THE SAMNITES
The fifth century is the most beautiful century of Rome. The plebeians
had conquered the consulship and are succeeding in conquering their
admission to other magistracies which the patricians wished to reserve;
they free themselves from the servitude which, under the name of Nexus,
weighed on the debtors. They arrive at political equality and individual
independence; at the same time the old aristocracy still dominates in
the senate and maintains there the inflexibility of its resolves and the
persistence of its designs. It was thanks to this interior condition that
the Roman people was able to survive the strongest tests from without
over which it had triumphed, and to make that progress which cost it most
dear. We see the peoples fight, one by one, and often all together; the
Latin people, the Etruscans, the Goths, the Samnites, the other Sabellic
peoples of the Apennines; and the end is always victory. The beginnings
of this history were sombre. Rome was afflicted by one of those
pestilences which one finds in all the epochs of the history of this
unsanitary city. Thence was the origin of those scenic pieces imported by
the Etruscans and giving origin to comedy--a means devised to appease the
gods; so that Roman comedy had an origin religious and dismal. The fifth
century is for Rome the age of great devotions and of grand sacrifices.[d]
We must now carry our eyes beyond the plain of Latium, and penetrate into
Campania and the valleys of the Apennines.
The Sabines are a people connected with the earliest legends of Rome. But
the Sabines of Cures and the country between the Anio and the Tiber are
those who have hitherto engaged our attention. It is in the highlands
of Reate and Amiternum that we must search for the cradle of the race.
The valleys of this high district afford but scanty subsistence; and
the hardy mountaineers ever and anon cast off swarms of emigrants, who
sought other homes, and made good their claim by arms. It was a custom
of the Sabellian tribes, when famine threatened and population became
dense, to devote the whole produce of one spring-time to the gods. Among
other produce, the youth born in that year were dedicated to the god
Mamers (Mars), and went forth to seek their fortunes abroad. On one such
occasion the emigrants, pressing southward from the Sabine highlands,
occupied the broad mountainous district which lies northward of
Campania, and took the name of Samnites. The Picenians and Frentanians,
on the north coast, with the four allied cantons of the Vestinians,
Marrucinians, Pelignians, and Marsians, who were interposed between the
Samnites and their ancestral Sabines, claimed kin with both nations.
The Samnites themselves also formed four cantons--the Caracenians,
Pentrians, Caudinians, and Hirpinians. Of these the Pentrians were far
the most considerable; they occupied the rugged mountain district between
the upper valleys of the Vulturnus and the Calor. Here a great mass of
mountains, now known by the name of Mount Matese, rises boldly from the
central chain to the height of more than six thousand feet; and its
steep defiles offer defences of great natural strength. But the remains
of massive polygonal masonry, which are still seen on the rocky heights
occupied by their towns of Æsernia and Bovianum (Isernia and Bojano),
showed that the Samnites used art to strengthen their natural defences.
Below Mount Matese, in the valley of the Calor, lay the canton of the
Caudinians, whose town of Beneventum (anciently called Maleventum or
Maliessa) was also made strong by art. It is within these limits, from
Æsernia to Beneventum, that the scenes of the chief campaigns of the
Samnite wars were laid.
[Sidenote: [423-354 B.C.]]
From the nature of their country the Samnites were a pastoral people.
Their mountains break into numberless valleys, sloping both north and
south, well watered, and fresh even in the summer heats. Into these
valleys, as is still the practice of the country, the flocks were driven
from the lower lands, ascending higher as the heats increased, and
descending towards the plain as autumn inclined towards winter.
But the Samnites were not contented with these mountain homes. As they
had themselves been sent forth from a central hive, so in time they cast
forth new swarms of emigrants. In early times a Samnite tribe, under the
name of Frentanians, had taken possession of the coast lands north of
Apulia. Other bands of adventurous settlers pushed down the Vulturnus
and Calor into the rich plain that lay beneath their mountains, to which
they gave the name of Campania, or the champagne land. In earlier times
this fair plain had attracted Etruscan conquerors; and its chief city,
anciently called Vulturnum, is said from them to have received the
lasting name of Capua. But about the year 423 B.C., nearly a century
before the time of which we are presently to speak, a band of Samnites
seized the famous city, and reduced the ancient Oscan inhabitants to the
condition of clients. Soon after, the great Greek city of Cumæ, which
then gave name to the Bay of Naples, was conquered by the new lords of
Capua, who from this time forth, under the name of Campanians, became the
dominant power of the country. In course of time, however, the Samnites
of Capua, or the Campanians, adopted the language and customs of their
Oscan subjects. Hence the Campanian Samnites broke off their connection
with the old Samnites of the mountains, just as the Roman Sabines lost
all sympathy with the old Sabines of Cures, and as in England the
Anglo-Normans became the national enemies of the French.
It may be added that the Lucanians and Apulians, who stretched across
the breadth of Italy below Campania, were formed by a mixture of Samnite
invaders with the ancient population, themselves a compound of Oscan
and Pelasgian races; while the Bruttians, who occupied the mountainous
district south of the Gulf of Tarentum, were a similar offcast from the
Lucanians. But these half-Sabellian tribes, like the old races from whom
the Samnites came, lent uncertain aid to their kinsmen in the struggle
with Rome.
[Sidenote: [354-343 B.C.]]
These remarks will prepare us for the great conflict which in fact
determined the sovereignty of Italy to be the right of the Roman, and
not of the Samnite people.[38] The first war arose out of a quarrel such
as we have just alluded to between the Campanians and the old Samnites
of the Matese. In the year 354 B.C. a league had been concluded with the
Romans and the Samnites. Since that time, Samnite adventurers had been
pressing down the valley of the Liris, and had taken the Volscian cities
of Sora and Fregellæ, while the Romans, combined with the Latins again
since the year 358 B.C., were forcing back the Volscians from the west.
In 343 B.C., the Samnites pursued their encroachments so far as to assail
Teanum, the chief city of the Sidicines, an Oscan tribe, who occupied
the lower hills in the north of Campania. The Sidicines demanded the aid
of Capua against their assailants; and the Campanians, venturing to give
this aid, drew upon their own heads the wrath of the mountaineers. The
Samnites took possession of Mount Tifata, a bare hill which overhangs
Capua on the north, and plundered at will the rich plain below. Unable
to meet the enemy in the field, the degenerate Campanians entreated the
assistance of the Roman and Latin league. There was some difficulty in
listening to this application; for a treaty of peace had been concluded
eleven years before, and no aggression against Rome was chargeable upon
the Samnites. But it is probable that their progress in the valleys of
the Liris and Vulturnus had alarmed the senate; and all scruples were
removed when the Campanians offered to surrender their city absolutely,
so that in defending them Rome would be defending her own subjects.
This quibbling bargain was struck, and war was declared against the
Samnites.[b]
THE FIRST SAMNITE WAR
[Sidenote: [343-342 B.C.]]
The consuls were ordered to take the field. The consul M. Valerius
Corvus led his legions into Campania, where, probably in consequence of
some reverses of which we are not informed, he encamped on the side of
Mount Gaurus over Cumæ. The Samnite army came full of confidence; the
consul led out his troops, and a battle commenced, highly important in
the history of the world, as the prelude of those which were to decide
whether the empire of Italy and of the world was reserved for Rome or for
Samnium.
The two armies were equal in courage, and similarly armed and arrayed;
that of the Samnites consisted entirely of infantry, and the cavalry,
which the consul sent first into action, could make no impression on its
firm ranks. He then ordered the cavalry to fall aside to the wings, and
led on the legions in person. The fight was most obstinate: each seemed
resolved to die rather than yield: at length, a desperate effort of
despair on the part of the Romans drove the Samnites back; they wavered,
broke, and fled to their entrenched camp, which they abandoned in the
night, and fell back to Suessula. They declared to those who asked why
they had fled, that the eyes of the Romans seemed to be on fire and their
gestures those of madmen, so that they could not stand before them.
The other consul, A. Cornelius Cossus, having been directed to invade
Samnium, led his army to Saticula, the nearest Samnite town to Capua.
The Apennines in this part run from north to south, in parallel ranges,
enclosing fertile valleys, and the road to Beneventum passes over them.
The consul, advancing carelessly, had crossed the first range, and his
line of march had reached the valley, when on looking back the Romans saw
the wooded heights behind them occupied by a Samnite army. To advance
was dangerous, retreat seemed impossible. In this perplexity a tribune
named P. Decius proposed to occupy with the hastats and principes of one
legion (that is, sixteen hundred men,) an eminence over the way along
which the Samnites were coming. The consul gave permission; Decius seized
the height, which he maintained against all the efforts of the enemy
till the favourable moment was lost, and the consul had led back his
army and gained the ridge. When night came, the Samnites remained about
the hill and went to sleep; in the second watch Decius led down his men
in silence, and they took their way through the midst of the slumbering
foes. They had got halfway through, when one of the Romans in stepping
over the Samnites struck against a shield; the noise awoke those at hand;
the alarm spread; the Romans then raised a shout, fell on all they met,
and got off without loss. They reached their own camp while it was yet
night, but they halted outside of it till the day was come. At dawn,
when their presence was announced, all poured forth to greet them, and
Decius was led in triumph through the camp to the consul, who began to
extol his deeds; but Decius interrupted him, saying that now was the
time to take the enemy by surprise. The army was then led out, and the
scattered Samnites were fallen on and routed with great slaughter. After
the victory the consul gave Decius a golden crown and a hundred oxen, one
of which was white with gilded horns; this Decius offered in sacrifice
to Father Mars, the rest he gave to his comrades in peril, and each
soldier presented them with a pound of corn and a pint (_sextarius_) of
wine, while the consul, giving them each an ox and two garments, assured
them of a double allowance of corn in future. The army further wove the
obsidional crown of grass and placed it on the brows of Decius, and a
similar crown was bestowed on him by his own men. Such were the generous
arts by which Rome fostered the heroic spirit in her sons!
Meantime the Samnites at Suessula had been largely reinforced, and they
spread their ravages over Campania. The two consular armies being united
under Valerius, came and encamped hard by them, and as Valerius had left
all the baggage and camp-followers behind, the Roman army occupied a much
smaller camp than was usual to their numbers. Deceived by the size of
their camp the Samnites clamoured to storm it, but the caution of their
leaders withheld them. Necessity soon compelled them to scour the country
in quest of provisions, and emboldened by the consul’s inactivity they
went to greater and greater distances. This was what Valerius waited for;
he suddenly assailed and took their camp, which was but slightly guarded;
then leaving two legions to keep it, he divided the rest of the army,
and falling on the scattered Samnites cut them everywhere to pieces.
The shields of the slain and fugitives amounted, we are told, to forty
thousand, the captured standards to one hundred and seventy. Both consuls
triumphed.
While the Roman arms were thus engaged in Campania, the Latins invaded
the territory of the Pelignians, the kinsmen and allies of the Samnites.
No military events are recorded of the year 342, but a strange tale of an
insurrection of the Roman army has been handed down. The tale runs thus:
The Roman soldiers, who at the end of the last campaign, had been left
to winter in Capua, corrupted by the luxury which they there witnessed
and enjoyed, formed the nefarious plan of massacring the inhabitants
and seizing the town. Their projects had not ripened, when C. Marcius
Rutilus, the consul for 342, came to take the command. He first, to keep
them quiet, gave out that the troops were to be quartered in Capua the
following winter also; then noting the ringleaders, he sent them home
under various pretexts and gave furloughs to any that asked for them; his
colleague, Q. Servilius Ahala, meantime taking care to detain all who
came to Rome. The stratagem succeeded for some time; but at length the
soldiers perceived that none of their comrades came back; and a cohort
that was going home on furlough halted at Lautulæ, a narrow pass between
the sea and the mountains east of Tarracina; it was there joined by all
who were going home singly on leave, and the whole number soon equalled
that of an army. They soon after broke up, and marching for Rome encamped
under Alba Longa. Feeling their want of a leader, and learning that T.
Quinctius, a distinguished patrician, who being lame of one leg from a
wound had retired from the city, was living on his farm in the Tusculan
district, they sent a party by night, who seized him in his bed, and
gave him the option of death or becoming their commander. He therefore
came to the camp, where he was saluted as general, and desired to lead
them to Rome. Eight miles from the city they were met by an army led by
the dictator M. Valerius Corvus. Each side shuddered at the thought of
civil war, and readily agreed to a conference. The mutineers consented
to entrust their cause to the dictator, whose name was a sufficient
security. He rode back to the city, and at his desire the senate and
curies decreed that none should be punished for, or even reproached with,
their share in the mutiny, that no soldier’s name should be struck out
of the roll without his own consent, that no one who had been a tribune
should be made a centurion, and that the pay of the knights (as they
had refused to join in the mutiny) should be reduced. And thus this
formidable mutiny commenced in crime and ended in--nothing!
Another and a far more probable account says that the insurrection broke
out in the city, where the plebeians took arms, and having seized C.
Manlius in the night, and forced him to be their leader, went out and
encamped four miles from the city, where, as it would seem, they were
joined by the army from Campania. The consuls raised an army and advanced
against them; but when the two armies met, that of the consuls saluted
the insurgents, and the soldiers embraced one another. The consuls then
advised the senate to comply with the desires of the people, and peace
was effected.
The still existing weight of debt seems to have been the cause of this
secession also, and a cancel of debts to have been a condition of the
peace. Lending on interest at all is said to have been prohibited at this
time by a _plebiscitum_, or decree of the tribes; and others were passed
forbidding any one to hold the same office till after an interval of ten
years, or to hold two offices at the same time. It was also decreed that
both the consuls might be plebeians. The name of the tribune L. Genucius
being mentioned, it is probable that he was the author of the new laws.
[Sidenote: [341-340 B.C.]]
The following year (341) peace was made with the Samnites on the light
condition of their giving a year’s pay and three months’ provisions to
the Roman army; and they were allowed to make war on the Sidicinians.
This moderation on the side of the Romans might cause surprise, were
it not that we know they now apprehended a conflict with their ancient
allies the Latins; for the original terms of their federation could not
remain in force, and one or other must become the dominant state.
The Sidicinians and Campanians, on being thus abandoned, put themselves
under the protection of the Latins, with whom the Volscians also formed
an alliance. The Hernicans adhered to the Romans, and the Samnites also
became their allies. As war between Rome and Latium seemed inevitable, T.
Manlius Torquatus, and P. Decius Mus were made consuls for the ensuing
year with a view to it. But the Latins would first try the path of peace
and accommodation; and at the call, it is said, of the Roman senate,
their two prætors and ten principal senators repaired to Rome. Audience
was given to them on the Capitol, and nothing could be more reasonable
than their demands. Though the Latins were now the more numerous people
of the two, they only required a union of perfect equality,--one of the
consuls and one-half of the senate to be Latins, while Rome should be the
seat of government, and Romans the name of the united nation.[39] But the
senate exclaimed against the unheard-of extravagance of these demands,
the gods were invoked as witnesses of this scandalous breach of faith,
and the consul Manlius vowed that if they consented to be thus dictated
to, he would come girt with his sword into the senate-house and slay
the first Latin he saw there. Tradition said, that when the gods were
appealed to, and the Latin prætor L. Annius spoke with contempt of the
Roman Jupiter, loud claps of thunder and a sudden storm of wind and rain
told the anger of the deity, and that as Annius went off full of rage, he
tumbled down the flight of steps and lay lifeless at the bottom. It was
with difficulty that the magistrates saved the other envoys from the fury
of the people. War was forthwith declared, and the consular armies were
levied.
THE LATIN WAR
[Sidenote: [340 B.C.]]
As the Latin legions were now in Campania (340), the Romans, instead
of taking the direct route through Latium, made a circuit through the
country of the Sabines, Marsians, and Pelignians, and being joined by
the Samnites, and probably the Hernicans, came and encamped before the
Latins near Capua. Here a dream presented itself to the consuls: the form
of a man, of size more than human, appeared to each, and announced that
the general on one side, the army on the other, was due to the Manes
and Mother Earth; of whichever people the general should devote himself
and the adverse legions, theirs would be the victory. The victims when
slain portending the same, the consuls announced, in presence of their
officers, that he of them whose forces first began to yield would devote
himself for Rome.
To restore strict discipline and to prevent any treachery, the consuls
forbade, under pain of death, any single combats with the enemy. One day
the son of the consul Manlius chanced with his troop of horse to come
near to where the Tusculan horse was stationed, whose commander, Geminus
Metius, knowing young Manlius, challenged him to a single combat. Shame
and indignation overpowered the sense of duty in the mind of the Roman;
they ran against each other, and the Tusculan fell; the victor, bearing
the bloody spoils, returned to the camp and came with them to his father.
The consul said nothing, but forthwith called an assembly of the army;
then reproaching his son with his breach of discipline, he ordered the
lictor to lay hold of him and bind him to the stake. The assembly stood
mute with horror; but when the axe fell, and the blood of the gallant
youth gushed forth, bitter lamentation, mingled with curses on the
ruthless sire, arose. They took up the body of the slain, and buried it
without the camp, covered with the spoils he had won; and when after the
war Manlius entered Rome in triumph, the young men would not go forth to
receive him, and throughout life he was to them an object of hatred and
aversion.
[Illustration: MANLIUS CONDEMNING HIS SON TO DEATH]
The war between Rome and Latium was little less than civil; the soldiers
and officers had for years served together in the same companies and
they were all acquainted. They now stood in battle-array opposite each
other at the foot of Mount Vesuvius, the Samnites and Hernicans being
opposed to the Oscan allies of the Latins. Both the consuls sacrificed
before the battle; the entrails of the victim offered by Decius portended
misfortune, but hearing that the signs boded well to Manlius, “’Tis
well,” said he, “if my colleague has good signs.” In the battle, the
left wing, led by Decius, was giving way; the consul saw that his hour
was come; he called aloud for M. Valerius, the pontifex maximus, and
standing on a naked weapon, clad in his consular robe, his head veiled,
and his hand on his chin, he repeated after the pontiff the form of
devotion. He then sent the lictors to announce to Manlius what he had
done, and girding his robe tightly round him, and mounting his horse,
he rushed into the midst of the enemies. He seemed a destructive spirit
sent from heaven; wherever he came he carried dismay and death; at length
he fell covered with wounds. The ardour of the Roman soldiers revived,
and the skill of Manlius secured the victory. When the front ranks
(_antesignani_) of both armies were wearied, he ordered the accensi to
advance; the Latins then sent forward their triarians; and when these
were wearied, the consul ordered the Roman triarians to rise and advance.
The Latins having no fresh troops to oppose to them were speedily
defeated, and so great was the slaughter that but one-fourth of their
army escaped. Next day the body of the consul Decius was found amidst
heaps of slain, and magnificently interred.
[Sidenote: [340-338 B.C.]]
The Latins fled to the town of Vescia, and by the advice of their prætor
Numisius a general levy was made in Latium, with which, in reliance on
the reduced state of the Roman army, he ventured to give the consul
battle at a place named Trifanum, between Sinuessa and Minturnæ, on
the other side of the Liris. The rout of the Latins, however, was so
complete, that few of the towns even thought of resistance when the
consul entered Latium. The Latin public land, two-thirds of that of
Privernum, and the Falernian district of Campania, were seized for the
Roman people, and assignments of 2¾ jugera on this side, 3¼ on the other
side of the Liris, were made to the poor plebeians, who murmured greatly
at the large quantity that was reserved as domain. As the Campanian
knights (sixteen hundred in number) had remained faithful to Rome, they
were given the Roman _municipium_, and each assigned a rent charge of 350
denarii a year on the state of Capua.
The Latin and Volscian towns continued singly to resist, and the conquest
was not completed till the year 338. Prudence and some moderation were
requisite on the part of Rome, in order not to have rebellious subjects
in the Latins. Citizenship therefore, in different degrees, was conferred
on them; but they were forbidden to hold national diets, and commerce
and intermarriage between the people of their different towns were
prohibited. The principal families of Velitræ were forced to go and live
beyond the Tiber, and their lands were given to Roman colonists. Their
ships of war were taken from the Antiates, who were forbidden to possess
any in future. Some of them were brought to Rome; the beaks (_rostra_)
of others were cut off, and the pulpit (_suggestum_) in the Forum was
adorned with them, whence it was named the “rostra.” The _municipium_,
such as the Latins had formerly had, was given to the people of Capua,
Cumæ, Suessula, Fundi, and Formiæ. The Latin contingents in war were
henceforth to serve under their own officers apart from the legions.
While the Roman dominion was thus extended without, wise and patriotic
men of both orders saw the necessity of internal concord, and of
abolishing antiquated and now mischievous claims and pretensions. In 339,
therefore, the patrician consul Tib. Æmilius named his plebeian colleague
Q. Publilius Philo dictator, who then brought forward the following laws
to complete the constitution. (1) The patricians should give a previous
consent to any law that was to be brought before the centuries; for as
such a law must previously have passed the senate, and the centuries
could make no alteration in it, their opposition, it would seem, could
hardly have any ground but prejudice and spite. (2) The _Plebiscita_
should be binding on all Quirites. (3) One of the censors should of
necessity be a plebeian. The curies were induced, we know not how, to
give their assent to these laws.[40] Internal discord was now at an end,
and the golden age of Roman heroism and virtue began.
THE SECOND SAMNITE WAR
[Sidenote: [338-325 B.C.]]
The affairs for the ten succeeding years are of comparative unimportance.
The Romans and Samnites both knew that another war was inevitable, and
they made the necessary preparations for it. In the year 327 the people
of the Greek town of Palæopolis (_Old Town_) being in alliance with the
Samnites, began to exercise hostilities against the Roman colonists in
Campania. As they refused to give satisfaction, the consul Q. Publilius
Philo was sent against them, while his colleague, L. Cornelius Lentulus,
watched the motions of the Samnites. Publilius encamped between
Palæopolis and its kindred town of Neapolis (_New Town_), and on his
sending word home that there was a large body of Samnite and Nolan
troops in them, envoys were sent to Samnium to complain of this breach
of treaty. The Samnites replied that those were volunteers, over whom
the state had no control; that moreover they had not, as the Romans had
alleged, excited the people of Fundi and Formiæ to revolt, while the
Romans had sent a colony to Fregellæ, in a district which of right was
theirs; that, in fine, there was no use in arguing or complaining when
the plain between Capua and Suessula offered a space on which they might
decide whose should be the empire of Italy. The Roman fetial then veiled
his head, and with hands raised to heaven prayed the gods to prosper the
arms and counsels of Rome if right was on her side; if not, to blast and
confound them. Right certainly was not on the side of Rome, for she had
first violated the treaty; but war was not to be averted, and it was now
to begin.
A Roman army entered Samnium on the Volscian side, ravaged the country,
and took some towns. Publilius’ year having expired, his command was
continued to him (326) under the new title of proconsul; and soon a party
in Neapolis, weary of the insolence of the foreign soldiers, began to
plot a surrender. While Nymphius, one of the leading men, induced the
Samnites to go out of the town, to embark in the ships in the port, and
make a descent on the coast of Latium, Charilaus, another of the party,
closed the gate after them, and admitted the Romans at another. The
Samnites instantly dispersed and fled home; the Nolans retired from the
town unmolested.
A chief ally of the Samnites were the people of the Greek city of
Tarentum; on the other hand, their kinsmen, the Apulians and Lucanians,
were in alliance with Rome. But in this year, a revolution took place in
Lucania, in consequence of which the country became subject to Samnium. A
similar fate menaced the Apulians, if not aided; but to reach Apulia it
was necessary to pass through the Vestinian country, the people of which
(one of the Marsian confederacy) refused a passage. It was apprehended
at Rome, that if the Vestinians were attacked, the other three states,
who were now neutral, would take arms, and throw their weight into the
Samnite scale, and their valour was well known; but, on the other hand,
the importance of Apulia, in a military point of view, was too great to
allow it to be lost. The consul D. Junius Brutus accordingly led his army
(325) into the Vestinian country: a hard-fought victory, and the capture
of two of their towns, reduced the Vestinians to submission, and the
other members of the league remained at peace.
The other consul, L. Camillus, fell sick as he was about to invade
Samnium and L. Papirius Cursor was made dictator;[41] but as there was
said to have been some error in the auspices, he was obliged to return
to Rome to renew them. As he was departing, he strictly charged Q. Fabius
Rullianus, the master of the horse, whom he left in command, not to
risk an action on any account during his absence. But, heedless of his
orders, Fabius seized the first occasion of engaging the enemy, over whom
he gained a complete victory. As soon as the dictator learned what had
occurred, he hastened to the camp, breathing fury. Fabius, warned of his
approach, besought the soldiers to protect him. Papirius came, ascended
his tribunal, summoned the master of the horse before him, and demanded
why he had disobeyed orders, and thus weakened the military discipline.
His defence but irritated his judge the more; the lictors approached and
began to strip him for death; he broke from them, and sought refuge among
the triarians: confusion arose; those nearest the tribunal prayed, the
more remote menaced, the dictator: the legates came round him, entreating
him to defer his judgment till the next day; but he would not hear them.
Night at length ended the contest.
[Sidenote: [325-322 B.C.]]
During the night Fabius fled to Rome, and by his father’s advice made
his complaint of the dictator to the assembled senate; but while he was
speaking, Papirius, who had followed him from the camp with the utmost
rapidity, entered, and ordered his lictors to seize him. The senate
implored; but he was inexorable: the elder Fabius then appealed to the
people, before whom he enlarged on the cruelty of the dictator. Every
heart beat in unison with that of the time-honoured father; but when
Papirius showed the rigorous necessity of upholding military discipline,
by which the state was maintained, all were silent, from conviction. At
length the people and their tribunes united with Fabius and the senate
in supplication, and the dictator, deeming his authority sufficiently
vindicated, granted life to his master of the horse.
Papirius, when he returned to his army, gave the Samnites a decisive
defeat; and having divided the spoil among his soldiers to regain their
favour, and granted a truce for a year to the enemy, on condition of
their giving each soldier a garment and a year’s pay, he returned to Rome
and triumphed.
The events of the next year (323) are dubious; but in 322 the camp of the
dictator, A. Cornelius Arvina, who had entered Samnium without sufficient
caution, was surprised by a superior force of the enemy. The day closed
before an attack could be made, and in the night the dictator, leaving
a number of fires burning in the camp, led away his legions in silence.
But the enemy were on the alert, and their cavalry hung on the retiring
army, to slacken its pace. With daybreak the Samnite infantry came up,
and the dictator, finding further retreat impossible, drew his forces up
in order of battle. A desperate conflict commenced; during five hours
neither side gave way an inch; the Samnite horse, seeing the baggage of
the Romans but slightly guarded, made for it, and began to plunder: while
thus engaged, they were fallen on and cut to pieces by the Roman horse,
who then turned and assailed the now unprotected rear of the Samnite
infantry. The dictator urged his legions to new exertions; the Samnites
wavered, broke, and fled; their general and thousands fell, and thousands
were made captives.
[Sidenote: [322-321 B.C.]]
Meantime, on the side of Apulia an equally glorious victory was gained
by the consul Q. Fabius; and the spirit of the Samnites being now quite
broken, they were anxious for peace on almost any terms. As it is usual
with a people, when measures to which they have given their full and
eager consent have failed, to throw the entire blame on their leaders,
so now the Samnites cast all their misfortunes on Papius Brutulus, one
of their principal men, and resolved to deliver him up to the Romans as
the cause of the war. The noble Samnite saved himself from disgrace by
a voluntary death; his lifeless corpse was carried to Rome; the Roman
prisoners, of whom there was a large number, were released, and gold
was sent to ransom the Samnites. The utmost readiness to yield to all
reasonable terms was evinced; but nothing would content the haughty
senate but the supremacy, and sooner than thus resign their national
independence the Samnites resolved to dare and endure the uttermost.
In the spring (321) the Roman legions, led by the consuls T. Veturius
and Sp. Postumius, encamped at Calatia in Campania, with the intention
of directing their entire force against central Samnium. But the
Samnite general, C. Pontius, having spread a false report that Luceria,
in Apulia, was hard pressed by a Samnite army, and on the point of
surrender, the consuls resolved to attempt its relief without delay. They
entered the Samnite country, and advanced heedlessly and incautiously. In
the vicinity of the town of Caudium they reached the Caudine Forks, as a
pass was named consisting of a deep valley between two wooded mountains;
a hollow way led into it at one end, and a narrow path over a mountain,
which closed it up, led out of it at the other end. Into these toils
the consuls conducted their army; they saw nothing to alarm them till
the head of the column came to the further end, and found the passage
stopped with rocks and trunks of trees, and on looking round they beheld
the hills occupied by soldiery. To advance or to retreat was now equally
impossible; they therefore threw up entrenchments in the valley, and
remained there, the Samnites not attacking them, in reliance on the aid
of famine. At length, when their food was spent and hunger began to be
felt, they sent deputies to learn the will of the Samnite leaders. It is
said that Pontius, on this occasion, sent for his father to advise him:
this venerable old man, who, in high repute for wisdom, dwelt at Caudium,
was conveyed to the camp in a wain, and his advice was either to let the
Romans go free and uninjured, or totally to destroy the army. Pontius
preferred a middle course, and the old man retired, shedding tears at
the misery he saw thence to come on his country. The terms accorded by
Pontius were the restoration of the ancient alliance between Rome and
Samnium, the withdrawal of Roman colonies from places belonging to the
Samnites, and the giving back of all places to which they had a right.
The arms and baggage of the vanquished army, were, as a matter of course,
to be given up to the conquerors. How rarely has Rome ever granted a
vanquished enemy terms so mild as these! Yet the Roman historians had
the audacity to talk of the insolence of the victorious Samnites, and
the Roman senate and people the baseness and barbarity to put to an
ignominous death the noble Pontius twenty-seven years after!
These terms were sworn to by the consuls and their principal officers,
and six hundred knights were given as hostages till they should have been
ratified by the senate and people. A passage wide enough for one person
to pass was made in the paling with which the Samnites had enclosed
them, and one of the pales laid across it, and through this door the
consuls, followed by their officers and men, each in a single garment,
came forth. Pontius gave beasts of burden to convey the sick and wounded,
and provisions enough to take the army to Rome. They then departed and
reached Capua before nightfall; but shame, or doubt of the reception they
might meet with, kept them from entering. Next morning, however, all the
people came out to meet and console them. Refreshments and aid of every
kind were given them, and they thence pursued their way to Rome.
When the news of their calamity had first reached Rome, a total cessation
of business (_justitium_) had taken place, and a general levy, either to
attempt their relief or to defend the city, had been made, and all orders
of people went into mourning. In this state of things the disgraced army
reached the gates. It there dispersed; those who lived in the country
went away; those who dwelt in the city slank with night to their houses.
The consuls, having named a dictator for the consular elections, laid
down their office; and Q. Publilius Philo and L. Papirius Cursor were
appointed to be their successors.[c]
[Illustration: TRIUMPH OF PAPIRIUS]
“If other nations delight in remembering the days of national triumphs,”
says Wilhelm Ihne, “and in celebrating the memory of victories by which
they feel their strength was increased and their pride gratified, the
greatness of the Roman people is shown much more by their keeping
continually before their eyes the evil days when the god of battles was
unfavourable to them, and by celebrating the anniversaries of their
defeats, in a certain degree, as days of national humiliation. The day of
the Allia and the day of Cannæ stood before the eye of the Roman in more
burning colours than the day of the victory of Zama. But by the side of
those names there was yet a third in the list of evil days--a name which
was more painful than any other to the proud Roman, because the feeling
of national disgrace and humiliation could not be separated from it; it
was the name of the Caudine Pass. At the Allia and at Cannæ thousands
fell in open battle; at Caudium four legions agreed to purchase life and
freedom by the sacrifice of military honour, and the Roman people, when
they refused to ratify the agreement, covered themselves with a load
of infamy, from which no sophistry could free them, even in their own
conscience.”[f]
[Sidenote: [321-315 B.C.]]
The senate having met to consider of the peace, the consul Publilius
called on Sp. Postumius to give his opinion. He rose with downcast looks,
and advised that himself and all who had sworn to the treaty should be
delivered up to the Samnites, as having deceived them, by making a treaty
without the consent of the Roman people, and a fresh army be levied, and
the war renewed; and though there was hardly a senator who had not a son
or some other relative among the hostages, it was resolved to do as he
advised. Postumius and his companions were taken bound to Caudium; the
fetial led them before the tribunal of Pontius, and made the surrender
of them in the solemn form. Postumius, as he concluded, struck his knee
against the fetial’s thigh, and drove him off, crying, “I am now a
Samnite, thou an ambassador: I thus violate the law of nations; ye may
justly now resume the war.”
Pontius replied with dignity: he treated this act of religious hypocrisy
as a childish manœuvre; he told the Romans that if they wished to
renounce the treaty with any show of justice, they should place their
legions as they were when it was made; but their present conduct he said
was base and unworthy, and he would not accept such a surrender as this,
or let them thus hope to avert the anger of the gods. He then ordered
Postumius and the other Romans to be unbound and dismissed.
The war therefore was renewed, and the Romans returning to their
original plan of carrying it on simultaneously in Apulia and on the
western frontier of Samnium, sent (319) the consul Papirius to lay
siege to Luceria, which was now in the hands of the Samnites, while his
colleague Publilius led his army into Samnium. Papirius sat down before
Luceria; but a Samnite army came and encamped at hand, and rendered his
communication with Arpi, whence he drew his supplies, so difficult, that
it was only by the knights’ going and fetching corn in little bags on
their horses that any food could be had in the camp. They were at length
relieved by the arrival of Publilius, who having defeated a Samnite army
marched to their aid; and after a fruitless attempt of the Tarentines to
mediate a peace, the Romans attacked and stormed the Samnite camp with
great slaughter, which, though they were unable to retain it, had the
effect of making the Samnite army retire, and leave Luceria to its fate.
Its garrison of seven thousand men then capitulated, on condition of a
free passage, without arms or baggage.
The two following years were years of truce, in consequence of exhaustion
on both sides; and during the truce the Romans so extended and
consolidated their dominion in Apulia that no attempt was ever after made
to shake it off. The war was resumed in 316, and the Romans laid siege
to Saticula, an Oscan town not far from Capua and in alliance with the
Samnites. Meantime the Samnites reduced the colonial town of Plistia;
and the Volscians of Sora, having slain their Roman garrison, revolted
to them. They then made an attack on the Roman army before Saticula, but
were defeated with great loss, and the town immediately surrendered. The
Roman armies forthwith entered and ravaged Samnium, and the seat of war
was transferred to Apulia. While the consular armies were thus distant,
the Samnites made a general levy, and came and took a position at
Lautulæ, in order to cut off the communication between Rome and Campania.
The dictator, Q. Fabius, instantly levied an army, and hastened to give
them battle. The Romans were utterly defeated, and fled from the field;
the master of the horse, Q. Aulius, unable to outlive the disgrace of
flight, maintained his ground, and fell fighting bravely. Revolt spread
far and wide among the Roman subjects in the vicinity; the danger was
great and imminent, but the fortune of Rome prevailed, and the menacing
storm dispersed.
[Sidenote: [314-311 B.C.]]
In 314 the Samnites sustained a great defeat near a town named Cinna,
whose site is unknown. The Campanians, who were in the act of revolting
at this time, submitted on the appearance of the dictator, C. Mænius, and
the most guilty withdrew themselves from punishment by a voluntary death.
The Ausonian towns, Ausona, Minturnæ, and Vescia, were taken by treachery
and stratagem, and their population massacred or enslaved, as a fearful
lesson to the subjects of Rome against wavering in their allegiance.
The united armies of the consuls, M. Pœtelius and C. Sulpicius, entered
Samnium on the side of Caudium; but while they were advancing timidly and
cautiously through that formidable region, they learned that the Samnite
army was wasting the plain of Campania. They immediately led back their
forces, and ere long the two armies encountered. The tactics of the
Romans were new on this occasion; the left wing, under Pœtelius, was made
dense and deep, while the right was expanded more than usual. Pœtelius,
adding the reserve to his wing, made a steady charge with the whole mass:
the Samnites gave way; their horse hastened to their aid, but Sulpicius
coming up with his body of horse, and charging them with the whole Roman
cavalry, put them to the rout. He then hastened to his own wing, which
now was yielding; the timely reinforcement turned the scale, and the
Samnites were routed on all sides with great slaughter.
The following year (313) was marked by the capture of Nola and some other
towns, and by the founding of colonies, to secure the dominion which had
been acquired. In 312 Sora was taken in the following manner: A deserter
came to the consuls, and offered to lead some Roman soldiers by a secret
path up to the Arx, or citadel, which was a precipitous eminence over the
town. His offer was accepted; the legions were withdrawn to a distance
of six miles from the town; some cohorts were concealed in a wood at
hand, and ten men accompanied the Soran traitor. They clambered in the
night up through the stones and bushes, and at length reached the area of
the citadel. Their guide, showing them the narrow, steep path that led
thence to the town, desired them to guard it while he went down and gave
the alarm. He then ran through the town crying that the enemy was on the
citadel; and when the truth of his report was ascertained, the people
prepared to fly from the town; but in the confusion, the Roman cohorts
broke in and commenced a massacre. At daybreak the consuls came; they
granted their lives to the surviving inhabitants, with the exception of
225, who, as the authors of the revolt, were brought bound to Rome, and
scourged and beheaded in the Forum.
[Sidenote: [311-310 B.C.]]
The tide of war had turned so decidedly against the Samnites, that one
or two campaigns more of the whole force of Rome would have sufficed for
their subjugation. But just now a new enemy was about to appear, who
was likely to give ample employment to the Roman arms for some time.
The Etruscans, who, probably owing to their contests with and fears
of the Gauls, had for many years abstained from war with the Romans,
either moved by the instances of the Samnites or aware of the danger
of suffering Rome to grow too powerful, began to make such hostile
manifestations that great alarm prevailed at Rome. Various circumstances,
however, kept off the war for nearly two years longer; at length in 311
all the peoples of Etruria, except the Arretines, having sent their
troops, a Tuscan army prepared to lay siege to the frontier town of
Sutrium. The consul Q. Æmilius came to cover it, and the two armies met
before it. At daybreak of the second day, the Tuscans drew out in order
of battle; the consul, having made his men take their breakfast, led
them out also. The armies stood opposite each other, each hesitating
to begin, till after noon; the Tuscans then fell on: night terminated a
bloody and indecisive action, each retired to their camp, and neither
felt themselves strong enough to renew the conflict next day.
The next year (310) a Tuscan army having laid siege to Sutrium, the
consul Q. Fabius hastened from Rome to its relief. As his troops were far
inferior to the Etruscans in number, he led them cautiously along the
hills. The enemy drew out his forces in the plain to give him battle;
but the consul, fearing to descend, formed his array on the hillside in
a part covered with loose stones. Relying on their numbers the Tuscans
charged up hill; the Romans hurled stones and missile weapons on them,
and then charging, with the advantage of the ground, drove them back, and
the horse getting between them and their camp forced them to take refuge
in the adjacent Ciminian wood. Their camp became the prize of the victors.
Like so many others in the early Roman history, this battle has probably
been given a magnitude and an importance which does not belong to it, and
the truth would seem to be, that the consul only repulsed the advanced
guard of the enemy, and not feeling himself strong enough to engage their
main army, resolved to create a diversion by invading their country.
To the north of Sutrium, between it and the modern city of Viterbo,
extends a range of high ground, which at that time formed the boundary
between Roman and independent Etruria. It was covered with natural wood,
and was thence named the Ciminian wood. Over this barrier Fabius resolved
to lead his troops. He sent to inform the senate of his plan, in order
that measures might be taken for the defence of the country during his
absence. Meantime he directed one of his brothers, who spoke the Tuscan
language, to penetrate in disguise to the Umbrians, and to form alliances
with any of them that were hostile to the Etruscans. The only people
however whom the envoy found so disposed were the Camertes, who agreed to
join the Romans if they penetrated to their country.
The senate, daunted at the boldness of Fabius’ plan, sent five deputies
accompanied by two tribunes of the people to forbid him to enter the
wood, perhaps to arrest him if he should hesitate to obey. But they
came too late: in the first watch of the night Fabius sent forward his
baggage, the infantry followed; he himself a little before sunrise led
the horse up to the enemy’s camp, as it were to reconnoitre. In the
evening he returned to his own camp, and then set out and came up with
his infantry before night. At daybreak they reached the summit of the
mountain, and beheld the cultured vales and plains of Etruria stretched
out before them. They hastened to seize the offered prey: the Etruscan
nobles assembled their vassals to oppose them, but they could offer
no effectual resistance to the disciplined troops of Rome. The Roman
army spread their ravages as far as Perusia, where they encountered and
totally defeated a combined army of Etruscans and Umbrians; and Perusia,
Cortona, and Arretium, three of the leading cities of Etruria, sent
forthwith to sue for peace, which was granted for a term of thirty years.
As the Romans were returning to the relief of Sutrium they encountered
at the lake of Vadimo another Etruscan army, of select troops bound by a
solemn oath (_lege sacrata_) to fight to their uttermost. The two armies
engaged hand to hand at once; the first ranks fought till they were
exhausted; the reserve then advanced, and the victory was only decided by
the Roman knights dismounting and taking their place in the front of the
line.
While Fabius was conducting the war in Etruria, his colleague C. Marcius
had entered Samnium and taken Allifæ and some other strongholds. The
Samnites collected their forces and gave him battle, and the Romans were
defeated; several of their officers slain, the consul himself wounded,
and their communication with Rome cut off. When the news reached Rome,
the senate at once resolved to create a dictator, and to send him off to
the relief of Marcius with the reserve which had been levied on account
of the Etruscan War. Their hopes lay in L. Papirius Cursor; but the
dictator could only be named by the consul; there was no way of reaching
Marcius, and Fabius had not yet forgiven the man who had thirsted after
his blood. The resolve of the senate was borne to Fabius by consulars;
they urged him to sacrifice his private feelings to the good of his
country: he heard them in silence, his eyes fixed on the ground, and
they retired in uncertainty. In the stillness of the night he arose,
and, as was the usage, named L. Papirius dictator, and in the morning
he again listened in silence to the thanks and praises of the deputies.
The dictator immediately set forth and relieved the army of Marcius,
but, impetuous as he was, he contented himself for some time with merely
observing the enemy.
[Sidenote: [310-304 B.C.]]
At length the time arrived for a decisive action. The Samnite army was
divided into two corps, the one clad in purple, the other in white linen
tunics, the former having their brazen shields adorned with gold, the
latter with silver: the shields were broad above, narrow below. Each
soldier wore a crested helmet, a large sponge to protect his breast,
and a greave on his left leg. In the battle the Roman dictator led the
right wing against the gold-shielded, the master of the horse, C. Junius,
the left against the silver-shielded Samnites. Junius made the first
impression on the enemy; the dictator urged his men to emulation, and
the Roman horse by a charge on both flanks completed the victory. The
Samnites fled to their camp, but were unable to retain it, and ere night
it was sacked and burned. The golden shields adorned the dictator’s
triumph, and they were then given to the money dealers to ornament their
shops in the Forum.
Q. Fabius was continued in the consulate for 309 and P. Decius given to
him as his colleague; the former had the Samnite, the latter the Etruscan
War. Fabius routed the Marsians and Pelignians, who had now joined
against Rome, and he then led his legions into Umbria, whose people had
taken arms, and with little difficulty reduced them to submission. Decius
meantime had forced the Etruscans to sue for peace, and a year’s truce
was granted them on their giving each soldier two tunics, and a year’s
pay for the army.
In the remaining years of the war, the exhausted powers of the Samnites
could offer but a feeble resistance to the legions of Rome. On the
occasion of a defeat which they sustained in 308, the proconsul, Q.
Fabius, adopted the novel course of dismissing the Samnite prisoners,
and selling for slaves those of their allies. Among these there were
several Hernicans, whom he sent to Rome; the senate having instituted an
inquiry into the conduct of the Hernican people in this affair, those
who had urged them to give aid to the Samnites now engaged them to take
arms openly. All the Hernican peoples but three shared in the war; but
they made a stand little worthy of their old renown; one short campaign
sufficed for their reduction, and they were placed (307) on nearly the
same footing as the Latins had been thirty years before.
The Samnites at length (304) sued for peace, and obtained it on the
condition they had so often spurned, that of acknowledging Rome’s
supremacy, in other words, of yielding up their independence; but peace
on any terms was now necessary, that they might recruit their strength
for future efforts. The Romans then turned their arms against the Æquians
who had joined the Hernicans in aiding the Samnites, and in fifty days
the consuls reduced and destroyed forty-one of their Cyclopean-walled
towns. The Marsian league sought and obtained peace from Rome.
THE THIRD SAMNITE AND ETRUSCAN WARS
[Sidenote: [304-297 B.C.]]
A few years passed away in tolerable tranquillity; in 298 Lucanian envoys
appeared at Rome, praying for aid against the Samnites who had entered
their country in arms, given them various defeats, and taken several of
their towns. The Romans, in right of their supremacy, sent orders to the
Samnites to withdraw their troops from Lucania: the pride of the Samnites
was roused at being thus reminded of their subjection; they ordered the
fetials off their territory, and war was once more declared against
them by the Romans. As the Etruscans were now also in arms, the consul
L. Cornelius Scipio went against them, while his colleague Cn. Fulvius
invaded Samnium.
Scipio engaged a numerous Etruscan army near Volaterræ. Night ended a
hard-fought battle, leaving it undecided. The morn however revealed that
the advantage was on the side of the Romans, as the enemy had abandoned
their camp during the night. Having placed his baggage and stores at
Falerii, Scipio spread his ravages over the country, burning the villages
and hamlets; and no army appeared to oppose him. Fulvius meantime carried
on the war with credit in Samnium. Near Bovianum he defeated a Samnite
army, and took that town and another named Aufidena.
[Illustration: ETRUSCAN WARRIOR
(From a statuette)]
[Sidenote: [297-295 B.C.]]
The rumour of the great preparations which the Samnites and the Etruscans
were said to be making caused the people to elect Q. Fabius to the
consulate, against his will; and at his own request they joined with him
P. Decius. As the Etruscans remained quiet, both the consuls invaded
Samnium (297), Fabius entering from Sora, Decius from Sidicinum. The
Samnites gave Fabius battle near Tifernum, their infantry stood firm
against that of the Romans, and the charge of the Roman cavalry had as
little effect. At length, when the reserve had come to the front, and the
contest was most obstinate, the legate Scipio, whom the consul had sent
away during the action with the hastats of the first legion, appeared
on the neighbouring hills. Both armies took them for the legions of
Decius; the Samnites’ courage fell, that of the Romans rose, and evening
closed on their victory. Decius had meantime defeated the Apulians at
Maleventum. During five months both armies ravaged Samnium with impunity;
the traces of five-and-forty camps of Decius, of eighty-six of Fabius,
bore witness to the sufferings of the ill-fated country.
The next year (296) the Samnites put into execution a daring plan which
they had formed in the preceding war, namely, sending an army, to be
paid and supported out of their own funds, into Etruria, leaving Samnium
meantime at the mercy of the enemy. The Samnite army, under Gellius
Egnatius, on arriving there, was joined by the troops of most of the
Tuscan states; the Umbrians also shared in the war, and it was proposed
to take Gallic mercenaries into pay. The consul App. Claudius entered
Etruria with his two legions and twelve thousand of the allies, but he
did not feel himself strong enough to give the confederates battle. His
colleague L. Volumnius, probably by command of the senate, led his army
to join him; but Appius gave him so ungracious a reception that he was
preparing to retire, when the officers of the other army implored him
not to abandon them for their general’s fault. Volumnius then agreed to
remain and fight: a victory was speedily gained over the Etruscans and
Samnites, whose general Egnatius was unfortunately absent; 7300 were
slain, 2120 taken, and their camp was stormed and plundered.
As Volumnius was returning by rapid marches to Samnium, he learned
that the Samnites had taken advantage of his absence to make a descent
on Campania, where they had collected an immense booty. He forthwith
directed his course thither: at Cales he heard that they were encamped
on the Vulturnus, with the intention of carrying their prey into Samnium
to secure it. He came and encamped near them, but out of view; and when
the Samnites had before day sent forward their captives and booty under
an escort, and were getting out of their camp to follow them, they
were suddenly fallen on by the Romans: the camp was stormed with great
slaughter; the captives, hearing the tumult, unbound themselves, and fell
on their escort; the Samnites were routed on all sides--six thousand were
slain, twenty-five hundred were taken, seventy-four hundred captives,
with all their property, were recovered.
The union of the Samnites, Etruscans, Umbrians, and Gauls, which had now
been formed, caused the greatest apprehension at Rome, and the people
insisted on again electing Q. Fabius consul, to which he would only
consent on condition of his approved mate in arms P. Decius being given
him for colleague. His wish was complied with. The four legions of the
former year were kept on foot and completed, two new ones were raised,
and two armies of reserve formed. The number of troops furnished by the
allies was considerable: among them were one thousand Campanian horse;
for as the Gauls were strong in this arm, it was necessary to augment its
force.
[Sidenote: [295-293 B.C.]]
During the winter, Fabius set out, with four thousand foot and six
hundred horse, to take the command in Etruria. As he drew nigh to the
camp of App. Claudius he met a party sent out for firewood; he ordered
them to go back and use the palisades of their camp for the purpose. This
gave confidence to the soldiers; and to keep up their spirits, he never
let them remain stationary, but moved about from place to place. In the
spring (295) he returned to Rome to arrange the campaign, leaving the
command in Etruria with L. Scipio.
The consuls led their main force to join the troops left with Scipio;
one army of reserve, under the proprætor Cn. Fulvius, was stationed in
the Faliscan; another, under the proprætor L. Postumius, in the Vatican
district. But the Gauls, pouring in by the pass of Camerinum, had
annihilated a Roman legion left to defend it; their numerous cavalry
spread over Umbria and got between Scipio and Rome; and as they rode up
to the consular army, the heads of the slain Romans which they carried on
spears and hung at their horses’ breasts, made the Romans believe that
Scipio’s whole army had been destroyed. A junction however was formed
with him, and the proconsul L. Volumnius, who commanded in Samnium, was
directed to lead his legions to reinforce those of the consuls. The
three united armies then crossed the Apennines, and took a position in
the Sentine country to menace the possessions of the Senonian Gauls; and
the two armies of reserve advanced in proportion, the one to Clusium,
the other to the Faliscan country. The confederates came and encamped
before the Romans; but they avoided an action, probably waiting for
reinforcements. The consuls, learning by deserters that the plan of
the enemy was for the Gauls and Samnites to give them battle, and the
Etruscans and Umbrians to fall on their camp during the action, sent
orders to Fulvius to ravage Etruria: this called a large part of the
Etruscans home, and the consuls endeavoured to bring on an engagement
during their absence. For two entire days they sought in vain to draw the
confederates to the field; on the third their challenge was accepted.
Fabius commanded on the right, opposed to the Samnites and the remaining
Etruscans and Umbrians; Decius led the left wing against the Gauls. Ere
the fight began, a wolf chased a hind from the mountains down between
the two armies; the hind sought refuge among the Gauls, by whom she was
killed; the wolf ran among the Romans, who made way for him to pass;
and this appearance of the favourite of Mars was regarded as an omen of
victory.
In the hope of tiring the Samnites, Fabius made his men act rather on
the defensive, and he refrained from bringing his reserve into action.
Decius, on the other hand, knowing how impetuous the first attack of the
Gauls always was, resolved not to await it; he therefore charged with
both foot and horse, and twice drove back the numerous Gallic cavalry;
but when his horse charged a third time, the Gauls sent forward their
war-chariots, which spread confusion and dismay among them; they fled
back among their infantry; the victorious Gauls followed hard upon them.
The battle, and with it possibly the hopes of Rome, was on the point of
being lost, when Decius, who had resolved, if defeat impended, to devote
himself like his father at Vesuvius, desired the pontiff M. Livius, whom
he had kept near him for the purpose, to repeat the form of devotion;
then adding to it these words, “I drive before me dismay and flight,
slaughter and blood, the anger of the powers above and below; with
funereal terrors I touch the arms, weapons, and ensigns of the foe; the
same place shall be that of my end and of the Gauls and Samnites,” he
spurred his horse, rushed into the thick of the enemies, and fell covered
with wounds.
The pontiff to whom Decius had given his lictors, encouraged the Romans;
a part of Fabius’ reserve came to their support: the Gauls stood in a
dense mass covered with their shields; the Romans, collecting the _pila_
that lay on the ground, hurled them on them; but the Gauls stood unmoved,
till Fabius, who by bringing forward his reserve, and causing his cavalry
to fall on their flank, had driven the Samnites to their camp, sent five
hundred of the Campanian horse, followed by the principes of the third
legion, to attack them in the rear; they then at length broke and fled.
Fabius again assailed the Samnites under their rampart; their general,
Gellius Egnatius, fell, and the camp was taken. The confederates lost
twenty-five thousand men slain and eight thousand taken; seven thousand
was the loss in the wing led by Decius, twelve hundred in that of Fabius.
Such was the victory at Sentinum, one of the most important ever achieved
by the arms of Rome.
The following year (294) the war was continued in Etruria and Samnium,
and a bloody but indecisive battle was fought at Nuceria. The next year
(293) the consuls, L. Papirius Cursor and Sp. Carvilius, took the field
against a Samnite army, which all the aids of superstition had been
employed to render formidable.
All the fighting men of Samnium were ordered to appear at the town of
Aquilonia. A tabernacle, two hundred feet square, and covered with linen,
was erected in the midst of the camp. Within it a venerable man named
Ovius Pacctius offered sacrifice after an ancient ritual contained in
an old linen book. The imperator or general then ordered the nobles to
be called in separately: each as he entered beheld through the gloom of
the tabernacle the altar in the centre, about which lay the bodies of
the victims, and around which stood centurions with drawn swords. He
was required to swear, imprecating curses on himself, his family, and
his race, if he did not in the battle go whithersoever the imperator
ordered him; if he fled himself, or did not slay any one whom he saw
flying. Some of the first summoned, refusing to swear, were slain, and
their bodies lying among those of the victims served as a warning to
others. The general selected ten of those who had thus sworn, each of
whom was directed to choose a man till the number of sixteen thousand was
completed, which was named from the tabernacle the Linen legion. Crested
helmets and superior arms were given them for distinction. The rest of
the army, upwards of twenty thousand men, was little inferior in any
respect to the Linen legion.
The Roman armies entered Samnium; and while Papirius advanced to
Aquilonia, Carvilius sat down before a fortress named Cominium, about
twenty miles from that place. The ardour for battle is said to have been
shared to such an extent by all the Roman army, that the pullarius, or
keeper of the sacred fowl, made a false report of favourable signs. The
truth was told to the consul as he was going into battle; but he said
the signs reported to him were good, and only ordered the pullarii to
be placed in the front rank; and when the guilty one fell by the chance
blow of a _pilum_, he cried that the gods were present, the guilty was
punished. A crow was heard to give a loud cry as he spoke; the gods, he
then declared, had never shown themselves more propitious, and he ordered
the trumpets to sound and the war-cry to be raised.
The Samnites had sent off twenty cohorts to the relief of Cominium; their
spirits were depressed, but they kept their ground, till a great cloud of
dust, as if raised by an army, was seen on one side. For the consul had
sent off before the action Sp. Nautius, with the mules and their drivers,
and some cohorts of the allies, with directions to advance during the
engagement, raising all the dust they could. Nautius now came in view,
the horseboys having boughs in their hands, which they dragged along the
ground; and the arms and banners appearing through the dust, made both
Romans and Samnites think that an army was approaching. The consul then
gave the sign for the horse to charge; the Samnites broke and fled, some
to Aquilonia, some to Bovianum. The number of their slain is said to have
been 30,340, and 3870 men and 97 banners were captured. Aquilonia and
Cominium were both taken on the same day. Carvilius then led his army
into Etruria; his colleague remained in Samnium, ravaging the country,
till the falling of the snow obliged him to leave it for the winter.
[Sidenote: [293-290 B.C.]]
In the next campaign (292), the Samnite general C. Pontius gave the Roman
consul Q. Fabius Gurges, son of the great Fabius, a complete defeat.
A strong party in the senate, the enemies of the Fabian house, were
for depriving the consul of his command; but the people yielded to the
prayers of his father, who implored them to spare him this disgrace in
his old age; and he himself went into Samnium as legate to his son. At a
place whose name is unknown the battle was fought, which decided the fate
of Samnium. Fabius gained the victory by his usual tactics, of keeping
his reserve for the proper time. The Samnites had twenty thousand slain
and four thousand taken, among whom was their great general C. Pontius.
In the triumph of Fabius Gurges, his renowned father humbly followed his
car on horseback; and C. Pontius was led in bonds, and then, to Rome’s
disgrace, beheaded. Q. Fabius Maximus, one of the greatest men that Rome
ever produced, died, it is probable, shortly afterwards.
The Samnite War, which had lasted with little intermission for
nine-and-forty years, was now terminated by a peace, of the exact terms
of which we are not informed (290). The Sabines, who, after a cessation
of 150 years, foolishly took up arms against Rome, were easily reduced
by the consul M. Curius Dentatus, and a large quantity of their land was
taken from them. Much larger assignments than the usual seven jugera
might now be made, but Curius deemed it unwise to pass that limit; and
when the people murmured, he replied that he was a pernicious citizen
whom the land which sufficed to support him did not satisfy. He refused
for himself five hundred jugera and a house at Tifata which the senate
offered him, and contented himself with a farm of seven jugera in the
Sabine country.
The Samnite War caused considerable distress at Rome, and it even came
to a secession. The people posted themselves on the Janiculum; but the
dictator, Q. Hortensius, induced them to submit, either by an abolition
or a considerable reduction of the amount of their debts. This is the
last secession we read of in Roman history.
On this occasion the Hortensian law, which made the plebiscits binding
on the whole nation, was passed;[42] a measure probably caused by the
obstinacy and caprice of the patricians, but pregnant with evil, from
which however the good fortune of Rome long preserved her. It was as if
in England a measure which had passed the Commons were to become at once
the law of the land.
Among the events of this period, the introduction of the worship of
the Grecian god Æsculapius deserves to be noticed. In the year 293 an
epidemic prevailed at Rome, and the Sibylline books being consulted, it
was directed to fetch Æsculapius to Rome. A trireme with ten deputies was
sent to Epidaurus for that purpose. The legend relates, that the senate
of that place agreed that the Romans should take whatever the god should
give them; and that as they were praying at the temple, a huge snake came
out of the sanctuary, went on to the town five miles off, through the
streets, to the harbour, thence on board the Roman trireme, and into the
cabin of Q. Ogulnius. The envoys having been instructed in the worship
of the god, departed, and a prosperous wind brought them to Antium. Here
they took shelter from a storm; the snake swam ashore, and remained
twined round a palm-tree at the temple of Apollo while they stayed. When
they reached Rome he left the ship again, and swimming to the island,
disappeared in the spot where the temple of the god was afterwards built.
LUCANIAN, GALLIC, AND ETRUSCAN WARS
[Sidenote: [290-282 B.C.]]
Rome now rested from war for some years. At length (284) the Tarentines,
who had been the chief agents in exciting the last Samnite War,
succeeded in inducing the Etruscans, Umbrians, and Gauls in the north,
and the Lucanians, Bruttians, and Samnites in the south, to take arms
simultaneously against her. The commencement was the hostility exercised
by the Lucanians against the people of the Greek town of Thurii, who,
despairing of aid from any other quarter, applied to the Romans.
[Sidenote: [282-280 B.C.]]
In 282, a Roman army under C. Fabricius Luscinus came to the relief
of Thurii. The spirits of the Romans sank as they viewed their own
inferiority of force; when, lo! a youth of gigantic stature, wearing a
double-crested helm, like those on the statues of Mars, was seen to seize
a scaling-ladder, and mount the rampart of the enemies’ camp. The courage
of the Romans rose, that of the foes declined, and a signal victory
crowned the arms of Rome. When next day the consul sought that valiant
youth, to bestow on him the suitable meed, he was nowhere to be found.
Fabricius then directed a thanksgiving to Father Mars (as it must have
been he) to be held throughout the army. Many other victories succeeded;
and no Roman general had as yet acquired so much booty as Fabricius did
in this campaign.
When the Roman army retired, a garrison was left for the defence of
Thurii. As it was only by sea that a communication could be conveniently
kept up with it, a squadron of ten triremes, under the duumvir L.
Valerius, was now in these waters. Some years before, it had been an
article in a treaty with the Tarentines, that no Roman ship of war should
sail to the north of the Lacinian Cape; but as they had taken no notice
of it now, and there was as yet no open hostility between them and the
Romans, Valerius appeared off the port of Tarentum. The people unluckily
happened at that moment to be assembled in the theatre, which commanded
a view of the sea; a demagogue named Philocharis, a man of the vilest
character,[43] pointing to the Roman ships, reminded them of the treaty;
the infuriated populace rushed on shipboard, attacked and sank four,
and took one of the Roman vessels. The Tarentines then sent a force
against Thurii, where they plundered the town and banished the principal
citizens: the Roman garrison was dismissed unmolested.
The Romans, as they had an Etruscan war on their hands, were anxious to
accommodate matters amicably in the south. Their demands were therefore
very moderate: they only required the release of those taken in the
trireme; the restoration of the Thurians, and restitution of their
property; and the surrender of the authors of the outrage. Audience was
given to the envoys in the theatre. When they entered, the people laughed
at the sight of their purple-bordered _prætextæ_, and the faults of
language committed by L. Postumius, the chief of the embassy, redoubled
their merriment. As the envoys were leaving the theatre, a drunken
buffoon came and befouled the robe of Postumius in the most abominable
manner: the peals of laughter were redoubled; but Postumius, holding up
his robe, cried out, “Ay, laugh, laugh while ye may; ye will weep long
enough when ye have to wash this out in blood.” He displayed at Rome his
unwashed garment; and the senate, after anxious deliberation, declared
war against Tarentum (281). The consul L. Æmilius Barbula was ordered to
lead his army thither, to offer anew the former terms, and if they were
refused, to carry on the war with vigour. The Tarentines, however, would
listen to no terms; they resorted to their usual system of seeking aid
from the mother country, and sent an embassy to invite over Pyrrhus, the
renowned king of Epirus. Meantime Æmilius laid waste their country, took
several strong places, and defeated them in the field.
We will now turn our view northwards. In 283 a combined army of Etruscans
and Senonian Gauls having laid siege to Arretium, the prætor L. Metellus
hastened to its relief; but his army was totally defeated, thirteen
thousand men being slain, and nearly all the remainder made prisoners.
When an embassy was sent to the Gauls to complain of breach of treaty,
and to redeem the prisoners, the Gallic prince Britomaris, to avenge his
father, who had fallen at Arretium, caused the fetiales to be murdered.
The consul P. Cornelius Dolabella instantly marched through the Sabine
and Picentian country into that of the Senonians, whom he defeated when
they met him in the field: he then wasted the lands, burned the open
villages, put all the men to death, and reduced the women and children
to slavery. Britomaris, who was taken alive, was reserved to grace the
consul’s triumph.
The Boians, who dwelt between the Senonians and the Po, were filled with
rage and apprehension at the fate of their brethren, and assembling all
their forces they entered Etruria, where being joined by the Etruscans
and the remnant of the Senonians, they pressed on for Rome; but at the
Lake Vadimo the consular armies met and nearly annihilated their whole
army; the Senonians, it is said, in frenzy of despair put an end to
themselves when they saw the battle lost. The Gauls appeared again the
next year (284) in Etruria; but a signal defeat near Populonia (282)
forced them to sue for peace, which on account of the war in the south,
the Romans readily granted.
The war with the Etruscans continued till the year 280, when, in
consequence of that with Pyrrhus, the Romans concluded a peace with them
on most favourable terms. This peace terminated the conflict, which had
now lasted for thirty years, and converted Etruria into Rome’s steadiest
and most faithful ally.[c]
FOOTNOTES
[38] [Edward A. Freeman[e] calls the Samnites “the worthiest foes whom
Rome ever met within her own peninsula.” He adds, “There can be little
doubt that they possessed a Federal Constitution. Their resistance ended
only with the extermination of their race.”]
[39] [Freeman[e] notes that Rome had never appeared to be “the mere
capital of the Latin League. As far as the faintest glimmerings of
history go back, Rome holds a position towards Latium far more lordly
than that of Thebes towards Bœotia. It is no wonder that a League of
small towns could not permanently bear up against a single great city of
their own race whose strength equalled their united strength, and which
was more liberal of its franchise than any other city-commonwealth ever
was.”]
[40] [In the interpretations of clauses 1 and 2 of the Publilian Law
scholars are divided. The comitia curiata had now lost all real power,
and in fact had never enjoyed the right to pass upon resolutions adopted
by other assemblies. It was probably either the senate or the patrician
part of the senate which was required to give its previous consent to
bills brought before the centuries. Clause 2 probably gave validity to
resolutions of the tribal assembly, even when no patricians were present;
cf. Botsford.[h]]
[41] [This is the Papirius Cursor of whom Livy [g] writes the glowing
eulogy we have quoted in the preceding Volume, Chapter LVII, where
Livy claims that Papirius Cursor--as the contemporary of Alexander and
the general whom he would have met had he attacked Rome instead of
Persia--would have equalled the Macedonian and driven him out of Italy.]
[42] [This law probably made unnecessary the consent of the senate to
resolutions passed by the tribal assembly under the presidency of the
plebeian tribunes.]
[43] [The Tarentines were not of course so bad as the Roman historians
represent. Though imprudent, they had good ground for indignation.]
[Illustration: ROMAN TROPHIES]
[Illustration]