the east from augustus to trajan 277

Co-opting the Conqueror: the East from Augustus to Trajan

maurice sartre

From Rome’s first dealings with the Greeks at the end of the 3rd Century bc, she adopted two contradictory attitudes toward them: disdain and ad- miration. Cicero’s works attest this ambiguous relation between Rome and the Greeks: in his courtroom speeches he never has words harsh enough for denouncing the foibles of the Greeks (trickery, cowardice, flattery), but he himself followed the teachings of Antiochus of Ascalon at Athens and of Posidonius at Rhodes, and recommends to his brother Quintus, governor of the province of Asia, never to forget that he is governing the descendants of the founders of civilisation. A long time before the age of Augustus, the Roman empire became de facto a bilingual empire: cultivated Roman notables all knew Greek, for they had long considered the Greeks as the custodians of culture; and whatever the disdain they show for Graeculi, towards whom they display unbearable arrogance, they became, from the mid-2nd Century and still more with Pompey, Caesar and Mark Antony, the propagators of Hellenism in the eastern Mediterranean. Not only did they respect everywhere the lifestyles à la grecque, but they adopted parts of them for themselves and propagated them broadly over the entire pars orientalis of the empire. In this sense the famous pronouncement of the poet Horace (Ep. 2.1.156), ‘conquered Greece captured her rough conqueror and brought the arts into rustic Latium’, proves to be exact but inadequate: her conqueror was for over three centuries the best propagandist for her culture, particularly in the new provinces of the Near East. The century that extends from Augustus to Trajan marks, in this field, a decisive stage on the political. as much as on the economic, social or cultural, level. While the totality of client states were moving progressive- ly under Rome’s direct administration, Rome was spreading the model of the Greek city (polis), making it the basic unit of its administration; was admitting many inhabitants of the Mediterranean provinces into Roman citizenship; and was introducing various members of their élites into the Senate. The return of peace and security, and respect for local traditions, 278 maurice sartre encouraged the inhabitants of the eastern provinces to adhere to the au- thority of Rome. This did not prevent either complaints from provincials faced with governors’ extortions or several violent revolts (Thrace, Judaea).

The battle of Actium (2 September, 31 bc) marks the opening in Mediter- ranean history of a double process achieved in the following months: the completion of the unification of all the shores of the Mediterranean under the direct or indirect authority of Rome (with the creation of the province of Egypt in spring 30), and the return of peace. The Greek-speaking prov- inces had paid a heavy tribute to the civil war in fact and in metaphor, and emerged exhausted by the exactions of the imperatores, the pillaging by pirates and bandits, and the ravages of Roman troops and those of the kings of Pontus, Armenia and the Parthians. The defeat of Antony and Cleopatra allowed peace to be glimpsed. And in fact, apart from localised revolts, peace reigned for the most part during the 1st Century of our era. Augustus broadly continued the policy of Antony on an essential point: recourse to client princes to administer the regions hardest to control. He left in peace native princes in Thrace, Judaea, Nabataea, Syria (at Emesus, Chalcis in Lebanon, etc.), and in Commagene, as well as in the interior of Asia Minor (Pontus, Cappadocia, Galatia, Paphlagonia and Cilicia, not to mention numerous states of lesser extent). But he also inaugurated a pol- icy of annexing these states when opportunity arose: this happened with Galatia from 25 bc, Paphlagonia in 6 bc, certain districts of Galatian Pontus in 3 bc (Amaseia, Sebastopolis, Sebasteia), and part of Judaea in ad 6. This integration policy was continued slowly but steadily until the reign of Tra- jan, who put an end to the last client-state in the region, the kingdom of the Nabataeans which became the provincia Arabia in 106. Thus, to men- tion only the chief states, Cappadocia was annexed in ad 17, Pontus in 33, the Lycian koinon in 43, the Thracian kingdoms in 46, Commagene, Arme- nia Minor and Emesa around 70–72, the kingdom of Agrippa II in southern Syria in the the late 80s. That did not prevent some backward turns, for example Caligula’s restoration of Commagene and Pontus after earlier an- nexation, and the re-establishment of the kingdom of Herod the Great for the benefit of Agrippa I by Claudius in 41. Annexing client states occurred as a result when Rome estimated that administration by Roman officials was made possible by the existence of native élites Hellenised enough to provide ruling groups in provincial cities. For Roman provincial administration, except in Egypt, was based on a relatively autonomous network of native cities and communities.