Geographical Journal (Journal of the Royal Geographical Society): Volume VIII, No. 5 [‎32v] (67/154)

470
A JOURNEY IN THE VALLEY OF THE UPPER EUPHRATES.
have existed on the right bank of the Euphrates previous to Vespasian’s reign, we
have one piece of positive evidence that the latter laid out a road in Armenia
Minor. Seeing also that he re-made Commagene into a province, and strengthened
the defences in Cappadocia and Syria, it is probable that the camps, not only at
Melitene but also at Samosata, may be attributed to him. And if so, it is more
than probable that he would have laid out a road to connect the two posts.
Hence it is fair incidentally to suggest that he may have built the original bridge
at Kiakhta, which we know, from the inscriptions found by Humann and Puch-
stein, to have been restored by Septimius Severus. The fact of the existence of an
older bridge * tells against the attribution of the southern lines to Septimius
Severus, suggested by Hogarth, and, if they are to be attiibuted to an eailier
emperor, there is no one more likely to have laid them out than Vespasian, who
first organized the two districts, which are joined by the bridge, for military
purposes.
In the reign of Domitian, according to two inscriptions,! roads were constructed
in Cappadocia and Armenia Minor, but the district of Armenia Minor is perhaps
only mentioned in order to give the full list of the administrative districts under the
governor who made the roads, and no definite inference can be drawn from the
inscriptions that Domitian planned any of the roads on the frontier. In
Trajan’s reign a milestone was placed on some road at a point 7 miles from Nico-
polis, and may perhaps, as I have tried to show, belong to a road Nicopolis-
Zimara, but the evidence is so slight, as compared with that of the roads laid out
by Trajan in Galatia and Pontus,J that not much stress can be laid on it. It is
possible, however, that this road was made by him as a connection between the
main system in that region and the frontier-road along the Euphrates. Trajan is
also said to have made Melitene a city (Procopius, ‘ De iEd.,’ iii. 5), but this fact does
not carry much weight, as a camp most probably existed at this point, according to
Procopius’s own testimony (loc. cit.), before Trajan’s time, and Legio XII. was
certainly sent here after the Jewish war. Procopius’s statement may very likely
refer only to some honours conferred on Melitene by Trajan, who must have passed
through the place on his march from Samosata to Satala. Whether Legio XV.
Apollinaris was stationed at Satala at the time of Trajan’s campaign is uncertain.
It is supposed by Domaszewski that the legion was not moved from Carnuntum till
Hadrian’s reign, but no definite evidence as to the date of the change of legions at
that camp has as yet come to light. At any rate, by the end of Hadrian’s reign
this legion had been brought back to the East,§ and seems to have remained till
the end of its history at Satala.
Thus it appears that before the middle of the second century the two legions,
the twelfth and the fifteenth, were both stationed on the frontier. An Ala Auriana
is mentioned by Arrian as having taken part in an expedition against the Alaui,
an l mi y be the same as the Ala II. Ulpia Auriana of the Notitia, which will thus
hive bt en stationed on the Euphrates as early as Hadrian’s reign.
With regard to the Legio Prima Pontica, which was stationed at Trapezus,|| * * * §
* It is confirmed by the erased inscription which we saw on it (vide p. 322).
f ‘ C.I.L.,’ vol. iii. pp. 312-318.
X Hogarth, loc. cit., p. 711; Ramsay, ‘Hist. Geogr.,’ p. 258.
§ It is mentioned by Arrian (100 and 103) as taking part in the expedition against
the Alani. (The only inscription which can be approximately dated at Satala is that
of Aurelian, vide p. 460.) Legio XII. also took part in the expedition,
li ‘Notit. Dignit. Orient.,’ cap. 32.