This They Were Obliged To Besiege In Regular Form; But,
After Lying Before It For Six Days, Gallus Was Forced, For Want Of Water,
To Raise The Siege, And To Terminate The Expedition.
He was told that at
this time he was within two days' journey of the land of aromatics and
frankincense, the great object which Augustus had in view.
On his retreat,
he no longer trusted to Syllaeus, but changed the route of the army,
directing it from the interior to the coast. At Nera, in Petraea, the army
embarked, and was eleven days in crossing the gulf to Myos Hormos: from
this place it traversed the country of the Troglodytes to Coptus, on the
Nile. Two years were spent in this unfortunate expedition. It is extremely
difficult to fix on the limit of this expedition, but it is probable that
the town which Gallus besieged, and beyond which he did not penetrate, was
the capital of the Mineans. From the time of this expedition, the Romans
always maintained a footing on the coast of the Red Sea; and either during
the residence of Gallus at Leuke Kome, or soon afterwards, they placed a
garrison in this place, where they collected the customs, gradually
extending their conquests and their geographical knowledge down the Gulf,
till they reached the ocean. This seems to have been the only beneficial
consequence resulting from the expedition of Gallus.
We must now attend to the expedition of Petronius against the Ethiopians.
This was completely successful, and Candake, their queen, was obliged, as a
token of her submission, to send ambassadors to Augustus, who was at that
time in the island of Samos.
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