No More Learning

FOOTNOTES:

[224] A close friend of Vespasian, who was supposed to ply the
trade of informer (cp. iv. 41 and 43).

[225] Vibius Secundus, banished for extortion in Mauretania.


OTHO'S MEASURES OF DEFENCE

Meanwhile the war opened successfully for Otho. At his order the 11
armies of Dalmatia and Pannonia started from their base. They
comprised four legions,[226] each of which had sent forward
detachments two thousand strong. The rest followed at a short
interval: the Seventh legion raised by Galba,[227] the Eleventh and
Thirteenth, both composed of veteran troops, and the Fourteenth, which
had won great distinction by crushing the rebellion in Britain. [228]
Nero had further increased their glory by choosing them for special
service,[229] which accounts for their lasting loyalty to Nero and
their keen support of Otho. But the stronger their numbers the greater
their self-confidence and the slower their march. The cavalry and
auxiliaries preceded the main body of the legions. From Rome itself
came no mean force, five regiments of Guards with some detachments of
cavalry and the First legion. [230] To these were added an irregular
force of 2,000 gladiators,[231] a shameful assistance of which during
the civil wars even strict generals availed themselves. Annius Gallus
was placed in command of these forces with Vestricius Spurinna,[232]
and they were sent forward to hold the line of the Po. Their first
plans had failed, Caecina, whom Otho had hoped to hold within the
Gallic provinces, having already crossed the Alps.
[233] Under Otho's
personal command marched picked detachments of his Body Guard and the
rest of the Household troops, together with reservists of the Guard
and a large force of marines. [234] He let no luxury either delay or
disgrace his march. In an iron breast-plate he marched on foot at the
head of his troops, looking rough and dishevelled, quite unlike his
reputation.

Fortune smiled on his first efforts. By sea his fleet held most of 12
the Italian coast right up to the foot of the Maritime Alps. To secure
these mountains and attack the province of Narbonese Gaul he had
placed in command Suedius Clemens, Antonius Novellus, and Aemilius
Pacensis. [235] Pacensis, however, was made a prisoner by his mutinous
troops: Novellus had no authority: Clemens' command rested on
popularity, and he was as greedy of battle as he was criminally blind
to insubordination. No one could have imagined they were in Italy, on
the soil of their native land. As though on foreign shores and among
an enemy's towns, they burnt, ravaged, plundered, with results all the
more horrible since no precautions had been taken against danger. The
fields were full, the houses open. The inhabitants came to meet them
with their wives and children, and were lured by the security of
peace into all the horrors of war. The Governor of the Maritime
Alps[236] at that time was Marius Maturus. He summoned the
inhabitants, whose fighting strength was ample, and proposed to resist
at the frontier the Othonians' invasion of the province. But at the
first engagement the mountaineers were cut down and dispersed. They
had assembled in random haste; they knew nothing of military service
or discipline, nothing of the glory of victory or the disgrace of
flight.

Enraged by this engagement, Otho's troops visited their 13
indignation on the town of Albintimilium.