early republic
entries
the farmer who saved rome
lucius quinctius cincinnatus receives absolute command as dictator in 458 bce to rescue the trapped legions. he crushes the enemy in sixteen days and astonishes the world by laying down power to return to his farm.
the end of the phalanx
in the mid-fourth century bce, in the mountains of southern italy, rome abandons the rigid spear-wall of the hoplite phalanx and reorganises its legions into maniples, articulated blocks laid out like a chessboard. the dating of that change, however, is far more schematic than it is usually told.
the father who executed his son
in 340 bce, during the latin war, the consul titus manlius torquatus orders his own son put to death for having won a duel without permission. from that severity a proverb was born, the "manlian discipline".
the sacrifice to the underworld
in 340 bce, with the roman left wing giving way before the latins at the foot of vesuvius, the consul publius decius mus covered his head and charged alone at the enemy, offering himself in the devotio to the gods of the underworld in exchange for victory.
the shame of the caudine forks
in 321 bce, in a defile of the apennines, two roman consular armies are trapped with no way out. the samnite general gaius pontius does not kill them: he forces them to surrender their arms and pass under the yoke, the worst affront a roman soldier could suffer.
the great coalition against rome
in 295 bce, samnites, gauls, etruscans and umbrians joined forces to annihilate rome on the plain of sentinum. the consul publius decius mus repeated his father's devotio and offered himself to the gods of death; the victory sealed roman hegemony over italy.
the oath of the linen legion
at aquilonia, in 293 bce, the samnite aristocracy shut its best men inside a linen enclosure and made them swear to die before they fled. the consul lucius papirius cursor discovered that fanaticism does not stop a well-drilled legion.
the fifth secession and the law that levelled
in 287 bce the plebs abandons rome for the last time and encamps on the janiculum. to bring it back, the dictator quintus hortensius enacts the lex hortensia, which turns plebiscites into binding law for everyone and closes two centuries of the conflict of the orders.