Ancient Rome: An Introductory History (20 page)

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altars, and around them were slaughtered victims and centurions with their swords drawn. More like a sacrificial victim than a participant in a sacred rite, each man was moved to the altar and there he was forced to swear that he would tell no one what he had seen and heard there. They also forced him to swear some terrible oath that called for a curse on his head, his family, and all his kin if he either fled from battle or did not immediately kill anyone he saw fleeing from battle. At first, some men refused to take that oath; they were instantly slain around the altar and, lying there dead among the various sacrificial victims, served as a warning to the others not to refuse to take the oath. Once the foremost Samnites had been bound by this oath, ten of them were named by the commander, and each of them was ordered to pick a man until their number amounted to sixteen thousand. They were called the Linen Legion after the covering of the enclosure where the nobles had taken their oaths. Special weapons and crested helmets were given to them, so that they would stand out from the others. (Livy X.38.5-13)

That was merely a part of the Smite army that the Romans were facing at the Battle at Aquilonia. The battle started badly for the Romans, for the keepers of the sacred chickens (birds that showed the goodwill of the gods by eating their grain and the displeasure of the gods by not eating) had lied about the auspices; the general, hearing that the keepers had falsely reported good auspices, simply noted that the liars brought the gods' retribution on their own heads, and placed them in the front lines. Before the battle started, the keeper who had lied was killed by a randomly thrown javelin. "The gods are here in the battle," cried the general on hearing this news, "and the guilty one has his punishment!" (Livy X.40.13).

The battle was hard, and although the Romans were winning, they were facing a formidable enemy. The consul Papirius had told the other consul, who was besieging a town miles away, to send cavalry to help him; when the Romans were winning, their cavalry came to take the Samnites in the rear. The cavalry also fooled the Samnites, for riding with the cavalry were servants on donkeys, trailing leafy branches along the ground, to raise the kind of dust storm that a huge body of cavalry would raise; terrified at the

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thought of being taken in the rear by a huge cavalry, the Samnites lost the battle.

The Romans did not stop with taking the Samnites' camp. They destroyed the Samnites' towns of Aquilonia and Cominium, and continued ravaging Samnite territory. The Samnites held out for three more years, finally seeking peace from the Romans in 290
B.C.

After establishing Roman supremacy in Samnium, the Romans changed the name of one of the Samnites' main cities, Malventum. This Oscan name in Latin sounds like "bad arrival," a terrible omen, so the Romans changed it to a more positive-sounding name, Beneventum, meaning "welcome."

The Romans continued their operations in Etruria for some time, mopping up the last remaining areas of rebellion, and beating back the Gauls. The other subject allies remained quiet for the time.

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Chapter 12
King Pyrrhus' Pyrrhic Victories

Tarentum, a Creek city in the instep of Italy, had been founded in 706
B.C.
and still had close ties to cities in mainland Greece. As the Romans extended their influence into southern Italy in the fourth century, they signed a treaty with Tarentum. In 282
B.C.
, however, when some Roman ships passed through Tarentine waters, the Tarentines, thinking that the Romans had broken the treaty, attacked the ships; the ships were seized, their sailors taken captive, and their commander killed in battle. The Romans at that time were still fighting against the Etruscans and Gauls, and did not want another war on their hands. So they sent ambassadors to propose that the Tarentines simply release the captives and the ships, and pay restitution. The Tarentines refused. The Romans next sent the consul Aemilius Barbula with his army; his orders, however, were only to negotiate a peace with the Tarentines. The negotiations were unsuccessful.

The Tarentines, worried about facing a war with the increasingly powerful Rome, called upon the assistance of Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, a kingdom in northwest Greece; he had a reputation as an excellent general. The Tarentines promised to provide him with an army of Tarentines, Lucanians, Samnites, and Messapians, all enemies of Rome, to augment the army that he would bring from Epirus.

Pyrrhus crossed over to Tarentum with twenty-five thousand soldiers and twenty elephants in 280
B.C.
He immediately closed Tarentum's parks and
palaestrae
(places for exercise), and prohibited parties and festivals, maintaining that the Tarentines were not capable of saving themselves or of being saved: Apparently

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they needed discipline. The Tarentines were not pleased, but Pyrrhus now controlled their city.

Pyrrhus and the Romans fought their first battle that same year at Heraclea. There the Romans encountered elephants for the first time, when Pyrrhus used them to smash the lines of the Roman legions. Reportedly the Romans lost seven thousand soldiers, while Pyrrhus lost four thousand of his best men. Pyrrhus won the battle, but at a great cost.

The Romans sent ambassadors to Pyrrhus to discuss the ransom for the Roman and Italian prisoners he was holding. One of the ambassadors was Fabricius, who was famous among his countrymen for his great poverty and his honesty. Meeting with the ambassadors, Pyrrhus was surprised to find that they were not seeking peace; after all, hadn't the Romans just been defeated? He offered to make peace and to release the prisoners, and he also offered "gifts"bribes, in other wordsto speed the negotiations along. Fabricius responded to Pyrrhus' offer:

"Pyrrhus, I applaud you for desiring peace, and I will bring it about, if it will help us. Since I am, as you say, an honorable man, you won't think it right for me to do anything against my country. Nor could I take any of those things which you are offering. I ask you, then, whether or not you really consider me an honorable man. After all, if I am not an honorable man, why do you think me worthy of gifts? If I am honorable, why do you urge me to take the gifts? Let me assure you that I have many things and that I do not need more. What I have now is enough, and I do not want anything that belongs to somebody else. Even though you consider yourself so rich, you are really very poor, for you would not have left Epirus and your possessions to come over here if you were satisfied with them and weren't trying for more. The man who lives in such a way and puts no end to his desire for more is the poorest of the poor." (Zonaras 8.4)

Pyrrhus then sent his officer Cineas to Rome with gifts to distribute to other Roman senators and their wives, figuring that the women would pressure their husbands into making peace with Pyrrhus. Influenced by the gifts, many Romans adopted a kinder attitude toward Pyrrhus, and the Senate met to discuss making peace. During the discussion of the terms, by which Pyrrhus would

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pledge his support to Rome against the Gauls in exchange for Rome's grant of security and autonomy to Tarentum, the aged Appius Claudius Caecus (
caecus
means "blind") stood up and gave a stinging speech, which began with these words: "Romans, before this, I have been afflicted with bad luck as far as my eyes go, but now I am pained that, in addition to being blind, I am not deaf too, since I am hearing your disgraceful discussions and opinions which are destroying Rome's reputation." He concluded by saying, "Don't think that once you have made Pyrrhus your friend you'll get rid of him. Instead, you'll bring on yourself all those who have no respect for you, thinking that you're easy to beat, if Pyrrhus leaves without suffering the consequences for the wrongs that he has committed against you. He has even received pay, since the Tarentines and Samnites have come to sneer at the Romans'' (Plutarch,
Pyrrhus
XIX.3).

Moved by this speech, the senators sent the reply to Pyrrhus that they would not negotiate peace with him until he had left Italy. While in Rome Cineas observed the Roman Senate, and on his return remarked to Pyrrhus that the Senate seemed like an assembly of kings, so great was the dignity and bearing of its members.

The next year, when Fabricius was consul, Pyrrhus' own doctor wrote to Fabricius offering to poison the king for the right price. Fabricius then wrote to Pyrrhus informing him of the doctor's offer to betray him: "You are waging war against just and honorable men, while you put your trust in evil and unjust men" (Plutarch,
Pyrrhus
XXI.2). Pyrrhus, in gratitude, released his Roman prisoners without ransom. The Romans, not wishing to receive any favors from him, released an equal number of prisoners whom they were holding.

Pyrrhus then proceeded north, where he and the Romans fought another battle in 279
B.C.
, at Ausculum. Again Pyrrhus won, but again at a heavy cost, for the Romans could, without great difficulty, replace the six thousand soldiers whom they lost in the battle, while Pyrrhus would be hard pressed to replace the thirty-five hundred men he had lost. Thus the term
Pyrrhic victory
came into English: Pyrrhus won the battles, but his heavy losses turned his victories into defeats, for he could not recover from his victories. Cineas had already warned Pyrrhus that he was fighting with the Lernaean Hydra, the many-headed creature that grows

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