Book 17

1.1. The Samnite war was kindled afresh, taking its beginning from a cause of this kind. After the treaty which the Samnites had made with the city of Rome, holding off for a short time, they marched against the Lucanians, who were their neighbors, moved by some old enmity.

1.2. At the outset, then, the Lucanians, trusting in their own forces, carried on the war; but coming off the worse in all the battles, and having already lost much territory and being in danger as to all the rest of their land, they were compelled to take refuge in the help of the Romans, conscious within themselves that they had broken the agreements which they had previously made with them, in which they had entered into friendship and alliance, yet not despairing of winning them over, if they should send from every city their most distinguished sons as hostages together with the envoys—which indeed

1.3. came to pass. For when the envoys arrived and made many entreaties, the senate resolved to accept the hostages and to join friendship with the Lucanians, and the

1.4. people ratified what had been decreed by it. When the compact had been made with the men sent by the Lucanians, the oldest and most honored of the Romans, chosen by the senate as envoys, were dispatched to the common council of the Samnites, to make plain to them that the Lucanians were friends and allies of the Romans, and to urge them both to give back the territory of which they happened to have deprived them and to do no further deed of enemies, since the city of Rome would not look on while its own suppliants were driven out of their own land.

2.1. The Samnites, on hearing the envoys, were indignant and made their defense, saying first that they had not concluded the agreements concerning peace upon this condition, that they should hold no one their own friend or enemy unless the Romans bade them; and next that the Romans had not earlier made the Lucanians friends, but had done so only recently, when they were already their own enemies, contriving a pretext neither just nor seemly

2.2. for breaking the treaty. And when the Romans answered that subjects who had agreed to follow them and, on these just terms, had brought the war to an end must obey in all things those who had received the sovereignty; and threatened, if they would not do what was commanded of their own accord, to make war upon them,

2.3. the Samnites, holding the arrogance of the city unbearable, ordered the envoys to depart at once, and themselves voted to make ready for war both in common and city by city.

3.1. The open pretext of the Samnite war, then, and one seemly to be alleged before all, was the aid given to the Lucanians who had taken refuge with them—as though this were a common and ancestral custom of the city of Rome, to help those who were wronged and took refuge with it; but the hidden one, which rather compelled them to dissolve the friendship, was the strength of the Samnites, already grown great and reckoned likely to grow still greater, since, once the Lucanians had been subdued and through them their neighbors, the barbarian peoples adjoining these were bound to follow. So immediately after the arrival of the envoys the treaty was dissolved, and two armies were enrolled.

4.1. Postumius the consul, as the time for his successor drew near, was high-minded about himself both because of the dignity of his family and because he had now been honored with two consulships,

4.2. at which his colleague at the outset was indignant, as one shut out from his equal share, and often spoke before the senate of his just claims against him; but afterward, recognizing that he himself had less strength both in the weight of ancestors and in the multitude of friends and in his other resources—for he was a man of the people and one of those but lately come into notice—he yielded to his colleague and gave over to him the command of the Samnite war.

4.3. This was the first thing that brought reproach upon Postumius, done with great arrogance; and then again upon this a second thing more grievous than befits a Roman commander. For choosing from his own army about two thousand men, he led them off to his private estates and ordered them to clear a wood without the use of iron. And for a long time he kept the men on his lands, performing the work of laborers and servants.

4.4. Having behaved with such arrogance before the campaign, he showed himself still more grievous in what was done during the campaign itself, and gave the senate and the people just grounds for hatred. For Fabius, who had been consul the year before and had conquered those of the Samnites called the Pentri, when the senate had voted that he should remain with the army and, holding the proconsular office, wage war against this division of the Samnites, Postumius sent a letter ordering him to withdraw from Samnium, on the ground that the command belonged to himself alone.

4.5. And to the envoys sent by the council, who asked him not to hinder the proconsul from remaining with the army nor to act against what they had decreed, he gave haughty and tyrannical answers, declaring that the senate did not rule him so long as he was consul, but that he ruled the senate.

4.6. Having dismissed the envoys, he led his army against Fabius, intending, if Fabius would not willingly give up the command, to compel him by arms. Finding him encamped before the city of Cominium, he forced him out of the camp with great disdain of ancient usages and dreadful arrogance. Fabius, yielding to his madness, withdrew from the command.

5.1. The same Postumius first took Cominium by siege, having spent not much time in the assaults; then Venusia, populous, and very many other cities besides, from which ten thousand were slain and six thousand

5.2. two hundred surrendered their arms. Yet for accomplishing these things he was deemed worthy by the senate of no thanks or honor; nay, he even lost the dignity he already possessed. For when twenty thousand colonists were being sent to one of the cities he had captured, the one called Venusia, others were chosen as leaders of the colony; and he who had taken the city and had himself proposed the sending of the settlers was deemed unworthy even of this honor.

5.3. Now if he had borne what befell him with prudent reasoning and had soothed the harshness of the council by services of friendly words and deeds, he would have experienced no further misfortune leading to disgrace. But as it was, indignant and harsh in return, he bestowed upon his soldiers all the spoils he had taken from the enemy, and before his successor in the command was dispatched he released his forces from the standards, and at the last led home, on his own authority, a triumph which neither the senate nor the people had granted him.

5.4. When upon all these things a still greater hatred had been kindled from all sides, no sooner had he handed over his office to the consuls who succeeded him than he was brought to public trial by two tribunes of the people. And being accused before the people, he was condemned by all the tribes, the indictment carrying a monetary penalty of five hundred thousand of silver.