Ancient Britain and the Invasions of Julius Caesar

Caesar’s earlier Operations in 54 B. C. (B. G., v, 9-11)

Caesar’s account of the events which occurred on the day after his first encounter with the Britons in 54 B.C. has been interpreted in several different ways; and yet his narrative is so clear that one would have thought it impossible to misunderstand it. After describing the first encounter, he proceeds, ‘Caesar, however, forbade them [the legionaries] to pursue the fugitives far, partly because he had no knowledge of the ground, partly because the day was far spent and he wished to have time for entrenching his camp. On the following morning he sent a light division of infantry and cavalry, in three columns, to pursue the fugitives. They had advanced a considerable distance, the rear-guard being still in sight, when some troopers from Quintus Atrius came to Caesar with the news that there had been a great storm on the preceding night, and that almost all the ships had been damaged and gone ashore.... On receiving this information, Caesar recalled the legions and cavalry, ordering them to defend themselves as they marched, and went back himself to the ships.... Although it involved great trouble and labour, he decided that the best plan would be to have all the ships hauled up and connected with the camp by one entrenchment. About ten days were spent in these operations, the troops not suspending work even in the night.’ (Sed eos fugientes longius Caesar prosequi vetuit, et quod loci naturam ignorabat, et quod magna parte diei consumpta munitioni castrorum tempus relinqui volebat. Postridie eius diei mane tripertito milites equitesque in expeditionem misit, ut eos qui fugerant persequerentur. His aliquantum itineris progressis, cum iam extremi essent in prospectu, equites a Q. Atrio ad Caesarem venerunt, qui nuntiarent superiore nocte maxima coorta tempestate prope omnes naves adflictas atque in litus eiectas esse.... His rebus cognitis Caesar legiones equitatumque revocari atque in itinere resistere iubet, ipse ad naves revertitur... Ipse, etsi res erat multae operae ac laboris, tamen commodissimum esse statuit omnes naves subduci et cum castris una munitione coniungi. In his rebus circiter dies X consumit ne nocturnis quidem temporibus ad laborem militum intermissis.3453)

The camp for the construction of which Caesar wished to allow time was of course quite distinct from the one for which, on the previous day, he had selected a site near his landing-place,3454 and was to be in the neighbourhood of the place where he had beaten the enemy, that is to say, twelve Roman miles or more from the sea.3455 Next morning he dispatched three flying columns in pursuit of the fugitives; and his rear-guard was just visible when the messengers arrived with the news of the shipwreck. He sent a galloper to recall the pursuing columns; and, as their retreat would naturally encourage the fugitives to rally and return to the attack, they were to offer the best resistance they could as they marched back to the coast.

C. Schneider3456 misunderstands the passage as far as misunderstanding is possible. He holds that cum iam extremi essent in prospectu means ‘when the rear of the enemy was just in sight’. But Caesar was not with any of the three pursuing columns, for he tells us that he sent them in pursuit: therefore, if Schneider were right, we should be forced to believe that he learned afterwards that the enemy’s rear had been just in sight. But why resort to this fanciful explanation, seeing that Caesar could by no possibility have ascertained that the rear of the fugitives was just visible to his troops at the very moment when he himself, separated from the troops, received the news of the shipwreck; and, further, that extremi must grammatically refer to his, that is to say, the pursuing columns? It has been objected that if extremi meant the Roman rear-guard, iam would not have its proper meaning, ‘already’ (ἤδη). But iam of course often means ‘by this time’, or ‘at length’ (nearly tandem). In the passage in question its sense may, I think, be illustrated by a clause in B. G., vii, 83, § 7,—cum iam meridies adpropinquare videretur (‘at length when it was evidently near noon’). Caesar meant to say that his pursuing columns had advanced so far that by the time when the news of the shipwreck reached him the rear-guard only was in sight. Again, Schneider takes the words in itinere resistere iubet to mean that Caesar ordered his troops ‘to stop in their march and halt where they were’. But, as Long3457 points out, ‘if this is so, he returned to his ships himself (“ipse”), leaving his men in the country doing nothing for ten days. But he tells us that his soldiers were employed in making his “munitio”, and therefore they must have come back to the camp.’

So far Long is quite right; but he too makes a great mistake. He actually believes3458 that the words munitioni castrorum tempus relinqui volebat (‘he wished to leave time for entrenching his camp’) refer to the camp near the seashore, for which he had selected a site immediately after the disembarkation. In other words, he believes that Caesar compelled his troops, who had already made a night-march of twelve miles, beaten the enemy on the banks of the Stour, stormed the stronghold to which the beaten enemy had retreated, and then pursued the fugitives for some distance, to march back all the way to the camp by the seashore, entrench it, and next morning march back again twelve miles or more into the interior, and then start in pursuit of the fugitives! The legionaries were hardy fellows; but if they did all this, they must have been as breathless as the reader will be when he has got to the end of the preceding sentence. And what had the fugitives been about? If Long is right, they must have got such a start that to pursue them would have been a wild-goose chase indeed. Needless to say, what Caesar meant was simply this:—when the Britons had been dislodged from their stronghold, he would not allow his troops to pursue them far because he wished to leave time for the construction of the temporary camp in which he intended to pass the night.

Von Göler3459 needlessly quarrels with the text of the Commentaries, and makes matters worse by an absurd emendation. ‘The reading legiones equitatumque revocari atque in itinere resistere iubet (B. G., v, 11, § 1),’ he says, ‘is obviously corrupt. Atque requires that the following clause should involve a climax’ (Steigerung). But so it does:—Caesar ‘orders the legions and cavalry to be recalled, and [not only to come back but also] to defend themselves upon the march’. In this literal translation a climax is as evident as in the emendation, to be quoted presently, which von Göler offers; and any one who is not familiar with the Commentaries will find in Meusel’s Lexicon Caesarianum abundant evidence that atque in the passage which von Göler brands as corrupt is in accord with Caesar’s usus loquendi.

‘As finally,’ continues von Göler, ‘one may conclude with certainty from the later substance of the narrative that all the legions returned to the shore, but the necessary express mention of the march thither is nowhere to be found in the Commentaries, I believe that the passage originally ran as follows:—legiones equitatumque revocari atque in itinere persistere iubet ad naves, ipse revertitur.’ If we may ‘conclude with certainty’ that ‘the legions returned’, why should the ‘express mention’ of their return be necessary? Heller3460 has taken the trouble to show that the text is above suspicion.