General History for Colleges and High Schools

by P. V. N. Myers

WARS FOR THE MASTERY OF ITALY.

THE FIRST SAMNITE WAR (343-341 B.C.).—The union of the two orders in the state allowed the Romans now to employ their undivided strength in subjugating the different states of the peninsula. The most formidable competitors of the Romans for supremacy in Italy were the Samnites, rough and warlike mountaineers who held the Apennines to the east of Latium. They were worthy rivals of the "children of Mars." The successive struggles between these martial races are known as the First, Second, and Third Samnite wars. They extended over a period of half a century, and in their course involved almost all the states of Italy.

Of the first of this series of wars we know very little, although Livy wrote a long, but unfortunately very unreliable, narration of it. In the midst of the struggle, Rome was confronted by a dangerous revolt of her Latin allies, and, leaving the war unfinished, turned her forces upon the insurgents.

REVOLT OF THE LATIN CITIES (340-338 B.C.).—The strife between the Romans and their Latin allies was simply the old contest within the walls of the capital between the patricians and the plebeians transferred to a larger arena. As the nobles had oppressed the commons, so now both these orders united in the oppression of the Latins—the plebeians in their bettered circumstances forgetting the lessons of adversity. The Latin allies demanded a share in the government, and that the lands acquired by conquest should be distributed among them as well as among Roman citizens. The Romans refused. All Latium rose in revolt against the injustice and tyranny of the oppressor.

After about three years' hard fighting, the rebellion was subdued. The Latin League was now broken up. Some of the towns retained their independence (Tibur, Præneste, and Cora); some received full Roman citizenship (Aricia, Lanuvium, and Nomentum); while others received only the private rights of Roman citizens, the right of suffrage being withheld.

SECOND AND THIRD SAMNITE WARS (326-290 B.C.).—In a few years after the close of the Latin contest, the Romans were at war again with their old rivals, the Samnites. Notwithstanding the latter were thoroughly defeated in this second contest, still it was not long before they were again in arms and engaged in their third struggle with Rome. This time they had formed a powerful coalition which embraced the Etruscans, the Umbrians, the Gauls, and other nations.

Roman courage rose with the danger. The united armies of the league met with a most disastrous defeat (at Sentinum, 295 B.C.), and the power of the coalition was broken. One after another the states that had joined the alliance were chastised, and the Samnites were forced to acknowledge the supremacy of Rome. A few years later, almost all of the Greek cities of Southern Italy, save Tarentum, also came under the growing power of the imperial city.

WAR WITH PYRRHUS (282-272 B.C.).—Tarentum was one of the most noted of the Hellenic cities of Magna Græcia. It was a seaport on the Calabrian coast, and had grown opulent through the extended trade of its merchants. The capture of some Roman vessels, and an insult offered to an envoy of the republic by the Tarentines, led to a declaration of war against them by the Roman Senate. The Tarentines turned to Greece for aid. Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, a cousin of Alexander the Great, who had an ambition to build up such an empire in the West as his renowned kinsman had established in the East, responded to their entreaties, and crossed over into Italy with a small army of Greek mercenaries and twenty war- elephants. He organized and drilled the effeminate Tarentines, and soon felt prepared to face the Romans.

The hostile armies met at Heraclea (280 B.C.). It is said that when Pyrrhus, who had underestimated his foe, observed the skill which the Romans evinced in forming their line of battle, he exclaimed, in admiration, "In war, at least, these men are not barbarians." The battle was won for Pyrrhus by his war-elephants, the sight of which, being new to the Romans, caused them to flee from the field in dismay. But Pyrrhus had lost thousands of his bravest troops. Victories gained by such losses in a country where he could not recruit his army, he saw clearly, meant final defeat. As he looked over the battle-field, he is said to have turned to his companions and remarked, "Another such victory, and I must return to Epirus alone." He noticed also, and not without appreciating its significance, that the wounds of the Roman soldiers killed in the action were all in front. "Had I such soldiers," said he, "I should soon be master of the world."

The prudence of the victorious Pyrrhus led him to send to the Romans an embassy with proposals of peace. When the Senate hesitated, its resolution was fixed by the eloquence of the aged Appius: "Rome," exclaimed he, "shall never treat with a victorious foe." The ambassadors were obliged to return to Pyrrhus unsuccessful in their mission.

Pyrrhus, according to the Roman story-tellers, who most lavishly embellished this chapter of their history, was not more successful in attempts at bribery than in the arts of negotiation. Upon his attempting by large offers of gold to win Fabricius, who had been intrusted by the Senate with an important embassy, the sturdy old Roman replied, "Poverty, with an honest name, is more to be desired than wealth."

After a second victory, as disastrous as his first, Pyrrhus crossed over into Sicily, to aid the Grecians there in their struggle with the Carthaginians. At first he was everywhere successful; but finally fortune turned against him, and he was glad to escape from the island. Recrossing the straits into Italy, he once more engaged the Romans, but at the battle of Beneventum suffered a disastrous and final defeat at the hands of the consul Curius Dentatus (274 B.C.). Leaving a sufficient force to garrison Tarentum, the baffled and disappointed king set sail for Epirus. He had scarcely embarked before Tarentum surrendered to the Romans (272 B.C.). This ended the struggles for the mastery of Italy. Rome was now mistress of all the peninsula south of the Arnus and the Rubicon. It was now her care to consolidate these possessions, and to fasten her hold upon them, by means of a perfect network of colonies and military roads. [Footnote: "Colonies were not all of the same character. They must be distinguished into two classes—the colonies of Roman citizens and the Latin colonies. The colonies of Roman citizens consisted usually of three hundred men of approved military experience, who went forth with their families to occupy conquered cities of no great magnitude, but which were important as military positions, being usually on the sea-coast. These three hundred families formed a sort of patrician caste, while the old inhabitants sank into the condition formerly occupied by the plebeians at Rome. The heads of these families retained all their rights as Roman citizens, and might repair to Rome to vote in the popular assemblies."—Liddell's History of Rome.

The Latin colonies numbered about thirty at the time of the Second Punic War. A few of these were colonies that had been founded by the old Latin Confederacy; but the most were towns that had been established by Rome subsequent to the dissolution of the League (see p. 244). The term Latin was applied to these later colonies of purely Roman origin, for the reason that they enjoyed the same rights as the Latin towns that had retained their independence. Thus the inhabitants of a Latin colony possessed some of the most valuable of the private rights of Roman citizens, but they had no political rights at the capital.]