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Teuta Agrees to Pay Tribute to Rome

Then Gnaeus Fulvius sailed back to Rome with the
B. C. 228. Teuta submits.
larger part of the naval and military forces, while Postumius, staying behind and collecting forty vessels and a legion from the cities in that district, wintered there to guard the Ardiaei and other tribes that had committed themselves to the protection of Rome. Just before spring in the next year, Teuta sent envoys to Rome and concluded a treaty; in virtue of which she consented to pay a fixed tribute, and to abandon all Illyricum, with the exception of some few districts: and what affected Greece more than anything, she agreed not to sail beyond Lissus with more than two galleys, and those unarmed. When this arrangement had been concluded, Postumius sent legates to the Aetolian and Achaean leagues, who on their arrival first explained the reasons for the war and the Roman invasion; and then stated what had been accomplished in it, and read the treaty which had been made with the Illyrians. The envoys then returned to Corcyra after receiving the thanks of both leagues: for they had freed Greece by this treaty from a very serious cause for alarm, the fact being that the Illyrians were not the enemies of this or that people, but the common enemies of all alike.

Such were the circumstances of the first armed interference of the Romans in Illyricum and that part of Europe, and their first diplomatic relations with Greece; and such too were the motives which suggested them. But having thus begun, the Romans immediately afterwards sent envoys to Corinth and Athens. And it was then that the Corinthians first admitted Romans to take part in the Isthmian games.

Histories. Polybius. Evelyn S. Shuckburgh. translator. London, New York. Macmillan. 1889. Reprint Bloomington 1962.

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  • Commentary references to this page (1):
    • Titus Livius (Livy), Ab urbe condita libri, erklärt von M. Weissenborn, books 31-32, commentary, 31.1
  • Cross-references to this page (4):
    • A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities (1890), SOCII
    • Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), ISSUS
    • Smith's Bio, Centumalus
    • Smith's Bio, Teuta
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