Livy

“ Just at this moment the standards were descried on the hills, and a fresh battle-shout arose from the Roman ranks. The alarm which was created among the Samnites was greater than circumstances warranted, for Fabius exclaimed that his colleague Decius was coming, and every soldier, wild with joy, took up the cry and shouted that the other consul with his legions was at hand. This mistake occurring so opportunely filled the Samnites with dismay; they dreaded, exhausted as they were by fighting, the prospect of being overwhelmed by a second army, fresh and unhurt. ”

“ At this critical moment the consul galloped back to the camp and posted a cavalry detachment before the gate with strict orders to treat as an enemy any one who made for the rampart whether Roman or Samnite. He then stopped his men who were running back to the camp in disorder, and in menacing tones called out, "Where are you going, soldiers? Here, too, you will find armed men, and not one of you shall enter the camp while your consul is alive unless you come as victors; now make your choice whether you would rather fight with your own countrymen or with the enemy." ”

“ In the middle of it all the consul, raising his hands towards heaven and speaking in a loud voice so that he might be well heard, vowed a temple to Jupiter Stator if the Roman army stayed its flight and renewed the battle and defeated and slew the Samnites. All officers and men, infantry and cavalry alike, exerted themselves to the utmost to restore the battle. Even the divine providence seemed to have looked with favour on the Romans, so easily did matters take a favourable turn. The enemy were repulsed from the camp, and in a short time were driven back to the ground where the battle began. ”

“ Armed men mounted on chariots and baggage wagons came on with a thunderous noise of horses and wheels, and the horses of the Roman cavalry, unaccustomed to that kind of uproar, became uncontrollable through fright; the cavalry after their victorious charges, were now scattered in frantic terror; horses and men alike were overthrown in their blind flight. Even the standards of the legionaries were thrown into confusion, and many of the front rank men were crushed by the weight of the horses and vehicles dashing through the lines. ”

“ Here he dwelt at some length upon the serious nature of the war in Etruria. Even, he said, when he and his colleague were conducting a joint campaign, the war was on too large a scale for any single general with his one army to cope with. Since then he understood that the Umbrians and an enormous force of Gauls had swollen the ranks of their enemies. The electors must bear in mind that two consuls were being elected on that day to act against four nations. The choice of the Roman people would, he felt certain, fall on the one man who was unquestionably the foremost of all their generals. ”

“ Count up the commanders in all the years since war was for the first time waged under the leadership and auspices of plebeians, you will find as many triumphs as commanders. The plebeians, too, have their nobility and have no cause to be dissatisfied with them. You may be quite certain that, if a war were suddenly to break out now, the senate and people of Rome would not put more confidence in a general because he was a patrician than in one who happened to be a plebeian. ”

“ In this timid and reluctant mood they commenced a feeble fight, without receiving any order to attack or raising any regular battle-shout, and not a man stirred a foot from where he stood. Then the consul, in order to infuse some spirit into the combatants, sent a few troops of cavalry to make a demonstration; most of them were thrown from their horses and the rest got into hopeless confusion. A rush was made by the Samnites to overpower those who had been dismounted; this was met by a rush from the Roman ranks to protect their comrades. ”

“ Act, every man of you, as you deem worthy of yourselves! I, the consul, M. Atilius, will go against the enemy alone if none will follow and fall amongst the standards of the Samnites sooner than see a Roman camp hedged in by circumvallation." The consul's words were welcomed by all his officers, and the rank and file, ashamed to hold back any longer, slowly put themselves in fighting trim and slowly marched out of camp. ”

“ There was not a man, whatever his rank or condition, in the camp who was not seized by the passion for battle, the highest and lowest alike were eagerly looking forward to it; the general was watching the excited looks of the men, the men were looking at their general, the universal excitement extended even to those who were engaged in observing the sacred birds. The chickens refused to eat, but the pullarius ventured to misrepresent matters, and reported to the consul that they had eaten so greedily that the corn dropped from their mouths on to the ground. ”

“ The only hope left to them now lay in the Etruscans. They knew that they of all the nations of Italy were the richest in arms and men and money, and they had for their neighbours the Gauls, trained to arms from the cradle, naturally courageous to desperation and especially against the Romans, a nation whom they justly boast of having captured and then allowing them to ransom themselves with gold. ”

“ There was no one in the world whom he would sooner have; if Decius were with him he should always find his forces sufficient for the work and never find the enemy too numerous for him to deal with. If his colleague preferred some other arrangement they might give him L. Volumnius. The people, the senate, and his own colleague all agreed that Fabius should have a perfectly free hand in the matter, and when Decius made it clear that he was ready to go either to Samnium or to Etruria, there was universal joy and congratulation. ”

“ Seeing himself surrounded by this crowd, he called out: "I do not intend to enlist more than 4000 infantry and 600 cavalry, and will take with me those of you who give in your names today and tomorrow. I am more concerned to bring you all back wealthy men than to have a large number of men for my fighting force." With this compact army full of confidence and hope - all the more so because he felt no need of a great host - he marched to the town of Aharna, which was not far from the enemy, and from there went on to Appius' camp. ”

“ Under these circumstances the consul thought he ought to go round and address the soldiers personally. When he came to any who were showing reluctance to arm themselves he asked them why they were so slow and so cowardly; the enemy would come up to their camp unless they met him outside; they would have to fight to defend their tents if they refused to fight in front of their rampart. Armed and fighting they had a chance of victory, but the men who awaited the enemy unarmed and defenceless would have to suffer either death or slavery. ”

“ The Romans under Fabius were acting more on the defensive and were protracting the contest as long as possible. Their commander knew that it was the habitual practice of both the Gauls and the Samnites to make a furious attack to begin with, and if that were successfully resisted, it was enough; the courage of the Samnites gradually sank as the battle went on, whilst the Gauls, utterly unable to stand heat or exertion, found their physical strength melting away; in their first efforts they were more than men, in the end they were weaker than women. ”

“ They dreaded their own countrymen more than the enemy. The Romans pressed on from both wings and from the centre and cut down men who were paralysed by fear of gods and men. Only a feeble resistance could be offered by those who were only kept from flight by fear. The carnage had almost extended to the second line where the standards were stationed when there appeared in the side distance a cloud of dust as though raised by the tread of an immense army. It was Sp. Nautius - some say Octavius Maecius - the commander of the auxiliary cohorts. ”

“ Two thousand one hundred combatants were cut off and made prisoners and an enormous quantity of plunder was seized. To avoid loading the army with a lot of heavy baggage Decius called his men together and addressed them thus: "Are you going to content yourselves with this one victory and this spoil? Raise your hopes and expectations to the height of your courage. All the cities of the Samnites and all the wealth left in them are yours now that their legions, routed in so many battles, have at last been driven by you beyond their frontiers. ”

“ They all assured him that as far as they were concerned they would do everything that he wished them to do, but the men had lost heart, they had passed a sleepless night amidst the wounded and the groans of the dying, and had the enemy attacked the camp while it was still dark, they were in such a state of fright that they would have deserted their standards. As it was they were only kept from flight by a feeling of shame, in every other respect they were practically beaten men. ”

“ The cavalry were pursued by cavalry, the infantry by infantry; the wings of the Roman army separated, the right directed its course towards the Samnite camp, the left to the city of Aquilonia. The first success fell to Volumnius, who captured the Samnite camp. Scipio met with a more sustained resistance at the city, not because the defeated foe showed more courage there, but because stone walls are more difficult to surmount than the rampart of a camp. They drove the defenders from their walls with showers of stones. ”

“ Great as the glory of the day on which the battle of Sentinum was fought must appear to any writer who adheres to the truth, it has by some writers been exaggerated beyond all belief. They assert that the enemy's army amounted to 1,000,000 infantry and 46,000 cavalry, together with 1000 war chariots. That, of course, includes the Umbrians and Tuscans who are represented as taking part in the battle. And by way of increasing the Roman strength they tell us that Lucius Volumnius commanded in the action as well as the consuls, and that their legions were supplemented by his army. ”

“ The Samnite army had come to them completely provided with arms and a war chest, and were ready to follow them at once, even if they led them to an attack on Rome itself.
17 While they were thus busy with their intrigues in Etruria the warfare which the Romans were carrying on in Samnium was terribly destructive. When P. Decius had ascertained through his scouts the departure of the Samnite army he summoned a council of war. "Why," he asked, "are we foaming through the country districts, making war only upon the villages? Why are we not attacking the walled cities? ”

“ The Etruscans derived encouragement from this incident, for they took it as an omen, and declared that the gods were fighting for them. When the sad news reached Rome, not only was the loss of the man severely felt, but also the inopportuneness of the time when it occurred. The senate were prepared to order the nomination of a Dictator, but refrained from doing so as the election of a successor to the consul went quite in accordance with the wishes of the leading patricians. Every vote was given in favour of M. Valerius, the man whom the senate had decided upon as Dictator. ”

“ During that period the Samnites, fighting sometimes alone, sometimes in conjunction with other nations, had been defeated by Roman armies under Roman generals on four several occasions, at Sentinum, amongst the Paeligni, at Tifernum, and in the Stellate plains; they had lost the most brilliant general they ever possessed; they now saw their allies - Etruscans, Umbrians, Gauls - overtaken by the same fortune that they had suffered; they were unable any longer to stand either in their own strength or in that afforded by foreign arms. And yet they would not abstain from war ”

“ There is no lack of honours in Rome for the strongest and most capable men, nor is there any lack of men to win the honour." This display of modesty and unselfishness only made the popular feeling all the keener in his favour by showing how rightly it was directed. Thinking that the best way of checking it would be to appeal to the instinctive reverence for law, he ordered the law to be rehearsed which forbade any man from being re-elected consul within ten years. Owing to the clamour the law was hardly heard, and the tribunes of the plebs declared that there was no impediment here ”

“ As soon as they caught sight of the Roman standards a murmur ran through the Samnite army from the foremost to the hindmost ranks that what they feared was actually happening, the Romans were coming out to oppose their march, there was no road open even for flight, they must either fall where they were or make their escape over the bodies of their prostrate foes. ”

“ As the enemy had now no army in a condition to fight in the open field, the war could only be carried on by attacking their cities, and the sack of those which they captured would enrich the soldiers, whilst the enemy, compelled to fight for their hearths and homes, would gradually become exhausted. In pursuance of this plan the consuls sent despatches to Rome giving an account of their operations and then separated, Papirius marching to Saepinum, whilst Carvilius led his legions to the assault on Velia. ”