Roma si luptele-civile-Partea-2!

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2-Istoria ramane pasiunea mea nr 1!

“Not only did the Samnites declare their intention of waging war against Capua, but their magistrates left the council chamber, and in tones loud enough for the envoys to hear, ordered their armies to march out at once into Campanian territory and ravage it.”

The only preserved source of the First Samnite War is from Livy, and there has been some questioning of its historicity, and these will be detailed later on. Livy detailed that the spark for the war came when the Samnites attacked the Sidicini without provocation, a tribe north of Campania with their chief settlement Teanum Sidicinum. The Sidicini enlisted the aid of the Campanians, but they too were defeated and now drew the ire of the Samnites. The Samnites first seized the Tifata hills overlooking Capua, and then defeated the Campanians for a second time, now driving them inside the walls of Capua. This drove the beleaguered Campanians to now seek the aid of Rome.

The Campanian ambassadors had an audience with the Senate, and states that their famous wealth could aid the Romans in subduing their enemy, the Volsci. Nothing in Rome’s treaty with Samnium prevented a Campanian alliance, and if Rome did not support them then their strength and wealth would be added to the Samnites. After discussion, the Senate rejected the request for fear it would dishonour the treaty with Samnium. Having received the rejection, the Campanians now surrendered themselves unconditionally to Roman vassalage. Moved by this surrender, the Senate resolved that Rome’s honour now required the defence of Campania from the Samnites. This account of the Campanians surrendered to Rome is one area of Livy’s record that is questioned. Such surrenders were common, though Campania would remain a powerful entity and it is difficult to see how it was reduced so swiftly by the Samnites. One argument for revisionist history is that showing the Campanians surrendered to Rome would justify the harsh terms Rome meted out to Capua in 211 BC, following the city’s unconditional surrender after it had defected to support Hannibal following the Battle of Cannae in the Second Punic War. The surrender of the Campanians also ties into Rome’s “just war” narrative, in which authors always sought to provide a principled reason for the start of a war, rather than it just being the pursuit of a military aristocracy who found advancement through the prestige and the glory of battle.

Envoys were sent to Samnium demanding that, in view of their mutual friendship with Rome, spare territory in Campania and desist in their aggression towards Capua. They were met with a defiant response by the Samnite Assembly, declaring that not only would they continue waging war, but that their armies would immediately move to ravage Campania. Roman priests were sent out to demand redress, and when this was refused, Rome declared war on Samnium. The start of the war is also question by historians due to its similarity to the start of the Peloponnesian War, and the parallels with the Corcyean debate.

Rome triumphed in the war following a trio of victories. The Consuls for 343 BC, Marcus Valerius Corvus and Aulus Cornelius Cossus, both marched against the Samnites, Valerius to Campania and Cornelius to Samnium. A tough day of fighting saw Valerius triumph at Mt Gaurus, while the Battle of Saticula almost saw Cornelisu trapped in a mountain pass. One of his tribunes, Pulius Decius Mus, seized a hilltop with a small detachment to allow the bulk of the army to escape, before attacking the Samnites the following morning and routing them. The Samnites then besieged Suessula in eastern Campania, and Valerius marched to relieve the city. He found a lightly defended Samnite camp with most of their soldiers out foraging, and was able to rout them. This hattrick of Roman successes convinced the Falerii to convert their forty year truce into a permanent peace treaty, and for the Latins to turn their hostile attentions from Rome to the Paeligni. Carthage sent a congratulatory embassy, including a 25 lb crown for the Temple of Jupiter, and both Consuls celebrated triumphs.

Historians doubt the accuracy of the second battle, comparing it to an event in Sicily during the First Punic War in 258 BC which is strikingly similar. A Roman army was in danger of being trapped in a defile, and when a tribune led a detachment of 300 to a hilltop to divert the enemy, the tribune was the sole survivor. There are also suggestions that much of the campaign record could be a mirror of Rome post-Cannae successes against Hannibal in Italia. However the Samnites would have gained significant ground in Campania, and while the ambush is a recurrent theme, it may be more the case that is what happened when armies sought to find each other in mountainous terrain, rather than a designed tactic. It is quite common for the scouts or foragers of armies to change upon each other, and suddenly a minor skirmish sees increasing forces committed until battle is in full flow – such as happened with the first major Roman victory over the Greek phalanx at Cynoscephalae in 178 BC. As Decius became the first in his family to attain the Consulship, he likely needed some heroic act – which may have been embellished with time – to establish his credentials. Rome now had an experienced, veteran army following their campaigns against the Samnites, though as they prepared to press the case to ensure victory, they would find the war develop into an anti-climax.