too small to relieve
Cremona. He wrote to the senate for help, and his letter states the fact of
Placentia and Cremona having maintained themselves all through the Punic War.
Purpureo soon after defeated the Galli, before Cremona, and Hamilcar fell in the
battle. (Liv. 31.21.) But the war still continued, and the praetor Cn. Baebius
Tamphilus fell into an ambuscade in the territory of the Insubres, and was
compelled to leave the country with the loss of above 6000 men. (Liv. 32.7.)
Sex. Aelius, one of the consuls of B.C. 198, did no more in Gallia than settle
the colonists of Placentia and Cremona, who had been dispersed in the late
troubles. It was only by securing those two colonies that the Romans could
subjugate this country, and they prosecuted the work with the characteristic
national stubbornness. In B.C. 197 both the consuls, C. Cornelius Cethegus and
Q. Minucius Rufus, went to Gallia. Cethegus went direct against the Insubres;
Rufus went to Genua and began the war with the Ligures in the basin of the Po.
Having reduced all the Ligurians on the south of the Po except the Ilvates, and
all the Galli except the Boii, he led his troops into the country of the Boii,
who had gone over the river to help the Insubres. The Boii returned to defend
their lands. The treacherous Cenomani were induced by Cethegus to betray the
Insubres, whom they had joined; and the story is, that in the battle which
followed the Cenomani fell upon their own countrymen and contributed to their
defeat. Above 30,000 Galli are said to have fallen; and according to some
authorities it was in this battle that Hamilcar fell. (Liv. 31.21, 32.30.) Livy
found even some authorities which affirmed that Hamilcar appeared in the triumph
of Cethegus. (Liv. 33.23.) The news of this defeat discouraged the Boii, who
dispersed to their villages, and left the Roman commander to plunder their lands
and burn their houses, which is still the way of dealing with nations who will
not consent to be beaten in a pitched battle. In B.C. 196 the consuls, L. Furius
Purpureo, who as praetor had served before in Gallia,: and M. Claudius
Marcellus, of a race well known in Gallic wars, were both employed at home. They
had Italia for their provincia, as the Roman phrase is. (Liv. 33.25.) Marcellus
defeated the Insubres in a great battle, and took the town of Comum, upon which
eight-and-twenty strong places surrendered to him. Purpureo carried on the war
in the country of the Boii in the usual way; burning, destroying, and killing.
The story of these campaigns is confused; but if the narrative is true, we learn
that the Boii, being unable to do any damage to the cautious Purpureo, crossed
the Po and fell on the Laevi and the Libui, who were Galli. Returning home with
their booty, they met the two consuls; and the fight was so fierce, for the
passions on both sides were greatly excited, that the Romans left scarcely a
Boian to return home and tell of the defeat. (Liv. 33.37.) Marcellus had a
triumph at Rome; and Livy on this and on previous occasions records the fact of
the great quantity of copper and silver coin which was brought into the aerarium
from this Gallic war. There is no doubt that the Galli used copper and silver
money, and probably had their own mint, as in Transalpine Gallia. Part of this
money might be Roman or Italian, the produce of old plunder. The consul, L.
Valerius Flaccus, the colleague of M. Porcius Cato, was employed in B.C. 194 in
fighting with the Boii, and restoring the buildings in Placentia and Cremona
which had been destroyed in the war. (Liv. 34.22.) Flaccus continued in
Cisalpine Gallia the following year as proconsul, carrying on the war in the
country of the Insubres. The consul, T. Sempronius Longus, led his troops
against the Boii. This unconquerable people were again in arms under a king
Boiorix. They attacked Sempronius in his camp; and after a desperate fight, with
great loss on both sides, and a doubtful result, the consul took shelter in
Placentia. (Liv. 34.46.) The numbers that fell in these battles are exaggerated,
and are a mere guess: but these continued losses were destroying all the manhood
of the Boii. In B.C. 192 the Ligures were in arms, and advanced as far as the
walls of Placentia. (Liv. 34.56.) The history of these campaigns shows that the
ultimate success of the Romans depended on their two colonies on the Po. The
senate declared that there was a �Tumultus,� a Gallic war. One consul, Minucius
Thermus, was sent against the Ligures. The other consul, Merula, had a battle
with the Boii near Mutina; and the [1.944] narrative of the Roman historian
admits the obstinate resistance of the Galli, of whom 14,000 fell, and 1092 of
the foot were taken prisoners. The mention of the exact number of the captives
is curious (Liv. 35.5), and Livy probably had good authority for it. The number
of prisoners could be ascertained, for they would be sold. The Romans also
counted their loss in this battle by thousands.
The complete subjugation of this brave people was accomplished by the consul P.
Cornelius Scipio Nasica (B.C. 191), a cruel man, who slaughtered the Boii
without mercy, and made it one of the grounds for claiming a triumph that he had
left only children and old men alive. (Liv. 36.40.) In the triumph of Scipio a
great quantity of the precious metal appeared. Like most uncivilised people, and
civilised too, as they are called, the Boii were fond of gold ornaments. They
had also bronze vessels and silver vessels, which they made themselves, and not
without skill, for the nation has always excelled in ingenuity, and shown an
aptitude for all works of taste. They must have become a very different people
in their habits from the Gallic invaders whom Polybius describes. The brutal
consul led in his triumph, all together, the nobles of the Boii and the horses
that he had taken from them. The nation had surrendered ( �sese dediderunt� ),
according to Roman phrase; and about half the land was declared the property of
the Roman people. This was the end of the nationality of the Boii in Italy. The
survivors are said to have left the country. [BOII] In B.C. 189 the Romans made
Bononia a Latin colony (Liv. 37.57), and six years later the Roman colonies (Liv.
39.55) of Parma and Mutina were settled. Polybius incorrectly speaks of Mutina
as a colony in B.C. 218. The name of the Senones had been effaced long ago; the
Boii now disappeared, and of the Lingones we know nothing, nor of the Ananes.
The whole of Gallia Cispadana was Roman. In Gallia Transpadana there were no
enemies except the Insubres, who, next to the Boii, had made the most vigorous
resistance to Rome; but they had taken no part in the last wars, and they were
now quiet. The perfidious Cenomani were long since the slaves of the Romans, and
the Veneti never gave them any trouble.
It is generally supposed that Gallia Cisalpina was made a province upon the
conquest of the Boii, B.C. 191. But though a great part of the basin of the Po
was now brought under Roman dominion, and colonies were planted, we have no
account of a regular provincial administration being established. In fact, the
Romans dealt with their conquered countries in different ways, according to
circumstances. Gallia Cisalpina was a Roman province, in one sense, long before
B.C. 191, for every praetor or consul who was commissioned by the senate to
carry on war there, had it for the time as his �provincia,� the field of his
operations. However, the making of the great road, called the Via Flaminia, from
Rome to Ariminum, and the Via Aemilia from Placentia to Ariminum (B.C. 187),
proves that the Romans were now settling in the country, and it must have had
some kind of administration. A road was also made from Bononia across the
Apennines to Arretium. (Liv, 39.1, 2; Strab. p. 217.) But the limits of this
provincial administration were less than those of the Cisalpine Gallia of
Caesar's time. The conquest of the Ligurians, both those in the plains of the
Po, and those in the mountains, was not yet completed; but these industrious,
brave people were incessantly attacked by the Romans. The consul, M. Popillius,
made war on the Statielli, near Carystum (B.C. 173), and sold the people and
their property, though they had never attacked the Romans. The senate, however,
made amends for this monstrous injustice as far as they could, by an order for
restoring the people to their liberty, and giving back what could be found of
their goods; an order which we may be certain could only be imperfectly
executed. (Liv. 42.7, 22.) It was probably from B.C. 109, when M. Aemilius
Scaurus made the road from Pisae, past Luna, over the Apennines to Dertona, that
we may date the subjugation of the Ligures. The Ligurian country was certainly a
separate province, in the Roman military sense, for some time after the final
defeat of the Boii. (Liv. 42.1, 10.)
In B.C. 186, 12,000 Transalpine Galli crossed the Alps into Venetia. Probably
they came down the valley of the Adige. They began to build a town near the site
where Aquileia afterwards stood. The Roman consul Marcellus (B.C. 183) gave them
notice to quit. He took from them the implements that they had seized in the
country, and what they had brought with them. These poor people sent some of
their number humbly to state their case to the Roman senate: poverty had
compelled them to cross the Alps, and they had chosen an uninhabited spot, where
they had settled without troubling anybody; and they had begun to build a town,
which was a proof that they had not come to plunder. They were told that they
must quit Italy, and their things would be restored to them. They quietly packed
up their moveables and crossed the Alps under the inspection of three Roman
commissioners, who were well received by the Transalpine Galli. So humbled was
this warlike nation, that the Transalpine chiefs affected to complain of the
great lenity that the Romans had shown to a body of men who, without permission
of their nation, had dared to intrude on Roman ground. (Liv. 39.54.) The consul
Marcellus now asked permission of the senate, which he got, to lead his legions
into Istria. At the same time the Romans founded the Latin colony of Aquileia,
in the same year that they sent colonists to Parma and Mutina. Thus they secured
a position at the head of the gulf of Venice, which they carefully maintained,
to check the inroads of barbarians on that side of Italy, and to extend their
own dominion to the east of the gulf. In B.C. 179, 3000 Transalpine Galli
crossed the Alps peaceably, and begged the consul, Q. Fulvius Flaccus, and the
senate to allow them to settle in Italy as subjects of the Roman people; but the
senate ordered them to quit the country, and the consul received instructions to
punish the leaders of the emigration. We do not know from what part these men
came, whether from Transalpine Gallia, as limited by Caesar in his Commentaries,
or from the country north of the eastern Alps. But, if we consider the state of
Gallia as it was in Caesar's time, when the poor were oppressed by the rich, and
the cultivator of the soil was a serf, we can easily understand what drove these
men to seek for a new home.
We know very little of the history of Gallia Cisalpina as a Roman province. It
was rapidly filled with Romans, and became one of the most valuable of the Roman
possessions. An instance of the wanton exercise of power by the consul C.
Cassius, is recorded when he held the province (B.C. 170). The ambassadors of a
Gallic prince, Cincibil, a mountaineer, complained to the senate that Cassius
had invaded the country of the Alpine people, who [1.945] were Socii of the
Romans, and carried off many thousands into slavery. Tile consul filled his
pockets by selling his prisoners. He was no better than a barbarous African
chief, who catches men, and sells them to the white man of Europe or America. A
like instance of gross injustice occurred at a later time (B.C. 44), when D.
Brutus, then governor of Cisalpine Gallia, led his men against the people in the
Alps (Inalpini), to please his soldiers, and secure their fidelity. (Cic. Fam.
11.4) The senate declared their willingness to hear the evidence against
Cassius, when he returned from Macedonia, where he then was. But in the mean
time they got rid of their troublesome complainants by handsome presents, and
allowing them to purchase ten horses and take them out of Italy. (Liv. 43.7.)
The peace of Cisalpine Gallia was not disturbed again, except in B.C. 101, when
the Cimbri came over the Eastern Alps, and crossed the Adige. They were defeated
by Marius and Catulus in the great battle near Vercellae.
Gallia Cisalpina remained quiet during the Social War, and it was probably to
reward the people for their fidelity that the consul Cn. Pompeius was empowered,
B.C. 89, by a Lex Pompeia to give the political condition called Jus Latii or
Latinitas to the towns north of the Po. Asconius, who is the authority for this,
does not say that the Latinitas was given to all the towns north of the Po; but
it is probable that it was. He remarks that Pompeius did not establish new
colonies, but gave this Jus Latii to the towns which existed. The Latinitas
placed the Transpadani in a middle position between Romani Cives and Peregrini,
for those who had filled a magistratus in the towns that had the Latinitas
acquired thereby the Roman civitas, This new Latinitas or Jus Latii is a
different thing from the former condition of the towns of Latium and the Latinae
coloniae. The Roman colonies (coloniae civium Romanorum) consisted only of Roman
citizens, and they were Roman communities. Latinae colonize might be composed
either of Roman citizens or of Latini; but a Roman citizen who joined a Latina
colonia in order to get a house and land, lost his civitas; and these Latinae
coloniae were viewed as Latin communities. The Lex Julia, B.C. 90, after the
Social War had broken out, gave the Roman civitas to all the Nomen Latinum, that
is, to all such towns of Latium as were not already municipia or coloniae; and
to all the Latin colonies in Italy. Thus all the Latinae coloniae became
municipal; and when it is said that the Latinitas or Jus Latii was given by Cn.
Pompeius to the Transpadani, it means to those towns which were not Latinae
coloniae. The new political condition of these Transpadani was expressed by this
term Latinitas or Jus. Latii; and accordingly the word Latini now received a new
signification, designating a class of people in a certain legal condition, and
having no reference to a particular country and people.
It is not stated by any ancient authority what was done with the inhabitants of
Gallia south of the Po, when the Transpadani received the Latinitas; but we
cannot refuse to accept Savigny's conjecture, which he supports by the strongest
arguments, that they received the Roman civitas; and it may be, as he supposes,
by virtue of the same Lex Pompeia. It appears from Cicero (Cic. Att. 1.1, B.C.
65), that Gallia, which means all Cisalpine Gallia, had great influence over the
elections at Rome by their votes; and therefore a large part of Gallia had the
civitas at this time, and it must have been given either in B.C. 89, or between
B.C. 89 and B.C. 65. But there occurred no occasion between these two dates for
giving new political rights to Cisalpine Gallia, so far as we know; and there
was a good reason for giving them after the close of the Social War. The
conclusion, then, of Savigny is this: �In B.C. 89 the towns of the Cispadan
regions became Roman municipia, and the Transpadani became Latinae coloniae. We
must except Placentia, Cremona, and Bononia, which, being old Latinae coloniae,
were changed into municipia by the Lex Julia (B.C. 90); also Mutina and Parma,
which, being old Roman coloniae, underwent. no change in their condition; we
must also except Eporedia in Gallia Transpadana, which must have belonged to the
one or the other of these two classes, for we do not know whether it was a Roman
or a Latin colonia.� This explains why Mutina is called by Cicero (Cic. Phil.
5.9) a colonia. It was in its origin a colonia., and might always be called so;
but in Cicero's time it was a Roman town, and a municipium in the sense of that
period. Cicero also calls Placentia a municipium, and he calls it so correctly,
for such it was in his time; but it was originally a Latina colonia.
There is a passage of Suetonius (Suet. Jul. 100.8) in which he says that Caesar.
when he was quaestor in Spain (B.C. 66), left it sooner than he ought to have
done, in order to visit the Latinae coloniae, who were agitating about the
civitas. This is explained by Savigny to refer to the Transpadani. In the
following year (D. C. 37.9) the censors could not agree whether they should
admit the Transpadani as cives or not; which is another proof that the people
south of the Po had the civitas. It was again talked of in B.C. 51, as we infer
from the letters of Cicero (Cic. Att. 5.2, ad Fam. 8.1), when they are rightly
explained. Finally, in B.C. 49, Caesar, after crossing the Rubicon, gave the
Transpadani the civitas. (D. C. 41.36.) Thus the towns of the Transpadani became
municipia, except Cremona, Aquileia, and Eporedia, which were already municipia
by virtue of the Lex Julia. When it is said that the towns of Gallia, Cisalpina
became municipia, we must understand this of course only of the larger towns:
the smaller places were attached to the large towns, and depended on them.
During Caesar's government of Gallia Cisalpina he added a body of colonists,
some of whom were Greeks, to the inhabitants of Comum, and put them on the same
footing as the former inhabitants. (Strab. p. 212.) Appian (App. BC 2.26),
states that Caesar established Novum Comum, and gave it the Latinitas; and he
shows that he understood what he was speaking about, for he says, �Those who
discharged an annual magistracy there became Roman citizens, for this is the
effect of the Latinitas.� Caesar's enemies at Rome took a malicious pleasure in
treating a magistrate of Comum. as if he were not a Roman citizen, intending by
this to insult Caesar. Suetonius (Suet. Jul. 100.28) says that it was by virtue
of a Rogatio Vatinia that Caesar gave the civitas to the people of Comum. He may
be mistaken about the civitas, but Caesar no doubt acted under some lex.
The limit of Gallia Cisalpina on the south-east, during Caesar's proconsulate,
was the Rubico; and it was this circumstance that made his crossing the river
with his troops into Italy equivalent to treason against the state. The boundary
on the west side [1.946] is fixed at the Macra (Magra), which enters the sea a
little west of Luna. Some (Sigonius, de Ant. Jur. Italiae, 1.100.22) would
extend the boundary to the Arnus. Polybius certainly (2.15) extends the Ligurian
territory to the neighbourhood of Pisae, yet not to the Arno; for Pisae was an
Etruscan city. But the boundary of Liguria, in the time of Augustus, was the
Macra; and on the Gallic frontier the boundary was the Varus (Var): and this may
have been so when Caesar was proconsul of Gallia. In the NE. the province
extended at least to Aquileia. Caesar had Gallia Cisalpina and Illyricum as his
provinces, besides Transalpina Gallia. Liguria was certainly within his
province. At Aquileia he had three legions at the commencement of the Helvetic
War (B.C. 58), which he carried over the Alps with him. (B. G. 1.10.) Aquileia
was in the country of the Carni, but it was at this time within the province of
Cisalpine Gallia; and this explains Livy (40.34), when he says that Aquileia was
in the Ager Gallorum, which he might say in a certain sense. Venetia was of
course in the province of Gallia Cisalpina. It seems from a passage in the
eighth book of the Gallic War (B. G. 8.24), that Caesar considered Tergeste
(Trieste) to be in Gallia Togata; or at least the author of this book did.
Sigonius makes the Formio (Risone), a little south of Tergeste, the boundary of
Gallia Cisalpina in this part; but the boundary probably was not fixed. If the
province included Istria, into which the proconsuls of Cisalpine Gallia had
carried their arms, we may perhaps extend the limit here as far as the river
Arsia (Arsa), which was at a later time the boundary of Italia. But there is no
evidence to show how far the civitas was extended when the Transpadani became
Roman citizens; it must have extended to Aquileia, or further, but we know
nothing about this. Caesar generally passed the winter in North Italy during his
Gallic wars, and he used to hold the conventus at this season. (B. G. 1.54,
6.44.) Gallia Cisalpina, therefore, at this time had its division into conventus,
like Sicily, and Hispania and Lusitania at a later time; but we do not know the
names of the conventus, nor the divisions of the country for judicial and
administrative purposes. The proconsul had the complete civil power in his
hands.
Even after B.C. 49, when Gallia Cisalpina had the civitas, and consisted of
Roman communities organised after Roman fashion, there was still one exception.
The towns had no II. vir juri dicundo, or magistrates for the administration of
justice. The proconsul had the general administration of justice, which he
exercised either in his own person, or by praefecti, to whom he delegated his
authority. �The towns were consequently here, on the whole, in a like condition
with the single praefecturae elsewhere, which however were not numerous; with
this exception, that they had not, like the praefecture, separate praefects, but
the proconsul was the general praefectus for the whole province. Only one place,
Mutina, was a real praefectura. The praetor did not exercise jurisdiction there,
but a praefectus juri dicundo was sent from Rome.� (Savigny.)
After the dictator's murder, B.C. 44, D. Brutus, one of his friends and
assassins, held the province of Gallia Cisalpina, as governor, by the authority
of the senate. He was beseiged in Mutina by M. Antonius; and in the spring of
B.C. 43 the battle took place, before Mutina, in which the consuls Hirtius and
Pansa fell. Cicero, in his Philippics, still speaks of the Provincia Gallia to
the end of April, B.C. 43. In the autumn of B.C. 43 the last proconsul of Gallia
Cisalpina, D. Brutus, was caught and put to death by order of M. Antonius. No
governor of Cisalpine Gallia was again appointed. Dio Cassius (48.12) speaks of
Galatia Togata, as he calls it, in the year B.C. 41, as being already included
in Italia; �so that no one, on the pretext of having the government there, could
maintain troops on the south side of the Alps.� This seems to imply an
arrangement made between Octavianus and M. Antonius. From this time the name
Italia, which in the popular language had sometimes been extended to Gallia
Cisalpina, as already observed, comprehended all the country south of the Alps.
A lex was enacted for the regulation of the jurisdiction in Gallia Cisalpina,
which is termed the Lex de Gallia Cisalpina. A considerable part of it was found
A.D. 1760, in the ruins of Veleia, and it is preserved in the Museum at Parma.
The date of its enactment was probably soon after B.C. 43. The name of the lex
is now generally admitted to be the Lex Rubria, or Lex Rubria de Gallia
Cisalpina, though some critics do not think that the name of the proposer of the
lex is known. In his first essay on this subject Savigny doubted about the
propriety of calling this lex the Lex Rubria, and he also supposed the object of
the lex to be to give directions, to the newly established magistrates in Gallia
as to procedure. In the additions to his original essay he has expressed himself
perfectly satisfied with Puchta's explanation of the purpose of the lex, and he
derives from this explanation satisfactory evidence that the true name of the
lex is Lex Rubria. The purpose of the lex is important for the understanding of
the municipal organisation of Italy under the empire.
In the Digest we find the jurisdiction of the municipal magistrates limited in
two ways: first, by the amount of the sum of money or matter in dispute;
secondly, by the fact that they had the powers which belonged to the proper
jurisdictio only, and not those which were comprised in the imperium. The origin
of this double limitation, which appears in the Digest as a general rule for all
municipal magistrates, must be sought for in the Lex Rubria. The second
limitation deprived those magistrates of the power of granting a missio, bonorum
possessio, and restitutio, and of compelling a praeterio stipulatio. As to the
amount or value of the matter in dispute, the magistrates of Gallia were not
allowed to decide in cases where it was above 15,000 sesterces. The lex, then,
had. two objects: one was to limit the amount, as just stated, and to exclude
the magistrates from the exercise of those powers which were contained in the
imperium; the other was to provide rules for their direction, which these
limitations made necessary, in order to prevent the administration of justice
from being impeded. The magistrates mentioned in the lex are II. vir, IIII. vir,
praefectus. The first is the ordinary name for a municipal magistrate; but
probably II. viri I. D. (juri dicundo) were in Gallia, as in other places, more
common than IIII. viri I. D. The third name, praefectus, occurs twice with the
designation of Mutinensis. The old colony of Mutina was a praefectura. and the
only one in Gallia. Accordingly, all the Gallic towns had for magistrates either
II. viri I. D. or IIII. viri I. D., except Mutina, which had a praefectus I. D.
The amount of the matter in dispute in which a Gallic magistrate had
jurisdiction was, as we have [1.947] seen, 15,000 sestertii. It remains to be
explained what was the process, if the party who was condemned to pay did not
obey the judgment. Puchta, who keeps close to the principle (which is true in
the main) that execution belongs to the imperium, infers that the municipal
magistrates had no power to order execution, but that the praetor at Rome must
be applied to. This monstrous unpractical conclusion is a simple impossibility.
According to this, as Savigny remarks, if a plaintiff at Padua obtained judgment
in his favour in the matter of a few denarii, or for a bushel of wheat that he.
had sold, and the defendant did not pay, the plaintiff must make a journey to
Rome to get execution. We must conclude that it was one of the objects of the
lex, after having limited the jurisdiction of the Gallic magistrates to a fixed
sum, to provide the means of enforcing their judgments, though we have no
evidence of this. But both the general principles of Roman law as to jurisdictio
(Javolenus, 50.2. de Jurisdict. 2. 1), and other arguments urged by Savigny, are
decisive against the absurd conclusion of Puchta.
The names by which these Gallic communities are mentioned in the lex are
various. In one passage �municipium� is used as a generic name, comprehending
coloniae and the praefectura; and this denomination could be correctly used, for
the whole country contained only Roman communities. In another passage occur �municipium,�
�colonia,� �locus;� where �locus� means any place which does not belong to the
other two classes. Savigny supposes that �coloniae� may mean such places as had
not consented to be changed into �municipia;� but that these could only be a
few, for he thinks that the towns south of the Po, when that country obtained
the civitas, and the Transpadani, when they also, at a later time, obtained the
civitas, must first have become Fundus, as the Romans termed it (see Dict.
Antiq., Art. FUNDUS); that is, must have given their consent to become Roman
municipalities, like the Italian cities which received the civitas by virtue of
the Lex Julia. This explanation of the word �coloniae� in the Lex Rubria seems
doubtful; and it may be nothing more than a legal superabundance of language. It
is true that, if there was not and could not be a colonia in Gallia, the name
would have no meaning in the lex, and would be not only an idle, but an absurd
redundancy; but there had been coloniae, and the lex may mean, whether you call
the place municipium or colonia, or any other name which is applicable to it. In
another passage there is a larger enumeration of places, if the abbreviations
are rightly explained:--�oppidum, municipium, colonia, praefectura, forum, vicus,
castellum.� Here �oppidum� is generic, not a particular class; �municipium�
comprehends most of the chief towns; �colonia,� according to Savigny, only a few
towns; and �praefectura,� only Mutina. The other three names denote smaller
places, which had a less complete organisation. Places of this kind, it is
assumed (and there can be no doubt of it), had not their separate magistrates; a
village had not its own judge. This appears from the general system of town
organisation in Italy, where each chief place had its district or territory, the
smaller places or villages in which were attached to the chief place, and
included in its jurisdiction. A �forum,� �vicus,� or �castellum,� would be a
part of the territory of a �municipium.� The municipium was the centre of
administration, as we see in the fact of the census being taken there. When the
lex, in speaking of these smaller places, says, �qui ibi juri dicundo praeest,�
this does not lead to the conclusion that these places had their separate
magistrates, for this expression may apply just as well to the II. viri of the
town to whose jurisdiction the �vicus� or the �forum� belonged. (Savigny,
Vermischte Schriften, vol. iii., Tafel von Heraklea; Puchta, Zeitschrift f�r
Geschicht. Rechtsw. Lex Rubria, &c. vol. x.)
The division of Italy into eleven �regiones� by Augustus had for its immediate
object the taking of the census, which was conducted in a new way, and was taken
in the several districts. The regiones into which Gallia was divided were: Regio
XI., which was Transpadana, or Italia Transpadana; Regio X., which was Venetia
et Histria, sometimes called Venetia only; Regio IX., which corresponded to the
former Liguria; and Regio VIII., which was bounded on the north by the Po, on
the east by the Hadriatic, on the south by the Rubicon, and on the west by the
Trebia, which separated it from that part of Regio IX. which was north of the
Apennines. - Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography,
William Smith, LLD, Ed.
Read The Bible
- 1599 Geneva Bible (GNV)
- 21st Century King James Version (KJ21)
- American Standard Version (ASV)
- Amplified Bible (AMP)
- Amplified Bible, Classic Edition (AMPC)
- Authorized (King James) Version (AKJV)
- BRG Bible (BRG)
- Christian Standard Bible (CSB)
- Common English Bible (CEB)
- Complete Jewish Bible (CJB)
- Contemporary English Version (CEV)
- Darby Translation (DARBY)
- Disciples’ Literal New Testament (DLNT)
- Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition (DRA)
- Easy-to-Read Version (ERV)
- English Standard Version (ESV)
- English Standard Version Anglicised (ESVUK)
- Evangelical Heritage Version (EHV)
- Expanded Bible (EXB)
- GOD’S WORD Translation (GW)
- Good News Translation (GNT)
- Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB)
- International Children’s Bible (ICB)
- International Standard Version (ISV)
- J.B. Phillips New Testament (PHILLIPS)
- Jubilee Bible 2000 (JUB)
- King James Version (KJV)
- Lexham English Bible (LEB)
- Living Bible (TLB)
- Modern English Version (MEV)
- Mounce Reverse Interlinear New Testament (MOUNCE)
- Names of God Bible (NOG)
- New American Bible (Revised Edition) (NABRE)
- New American Standard Bible (NASB)
- New American Standard Bible 1995 (NASB1995)
- New Catholic Bible (NCB)
- New Century Version (NCV)
- New English Translation (NET)
- New International Reader's Version (NIRV)
- New International Version - UK (NIVUK)
- New International Version (NIV)
- New King James Version (NKJV)
- New Life Version (NLV)
- New Living Translation (NLT)
- New Matthew Bible (NMB)
- New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)
- New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE)
- New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised (NRSVA)
- New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised Catholic Edition (NRSVACE)
- New Testament for Everyone (NTE)
- Orthodox Jewish Bible (OJB)
- Revised Geneva Translation (RGT)
- Revised Standard Version (RSV)
- Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (RSVCE)
- The Message (MSG)
- The Voice (VOICE)
- Tree of Life Version (TLV)
- World English Bible (WEB)
- Worldwide English (New Testament) (WE)
- Wycliffe Bible (WYC)
- Young's Literal Translation (YLT)
Table of Contents
Main Menu
- Ancient Assyrian Social Structure
- Ancient Babylonia
- Ancient Canaan During the Time of Joshua
- Ancient History Timeline
- Ancient Oil Lamps
- Antonia Fortress
- Archaeology of Ancient Assyria
- Assyria and Bible Prophecy
- Augustus Caesar
- Background Bible Study
- Bible
- Biblical Geography
- Fallen Empires - Archaeological Discoveries and the Bible
- First Century Jerusalem
- Glossary of Latin Words
- Herod Agrippa I
- Herod Antipas
- Herod the Great
- Herod's Temple
- High Priest's in New Testament Times
- Jewish Literature in New Testament Times
- Library collection
- Map of David's Kingdom
- Map of the Divided Kingdom - Israel and Judah
- Map of the Ministry of Jesus
- Matthew Henry Bible Commentary
- Messianic Prophecy
- Nero Caesar Emperor
- Online Bible Maps
- Paul's First Missionary Journey
- Paul's Second Missionary Journey
- Paul's Third Missionary Journey
- Pontius Pilate
- Questions About the Ancient World
- Tabernacle of Ancient Israel
- Tax Collectors in New Testament Times
- The Babylonian Captivity
- The Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser
- The Books of the New Testament
- The Court of the Gentiles
- The Court of the Women in the Temple
- The Destruction of Israel
- The Fall of Judah with Map
- The History Of Rome
- The Incredible Bible
- The Jewish Calendar in Ancient Hebrew History
- The Life of Jesus in Chronological Order
- The Life of Jesus in Harmony
- The Names of God
- The New Testament
- The Old Testament
- The Passion of the Christ
- The Pharisees
- The Sacred Year of Israel in New Testament Times
- The Samaritans
- The Scribes
Ancient Questions
- Why Do the Huldah Gates Appear Different in Ancient Replicas and Modern Photos?
- What Is the Origin of the Japanese and Chinese Peoples? A Biblical Perspective
- How did the ancient Greeks and Romans practice medicine and treat illnesses?
- What were the major contributions of ancient Babylon to mathematics and astronomy?
- How did the ancient Persians create and administer their vast empire?
- What were the cultural and artistic achievements of ancient India, particularly during the Gupta Empire?
- How did ancient civilizations like the Incas and Aztecs build their remarkable cities and structures?
- What were the major trade routes and trading practices of the ancient world?
- What was the role of slavery in ancient societies like Rome and Greece?
- How did the ancient Mayans develop their sophisticated calendar system?
Bible Study Questions
- Why did Moses say bastards are condemned?
- Why Do Christians Celebrate Christmas?
- How Many Chapters Are There in the Bible?
- The Five Key Visions in the New Testament
- The 400-Year Prophecy: Unpacking Genesis 15 and the Journey of a People
- The Authorized (King James) Version (AKJV): Historical Significance, Translation Methodology, and Lasting Impact
- Exploring the English Standard Version (ESV): Its Aspects, Comparisons, Impact on Biblical Studies, and Church Use
- A Detailed Historical Analysis of Language Updates in the KJ21: Comparison with Other Versions
- A Detailed Historical Analysis of the American Standard Version (ASV): Comparison to the King James Version, Influence on Later Translations, and Evaluation of Strengths and Weaknesses
- A Detailed Historical Analysis of Amplifications in the Amplified Bible (AMP) and Its Comparison to Other Bible Translations
About
Welcome to Free Bible: Unearthing the Past, Illuminating the Present! Step into a world where ancient history and biblical narratives intertwine, inviting you to explore the rich tapestry of human civilization.
Discover the captivating stories of forgotten empires, delve into the customs and cultures of our ancestors, and witness the remarkable findings unearthed by dedicated archaeologists.
Immerse yourself in a treasure trove of knowledge, where the past comes alive and illuminates our understanding of the present.
Join us on this extraordinary journey through time, where curiosity is rewarded and ancient mysteries await your exploration.
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