Part 13

NOLA was situated at a greater distance from Capua, and was not one of the Campanian towns properly so called; it was independent, and in no way subordinate to Capua. It might be doubted whether it was really an Oscan town; in Justin it is called a Chalcidian settlement, and I have no doubt that the whole chapter in which this occurs is taken from Timaeus. The coins of Nola have a perfectly Greek character and Greek inscriptions; this is indeed the case with those of Capua also, though not in the same degree as with those of Nola. My opinion is, that these places were originally Tuscan, and that during invasions of the Oscans and Sabellians, Capua lost this Tusco-Tyrrhenian character, while Nola retained it longer. If then the Greeks call the latter place Chalcidian, they do so because it received Greek, probably Chalcidian, epoeci from Naples, and not barbarians. All these towns were situated in the midst of barbarians, who, for the purpose of commercial transactions, even advanced to the Greek towns on the coast, and accordingly much more to a place which, like Nola, was situated in the midst of the country. Nola was built in that splendid plain of Campania, which extends between the Vulturnus and Naples: it is a perfect plain, with quite a volcanic soil; notwithstanding this, however, it is not dry, but very well watered, and almost marshy, whence the country abounds in draining canals lined with poplars. Nola, situated on the other side of mount Vesuvius, whose torrents of lava never reach so far, forms with Capua and Naples a triangle. In the second Samnite war it appears to have been an important town, for it sent 2000 men to Naples to defend that place against Rome; but in the course of the same war it was taken by the Romans. In the Hannibalian war, the fidelity of Nola was of infinite importance to Rome. At Nola the most beautiful Campanian vases have been found: they are made of an extremely fine clay; but they ceased to be manufactured as early as the time of Augustus, for the art of making them had been lost. They were made of clay mixed with asphalt, and then burnt, but so slightly that the asphalt was not changed by the process, hence the lightness and extraordinary fineness of the material. The darkness of the colour arises from the admixture of asphalt. Professor Hausmann of Göttingen first re-discovered the nature of the composition, and the experiments he made with it which were perfectly successful. This is really an interesting discovery, of which good use might be made, if not in Germany, at least in Italy. The art had died away to such a degree, that in Caesar’s time amateurs collected vases from Capua as well as from Corinth, and even opened tombs for the purpose of obtaining them. The vases of Arretium continued to be manufactured in the time of Augustus. The Campanian vases are not jars containing the ashes of deceased persons, such as we find elsewhere in tombs: the body was not burnt, but the skeletons are found in coffins, and on each side of the coffin, four, six, or eight vases of this kind are set up. As they were so slightly burnt, they are often found broken and crumbled, and it is a rare thing to find a large one preserved entire. They must be treated with great care, when brought to light and exposed to the atmospheric air.

CUMAE is the most ancient Greek colony in those parts, though it certainly cannot be as ancient as it is said to be. In the first edition of my Roman History, I had not sufficiently considered this point; it is one of the few subjects on which the objections raised against my view are well founded. I am now convinced, that the statement of Timaeus, for to him it belongs, is false. Certain it is, that Cumae was an ancient Chalcidian colony; but it might even be doubted whether the Chalcidian towns in Sicily were not more ancient. When Capua was taken by the Samnites, Cumae, too, was conquered, and lost its Greek character: the Greek population, which until then had formed the ruling class, became subjects; their fate was that of the American aborigines: they were not indeed extirpated, but lost their political existence. Gradually the Italicans spread more and more, and many families from Campania removed to Cumae, which thus gradually became Italian. The same also was the fate of Naples, though not to such a degree. Cumae for a long time ruled over the whole Phlegraean plain, that is, the Acte between the Vulturnus and mount Vesuvius. _Dicaearchia_, on the site of the modern Puzzuoli, was then the port town of Cumae. In the time of king Darius, it was colonised by Samians, probably in the reign of Polycrates and Syloson.

Another Greek colony from Eretria had settled in the island of ISCHIA, which bore the Greek name Αἰναρία. It is a large extinct volcano, which, however, has repeatedly been active both in ancient and in modern times; for the island is remarkable for its internal fire, which is not yet quite extinct, and is still distinctly perceptible; hence it also contains hot springs; it is a truly paradise-like place on account of the fiery character of its whole nature, its soil, and its vegetation. The Greek colony afterwards disappears, and the island became Oscan simultaneously with Cumae.

Between Ischia and the main land of Naples, there are several other islands, which were no doubt called PITHECUSAE. One of them is NESIS (the modern Nisita), that is, the little island (νησίς), a proof showing how early the modern Greek pronunciation of the η became prevalent. The ancients do not mention it.[40] Another island was PROCHYTA. All these islands had Eretrian colonies.

DICAEARCHIA was a beautiful port, which was, no doubt, likewise taken by Campanians. After the capture of Capua, it came into the hands of the Romans, who established a Roman colony there, and called it PUTEOLI, though this name may have existed previously. The place then became the real port of Rome, for Ostia was bad, and the Portus Romanus on the right arm of the Tiber was not fit for sea-ships. The port of Puteoli, on the other hand, was naturally very beautiful, and even in the time of Augustus pains were taken to make use of the nature of the locality for the purpose of extending the port. Puzzolano, so excellent as a cement for water and harbour-works, was ready at hand in abundance, and in the greatest perfection. In the neighbourhood of Rome it is likewise found, but is not so beautiful; near Centumcellae, it was also employed in making the harbour, but it had to be conveyed thither from a distance. Its abundance in the neighbourhood led to the building of the molo of Puteoli. This _moles_ of Caligula is in reality not so mad a scheme as it is commonly described: it was suggested by the wishes of rational people, but its gigantic extent was the work of madness: when ever Caligula took up a good idea, he at once turned it into something irrational. The whole commerce and intercourse of Rome with her transmarine provinces at that time was carried on by way of Puteoli; and it was there that St. Paul landed, for the voyage along the coast from cape Misenum to the mouth of the Tiber was very dangerous. The ships of that period were in many respects excellent, but in others they were very deficient. It must be supposed that at Puteoli the ships were generally so far unladen as to enable them to sail into the Tiber at Ostia; they also found at Puteoli more easily than on the Tiber, advantageous cargoes to carry back. So long as commerce supplied only the actual wants, so that there was little or no speculation, it was carried on by means of large fleets, or, according to the modern expression, of register vessels. In this way, Rome received from Egypt her supplies of corn, glass, linen, and papyrus. Such fleets, however, did not come from Egypt alone, but also from other quarters, among which Ionia, for example, is expressly mentioned. The expression for these fleets is κατάπλους, as we see from Lucian’s dialogue of this name; but the term is also quite commonly used by Latin writers of the second and third century.[41] Puteoli, as a Roman colony, was very celebrated on account of its situation and at the same time as a watering-place. Pope Gregory the Great quite seriously thinks that the hot springs of Puteoli are connected with purgatory.[42]

The real watering-place, however, was BAIAE, towards cape Misenum. It is very remarkable that at present the district is quite pestilential; if a man were to sleep there one night during the summer, he would be seized with a bilious fever, in consequence of the poisonous air. A French officer, who imagined this to be a mere prejudice, made a bet that he would sleep in the villa Borghese: he was urgently requested not to do it, but the next morning he was quite swollen, and after a few days he died of a putrid fever. The same is the case at Baiae, and yet the ancients, as we see from a fragment of Cicero’s speech _in Clodium et Curionem_, most commonly stayed there in April, when it is already dangerous. I have discovered the explanation of all this, from a conversation with a common man. He said to me that the nature of the Pontine marshes was a very strange thing, that it was not possible for any one in summer to sleep there without fatal consequences, and that it was the same in many parts of Latium; but, he added, that to his own knowledge sailors and boatmen, even in the dangerous season, slept in their boats very near the coast without injuring their health. This proves that the poisonous atmosphere does not extend across the water. The man’s remarks contain a significant hint. I remembered that the English ambassador, with whom I often took a walk there—he was not a man of learning—directed my attention to the fact, that beyond mount Posilipo, in the midst of the sea, ruins of ancient Roman houses were found, and he observed that the Romans must have had a singular taste in thus building houses in the midst of the water, and connected with the mainland by means of bridges, although there was no beauty to attract them. To abandon such a charming coast, and to build a house in the sea, was, he thought, a strange fancy. When, afterwards, I heard the account of the man I mentioned before, the matter ceased to be a mystery to me. Even at Formiae, and certainly at Baiae, the Romans built houses into the sea, in order to isolate themselves from the bad air: these are the _moles jactae in altum_, and on them people were safe.

The country there is indescribably beautiful and charming, and besides Baiae, the lake AVERNUS, surrounded by very ancient forests, is likewise a spot of great interest. Near it, a road has been cut through the rock leading to Cumae. Such roads were often constructed for the purpose of shortening the distance and avoiding the heights, for the Romans generally endeavoured by every means to shorten the roads. A similar road leads from Naples to Puzzuoli, likewise made to avoid a hill, which it would be very difficult to cross: hence the _crypta Pausilippana_, _Puteolana_, _Neapolitana_.[43] The Avernus was, no doubt, originally called ἄορνος, and with the digamma ἄϝορνος. This etymology has been rejected, because it implied the statement that birds could not fly over the lake, which, it is said, is an absurdity. But no bird settles there without dying in consequence, on account of the quantity of carbonic acid which is exhaled by the earth and the lake; dogs, too, are not safe there, but men may pass without any danger.

NAPLES[44] was originally called PARTHENOPE, and was, no doubt, situated on mount Posilipo, towards Nisita, where the crypta turns towards the cape. Afterwards, NEAPOLIS was built a few miles from it on the other side of the cape; and it is a mistake to believe that the two places were nearer each other. Parthenope was a colony of the Eretrians of Ischia, while Neapolis was a Cumaean settlement with an admixture of Athenians; and after the establishment of the latter place, Parthenope was called PALAEPOLIS. In the second Samnite war, Palaepolis was taken by the Romans, and must have been destroyed, for it entirely disappears; Neapolis, on the other hand, became a federate town of Rome, and was treated with kindness. Strabo, however, relates, that the town was so much distracted by internal disturbances, as to be obliged to concede the franchise even to the Campanians, its natural enemies. But notwithstanding all this, it remained a perfectly Greek city until the imperial times; this is evident in the reign of Augustus, evident from a letter of the emperor M. Aurelius to Fronto, and evident, also, from Petronius; there exists, moreover, a great number of Greek inscriptions of the third century. Afterwards, we lose our thread. But the chapel of the ancient church of S. Rosa at Naples contains Greek inscriptions of the period when Naples was a free city, under the protectorate of Byzantium, that is, of the seventh or eighth century.[45] Traces of Greek words still exist in the Neapolitan dialect. The Italian word _golf_ is evidently formed from κόλπος; the gulf of Naples is specially called _the_ gulf; but the ancients also called it κρατήρ.

On this gulf, at the foot of mount Vesuvius, were situated the celebrated towns of POMPEII and HERCULANEUM, remarkable for their destruction and their re-discovery. Both are called Oscan, though it is said in regard to Herculaneum, that at an earlier period it was Tyrrhenian. But from their ruins, especially those of Herculaneum when compared with those of Roman origin, it is clear that the place had assumed an entirely Greek character. Pompeii was conquered by the Romans in the Social War, and there, too, we can clearly distinguish the ancient Oscan and the more recent Roman town.

In ancient times, the bay of Naples was encircled by a wreath of towns, extending all over the coast from Naples to Sorrentum and the promontory of Minerva; but I cannot trace them here, and must now proceed to the interior of Italy.

THE SABELLIANS, SABINES, SAMNITES.

I am now going to speak of the great Sabellian nation; I shall treat of it according to its tribes beginning with the Sabines, who formed the original stock.

The names _Sabini_ and _Sabelli_ are the same, just as _Hispani_ and _Hispalli_, _Graeci_ and _Graeculi_. The form _Sabelli_ is either a diminutive or changed by a pleonasm, _Sabinulus_, and, with a change of vowel, _Sabellus_.[46] This nation occupies a large extent of country in history; but we should be mistaken, if we were to suppose, that all the tribes included under the name were pure Sabines and that they alone inhabited the countries governed by them; for they did not by any means extirpate the ancient inhabitants when they conquered a country. According to a tradition admitted by Cato himself, which contains some truth, but disfigured, the Sabines had originally come from Amiternum, the highest district of the Abruzzi, or as we may call them, the real Apennine Alps. We must not, indeed, understand this, as if the Sabines had been autochthons there, as has sometimes been asserted; but the meaning is, that the tribe from which the different Sabellian cantons issued, came down from those mountains. The ancients say no more than this, but later writers have converted it into a genealogical connection.

We cannot decide how far the Sabellians constituted one race with the Opicans and Auruncans, whether they were akin in a degree like that subsisting between the upper and lower Germans, the Suabians and Saxons, or the Germans and Scandinavians, or whether they were as foreign to each other as the Romans were to the Etruscans. That they differed from each other, is expressly attested. But the ancients are too inaccurate in these matters to allow a careful modern inquirer to accept their statement without hesitation; and although Varro attests that the Sabines and Oscans spoke different languages, still we cannot ascertain, whether he meant only different dialects, or entirely different languages. In like manner, the extension of the Sabellians in southern Italy from the Apennines can be traced only very indefinitely. This much, e.g., is attested, that the neighbourhood of Beneventum was previously occupied by Oscans, without their being the original natives of it; they must have extended even farther upwards into the country of the Marsians, and must have been expelled by the Sabines. The name Maluentum shows, that originally a people of Tyrrhenian origin dwelt between the Apennines and the valley of the Calore. Before the Sabines conquered that district, they probably had their abode in the eastern Apennines. The real and unmixed Sabines occupied a considerable extent of country; in the narrowest sense, they did not touch the sea on either side, either the Adriatic or the Lower Sea, but they extended so far, as to be separated from the latter only by a narrow strip of land, from Amiternum to the vicinity of Rome. But they sent forth branches of their nation which established themselves in other parts and became great nations.

The Sabellian people had this peculiarity, that they formed both distinct tribes and different confederations. Some of them accordingly, such as the Picentians, were without any federal relations, while the four tribes dwelling in the Abruzzi, the Marsians, Marrucinians, Pelignians, and Vestinians, were on many occasions inseparably united, and evidently formed a confederation with isopolity, similar to that subsisting between the Romans and Latins; it was, no doubt, at the same time, at least a defensive, if not an offensive, alliance. The supremacy must have belonged to one of these tribes by rotation, so that each of them may conveniently be called a canton. They stand completely by themselves, and without any connection with the mother people, the Picentians, Samnites, etc. This isolation of the Sabellian tribes was their misfortune. The Marsians and their allies never assisted the Samnites, but allowed themselves to be captivated by the Romans, by favourable terms, first to remain neutral, and afterwards to become their allies. Nor can the Samnites be regarded as a compact nation in their struggles against Rome; if this had been the case, they would unquestionably have offered a very different resistance, for they had a large population and an extensive territory. The Samnites, like the northern tribes, formed a confederation, but their bond of union was scarcely closer than that among their neighbours: they formed perfectly distinct states, which joined one another for a common purpose. The Hirpinians, Caudines, and Pentrians certainly formed a confederation; but the Frentanians did not, strictly speaking, belong to this union; they separated at an early time. To these we must add a fifth Samnite state, to which Nuceria Alfaterna belonged; its name is unknown, though it was perhaps called Alfaterna, and extended from Surrentum to the Silarus. Scylax of Caryanda clearly proves, that this district, from Surrentum to the Silarus, before it was occupied by Greeks, was inhabited by Samnites, and the same is manifest from Livy’s account. When the Romans penetrated there, Nuceria was a Samnite town, and they conquered it as such. In this manner we have, exclusive of the Frentanians, who took no great part in the second Samnite war, four Samnite cantons, which were very populous. In no map are the Caudines mentioned as a tribe, but that they were one is clear from Strabo and Velleius; manuals of geography and maps mention Caudium only as a town.

The LUCANIANS proceeded from the Samnites, but became quite independent of them. The connection with the mother-country was extremely loose with all these people; their migrations are quite different from those of other nations: they are conquests of emigrating bands of men, who for this reason lose their language and national character, and adopt those of the old inhabitants. According to a tradition, the Lucanians emigrated from Samnium as a _ver sacrum_. This phenomenon occurs among all the Italian nations: a people made a vow, that all boys born within a certain year should, after the lapse of twenty years, emigrate and seek a new home for themselves. Thus the Lucanians emigrated, and spread from the frontiers of Samnium as far as Rhegium on the straits of Messina. The ancient inhabitants were subdued, and thus three strata of different nations were mixed together: the ancient Oenotrians were conquered by the Oscans, and the Oscans by the Samnites. But these subjects afterwards rose against their rulers, and formed an independent state under the name of BRUTTIUM. The Bruttians, therefore, did not belong to the Sabellians; they must be regarded as a mixture of Oenotrians and Greeks, and were Greek rather than Italian, whence they were treated by the Romans as Greeks. The Greek language was so firmly established there, that in Terra di Lecce, about Otranto, documents were composed in the Greek language as late as the fifteenth century; specimens of it occur in the Biblioteca Barberini. In the town of Rossano in Calabria, Greek was spoken as late as the sixteenth century,[47] and in Sicily Greek poetry was written in the twelfth; when the Arabs were expelled the remaining population consisted of Greeks, and it was not till a later period that they became Italians. The praetor of Messina was, ever since the Greek times, called _Stratigo_, until in 1672[48] the people revolted against Spain, when the constitution and the office were abolished. The laws of king Roger and of Frederic II. were written in Greek.

In this manner, the component parts of the Sabellian nation, from the Picentians down to the Lucanians, presented different shades of their national character. The Sabine blood in some of them was probably not of more importance than the Frankish blood is among the modern French; for the 20,000 Franks of king Clovis were easily lost among the millions of Gauls. In our neighbourhood on the Rhine, however, the population is almost entirely Frankish, as the Franks settled here in great multitudes. The population here on both sides of the Rhine, and as far as the low German dialect is spoken, that is, as far as Andernach, is descended from the Ripuarian Franks. In the Netherlands also, there are Franks, but strongly mixed with Gauls, Batavian and Frisian tribes; still, however, the population is more Frankish than in France, and in northern France it is more so than in the south; from the Loire to Gascony only the lords of the land are Franks. In Languedoc, there was only a French garrison, and the remaining population, for centuries, remained Gothic. Although, therefore, the Franks extended even beyond the Pyrenees, their race, from the Main to Spain, presented very great differences. The country now called Franconia, scarcely contains any Franks at all. We cannot wonder, therefore, at the fact that in antiquity the Lucanians and the Sabines of Reate did not understand one another.