This speech was delivered against C. Verres, in 70 B.C.
The translation is by L.H.G. Greenwood (1928). Click on the L symbols to go to the Latin text of each section. Click on ** to go to the translator's footnotes.
[1.] L [1] Gentlemen, all of you are, I perceive, convinced that Gaius Verres has plundered Sicily of all its treasures, sacred and secular, privately and publicly owned, in the most open fashion : that he has practised every description of theft and robbery, not only without the least scruple, but without the least concealment. But I am aware that a truly noble and impressive plea will be urged in his defence; a plea that I must be ready, well in advance, to counter properly. The argument now being built up is this, that during these years of anxiety and danger ** the province of Sicily has been safely defended against the revolted slaves and the perils of war by the exceptional courage and vigilance of Verres. [2] What am I to do, gentlemen ? to what line of attack am I to resort ? which way am I to turn ? the description of him as a great military commander rises like a rampart to withstand all my assaults. I know the type of argument ; I see the topics on which Hortensius will triumphantly enlarge. He will remind you of the threatening military position, of the national crisis, of the shortage of good generals ; and then he will implore you - nay, he will insist, as on something to which he himself is entitled, that you should not let Rome be robbed of so great a soldier by the evidence of Sicilian witnesses, nor suffer charges of avarice to wipe out so great a soldier's shining record.
[3] I must be honest with you, gentlemen. I do fear that the outstanding merit of Gaius Verres in the military sphere may gain him impunity for doing all the things that he has done. I remember, in the trial of Manius Aquilius, ** how impressive, and how decisive, the speech of Marcus Antonius was felt to be. Near the end of it, like the bold as well as able orator that he was, with his own hands he laid hold of Aquilius, made him stand where all could see him, tore open his shirt and exposed his breast, that his countrymen might see the scars that he bore on the front of his body ; and dwelling at the same time on the wound he had received in his head from the enemy's leader, reduced those with whom the decision lay to a state of trembling agitation. Fortune had saved a brave soldier from that death by the foeman's sword from which he had not sought to save himself : was it to seem that he had escaped, not to be the hero of Rome, but to fall a victim to the cruelty of his judges? [4] This is the line of defence which my opponents intend to adopt now, and the result at which they aim. Granted that Verres is a thief, that he is a sacrilegious thief, that he is a matchless exponent of vice and wickedness of every description : yet he is a great commander, a fortunate ** commander, a commander whom we must keep to save our country in the hour of its danger. - [2.] L Now, Verres, I will not deal with you as I am fully entitled to deal with you. I will not use an argument which I believe deserves to be held valid - that the law calls for a verdict on a specific issue, and that what you are therefore bound to demonstrate is not that you have done great things as a soldier, but that you have kept your hands off other men's property. I will not, I repeat, deal with you thus. I will inquire, as I gather that you would have me inquire, into the nature and extent of your military achievements.
[5] What is your claim? Is it that your vigorous measures saved Sicily from the war with the revolted slaves? A most praiseworthy achievement, and an admirable argument. But - what war was this? I have always understood that since the war to which Manius Aquilius put an end there has been no war with revolted slaves in Sicily. There was one in Italy ? To be sure there was, and a great and terrible war. But you surely are not claiming a share in the credit of ending it? you surely do not regard Marcus Crassus or Gnaeus Pompeius as dividing with yourself the renown arising from its victorious conclusion ? Your impudence, I do believe, is equal even to venturing upon some such claim as that. We are asked to believe that you made it impossible for bands of revolted slaves to cross from Italy to Sicily. Where ? when? from what quarter? What attempted landing, in boats or ships, did you stop? I have never heard of anything of the kind at all. What I have heard is that the energy and ability of that great soldier Marcus Crassus made it impossible for the rebels to make a bridge of boats ** and so cross the straits at Messana: an attempt that would not have needed much preventing, if it had been supposed that there were any garrisons stationed in Sicily to meet them when they landed. [6] We shall be told that there was war in Italy, so close to Sicily, and yet in Sicily there was none. Is that remarkable? in just the same way, when there was war in Sicily, equally close to Italy, nothing of it crossed over to Italy. [3.] L What, indeed, is the nearness of the two countries here produced to prove ? that our enemies could easily enter Sicily ? or that there was a danger of the infection of revolt spreading to it? For men wholly unprovided with ships, the way into Sicily was not only interrupted but completely blocked: the people you describe as close to Sicily could have got to the Atlantic Ocean more easily than to Cape Peloris. [7] And as for your infection of the slave revolt, why should that be brought up by you any more than by any one of the governors of all our other provinces ? Is it because there have in the past been wars against revolted slaves in Sicily ? Why, just for that reason your province is, and was then, in very little danger. Ever since Manius Aquilius left it, all its governors have made regulations and orders to ensure that no slave should have arms in his possession. I will recall an old story - so notable an instance of severity that it may be known to all of you. When Lucius Domitius was governor of Sicily, ** a huge boar was one day brought to him. "A fine beast," he said; " who killed it?" Being told that it was someone's shepherd, he sent for the man, who came eagerly, expecting to be praised and rewarded. Domitius asked him how he had killed such a monster. "With a hunting-spear," the man replied: whereupon by the governor's orders he was immediately crucified. This may seem cruel treatment ; I do not say that it was or that it was not. What is clear to me is that Domitius chose to punish the man and be thought merciless rather than to overlook his offence and be thought lax. [4.] L [8] Well, the result of these regulations for Sicily was that under Gaius Norbanus, even though all Italy was then ablaze with the flames of the Social War, that not very strenuous or valiant governor had no trouble at all to face : Sicily was now quite easily able to protect itself against the risk of any internal outbreak. Roman business men are linked with the Sicilians in the closest way by daily intercourse, material interests, common sense and friendly feeling. The activities of the Sicilians themselves are so organised that a state of peace is to their advantage, and they are well enough satisfied with the government of Rome not to have the least wish for its enfeeblement or transformation. ** Against the danger already mentioned of war with revolted slaves they have been safeguarded by governors' regulations and the strictness of the slaves' own masters. For all these reasons, there is no internal a that can possibly arise within the province itself.
[9] Well, but has no rising among the slaves, have no conspiracies, been reported as occurring in Sicily while Verres was governor? Nothing, certainly, that has come to the ears of the Senate and people of Rome, nothing about which Verres has sent home any official written statement. But in spite of this I have reason to think that attempts at slave risings took place in several places in Sicily. And I am led to this conclusion not so much by direct evidence as by observing what Verres did or ordered to be done. I ask you to note how little malice there is in what I am about to say : of my own accord I shall be narrating and bringing to light just those facts which Verres is anxious to establish, ** and of which you have so far heard nothing.
[10] In the district of Triocala - a place once occupied, in past days, by revolted slaves - the slaves of a Sicilian named Leonidas came to be suspected of planning a conspiracy. This was reported to Verres ; and by his orders the persons named were very properly at once arrested and taken to Lilybaeum : their owner was summoned to appear, the case was tried, and the prisoners found guilty. [5.] L What next? well, what would you suppose ? you will be looking, perhaps, to hear of some piece of theft or robbery. But do not expect the same thing every time. In the midst of a war scare how can there be an opportunity for thieving ? Besides, any chance the affair might have offered had been let slip. The man might have extracted a bit of money from Leonidas when he summoned him to appear in court; a bargain might have been struck - it would have been no novelty - to get the case dismissed; there was another one possible, to get the prisoners acquitted. But once the slaves have been found guilty, what method of robbing anyone is available? they must inevitably be marched off and executed. For the facts of the case are attested by the members of the court, by the official records, by the illustrious city of Lilybaeum, by the numerous and highly-respected community of Roman citizens. No help for it - off they must go. Off they went accordingly, and were bound to the stake. [11] You look to me, gentlemen, still anxious to hear the sequel, knowing as you do that the man never did anything without getting some profit or plunder out of it. But what could be done here? Expect what you will - as rascally a deed as you like to fancy : my tale will surpass your wildest expectations. Those men, after being convicted of the crime of conspiracy, handed over to execution, and bound to the stake, were suddenly, before the eyes of thousands of people, unbound and handed over to their owner, the man from Triocala. - What can you say to this, you consummate madman, unless you answer a question that I do not ask - a question that indeed ought not to be asked in connexion with such a piece of iniquity, even if the answer were as doubtful as it is in fact obvious - the question of what you got for this, and how much you got, and how you got it? I spare you all this, and save you the trouble of an answer : I have no fear of anyone's being induced to believe that no money was paid to you for involving yourself in a crime which no money could have persuaded anyone but yourself to commit. However, I will not concern myself with your methods of thieving and plundering : my present subject is your reputation of being a great commander.
[6.] L [12] Tell me now, you worthy guardian and protector of your province : you found that those slaves meant to get hold of weapons and carry out an armed rising in Sicily, and pronounced. them guilty in accordance with the verdict of your court, and then, when they were already delivered over, in the manner prescribed by tradition, to suffer execution, did you dare to save them, to pluck them from the very jaws of death - intending, no doubt, that the gallows you set up for slaves who had been convicted should be kept for Roman citizens who had not ? - A crushed and hopelessly defeated country will often resort to the disastrous expedient of pardoning its convicts, releasing its prisoners, restoring its exiles, cancelling the sentences pronounced in its courts of law. When this happens, everyone knows that the country is tottering to its fall; where such things come to pass, nobody believes that there is any hope of escaping calamity. [13] The effect of such measures, wherever they are taken, is that certain persons, whether democrats or aristocrats, have their sentences of execution or exile revoked ; but even so, not by the actual pronouncer of those sentences, nor instantaneously, and not if they have been convicted of crimes endangering the lives and fortunes of all their countrymen. Here, we have a new thing, a thing so monstrous that we believe it possible more because of the character of the criminal than because of the facts of the crime. The men thus let go were slaves ; they were let go by the man who had sentenced them ; they were let go instantaneously, and while their sentence was already being carried out ; they were slaves condemned for a crime that endangered the persons and the lives of all free men. A truly great commander this! [14] Let us compare him no longer with the gallant Manius Aquilius : he is a Paulus, a Scipio, a Marius. What profound judgement he showed in that hour of fearful danger for the province! Observing the unrest among the slaves of Sicily that was caused by the servile war in Italy, how effectively he frightened them into keeping quiet! He has ordered arrests to be made - that must have terrified them all ; he has summoned their masters to their trial - what can alarm slaves more than that? He has pronounced the accused men Guilty, and thus, by sentencing a few persons to a painful death, has quenched the flames of rebellion. What is the next step? ‘The lash, the fire, ** and that final stage in the punishment of the guilty and the intimidation of the rest, the torments of crucifixion. And from all these penalties those men were set free. Who can doubt that he cowed and terrified the slaves, when they found our governor so easy-going that the executioner himself was the agent who purchased from him the lives of those slaves convicted of the crime of conspiracy ? -
[7.] L [15] Did you not also behave in the same way in the case of Aristodamus of Apollonia ? and again in the case of Leon of Imachara ? And did your "unrest among the slaves" and "sudden evidence of armed conspiracy" lead you to a belated zeal for securing the safety of your province, or to a new and most villainous method of enriching yourself? Eumenides of Halicyae, a man of rank, distinction and wealth, ** had a manager who at your instigation was charged with conspiracy ; and you took 60,000 sesterces from his owner, a transaction whose nature has recently been made clear in the sworn evidence of Eumenides himself. During the absence at Rome of the knight Gaius Matrinius, you got 600,000 sesterces out of him by alleging that you had evidence incriminating his managers and shepherds. This has been stated by Lucius Flavius, who was in charge of the affairs of Matrinius and paid you the sum mentioned ; it has been stated by Matrinius himself; and it will be stated by our illustrious censor Gnaeus Lentulus, who out of regard for Matrinius wrote to you at an early stage of the affair and caused others to write as well. **
[16] Then there is the case of Apollonius of Panhormus, the son of Diocles, surnamed Geminus : this cannot be passed over. I could not put before you any case the facts of which are more notorious throughout Sicily, or more shameful, or more unmistakable. Upon reaching Panhormus, Verres sent for him - issued, indeed, an official summons against him, in the hearing of a large and crowded gathering of the Roman community. ** At once people began to talk like this: "I was wondering how a well-to-do man like Apollonius had escaped our friend yonder so long ; he has thought out some scheme or other, and got it going; it certainly means something when Verres suddenly issues a summons against a rich man." Everyone was waiting anxiously to know what was afoot, when Apollonius suddenly hurried in, breathless with anxiety, and accompanied by a young man who was his son - his old father had been bed-ridden for some time. [17] Verres named a slave who was, he said, Apollonius's head shepherd, and alleged that he had formed a conspiracy and had been stirring up the slaves on various estates. There was in fact no such slave at all on the estate of Apollonius. Verres, however, ordered him to be produced ; and when Apollonius insisted that he had no slave at all of that name, Verres gave orders to run him out of the court and throw him into prison. As they were hurrying him off, the poor wretch kept crying out that he was innocent, that he had done no wrong, that all his money was invested and he had no ready cash available. It was just when he was proclaiming this fact in the hearing of a large crowd, so that anyone could see that this cruel wrong was being done to him simply because he would not pay up - it was, I say, just when he was calling out thus about his money that he was thus thrown into prison.
[8.] L [18] Observe the consistent firmness of our governor, remembering that in these matters he is not merely being defended as a governor of average merit, but eulogised as a great military commander. Amid the fears of a slave rising, he inflicted upon slave-owners who had not been found guilty the penalties from which he exempted slaves who had. Apollonius was a wealthy man, who would lose his great wealth if a slave rebellion took place in Sicily : yet Verres charged Apollonius with complicity in a slave rebellion, and flung him into prison without a trial. He had himself, with the support of his assessors, pronounced those slaves guilty of conspiring with intent to rebel: yet of his own accord, with no support from his assessors, he gave those slaves complete exemption from punishment. [19] But further: we may be asked, supposing Apollonius to have done something for which he deserved to be punished, whether we mean nevertheless so to deal with this matter as to hold it a proper charge against Verres, or a proper ground for ill-will towards him, that he sentenced a man with undue severity. No; I will not be so sharp with him ; I will not adopt the prosecutor's well-known custom of denouncing any piece of clemency as a piece of laxity, while exciting ill-will by trying to prove cruelty wherever justice has not been tempered with mercy. That is not the line that I shall take. I will accept your sentences, Verres, and declare you as infallible as you please ; but when you proceed to annul your own sentences yourself, you must cease to resent my words ; for I am fully entitled to argue that a man who has pronounced himself guilty should be pronounced guilty by the solemn verdict of this Court. [20] I will not let myself seem eager to annul your sentence against Apollonius, by pleading the cause of my friend and entertainer. I will say nothing about his honesty, his excellence, his industry. I will also pass over the fact of which I have already spoken- - that his fortunes were invested in labourers, live-stock, farmhouses and loans to others, in such a way that no man stood to lose more by any outbreak of rebellion or war in Sicily. I will not even argue that, however greatly Apollonius may have been to blame, yet so honourable a member of so honourable a community should not have been sentenced without trial to undergo so heavy a punishment. [21] Nor will I seek to stimulate resentment against you by telling how, while this worthy man was lying a ragged prisoner in a dark and dirty prison, your tyrannical prohibitions prevented the poor fellow's ever being visited by his aged father and his youthful son. I will also pass over the fact that, whenever you appeared at Panhormus during the eighteen months that Apollonius spent in prison, the senate of Panhormus, with the magistrates and priests of the city, waited upon you with the humble and earnest petition that this innocent and unhappy man might at last be delivered out of his affliction. All these things shall go unsaid: and yet, if I chose to dwell upon them, I might easily show how your own merciless treatment of other men has altogether debarred this Court from showing any mercy to yourself.
[9.] L [22] I will not urge or insist upon any of these arguments against you ; for I foresee the reply that Hortensius means to make to them on your behalf. - He will tell you, gentlemen, that in Verres' eyes, the age of the father, the youth of the son, the tears of them both, were of less account than the welfare and safety of his province ; he will declare that intimidation and severity are indispensable parts of government ; why, he will ask you, are the fasces borne before our governors, why are the axes assigned them, why have been built, why are the manifold penalties for evil-doers a fixed part of our traditions? But when, in austere and impressive tones, he has said all this, I will ask him a question: Why, with no new fact adduced, no further plea submitted, no just reason given, did this same Verres suddenly order this same Apollonius to be released from prison? And I will affirm that the circumstantial evidence in this charge is so strong that I may now allow the members of this Court, without listening to any arguments of my own, to infer for themselves what method of robbery was here employed, how vicious and how shameful a method it is, and how boundless, how endless, are the opportunities of vast enrichment that it furnishes. [23] I would have you first consider briefly the number and the magnitude of the several features in the man's ill-treatment of Apollonius, and then to reckon up their value in terms of money. You will find that they were all deliberately employed in the case of a single wealthy man, in order to terrify all the others with the prospect of similar miseries, and to put before them illustrations of the dangers that threatened them. The first feature is the sudden allegation of what is at once a capital and a detestable offence: compute the probable sums paid, and the number of persons who paid them, to escape from this. Next, we have the accusation brought by no prosecutor, the verdict pronounced by no court, the condemnation preceded by no defence : calculate the money value of all these circumstances, and reflect that while Apollonius was the one actual victim of these outrages, the others, who bought freedom from such injuries, were assuredly numerous. Lastly there is the darkness - the chains - the prison - the tortures of being shut up, of being shut off from the sight of parent and child, nay, from drawing free breath and looking upon the common light of day : from such evils escape may well be bought with life itself - I cannot assess them in terms of money. [24] From all these horrors Apollonius did at long last buy his escape, by now a tortured and miserable wreck; not, however, before teaching the others to make terms beforehand with this scoundrel's cupidity ; or will you suppose that any motive but gain selected that wealthy man to be the object of so incredible a charge, or that any other motive but this suddenly released him from his prison, or that this method of robbery was merely tried and applied in the case of that single man, and that he was not made the means of intimidating and terrifying every wealthy man in Sicily ?
[10.] L [25] I hope, gentlemen, that our illustrious friend, while I am on the subject of his eminent military services, will remind me of any that I may fail to mention. I believe, however, that I have now given you the complete story of his achievements, so far, at least, as they had to do with the supposed indications of a slave rising : I have certainly passed over none of them knowingly. The prudence, the care, the watchfulness, with which he looked after and protected his province, have been put before you. There are various types of military leaders ; and my general purpose has been to inform you of the type to which Verres belongs ; in view of the present dearth of great soldiers, I would ensure the universal recognition of his remarkable qualities. They are not modelled upon the sagacity of Quintus Maximus, nor the swift activity of the elder Africanus, nor the unique resourcefulness of the younger Africanus, nor the methodical intelligence of Paulus, nor the fiery courage of Gaius Marius. I have, with your permission, to describe to you a different kind of military leader, a kind that we must surely take care to keep safely at our disposal.
[26] To speak first of the laborious duty of making journeys, the most laborious of all a military governor's duties, and in Sicily the most essential, let me tell you how his intelligence and good sense rendered it easy and agreeable for him. To begin with, during the winter he made the following admirable arrangement for dealing with severe cold and the violence of storms and flooded rivers. He selected the city of Syracuse, whose position, surroundings and climate are said to be such that even during the most violent and stormy weather no day has ever passed without the sun's having been at some time visible. Here this excellent commander of our forces spent his winters in such a fashion that it was not easy for anyone to see him out of doors or even out of bed: the short days were passed in continual feasting, and the long nights in continual debaucheries and immorality.
[27] When spring began, whose coming was marked for him not by Favonius nor by any constellation, for it was when he saw the first rose that he recognized spring's arrival, ** then he betook himself to the toilsome work of travelling, wherein he showed himself so hardy and active that no one ever saw him on horseback. [11.] L No; following the custom of the old kings of Bithynia, he rode in a litter carried by eight bearers, which contained a cushion of transparent Maltese embroidery stuffed with rose-leaves, he himself wearing one garland on his head and another round his neck, and putting to his nostrils a fine-meshed bag of delicate linen gauze stuffed with rose petals. Whenever, his journey thus effected, he reached a town, he would be carried, in this same litter, direct to his bed-chamber. To this apartment Sicilian magistrates, to this apartment Roman knights betook themselves - you have heard many witnesses swear to the truth of this. Legal controversies were there brought before him privately, and shortly afterwards his decisions were brought away from him openly. Having thus briefly administered the law in his bedroom for an hour or two on principles more profitable than equitable, he felt it his duty to devote the rest of the day to the service of Venus and Bacchus. [28] And I think it proper to mention the exceptional, the unparalleled thoroughness displayed in this connexion by our illustrious commander. You must know that, among all the towns in Sicily where it is customary for governors to stay and to hold assizes, there is no single town in which some woman belonging to some respectable family was not selected for the gratification of his lust. Some of these were openly brought to his dinner-table: the less abandoned ones came later at an appointed hour, avoiding the daylight and the society of his guests. Nor were his dinner-parties the quiet gatherings proper for a Roman governor and commander, nor had they the decency normally maintained at the tables of our magistrates: they were celebrated with loud shouts and cries of abuse, and sometimes things would go as far as an actual hand-to-hand fight. For this strict and thorough governor of ours, who never in his life obeyed the laws of Rome, was none the less most careful to observe all the laws prescribed for the drinking of wine ; which led to such final scenes that one man would be carried away from the party, as though from a battlefield, in other people's arms, another would be left there for dead, and most of them would be lying about the place fuddled and unconscious: so that any spectator would have thought he had been looking on not at a governor's dinner-party but at some disastrous battle between two gangs of ruffians.
[12.] L [29] As soon as midsummer arrived, a season which it is always the practice of all Sicilian governors to spend in travelling about, because they hold that the most important time for inspecting their province is the time when the grain is on the threshing-floors, since the hands are then gathered together, the number of the slaves can be reckoned, and their labours most easily catch the eye; ** besides which, the abundance of corn invites travel and the weather does not hinder it : - at this season, I repeat, when all other governors move actively about, this new variety of military commander used to pitch a fixed camp for himself in the loveliest part of Syracuse. [30] At the very entrance of the harbour, where the bay begins to run in from the open coast towards the city, he set up a number of pavilions, made of linen canvas stretched on poles. From the governor's residence, once King Hiero's palace, he moved house to this new spot so completely that during these periods nobody could ever see him outside it. Nor was anyone allowed inside the place itself except those qualified to share or minister to his vices. Hither came all the women with whom he had associated - and the number of these at Syracuse is beyond belief; hither came the persons worthy to be Verres' friends, and to share in the life and the revels of a place like that. Such were the men, such were the women, with whom Verres' son, now no longer a child, would spend his days: even if his nature should urge him to be unlike his parent, the compulsion of habit and training were to make him the true son of his father. [31] The bringing there of that woman Tertia, ** after the crafty trick of her abduction from her Rhodian flute-player, is said to have caused a serious upheaval in Verres' camp, as the wife of Cleomenes of Syracuse, being a lady of rank, and also the wife of Aeschrio, who came of a good family, resented the addition to their society of a daughter of Isidorus the ballet-dancer. But this Hannibal ** of ours, holding that in his camp promotion should be by merit and not by birth, became so much attached to this woman Tertia that he took her off with him when he left his province. [13.] L Now during all those weeks, while he spent his time, dressed in a purple Greek cloak and a long-skirted tunic, revelling with his women, no irritation or discontent was felt at the absence of the chief magistrate from the forum, the giving of no legal decisions, the hearing of no cases in court. That place on the coast might resound everywhere with women's voices and the strains of band music, while in the market-place the voices of litigant and judge were completely hushed. But this caused no discontent. Men felt that what was gone from the market-place was neither magistrate nor judge, but violence and savagery and the cruel and unmerited plundering of their property.
[32] Do you, then, Hortensius, plead that such a man as this was a great military leader? do you seek to screen his thefts and robberies, his greed and cruelty, his arrogance and impudence and wickedness, with eulogies of his great deeds and his fame as a commander? Are we now to fear, as your speech for the defence nears its close, that you will bring into play the impressive methods of argument used of old by Antonius? will you bid Verres stand up, bare his breast, show the people of Rome his scars - scars made by women's teeth, the imprinted records of lechery and foulness? [33] Most devoutly do I hope that you will dare to speak of war and military service. - If he does, gentlemen, the facts of all those former campaigns of Verres shall be put before you: you shall learn how he behaved not only as a commander but when he was serving under others. The story of his earliest engagements shall be told again, the story of the days when he would be led from the Forum, not, as he declares, to the embraces of a mistress, but to those of a lover. ** You shall hear again of the gambling-den at Placentia, where he appeared so regularly for duty and was docked of his pay notwithstanding. Mention shall be made of his frequent financial losses during his campaigns, and how he paid off his debtors with his youthful charms. [34] And then, when he had grown callous by submitting to such foulness till others, though not himself, had had their fill of it, his behaviour as a grown man, and the number of strong castles of modesty and chastity stormed by his reckless violence - is it for me to speak of this, or to combine the tale of his wickedness with the tale of any other person's shame? No, gentlemen, it is not: I will pass over all that happened earlier, and merely put before you, without bringing discredit upon anyone, two recent matters, from which you may infer all the rest of the story. One is a fact so notorious, so well known to everyone, that during the consulship of Lucullus and Cotta ** not even the simplest rustic from the remotest provincial town came to Rome, in connexion with any case heard in the law-courts, without learning that all the decisions pronounced by the City Praetor were controlled by the goodwill and pleasure of that courtesan Chelidon. The other is that, having already left the city in his commander's cloak, and already made the vows on behalf of his term of office and the general welfare of his country, he repeatedly had himself carried back into the city after nightfall in a litter, to gratify his adulterous passion for a woman who was one man's wife but at all men's service; thus violating the law of God, violating the auspices, violating every principle of religion and morality.
[14.] L [35] The contrast between the dispositions and reflections of different men is a truly remarkable thing! For my own part, may I forfeit your approval, and the nation's approval, of my ambitions and my hopes for the future, if I have not, in entering upon the offices which the nation has hitherto entrusted to me, felt myself constrained to the conscientious performance of all my duties. My election as quaestor meant for me that the office was not only conferred upon me but committed and entrusted to me. While I carried out my duties of quaestor in the province of Sicily, I felt all men's eyes directed upon me and me only; I fancied myself and my office staged in a theatre where all the world was audience; I refused all the accepted methods of gratifying not only the abnormal passions but even the most natural and inevitable desires. [36] I am now an aedile elect; and I understand the position in which the nation's will has placed me. With the utmost diligence and solemnity I am to celebrate the holy festival of Ceres, Liber and Libera. By holding the solemn festival of our Lady Flora I am to secure her favour for the people and commons of Rome. In the most worthy and devout fashion, I am to perform the most ancient festival, the earliest to bear the name of "Roman," in honour of Jupiter, Juno and Minerva. I have been made responsible for the safeguarding of our sacred edifices, and for the protection of the whole of our city. In return for the labour and anxiety which these duties entail, I have received certain privileges : priority of speech in the Senate, the toga praetexta, the curule chair, the right of leaving my portrait as a memorial of me to those who follow me. [37] And in view of all these things I declare to you, gentlemen, as I hope for the favour of all the gods in heaven, that, delightful to me as my attainment of this public office is, my pleasure in it is far less than the burden of my anxious desire that men should think of this same office as not given to me because it must needs be given to one or other of those who sought it, but as rightly assigned to the right man, and by the nation's deliberate judgement bestowed in the proper quarter.
[15.] L [38] But you, Verres? When your election as praetor was declared, however it had been effected - I pass over in silence the story of what happened then - but when, as I say, your election was declared, did not the very sound of the crier's voice, as he announced your endowment with that high office by the votes of all those senior and junior divisions of the electors, arouse in you the feeling that you had been entrusted with a share in the government of your country, and for that one year must cease to frequent a harlot's dwelling ? When the lot gave you the duty of administering the law, did you never reflect how troublesome, how burdensome this duty was, nor consider - if it were possible for you so far to come to your senses - that functions hard enough to discharge with the help of exceptional wisdom and integrity had been assigned to the most foolish and corrupt of men? No; and so far from forbidding Chelidon your house during your year of office, you transferred your office bodily to the house of Chelidon. [39] Then came your provincial government, during which it never crossed your mind that those fasces and axes, that crushing weight of authority, that position of majestic splendour, were not given you in order that you might use their force and their authority to break through every barrier of decency or duty, or that you might treat all men's property as your prey, or that it might be impossible for anyone's possessions to be safe, anyone's house secure, anyone's life defended, or anyone's chastity guarded, against your cupidity and your unscrupulous wickedness. Such, throughout that period, has been your conduct that you must seek refuge, in this argument about a slave rebellion, from the conviction that your unqualified guilt ensures you. And now you are aware that this is so far from providing you a defence that it is the source of a great multitude of charges against you. I presume that you will hardly mention the faint survivals of the slave war in Italy, or that unlucky reverse ** at Tempsa : chance threw this in your way, giving you your opportunity, if there had been one spark of manhood or energy in you; but you proved yourself to be what you have always been.
[16.] L [40] A deputation from the town of Valentia approached you, and its spokesman, a man of eloquence and high standing named Marcus Marius, asked you to deal with the situation: you had the authority and rank of praetor - would you not take the lead, and see to the destruction of that small band of men? Not only did you shirk this duty, but at that very time there you were on the sea-coast with that woman of yours, Tertia, whom you were taking off home with you, in full view of everyone ; and when you gave your answer to the people of a town so famous and important as Valentia, you were wearing a dark tunic and a Greek cloak. ** - You may easily conceive how the man behaved when leaving for his province ** and when he was there, since you see him on his way home, not to receive a triumph but to face a trial, ready to disgrace himself even by conduct that could give him no pleasure. [41] How admirably just were those murmurs of dissent at that crowded meeting of the Senate in the temple of Bellona! You will remember, gentlemen, how, late in the afternoon, the news of the reverse at Tempsa having just been reported, we could think of no one possessing military authority whom we could send there, and someone observed that Verres was not far from Tempsa, and how universal the murmurs of protest were, and how openly our chief speakers opposed the suggestion. And does a man convicted of all these crimes by all these witnesses rest any hopes on the voting-tablets of his judges, when their voices have all openly pronounced him guilty before his trial began ?
[17.] L [42] Well, let it be granted that he has acquired no credit from any revolt, or threatened revolt, among the slaves, because in Sicily there was no such revolt, nor was there any reason to fear one, nor did he take any steps to prevent one. But we shall be told that he has kept his fleet in good condition to fight the pirates ; that he has given this matter exceptional attention ; and that he has therefore provided admirably for the defence of his province. Gentlemen, what I have to tell you about the Sicilian fleet, and about its operations against the pirates, is of such a nature that I may assure you, at the outset, that in this one matter all his evil qualities are displayed at their worst - cupidity, treachery to his country, insane folly, wantonness and cruelty. I will ask you to give my brief statement of the facts the careful attention you have so far shown me.
[43] I assert, in the first place, that naval affairs were not administered for the defence of the province, but to make money out of what was supposed to be spent on the fleet. - Whereas it had been the regular practice of previous governors to require the towns to furnish ships and a fixed number of sailors and marines, you, Verres, exempted the great and wealthy town of Messana from furnishing any. How much the people of Messana secretly paid you for doing so we will, if it seems desirable, ascertain presently from their own records and witnesses. [44] I now assert that a cargo-ship, a very large one, as big as a trireme, a splendid vessel most completely fitted out, was openly built at the town's expense for your benefit, and that, to the certain knowledge of all Sicily, this ship was officially given and presented to you by the chief magistrate and senate of Messana. - At the time when he was himself leaving the country, this ship, loaded with the plunder of Sicily, and indeed itself a part of that plunder, put in at Velia with its large cargo, including the objects that he would not send direct to Rome, because of their great value and his special attachment to them. I saw this ship myself at Velia not long ago, and many others besides have seen it ; a splendid vessel, gentlemen, and most completely fitted out; and I may add that all who saw it felt that it was anticipating its owner's banishment and preparing the way for his flight into exile. -
[18.] L [45] What answer will you make to me about this? Only, I presume, the answer which, totally unacceptable as it must be, must nevertheless at least be made by a man accused of extortion, namely, that the ship was built at your own expense. Come, say this at least, since say it you must. - Have no fear, Hortensius, of my asking what legal right a senator had to build a ship. The statutes forbidding it are ancient things, what you yourself often call "dead letters." There was a time when the state of public morals, there was a time when the strictness of our law-courts, ranked such an action among the most serious charges that a prosecutor could put forward. What need had you of a ship? For any official journey, vessels are provided at the public expense for your safe escort and conveyance: unofficially, you have no right to make journeys at all, nor to have property sent over sea for you from regions in which you are not allowed to own any. [46] Why, then, in the next place, did you break the law by acquiring any such property ? "This would have counted heavily against you in the fine old days when strict moral standards prevailed. To-day I do not put forward this as a charge against you ; I do not even express the general feeling against you by attacking you thus - "Did you never think of the discredit, the danger, the dislike, you must incur by having a merchant vessel openly built for you at a populous centre in the province that you were governing?" What did you suppose those who saw it would say, or those who heard of it think? That you were going to take the ship to Italy empty? that you were going into the shipping business when you reached Rome ? No one could even suppose that you had an estate on the Italian coast, and were providing yourself with a merchant-vessel for the export of your produce. You chose to make everyone talk about you in such a fashion that they said openly that you were getting this ship in order to export your plunder from Sicily in it, and to send it back again for such stolen property as you had left behind. [47] All this, however, I am ready to withdraw and forgo in your favour, if you can show that this ship was built at your own expense. But fool that you are, can you not understand that this was put out of your power in the first part of this trial by your friends and eulogists, the people of Messana themselves? Heius, the head of the deputation sent to pronounce the eulogy upon you, stated then that the ship had been built for you by workmen employed by Messana, and that a Messanian senator had been officially put in charge of the building. There remains the timber. This, the Messanians having none, you officially ordered the town of Regium to supply, as its citizens themselves tell us - not that you could deny the fact in any case. [19.] L Now if both the material to build the ship and the men who built it were procured by your official authority and not by your money, where, may I ask, are we to discover the expenditure that you tell us was met out of your own purse? [48] It is argued that nothing appears in the city accounts of Messana. But I observe, in the first place, that possibly no money was paid out of the city treasury : even with the Capitoline temple, as built in the days of our ancestors, it proved possible, by officially impressing masons and conscripting workmen, to construct and complete it for nothing. In the next place, as I perceive clearly, and as I shall prove, when I put the persons concerned in the witness-box, from their own accounts, large sums of money paid over to Verres were falsely entered as paid in connexion with contracts that never existed. Nor indeed is it at all wonderful that the Messanians should have kept out of their accounts entries that might ruin the man who had done them the utmost service, and whom they knew to be a better friend to themselves than he was to the Roman nation. In any case, if the Messanians' having no entry of any money paid to you is a proof that none was paid, your inability to produce any entry of any purchase or contract made by yourself must be a proof that the ship cost you nothing.
[49] You tell us that your reason for not requiring the Messanians to furnish a ship was that they have special treaty privileges, Oh, thank Heaven ! here we have a trained expert in international law, ** a man scrupulous and watchful above all other men to discharge our solemn national obligations in treaty matters. Let all the governors before you be surrendered for punishment to the Messanians, because they broke the terms of the treaty by requiring a ship of them. None the less, why did a man so scrupulous and conscientious as you are require a ship from the people of Tauromenium, who also have these treaty privileges ? Will you make us believe that two communities with the same claims have been treated as if their rights were different, and their positions unequal, without money changing hands ? - [50] And if I further prove, gentlemen, that the two treaties of these two communities are of such a nature that the treaty with Tauromenium expressly provides for its exemption from the duty of furnishing a ship, whereas in the actual text of the treaty with Messana it is solemnly prescribed that a ship must be furnished, and that Verres broke both treaties by requiring a ship from Tauromenium and letting Messana off, will it be possible to doubt that the cargo-ship helped Messana more than the treaty helped Tauromenium, when Verres was governor of Sicily ? - Let the text of the treaties be read aloud.
[20.] L Well, then, by this action of yours, which you yourself call a benefaction, but which the facts show to have been a piece of bribery and corruption, you have lowered the position of your country, lessened the resources of the Roman nation, weakened the forces procured for us by the valour and wisdom of our forefathers, annulled our imperial rights, the obligations of our allies and the observance of our treaty with them. By the actual terms of the treaty they were bound to arm and equip that ship and dispatch it, if so ordered, even as far as the Atlantic Ocean, at their own cost and risk; and they bribed you to exempt them so completely from their obligations under the treaty and as our subjects that they might not even have to patrol the waters of the strait in front of their own roofs and homes, or to defend their own walls and harbours. - [51] When this treaty with the Messanians was being drawn up, think, gentlemen, how much trouble and toil and money they would gladly have devoted to escape having the clause about this bireme inserted, if it had been at all possible to secure this concession from our ancestors; the imposition of so heavy a burden as this upon the community somehow added to this treaty of alliance the suggestion of a symbol of servitude. Here is a privilege that they failed to obtain from our ancestors by agreement, although they had recently done us good service, no precedent blocked the way, and Rome's resources were not strained ; yet they now, after all these years, obtained this privilege from Gaius Verres by bribery, although they have done us no fresh service, our imperial rights in the matter have been exercised every year and maintained without a break, and our naval resources are strained most severely. Nor did they obtain only the privilege of not supplying a ship: during the three years of your governorship, have the Messanians supplied one single sailor, or one single soldier either for service afloat or for garrison duty ashore ?
[21.] L [52] And finally, whereas it was required by decree of the Senate, and also by the Lex Terentia-Cassia, that corn should be bought, in equitable proportions, from all the towns of Sicily, ** you exempted the Messanians from this duty also, light and universal though it was. You will tell us that the Messanians were not bound to supply corn. In what sense not bound to supply it? Not bound to sell it to us? This kind of corn was not the kind to be exacted as a tribute, but the kind to be bought and paid for. I see: if we are to take your opinion and accept your explanations, the Messanians were not bound to assist the Roman nation even by trading and doing business with it. [53] Then pray what community was bound to do so? The farmers of state lands were bound to supply the amount fixed by the censors' regulations : why did you require them to supply a further amount under another heading? Again, under the Lex Hieronica, each of the tithed farmers is only bound to supply his tithe: in their case too, why did you fix the amount of corn they were to supply for purchase? And what of the exempted towns ? they, at least, were not bound to supply anything. Yet you not only ordered them ** to do so, but also, in order to make them supply more than they possibly could, further demanded from them the 60,000 modii that you had let the Messanians keep. And I do not mean to say that it was wrong to require these supplies from all the other towns. What I do say is this, that the Messanians were on the same footing as the rest ; that all previous governors had required corn from them as from the rest, and had paid them for it as is directed by the decree of the Senate and the law concerned; and that therefore it was wrong to let them off.
To nail down this so-called benefaction for good and all, ** the man brought the case of the Messanians before his council, and announced that he was not requiring Messana to supply corn, "in accordance with a resolution of the council." [54] Listen to the order made by this tradesman of a governor, extracted from his own minutes: observe the dignity of his style, and the impressiveness of his legal decisions - Read it, please. (The extract is read.) - He gladly gives effect, he says, to the resolution passed by his council, and so on, to the end. - What if you had left out the word "gladly" ? we should be assuming, no doubt, that you disliked making money in this way. - And this "resolution passed by his council"! You heard, gentlemen, who the members of this distinguished council were: as you listened to their names being read aloud, did you take them to be really a governor's council, or the partners and associates of a rascally pirate ? [55] Here are the gentlemen to interpret our treaties and negotiate our alliances and teach us our solemn duty! Never was there an official purchase of corn in Sicily without the Messanians' being ordered to furnish their due share, until Verres set this choice and distinguished council of his to work, so as to get his money out of these people, in accordance with his regular principles. This decree of his consequently remained in force no longer than was proper, being the work of a man who sold it to the people from whom he should have bought corn. As soon as Lucius Metellus succeeded him, he followed the recorded practice of Gaius Sacerdos and Sextus Peducaeus, and required corn from the Messanians, [22.] L [56] who then perceived that they could no longer keep what they had bought from a man who had no right to sell it. -
And tell us this, moreover, you who would pass for a conscientious interpreter of treaties : why did you require corn from Tauromenium and Netum, when both towns enjoy treaty privileges? The people of Netum, indeed, stood up for themselves; as soon as you had announced that you were gladly exempting the Messanians, they approached you and pointed out that their treaty entitled them to the same treatment. You were unable to order different treatment when the case was just the same; you announced that Netum was not bound to supply corn - and forced them to supply it nevertheless. Let us hear the text of our governor's decree, and that of the corn requisition by the same author. (The text of the decree is read.) ** Considering this gross and shameful piece of inconsistency, gentlemen, can we avoid drawing the inevitable conclusion, that either he asked Netum for a sum of money which Netum refused to pay, or that his object was to show the Messanians how advantageously they had invested all the bribes and gifts they had given him, by refusing the same privilege to others who had the same claim to it ?
[57] Shall I find that even in this connexion he dares to remind me of the Messanian eulogy ? Gentlemen, there is not one of you but perceives the many reasons why that eulogy is worthless. In the first place, when an accused person cannot produce ten others to speak to his good character, it is better for his reputation that he should produce none than that he should fail to make up this number that custom prescribes. - Yet of the numerous Sicilian communities which you have governed for three years nearly all testify against you, a few small ones are intimidated into silence, and a single one speaks for you. What this means is plain: that you know the advantage of a genuine eulogy, and that nevertheless your behaviour as governor has deprived you of that advantage. [58] In the next place - to repeat what I have already said elsewhere - what can be made of this eulogy of yours, when we hear from the persons sent to pronounce it, and from their chairman, ** of the ship built for you at the expense of the community, and of the way in which they themselves as individuals were stripped and plundered by you? And finally, when these friends of yours thus eulogise you, they and no one else in Sicily, what they do is simply to testify before us to all that you bestowed on them by robbing our country. Is there in all Italy a colony so privileged, is there a municipality so immune from burdens, that it has enjoyed, during those years, exemptions of every kind as profitable as those enjoyed by Messana? For those three years, they alone did not furnish what by treaty they were bound to furnish ; they alone, while Verres was governor, were immune from every burden ; for them alone, of all over whom he had authority, it was understood that they need let Rome have nothing if they would let Verres have everything. -
[23.] L [59] But to go back to my present subject, which is the fleet : as you broke the law by accepting the one ship from the Messanians, so you violated the treaty by exempting them from supplying the other. In your dealings with this one state you have been guilty of two crimes - that of granting them an improper exemption, and that of accepting from them an illegal present. It was your duty to secure from them a ship to harry plunderers, not to carry plunder ; a ship to protect the province from spoliation, not to convey the spoils of the province. The Messanians provided you with a sea-port at which to gather your stolen treasures from every part of the island, and with a ship in which to carry them away from it: this town was the receiving-station of your booty, this town's inhabitants were the witnesses and custodians of your thefts ; they it was who procured you a place in which to deposit what you stole, and a vessel in which to remove it. The result was that not even when your greed and wickedness had led to the destruction of the fleet did you dare to require a warship of the Messanians, though it was a time when the shortage of warships, and the disaster that had befallen the province, might well have made them give you one, even if you could only have asked for it as a favour. The fact is that sharp command and earnest request were alike debarred by that notorious vessel which, instead of being a frigate duly delivered to the Roman nation, was a cargo-ship kindly presented to the Roman governor. With this vessel was bought exemption from receiving orders, from rendering assistance, from duty ** and custom and treaty obligations. -
[60] You have now heard how the powerful aid of one particular state was bartered away and lost. Let me next tell you of a plan for securing plunder that was worked out for the first time by the inventive brain of Verres. [24.] L It had been the regular practice that each state should provide for its naval expenditure on provisions, pay, and all other such matters, by furnishing its own commander with the sum needed. The commander would never dare to risk being charged by his men with misconduct; he was bound to render account of everything to his fellow-citizens; his duties throughout entailed not only toil but personal responsibility. This, I repeat, was the invariable practice, and not in Sicily only, but in all our provinces, and even for the pay and maintenance of the Italian allies and Latins in the days ** when they supplied us with auxiliary troops : Verres was the first person since our empire was established to require all this money to be paid over by the communities to himself, and to be handled by commanders whom he himself appointed. - [61] It must be plain to everyone why you altered a practice so ancient and so generally observed ; why you were indifferent to the great advantage of delegating to others the handling of this money ; why you took upon yourself a difficult and troublesome task that at the same time exposed you to suspicion and charges of misconduct. - Other devices for making money were then set going ; and observe, gentlemen, how many the fleet alone supplied : communities would pay him to exempt them from having to supply sailors ; he would discharge sailors from duty at so much a head; he would appropriate the pay of all those thus discharged, and withhold the pay due to all the rest. All these facts you will find stated in the evidence given by the communities. - Read it to us. - (The evidence is read.) - [25.] L [62] Look at this fellow, gentlemen, look at his unscrupulous impudence. Think of his making a list of the sums of money that corresponded to the number of men the various states had to supply, and of his fixing the definite amount of six hundred sesterces a head as the fee for discharging sailors. Any man who paid his six hundred sesterces got away, discharged from duty for the whole summer, and the money Verres had received for that man's pay and food went into his own purse: thus a single discharge provided a double gain for him. And in spite of the activity of the pirates and the danger of the province, the crazy madman did all this so openly that the pirates themselves knew of it, and the whole province saw it done.
[63] Now although as the result of the man's cupidity the Sicilian fleet was a fleet in name only, and in fact consisted of empty ships, better fitted to put gold into the governor's purse than to put fear into the pirates' hearts, yet while Publius Caesetius and Publius Tadius were cruising about with their ten half-manned vessels, they did fall in with one of the pirates' ships, which they cannot be said to have captured, for already it was completely overpowered by the heavy load it carried, but at least they towed it off. It was full of handsome young captives, and of silver plate and silver coin, together with a quantity of woven stuffs. This one ship our fleet discovered - one cannot say captured - off the coast of Megara, a place not far from Syracuse. When the news was brought to Verres, he was lying drunk on the sea-coast with those women of his ; however, he got on to his feet, and immediately sent off several of his guards to his quaestor and legate, with instructions that everything was to be brought intact without delay for his inspection. [64] The ship was brought into Syracuse. Everyone was looking to see justice done; but Verres behaved less like a captor of pirates than like a pirate receiving his booty. He treated as public enemies ** all of his prisoners ** who were old or ugly ; but he took away all who possessed any measure of beauty, youth or artistic skill, distributing some of them as gifts to his secretaries, his son or his staff, and sending half-a-dozen musicians ** as a present to a friend of his in Rome. The whole night was spent unloading the ship. The pirate captain himself, who ought to have been executed, was nowhere to be seen. Everyone to-day believes - you must draw your own inferences as to how far they are right - that Verres was secretly bribed by the pirates to spare this pirate captain.
1.(↑) Besides the war against Mithradates, these were the years of the great Servile War in Southern Italy.
2.(↑) For extortion, in 98 B.C. He had been governor of Sicily, and ended the slave war there, three years earlier.
3.(↑) Felicitas was felt by the Romans to be an actual quality attaching to certain persons, to be inferred from their past and reckoned upon for their future.
4.(↑) 'Ratibus coniunctis' perhaps means "by building rafts" (so Long takes it).
5.(↑) A few years later than Aquilius.
6.(↑) The form of this sentence is intended to suggest a contrast with the feelings and aims of the revolting Italian communities.
7.(↑) i.e. the reality (till now scouted by Cicero) of the danger of slave risings.
8.(↑) These words, among others, show that torture before execution was normal in such cases.
9.(↑) Some editors omit the comma after pecuniae : it is doubtful whether magnae pecuniae vilicus could mean "a valuable manager," or "a manager of a valuable estate."
10.(↑) Presumably to bargain for repayment to Matrinius in return for not giving evidence against him.
11.(↑) Or possibly "of the people in the district."
12.(↑) i.e., his information was got from the decorations available for dinner.
13.(↑) Or possibly "and their hard work most irritates them."
14.(↑) See Book iii. § 78. The "crafty trick" was her 'deductio' to Docimus, really for Verres' own use, not her 'abductio' from her 'tibicen', which was forcible ('vi abductam').
15.(↑) Ennius makes Hannibal say "He who strikes down his foe, Whoever he be, for me shall be accounted A son of Carthage."
16.(↑) Or perhaps "not, as he declares, to the door of his lodgings, but to the embraces of a lover." The meaning of 'perduci' is doubtful: 'reduci' or 'deduci', "to be escorted home," would be easy, but there are no variants in the mss.
17.(↑) The year (74 B.C.) of Verres’ urban praetorship.
18.(↑) Nothing is known of this. Tempsa is in Bruttium. The suggestion seems to be that Verres, on his return journey, ran away from a situation of some slight danger, in spite of the appeal made to him by the people of Valentia.
19.(↑) See note on book iv. § 54.
20.(↑) Probably this refers to the second of the two pieces of misconduct mentioned in § 34.
21.(↑) The "college" of fetiales had from very ancient times been responsible for the correct wording of declarations of war and treaties of peace.
22.(↑) For the compulsory purchase of corn see Book iii. § 163-187.
23.(↑) 'Eis' refers to all the three classes of persons, not to the 'immunes' only.
24.(↑) A 'clavus trabalis' is an especially massive nail used for main beams ('trabes').
25.(↑) The text is rather doubtful just here: it probably indicated the reading of the requisition also.
26.(↑) The plural in 'principes' and 'se ipsos' is rhetorical: Heius was the 'princeps legationis', and the only Messanian whom Verres is alleged to have robbed. See Book iv. § 3-28.
27.(↑) 'Iuris': the 'ius' is the "right" of Rome to receive the warship from Messana.
28.(↑) Until, that is, the Lex Julia (90 B.C.), by conferring Roman citizenship on Rome's Italian subjects, substituted voluntary enlistment in the legions for the obligation to furnish contingents of auxiliary troops.
29.(↑) i.e., he executed them.
30.(↑) Whether pirates or their captives.
31.(↑) These were of course captives.
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