[91] After Cæsar had performed these exploits in Alexandria he hastened by way of Syria against Pharnaces. The latter had Already accomplished many of his aims, had seized some of the Roman countries, had fought a battle with Cæsar's lieutenant, Domitius, and won a very brilliant victory over him. Being much elated by this affair he had subjugated the city of Amisus in Pontus, which adhered to the Roman interest, sold their inhabitants into slavery, and made all their boys eunuchs. On the approach of Cæsar he became alarmed and repented of his deeds, and when Cæsar was within 200 stades he sent ambassadors to him to treat for peace. They bore a golden crown and foolishly offered him the daughter of Pharnaces in marriage. When Cæsar learned what they were bringing he moved forward with his army, walking in advance and chatting with the ambassadors until he arrived at the camp of Pharnaces, when he merely said, "Why should I not take instant vengeance on this parricide?" Then he sprang upon his horse and at the first shout put Pharnaces to flight and killed a large number of the enemy, although he had with him only about 1000 of his own cavalry who had accompanied him in the advance. Here it is said that he exclaimed, "O fortunate Pompey, who wast considered and named the Great for warring against such men as these in the time of Mithridates, the father of this man." Of this battle he wrote to Rome the words, "I came, I saw, I conquered."
The Civil Wars. Appian. Horace White. London. MACMILLAN AND CO., LTD. 1899.
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.