left Teanum to the Samnites (413). Congratulations
came from all sides, even from Carthage. The
Latins, who had refused their contingent and seemed
to be arming against Rome, turned their arms not against
Rome but against the Paeligni, while the Romans were
occupied first with a military conspiracy of the garrison
left behind in Campania (412), then with the capture
of Privernum (413) and the war against the Antiates.
But now a sudden and singular change occurred in
the position of parties. The Latins, who had
demanded in vain Roman citizenship and a share in
the consulate, rose against Rome in conjunction with
the Sidicines, who had vainly offered to submit to
the Romans and knew not how to save themselves from
the Samnites, and with the Campanians, who were already
tired of the Roman rule. Only the Laurentes in
Latium and the -equites- of Campania adhered to the
Romans, who on their part found support among the
Paeligni and Samnites. The Latin army fell upon
Samnium; the Romano-Samnite army, after it had marched
to the Fucine lake and from thence, avoiding Latium,
into Campania, fought the decisive battle against
the combined Latins and Campanians at Vesuvius; the
consul Titus Manlius Imperiosus, after he had himself
restored the wavering discipline of the army by the
execution of his own son who had slain a foe in opposition
to orders from headquarters, and after his colleague
Publius Decius Mus had appeased the gods by sacrificing
his life, at length gained the victory by calling up
the last reserves. But the war was only terminated
by a second battle, in which the consul Manlius engaged
the Latins and Campanians near Trifanum; Latium and
Capua submitted, and were mulcted in a portion of
their territory.
The judicious and candid reader will not fail to observe
that this report swarms with all sorts of impossibilities.
Such are the statement of the Antiates waging war
after the surrender of 377 (Liv. vi. 33); the independent
campaign of the Latins against the Paeligni, in distinct
contradiction to the stipulations of the treaties between
Rome and Latium; the unprecedented march of the Roman
army through the Marsian and Samnite territory to
Capua, while all Latium was in arms against Rome;
to say nothing of the equally confused and sentimental
account of the military insurrection of 412, and the
story of its forced leader, the lame Titus Quinctius,
the Roman Gotz von Berlichingen. Still more
suspicious perhaps, are the repetitions. Such
is the story of the military tribune Publius Decius
modelled on the courageous deed of Marcus Calpurnius
Flamma, or whatever he was called, in the first Punic
war; such is the recurrence of the conquest of Privernum
by Gaius Plautius in the year 425, which second conquest
alone is registered in the triumphal Fasti; such is
the self-immolation of Publius Decius, repeated, as
is well known, in the case of his son in 459.
Throughout this section the whole representation betrays
a different period and a different hand from the other