MARC U S U L PIU S TR A IA N U S PATER IN TH E E AS T Leonardo Gregoratti Udine University · Italy
[email protected]
Abstract — With the rise of Flavius Vespasianus to the imperial throne a new policy was initiated concerning control over Near-Eastern lands belonging to the Roman sphere of influence. The previous system, based on several Roman-controlled client kings, was dismantled, and in its stead, large military units were deployed near the frontier. These new strategic conceptions induced Vespasian’s men to build an efficient communication network both by land routes and water routes. This network was used to create rapid connections between provincial decision-making centres and the military. It also provided the army with mobility and speed of intervention along the whole frontier. In the middle Euphrates area the necessity of controlling wide deserted areas forced Roman authorities to begin an impressive road-building program. M. Ulpius Traianus, father of the future emperor and governor of Syria from 73 / 74 AD to 79 AD, is considered the main implementer of Vespasian’s policy in the middle Euphrates. A veteran of the Judaic wars, he used the experience he achieved in the Near East to reorganize the provincial communication system. Traianus was not only able to strengthen Roman influence over inner Syria, but he also succeeded in extending its range to the right bank of the Euphrates, thus reaching the trade routes along the river. Keywords — M. Ulpius Traianus pater, Syria, Easter limes, Euphrates, Parthia, road network MARCUS ULPIUS TRAIANUS PATER EN ORIENTE Resumen — Con el acceso al trono imperial de Flavius Vespasianus, fue inaugurada una nueva política de control en los territorios del Próximo Oriente que se encontraban dentro de la esfera de influencia romana. el sistema presente, basado en una serie de reinos vasallos controlados por Roma, fue desmantelado a la vez que las grandes unidades militares eran alineadas en las proximidades de las fronteras. Estas nuevas sagacidades llevaron a los hombres de Vespasiano a construir un eficiente sistema de comunicaciones tanto terrestre como fluvial. Tal infraestructura fue empleada para conectar rápidamente los centros de poder provincial con las unidades militares y para
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M ar cu s Ulpiu s Tr ai anus Pate r i n the E ast poder otorgar mayor movilidad y velocidad de intervención a lo largo de las fronteras. En el sector del medio Éufrates la necesidad de controlar amplias extensiones desérticas obligó a las autoridades romanas a adoptar un imponente programa de construcción de vías. M. Ulpius Traianus, padre del futuro emperador y gobernador de Siria entre los años 73 / 74 y 79, es considerado el principal promotor de la política de Vespasiano en el medio Éufrates. Veterano de las guerras judaicas, empleó la experiencia lograda en el Próximo Oriente para reorganizar profundamente la red de comunicación provincial. Traianus no sólo fue capaz de consolidar la influencia romana en Siria, sino que también fue capaz de extender el control de Roma hasta la orilla derecha del Éufrates obteniendo el control de las rutas comerciales presentes a lo largo del río. Palabras clave — M. Ulpio Trajano Pater, Siria, Limes oriental, Éufrates, Partia, red viaria romana
Following the accession of Flavius Vespasianus to the imperial throne, during the winter of 69 AD, some major changes occurred in the strategy employed by the Roman empire to maintain its control over the composite reality which was the ancient Near East. Since the Pompeian constitution of the Syria province, almost one and a half centuries previously, a system of territorial control had been gradually developed based on client states. The task of controlling and ruling a vast portion of the region was thus given to local monarchs whose authority was formally acknowledged and preserved by Rome. Nonetheless the decisions these kings took concerning their kingdoms’ foreign policy and frequently also internal problems were strongly influenced by the imperial officers’ instructions. East of the area under direct Roman control there was a vast territory ruled by several client kings, which formed a sort of uninterrupted protective curtain extending from the Red Sea to the Caucasus, reaching the Euphrates river on the east, a landmark considered since the first years of the I st century AD the ideal limit of the area under Roman political influence. Beyond the Euphrates the domains of the Parthian Great King began1. Such an indirect strategy of territorial control based on the capacity of the allied king’s troops to pre-emptively intervene and tackle a possible external menace proved its ineffectiveness during the course of Nero’s military operations against Parthia and even more so at the outbreak of the Great Jewish Revolt. From the winter of 66 to the summer of 69 AD, E. N. Luttwak, The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire, Baltimore 1976, passim.
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most of the regular troops deployed in the East were utilized to quash the revolt in Judea. Three entire legions (the V Macedonica, the X Fretensis and the X V Apollinaris) and several auxiliary units were continuously employed in Judaea under the supreme command of Vespasianus, the future emperor2. The military experience in the East and the difficulties he found in suppressing the uprising influenced the political conceptions of the new princeps. He devised an alternative strategy for the territorial control and military occupation of the Roman Near East. In its southern sector, the crisis solved, a legion was permanently stationed in Judea, a province now administrated by a Roman legatus of praetorial rank. In those same years an articulated programme of consolidation of the borders also took place in the northern sector. It involved a decisive advancement of the Roman military positions towards the Euphrates. Between 69 and 76 AD, following the annexation of Armenia minor3, Cappadocia became an important military province, base of two legions, the X I I Fulminata quartered at Melytene4 and the newly created X V I Flavia Firma at Satala5. Between 72 and 73 AD the client Kingdom of Commagene, ruled by the dynast Antiochos IV, accused of connivance with the Parthians of Vologaeses I, was annexed. Other two legions were deployed in the neo-acquired territory6. The condition of extreme weakness and the consequent powerlessness of Rome’s first antagonist in the East, in the same F. Millar, The Roman Near East (31 B C - A D 337), Cambridge (Mass.) · Londres 1993, passim. In 70 / 71 AD; A. B. Bosworth, ‘Vespasian’s Reorganization of the North-East Frontier’, Antichthon 10, 1976, 66; E. Dąbrowa, ‘Les rapports entre Rome et les Parthes sous Vespasien’, Syria 58, 1981, 195-196; E. Dąbrowa, La politique de l’état parthe à l’égard de Rome – d’Artaban I I à Vologèse I (ca 11 - ca 79 de n.è.) et les facteurs qui la conditionnaient (Uniwersytet Jagiellónski Rozprawy Habilitacyjne 74), Cracovia 1983. P- 164. 4 Fl. Joseph. Bell. Iud., 7.18, Suet. Vesp., 8.4 and 8.7; Dąbrowa, ‘Les rapports’, cit., 194 and 201. 5 La presenza della legione X V I Flavia Firma, tradizionalmente ritenuta acquartierata a Satala, è stata di recente messa in discussione. D. van Berchem, ‘Une inscription flavienne du Musée d’Antioche’, M H 40, 1983, 190-191. 6 The I V Scythica and the I I I Gallica at Seleucia Zeugma and Samosata. Fl. Joseph. Bell. Iud., 7.219-226; N. C. Debevoise, A Political History of Parthia, Chicago 1938, 198; F. Grosso, ‘M. Ulpio Traiano, governatore di Syria’, Rendiconti. Istituto Lombardo, Accademia di Scienze e Lettere, Classe di Lettere e Scienze Morali e Storiche 91, 1957, 322-323; K.-H. Ziegler, Die Beziehungen zwischen Rom und dem Partherreich. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Völkerrechts, Wiesbaden 1964, 79; Dąbrowa, ‘Les rapports’, cit., 197-201; Dąbrowa, ‘La politique’, cit., 164-165. 2
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years facing a huge Alan invasion in Media and Armenia, undoubtedly constituted a decisive element for the achievement of Vespasianus’ new territorial policy. Deploying the units near the borders at the periphery of the provincial territory made it possible, through a rapid and direct use of military force, to face and neutralize any external threat before it could penetrate further into the imperial territory. At the same time the imperial positions in the middle Euphrates were also consolidated and the region directly controlled by the Romans was expanded eastwards. Here more than in the mountainous regions of eastern Anatolia, the vast plains and steppes lying between the Mediterranean coast and the Euphrates, made the construction of a complex road network to connect the many settlements necessary. This road network, here as elsewhere, constituted the most striking feature of Rome’s presence in a long since urbanised region. When in 72 AD the mandate of L. Caesennius Paetus was over, the charge of administering the Syrian province was taken over by M. Ulpius Traianus, father of the future emperor. Born in the municipium of Italica in Hispania Baetica7, he was one of Vespasianus’ first followers. Under his command he had served in Judaea as legatus legionis of the X Fretensis8. Flavius Josephus, in his Bellum Judaicum, attests to his military skills during the siege of the rebel town of Japha in 67 AD 9. Between the summer of 69 AD and the first half of 70 AD, during the truce in the fighting which preceded the final attack on Jerusalem, Vespasianus reached Rome to gain the imperial power, leaving to his loyal
7 Born between 25 and 30 AD: G. Alföldy, Fasti Hispanienses. Senatorische Reichsbeamte und Offiziere in den spanischen Provinzen des römischen Reiches von Augustus bis Diokletian, Wiesbaden 1969, 157; G. Alföldy, ‘Traianus Pater und die Bauinschrift des Nymphäums von Milet’, R E A 100, 1998, 367-399. 8 G. W. Bowersock, ‘Syria under Vespasian’, JRS 63, 1973, 133-140; B. Isaac & I. Roll, ‘A Milestone of AD 69 from Judaea: the Elder Trajan and Vespasian’, JRS 66, 1976, 13, n. 26; P. M. M. Leunissen, ‘Direct Promotions from Proconsul to Consul under the Principate’, Z P E , 89, 1991, 235; E. Dąbrowa, Legio X Fretensis. A Prosopographical Study of His Officers (I - I I I A D ), Stuttgart 1993, 23-25. 9 Fl. Joseph. Bell. Iud. 3.289-299.
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lieutenant the responsibility of controlling the territories just taken from the rebels10. Under these delicate circumstances, immediately following the cessation of military operations, it is not hard to understand how fundamental it would be for the Romans to be able to consolidate their positions and establish full control over the land. In view of future military operations it was thus necessary to consolidate the isolation of those urban centres still in the rebels’ hands. An inscription found at Afula in the Jezreel valley sheds light on Traianus’ activity during those months11. The text dated between July 69 AD and the first months of 70 AD witnesses the works of widening and restoration conducted by the legatus along the road leading inland from the important supply base of Caesarea on the coast to Schythopolis, an important centre of the Roman strategic organization in inner Judea, and from there to Pella and Gerasa12. The existence of an effective road network made it possible for the military units to move freely and rapidly where the situation required. The deterrent power that such a strategic apparatus constituted towards threats originating in the provincial territory formed the basis of Rome’s effective control over a determined region. During those months spent in Judaea without fighting, Traianus, who had already proved to be a valuable general, also showed his capability to be a good ruler of an Oriental province. On the occasion of the successive conquest of Jerusalem he was no longer in command of the X Fretensis. His talents were by that time required elsewhere. Some time after his consulate in fact, Traianus obtained the governorship of the Syria province, attested to by epigraphical sources from 73 / 74 AD until 77 AD 13. It is not at all surprising, considering the facts recorded Isaac & Roll, ‘A Milestone’, cit., 18. AE 1977, n. 829; Isaac and Roll, ‘A Milestone’, cit., 15; van Berchem, ‘Une inscription flavienne’, cit., 187. 12 During the year 67 AD the V Macedonica and X Fretensis were in Caesarea and the X V Apollinaris was at Scythopolis: Fl. Joseph. Bell. Iud., III 412. Concerning the importance of that road: Fl. Joseph., Bell. Iud., 4.413-419; Isaac & Roll, ‘A Milestone’, cit., 16-17; B. Isaac, The Limits of the Empire, the Roman Army in the East, Oxford 1990, 110. 13 J.-P. Rey-Coquais, ‘Syrie romaine, de Pompée à Dioclétien’, JRS 68, 1978, 63; E. Dąbrowa, Governors of Roman Syria from Augustus to Septimius Severus, Bonn 1998, 64-68. 10 11
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above, that most of the evidence at our disposal concerning Traianus’ mandate refers to a series of civic engineering works mainly aimed at improving communication between the coast and inland regions, rendering the provincial territory much more cohesive. This is the case of the stelae from Qorsi, written in 76 AD and found in the proximity of a strategic point where important roads met. The text refers to the maintenance works of the routes connecting Apamea with Palmyra and Chalcis with Emesa, a few years after the annexation of the Emesenian dynastic kingdom in 72 AD. Two other inscriptions coming from the region of Antiochia, the provincial capital city, attest to the works of canalization undertaken by the governor between 73 AD and 75 AD with the purpose of improving the water communications between the governor’s capital, its harbour of Seleucia Pieria and the Oronthes river14. At Palmyra in the south-eastern desert the process of formation involving the urban society and institutions was heading towards its conclusion in the same period. The first inscriptions in the city agorà attesting to the activity of the civic councils date to these years15. The text on an inscribed milestone, dated to 75 AD, from the territory of Palmyra, more precisely from Ereck, 27 Km north-east of the settlement, gives information on Traianus’ road building activity in the area16. The new road connected Palmyra with Soura on the Euphrates’ western bank17. It was a route which linked the Palmyrene system of desert tracks with the Euphrates area at the confluence with the Balikh and with the northern sector of the frontier. 14 AE 1983, n. 927; SEG XXXV 1483a and 1483b; Bowersock, ‘Syria under Vespasian’, cit., 133; van Berchem, ‘Une inscription flavienne’, cit., 185-196; D. van Berchem, ‘Le port de Séleucie de Piérie et l’infrastructure logistique des guerres parthiques’, B J 185, 1985, 86-87; D. Feissel, ‘Deux listes de quartiers d’Antioche astreints au creusement d’un canal (73 / 74 après J.-C.)’, Syria 62, 1985, 77-103. 15 G. W. Bowersock, ‘City Development in Syria under Vespasian’, Akten des V I . Internationalen Kongresses für Griechische und Lateinische Epigrafik, München 1972, Múnich 1973, 124-125; Bowersock, ‘Syria under Vespasian’, cit., 135-137. 16 AE 1933, n. 205; H. Seyrig, ‘Antiquités syriennes 9. L’incorporation de Palmyre à l’empire romain’, Syria 13, 1932, 266-277 = H. Seyrig, Antiquités syriennes, I, París 1934, 44-55; R. Mouterde, ‘La Strata Diocletiana et ses bornes milliaires’, M U S J 15, 1931, 232-233, n. 27; Grosso, ‘M. Ulpio Traiano’, cit., 318-320; W. Eck, ‘Jahres- und Provinzialfasten der senatorischen Statthalter von 69 / 70 d.C. bis 138 / 139’, Chiron 12, 1982, 295-299. 17 Plin., N.H., 5.87.
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In Traianus’ plans this road marked the eastern limit of the Roman domains in the East. It constituted, together with the routes along the northern Euphrates, the Eastern limes that included the regions where the Roman presence was to be developed, and excluded those areas, like the Eastern Palmyrene, not directly administered by imperial officers. In the years of Traianus’ governorship the direct control of Syria was significantly consolidated, reaching the banks of the Euphrates. On the other side the Parthians presumably looked with concern at the transformations occurring in the Roman province. The Great King Pacoros was forced to passively accept Roman initiatives, unable to face the risk of a large-scale conflict both with the empire and the Trans-Caucasian tribes. When the Alan emergency was over, the situation which Pacoros faced in the West was irreparably compromised: in the course of a few years his enemy had been able to consolidate his positions almost everywhere. The Roman legions had reached the Euphrates, the western border of his kingdom. Managing to build, in a few years, an effective network able to consolidate the territorial control over Syria and the neo-annexed lands, Traianus achieved a bloodless strategic victory over Rome’s enemies. To reward his successes, once his Syrian mandate was concluded, he was granted the highly desirable proconsulate of Asia18 and the right to wear the ornamenta triumphalia. Through bestowing such an honour the imperial leadership wanted to celebrate the political career of a man who had been a skilful player and an undisputed winner in the chess game played on the Eastern steppes against a Great King, metu solo in pacem coactus19.
18 Mentioned by several inscriptions: Ephesos, ILS, 8970 = M. McCrum & A. G. Woodhead, Select Documents of the Flavian Emperors Including the Year of Revolution A D 68-96, Cambridge 1966, n. 263 = AE 1999, n. 1576; J. Hülsen, Milet, Ergebnisse der Ausgrabungen und Untersuchungen seit dem Jahre 1889, Bd. I, Heft V, Das Nymphaeum, Berlín y Leipzig 1919, 53-54; Bowersock, ‘Syria under Vespasian’, cit., 134-135; G. Alföldy, ‘Evergetismus und Epigrafik in der augusteischen Zeit’, in M. Christol & O. Masson (eds.), Actes du Xe Congrès International d’épigrafie Greque et Latine, Nimes, 4-9 Octobre 1992, París 1997, 304; Alföldy, ‘Traianus Pater’, passim; ILS, 8797 = CIG, 3146 = SEG III 818; Laodicea on the Lycus, IGR IV 845 = CIG, 3935; Smyrne, IGR IV 1411-1412 = OGIS, 477-478. 19 Aur., Vict., rex Parthorum metu solo in pacem coactus est, Epit. de Caes., 9, 12.
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