Regum et imperatorum apophthegmata

Encamped against the Teutons in a place which had little water, when the soldiers said they were thirsty, he pointed out to them a river flowing close by the enemy’s palisade, saying, There is drink for you which can be bought with blood. And they called upon him to lead them on while the blood within them was fluid and not all dried up by their thirst. [*](Cf. Plutarch’s Life of C. Marius, chap. xviii. (416 A); Frontinus, Strategemata, ii. 7. 12; Florus, Epitome of Roman History, i. 38. 8 ff.)

In the Cimbrian wars a thousand men of Camerinum who had acquitted themselves bravely he made Roman citizens, in accord with no law. To those who complained he said that he did not hear the laws because of the clash of arms. [*](Cf. Plutarch’s Life of C. Marius, chap. xxviii. (421 E); Cicero, Oration for Corn. Balbus, 20 (46); Valerius Maximus, v. 2. 8. Cf. also Cicero, Pro Milone, 4 (10), silent enim leges inter arma. )

In the Civil War, [*](Usually called the Social War (ὁ συμμαχιὸς πόλεμος), 90-88 B.C.) when he found himself

Catulus Lutatius, in the Cimbrian War, was encamped beside the Atiso [*](Presumably the same river which the Roman writers call the Athesis.) River. The Romans, seeing the barbarians crossing to attack, retreated, and he, not being able to check them, made haste to put himself in the front rank of those who were running away so that they might not seem to flee from the enemy, but to be following their commander. [*](Cf. Plutarch’s Life of C. Marius, chap. xxiii. (418 F).)

Sulla, who was called the Fortunate, counted two things among his greatest pieces of fortune: the friendship of Pius Metellus, and the fact that he had not razed Athens, but had spared the city. [*](Cf. Plutarch’s Life of Sulla, chap. vi. (454 D), chap. xiv. (460 E), and the Comparison of Lysander and Sulla, chap. v. (478 B).)

Gaius Popillius was sent [*](In 18 B.C. to Antiochus IV. (Epiphanes).)

Lucullus in Armenia with ten thousand menat-arms and a thousand horsemen was proceeding against Tigranes, who had an army of an hundred and fifty thousand men, on the sixth day of October, the day on which, some years before, [*](In 105 B.C.) the force with Caepio had been annihilated by the Cimbrians. When somebody remarked that the Romans set that day aside as a dread day of expiation, he said, Then let us on this day strive with might and main to make this, instead of an ill-omened and gloomy day, a glad and welcome day to the Romans. [*](Cf. Plutarch’s Life of Lucullus, chap. xxviii. (510 C).)

His soldiers feared most the men in full armour,

Gnaeus Pompey was loved by the Romans as much as his father was hated. [*](Cf. Plutarch’s Life of Pompey, chap. i. (619 B).) In his youth he was heart and soul for Sulla’s party, and without holding public office or being in the Senate, he enlisted many men in Italy for the army. [*](Ibid. chap. vi. (621 D).) When Sulla summoned him, he refused to present his troops before the commander-in-chief without spoils and without their having been through bloodshed. And he did not come until after he had vanquished the generals of the enemy in many battles. [*](Ibid. 621 F.)

When he was sent by Sulla to Sicily [*](In 82 B.C.) in the capacity of general, he perceived that the soldiers on the marches kept dropping out of the ranks to do violence and to plunder, and so he punished those who were straggling and running about, and placed seals upon the swords of those who were officially sent by him. [*](Cf. Plutarch’s Life of Pompey, chap. x. (624 A).)

The Mamertines, who had joined the other party, he was like to put to death to a man. But Sthennius, their popular leader, said that Pompey

He crossed over to Africa against Domitius [*](In 81 B.C.) and overcame him in a mighty battle; then, when the soldiers were hailing him as commander-in-chief, he said he could not accept the honour while the enemy’s palisade still stood upright. And they, in spite of a heavy rain that enveloped them, swept on and plundered the camp. [*](Cf. Plutarch’s Life of Pompey, chaps. xi.-xii. (624 C-E).)

When he returned, Sulla received him graciously with many honours, and was the first to call him Magnus (The Great). He desired to celebrate a triumph, but Sulla would not allow him to do so, since he was not as yet a member of the Senate. When Pompey remarked to those present that Sulla did not realize that more people worship the rising than the setting sun, Sulla cried out, Let him have his triumph ! Servilius, a man of noble family, was indignant, and many of the soldiers stood in his way with their demands of largess before his triumph. But when Pompey said that he would rather give up his triumph than curry favour with them, Servilius said that now he saw that Pompey was truly great, and deserved his triumph. [*](Ibid. chaps. xiii.-xiv. (625-626 B); Moralia, 804 F.)

It is a custom in Rome for the knights, when