Bellum Iugurthinum G. Sallusti Crispi

Introduction

   Sallust has himself informed us of the reasons which induced him to write the history of a period so painful in many respects to a patriotic Roman as that of the war with Jugurtha. It attracted him, he tells us, in the first place, "as a great and severe contest waged with varying success-" and, in the second, as "the occasion of resistance being for the first time made to the pride of the nobility," which resistance he regards as the prelude to all the civil wars which afterwards exhausted Italy and the whole Roman world. The interest of his narration is, therefore, twofold, both military and political, and his success in bringing it home to his readers is by no means equal in the different parts of his work. In its military aspect the war with Jugurtha is really of little importance. Some hundred and twenty or thirty years later, in the reign of Tiberius, another Numidian arose, who gave the Romans almost as much trouble as Jugurtha. Tacfarinas, like Jugurtha, had become acquainted with the Roman discipline; like him, he was always (with one trifling exception) defeated in pitched battles; like him, by surprises and petty skirmishes he wore out the enemy whom he could not meet with success in the field. Two Roman generals triumphed for bringing the war to a supposed conclusion, but each time, after an interval, Tacfarinas renewed it with as much and as little success as before; and, as in the case of Jugurtha, it was only brought to a final end by his death, after the contest had been carried on for seven years (A.D. 17-24). Tacitus gives us the history of this war in some seven chapters (Annals ii. 52; iii. 21, 73, 74; iv. 23-25), and it may fairly be said that the knowledge we receive from these is quite as satisfactory as that which Sallust's prolix narration affords us of the conflict with Jugurtha. The materials, indeed, for writing a good military history of any war in Africa did not exist, and we, therefore, cannot blame Sallust for his failure. If he had had an accurate map of Numidia to refer to as he wrote, and the accounts of eye-witnesses to supply him with details of the several campaigns, there is no reason to doubt that he would have produced an excellent and thoroughly intelligible history of the war. The vivid description which he gives of the battle of the Muthul, where he had the account of one of the Roman officers, Publius Rutilius Rufus, to guide him, is a sufficient proof of his ability to deal with good materials when he possessed them. As it is, in the absence of all information as to the geography of the country, and with a chronology which seldom extends beyond such references as "after a few days," or "in the course of the same campaign," it is impossible to extract from the account of Sallust any clear idea of the details of the war. We have, indeed, certain sieges and battles assigned to the several campaigns, but the links connecting them are mostly wanting, and their place is inadequately supplied by repeated assertions that each new tactic of Metellus or Marius reduced Jugurtha to frenzy and despair, and then, after a while, had to be abandoned by the Roman general as ineffectual. Even in the case of the operations which he describes at length, it is often impossible to help feeling that the historian is drawing largely on his imagination, or, which comes to the same thing, is filling in some bare outline of fact, which he found in his authorities, from the commonplace book of Roman military description.

If we turn now to the chapters in which lie deals with the politics of the capital, we shall find much more reason to be grateful to Sallust for his history of this period. It is true that his love of fine writing and his pompous affectation of a virtue which he did not possess, seriously detract from the value of his work; the recurrence, too, of tags like "pauci quis omnia, honesta atque inhonesta, vendere mos erat," gives an annoying impression of pedantry and unreality to much that he says. Despite these drawbacks, however, Sallust often speaks of the relation of parties in Rome with all the weight of a practical and clearheaded politician, and, for one who lived in the thick of the very struggle of which he narrates the beginning, is singularly broad and comprehensive in his views. The period with which lie deals is full of instruction. Gaius Gracchus had been murdered in B.C. 121, and from that time down to the end of the Jugurthine war Senate and populares alike did nothing but demonstrate at once their power and their impotence. The Senate could recall Popilius, uphold Opimius, at least for a time, and prevent any further divisions of the domain land by converting as much of it as still remained in private hands at first into perpetual leaseholds, and afterwards into full freeholds. As was shown, however, by the Prosecutions of B.C. 110, and again in B.C. 105, and by the election of Marius to the consulship, it became utterly powerless as soon as the mob asserted its will. It could not even defend its successful general, Metellus, from a most unjust attack, or prevent the whole credit of terminating the war, which was really due to Metellus and Sulla, falling to the popular leader, Marius. It is significant, indeed, that at this crisis of their fate the aristocracy of Rome could find no better commander than M. Aemilius Scaurus, a man who, except by some village triumphs in the Alps, had never in his life distinguished himself, whose morality was no higher than that of his fellows, and who, when the storm came, was quite ready to surrender his party so long as he could save himself. On the other hand, the populares were not much better; they could assert their power by persecuting the Optimates on the occasion of any disaster to the state, but they were destitute of any worthy policy which they could unite to pursue. Their narrowness of view and anarchist tendencies alienated from them the two allies by whose help they might have obtained a peaceful triumph over the Senate. The Italians they had made their enemies by threatening to encroach on the domain lands held by the allied towns, and by the disfavor with which they regarded any proposals for a liberal concession of the full Roman franchise. As for the equites, the disturbances in the streets of Rome had sufficed to estrange them from the party by whose help they had secured the control of the law courts. These two Great powers were content to stand aside and allow the Optimates and Populares to decide their battles by themselves, and, as a result, the nobles were enabled to maintain their monopoly of all the chief offices and prizes of the state, while the mob continued supreme in the streets of Rome. Such a condition of affairs could not continue for ever, and the Jugurthine war ushered in the military regime by which it was to be superseded. Not only was it in this war that both Sulla and Marius made their name, but the change was effected by which the future generals in the civil war were provided with armies suitable to their purposes. Hitherto, levies had always been made from the respectable class of citizens, men who had some interest in the welfare of the state, and who looked on war as an evil to be brought to an end as soon as possible. Marius, when starting for Numidia, recruited his army from among the "capite censi," who had no stake in the country, but now adopted arms as their profession, and looked to their general for reward. Armies composed of men like these murdered their commanders if they had become unpopular; if popular, they would follow them to death, but, henceforth, obedience was neither rendered nor refused out of any consideration of duty towards the state. This was the kind of force of which a Caesar could make use.

-- Reprinted from "Introduction to the Jugurthine War," The Catiline and Jugurtha of Sallust, trans. Alfred W. Pollard; Macmillan & Co: London, 1882.

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