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Updated: June 1, 2025
After the assassination of Viriatus, procured by the Consul Cæpio, and the horrible siege of Numantia, that country was annexed as a province. Next we see the gigantic republic extending itself over the richest parts of Asia Minor, through the insane bequest of Attalus, king of Pergamus.
It had certainly been rendered by the Marian reform more ready for action and more militarily useful than when it did not fight before the walls of Numantia; but it had at the same time been converted from a burgess- force into a set of mercenaries who showed no fidelity to the state at all, and proved faithful to the officer only if he had the skill personally to gain their attachment.
In 142 Scipio was censor, and acted with almost Catonian severity. In 134, though not a candidate, he was elected to the consulship and put in command of the Roman army then besieging the city of Numantia in Spain. The war, of which this siege formed a part, had been going on for some years most disastrously for the Romans, but Scipio speedily brought it to a conclusion in 133.
What had been the doom of Viriathus? and what warning against vain valour was written on the desolate site where Numantia once had fourished? Nor was a caution wanting in scenes nearer home and in more recent times.
And when you have destroyed Carthage, and received the honor of a triumph, and been made censor, and, in quality of ambassador, visited Egypt, Syria, Asia, and Greece, you shall be elected a second time consul in your absence, and, by utterly destroying Numantia, put an end to a most dangerous war.
Should difficulties arise with Rome, might not the assent of the great powers be purchased with a price? Scipio had not been blind to the colloquies of his favourite. When Numantia had been destroyed and the army was folding its tents, he gave Jugurtha the benefit of a public ovation and a private admonition.
Such a nucleus they already possessed in the province of Africa, and there also war was kindled by the ambition of a bastard. He had served at Numantia under Scipio, along with his future conqueror Marius.
It seemed folly: the consular army, the command of which was taken up in 613 by the consul Quintus Pompeius, was four times as numerous as the whole population capable of bearing arms in Numantia. With Termantia a definitive agreement must have taken place.
But I should hardly accept such an hypothesis even in the case of a greater Aemilianus, not our African friend here, but the conqueror of Africa and Numantia, who held, moreover, the office of censor at Rome. Much less will I believe that this dull blockhead, I will not say, hates sin, but recognizes it when he sees it. What then was his motive?
It was a decision that recalled the days of Numantia or the more distant history of the Caudine Forks; but the formal sacrifice that followed and was thought to justify those famous instances of breach of contract, was no longer deemed worthy of observance, and Aulus was not surrendered to the vengeance or mercy of the foe with whom he had involuntarily broken faith.
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