Romans and Barbarians: Four Views From the Empire's Edge (17 page)

By now Ovid had arrived in Tomis and begun the composition of his
Tristia.
Six months from Rome in postal terms, he could only guess at events in Germany. Naturally he assumed a ‘best-case scenario', the usual outcome when the legions marched:

Already wild Germany may have followed

All the rest in kneeling to the caesars …

But I, obliged to live apart, see nothing

Of such celebration; and can only

Go by rumour's distant echoes.
91

Turning to the actual scenario, Velleius writes as follows:

Quintilius Varus, of a well-known rather than aristocratic family, was of mild and quiet temperament, somewhat ponderous both in mind and body; and more at home in the camp than on the battlefield. During his spell as governor of Syria he had shown no aversion toward cash: for that episode began with a poor man's arrival in a rich province and ended with a rich man's departure from a poor one.

When given the German command he went out with the quaint preconception that here was a subhuman people which would somehow prove responsive to Roman law even where it had not responded to the Roman sword. He therefore breezed in – right into the heart of Germany – as if on a picnic, wasting a summer lording it on the magistrate's bench, where he insisted on the punctilious observance of every legal nicety.

Meanwhile the Germans, a race combining maximum ferocity with supreme guile (and being born liars besides) fawned upon Varus, making much of their lawsuits, marvelling at his jurisprudence and flattering him regarding his civilizing mission; until the poor fellow came to think he was still handing down verdicts from the judge's seat in the Roman forum; quite forgetting he was in fact field commander of an expeditionary force deep within darkest Germany.
92

Vain, pedantic and gullible, Varus had spent years presiding over servile provinces which Rome had inherited from others. Now, overconfident and under-armed, incapable of comprehending that Drusus and Tiberius might have done their work with less than total thoroughness, he held court in the heart of Germany and spent a summer on the bench instead of building forts and roads. Tragically he allowed his army to be accompanied by a large number of women and children, with servants and a cumbrous baggage train; giving the impression of not being on a war footing or even in a state of preparedness at all.

Though Varus' force was less than half that of recent invasion armies it was enough for self-protection, amounting perhaps to 35,000 men, including auxiliaries. Among these he was doubtless comforted by the presence of a large German brigade, of proven loyalty to Rome. All around was evidence of a defeated people, cringing and eager to please. But, as in the Balkans three years earlier (and in Africa five years hence),
93
the danger would not be immediately after conquest but later, when the realities of taxation, disarmament and other restrictions had begun to sink in. As then, success or failure could depend on how tactfully these medicines were ministered. Unfortunately Varus tended to arrogance as well as self-deception.

Here was a difficult job and the wrong man to do it; a mismatch so total it reminds us in an odd way of Ovid. Both were directed, in that same year to places which suited their temperaments least. Both were sent from safety and comfort to an unstable and frightening frontier region. Was Augustus entirely unaware that Varus had acted so venally in Syria and Africa? Is it possible he had found out; and determined that his next governorship would be of a more bracing and less lucrative kind? Can one detect Livia's hand in this spiteful appointment?

Dio (the Greek historian Cassius Dio of Nicaea), writing in the early 3rd century, takes up the story:

The Romans had by now established themselves in parts of Germany, wintering there and founding cities.
94
On their side the barbarians had begun to accept Roman ways: holding markets and peaceful meetings. But they had not forgotten their ancestral customs. Nor had they lost their sense of freedom, or of what may be accomplished by arms. When Varus became governor he tried to force the pace of change, dishing out orders as if to slaves and squeezing money as if from docile subjects. However, in view of powerful regiments on the Rhine and within their borders, the Germans bided their time, pretending obedience and drawing Varus far into Cheruscan territory, near the Weser; while always behaving peaceably and amiably. The outcome was that he failed to keep his legionaries together, detaching many to different duties.
95

‘Cheruscan territory': this was Armin's own tribe, thought to have occupied today's Minden-Hannover-Brunswick area, between Weser and Elbe. According to Roman accounts, they had been defeated at least twice during the previous twenty years. However, as the currents of conflict swirled more savagely about them, we may imagine the usual fragmentation into resistant and collaborationist factions; a process which was no respecter of families. Under circumstances of which we know little, Armin (following his father, Sigimer, the tribe's leader) had thrown in his lot with the invaders, become a Roman officer and received a knighthood from the emperor. This was clearly a sweetener, for the cultivation of German friends was a priority at that time. Now, covered in glory and with the highest possible commendations, Armin returned to his tribe as Varus' deputy and liaison officer. He was still only twenty-five years of age. Velleius resumes the narrative:

Onto this stage now strode a young German nobleman of firm purpose and astute mind; a high-flier, far above the usual run of barbarian intelligence: Armin, a prince of the Cheruscan tribe, whose face and eyes seemed to shine with the light of some inner zeal. He had served with the Roman army for some years, earning Roman citizenship and a knighthood to boot. Here was the type of man who would be quick to spot in Varus the perfect dupe, for none is more credulous than the incautious; and a sense of security is the surest recipe for calamity.
96

It now becomes clear that Armin's devotion to the Roman cause was only skin deep; and beneath that skin there festered earlier hatreds. Bending before Drusus' and Tiberius' onslaughts had been one thing; dancing attendance on this military ignoramus was another. As a teenager he had thought Rome invincible; yet later, in the Balkans, he had seen brave people make a bid for freedom and almost win. What is more, when it came to rebellion, Germania had a telling advantage over Illyricum. There the mountains could be surrounded and in time reduced. Here desperate men could, in the last resort, retreat indefinitely north or east, beyond even Rome's long reach.

None the less it needed nerve to take on a superpower. This must not be a rash rebellion which ignites from a riot, but one which was meticulously planned and stealthily fostered; in the event by one man's will. Despite Varus' ineptitude, the odds were daunting. How could the young Armin unite warring tribes when even his own family was divided? He had married a girl named Thusnelda against her father's will. His father-in-law, Segestes, hated him and was to warn Varus repeatedly that he could not be trusted. This was dismissed as jealousy; for how could Armin, whom the emperor himself had knighted, behave in so un-Roman a manner?

To consider the problem from another direction: empires are seldom as powerful as they seem. They are based on bluff, on making their subjects think them stronger than they are. Had Armin sensed this secret? Might an obscure German princeling puncture the imperial bubble, as Japan would one day prick the British balloon at Singapore?

Velleius continues:

At first Armin confided in a few of his compatriots only, but as time passed the circle widened. He argued that Rome could be beaten. More to the point he gave substance to his words by organizing a plan of action and fixing a date for its execution. Segestes, Armin's father-in-law, warned Varus of what was afoot and urged him to have the plotters clapped in irons. But by now the Fates were taking a hand, controlling all Varus did and lulling his suspicions; as they often do to those whose fortunes they are about to topple.
97

A plot was hatched along the following lines. As summer ended and the army began to fall back toward the Lippe, an ‘uprising' would be invented to divert the column away from the established route with its lifeline of fortified camps and depots, with its bridges ready-built and trees ready-felled. When the Romans had been lured some distance into unfamiliar and unfavourable terrain, the German auxiliary brigade would abscond. Finally, at an advantageous moment, the deserters (shadowing at a distance) plus all other dissidents and malcontents who could be mustered, would close in on the Roman column and destroy it.

Dio:

The plot's ringleaders were Armin and [his father] Sigimer, constant companions with whom Varus often feasted. As a result he became more and more confident and completely off his guard. Then came news of an uprising designed to inveigle him through ostensibly friendly territory toward the supposed trouble spot. At first Armin and Sigimer went with him, but subsequently excused themselves on the grounds that they were going to mobilize more assistance. When each district had butchered the soldiers in its vicinity they all closed in on Varus, by now in almost inextricable forest. Then, at the very moment of showing themselves as enemies, the conspirators struck a terrible blow.
98

Dio now depicts the final phase of this
débâcle:
the three or four-day running fight known to posterity as the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest. Not only did Varus follow the course which treachery had devised but the Roman response was hindered by a catastrophic change in the weather, favouring an enemy to whom slithering mud and rough ground were familiar conditions.

The slopes were uneven and creased with gorges. Felling trees, clearing a trail and improvising bridges, the Roman column advanced. It included large numbers of carts and pack animals, as if this were a peacetime journey. There were, besides, numerous women and children, with a big retinue of servants behind them, all tending to make the column longer and more scattered. A hurricane began, bringing drenching rain. The tops of trees snapped off and fell among the marchers. The ground was slippery and treacherous.

Now the savages began to close in, appearing through the dense forest suddenly and from all sides at once. At first it was hit-and-run, with spears hurled from a distance; but when they could see that many were being wounded and there was no serious counter-attack, they began to press closer. By now the column was in chaos, with soldiers, wagons and civilians all jumbled up: impossible to organize into defensive formations and being whittled away piecemeal.

A halt was called and – insofar as a suitable place could be found on a forested hillside – camp was established for the night. Here they reorganized, burning most of the carts and abandoning inessential equipment.

On the second day things went better. Despite losses, they broke through to open country. But on the third morning the column plunged once more into forest and began to take the heaviest casualties yet. There was no room to deploy the cavalry among the trees, or use infantry and cavalry in unison.

On the fourth day the hurricane struck again and the rain returned in torrents. It was difficult even to stand. Wet bowstrings, slippery spears and sodden shields deprived them of effective use of their weapons; while the Germans, more lightly armed, fared better. As word spread that the Romans were weakening, the enemy's ranks began to be swelled by fence-sitters and plunder-seekers; his strength growing as the Roman bled away.
99

The crisis was now at hand. Neither Dio nor Velleius makes clear its tactical character or reveals the place and circumstances, though
à propos
of the battle's finale Tacitus uses the words
in medio campo;
‘in midfield', as it was formerly translated. A more recent reading
100
proposes a specialized meaning for
campus,
as the space in the centre of a camp, normally used as a gathering place or parade ground. This could suggest that Varus' men spent the last night crouched within the shallow mounds of a temporary fortification and that an inner redoubt
101
was improvised in the muster-area to which the perimeter's defenders could retire to join the senior officers, fighting back to back in a final stand. Dio describes the end:

By now Varus and all his senior officers were wounded. Fearing they were about to be taken alive or that slaughter was imminent, they steeled themselves to face the terrible alternative. When the soldiers heard that their commanders had taken their own lives, resistance collapsed, some killing themselves, others throwing away their arms and inviting anyone to kill them who wanted. Every man and animal was cut down without returning a blow.
102

Some were in fact taken prisoner. Velleius summarizes:

And so a Roman army, in bravery, discipline, dash and battle-worthiness the best we had bar none, was entrapped through its general's fecklessness, its enemy's trickery and its own wretched luck. Hemmed in by bog, bush and ambush it was exterminated almost to a man by the very enemy it was used to slaughtering like swine.

Varus found more pluck to die than he did to fight. Following the example of his father and grandfather,
103
he ran himself through with his own sword. V. Numonius, the cavalry commander, deserted the field, leaving the infantry unprotected, and tried in vain to break through to the Rhine. The body of Varus, partially burned, was further mangled by the enemy; his head cut off and dispatched to Maraboduus, who sent it on to Augustus. Despite the ignominy it was honoured by burial in the family tomb.
104

Here Velleius, one of Augustus' staunchest propagandists, is making Varus the scapegoat for the emperor's miscalculation. As for Armin's cruder but shrewder propaganda sense: the head, sent to Maraboduus, King of German Bohemia, was a way of saying, ‘See! It can be done! Rome
can
be defeated! Join our resistance movement!' Maraboduus, fearing resumption of the Bohemian plan, preferred to keep his options open. Nevertheless, in forwarding the consignment to Augustus he was doing Germany a service; for with the decomposing head of Quintilius Varus the message from the Teutoburg Forest reached its ultimate recipient.