From Book 48

[48.1] [154 BCE] The censors performed the lustrum ceremony.

[48.2] 324,000 citizens were registered.

[48.3] The causes of the Third Punic War are described.

[48.4] It was said that a very large Numidian army, commanded by Arcobarzanes, son of Syphax, was on Carthaginian soil, and Marcus Porcius Cato argued that although this force was ostensibly directed against Massinissa, it was in fact against the Romans, and that consequently, war had to be declared.

[48.5] Publius Cornelius Nasica defended the opposite, and it was agreed that envoys were to be sent to Carthage, to see what was going on.

[48.6] They rebuked the Carthaginian Senate because it had, contrary to the treaty, collected an army and timber to build ships, and proposed to make peace between Carthage and Massinissa, because Masinissa was evacuating the contested piece of land.

[48.7] But Hamilcar's son Gesco, a riotous man who occupied an office, provoked the populace to wage war against the Romans, so that when the [Carthaginian] Senate announced it would comply with the Roman wishes, the envoys had to flee to escape violence.

[48.8] When they told this, they made the [Roman] Senate, already hostile towards the Carthaginians, even more hostile.

[48.9] Marcus Porcius Cato gave his son, who had died during his praetorship, a cheap funeral according to his means (because he was poor).

[48.10] Andriscus, who pretended persistently that he was the son of Perseus, the former king of Macedonia, was sent to Rome.

[48.11] Before he died, Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, who had been chosen as first among the senators by six pairs of censors, ordered his sons that they should carry his bier to the pyre covered with linens without purple, and they were not to spend more than a million for the remainder: the images^note[Of his ancestors.] and not the expenditure should enhance the funerals of great men.

[48.12] There was an investigation of poisonings.

[48.13] The noble women Publilia and Licinia were accused of murdering their husbands, former consuls; after the hearing, they assigned real estate as bail to the praetor, but were executed by a decision of their relatives.

[48.14] Gulussa, the son of Massinissa, told that a levy was conducted in Carthage, a navy was being built, and that without any doubt, they were preparing for war. 

[48.15] When Cato argued that war should be declared, and Publius Cornelius Nasica said that it was better to do nothing too fast, it was decided to send ten investigators.

[48.16] [151] When consuls Lucius Licinius Lucullus and Aulus Postumius Albinus recruited their army with great strictness and favored no one with an exemption, they were imprisoned by the tribunes of the plebs, because they were unable to obtain exemptions for their friends.

[48.17] The Spanish War had been waged unsuccessfully and resulted in such a great confusion among the Roman citizens that no one wanted to go there as tribune or commander, but Publius Cornelius [Scipio] Aemilianus came forward and said he would accept any kind of military task to which he should be assigned.

[48.18] This example gave everyone an appetite for war.

[48.19] Although Claudius Marcellus appeared to have pacified all Celtiberian nations, his successor consul Lucullus subdued the Vaccaeans and Cantabrians and several other hitherto unknown nations in Hispania.

[48.20] Here, tribune Publius Cornelius Scipio Aemilianus, the son of Lucius [Aemilius] Paullus, and the grandson of [Publius Cornelius Scipio] Africanus (although by adoption), killed a barbarian challenger, and added an even greater danger when the town of Intercatia was stormed,

[48.21] because he was the first to climb the wall.

[48.22] Praetor Servius Sulpicius unsuccessfully fought against the Lusitanians.

[48.23] The envoys returned from Africa with Carthaginian ambassadors and Massinissa's son Gulussa, saying they had seen how an army and navy were built in Carthage, and it was decided to ask for opinions [of all senators]

[48.24] While Cato and other influential senators argued that an army should immediately be sent to Africa, Cornelius Nasica said that it still did not seem to be a justified war, and it was agreed to refrain from war if the Carthaginians would burn their ships and dismiss their army; if they did less, the next pair of consuls should put the Punic War on the agenda.

[48.25] When a theater, contracted for by the censors, was built, Publius Cornelius Nasica was the author of a senatorial decree that this building, which was so useless and dangerous for the public morals, should be destroyed; for some time, the people had to stand to watch theatrical performances.

[48.26] When the Carthaginians declared war upon Massinissa and broke the treaty, they were beaten by this man (who was ninety-two years old and accustomed to eat and enjoy dry bread without a relish) and incurred a war against the Romans.

[48.27] It^note[Book 48.] also contains an account of the situation in Syria and the war waged between its kings

[48.28] [150] In this turmoil, the Syrian king Demetrius [I Soter] was killed.