Chapter 23

135I speak of course of the restored league after the election of one Strategus began,B.C.255.

136For the change of time of the election see note on5,1.

137We hear nothing of a secretary under the new league after the abolition of the dual presidency. But he probably still existed (2,43).

13810,22.

139See ch. 46.

140This is certainly the meaning of the words of Polybius. But he has confused matters. The two new Consuls designated at the comitia of 249 were C. Aurelius Cotta II and P. Servilius Geminus II, whereas Lucius Junius Pullus was the existing Consul with the disgraced P. Claudius Pulcher. What really happened is made clear by Livy, Ep. 19. The Senate sent Junius with these supplies, recalled Claudius, and forced him to name a Dictator. Claudius retaliated by naming an obscure person, who was compelled to abdicate, and then Atilius Calatinus was nominated.

141The dangerous nature of the S. Coast of Sicily was well known to the pilots. See above, ch. 37.

142About £500,000. For the value of the talent, taking the Euboic and Attic talent as the same, see note on Book34,8.

143ἱστορήσαντας. There seems no need to give this word the unusual sense ofnarratum legerehere, as some do.

144Sicca Venerea, so called from a temple of Venus, was notorious for its licentiousness. Valer. Max. 2, 6, 15.

145A line of the text appears to have been lost, probably containing an allusion to Hiero.

146The southernmost point of Italy is Leucopetra (Capo dell’ Armi). Cocinthus (Punta di Stilo) is much too far to the north; yet it may have been regarded as the conventional point of separation between the two seas, Sicilian and Ionian, which have no natural line of demarcation.

147Really 3/16; for 16 ases = 6 obols (one drachma or denarius) see34,8. The Sicilian medimnus is about a bushel and a half; the metretes 8-1/2 gallons.

148Livy, 5, 17, 33-49; Plutarch,Camillus, 16; Mommsen,History of Rome, vol. i. p. 338 (Eng. tr.)

149Compare the description of the Gauls given by Caesar,B.G.6, 11-20. They had apparently made considerable progress in civilisation by that time, principally perhaps from the influence of Druidism. But the last characteristic mentioned by Polybius is also observed by Caesar (15),omnes in bello versantur atque eorum ut quisque est genere copiisque amplissimus, ita plurimos circum se ambactos clienteeque habet. Hanc unam gratiam potentiamque habent.Even in the time of Cato they were at least beginning to add something to their warlike propensities. Or, 2, 2 (Jordan)Pleraque Gallia duas res industrissime persequitur, rem militare et argute loqui. Cf. Diod. 5, 27sq.

150Lucius Caecilius, Livy, Ep. 12.

151For a more complete list of Gallic invasions in this period, see Mommsen,H.R.i. p. 344. The scantiness of continuous Roman history fromB.C.390, and its total loss from 293 to the first Punic war renders it difficult to determine exactly which of the many movements Polybius has selected.

152Ch. 13.

153This clause is bracketed by Hultsch, Mommsen, and Strachan-Davidson. See the essay of the last named in his Polybius, p. 22. Livy, Ep. 20, gives the number of Romans and Latins as 300,000.

154Others read Ananes and Marseilles [Ἀνάνων ... Μασσαλίας]; but it seems impossible that the Roman march should have extended so far.

155That is, each city struck its own coin, but on a common standard of weight and value. See P. Gardner’s Introduction to Catalogue of Greek Coins (Peloponnesus) in the British Museum, p. xxiv.

156The Pythagorean clubs, beginning in combinations for the cultivation of mystic philosophy and ascetic life, had grown to be political,— a combination of the upper or cultivated classes to secure political power. Thus Archytas was for many years ruler in Tarentum (Strabo, 1, 3, 4). The earliest was at Croton, but they were also established in many cities of Magna Graecia. Sometime in the fourth centuryB.C.a general democratic rising took place against them, and their members were driven into exile. Strabo, 8, 7, 1; Justin, 20, 4; Iamblichusvit. Pythag., 240-262.

157The MS. vary between ὁμάριος and ὁμόριος. The latter form seems to mean “god of a common frontier.” But an inscription found at Orchomenus gives the form ἀμάριος, which has been connected with ἡμάρα “day.”

158There was still an under-strategus (ὑποστρατηγὸς), see5,94;23,16;30,11. But he was entirely subordinate, and did not even succeed to power on the death of a strategus during the year of office, as the vice-president in America does.

159Alexander II. of Epirus, son of Pyrrhus, whom he succeededB.C.272. The partition of Acarnania took place inB.C.266.

160Near Bellina, a town on the north-west frontier of Laconia, which had long been a subject of dispute between Sparta and the Achaeans. PlutarchArat.4; Pausan. 8, 35, 4.

161Ptolemy Euergetes (B.C.247-222).

162The treaty, besides securing the surrender of the Acrocorinthus, provided that no embassy should be sent to any other king without the consent of Antigonus, and that the Achaeans should supply food and pay for the Macedonian army of relief. Solemn sacrifices and games were also established in his honour, and kept up long after his death at Sicyon, see28,19;30,23. Plutarch,Arat.45. The conduct of Aratus in thus bringing the Macedonians into the Peloponnese has been always attacked (see Plut.Cleom.16). It is enough here to say that our judgment as to it must depend greatly on our view of the designs and character of Cleomenes.

163Phylarchus, said by some to be a native of Athens, by others of Naucratis, and by others again of Sicyon, wrote, among other things, a history in twenty-eight books from the expedition of Pyrrhus into the Peloponnese (B.C.272) to the death of Cleomenes. He was a fervent admirer of Cleomenes, and therefore probably wrote in a partisan spirit; yet in the matter of the outrage upon Mantinea, Polybius himself is not free from the same charge. See Mueller’sHistor. Graec.fr. lxxvii.-lxxxi. Plutarch, though admitting Phylarchus’s tendency to exaggeration (Arat.38), yet uses his authority both in his life of Aratus and of Cleomenes; and in the case of Aristomachus says that he was both racked and drowned (Arat.44).

164ἡγεμόνα καὶ στρατηγὸν. It is not quite clear whether this is merely a description of the ordinary office of Strategus, or whether any special office is meant, such as that conferred on Antigonus. In4,11ἡγεμόνες includes the Strategus and other officers. See Freeman,Federal Government, p. 299.

165Of Chaereas nothing seems known; a few fragments of an historian of his name are given in Müller, vol. iii. Of Sosilus, Diodorus (26, fr. 6) says that he was of Ilium and wrote a history of Hannibal in seven books. Nepos (Hann. 13) calls him a Lacedaemonian, and says that he lived in Hannibal’s camp and taught him Greek.

166i.e.in Latium.

167ἐπιλάβηταιinjecerit manum, the legal form of claiming a slave.

1681,83.

169Saguntum of course is south of the Iber, but the attack on it by Hannibal was a breach of the former of the two treaties. Livy (21, 2) seems to assert that it was specially exempted from attack in the treaty with Hasdrubal.

170From ch. 21.

171βασιλεύς. The two Suffetes represented the original Kings of Carthage (6,51). The title apparently remained for sacrificial purposes, like the ἄρχων βασιλεύς, and therex sacrificulus. Polybius, like other Greek writers, calls them βασιλεῖς.Infra, 42. Herod. 7, 165. Aristot. Pol. 2, 8.

172A promontory in Bruttium,Capo del Colonne.

173This division of the world into three parts was an advance upon the ancient geographers, who divided it into two, combining Egypt with Asia, and Africa with Europe. See Sall.Jug.17; Lucan,Phars.9, 411; Varro de L. L. 5, § 31. And note on12,25.

174Thearae Philaenorumwere apparently set up as boundary stones to mark the territory of the Pentapolis or Cyrene from Egypt: and the place retained the name long after the disappearance of the altars (Strabo, 3, 5, 5-6).

175For Polybius’s calculation as to the length of the stade, see note on34,12.

176Livy, 21, 25, calls itTannetum, and describes it only asvicus Pado propinquus. It was a few miles from Parma.

177Pluribus enim divisus amnis in mare decurrit(Livy, 21, 26).

178See on ch. 33, note 2.

179This statement has done much to ruin Polybius’s credit as a geographer. It indicates indeed a strangely defective conception of distance; as his idea, of the Rhone flowing always west, does of the general lie of the country.

180I have no intention of rediscussing the famous question of the pass by which Hannibal crossed the Alps. The reader will find an admirably clear statement of the various views entertained, and the latest arguments advanced in favour of each, in the notes to Mr. W. T. Arnold’s edition of Dr. Arnold’sHistory of the Second Punic War, pp. 362-373.

181περί τι λευκόπετρον, which, however, perhaps only means “bare rock,” cf.10,30. But see Law’sAlps of Hannibal, vol. i. p. 201sq.

182His life according to one story, was saved by his son, the famous Scipio Africanus (10,3); according to another, by a Ligurian slave (Livy, 21, 46).

183Livy says “to Mago,” Hannibal’s younger brother (21,47). This Hasdrubal is called in ch. 93 “captain of pioneers.”

184That is, four legions and their regular contingent of socii. See6,19sqq.

185“He crossed the Apennines, not by the ordinary road to Lucca, descending the valley of the Macra, but, as it appears, by a straighter line down the valley of the Auser or Serchio.”—Arnold.

186The marshes between the Arno and the Apennines south of Florence.

187ἀπεκοιμῶντο Schw. translates simplydormiebant. But the compound means more than that; it conveys the idea of an interval of sleep snatched from other employments. See Herod. 8, 76; Aristoph.Vesp.211.

188Livy, 22, 4-6. For a discussion of the modern views as to the scene of the battle, see W. T. Arnold’s edition of Dr. Arnold’sHistory of the Second Punic War, pp. 384-393. The radical difference between the account of Livy and that of Polybius seems to be that the former conceives the fighting to have been on the north shore of the lake between Tucro and Passignano; Polybius conceives the rear to have been caught in the defile of Passignano, the main fighting to have been more to the east, where the road turns up at right angles to the lake by La Torricella. Mr. Capes, however in his note on the passage of Livy, seems to think that both accounts agree in representing the fighting on the vanguard as being opposite Tucro.

189This treatment of non-combatants was contrary to the usages of civilised warfare even in those days, and seems to have been the true ground for the charge ofcrudelitasalways attributed to Hannibal by Roman writers, as opposed to the behaviour of such an enemy as Pyrrhus (Cic.de Am.28). It may be compared to the order of the Convention to give no quarter to English soldiers, which the French officers nobly refused to execute.

190Polybius expresses the fact accurately, for, in the absence of a Consul to nominate a Dictator, Fabius was created by a plebiscitum; but the scruples of the lawyers were quieted by his having the title ofprodictatoronly (Livy, 22, 8).

191Ramsay (Roman Antiquities, p. 148) denies this exception, quoting Livy, 6, 16. But Polybius could hardly have been mistaken on such a point; and there are indications (Plutarch,Anton.9) that the Tribunes did not occupy the same position as the other magistrates towards the Dictator.

192Theager Praetutianuswas the southern district of Picenum (Livy, 22, 9; 27, 43). The chief town was Interamna.

193On the Appian Way between Equus Tuticus and Herdonia, mod.Troja.

194Holsten for the Δαύνιοι of the old text; others suggestCalatia.

195Added by conjecture of Schw. One MS. has δευτέρα ἡ ἀπὸ τοῦ Ἐριβανοῦ.

196Near Cales.

197Homer,Odyss.10, 230.

198See i. 16.

199ἐξ ἀσπίδος ἐπιπαρενέβαλλον. The ordinary word for “forming line” or “taking dressing” is παρεμβάλλειν. In the other two passages where ἐπιπαρεμβάλλειν is used, ἐπί has a distinct (though different) force. I think here it must mean “against,” “so as to attack.” And this seems to be Casaubon’s interpretation.

200There is nothing here absolutely to contradict the picturesque story of the death of Paulus given by Livy (22, 49), but the words certainly suggest that Polybius had never heard it.

201A town on the lake of Trichonis, in Aetolia, but its exact situation is uncertain. Strabo (10, 2, 3) says that it was on a fertile plain, which answers best to a situation north of the lake.

202Cf.9,34. We know nothing of this incident.

203See2,53.

204The Achaean Strategus was elected in the middle of May, the Aetolian in the autumn. Aratus would be elected May 12,B.C.220, and come into office some time before midsummer; Ariston’s Aetolian office would terminate in SeptemberB.C.220. See v. 1.

205The capture of Sicyon and expulsion of the tyrant Nicocles was the earliest exploit of Aratus,B.C.251. Plutarch,Arat.4-9. The taking of the Acrocorinthus from the Macedonian garrison was inB.C.243,ib.ch. 19-24. For the affair at Pellene seeib.31. The capture of Mantinea was immediately after a defeat by Cleomenes. See Plutarch,Cleom.5.

206The city of Pheia was on the isthmus connecting the promontory Ichthys (Cape Katákolo) with the mainland: opposite its harbour is a small island which Polybius here callsPheias, i.e.the island belonging to Pheia.

207Caphyae was on a small plain, which was subject to inundations from the lake of Orchomenus; the ditches here mentioned appear to be those dug to drain this district. They were in the time of Pausanias superseded by a high dyke, from the inner side of which ran the River Tragus (Tara). Pausan. 8, 23, 2.

208The Olympiads being counted from the summer solstice, these events occurring before midsummer ofB.C.220 belong to the 139th Olympiad. The 140th begins with midsummerB.C.220.

209But outside the natural borders of Arcadia. Mod. Kalávryta.

210By the diolcos which had been formed for the purpose. Strabo, 8, 2. Ships had been dragged across the Isthmus on various occasions from early times. See Thucyd. 3, 15.

211Reading, μόνου. See ch. 13.

212A mountain on the frontier, on the pass over which the roads to Tegea and Argos converge.

213A town of Phthiotis in Thessaly. See Book25,3.

214See ch. 15.

215See ch. 24.

216See Stobaeus Floril. 58, 9, who gives three more lines.

217Cf. ch. 74.

218The hero of the second Messenian war,B.C.685-668 (Pausan. 4, 14-24). The story told by Pausanias, who also quotes these verses, is that Aristocrates, king of the Arcadians, twice played the traitor to Aristomenes, the Messenian champion: once at the battle of the Great Trench, and again when Aristomenes renewed the war after his escape from the Pits at Sparta; and that on the second occasion his own people stoned him to death, and set up this pillar in the sacred enclosure of Zeus on Mount Lycaeus.

219But Pausanias represents the pillar as put up by the Arcadians, not the Messenians (4, 22, 7).

220The text is uncertain here.

221Reading with Hultsch, τὰ καλὰ.

222However cogent may be the reasons for his prophecy adduced by Polybius, there are no signs of its being fulfilled. Indeed, the bank at the mouth of the Danube, which he mentions, has long disappeared. The fact seems to be that he failed to take into calculation the constant rush of water out of the Euxine, which is sufficient to carry off any amount of alluvial deposit.

223Xenophon,Hellen.1, 1, 22.

224Or Tylis, according to Stephanos Byz., who says it was near the Haemus. Perhaps the modern Kilios.

225Seleucus II. (Callinicus),B.C.246-226. Seleucus III. (Ceraunus),B.C.226-223. Antiochus the Great (son of Callinicus),B.C.223-187.

226Of Seleucus Callinicus.

227That this was the name of a yearly officer at Byzantium appears from a decree in Demosthenes (de Cor.§ 90), and Byzantine coins, Eckhel, ii. p. 31. The title seems to have been brought from the mother-city Megara; as at Chalcedon, another colony of Megara, the same existed (C. I. G. 3794). It was connected with the worship of Apollo brought from Megara, Müller’sDorians, i. p. 250. It seems that this use of the name (generally employed of the deputies to the Amphictyonic council) was peculiarly Dorian. See Boeckh. C. I., vol. i. p. 610.

228Or Lyctos (Steph. Byz.)

229Of Arcadia, a city of Crete (Steph. Byz.)

230Which had a harbour formed by a projecting headland called Lisses. Steph. Byz., who quotes Homer,Odyss.3, 293:ἔστι δέ τις Λισσὴς αἰπεῖά τε εἰς ἅλα πέτρη.

230Which had a harbour formed by a projecting headland called Lisses. Steph. Byz., who quotes Homer,Odyss.3, 293:

ἔστι δέ τις Λισσὴς αἰπεῖά τε εἰς ἅλα πέτρη.

231As a measure of weight a talent = about 57 lbs. avoirdupois. The prepared hair was for making ropes and bowstrings apparently.

232Gortyna or Gortys is an emendation of Reiske for Gorgus, which is not known. Gortys is mentioned by Pausanias, 5, 7, 1; 8, 27, 4; 8, 28, 1; it was on the river Bouphagus, and in the time of Pausanias was a mere village.

233See2,41. We have no hint, as far as I know, of the circumstances under which such recovery would take place. We may conjecture from this passage that it would be on showing that losses had been sustained by reason of a failure of the league to give protection.

234Stephanos describes Ambracus as a πολιχνίον close to Ambracia.

235Though it was in the territory of Acarnania (Steph. Byz.)

2363,19.

237The position of Dodona, long a subject of doubt, was settled by the discovery of the numerous inscriptions found about seven miles from Jannina, and published by Constantine Caraponos in 1878,Dodon et ses Ruines. See alsoJournal of Hellenic Studies, vol. i. p. 228.

238See ch. 68.

239Reading ἁλίαν. See Muller’sDorians, vol. II, p. 88.

240The local name of Tarentine, though doubtless originating in fact, had come to indicate a species of mercenary cavalry armed in a particular way. Arrian,Tact.4, distinguishes two sorts of light cavalry for skirmishing Tarentines armed with javelins (δορατία), and horse archers (ἱπποτοξόται). Cp,11,12. Livy 35, 29; 37, 40.

241Pausanias (8, 26, 7) calls him Hypatodorus; and mentions another work of his at Delphi (10, 10, 3). He flourished aboutB.C.370. He was a native of Thebes. Sostratos was a Chian, and father of another statuary named Pantias. Paus. 6, 9, 3.

242That is the office of the Polemarch, as in Athens the Strategium (στρατηγίον) is the office of the Strategi. Plutarch,Nicias, 5.

243Yet the avowed project of Cleomenes was the restoration of the ancient constitution. Plutarch,Cleom.c. 10.

244See ch. 59.

245From4,6, it appears that the election took place at the rising of the Pleiades (13th May) and that the new Strategus did not enter upon his office until some time afterwards, towards the middle of June or even midsummer. But the custom apparently varied, and the use of τότε seems to indicate a change.

246Later on the assemblies were held at the different cities in turn. See23,17;24,10, etc.

247Νεοκρῆτες, cf. cc. 65, 79. Livy (37, 40) transcribes the wordNeocretes. It is uncertain what the exact meaning of the word is. It seems most reasonable to suppose that, like Tarentini, it had ceased to be an ethnical term, and meant mercenary soldiers (νέοι) armed like Cretans, that is, as archers.

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