Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 1.djvu/627

Rh C ARAN us. and there took a position which was as favourable to himself as it appeared detrimental to the Ro- mans. When Cai-actacus, in addition to this, had also fortified himself with artificial means, he ex- horted his men either to die or to conquer in the approaching battle. The Roman propraetor, P. Ostorius, who saw the disadvantages under which the Romans were labouring, would not have ven- tured upon an engagement, had not the courage of his soldiers and officers demanded it. The superior military skill of the Roman legions overcame all tiie difficulties, and a splendid victory was gained : the wife and daughters of Caractacus fell into the hands of the Romans, and his brothers surrendered. Caractacus himself sought the protection of Carti- mandua, queen of the Brigantes ; but she betrayed him, and he was delivered up to the Romans, and carried to Rome, A. D. 51, after the war in Britain had lasted for nine years, as Tacitus says. The emperor Claudius wished to exhibit to the people this old and formidable foe in his humiliation, and ordered Caractacus and the members of his family, with their clients and ornaments, to be led in a sort of triumph before an assembly of the people and an array of soldiers. The emperor himself was present. The relatives of Caractacus walked by his side cast down with grief, and entreated the mercy of the Romans; Caractacus alone did nei- ther of these things, and when he approached the seat of the emperor, he stopped and addressed him in so noble a manner, that Claudius pardoned him and his friends. They appear, however, not to have returned to Britain, but to have spent the remainder of their life in Italy. (Tac. Ann. xii. 33-38 Hist. iii. 45 ; Dion Cass. Ix. 20.) [L. S.] CARA'NUS {Kdpavos or Kapavos). 1. A He- racleid of the family of the Temenidae, and accord- ing to some accounts, the founder of the Argive dynasty in Macedonia, about the middle probably of the eighth century b. c, since he was brother to Pheidon, the Argive tyrant. The legend tells, that he led into Macedonia a large force of Greeks, and, following a flock of goats, entered the town of Edessa in the midst of a heavy storm of rain and a thick mist, unobserved by the inhabitants. Re- membering the oracle which had desired him " to seek an empire by the guidance of goats," he fixed here the seat of government, and named the place Aegae in commemoration of the miracle. Herodo- tus gives a different tradition of the origin of the dynasty, and his account seems to have been adopt- ed by Thucydides, who speaks of Archelaus I. as tlie ninth king, and therefore does not reckon Cara- nus and the other two who come before Perdiccas I. in the lists of Dexippus and Eusebius. Miiller thinks that the two traditions are substantially the same, the one in Herodotus being the rude native legend, while the other, of which Caranus is the hero, was the Argive story ; and he further sug- gests that Kdpauos is perhaps only another form of Koipauos. (Diod. Fragm. ix. p. 637, ed. Wess.; Plut. Jfer. 2; Just.vii. 1, xxxiii. 2; Clinton, Fas^. ii. p. 221 ; Miiller, Dor. i. 7. § 15, App. i. § 15, and the authorities there referred to ; Herod, viii. 137-139; Thuc. ii. 100.) Pausanias, in mention- ing that the Macedonians never erected trophies when victorious, records the national tradition by which they accounted for it, and which related, that a trophy set up by Caranus, in accordance with Argive custom, for a victory over his neigh- bour Cisseus, was thrown down and destroyed by CARAUSIUS. 609 a lion from Olympus ; whereby, it was said, the king loarnt that its erection had been of evil coun- sel, as deepening the enmity of the conquered. (Pans. ix. 40.) 2. Mentioned by Justin (xi. 2) as a son of Phi- lip and a half-brother of Alexander the Great. The latter suspected him of aiming at the throne, and put him to death soon after his accession, b. c. 336. 3. A Macedonian of the body called fraipoi or guards (comp. Polyb. v. 53, xxxi. 3), was one of the generals sent by Alexander against Satibarzanes when he had a second time excited Aria to revolt. Caranus and his colleagues were successful, and Satibarzanes was defeated and slain, in the winter of B. c. 330. (Arrian, Jnalt. iii. 25,28 ; Curt. vi. 6. § 20, &c., vii, 3. § 2, Freinsheim, ad he, vii. 4. § 32, &c. ; comp. Diod. xvii. 81.) In B. c. 329, Caranus was appointed, together with Androma- chus and Menedemus, under the command of the Lycian Pharnuches, to act against Spitamenes, the revolted satrap of Sogdiana. Their approach com- pelled him to raise the siege of Maracanda ; but, in a battle which ensued, he defeated them with the help of a body of Scythian cavalry, and forced them to fall back on the river Polytimetus, the wooded banks of which promised shelter. The rashness however or cowardice of Caranus led him to attempt the passage of the river with the cavalry under his command, and the rest of the troops plunging in after him in haste and disorder, they were all destroyed by the enemy. (Arr. Anab. iv. 3, 5 ; comp. Curt. vii. 6. § 24, 7. § 31, &c.) [E.E.J CARAU'SIUS, M. AURE'LIUS VALE'- RIUS. Maximianus Herculius having equipped a naval force at Boulogne for the purpose of re- pressing the outrages of the Franks, who cruising from place to place in their light sloops were de- vastating the coasts of Holland, Gaul, and Spain, gave the command of the armament to a certiiin Carausius, a man of humble extraction, bom in Me- napia, a district between the Scheldt and Meuse, who had been bred a pilot and had distinguished himself as a soldier in the war against the Bagaudae. Carausius was by no means deficient in zeal and energy, but after a time his peculiar tactics and rapidly increasing wealth gave rise to a suspicion, probably not ill founded, that he permitted the pirates to commit their ravages unmolested, and then watching for their return, seized the ships laden with plunder and appropriated to his own use the greater portion of the spoils thus captured. Herculius accordingly gave orders for his death, but the execution of this mandate was anticipated by the vigilance of the intended victim, who having crossed the channel with the fleet, which was de- voted to his interests, and having succeeded in gaining over the troops quartered in Britain, estab- lished himself in that island and assumed the title of Augustus. His subsequent measures were cliaracterised by the greatest vigour and prudence. A number of new galleys was constructed with all speed, alliances were formed with various barbarous tribes, who were carefully disciplined as sailors, and the usurper soon became master of all the western seas. After several ineffectual attempts to break his power, Diocletian and Maximianus found it necessary to acknowledge him as their colleague in the empire, an event commemorated by a medal bearing as a device three busts with a[)propriate emblems and the legend caravsivs. kt. fhatrks. svi., while on the reverse we read the words pax. 2 R