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Rh the senate, ever eager to outrun a ruler's taste for flattery, would never have kept within such moderate bound's.

On the 25th of March in the year 101 Trajan left Rome for the Danube. Pretexts for a Dacian war were not difficult to find. Although there was no lack of hard fighting, victory in this war depended largely on the work of the engineer. The great military road connecting the posts in Upper Germany with those on the Danube, which had been begun by Tiberius, was now extended along the right bank of the river as far as the modern Orsova. The campaign of 101 was devoted mainly to road-making and fortification. In the following campaign, after desperate fighting to the north of the Danube in the mountainous region of Transylvania, Sarmizegethusa, the capital of Decebalus, was taken, and he was forced to terms. He agreed to raze all fortresses, to surrender all weapons, prisoners and Roman deserters, and to become a dependent prince under the suzerainty of Rome. Trajan came back to Italy with Dacian envoys, who in ancient style begged the senate to confirm the conditions granted by the commander in the field. The emperor now enjoyed his first Dacian triumph, and assumed the title of Dacicus. At the same time he royally entertained the people and no less royally rewarded his brave officers. But the Dacian chief Could not school his high spirit to endure the conditions of the treaty, and Trajan soon found it necessary to prepare for another war. A massive stone bridge was built across the Danube, near the modern Turn Severin, by Apollodorus, the gifted architect who afterwards designed the forum of Trajan. In 105 began the new struggle, which on the side of Decebalus could now only lead to victory or to destruction. The Dacians fought their ground inch by inch, and their army as a whole may be said to have bled to death. The prince put an end to his own life. His kingdom became an imperial province; in it many colonies were founded and peopled by settlers drawn from different parts of the empire. The work done by Trajan in the Danubian regions left a lasting mark upon their history. The emperor returned to the capital in 106, laden with captured treasure. His triumph outdid in splendour all those that went before it. Games are said to have been held continuously for four months. Ten thousand gladiators are said to have perished in the arena, and eleven thousand beasts were killed in the contests. Congratulatory embassies came from all lands, even from India. The grand and enduring monument of the Dacian wars is the noble pillar which still stands on the site of Trajan's forum at Rome.

The end of the Dacian wars was followed by seven years of peace. During part of that time Pliny was imperial legate in the provinces cf Bithynia and Pontus, and in constant communi- cation with Trajan. The correspondence is extant and gives us the means of observing the principles and tendencies of the emperor as a civil governor.

Late in 113 Trajan left Italy to make war in the East. The never-ending Parthian problem confronted him, : and with it were more or less connected a number of minor difficulties. Already by 106 the position of Rome in the East had been materially improved by the peaceful annexation of districts bordering on the province of Syria. The region of Damascus, hitherto a dependency, and the last remaining fragment of the Jewish kingdom, were incorporated with Syria; Bostra and Petra were permanently occupied, and a great portion of the Nabataean kingdom was organized as the Roman province of Arabia. Rome thus obtained mastery of the most important positions lying on the great trade routes between East and West. These changes could not but affect the relations of the Roman with the Parthian Empire, and the affairs of Armenia became in 114 the occasion of a war. Trajan's campaigns in the East ended in complete though brilliant failure. In the retreat from Ctesiphon (117) the old emperor tasted for almost the first time the bitterness of defeat in the field. He attacked the desert city of Hatra, westward of the Tigris, whose importance is still attested by grand ruins. The want of water made if impossible to maintain a large force near the city, and the brave Arabs routed the Roman cavalry. Trajan, who narrowly escaped being killed, was forced to withdraw. A more alarming difficulty lay before him. Taking advantage of the absence of the emperor in the Far East, and possibly by an understanding with the leaders of the rising in Armenia and the annexed portions of Parthia, the Jews all over the East had taken up arms at the same moment and at a given signal. The massacres they committed were portentous. In Cyprus 240,000 men are said to have been put to death, and at Cyrene 220,000. At Alexandria, on the other hand, many Jews were killed. The Romans punished massacre by massacre, and the complete suppression of the insurrection was long delayed, but the Jews made no great stand against disciplined troops. Trajan still thought of returning to Mesopotamia and of avenging his defeat at Hatra, but he was stricken with sickness and compelled to take ship for Italy. His illness increasing, he landed in Cilicia, and died at Selinus early in August 1 17.