Note 74 — Chapter IV

The accounts of this war have been lost; its time and place admit of being determined. As the coins give to Domitian the title Germanicus after the beginning of the year 84 (Eckhel, vi. 378, 397), the campaign falls in the year 83. Accordant with this is the levy of the Usipes, which falls on this same year, and their desperate attempt at flight (Tacitus, Agr. 28; comp. Martialis, vi. 60). It was an aggressive war (Suetonius, Dom. 6: expeditio sponte suscepta; Zonaras, xi. 19; λεηλατήσας τινὰ τῶν πέραν Ῥήνου τῶν ἐνσπόνδων). The shifting of the line of posts is attested by Frontinus, who took part in the war, Strat. ii. 11, 7: cum in finibus Cubiorum (name unknown and probably corrupt) castella poneret, and i. 3, 10: limitibus per cxx. m. p. actis, which is here brought into immediate connection with the military operations, and hence may not be separated from the Chattan war itself and referred to the agri decumates, which had for long been in the Roman power. The measure of 108 miles is very conceivable for the military line which Domitian planned at the Taunus (according to Cohausen’s estimates, Röm. Grenzwall, p. 8, the later Limes from the Rhine round the Taunus as far as the Main is set down at 137 miles), but is much too small to admit of its being referred to the line of connection from thence to Ratisbon.