Not less spirited than that was the conflict that grew up in the countries of Africa between the forces of the same generals. Thus did that happen. Caesar sent one of his lieutenants, together with two legions of his soldiers, to the islands of Sardinia and Sicily on the Tyrrhene sea, to seek provisions for him, as we have said before. The lieutenant's name was Curio. When he came to Sicily he determined to pass into the countries of
So he unmoored his ships from the southern sea-shore of Sicily, and their sloping sail-canvasses were hoisted upon them, and they began joyfully, with the shrill cry (?) of the southerly wind, to traverse the sea towards Africa, slowly and straightly, till he took harbour and haven near the ancient city of Carthage.
Curio then came through the land and pitched a camp on the brink of the river Tigir (Bagrada?), a long distance up from the sea-haven. While the troops were settling their camp, Curios, together with a few of his bodyguard, went to scout and reconnoitre on a lofty hill which was above the camp. A peak of a great mountain-range, and a rough stony cliff, and many rough-headed rocks were above that hill. Very delightful was that place, and it was a point of outlook into all the country. Curio then began to visit one height after another, until one of the countryfolk came to him. Curio fell to a fitting converse with him, and the African warrior answered him. ‘Art thou acquainted with this country?’ says Curio. ‘That am I indeed’, he answers. ‘Hast thou a story about its forts and its heights and its cities?’ asks Curio. ‘Yea’, says the warrior, ‘such as our fathers and our grandsires have left with us.’ ‘What then is the name of this hill whereon we are’, asks Curio, ‘and the name of this rock behind us?’ ‘Truly’, says the warrior, ‘‘the Rock of Antaeus’ is the name of the rock, and the ‘Hill of the Struggle’ is the name of the hill whereon thou art.’ ‘Why are these names upon them?’ asks Curio. ‘If it were not wearisome to thee I would tell thee all’, says the African warrior. ‘Tell it exactly’, says Curio.
‘There was a wondrous champion in this country, who had neither father nor human mother, but was born out of the
‘When the country was wasted around him, this was his food, the flesh of deer and wild animals and bears and lions, which he himself used to kill when touring the wilderness every day. This was his house and his bed, the huge cavern that is there in this rock. Neither covering nor branches nor sheet nor quilt, nor plaid nor animal's skin was on that bed; but his side was against the bare earth. Thence great courage came to him, so that on every day he had fresh vigour through touching his original mother, the earth. From him this rock is called the Rock of Antaeus, and the cave which is therein is Antaeus' Cave.’
‘Now the fame and repute of that evil one finally spread through the four airts of the world. The same fame reached the place wherein was the champion and the rock of doom and the man whose conflict was unendurable, the furiously bold, great-spirited soldier, the high, glorious, angry warrior, to wit, Hercules the great son of Amphitryon. Now when Hercules heard of that calamity harrying Africa, he could not refrain from seeking him, for it was his custom to go and seek every place in the world where he heard there was a monster or an unendurable evil, and to cast it therefrom.’
‘So he came at the bruit of the monster. Soon or late he reached this country and searched the whole land till he lighted on the champion's track towards his lair. Antaeus was not staying there, but was going round the land as was his custom. Since Hercules did not find him, he sat down on the top of this hill whereon ye are here. He had not waited long there, when he saw the champion passing by him towards his cave, bearing a great burden of hams and skins of bears and lions. He gazed on Hercules and took heed of him, for the make of the warrior whom he beheld was manly.’
‘Then he goes to his cave, and casts off on the floor his load of venison, and began to anoint his body with oil and other smeary things, and with smooth-stiff grease, so that a hand was not more slippery on fish or ice than on every limb of him. Then he came to the place on this hill where Hercules was and challenged him to a wrestling-match. Skilful and cunning was Hercules in this art, for he was used to practise it greatly in the game of the Olympian Assembly. He rose up and cast his weapons away, and he also threw on the floor beside him the lion's skin that he wore, namely, the lion that he himself had killed in the sacred grove of Nemea.’
‘Then each of them moved to the other, and they link their forearms, and give a valiant crash, so that one forehead struck against the other like the sounding blow of the door-valve of a royal fort against the doorpost.’
‘They stretched and bound their huge, thick-wristed arms over throats and necks and shoulders. That was a conflict of two equal athletes! Fierce was the trouble (and) perturbation. Manly was the grasping and dragging which each of them inflicted on the other. 'Twas a great wonder and a mighty marvel to each that anyone on earth would answer him in that wise. For it seemed to each of them that there was no one
‘When Hercules saw that, he closed his forearms round the small of Antaeus' back, and gave him a stretching and a strong, stubborn dragging and squeezing, so that he pressed breast against breast, and put his chin over his neck, and forced a knee into his fork, and broke all his private parts, and afterwards gave him a powerful throw, so that he lay upon the ground.’
‘When his side touched the earth he promptly sucked up his sweat at once and renewed his vigour, and made a gallant spring at him, so that he loosed the hero's hands around him, and rose up mightily over Hercules. That was sorrow to Hercules, and he supposed that he would never vanquish Antaeus. Again they locked together. Much difficulty Hercules felt on this as on the former occasion. He had never met with the like of that conflict. At no time was it properer for his foes to rejoice, because of the might of the champion who opposed him. Howbeit Hercules manfully stands up (?) to the second combat with Antaeus until he began to weaken his opponent greatly. When Antaeus perceived that his vigour and might were exhausted, he lets himself, of his own accord, to the ground, and rose up at once with his fresh vigour in him.’
‘Then did Hercules recognise that his vigour and his valour came to Antaeus by contact of the earth. Then Hercules began to overpower him mightily, and Antaeus tried again to let himself down on the ground. Hercules promptly anticipates him, clasps his arms around him, that his raises him aloft so feet did not touch the earth, and said to him: ‘Stay standing
‘So spoke Hercules, and suddenly lifts Antaeus aloft, and squeezes him between his forearms and his sides, so that he made a marrowbath of his bones amid his skin, and did not let him to the ground till he cast his heart in draughts of blood and foaming clots of gore out over his lips.’
‘In that struggle on this hill Antaeus got his death from Hercules. Wherefore, thenceforward it is called ‘the Hill of the Struggle’.’ ‘Noble is that appellation’, says Curio.
‘A name that is nobler than that is found’, says the African warrior, ‘to wit, ‘the Hill of the Disused Encampment’ is another name of it.’
‘Why then is this?’ asks Curio.
‘Easy to say’, answers the African warrior. ‘Scipio Africanus, together with the warriors of Rome, pitched a camp round this hill and round the fields of this river below where your camp is now situate. Seest thou not still there the trace of the entrenchment, and the site of the wall, and the butts of the stakes, and the places of the cow-fields, and the outlines of the great camp? Out of this the whole of Africa was raided and ravaged by him, and its armies were utterly destroyed, and the whole country shook.’
‘Alas, O warrior’, says Curio, ‘what name hath yon great half-ruined city before us? Is it Carthage?’
‘It is indeed’, says the African warrior.
‘Why did not Scipio leave it in fair flourishing condition?’ says Curio.
‘Even the youths of that stead, were brave and numerous,’ says the African warrior, ‘so they were all put to death by Scipio, and the walls of the city were razed by him, so that it is in the flourishing condition that thou seest.’
Great joy and strength of spirit came thence to Curio, for he deemed it a good omen that he had chanced on the camp out of which Africa was subdued by Scipio. Then he came to his people cheerfully and spiritedly, and sat down among them in his camp.
There was then a choice lieutenant as Pompey's deputy in Africa. His name was Varus. He heard that Curio had arrived in Africa. He at once collected his soldiers and all the Roman youths near him in the south. There was an excellent warrior at that same time reigning with the Africans. Juba was the name of that king. Never in Africa had there been a king with greater territory, for it was under his yoke from sunset and Mount Atlas in the west to the bounds of Asia in the east, and from the northern borders of the Tyrrhene sea in the north to the southern bounds of the fiery zone in the south. A rooted foe to Curio was that man, for Curio, when he possessed power and influence in the Roman senate, had attempted to dethrone him.
So when Juba heard that Curio was in Africa his armies were gathered to him, to avenge his injury on Curio. And such was the weight and strength of the Roman rule in Africa that he was more anxious to co-operate in promoting dissension among the Romans than peace.
So then, in a very short space of time, many numerous armies came to Juba. There came the Autololes. The Numidians came: the Gaetulians, those men who never use saddles under them. Then came the swarthy peoples of the Moors. There came the Marmaridae. Came the folk of the Nasamones. Came there the people of the Garamantes. Came there the people of the Mazagians. Came there the people of the Massyli and the folk of all the rest of Africa.
Then Juba, the king of the Africans, came with that great army and pitched a camp at the edge of the plain where Curio was posted. Varus the lieutenant came with his troops and pitched camp at the other end of the same plain. When Curio heard of that great host coming towards him, fear and dread filled him at the multitude of the armies that came to him to the tryst of battle, and at Juba's strong desire to take vengeance for the injury done in dethroning him. Yet Curio did not deem it proper to march against his foes, to the mutual swording of battle, with the fragment of an army that chanced to be along with him. For they were not of Caesar's original soldiers, but a mixture of an army that had been gathered out of the town of Corfinium and out of the other citadels that Caesar seized in Italy.
Howbeit, no one perceived that trembling fear on Curio; but by a good voice and boldness of nature and power of eloquence in the presence of his forces he wrought so that they did not suppose (there was) any thought of fear in his mind. This then was the plan he formed, to act boldly and to take his forces without delay to their enemies, so that when they reached the place of conflict they should have only one resolve, namely, to deliver battle.
With that he decided on that plan, and donned his armour, and brought his troops under arms out of the camp to the midst of the plain. There the commandant of Africa, Varus, happened to be with his people face to face on the plain, seeking the camp in which was Curio. It seemed to him that he would find him there. Then they came together, and a rough merciless combat is fought between them, so that Varus and his people were routed to their tents, and Curio's force smote their backs, without resting, without turning, until the fortifications of the camp prevented them.
That was told to Juba the overlord of Africa. He rejoiced that Curio's overthrow had not been made in his absence, and that Curio had not been routed in battle until he, Juba, should have come towards him. On that night Curio returned to his own camp with great triumph and vast gladness. This is the plan that Juba, king of Africa, formed: to come that night at once with his troops out of the camp. He turns forward silently, quietly, noiselessly, till he reached the great steep valley that lay in the very midst of the plain, and there kept back the battle until the twilight of early morning came on the morrow.
Now when the first light of the day came to him, Juba arranged his troops and made ordered battalions of them, and got ready concealedly in the forks of the valley and in the passes of the hills around him. He sent forward his cavalry, with Sabura the tanist of the Numidians, to Curio's camp, to provoke the men of the camp to fight and to beguile them to the battle-ambushes which the king had arranged against them. Never was there the like of that stratagem which he ordered, save the way asps are hunted in the districts of Egypt in the south. Those are a kind of serpents, with precious stones in their faces, and their own dwelling is in clefts of rocks and in caverns of the earth. The hound that is hunting (them) puts his tail into the den in which is one of those serpents. When the serpent sees the shadow of the tail, it thrusts its head out of the den. Then from the lintel of the den the hound grasps the throat on the side behind its venom; so in that wise it is beguiled from its abode. In like manner, then, Juba, king of Africa, sent a few horse-soldiers to hunt Curio and to invite him out of his camp to the great army which he had prepared against him.
That wile was not ‘a wile without success’. For Curio enjoined his cavalry to sally that night out of their quarters and
When Curio's cavalry reached the centre of the plain Sabura and the African horsemen met them at once. They maintain a quarrelsome combat with them until Curio with his whole force came up to them. Thereat the Africans took to feigned flight to the valley in which their battalions were drawn up ahead of them.
When Curio and his force saw that, they began striking them behind them, eagerly and zealously, till they reached the centre of the plain. They heard the clangor of the curving-sided smooth-bright trumpets, the noise of the horns and the bugles and the battle-pipes. They saw the unfurled flags, and the beautiful winged banners, and the fiery splendour of the fearful, naked arms above the arrayed battalions on every airt and every point, east and west, south and north, before and behind them. A sanguinary circle and a virulent shieldburgh, and a warlike fold were made of the Africans' battalions all round about the valley; so that the Romans had neither road nor path out of it unless they mined the earth beneath them, or went flying into the air above them, or unless they went against armed soldiers outnumbering them a hundred-fold, with the intention on the part of everyone of them of all being slain.
Curio was silent, seeing the overwhelming force. All his people are silent. Unfair was the feat which they then performed.
Reason had the soldiers that heartbeating filled them in that wise, for the same terror affected even the senseless herds of horses that they had, so that no courage of nature nor greatening of spirit came to them at the mingled cry which they heard of the blare of the trumpets, and the din of the steeds, and the shouting of the soldiers, the whistling of the red-pointed darts, the screaming of the edged javelins, the strong cry of the linen, full-right mailcoats, the striking together of the bucklers fit for shieldburghs, the clashing of the hard-sharp, wide-grooved swords, the clamour of the multitude commencing the conflict at one time and in one movement. The horses of Curio's troops, hearing that great and fierce uproar, retreated and turned; and it made timid, weary, panting, inactive chargers of them, so that they failed to answer their spurring or their goading.
Now when the Africans saw them behaving thus, they shouted together upon them, and moved unquestionably towards them, both footsoldiers and cavalry, so that ashes and dust were made of the field-roads which they traversed, and dim dark clouds of black mist grew over them, and the gathered mass of the dust rose above the breaths of the steeds and the warriors pressing forward on the road to attack their enemies.
Thereby the Romans were hemmed in, and a warlike circle of the youth of Africa was made around them, so that they
Thereby were compact mailcoats loosened, and beautiful helmets broken, and shields shattered, and sides pierced, and bodies maimed, and youths severely wounded, and death-doomed men overthrown, and fierce warriors lacerated, and soldiers killed, and heroes' bodies on a litter of gore. Each of the Romans was then cast against another, so that a globular mass was made of them among the Africans in the midst of the valley. They were then thrust, pressed together, pushed, strongly beaten; so that none of them could use his shield, or wield his sword, or plant his spear, or move his hands.
The timid man whom fear was enjoining to leave the edge of the fight and go into the midst of his people, could not reach the path on which he should go until the spears and swords of his own people were athwart through him, so that nothing was left for them but to suffer his death. For they could not wield their weapons in the narrow room in which they were; and even though their foes did not ply their weapons upon them, they would fall from the mutual blows and striking of their swords, with their own breasts against others. The entrails and the mangled corpses, and the hateful dead men were standing up against the living, for they had no way of falling to the ground, because of the force with which their enemies had crushed each against another of them.
However, the joy of the Africans was greatly diminished by not seeing the fate which their own weapons brought upon the Romans. For in that fight the Romans had abundant streams of blood, and clots of gore, and heaps of bones, and (severed) hands of warriors, and half-heads hacked, and bowels and entrails crushed under feet. Until then the Africans had never taken vengeance on the Romans for the dethronement of Hannibal, or the raiding of Africa, or all their other injuries. God knows, wondrous was the deed that happened there! to wit, the slaughter which the foes of the Romans inflicted upon them, the benefit and service which it was to the Roman general, Pompey.
Thereafter the air shone and brightened above the hosts, since the wind swept from them the gloomy clouds of dust that lay over them, for the rills of crimson blood and the streampools of gore filled the earth beneath them and flowed in red rivers over it, so that neither dust nor ashes rose aloft therefrom.
Thereat Curio beheld those great slaughters and all his people, without a fugitive to tell tidings of them, simultaneously falling to death in his presence. His nature could not bear to see them and not to have means of helping them. He threw himself down on the ground, strongly, unweariedly: a gore-burst of his heart broke in his breast; and death entered the midst of the soldier. On every point around him his people fell, so that not one of them escaped to tell their tale.
Good was the man that fell there among them, namely Curio. Never in Rome grew one of the same age who would have been better than he, had he not marred himself, and deserted the senate, and sold Rome and the regal authority to Caesar for sake of gold and wealth. It befel him there to be deserted
So far one of the foretales of the Great Battle of Thessaly. Curio's tragic Death is the name of the story.