Roman History, 48.46

Cassius Dio  translated by Earnest Cary

« Dio 48.45 | Dio 48.46 | Dio 48.47 | About This Work »

46So much for this matter. Sextus, now, blamed Caesar, not only for harbouring Menas, but for the further reasons that Achaia had been injured and the terms agreed upon were not being carried out either in his case or in that of the restored exiles, and he accordingly sent to Italy Menecrates, another freedman of his, and had him ravage Volturnum and other parts of Campania. 2Now when Caesar learned of this, he took the documents containing the treaty from the Vestal Virgins and sent for Antony and Lepidus. Lepidus did not at once answer the summons, and as for Antony, although he came to Brundisium (for he chanced to be still in Greece), 3yet before he could meet Caesar, who was in Etruria, he became alarmed because a wolf had entered his headquarters and killed some soldiers, and so he sailed back to Greece again, making the urgency of the Parthian situation his excuse. 4At this, Caesar, in spite of his strong conviction that he had been left in the lurch by Antony with the purpose of making him face the difficulties of the war alone, nevertheless showed no anger openly. But Sextus, on his part, noised it abroad that Antony did not think Caesar’s conduct right and set himself more zealously to the task in hand. Finally he sailed against Italy, landed at various points, inflicted much injury, and suffered much in turn. 5Meanwhile a naval battle occurred off Cumae between Menecrates and Calvisius Sabinus, in which Caesar lost a larger number of ships, since he was arrayed against expert seamen; but Menecrates attacked Menas out of jealousy and perished, thus making the loss of Sextus equally great. 6For this reason Sextus laid no claim to his victory and Caesar consoled himself over his defeat.

« Dio 48.45 | Dio 48.46 | Dio 48.47 | About This Work »