The third
Punic war began in the six hundred and second year from the founding of the city, [and was] completed within the fifth year from its beginning. Between
Marcus Porcius Cato and
Scipio Nasica—of whom the one was held the wisest man in the state, the other had even been judged the best man by the
Senate—it was contended with opposite opinions, Cato urging war and that
Carthage be removed and destroyed, Nasica dissuading. It was resolved, however—because they had ships against the
treaty, because they had led an army outside their borders, because they had borne arms against
Masinissa, an ally and friend of
the Roman people, because they had not received his son
Gulussa, who was with the
Roman legates, into their town—that war be declared on them. Before any forces were put aboard the ships, the envoys of
Utica came to
Rome, surrendering themselves and all their goods. That embassy, like an omen, was welcome to the fathers, bitter to
the Carthaginians. Games to Father Dis were held at
Tarentum, according to the prescription of the books, which had been held a hundred years before, in the first Punic war, in the five hundred and second year from the founding of the city. Thirty legates came to Rome, through whom the Carthaginians surrendered themselves. Cato’s opinion prevailed, that they persist in the decree, and that the
consuls set out for the war at the earliest time. When these had crossed into
Africa, the three hundred
hostages they had demanded received, and all the arms and engines of war that were at Carthage, when by the authority of the fathers they ordered them to build their town in another place, provided it were removed not less than ten miles from the sea, by the indignity of the thing they drove the Carthaginians to war. Carthage began to be besieged and assaulted by
Lucius Marcius and Manius
Manilius the consuls. In which assault, when two tribunes had rashly burst in with their cohorts at one part where the walls were neglected, and were being heavily cut down by the townsmen, they were extricated by Scipio; through whom too a Roman fort, which the
enemy were storming by night, was relieved with the help of a few horsemen, and, the camp relieved which the Carthaginians, gone out from the city with all their forces, were storming, he himself bore the chief glory of it. Moreover, when the consul—for the other had gone to Rome for the
elections—was leading his army from the fruitless assault of Carthage against
Hasdrubal, who with an ample band had occupied an unfavorable pass, he advised the consul at first not to fight in so unfavorable a place; then, overcome by the opinions of several who envied both his prudence and his valor, he himself too entered the pass. When, as he had foretold, the Roman army had been routed and put to flight, and two cohorts were being besieged by the enemy, with a few squadrons of horse, returning into the pass, he freed them and brought them back unharmed. Which valor of his even Cato, a man of a tongue readier to blame, so followed up in the Senate that he said the rest who served in Africa were flitting shades, but Scipio was vigorous; and the Roman people embraced him with such favor that at the elections very many tribes wrote him down as consul, though this was not lawful for his age. When Lucius Scribonius the
plebs/">tribune of the plebs had promulgated a bill that the
Lusitanians—who, having surrendered to the
good faith of the Roman people, had been sold by Servius Galba in
Gaul—be restored to liberty, Marcus Cato most fiercely urged it; the speech is extant, included in his own Annals.
Quintus Fulvius Nobilior, often torn at by him in the Senate, answered for Galba. Galba himself too, when he saw that he was being condemned, embracing his two sons in their bordered togas and the son of Sulpicius Galus, whose guardian he was, spoke so pitiably for himself that the bill was rejected. Three of his speeches are extant: two delivered against Libo the tribune of the plebs and his bill about the Lusitanians, one against Lucius
Cornelius Cethegus, in which he confesses that the Lusitanians who had their camp near him were cut down, because he had ascertained that—a horse and a man sacrificed after their custom—they had it in mind, under the appearance of peace, to attack his army.
tertii Punici belli initium altero et sescentesimo ab urbe condita anno, intra quintum annum quam erat coeptum, consummati. inter M. Porcium Catonem et
Scipionem Nasicam, quorum alter sapientissimus vir in civitate habebatur, alter optimus vir etiam iudicatus a
senatu erat, diversis certatum sententiis est, Catone suadente bellum et ut tolleretur delereturque
Carthago, Nasica dissuadente. placuit tamen, quod contra foedus naves haberent, quod exercitum extra fines duxissent, quod socio populi Romani et amico, Masinissae, arma intulissent, quod filium eius Gulussam, qui cum legatis Romanis erat, in oppidum non recepissent, bellum his indici. priusquam ullae copiae in naves imponerentur,
Uticenses legati
Romam venerunt se suaque omnia dedentes. ea legatio velut omen grata patribus, acerba Carthaginiensibus fuit. ludi Diti patri ad Tarentum ex praecepto librorum facti, qui ante annum centesimum primo Punico bello, quingentesimo et altero anno ab urbe condita facti erant. legati triginta Romam venerunt, per quos se
Carthaginienses dedebant. Catonis sententia evicit, ut in decreto perstaretur, et ut consules quam primum ad bellum proficiscerentur. qui ubi in Africam transierunt, acceptis quos imperaverant trecentis obsidibus et armis omnibus instrumentisque belli, si qua Carthagine erant, cum ex auctoritate patrum iuberent, ut in alio loco, dum a mari decem milia passuum ne minus remoto, oppidum facerent, indignitate rei ad bellandum Carthaginienses compulerunt. obsideri obpugnarique coepta est Carthago a L. Marcio M’. Manilio consulibus. in qua obpugnatione cum neglectos ab una parte muros duo tribuni temere cum cohortibus suis irrupissent et ab oppidanis graviter caederentur, a Scipione † Orfitiano expliciti sunt; per quem et castellum Romanorum, quod nocte expugnabant, paucis equitibus iuvantibus liberatum est, castrorumque, quae Carthaginienses omnibus copiis ab urbe pariter egressi obpugnabant, liberatorum is ipse praecipuam gloriam tulit. praeterea cum ab inrita obpugnatione Carthaginis
consul — alter enim Romam ad comitia ierat — exercitum duceret adversus Hasdrubalem, qui cum ampla manu saltum inicum insederat, suasit primo consuli, ne tam inico loco confligeret. victus deinde complurum, qui et prudentiae et virtuti eius invidebant, sententiis et ipse saltum ingressus est. cum, sicut praedixerat, fusus fugatusque esset Romanus exercitus et duae cohortes ab hoste obsiderentur, cum paucis equitum turmis in saltum reversus liberavit eas et incolumes reduxit. quam virtutem eius et
Cato, vir promptioris ad vituperandum linguae, in senatu sic prosecutus est, ut diceret reliquos, qui in Africa militarent, umbras volitare, Scipionem vigere, et populus Romanus eo favore complexus, ut comitiis plurimae eum tribus consulem scriberent, cum hoc per aetatem non liceret. cum L. Scribonius
tribunus plebis rogationem promulgasset, ut
Lusitani, qui in fidem populo R. dediti ab Ser. Galba in Gallia venissent, in libertatem restituerentur, M. Cato acerrime suasit. extat oratio in annalibus ipsius inclusa. Q. Fulvius Nobilior ei, saepe ab eo in senatu laceratus, respondit pro Galba. ipse quoque Galba, cum se damnari videret, complexus duos filios praetextatos et Sulpicii Gali filium, cuius tutor erat, ita miserabiliter pro se locutus est, ut rogatio antiquaretur. extant tres orationes eius, duae adversus Libonem tribunum plebis rogationemque eius habitae de Lusitanis, una contra L. Cornelium Cethegum, in qua Lusitanos prope se castra habentis caesos fatetur, quod compertum habuerit equo atque homine suo ritu immolatis per speciem pacis adoriri exercitum suum in animo habuisse.