other by the consuls, and were confirmed by the responses of the aruspices, who were subsequently consulted: the will of the gods was therefore manifest, and the consuls agreed that if any part of the line of the Roman army should give way, the consul who commanded that part should devote himself to death. This resolution was privately imparted beforehand to the lieutenants and tribunes, in order to prevent any alarm being caused by the voluntary death of the consul.

The close resemblance between the Romans and Latins in language, manners, arms, and military discipline, and the community of service which had existed between them, rendered a confusion of the opposing forces easy, and favoured mistake or treachery. Strict orders were therefore given that no one should engage in any combat out of his ranks. This injunction was disobeyed by T. Manlius, the son of the consul, who, being challenged by Geminius Metius, a distinguished citizen of Tusculum, engaged him in a single equestrian combat, was victorious, and brought his spoils back to his father's tent. The consul having heard the story, summoned an assembly of the soldiers, and ordered his son to execution—a sentence which was carried into immediate effect. This example of stern military discipline is said to have made a profound impression in the camp, to have left a lasting aversion against Manlius in the minds of the young men of his own time, and to have caused the expression Manliana imperia to become proverbial, as denoting unrelenting severity in the enforcement of military commands.(33)

§ 21 The battle was fought at the foot of Mount Vesuvius, near a place called Veseris.(34) The sacrifice of Manlius was

(33) Livy, viii. 6-7; Gell. i. 13, §7; Victor de Vir. Ill. 28; Dio Cass. Fragm. xxxv. 3, 4, 9; Zon. vii. 26. The execution of Manlius by his father is assigned to a Gallic war by Sallust, Cat. 52, and Dion. Hal. viii. 79. These writers appear to have connected the idea of a Gallic war with Manlius, on account of the exploit which gave him the name of Torquatus. Servius, Æn. vi. 825, says that Manlius caused his son to be beaten to death, and not executed with the axe: Livy describes the execution as taking place by decapitation, in the ordinary manner.

(34) From the expression of Livy, 'qua via ad Veserim ferebat,' viii. 8, it seems probable that Veseris was not a river, as it is called by Victor de Vir. Ill. c. 26, 28, a writer of no authority.

propitious; but the soothsayer pointed out to Decius that the liver of his victim had an ill-omened mark. Decius expressed himself satisfied, if there was nothing wrong in his colleague's sacrifice. The left wing, commanded by Decius, soon began to waver, and the first rank retreated in order to make way for the second. Hereupon Decius called for the Pontifex, M. Valerius, who ordered him to put on the official toga prætexta, to stand upon a spear, and to repeat the formula of selfdevotion to death for his country. When this ceremony had been performed, Decius mounted his horse, and dashed into the enemy's ranks, where his appearance is said to have caused alarm, but where he soon found the death which he courted. (35) After a protracted and severe struggle, the surviving consul, Manlius, succeeded in achieving a complete victory over the Latin army and their Campanian allies. The Samnites are stated to have been posted under Vesuvius, but to have taken no part in the conflict; according to one account, they did not come up till after the battle, having waited to see which side would be victorious. (36) Livy remarks that the consuls obtained the chief credit of this victory; the one because he had devoted himself for his country, while the other had shown such courage and ability that both the Romans and the Latins, who handed

(35) Livy, viii. 9; Florus, i. 14; Victor de Vir. Ill. 26; Cic. de Fin. ii. 19, De Div. i. 24; Dio Cass. fragm. xxxv. 6. Plutarch, An. vitios. ad infel. suff. c. 3, speaks of Decius sacrificing himself on a pyre to Cronus between two armies; but he does not specify whether it is the father or the son. The author of the Plutarchean Parallela, c. 18, relates that Decius the father devoted himself in a war against the Albans, and Decius the son in a war against the Gauls. Aristides of Miletus is cited as the authority for this statement; see Fragm. Hist. Gr. vol. iv. p. 323. Zonaras, vii. 26, says that some writer represented Decius to have ridden into the midst of the enemy, while others described him as having been slain by a Roman soldier. The deaths of the two Decii are thus alluded to by Juvenal:

Plebeia Deciorum animæ, plebeia fuerunt

Nomina: pro totis legionibus hi tamen, et pro
Omuibus auxiliis atque omni pube Latinâ

Sufficiunt dis infernis Terræque parenti.-viii. 254-7.

(36) Samnites quoque, sub radicibus montis procul instructi, præbuere terrorem Latinis; Livy, viii. 10. Romanis post prælium demum factum Samnites venisse subsidio, expectato eventu pugnæ, apud quosdam auctores invenio; ib. c. 11.

down the memory of that day to posterity, agreed that whichever army was commanded by Manlius would have gained the victory.(37)

Whatever might be the amount of active assistance which the Romans received from the Samnites in the battle of Veseris, the description of the campaign shows that Samnium was at this time a friendly country.(38) After their defeat, the Latins evacuated Campania, and retreated to Minturnæ, north of the Liris. Letters giving a false account of the result of the battle were circulated in Latium, and in the Volscian country, and thus reinforcements were speedily obtained. The Romans now marched northwards in pursuit of the Latin army, which was interposed between them and Rome, and met it at Trifanum, a coast town, between Sinuessa and Minturnæ. Here the Latin and Campanian confederacy received another blow, and both Latium and Capua were mulcted of their public land.(39)

The Latins, however, were not yet subdued; hostilities were renewed against them by the next consuls, and it was not till the third year that the definitive reduction of the entire country was effected. Different measures were adopted with the several cities, according to their conduct in the late war: those few that remained faithful to Rome were rewarded; the most delinquent were deprived of their public territory, and received colonies of Roman settlers: the policy however applied generally to them was to reduce them to isolated units, without any power of combination and joint action. For this purpose they were prohibited

(37) Alter eâ virtute eoque consilio in prælio fuit, ut facile convenerit inter Romanos Latinosque, qui ejus pugnæ memoriam posteris tradiderunt, utrius partis T. Manlius dux fuisset, ejus futuram haud dubie fuisse victoriam; Livy, viii. 10. There is a similar statement respecting Manlius in Dio Cass. Fragm. xxxv. 4. ὥστε καὶ πρὸς τῶν πολιτῶν καὶ πρὸς τῶν ἐναντίων ὁμοίως λέγεσθαι ὅτι τό τε κράτος τοῦ πολέμου ὑποχείριον ἔσχε, καὶ εἰ καὶ τῶν Λατίνων ἡγεῖτο, πάντως ἂν αὐτοὺς νικῆσαι ἐποίησεν.

(38) See Arnold, vol. ii. p. 150, n.

(39) This victory is described by Diod. xvi. 90, as having been gained by T. Manlius the consul over the Latins and Campanians near Suessa, and to have cost the defeated nations a part of their territory. He says nothing of the battle of Veseris.

from convening federal assemblies; and the citizens of one state were not permitted to marry, or to hold land, in another.(40)

As this reduction of Latium is one of the great turning points in Roman history, and produced a settlement which even the battle of Cannæ did not disturb,(41) it is worth while to consider, as well as we can, in what state the accounts of it have descended to us. The Latins are described as shaking off their allegiance to Rome, and taking arms against her, in the year after the Gallic capture of the city:(42) their hostile movements and refusals to furnish troops continue at certain intervals until the Samnite war; but although this seems a favourable opportunity for attacking the Romans, the Latins (probably from jealousy of the Samnites) remain quiescent, until the campaign is decided in favour of the Romans; when their army, which is stated to be in readiness for an attack upon the Romans in case they had been worsted, invades the territory of the Pelig

(40) Ceteris Latinis populis connubia commerciaque et concilia inter se ademerunt; Livy, viii. 14. When the Hernici were reduced, the cities which had borne arms against Rome were deprived of the right of holding federal councils, and of intermarriage; their magistrates were likewise stripped of all civil powers, and were allowed only to retain their religious functions; ib. ix. 43. After the Roman conquest of Macedonia, it was divided into four regions, each of which was permitted to have a concilium or assembly of its own; and the right of marriage and of holding land and houses was limited to the region. 'Pronunciavit deinde neque connubium neque commercium agrorum ædificiorumque inter se placere cuiquam extra fines regionis suæ esse;' Livy, xlv. 29. The commercium agrorum ædificiorumque' is equivalent to the yкrnos yns Kai oikiaç of the Greeks. Polybius, in his summary of Roman history after the taking of the city by the Gauls, says that the Romans, having mastered all the Latins (yevóμEvo lyrρatεis ἁπάντων τῶν Λατίνων διά τε τὴν ἀνδρίαν καὶ τὴν ἐν ταῖς μάχαις ἐπιτυχίαν), afterwards went to war with the Etruscans, then with the Gauls, and afterwards with the Samnites; i. 6.

(41) Some of the Latin cities were among the twelve Roman colonies which refused to furnish men and money in the ninth year of the Second Punic War. This however was not so much a defection as a refusal to make additional sacrifices for continuing the war; Livy, xxvii. 9-10.

(42) Great terror is stated to be caused in 389 B.C., by the defection of the Latins who had been faithful to the Romans since the battle of Regillus; Livy, vi. 2. The Latins assist the Antiates against Rome; ib. 6. In answer to a message from the Romans, they excuse themselves for not furnishing a contingent, and for assisting the enemies of Rome; ib. 10. Afterwards however they send succours to the Volsci; ib. 12, 13. Latium is described as doubtful in its allegiance; ib. 21. The Latins join the Volsci against Rome; ib. 32-3. In 349 B.C., the Latins, in answer to

nians, who are now friendly to the Romans. (+3) The mutiny in Campania gave them fresh hopes, (+) and in the following year they openly revolted, with the Campanians and Sidicines.(45) Annius, the prætor, is described in Livy as telling the Latin assembly that the time for declaring their independence is now arrived; that the Romans are manifestly holding back from fear; for that they have acquiesced in a refusal of the Latins to furnish troops, after a submission of more than two hundred years;(46) in their invasion of the Pelignians, when formerly they could not obtain permission to defend themselves;(47) in their protection of the Sidicines and Campanians, and their hostilities against the Samnites, now the allies of Rome.(48) No specific reason is assigned for the defection of the Latins at this particular time; and we must suppose that, by a succession of circumstances, they were rendered impatient of the state of

a demand for troops, refuse to furnish them, but announce that they shall fight for their own independence, and not to support any other nation; ib. vii. 25. The hostile feeling of Latium is mentioned; ib. 27-28.

(43) Hujus certaminis fortuna-Latinos, jam exercitibus comparatis, ab Romano in Pelignum vertit bellum; Livy, vii. 38.

(44) Livy, vii. 42.

(45) They are described as 'suâ sponte in arma moti;' Livy, viii. 2. (46) Livy seems to reckon from the reign of Tarquinius Priscus (616-579 B.C.); see i. 38. The battle of Regillus, placed by Livy in 499 B.C., would give an interval of only 159 years.

(47) Livy represents the Roman Senate as declaring that the treaty did not prohibit the Latins from making war without the consent of Rome; viii. 2. He must therefore suppose the Romans to have exercised a power in excess of that conferred by the treaty. He states, as early as 494 B.C., that the Latins applied to the Senate for assistance against the Equi, or for permission to defend themselves, and that the Senate, thinking it safer to defend them than to allow them to defend themselves, sent one of the consuls; ii. 30, above, p. 62. See also the answer to the Hernicans, in iii. 6. Dion. Hal. viii. 15, says that in 489 B.C. the Latins received permission from the Senate to levy an army and appoint generals of their own, which they were prohibited from doing by their treaty with Rome. See above, p. 108, n. 49. The same historian states that in 466 B.C., when the territory of the Latins was ravaged by the Equi, the Romans neither sent an army to their assistance, nor would permit them to defend themselves; ix. 60. They are described, in a subsequent year (463 B.C.), as receiving permission to defend themselves until the Roman force comes up; ib. 67. It will be observed that the statements of Livy, viii. 2, and Dion. Hal. viii. 15, with respect to the provisions of the treaty on this important point, are wholly at variance with each other. (48) viii. 4.