Ita proelium restitutum est, atque omnes hostes terga verterunt neque prius fugere destiterunt quam ad flumen Rhenum milia passuum ex eo loco circiter quinque pervenerunt.  Ibi perpauci aut viribus confisi tranare contenderunt aut lintribus inventis sibi salutem reppererunt.  In his fuit Ariovistus, qui naviculam deligatam ad ripam nactus ea profugit:  reliquos omnes equitatu consecuti nostri interfecerunt.  Duae fuereunt Ariovisti uxores, una Sueba natione, quam domo secum duxerat, altera Norica, regis Voccionis soror, quam in Gallia duxerat a fratre missam:  utraque in ea fuga perierunt; duae filiae:  harum altera occisa, altera capta est.  Gaius Valerius Procillus, cum a custodibus in fuga trinis catenis vinctus traheretur, in ipsum Caesarem hostes equitatu persequentem incidit.  Quae quidem res Caesari non minorem quam ipsa victoria voluptatem attulit, quod hominem honestissimum provinciae Galliae, suum familiarem et hospitem, ereptum e manibus hostium sibi restitutum videbat, neque eius calamitate de tanta voluptate et gratulatione quidquam fortuna deminuerat.  Is se praesente de se ter sortibus consultum dicebat utrum igni statim necaretur, an in aliud tempus reservaretur:  sortium beneficio se esse incolumem.  Item Marcus Mettius repertus et ad eum reductus est.


So the battle was restored, and all the enemy turned and ran:  nor did they cease in their flight until they reached the river Rhine, some five1 miles from that spot.  There a very few, trusting to their strength, set themselves to swim across, or discovered boats, and so won safety.  Among them was Ariovistus, who found a skiff moored to the bank and escaped therin; all the rest our cavalry caught and slew.  There were two wives of Ariovistus, one of Suebian nationality, whom he had brought with him from home; the other a woman of Noricum, sister to King Voccio, and sent by him to be married to Ariovistus in Gaul.  Both wives perished in the rout; of his two daughters one was slain, and the other taken prisoner.  Gaius Valerius Procillus, bound with a threefold chain, was being dragged by his keepers in the rout, when he chanced to meet Caesar himself pursuing the enemy with the cavalry.  And indeed it brought Caesar no less pleasure than the victory itself, to see a most distinguished member of the Province of Gaul, his own close friend and guest, snatched from the hands of the enemy and restored to himself; and to feel that fortune had in no wise lessened, by the loss of his friend, his own great pleasure and gratification.  Procillus said that in his own presence the lots had been thrice consulted to see whether he should be burnt to death at once or saved for another time:  to the favor of the lots he owed his safety.  Marcus Mettius also was discovered and brought back to Caesar.

1Dr. Rice Holmes suggests XV for V:  or a mistake of the river Ill for the Rhine.

Translation and notes by H.J. Edwards


<< Previous | De Bello Gallico | Next >>