=Conquests of the Orient.=—­The Greek kings, successors of the generals of Alexander, divided the Orient among themselves.  The most powerful of these took up war against Rome; but they were defeated—­Philip, the king of Macedon, in 197, his son Perseus in 168, Antiochus, the king of Syria, in 190.  The Romans, having from this time a free field, conquered one by one all the lands which they found of use to them:  Macedon (148), the kingdom of Pergamum (129), the rest of Asia (from 74 to 64) after the defeat of Mithradates, and Egypt (30).

With the exception of the Macedonians, the Orient opposed the Romans with mercenaries only or with undisciplined barbarians who fled at the first onset.  In the great victory over Antiochus at Magnesia there were only 350 Romans killed.  At Chaeronea, Sulla was victorious with the loss of but twelve men.  The other kings, now terrified, obeyed the Senate without resistance.

Antiochus the Great, king of Syria, having conquered a part of Egypt, was bidden by Popilius acting under the command of the Senate to abandon his conquest.  Antiochus hesitated; but Popilius, taking a rod in his hand, drew a circle about the king, and said, “Before you move from this circle, give answer to the Senate.”  Antiochus submitted, and surrendered Egypt.  The king of Numidia desired of the Senate that it should regard his kingdom as the property of the Roman people.  Prusias, the king of Bithynia, with shaved head and in the garb of a freedman, prostrated himself before the Senate.  Mithradates alone, king of Pontus, endeavored to resist; but after thirty years of war he was driven from his states and compelled to take his life by poison.

=Conquest of the Barbarian Lands.=—­The Romans found more difficult the subjection of the barbarous and warlike peoples of the west.  A century was required to conquer Spain.  The shepherd Viriathus made guerilla warfare on them in the mountains of Portugal (149-139), overwhelmed five armies, and compelled even a consul to treat for peace; the Senate got rid of him by assassination.

Against the single town of Numantia it was necessary to send Scipio, the best general of Rome.

The little and obscure peoples of Corsica, of Sardinia, and of the mountains of Genoa (the Ligurians) were always reviving the war with Rome.

But the most indomitable of all were the Gauls.  Occupying the whole of the valley of the Po, they threw themselves on Italy to the south.  One of their bands had taken Rome in 390.  Their big white bodies, their long red mustaches, their blue eyes, their savage yells terrified the Roman soldiers.  As soon as their approach was learned, consternation seized Rome, and the Senate proclaimed the levy of the whole army (they called this the “Gallic tumult").  These wars were the bloodiest but the shortest; the first (225-222) gave to the Romans all Cisalpine Gaul (northern Italy); the second (120), the Rhone lands (Languedoc, Provence, Dauphine); the third (58-51), all the rest of Gaul.