JUGURTHA, the Numidian usurper, occupies a prominent place in the history of Rome, not only from the greatness of his own exploits, but as having furnished the subject of one of the most masterly pieces of historical writing that antiquity has handed down to modern times. He was born shortly before the middle of the second century B.C. He was the illegitimate child of Mastanabal, the youngest son of Masinissa, king of Numidia. He was brought up by his uncle, Micipsa, and at an early age gave signs of that warlike, intriguing, and ambitious spirit which enabled him for some years to defy the generals and armies of Rome itself. In the hope that he might fall in battle, Micipsa gave him the command of the troops which he was sending into Spain to help the Romans in the Numantine war. Jugurth distinguished himself greatly, and returning home in safety at the end of the war, was adopted by Micipsa, and named joint-heir with his own sons, Adherbal and Hiempsal. Micipsa died soon after, and Jugurth,
aspiring to the undivided sovereignty, caused Hiempsal to be murdered, and Adherbal only escaped the same fate by a timely flight to Rome, where he laid his case before the senate. A commission was appointed to decide upon the claims of the rivals. By means of unscrupulous bribery Jugurtha secured the largest and best portion of his uncle's kingdom. Scarcely had peace been restored, when Jugurtha invaded his cousin's territory, defeated him in the open field, shut him up in Cirta, his capital, and having taken that city by storm, cruelly put him to death. This outrage excited great indignation at Rome, and war was immediately declared against the usurper. Partly by a desperate resistance, partly by skilful bribery, Jugurtha foiled the generals opposed to him, and was by them confirmed in possession of the whole realm of Numidia. The senate refused to sanction this arrangement, and Jugurtha repaired to Rome under the public guarantee to plead his cause in person before the senate. Unstinted bribery was as effective now as ever, and he practically gained his case by prevailing on the senate to suspend judgment altogether. This success encouraged him to fresh outrages. Hearing that his cousin Massina was plotting to supplant him on the Numidian throne, he caused him to be assassinated. The murder was traced to him; but as he had come to Italy under the public guarantee, it was impossible to punish him in Rome. He was immediately ordered out of Italy. On quitting the city, he is said to have looked back upon it, and to have apostrophized it as "venalis, et mature peritura si emptorem inveniet." War was now formally declared, B.C. 111, and the campaign opened disastrously for the Romans. Aulus Posthumius was surprised, surrounded, and, with his whole army, sent under the yoke. Metellus, the new consul, next took the field with fresh troops, and prosecuted the war with great vigour. Bribes were offered to him in vain by his wily adversary, who was speedily reduced to desperate straits. Cains Marius next took the command; but Jugurtha, aided by the Mauritanian Bocchus, still continued to make head against this terrible foe. Town after town fell into the hands of Marius, and a bloody pitched battle at last laid Africa at his feet. Bocchus temporized, and, as the price of his own safety, delivered up his ally to the Romans. Jugurtha was carried to Rome, where, after decking the triumph of Marius, he was thrown into the Mamertine prison, and cruelly put to death, B.C. 106. (Sallust's Jugurtha; Plutarch's Life of Marius; Diodorus Siculus, Fragm., vol. x., p. 141.)