62 THE ROMAN EMPIRE
Egyptian revolt of AD 172–3 (Dio 72.4). The supporters of Bar Kosiba who,
according to letters found in the Judaean desert, called each other ‘brothers’,
may have wished to signify thereby participation in a holy war. Julius Civilis
in AD 69 gathered his Batavan followers to feast in a sacred grove and
signifi ed a religious vow by neglecting to cut his hair (Tac. Hist. 4 61). The
support of the prophetess Veleda for his cause was of such importance that
her services may have been taken over by the Romans themselves in later
years. More sinister were the human sacrifi ces practised by Arminius in the
Teutoburger Wald and the wild posturings of druids at Anglesey (in support
probably of resistance to Rome in Wales, not by Boudicca and the Iceni,
who were too far distant). Druids were active also in Gaul, where their
prophecy that the burning of the Capitol signifi ed the demise of Rome
encouraged Gauls to think of joining the Germans in revolt (Tac.
Hist. 4.54); it is likely that the anti-Roman prophecy of the self- proclaimed
god Mariccus in the same year was made in concert with them (Tac.
Hist. 2.61). The revolt of the Bessi in the Macedonian area in 11 BC was
whipped up by a priest of Dionysus who used divination to encourage unrest
(Dio 54.34.5–7). Such religious approval of rebellion fulfi lled a function
similar to the savagery that frequently accompanied uprisings, such as the
massacre of Roman civilians by Boudicca in Colchester.^16
The methods used by rebel leaders to garner support in revolts that took
place long after conquest were similar to those of the immediate post-
conquest uprisings, but the motives of the leaders themselves were probably
rather different. Vindex in Gaul may have been as interested in using local
support for Roman political ends as in breaking away from Rome, for his
coins are entirely Roman in terminology. In Judaea in AD 66 the immediate
impulse to war was the failure of the ruling class to fulfi l its function in
administering the province, and in particular its inability to control the
frequent riots caused by minor infringements of the religious feelings of the
people at fraught times, such as the pilgrim festivals held three times a year.
This failure was caused by the lack of prestige of that class in the eyes of its
Jewish subjects, and in turn it provoked the governor so far to lose confi dence
in them as to crucify Jewish Roman citizens of equestrian status before his
tribunal (Jos. B.J. 2.308). Faced with the withdrawal of the support of the
Roman authorities, some members of the ruling class seem to have felt that
only leadership of a rebellion would keep them in power. But the precarious
position of the Judaean ruling class may have been unparalleled: the Jewish
aristocracy favoured by the Hasmonaean dynasts was apparently wiped out
after 37 BC by the Idumaean upstart Herod supported by Rome, and those
put by him in positions of prominence, in particular the high priesthood,
were specially chosen to be nonentities who would lack any local following
with which they might threaten his supremacy over a nation that hated him;
the men entrusted with power by Rome after AD 6 were the descendants of
the nonentities promoted by Herod and, although they undoubtedly gained
prestige from their role over time, they had diffi culties imposing their will on