3S5 



SCIPIO. 



SCIPIO. 



from deserving such praise. His pride aud haughtiness were intoler- 

 able, and the laws of the constitution were set at nought whenever 

 they opposed his own views and passions. As a statesman he scarcely 

 did anything worth mentioning. By his wife ^Emilia, daughter of 

 uEmilius Paullus, he had two daughters, one of whom married P. Cor- 

 nelius Soipio Nasica Corculum (Liv. xxxviii. 57) ; the other, the cele- 

 brated Cornelia, married Tib. Sempronius Gracchus, and was the 

 mother of the two Gracchi, the tribunes of the people. Africanus 

 had also two sons. 



12. P. CORNELIUS SCIPIO, son of the great Scipio Africanus (No. 11). 

 He was augur in B.C. 180. (Liv., xl. 42.) Cicero ('Brut.,' 19; 'De 

 Senect.,' 11 ; 'De Off.,' i. 33) says that he was a man of great mental 

 powers, but of a weakly constitution. He was the adoptive father of 

 P. Cornelius Scipio ^Emilianus Africanus Minor. His epitaph is given 

 by Orelli (' Onomast. Tull.,' p. 187). 



13. Lucius or CNEIUS SCIPIO, the second son of Scipio Africanus 

 Major (No. 11). He was, as we have seen, taken prisoner in the war 

 with Antiochus. He is described as a contemptible man. In B.C. 174 

 he became praetor urbanus, by the modest withdrawal of his com- 

 petitor, who had been a scribe to his father; but he was in the same 

 year expelled from the senate by the censors. (Liv., xli. 27; VaL Max., 

 iii. 5, 1.) 



14. L. CORNELIUS SCIPIO ASIATICUS, ASIAQENES, or ASIAQENUS, son 

 of P. Cornelius Scipio (No. 9), and brother of the great Scipio Africanus 

 (No. 11). He accompanied, as we have seen, his brother Africanus on 

 his campaigns in Spain. In B.C. 193 he was praetor in Sicily. In 

 B.C. 190 he was made consul with Laelius, and obtained Greece as his 

 province, with the command in the war against Antiochus, with whom 

 he had already had some negociations in B.C. 196. (Polyb., xviii. 33.) 

 The senate at Home do not appear to have had any great confidence 

 in his talents as a general (Cic., ' PhiL,' xi. 7), as it was only owing to 

 the offer of his great brother to accompany him as his legate that he 

 obtained Greece as his province. After the conclusion of the war with 

 Antiochus he assumed the name of Asiaticus, and entered Eome in 

 triumph. (Liv., xxxvii. 58, &c.) According to Valerius Antias (Liv., 

 xxxix. 22), he celebrated in B.C. 185 magnificent games for ten days. 

 The money expended on these games he is said to have collected in 

 Asia during an embassy, on which he had been sent to settle some 

 disputes between Antiochus and Eumenes, shortly after his con- 

 demnation. In B.C. 184 he was a candidate for the censorship, but he 

 was defeated by his competitor Cato, the great enemy of his family, 

 who in his censorship took away from Scipio Asiaticus his horse. 

 (Liv., xxxix. 44.) 



15. P. CORNELIUS SCIPIO JEMILIANUS AFRICANUS MlNOR, SOU of L. 



yEtnilius Paullus, and adopted son of P. Cornelius Scipio (No. 12). 

 He must have been born about B.C. 185, for in B.C. 168 Scipio, then a 

 youth in his seventeenth year, took a very active part in the battle of 

 Pydna, in which bis father defeated King Perseus of Macedonia. 

 (Liv., xliv. 44 ; Plut., ' ^Em. Paul,' 22.) From his earliest youth he 

 had an ardent love of intellectual occupations, and cultivated the 

 friendship of men like Polybius, Panaetius, Laelius, and others. It was 

 perhaps on this account that he appeared to his relatives to be wanting 

 in youthful vigour, and no great hopes were entertained of him ; but 

 with his partiality for science, and Greek refinement and art, he 

 esteemed no less the stern virtues of the best of the Romans. Old 

 Cato was in this respect bis model. At the beginning of the third 

 Punic war, B.C. 151, when no one was willing to enter his name either 

 as an officer or as a common soldier for the campaign in Spain, Scipio, 

 although he was at this time requested by the Macedonians to settle 

 some disputes among themselves, came forward and declared that he 

 would gladly accept any post that might be assigned to him. This 

 example inspired with courage even those who had hitherto kept back. 

 (Liv., 'Epit.,' 48; Polyb., xxxv. 4.) Scipio thus became military 

 tribune under L. Lucullus. Two heroic deeds of Scipio in this expe- 

 dition are recorded : he was the only Kcman who ventured to accept 

 the challenge of a huge Spanish chief, whom he slew in single combat ; 

 Scipio also was the first to scale the walls of the town of Intercatia 

 while it was besieged by the Romans. These proofs of personal 

 courage, and his other virtues, filled even the enemy with admiration, 

 and gained for him a greater influence over the Spaniards than his 

 avaricious general, Lucullus, was able to acquire. (Appian, vi. 54.) 

 The year following, B.C. 150, Scipio was sent by Lucullus to Africa, to 

 request Maasinissa to send a number of elephants over to Spain. 

 Scipio was most honourably received. Massinissa and the Cartha- 

 ginians were just preparing for battle ; Scipio beheld the contest from 

 an eminence, and as soon as the Carthaginians were apprised of his 

 presence they entreated him to act as mediator between them and 

 Massinissa. But he was not able to effect what they wished, and he 

 returned to Spain with the elephants. (Appian, viii., 71, &c.) When 

 the war between Carthage and Rome broke out, Scipio, then still 

 military tribune, wtnt to Africa, and here again distinguished himself 

 so much by his courage, prudence, and justice, that he not only gained 

 the unlimited confidence of his own countrymen and Massinissa, but 

 even of the Carthaginians, who trusted no Roman but Scipio. Roman 

 ambassadors who were sent to the camp in Africa to report on the 

 state of affairs, on their return to Rome were unbounded in their 

 praiae of Scipio and of the attachment of the soldiers to him. (Appian, 

 viii. 98, &c.) In B.C. 148, when the consul Calpurnius Piso undertook 



the command in Africa, Scipio returned to Rome, where everybody 

 appears to have been convinced that he alone was able to complete the 

 conquest of Carthage. Cato said that Scipio alone was alive, while all 

 the other generals were mere shadows. (Liv., ' Epit,' 49 ; Polyb., 

 xxxvL 6.) The consul Piso made very little progress in Africa, and 

 when Scipio was a candidate for the sedileship, he was unanimously 

 elected consul for the year B.C. 147, though he had not yet attained 

 the legitimate age : he obtained Africa as his province. On hi* return 

 to Africa he was accompanied by Polybius and Laelius, and imme- 

 diately after his arrival he saved a considerable body of Roman soldiers, 

 who had penetrated into one of the suburbs of Carthage. (Appian, 

 viii. 113, &c.) He restored discipline in the Roman army. His first 

 operation was to cut off all supplies which the Carthaginians had 

 hitherto received from the interior of Africa, aud in the following 

 winter (B.C. 147-146) he succeeded in taking Nepheris, whence the 

 Carthaginians till then had received their supplies by sea. His com- 

 mand of the army was prolonged for the year B.C. 146, and in the 

 spring of this year he made his attack on the city, which was defended 

 with the utmost despair, and by a decree of the senate he razed the 

 city to the ground. He is said to have wept over its ruins, aud to 

 have uttered the prophetic words of Homer : 



Kal 



> ST &v iror' o\<a\ri "IXios Ipij, 

 not \abs tvf*.fJLf\i(i> npidpoto. 



(' Iliad,' vi. 448, &c.) 



After he had made the necessary arrangements in Africa, aud anni- 

 hilated an enemy who, though humbled, waa still looked upon by 

 Rome with jealousy, Scipio returned to Italy, and entered Rome in 

 triumph. In B.C. 142 he was censor with L. Mummius, and at this 

 time of increasing luxury he fulfilled the duties of his office with the 

 greatest strictness, aud without any respect to person or rank. In the 

 lustrum which he performed at the close of his census, he did not pray, 

 as had been customary before, for the increase of the republic, but 

 only for its preservation. (Val. Max., iv. 1, 10.) It was probably after 

 his censorship that he, together with Sp. Mummius and L. Metellus, 

 travelled through Egypt, Syria, Asia, and Greece, to look into the state 

 of affairs in these countries. (Cic. 'De Rep.,' vi. 11 ; comp. 'Acad.,' 

 ii. 2.) The war against Numantia in Spain had been carried on for a 

 long time without success ; Scipio was considered the only man who 

 could bring the war to a termination, and, although absent at the time 

 of the elections, he was made consul for the year B.C. 134. On his 

 arrival in Spain he found the Roman army in a most deplorable state, 

 and here, as in Africa, he had to restore military discipline before he 

 could venture upon any enterprise. The brave inhabitants of Xu- 

 mantia held out against him till famine rendered further resistance 

 impossible. The town fell into the hands of Scipio, after most of the 

 citizens had put an end to their own lives. Fifty of the survivors 

 were selected by Scipio to adorn his triumph ; the rest were sold as 

 slaves, and the city was razed to the ground. (Appian, vi. 84, &c. ; 

 Liv., ' Epit.,' 57, 59.) While he was engaged in the siege of Numantia, 

 the Gracchian disturbances began at Rome. Although his wife Sem- 

 pronia was a sister of the Gracchi, Scipio approved of his brother-in- 

 law being put to death, but still he was not, like many others, an 

 obstinate advocate of the privileges of a class, for we find him sup- 

 porting the lex Cassia tabellaria against the aristocrats (Cic., 'Brut.,' 

 25.), whence he was considered by some as a man of the people. (Cic., 

 ' Acad.,' ii. 5.) Scipio was opposed to all violent measures ; caution 

 was one of his prominent characteristics. But his opposition to the 

 popular party deprived him of a great part of the favour and influence 

 which ha had hitherto possessed through the people. The consequence 

 was, that when, in B.C. 131, he was inclined to undertake the com- 

 mand in the war against Aristonicus, he only obtained the votes of 

 two tribes. (Cic., 'PhiL,' xi. 8.) But notwithstanding this slight, he 

 still possessed great influence, for when the tribune Papirius Carbo 

 proposed a law that the people should be at liberty to re-elect their 

 tribunes as often as they pleased, the eloquent speech of Scipio 

 induced the people to reject the measure, though it was in their own 

 favour. (Cic., ' Lsel.,' 25.) Soon after this however a circumstance 

 occurred which called forth the bitterest opposition of the popular 

 party against him. Scipio had made a proposal in favour of the old 

 Italian veterans, which had been approved by the senate, and accord- 

 ing to which the disputes arising out of the distribution of the public 

 laud should not be decided by the distributors, but by other persons. 

 This measure produced a delay in the distribution itself, and the 

 popular leaders, F. Flaccus, C. Gracchus, and Papirius Carbo, made 

 the bitterest invectives against Scipio in the assembly, and called him 

 the enemy of the people. When Scipio repeated his approval of the 

 death of Gracchus, the demagogues cried out, "Down with the tyrant ! " 



After these fierce debates Scipio went quietly home accompanied by 

 the senate and a great number of Latins aud Roman allies. (Cic., 

 ' Lsel.,' 3.) In the evening he went into his bedroom with the inten- 

 tion of writing a speech to be delivered the following morning. But 

 in the morning Scipio was found dead in his bed (B.C. 129.) (Appian, 

 'Civil.,' L 19, &c.) An investigation into the cause of his death waa 

 prevented by the multitude, and the event remained a secret. Public 

 opinion pointed out many who were suspected of having murdered 

 him, and the heaviest suspicion fell upon Carbo. (Comp. Dr. Fr. 

 Gcrlach, ' Der Tod des P. Cornelius Scipio ./Emilianus, eine Historische 



