The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08
that also carried. Equally ineffectual was the demand, that some
deductions should be made from the pay of the cavalry, (they then
received triple,) because they had opposed the conspiracy.
42. Besides these, I find in some writers that Lucius Genucius, tribune
of the commons, proposed to the people, that no one should be allowed to
practise usury; likewise provision was made by other enactments, that no
one should fill the same office within ten years; nor hold two offices
on the same year; and that it should be allowed that both the consuls
should be plebeians. If all these concessions were made to the people,
it is evident that the revolt possessed no little strength. In other
annals it is recorded, that Valerius was not appointed dictator, but
that the entire business was managed by the consuls; and also that that
band of conspirators were driven to arms not before they came to Rome,
but at Rome; and that it was not on the country-house of Titus
Quinctius, but on the residence of Caius Manlius the assault was made by
night, and that he was seized by the conspirators to become their
leader: that having proceeded thence to the fourth mile-stone, they
posted themselves in a well-defended place; and that it was not with the
leaders mention of a reconciliation originated; but that suddenly, when
the armies marched out to battle fully armed, a mutual salutation took
place; that mixing together the soldiers began to join hands, and to
embrace each other with tears; and that the consuls, on seeing the minds
of the soldiers averse from fighting, made a proposition to the senate
concerning the re-establishment of concord. So that among ancient
writers nothing is agreed on, except that there was a mutiny, and that
it was composed. Both the report of this disturbance, and the heavy war
entered into with the Samnites, alienated some states from the Roman
alliance: and besides the treaty of the Latins, which now for a long
time was not to be depended on, the Privernians also by a sudden
incursion laid waste Norba and Setia, Roman colonies in their
neighbourhood.
BOOK VIII.
_The Latins with the Campanians revolt; and ambassadors having been
sent to the senate, they propose that, if they wished for peace,
they should elect one of the consuls from among the Latins. Titus
Manlius, the consul, put his son to death, because he had fought,
though successfully, against the Latins, contrary to orders. The
Romans being hard pressed in the battle, Publius Decius, then
consul with Manlius, devoted himself for the army. The Latins
surrender. None of the young men came out to meet Manlius on his
return to the city. Minucia, a vestal virgin, was condemned for
incest. Several matrons convicted of poisoning. Laws then first
made against that crime. The Ausonians, Privernians, and
Palæpolitans subdued. Quintus Publilius the first instance of a
person continuing in command after the expiration of his office,
and of a triumph decreed to any person not a consul. Law against
confinement for debt. Quintus Fabius, master of the horse, fights
the Samnites with success, contrary to the orders of Lucius
Papirius, dictator; and, with difficulty, obtains pardon, through
the intercession of the people. Successful expedition against the
Samnites._
1. The consuls now were Caius Plautius a second time, and Lucius Æmilius
Mamercinus; when the people of Setia and Norba came to Rome to announce
the revolt of the Privernians, with complaints of the damages received
by them. News were brought that the army of the Volscians, under the
guidance of the people of Antium, had taken post at Satricum. Both wars
fell by lot to Plautius. He, marching first to Privernum, immediately
came to an engagement. The enemy were defeated after a slight
resistance: the town was taken, and given back to the Privernians, a
strong garrison being placed in it: two thirds of their land were taken
from them. The victorious army was marched thence to Satricum against
the Antians; there a desperate battle was fought with great slaughter on
both sides; and when a storm separated the combatants, hope inclining to
neither side, the Romans, nowise disheartened by this so indecisive an
engagement, prepare for battle against the following day. The
Volscians, reckoning up what men they had lost in battle, had by no
means the same spirits to repeat the risk. They went off in the night to
Antium as a vanquished army in the utmost confusion, leaving behind
their wounded and a part of their baggage. A vast quantity of arms was
found, both among the dead bodies of the enemy, and also in the camp.
These, the consul declared, that he offered up to Mother Lua; and he
laid waste the enemy's country as far as the sea-coast. The other
consul, Æmilius, on entering the Sabellan territory, found neither a
camp of the Samnites nor legions opposed to him. Whilst he laid waste
their territories with fire and sword, the ambassadors of the Samnites
came to him, suing for peace; by whom being referred to the senate,
after leave to address them was granted, laying aside their ferocious
spirits, they sued for peace for themselves from the Romans, and the
right of waging war against the Sidicinians. Which requests, [they
alleged,] that "they were the more justified in making, because they had
both united in friendship with the Roman people, when their affairs were
flourishing, not under circumstances of distress, as the Campanians had
done, and they were taking up arms against the Sidicinians, ever their
enemies, never the friends of the Roman people; who had neither, as the
Samnites, sought their friendship in time of peace, nor, as the
Campanians, their assistance in time of war, and were neither in
alliance with, nor under subjection to the Roman people."
2. After the prætor Tiberius Æmilius had consulted the senate respecting
the demands of the Samnites, and the senate voted that the treaty should
be renewed with them, the prætor returned this answer to the Samnites:
"That it neither had been the fault of the Roman people that their
friendship with them was not perpetual; nor was any objection made to
that friendship being once more re-established, since they themselves
were now become tired of a war entered into through their own fault.
With respect to what regarded the Sidicinians, they did not interfere
with the Samnite nation having the free decision of peace and war." The
treaty being concluded, on their return home, the Roman army was
immediately withdrawn after they had received a year's pay, and corn for
three months: for which the consul had stipulated, to grant time for a
truce, until the ambassadors should return. The Samnites having marched
against the Sidicinians with the same forces which they had employed in
their war against the Romans, entertained rather sanguine hopes of
becoming masters of the enemies' citadel. Then the Sidicinians first
began to surrender to the Romans. Afterwards, when the senate rejected
that offer as too late, and as being wrung from them by extreme
necessity, it was made to the Latins, who were already taking up arms on
their own account. Nor did even the Campanians (so much stronger was
their recollection of the injuries done them by the Samnites than of the
kindness of the Romans) keep themselves from this quarrel. Out of these
so many states, one vast army, entering the territories of the Samnites
under the direction of the Latins, committed more damage by depredations
than by battles; and though the Latins had the advantage in the field,
they retired out of the enemies' territory without reluctance, that they
might not be obliged to fight too frequently. This opportunity was
afforded to the Samnites to send ambassadors to Rome. When they appeared
before the senate, having complained that they, though now confederates,
were subjected to the same hardships as those they had suffered as
enemies, solicited, with the humblest entreaties, that "the Romans would
think it enough the victory, of which they had deprived the Samnites,
over their Campanian and Sidicinian enemy; that they would not besides
suffer them to be vanquished by these most dastardly states. That they
could by their sovereign authority keep the Latins and the Campanians
out of the Samnite territory, if they really were under the dominion of
the Roman people; but if they rejected their authority, that they might
compel them by arms." To this an equivocal answer was returned, because
it was mortifying to acknowledge, that the Latins were not now in their
power, and they were afraid lest by finding fault they might estrange
them from their side: that the case of the Campanians was different,
they having come under their protection, not by treaty but by surrender:
accordingly, that the Campanians, whether they wished or not, should
remain quiet: that in the Latin treaty there was no clause by which they
were prevented from going to war with whomsoever they pleased.
3. Which answer, whilst it sent away the Samnites uncertain as to what
conduct they were to think that the Romans would pursue, it further
estranged the Campanians through fear; it rendered the Samnites more
presuming, they considering that there was nothing which the Romans
would now refuse them. Wherefore, proclaiming frequent meetings under
the pretext of preparing for war against the Samnites, their leading
men, in their several deliberations among themselves, secretly fomented
the plan of a war with Rome. In this war the Campanians too joined
against their preservers. But though all their schemes were carefully
concealed, and they were anxious that their Samnite enemy should be got
rid of in their rear before the Romans should be aroused, yet through
the agency of some who were attached [to the latter] by private
friendships and other ties, information of their conspiracy made its way
to Rome, and the consuls being ordered to resign their office before the
usual time, in order that the new consuls might be elected the sooner to
meet so important a war, a religious scruple entered their minds at the
idea of the elections being held by persons whose time of office had
been cut short. Accordingly an interregnum took place. There were two
interreges, Marcus Valerius and Marcus Fabius. The consuls elected were
Titus Manlius Torquatus a third time, and Publius Decius Mus. It is
agreed on that, in this year, Alexander, king of Epirus, made a descent
on Italy with a fleet. Which war, if the first commencement had been
sufficiently successful, would unquestionably have extended to the
Romans. The same was the era of the exploits of Alexander the Great,
whom, being son to the other's sister, in another region of the world,
having shown himself invincible in war, fortune cut short in his youth
by disease. But the Romans, although the revolt of their allies and of
the Latin nation was now no matter of doubt, yet as if they felt
solicitude regarding the Samnites, not for themselves, summoned ten of
the leading men of the Latins to Rome, to whom they wished to issue such
orders as they might wish. Latium had at that time two prætors, Lucius
Annius, a native of Setia, and Lucius Numisius of Circeii, both from the
Roman colonists; through whose means, besides Signia and Velitræ, also
Roman colonies, the Volscians too had been stirred up to arms. It was
determined that these two should be summoned specially; it was a matter
of doubt to no one, on what matter they were sent for. Accordingly the
prætors, having held an assembly, before they set out for Rome, inform
them, that they were summoned by the Roman senate, and consult them as
to what answer it was their wish should be given on those subjects which