Res Gestae

At that same time the savages who had established their homes on our side of the Rhine, were alarmed by the approach of our armies, and some of them skilfully blocked the roads (which are difficult and naturally of heavy grades) by barricades of felled trees of huge size; others, taking possession of the islands which are scattered in numbers along the course of the Rhine, with wild and mournful cries heaped insults upon the Romans and Caesar. Whereupon he was inflamed with a mighty outburst of anger, and in order to catch some of them, asked Barbatio for seven of the ships which he had got ready for building bridges with the intention of crossing the river; but Barbatio burned them all, in order that he might be unable

Finally Julian, learning from the report of some scouts just captured, that now in the heat of summer the river could be forded, with words of encouragement sent the light-armed auxiliaries with Bainobaudes, tribune of the Cornuti, to perform a memorable feat, if fortune would favour them; and they, now wading through the shallows, now swimming on their shields, which they put under them like canoes,[*](Cf. xiv. 2, 10, cavatis arborum truncis; xxxi. 4, 5, navibus ratibusque et cavatis arborum alveis. ) came to a neighbouring island and landing there they butchered everyone they found, men and women alike, without distinction of age, like so many sheep. Then, finding some empty boats, they rowed on in these, unsteady as they were, and raided a large number of such places; and when they were sated with slaughter, loaded down with a wealth of booty (a part of which they lost through the force of the current) they all came back safe and sound.

And the rest of the Germans, on learning of this, abandoned the islands as an unsafe refuge and carried off into the interior their families, their grain, and their rude treasures.

From here Julian turned aside to repair the fortress called Tres Tabernae,[*](The Three Taverns; modern Savernes, Germ. Rheinzabern.) destroyed not long before by the enemy’s obstinate assault, the rebuilding of which ensured that the Germans could not approach the interior of Gaul, as they had been wont to do. And he both finished this work sooner than was expected and, for the garrison that was to be stationed there, he stored up food for the needs of a whole year, gathered together by the hands of the soldiers, not without fear of danger, from the savages’ crops.