BOOK LXXXV.
Sylla entered Italy at the head of an army, and defeated in a battle Norbanus, the consul, by whom his ambassadors, sent to negotiate a peace, had been maltreated. Having ineffectually tried every means with Lucius Scipio, the other consul, to bring about a peace, he prepared to attack his camp, when the consul’s whole army deserted to Sylla, having been seduced by some soldiers sent out by him. Scipio was set free, when he could have been killed. Cneius Pompeius, the son of Pompeius, who took Asculum, raised an army of volunteers, and went over to Sylla with three legions; also the whole body of the nobility quit the city and joined his camp. Sundry actions in different parts of Italy are recorded in the book.
BOOK LXXXVI.
While Caius Marius, son of Caius Marius, was made consul [y. r. 670. b. c. 82] by force, before he was twenty years old, Caius Fabius was burned alive in his tent, in Africa, for his avarice and extortion. Lucius Philippus, Sylla’s lieutenant-general, having overthrown and killed the prætor, Quintus Antonius, took Sardinia. Sylla made a league with the states of Italy, lest he should be suspected of intending to deprive them of their constitution and the right of suffrage, which had been lately conceded to them. So confident was he of the victory, that he published an order that all persons engaged in lawsuits, bound by sureties, should make their appearance at Rome, although the city was yet in the possession of the opposite party. Lucius Damasippus, the prætor, having called together the senate, at the desire of Marius, murdered such of the nobility as remained in the city; among them Quintus Mucius Scævola, the high priest, who, endeavouring to make his escape, was killed in the vestibule of the temple of Vesta. Besides, it includes an account of the war in Asia against Mithridates, renewed by Lucius Muræna.
BOOK LXXXVII.
Sylla, having conquered and destroyed Caius Marius’s army, at Sacriportus, laid siege to Præneste, where Marius had taken refuge. He recovered Rome out of the hands of his enemies. Marius attempting to break forth from Præneste, was repelled. This book moreover contains an account of the successes of the different commanders under him, every where.