Who is the Second Founder of Rome?
In The Rise of Rome, Livy sets out to examine the character and moral principles of men from “Rome’s foundation and early years,” that contemporary readers might select “what to emulate…what to avoid,” and find the necessary “remedies” to defend against Rome’s latest symptoms of moral decay (Preface, pp.3-4).
He begins by interrogating the reign of Romulus and Numa, praising especially the latter for transforming Rome into a pious city, where a concern for the gods attuned the “untutored multitude” to ways of “justice, law, and proper observances” (I.19-21, pp.24-26). To Livy, Rome was at its best when people recognized the role of divine will in human affairs. Perhaps, then, the “remedy” that restores the nobility of Rome is no other than the ancestral virtue of religious sensibility.
Excavation on the Palatine Hill has found the foundations of a hut believed to correspond to the Hut of Romulus, which the Romans themselves preserved into late antiquity
This essay explores an interpretation wherein Livy’s account of Marcus Furius Camillus— a dictator who is variably adherent to religious principles— may be read as a didactic tale that teaches the importance of religious sensibility. Camillus’s final speech to the Romans may be a distillation of the lessons Livy intends to impart unto his readers, a script for how the Roman empire may restore its harmony and discipline.
Camillus formally debuts in Livy’s work as “a leader fated to destroy [Veii] and save his country” (V.19, p.302). “Everything suddenly changed with the change in commander,” Livy writes, “men’s hopes were different, their spirits different— even the fortune of Rome herself seemed to have been transformed” (V.19, p.302). Camillus lives up to this assessment; as dictator, his military genius immediately sets him apart from the string of leaders before him. Instead of losing men to “rash forays,” he decrees the secret construction of a tunnel that would infiltrate the Veiente citadel (V.19, p.303). The military operation, however, does not take center stage in Livy’s portrayal of the war.
Moreover, the climax lies elsewhere, in Camillus’s prayers. In anticipation of the final assault, Camillus says two prayers. The first is a customary invocation: he calls on Pythian Apollo to aid in this war, promising to repay his strength with a tenth of the spoils (V.21, p.304). In the second, he turns and pleas to Queen Juno, the “patron divinity of Veii” (V.21, p.304). Camillus asks the goddess to follow the Romans’ victory to return “home…where a temple worthy of your majesty will await to receive you” (V.21, p.304). Camillus reimagines the war at hand as a sacred duty to restore Rome and its national glory: what injustice and embarrassment, that a Roman goddess should be kept from her home? It only follows that Rome’s conquest must be in harmony with the cosmic order, and that Veientes by all accounts must now be forsaken by the gods (V.21, p.304).
Eighteenth century painting by Pompeo Batoni depicting Aeneas fleeing from Troy. Aeneas carries his father.
Livy, on his part, casts doubt on Camillus’s methods. Notice that Numa intended for religious principles to soften the bellicose Roman temper; Camillus, in this instance, weaponizes religious arguments to abet a massacre. In other words, proficiency in the ‘language of religion’ alone is hardly synonymous to the religious sensibility that Livy prescribes. One anecdote best illustrates the cruel irony of Camillus’s supposed piety: when the slaughtering reached its conclusion, the same “despoilers” who set afire women and children turned “worshippers,” tasked to transport Queen Juno to Rome, delivering on Camillus’s original promise (V.22, p.306).
In fact, Camillus himself regretted the scale of plunder. The fall of Veii ended on a third prayer by Camillus: he begs that gods show mercy on himself and Rome, and forgive their transgression (V.21, p.305). As Livy notes, tradition says that Camillus fell at the end of his prayer, a portent of the trials he would endure before returning to save Rome (V.21 pp.305-6). And thus Livy completes the first part of his parable, demonstrating the dangers of false piety and the senseless conquest that follows. Rome, like Camillus, must not be tempted by a false sense of honor to win a war, but end up falling out of favor with the gods.
Camillus blunders once more when he returns from Rome, “riding on a chariot drawn by white horses, which seemed to place him on a level too high for a citizen or a mortal” (V.23, p.307). Importantly, the people never objected to celebrating Camillus and his achievements; indeed, “all ranks of society thronged to greet him in numbers as no man had been honored before” (V.23, p.307).
However, Camillus’s blatant imitation of Jupiter spoiled the festivities.
His piety fell into question with the populace, even as he discharged more religious duties. For contemporary readers of Livy who lived through the reign of Julius Caesar, who too in his hubris imitated Jupiter, this particular episode may have struck even more poignantly. This section of the parable is quite straightforward: Rome must stay wary of leaders who challenge the religious order. After all, those who do not hold gods in reverence must have little respect for their people. It follows that the nation also has a responsibility unto itself to elevate those who do practice religious sensibility, or see its citizens fall into habits of corruption.
Livy recognizes that Camillus is equally a symptom of the affliction as he is the affliction itself. Rome had long before made it a habit to only look to the gods when ‘despairing of success in human effort,” practicing piety in dishonorable and transactional terms (V.16, p.300). And even in Camillus’s exile, local Roman magistrates chose to disregard the divine sign that warned of the Gallic invasion (V.32, p.317).
Livy spends the second half of Book V documenting the redemption of Camillus, and two speeches mark Camillus’s new and deepened understanding of religious sensibility. Bearing witness to the Gallic advance from his exile in Ardea, the former dictator became “saddened more by the fortune that had befallen his native city than by his own…feeling old and useless, railing against gods and men, indignant” (V.43, p.328). But “Fortune herself” brought the Gauls to Ardea, and, as if “one divinely inspired,” Camillus stepped forth and began once more to rally the troops (V.43, p.328). This time, Camillus spoke with compassion, for he himself had become a victim of “hapless fortunes.”
Having recognized his smallness in the face of gods, Camillus urged that men do what they can. “Fortune has given you the opportunity to show your thanks to the Roman people,” he declared (V.44, p.329). Camillus asked that the men of Ardea not stand idly by their own destruction; rather, choose to see the imminent danger as an opportunity to show the gods your good faith— that you stand by the Romans, who have done you great service. This speech led to the first of many successful counterattacks on the Gauls (V.45, p.329).
Camillus’s rallying cries before Rome’s final defense against the Gallic invasion lends itself to similar analysis.
Titus Livius by Andrea Briosco (c. 1567)
Unwilling for Rome to become a ransomed people, the newly restored dictator prepared for one last struggle against the Gauls. He ordered his men to have before their eyes “the shrines of the gods, their wives and children, the soil of their country ravaged by the evils of war, and all those things that duty enjoined them to defend, reclaim, and avenge” (V.49, p.334). This soul-stirring scene calls to mind Camillus’s previous exploits at Veii; this time around, however, Rome is the city that might just meet its end.
When Camillus referred to their sacred duty to defend, he himself cannot become sure if Rome, like Veii, possibly given up by their own seers, oracles, and gods (V.21, p.304). To Livy, this courage to fight for god, even if god had forsaken Rome, completes an education in religious sensibility. Recall that in Numa’s vision, religion means to cultivate a habit of applying oneself to justice and law; thus, even in the absence of god, one who truly embodies religious sensibility does not cease to fight for these ideals. Hence Camillus finally aligned his talent in war and rhetoric with piety, and thus “Fortune reversed her course…the favour of the gods and man’s intelligence were on Rome’s side” (V.49, p.334).
Conceivably, Livy speaks through Camillus in his final speech to the Romans, urging his readers to follow in the example of this “man of great religious sensibility” (V.50, p.335). Camillus argued that to abandon Rome would be to abandon the gods of the state; to worship the Roman gods in any other place would desecrate the sacral integrity of the relevant rites and ceremonies (V.52, p.337). And Romans should need no further reminder than their recent victory to practice religious sensibility:
“the power of the gods has been so clearly revealed in Rome’s affairs…everything the gods favored turned out well, everything they opposed did not” (V.51, p.336). It follows that Romans should live amid “tutelary deities… than to go en masse into exile” (V. 53, p.339).
Indeed, God and men together chose this place for a great city and empire to come, and to walk away when she becomes left in ruins would be forever “a source of shame and humiliation” (V.53-54, pp.339-340). Livy reports that this speech moved the senate greatly, but to settle on the decision to stay required the nudge of a “fortuitous remark,” coming from a centurion who by chance returned from sentry duty: “Standard-bearer, plant the standard; we will do best to remain here” (V.55, p.341). Taken as an omen, a divine invitation to stay.
In conclusion, perhaps Livy intended for his work of history to serve as a “fortuitous remark” of his time (Preface, pp.4). Where Camillus insisted that Romans remain in Rome and rebuild their city, Livy asks his Roman peers to similarly dedicate themselves to the empire and attend to her frayed moral fabric. In teaching the value of religious sensibility, Livy hopes that his work will inspire his contemporaries to strive at resisting moral decay.
Written by Clark Wu
