41.6
After the
Histrian disturbance had at last quieted down, the senate passed a resolution
that the consuls should arrange which of them was to come to Rome for the
election. Two tribunes of the plebs, Licinius Nerva and C. Papirius Turdus,
attacked Manlius in his absence and brought forward a motion that he should
not retain his command after the Ides of March -the consuls had already had
their administrations extended for a year -in order that he might be brought
to trial immediately on quitting office. Their colleague, Q. Aelius, opposed
the motion and after long and violent disputes prevented it from being
carried. On their return from Spain, Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus and L.
Postumius Albinus were received by the senate in the temple of Bellona.
They gave a report of their administration and asked that honours should be
paid to the immortal gods. News came from T. Aebutius, commanding in
Sardinia, of a serious disturbance in that island. The Ilienses, in conjunction
with the Balari, had invaded the province which was at peace, and owing to
the weakened condition of the army, a large number of men having been
carried off by the pestilence, no resistance could be offered. Envoys from
Sardinia came with the same tale; they implored the senate to send assistance
to the cities at all events; it was too late to save the fields.
It was left to the consuls to decide what reply should be given to
these envoys and to deal with the whole state of things in Sardinia. An
equally tragic story was told by the Lycians, who had come to complain of
the cruel tyranny of the Rhodians, under whose government they had been
placed by L. Cornelius Scipio. They had been formerly under Antiochus and
they assured the senate that their subjection under the king was glorious
liberty compared with their present condition. It was not political oppression
only under which they were suffering, but absolute slavery; they, their wives
and children were the victims of violence; their oppressors vented their rage
on their persons and their backs, their good name was besmirched and
dishonoured, their condition rendered detestable in order that their tyrants
might openly assert a legal right over them and reduce them to the status of
slaves bought with money. Moved by this recital, the senate gave the Lycians
a letter to hand to the Rhodians, intimating that it was not the pleasure of the
senate that either the Lycians or any other men born free should be handed
over as slaves to the Rhodians or any one else. The Lycians possessed the
same rights under the suzerainty and protection of Rhodes that friendly
states possessed under the suzerainty of Rome.
