Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 1.djvu/1104

Rh U)8 DRUSUS. numerous writers wlio mention the death of Dru- bU8, no one besides alludes to the broken leg. Suetonius, whose history is a rich receptacle of scandal, mentions the incredible report that Dru- Rus was poisoned by Augustus, after having dis- obeyed an order of the emperor for his recall. It is indeed probable enough that the emperor thought he had advanced far enough, and that it would be unwise to exasperate into hostility the inoffensive tnbes beyond the Elbe. Tiberius, Augustus, and Livia were in Pavia (Ticinum) when the tidings of the dangerous illness of Drusus reached them. Tiberius with extraordinary speed crossed the Alps, performing a journey of 200 Roman miles through a difficult and dangerous country, without stopping day or night, and arrived in time to close the eyes of his brother. (Plin. H. N. xii. 20; VaL Max. v. 5 ; Ped. Albin. 1. 89; Senec. ConsoL ad Polyb. 34.) Drusus, though at the point of death, had yet presence of mind enough to com- mand, that Tiberius should be received with all the distinction due to a consular and an imperator. The summer cjimp where Drusus died was called Scelerata, the Accursed. The corpse was carried in a marching military procession to the winter- quarters of the army at Moguntiacum (Mayence) upon the Rhine, Tiberius walking all the way as chief mourner. The troops wished the funeral to be celebrated there, but Tiberius brought the body to Italy. It was burnt in the field of Mars, and the ashes deposited in the tomb of Augustus, who • omposed the verses that were inscribed upon his fepulchral monument, and wrote in prose a memo- liiil of his life. In a funeral oration held by Au- jjustus in the Flaminian Circus, he exclaimed, " I ]>my the gods to make my adopted sons Caius and Lucius like Drusus, and to vouchsafe to me as honourable a death as his." Among the honours paid to Drusus the cogno- Dien Germanicus was decreed to him and his pos- ti'rity. A marble arch with trophies was erected la his memorj' on the Appian Way, and the re- I resentation of this arch may be seen upon ex- tant coins, as for example, in the coin annexed. which was struck by order of Augustus. He had a cenotivph on the Rhine, an altar near the Lippe (Tac. Ann. ii. 7), and Eusebius {Ckrunicon lid A. D. 43) speaks of a Drusus, the nephew of the enn)eror Claudius, who had a monument at May- ence ; but here Drusus Senior seems to be meant, and there is probably a confusion between the son and the father of Germanicus. It is to the latter that the antiquaries of Mayence refer the EicM- ulein and the Drusiloch. Besides the coins of Drusus, several ancient signet-rings with his effigy liave been preserved (Lippert, Daciyliothek, i. No. (JlO-12, ii. No. 241 and No, 25.5) ; and among the bronzes found at Herculaneum there is one which is supposed to contain a full-length likeness of Drusus. In the preceding narrative the dates have been collected from Dion Cassius and the Epitomiser of Livy. In assigning the precise date of events not DRUSU& mentioned by those writers, it is often necessar}' to have recourse to uncertain conjecture. The misery that Drusus must have occasioned among the German tribes was undoubtedly exces- sive. Some antiquaries have imagined that the German imprecation " Das dich der Drus hole " may be traced to the traditional dread of this ter- rible conqueror. The country was widely devas- tated, and immense multitudes were carried away from their homes and transplanted to the Gallic bank of the Rhine. Such was the horror occa- sioned by the advance of the Romans, that the Gennan women often dashed their babes against the ground, and then flung their mangled bodies in the faces of the soldiers. (Oros. vi. 21.) Drusus himself possessed great animal courage. In battle he endeatoured to engage in personal combat with the chieftains of the enemy, in order to earn the glory of the spolia opima. He had no contemptible foe to contend agjiinst, and though he did not escape unscathed — though, as Varus soon had occasion to feel, the Germanic spirit was not quelled — he certainly accomplished an inipor- tjint work in subjugating the tribes between the Rhine and the Weser, and erecting fortresses to preserve his conquests. According to Florus, he erected upwards of fifty fortresses along the banks of the Rhine, besides building two bridges across that river, and establishing ganisons and guards on the Meuse, the Weser, and the Elbe. He im- pressed the Gennans not less by the opinion of his intellect and character than by the terror of his arms. They who resisted had to dread his un- flinching firmness and severity, but they who sub- mitted might rely on his good faith. He did not, like his successor Varus, rouse and inflame opposi- tion by tyrannous insolence or wanton cruelty to the conquered. Whether, educated as he was in scenes of bloodshed, he would have fulfilled the expectations of the people, had he lived to attain the empire, it is impossible to pronounce. He was undoubtedly, in his kind, one of the great men of his day. To require that a Roman general, in the heat of conquest, should shew mercy to people who, ac- cording to Roman ideas, were ferocious and danger- ous barbarians, or should pause to balance the cost against the glory of success, would be to ask more than could be expected of any ordinary mortal in a similar position. It is not fair to view the cha- racters of one age by the light of another ; for he who has lived, says Schiller, so as to satisfy the best of his own time, has lived for all times. (Bayle, IHct. s. v.; Ferd. Wachter, in Ersch und Gruber's Encyclopddie, s. v.; Wilhelm, die Fe.ld- zuge des Nero Clauditcs Drusus in dem Nordl. Deutschland, Halle, 1826.) 12. Tiberius Nkho Caesar, the emperor Tiberius. [Tiberius.] 13. Germanicus Caesar. [Germanicus.] 14. Livia. [Livia ] 15. Ti. Claudius Drusus Caesar, the em- peror Claudius. [Claudius, p. 775, b.] 16. Drusus Caesar, commonly called by modem writers Drusus Junior, to distinguish him from his uncle Drusus, the brother of Tiberius (No. 11), was the son of the emperor Tiberius by his first wife, Vipsania, who was the daughter of Agrippa by Pomponia, the daughter of Atticus. Thus, his great-grandfather was only a Roman knight, and his descent on tlie motlier's side was by no means so splendid as that of his cousin Germanicus, who