Herod Before Caesar

At once Herod was plunged into anxiety for his whole position because of his friendship with Antony, now that Caesar had won at Actium. Yet he gave Caesar more cause for fear than he himself had to fear; for Caesar did not consider Antony finished while Herod stood by him. The king, however, decided to meet the danger head-on. He sailed to Rhodes, where Caesar was staying, and came before him without his diadem, a private citizen in dress and bearing, but a king in spirit. Holding back nothing of the truth, he said to his face: “Caesar, I was made king by Antony, and I admit that I have been of use to Antony in everything. I will not shrink from saying this either: you would certainly have found me in arms beside him, a grateful friend, if the Arabs had not prevented it. Even so, I sent him as many troops as I could and many tens of thousands of measures of grain. Nor did I desert my benefactor after the blow he received at Actium. When I could no longer be of use as an ally, I gave him the best advice I could. I told him that the one way to repair his failures was Cleopatra’s death, and if he killed her, I promised him money, walls for his safety, an army, and myself as his partner in the war against you. But his passion for Cleopatra stopped his ears, and so did God, who is granting the power to you. I share Antony’s defeat, and with his fortune I have laid aside my diadem. I have come to you with my own integrity as my hope of safety, and I expect that what will be asked is what kind of friend I have been, not whose.” [a]

Caesar replied, “No, be safe, and be king now more firmly than before. You deserve to rule over many, since you stand by friendship so well. Try to stay as faithful to those whose fortune is better, for I have the brightest hopes of your spirit. Antony did well to listen to Cleopatra rather than to you; for we have gained you by his folly. You have begun the kindness, it seems, since Ventidius also writes to me that you sent him help against the gladiators. So now I confirm your kingdom to you by decree, and I will try to do you further good hereafter, so that you will not miss Antony.” [d]

With these gracious words Caesar put the diadem back on the king’s head, and he announced his gift by a decree in which he praised the man generously and at length. Herod softened him further with gifts, and asked him to pardon Alexas, one of Antony’s friends, who had come as a suppliant. But Caesar’s anger won out. He had many serious complaints against the man Herod was asking for, and with these he turned the request down. After this, when Caesar was on his way to Egypt through Syria, Herod received him with all the wealth of his kingdom. He then rode at Caesar’s side for the first time as he reviewed his army near Ptolemais, and he entertained him and all his friends at a banquet, and after them gave out everything the rest of the army needed for a feast. He also took care that they had plenty of water as they marched through the dry country to Pelusium, and likewise on their return, and the army lacked nothing it needed. So both Caesar and his soldiers came to think that Herod’s kingdom was far too small for all he had given them. That is why, when Caesar reached Egypt and Cleopatra and Antony were dead, he not only gave Herod other honors, but added to his kingdom the territory Cleopatra had cut off from it, and besides that Gadara, Hippos and Samaria, and of the coastal cities Gaza, Anthedon, Joppa and Strato’s Tower. He also gave him four hundred Gauls, who had formerly been Cleopatra’s bodyguard, to guard his person. Nothing moved Caesar to these gifts so much as the generous spirit of the man who received them. [f]

After the first Actian games, Caesar added to his kingdom the region called Trachonitis and the neighboring districts of Batanea and Auranitis, for this reason. Zenodorus, who had leased the domain of Lysanias, kept letting loose the robbers of Trachonitis on the people of Damascus. They fled for help to Varro, the governor of Syria, and asked him to report their plight to Caesar. When Caesar learned of it, he sent back orders that the robbers’ nest be destroyed. So Varro made an expedition, cleared the land of these men, and took it away from Zenodorus. Later Caesar gave it to Herod, so that it would never again become a base for robbers against Damascus. In the tenth year after that, when Caesar came again to the province, he also made Herod a procurator of all Syria, so that the other procurators could do nothing in their administration without his advice. And when Zenodorus died, he gave him all the land between Trachonitis and Galilee as well. What mattered more to Herod than all this, Caesar loved him next after Agrippa, and Agrippa next after Caesar. From then on he rose to the height of prosperity; his spirit rose higher still, and he directed the greater part of his magnanimity toward piety.