Maroboduus, now utterly
deserted, had no resource but in the mercy of Cæsar. Having crossed
the
Danube
DRUSUS' DIPLOMATIC
SUCCESSES IN GERMANY |
where it flows by the
province of
Noricum, he wrote to Tiberius, not like
a fugitive or a suppliant, bus as one who remembered his past greatness.
When as a most famous king in former days he received invitations from many
nations, he had still, he said, preferred the friendship of
Rome. Cæsar replied that he should have a safe and
honourable home in
Italy, if he would remain there,
or, if his interests required something different, he might leave it under
the same protection under which he had come. But in the Senate he maintained
that Philip had not been so formidable to the Athenians, or Pyrrhus or
Antiochus to the Roman people, as was Maroboduus. The speech is extant, and
in it he magnifies the man's's power, the ferocity of the tribes under his
sway, his proximity to
Italy as a foe, finally his
own measures for his overthrow. The result was that Maroboduus was kept at
Ravenna, where his possible return was a menace to
the Suevi, should they ever disdain obedience. But he never left
Italy for eighteen years, living to old age and losing
much of his renown through an excessive clinging to life.
Catualda had a
like downfall and no better refuge. Driven out soon afterwards by the
overwhelming strength of the Hermundusi led by Vibilius, he was received and
sent to
Forum Julii, a colony of Narbonensian
Gaul.
The barbarians who followed the two kings, lest they might disturb the peace
of the provinces by mingling with the population, were settled beyond the
Danube between the rivers
Marus and
Cusus, under a king,
Vannius, of the nation of the Quadi.
