The Storm Before the Storm: The Beginning of the End of the Roman Republic

by Mike Duncan

Arriving in Gaul for a campaign in 106, Caepio finally delivered some good news when he captured the city of Tolosa (modern Toulouse, in southwestern France). We might not know anything about Caepio’s activities were it not for a famous scandal that soon passed into legend. Upon taking the city, Caepio’s men stumbled across an incredible find: 50,000 bars of gold and 10,000 bars of silver. The fortune was soon identified as the missing treasure from a famous Gallic invasion of Greece way back in 279 that, much like the more recent incursions by the Scordisci, ended with the plunder of the Oracle of Delphi. But the sacred treasure had apparently carried with it a curse: “whoever touched a piece of gold from that sack died a wretched and agonizing death.” As the Gauls were driven out of Greece they came to suspect that the tainted treasure was a part of their problem. According to legend, the Gauls dumped most of it in the lakes around Tolosa, but some of it wound up in a temple inside the city. This was the stash that Caepio’s men discovered.18