he fortress of Luna (not far from Spezzia), established in 577
in the former territory of the Apuani, protected the frontier against
the Ligurians just as Aquileia did against the Transalpines, and gave
the Romans at the same time an excellent port which henceforth became
the usual station for the passage to Massilia and to Spain. The
construction of the coast or Aurelian road from Rome to Luna, and
of the cross road carried from Luca by way of Florence to Arretium
between the Aurelian and Cassian ways, probably belongs to the
same period.

With the more western Ligurian tribes, who held the Genoese Apennines
and the Maritime Alps, there were incessant conflicts. They were
troublesome neighbours, accustomed to pillage by land and by sea: the
Pisans and Massiliots suffered no little injury from their incursions
and their piracies. But no permanent results were gained amidst these
constant hostilities, or perhaps even aimed at; except apparently
that, with a view to have a communication by land with Transalpine
Gaul and Spain in addition to the regular route by sea, the Romans
endeavoured to clear the great coast road from Luna by way of Massilia
to Emporiae, at least as far as the Alps--beyond the Alps it devolved
on the Massiliots to keep the coast navigation open for Roman vessels
and the road along the shore open for travellers by land. The
interior with its impassable valleys and its rocky fastnesses,
and with its poor but dexterous and crafty inhabitants, served
the Romans mainly as a school of war for the training and hardening
of soldiers and officers.

Corsica
Sardinia

Wars as they are called, of a similar character with those against the
Ligurians, were waged with the Corsicans and to a still greater extent
with the inhabitants of the interior of Sardinia, who retaliated for
the predatory expeditions directed against them by sudden attacks on
the districts along the coast. The expedition of Tiberius Gracchus
against the Sardinians in 577 was specially held in remembrance,
not so much because it gave "peace" to the province, as because
he asserted that he had slain or captured as many as 80,000 of
the islanders, and dragged slaves thence in such multitudes to
Rome that "cheap as a Sardinian" became a proverb.

Carthage

In Africa the policy of Rome was substantially summed up in the one
idea, as short-sighted as it was narrow-minded, that she ought to
prevent the revival of the power of Carthage, an