Produced by Tapio Riikonen and David Widger
By
C. Suetonius Tranquillus;
To which are added,
The Translation of
Alexander Thomson, M.D.
revised and corrected by
T.Forester, Esq., A.M.
(295)
I. Livia, having married Augustus when she was pregnant, was withinthree months afterwards delivered of Drusus, the father of ClaudiusCaesar, who had at first the praenomen of Decimus, but afterwards that ofNero; and it was suspected that he was begotten in adultery by hisfather-in-law. The following verse, however, was immediately in everyone's mouth:
Tois eutychousi kai primaena paidia.
Nine months for common births the fates decree;
But, for the great, reduce the term to three.
This Drusus, during the time of his being quaestor and praetor, commandedin the Rhaetian and German wars, and was the first of all the Romangenerals who navigated the Northern Ocean [466]. He made likewise someprodigious trenches beyond the Rhine [467], which to this day are calledby his name. He overthrew the enemy in several battles, and drove themfar back into the depths of the desert. Nor did he desist from pursuingthem, until an apparition, in the form of a barbarian woman, of more thanhuman size, appeared to him, and, in the Latin tongue, forbad him toproceed any farther. For these achievements he had the honour of anovation, and the triumphal ornaments. After his praetorship, heimmediately entered on the office of consul, and returning again toGermany, died of disease, in the summer encampment, which thence obtainedthe name of "The Unlucky Camp." His corpse was carried to Rome by theprincipal persons of the several municipalities and colonies upon theroad, being met and received by the recorders of each place, and buriedin the Campus Martius. In honour of his (296) memory, the army erected amonument, round which the soldiers used, annually, upon a certain day, tomarch in solemn procession, and persons deputed from the several citiesof Gaul performed religious rites. The senate likewise, among variousother honours, decreed for him a triumphal arch of marble, with trophies,in the Appian Way, and gave the cognomen of Germanicus to him and hisposterity. In him the civil and military virtues were equally displayed;for, besides his victories, he gained from the enemy the Spolia Opima[468], and frequently marked out the German chiefs in the midst of theirarmy, and encountered them in single combat, at the utmost hazard of hislife. He likewise often declared that he would, some time or other, ifpossible, restore the ancient government. In this account, I suppose,some have ventured to affirm that Augustus was jealous of him, andrecalled him; and because he made no haste to comply with the order, tookhim off by poison. This I mention, that I may not be guilty of anyomission, more than because I think it either true or probable; sinceAugustus loved him so much when living, that he always, in his wills,made him joint-heir with his sons, as he once declared in the senate; andupon his decease, extolled him in a speech to the people, to that degree,th