Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 1.djvu/86

70 AFRICA. between the Idngs of Manietania and Namidia to make a party of hia own, composed of adventurers like himself, and who now espoused the cause of Caesar. (Ap|nan. B. C, It. 54; Dion Cass. xlir. 3.) Jost before the close of b. c. 47, Caesar landed in AMca; and, after a brief but critical campaign, orerthrew the united forces of the other party in the battle of Thapsus, in April, 46. The kingdom of Numidia was now taken possession of by Caesar, who erected it into a province, and committed its govcm- mont to Sallustius, the historian, as proconsul, " in name," says Dion Cassius, ^ to govern, but in deed to plunder." (Hirt^ J3. Afr. 97; Dion Cass, xliii. 9; Appian. B. C. ii. 100.) Henceforth Numidia became known by the name of New Africa, and the former Roman ]nt}vince as Old Africa. (Appian. B. C. iv. 63 ; Plin. v. 4. s. 3.) But further, within the province of New Africa itself, Caesar is said to have made a partition, to reward the services of Sit- tius and of the kings of Mauretania; giving to the latter the W. part of Numidia, as fiu" £. (probably) as Saldae (possibly to the Ampsaga), and to the former the territory about Cirta. (Appian. B. C. iv. 54.) Very probably this partition amounted to nothing more than leaving his allies, for the present, in possession of what they had already seized, espe- cially as, in his anxiety to return to Rome, Caesar settled the affiiirs of Africa in great haste. (Dion, xiiii. 14, T(i TC &AAa iv rp *A<ppiKp 8i& fipax^oty &s ivriv fuUurra, Koraariiaas.') Among the exiles from Africa of the defeated party, who had taken refuge with the sons of Pompey in Spain, was a certmn Arabion, whom Appian (iv. 54) calls a son of a certain Masinissa, the ally of Juba. This man, after Caesar's murder, returned to Numidia, expelled Bocchus, and slew Sttius by stratagem. This story of Appian's is confused and doubtfiU, even with the help of a few obscure words in a letter of Cicero which have some appearance of confirming it. (^i^ AU. XV. 17, Arabioni de Sitio nihil irascorj comp. Dion Cass, xlviii. 22.) In the arrangements of the second triumvirate, B. c. 43, the whole of Africa was assigned to Octavion. (Dion Cass. xlvi. 55; Appian. B. C iv. 53.) T. Sextius, a former legate of Julius Caesar, was governor of the New Province; while Q. Comifidus and D. Laelius held Old Africa for the so-called republican party, and to them many betook tliemselves who had escaped firom the cruelties of the triumvirs at Rome. A war ensued, the events of which are related differently by the historians; but it ended in the defeat and death of Comifidus and Laelius, b. c. 42. (Appian. B. C. ill. 85, iv. 36, 52 — 56; Dion Cass, xlviii. 21.) . After another and successful struggle with C. Fango, which there is not space to relate (see Dion Cass, xlviii. 22 — 24; Appian. B. C. v. 12, 26, 75), Sextius found himself (A)Ugod to give up both the African pro- vinces to Lepidus, to whom they had been assigned in the new arrangements made by the triumvirs after the battle of Philippi, and confirmed after the war of Perusia, b. c. 41. By the surrender and re- tirement of Lepidus, both the African provinces came into the power of Octavian, b. c. 36. In the general settlement of the empire after the overthrow of Antony, b. c. 30, Augustus restored to the young Juba, son of Juba I., his paternal kingdom of Nu- midia (Dion Cass. 11. 15); but shortly afterwards, B. c. 25, he resumed the possession of Numidia, giving Juba in exchange the two Mauretanias, the £. buondaiy of his kingdom being fixed at Saldae. AFRICA. (Stnb. pp. 828, 831.) [Maubetaku.] Tbni the two j^rovinces of Afirica were finally united to the R(Mnan empire, consisting of Old Africa, or the andent Carthaginian territory, namely, Zengitana and Byzadum, and New Africa, or, as it was abo called, Numidia Provincia; the boundaries being, on the W., at Saldae, where Afirica joined Mauretania Caesariensis, and on the £., the monument of the Philaeni, at the bottom of the Great Syitis, wheie Africa touched Cyrenalca. The boundaries between Old and New Africa remained as before, namely, en the N. coast, the New Province was divided from the Old by the river Tnsca, and on the E. coast bj the dyke of Scipio, which terminated at Thoiae, at the N. entrance of the Syrtis Minor. (Plin. v. i. s. 3.) This province of Africa was assigned to the senate, and made a proconsular province, b. c. 27 (Stnib. p. 840; Dion Cass. Ini. 12). A further change was made by Caligula, in two particulars. First, as to the western boundaiy: when, having put to death Ptolemy, the son of Juba II., he made his kingdom of Mauretania a Roman province, he also extended its boundary east- wards from Saldae to the river Ampsaga, which be- came thenoefwth the W. boundary oi Numidia, or New Africa. (Tac. HitL i. 11.) But he also clianged the government of the province. Under Augustus and Tiberius, the (me legion (III*), which was deemed sufiident to protect the province against the barbarians on the S. frontier, had been under the orders of the proconsul; but Caligula, moved by fear of the power and popularity of the proconsul M. Si- lanus, deprived him of the military command, and placed the legion under a legatua of his own. (Tac Hi^ iv. 48.) From the account of Dion Cassias, which is, however, obviously inexact in some points, it would seem that Numidia was alt<^ther sepa- rated from Africa, and made an imperial prorincc under the UgaJhu Caetarit. (Dion Cass. lix. 20: koI 9ix<i rh iOvos ytifiasj irdpif r6 re arparutru^ KoX rovs voftdHas rovs xtpl avro irpoo'era{c.) Ta- citus does not mention this separation, but rather points out the evil results of the divided authority of the proconsul and legatus in a way which seems to imply that they had coordinate powers in the same province. A recent writer suggests that Na- midia was always regarded, from the time of the settlement by Augustus, as a province distinct finxn Old Africa; that it may have been governed by a legatus under the proconsul; and that the only change made by Caligula was the making the le- gatus immediately dependent on the emperor (Mar- quardt, Becker^* Rom. Alt. voL iii. p. 229); and certainly, in the list given by Dion Cassius (liii. 12) of the provinces as constituted by Au^fostus, Nu- midia is mentioned as well as Africa. On the whole, however, it seems that the exact relation of the New Province of Africa to the Old, from the time of Ca- ligula to that of Diocletian, must be considered as somewhat doubtful. The above historical review may aid in removing the difficulty often found in understanding the state- ments of tlie ancient writers respecting the limits of Africa. Mela (i. 7; comp. c 6), writing in the reign of Claudius, gives Africa its wide>t extent, from the river Ampsaga and the promontory Metago- nites on the W. (the same, doubtless, as the Tretum of Stralx), Ras Seba Rouiy i. e. 7 Capes) to the Arne Phihienorum on the E.; while Pliny (v. 4. s. 3), making Numidia extend from the Ampsaga to the Tusca, and Africa from the Tusca to the frontier of