The Partial Historians

396 BCE is finally here! Rome and Veii have been locked in a competition for space and resources for quite some time and it seems like the tide is about to turn. The year 396 BCE is perhaps one of the most significant years for Rome’s history in the early republic. Given the events at play, this episode is considering how the year begins and it might not be quite the thrills you might expect…

Episode 158 – The Fall of Veii – Part I

What’s going on with Rome’s magistrates?

The situation with Roman magistrates in 396 BCE is quite complicated. We spend some time considering some of the challenges we face with the evidence. There seems to have been some problems with the military tribunes which leads to a changing of the guard. There also seems to be great fondness for the plebeian military tribune with consular power, Publius Licinius Calvus Esquilinus, but is he really fit for public duties? We consider the details.

The challenges of our sources

While Livy is providing plenty of narrative material for 396 BCE, every other ancient source seems only interested in some of the big ticket events and not the finer details of family politics in Rome. How can we reconcile these different accounts? We’ll try our best!

Success is not assured…

Rome gets off to a bad start in 396 BCE with a botched Roman ambush led by Genucius and Titinius. After waiting so long with the siege business, it seems a couple of the military tribunes with consular power decide that a little bit of action might be preferable. But things do not go according to plan… it’s only a matter of time for panic to set in among the citizens.

Things to listen out for

• The gradual Etrurian retreat from Campania in favour of the north


• Some of the significant moments between Veii and Rome over the years including the challenges of the Fabian gens at Cremera (see Episode 82 – Fabian Demise), and the death of the king of Veii Lars Tolumnius (see Episode 129 – Lars Tolumnius and the Fate of Fidenae)


• The emphasis in the annalist tradition on the TEN years of conflict between Rome and Veii and the questions that might be asked about this


• The apparent lack of broader support for Veii from Etruscan city-states further north


• Rome’s fondness for building up their enemies in their histories and other written evidence


• Chronological issues with the source material? Shock! Horror!


• Does Livy have a penchant for family histories? Licinius Macer is worth a mention


• Periander as Greek inspiration for Calvus?


• Homeric parallels!


• Igor taking a short break

Our Players for 396 BCE

Military Tribunes with Consular Power

• Lucius Titinius L. f. M’. n. Pansa Saccus


• Publius Licinius P. f. P. n. Calvus Esquilinus (Mr Original Plebeian in the role according to Livy)


• Publius Maelius Sp. f. C. n. Capitolinus


• Quintus Manlius A. f. Cn. n. Vulso Capitolinus? (Pat)


• Gnaeus Genucius M. f. M. n. Augurinus


• Lucius Atilius L. f. L. n. Priscus

Dictator

• Marcus Furius L. f. Sp. n. Camillus (Pat)

Master of the Horse

• Publius Cornelius P. f. M. n. Maluginensis (Pat)

Interreges

• Lucius Valerius (Potitus) (Pat)


• Quintus Servilius Fidenas (Pat)


• Marcus Furius Camillus (Pat)

Our Sources

• Dr Rad reads Livy, 5.18.2-12


• Dr G reads Dionysius of Halicarnassus 12.13-16 and 13.1-3; Plutarch Life of Camillus 5-8; Diodorus Siculus 14.90.1; 14.93.2-3; Valerius Maximus 1.5.2; 1.8.3; Pliny Natural History 33.111; Appian Ital. 8; Florus 1.17; Aulus Gellius Attic Nights 17.21; Eutropius 1.20; [Aurelius Victor] De virus illustribus 23; Augustine The City of God 2.17; Orosius 2.19.1-4; Zonaras 7.21


• Bradley, G. 2020. Early Rome to 290 BC: The Beginnings of the City and the Rise of the Republic (Edinburgh University Press).


• Broughton, T. R. S., Patterson, M. L. 1951. The Magistrates of the Roman Republic Volume 1: 509 B.C. – 100 B.C. (The American Philological Association)


• Cornell, T. J. 1995. The Beginnings of Rome: Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars (c. 1000-264 BC) (Taylor & Francis)


• Forsythe, G. 2006. A Critical History of Early Rome: From Prehistory to the First Punic War (University of California Press)


• Lomas, Kathryn (2018). The Rise of Rome: From the Iron Age to the Punic Wars. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.


• Ogilvie, R. M. 1965. A Commentary on Livy: Books 1-5 (Clarendon Press).


• Raaflaub, K. A. 2006. Social struggles in archaic Rome: new perspectives on the conflict of the orders (2nd ed). (Wiley).


• Smith, C. 2019. ‘Furius Camillus and Veii’, in Taboli, J., Cerasuolo, O. (eds.) Veii (University of Texas Press), 219-224.

Sound Credits

Our music is composed by the amazing Bettina Joy de Guzman. Additional sound effects from the BBC Sound Library,

Partial Reconstruction of a Temple at Veii – Photo credit to ArtSupp.

Automated Transcript

Lighted edited for our wonderful Australian accents.

Dr Rad 0:15
Welcome to the Partial Historians.

Dr G 0:19
We explore all the details of ancient Rome.

Dr Rad 0:23
Everything from political scandals, the love affairs, the battled wage and when citizens turn against each other. I’m Dr Rad

Dr G 0:33
And I’m Dr G, we consider Rome as the Romans saw it, by reading different authors from the ancient past and comparing their stories.

Dr Rad 0:44
Join us as we trace the journey of Rome from the founding of the city. Hello and welcome to a brand new episode of the Partial Historians. I am one of your hosts, Dr Rad

Dr G 1:05
and I am Dr G and I am so excited for this episode, because we are hitting a bonanza of a year. It is 396 BCE and oh boy. After a long time of not a lot happening, except people sitting around in a siege. I think something might be about to happen, Dr Rad.

Dr Rad 1:26
I think you might be right. Dr G, oh, it’s been 10 long, wintry years.

Dr G 1:31
Yeah, look, I’ve grown a whole fur coat in that period of time, and it’s not going away.

Dr Rad 1:38
Oh, Dr G, this is a big year. And you know, I was saying to you the other day off mic, that it feels a bit like our podcast journey sometimes oddly mirrors that of ancient Rome, because during the early republic, due to locations of recordings being switched around and issues with microphones, etc, etc, we had some ups and downs in terms of our experimentation with the show, and I feel like we’ve got it all sorted out just in time for 396 which you could kind of see as one of the most important years in early Republican history, I think.

Dr G 2:16
This is a massive time, so we’re building the hype, and I don’t think that this is something that we’re over hyping at all. This is actually going to be an exceptional time in Rome’s history, and the Romans know it as well. Just to put that out there, maybe a little bit too much, they are well aware, and when they write their histories about this time period, there is a great consistency to the sorts of things that they talk about. So I’m looking forward to delving into that. But perhaps we should do a bit of a where are we at recap, before we dive in.

Dr Rad 2:54
You read my mind, I was going to say I know we did talk. I know that every time Veii has come up, we have talked about the relationship between Rome and Veii, but this is the last time that we’re probably going to really need to do this, and it is the end of the big conflict, the big feud. So I do think a recap is in order.

Dr G 3:17
Veii? Who are you and why do you exist?

Dr Rad 3:22
Why are you so far south? Why can’t you be further north, like all the rest of the Etruscan cities?

Dr G 3:27
Well, the thing about Eturia as a kind of a group of people is that they used to be much further south than they appear to be by the time we get into Roman history proper. So as far as we’re aware, there’s good evidence for the Villanovan culture, which is the precursor to Etruscan culture. Archeologically, as far down as Campania, which is, you know, the Amalfi Coast, Naples, Positano, Pompeii, Herculaneum…

Dr Rad 3:57
All the gorgeous places to go on holiday.

Dr G 3:59
Exactly. And so Etruria actually extended right through the region where Rome has sort of popped up like a little city state mushroom. And now we’re dealing with what is a legacy of kind of a fallout of many centuries of Etruscan retreat out of the south and the more substantial investment that they’ve had in their northern places of influence, so all the way up to what is now modern Milan, for instance.

Dr Rad 4:30
Yes, this is true, and we have seen some really interesting dynamics between the Etruscans and the Romans over the centuries. If we go back to our beloved regal period, Dr G, although we don’t know exactly what was going on with those last few things, with those last few kings.

Dr G 4:48
Oh, those guys

Dr Rad 4:49
Yeah, those guys, those things, yeah, those things, the kings, we certainly know that there’s obviously an interesting relationship between Etruria and Rome at that time period. Was it an invasion? Was it a hostile takeover? Did the Romans welcome them with open arms? We’ll never know.

Dr G 5:11
But there’s certainly lots of parallels in terms of the cultural exchange that seems to have gone on between early Romans and the Etruscans, and the fact that this rivalry between Rome and Veii has taken the shape that it has is mostly to do with their proximity to each other and the competition for local resources. So one of the things that has been a source of conflict is control of the salt pans at Ostia as the river hits the Mediterranean Sea, there’s been competition about that they used to control it. Rome eventually seems to have taken over. Veii is pretty unhappy about that. And then we do see increasing violence across the fifth century BCE, where the archeology suggests that there is ongoing raiding across both sides, and a lot of that agricultural land that sits in between these two places, which are a mere few kilometers away from each other, has produced this sort of escalation in violence across the century. And now here we are at the moment of a siege, which has been taking place for years now. Rome’s been sitting outside the gates of a being like hand over the keys, and the Etruscans inside. They are like, Not on your life.

Dr Rad 6:33
Well, this is the thing ,Veii is fairly well positioned in terms of the you know, this speaks to the fact that the Romans couldn’t just waltz in and take it. And so there’s probably no doubt that there was really a lengthy siege between Rome and Veii at this moment. However, was it a neat little 10 years as Livy wants us to think, Dr G?

Dr G 6:57
Well, I think that’s debatable. There’s obviously a lot of incentive to draw that Trojan War comparison that I think Livy explicitly references as well at some point. So, yeah, good times for the Romans.

Dr Rad 7:13
Yes, exactly. Yeah. So there’s some questions about the exact length of this siege, but a lengthy siege, I think would be an order, given how well positioned Veii is, and we have seen conflict throughout the early republic with Veii, Dr G, just a quick reminder of some of the biggest hits.

Dr G 7:33
Yes, please.

Dr Rad 7:34
483 to 474. That’s when we had the first conflict between Rome and Veii. And the Romans weren’t always beaten, but that was, of course, the time period where there was a fairly significant defeat with the fabulous Fabians, where we had a family that was almost entirely wiped out when they tried to take on they on behalf of Rome.

Dr G 8:00
Yeah, so we get this sense that we’ve got elite families acting as local war bands in the region, and presumably they is touching on Fabian interests in the area. But Cremera is a sad day for the Fabians. And fabulous or not, they mostly don’t make it through.

Dr Rad 8:21
Exactly. So doesn’t end that well for Rome on that particular point, because that becomes a pretty infamous moment in Roman history. However, when we get to the 430s we have another conflict with Veii, and this, of course, involves the possession of Fidenae, which is tossed backwards and forwards between Roman ve throughout the years. And this is where we get the murder of those Roman ambassadors at Veii. And then in the conflict that ensued, we see the king of Veii, Lars Tolumnius, slain by Cossus.

Dr G 8:58
Stabbed right through the groin. Yeah, what a time to be alive. So Fidenae, as far as we understand it from the archeological record, seems to also have been a mostly Etruscan populated area. So Rome has this real incentive as a sort of buffer zone, to take Fidenae, try to re populate it with Romans, colonialism, colonialism… and to create that sort of buffer point for themselves so that they can easily move forward towards they so the competition is really hotting up between these two by the time we get to what happens with Fidenae, and then also the devastation of they losing a king. And this feeds into a broader understanding of how are the Etruscans running themselves. And one of the narrative features of Rome’s conversation about the Etruscans is that the Etruscans have a group of 12 kings, and that’s kind of the leadership circle that runs everything. But it seems like what we can tell from the Etruscans is that there are a loose collection of city states that share some cultural interests. They have different leaders within the particular city states themselves who come together to talk about things. Now, whether that number is precisely 12 or some other number which isn’t quite as pretty from a Roman perspective, I don’t know.

Dr Rad 10:36
This is the big question. And then, of course, we’ve got the final conflict, the 10 year – asterix asterix – siege of Veii which is coming to an end in this particular year. Now, the interesting thing is that in this 10 years, we have seen they been continually rebuffed by its Etruscan sister, states, Sister cities. And this is something that the Romans, I think, find a bit puzzling, as well as modern scholars like ourselves. But I think that speaks to what you were just saying. The Etruscan cities are not a country or a nation in the way that we would understand it. In fact, even the way that they are represented in our sources might be a little bit questionable. We have these regular meetings where they all come together and they talk about matters that concern the Etruscan community. And this is where they says, Hey, I think I’ve got some remnants camped on my doorstep, little help. And the Etruscan saying, No. What some scholars have theorized is that maybe this collection was actually more religious in nature, or something along those lines, but it’s been painted as more of a military or political alliance because the Romans maybe wanted to build up the nature of the threat that they were facing in taking on Veii.

Dr G 12:04
Okay. This is a classic Roman literary trope, which, like listeners, need to be aware of, because the Romans will do this at every opportunity. There is nothing more satisfying than winning against a very worthy opponent. So it’s not cool to, like, just beat up your neighbors and be like, I did it, and everyone like you’re a bully. So it’s much better if you can be like, Look, these guys were aggressive. They’re a really potent force to have to deal with. They’ve got lots of friends in the north, but they’re not chipping in because they know these guys are on the wrong side of things, and they should just be bowing down to Rome at this point. So it produces a kind of narrative that allows Roman citizens to feel good about the violence that they do to other people. And I suppose if this was a more modern period in history, you might start to think of this as a kind of like military nationalism. This is not how the ancient Romans would have thought about it, but it certainly has that kind of quality to it where it’s about justification. It’s about being proud of the violence that you’re able to do, and that means that the enemy has to be worthy of being conquered in the first place.

Dr Rad 13:25
Absolutely. And what you just highlighted there again is that there have been all these supernatural signs as well that things are about to happen. The game is afoot, Dr. G.

Dr G 13:37
The gods are watching.

Dr Rad 13:40
We’ve seen in previous years, you know, the Romans needing to consult the Sibylline Books to go to the Delphic Oracle. We’ve seen the flooding of the Alban lake and the fact that the Romans need to, you know, fulfill a certain act in order to, in order for Veii to fall, you know, they’ve, we’ve seen them also trying to get the gods back on side. There’s been various things that they’ve had to do in terms of the spiritual world. And it’s possibly that actually what people like the later analysts had to work with, and the analysts of the people that Livy and Dionysus are working from, we presume they might have actually been working from probably your favorite source, Dr G, priestley records, who were keeping track of these big religious moments and developments which supposedly happened at around this time, and that might be part of that important skeleton that they’re working from. And then lean into epics a little bit.

Dr G 14:36
Just few details here and there. That’s fine,

Dr Rad 14:38
Yeah, just yeah. We’ll add in like a massive hero, and I’ll throw some Trojan war on top. You know, nothing, nothing too crazy.

Dr G 14:47
Get it all in there. Yeah, let’s make this a rousing read as well as an exciting time for the gods.

Dr Rad 14:55
All right, Dr G, so here we are. I think it’s time to actually dive in to 396. In the grand tradition of our podcast, please tell me who were the magistrates in this most momentous of years.

Dr G 15:46
Oh, this year is full of names. My God, there are so many. First of all, we’ve got military tribunes with consular power. Naturally, there’s six of them. Chaotic times, Siege of Veii times. This is now pretty standard for them to have so many in the field. First of all, we’ve gotLucius Titinius Pansa Saccus, previously military tribune with consular power in 400 BCE.

Dr Rad 16:17
Not an accident. I’m going to come back to that.

Dr G 16:22
Look, I put it to you that we’ve got quite the cohort of plebeians, and this guy is the first of many. He is accompanied by Publius Licinius Calvus Esquilinus, also military tribune with consular power in 400.

Dr Rad 16:42
The first plebeian one apparently.

Dr G 16:46
Apparently, except he serves with a whole bunch of others. Apparently,

Dr Rad 16:51
Shhh, your reality is ruining it.

Dr G 16:54
I’m sorry that Livy got something wrong. I really am.

I think we might have to, though. Okay, well, you can keep that position for now. We also have Publius Maelius Capitolinus, previously military tribune with consular power in 400 also a plebeian. That’s three for three.

Dr Rad 17:21
Seeing a pattern here, seeing a pattern here,

Dr G 17:24
Quintus Maelius Vulso Capitolinus, now unfortunately, big brackets, patrician, then we have –

Dr Rad 17:33
There’s bound to be at least one.

Dr G 17:35
You know, they can’t help themselves, can they?

Dr Rad 17:36
Yeah.

Dr G 17:37
Gnaeus Genucius Augurinus, previously, military tribune with consular power in 399. Also notably a plebeian. And finally, last, but definitely not least, Lucius Atilius Priscus, also previously military tribune with consular power in 399. Also plebeian. So that’s five of the six plebeians.

Dr Rad 18:06
But there are so many question marks we’re going to get into this. But there are a lot of question marks about these names and who these guys are.

Dr G 18:12
And also like, does it matter if it’s also the year where you get a dictator?

Dr Rad 18:17
Yes, let’s roll him out. Dr G, who is our dictator for this year?

Dr G 18:23
Hold your breath, everybody. This is going to come as a massive surprise. Our dictator this year is a guy called Marcus Furius Camillus. Wow.

Dr Rad 18:32
The crowd goes wild! Now you know what? Our listeners might not be super excited to hear his name. Dr G, because whilst he’s been around for a little while now, he has always kind of just been there, you know.

Dr G 18:47
Just hanging about, not, not hugely distinguishing himself, although he’s done some things previously, military tribune with consular power in 401, and 398, so he’s had a couple of rounds in The top gig, but now he’s being given like a really special job dictator. And boy, we’ll see how that goes for him. And he is joined by the master of the horse. So what happens when a dictator gets selected? The Senate usually decides that things have gotten out of hand in really particular ways. It might be a religious way. It might be a military way. There is a problem that needs to be solved. They require a dictator, somebody to take up all of the reins of power for a really finite period of time to solve this particular issue, whatever it is. And when that person is decided upon, and they accept the position and be like, Sure, I’ll be dictator. Usually, the first thing that they do is select an offsider to be like their kind of like other person to be in charge of stuff. Now, the role of the master of the horse is something that I think we should definitely devote an episode to in the future, because there’s some complexity there. But for now, it’s sounds like a guy with a horse, very exciting. And this year we have Publius Cornelius Maguginensis.

Dr Rad 20:11
A mouthful.

Dr G 20:13
So he says. Previously, military tribune with consular power in 397. So everybody in these sort of top gigs has been around traps recently, but we also have some intereges. Oh, so finally, we’re on to the last magistrates of this year.

Dr Rad 20:34
Are you sick of all this Latin?

Dr G 20:36
It’s a lot, it’s a lot, and they’re all names. And you think to yourself, and after a while, you’re like,Lucius this Marcus that? And it’s like, look, we put them in here because we know the names. And apparently there’s lists of these names, and you’ll be surprised how little they’re referred to in any of the actual source material. So it is kind of incredible, but we have three interreges which means that we’ve got a situation where at some point the cohort of magistrates that we have in power have to come out of power. And it seems to be not just related to the dictatorship, it may be related to other things as well. And there needs to be a new set of people decided upon. So you’ve got to have some interim people to look after that situation. And the interreges are those people. And we have Lucius Valerius, possibly Potitus brackets. We also have Quintus Servilius Fidenas, and also stepping into a second role for the year, Marcus Furius Camillus.

Dr Rad 21:38
Hmm.

Dr G 21:39
Hmm. What could it all mean?

Dr Rad 21:41
Curioser and curioser. Well, Dr G, I think I can clear up some of your questions around these magistrates. Oh, please allow me to use Livy,

Dr G 21:52
Please. I mean, that’s the one source I haven’t read.

Dr Rad 21:54
All right. So in order to understand why we have so many magistrates, and some of the details about these magistrates, we do need to backtrack a little bit to what I told you at the end of last episode, so you might remember that. Well, I’m going to call him, I guess, can I call him Calvus? Publius Licinius?

Dr G 22:15
You could. You know this, this very moderate plebeian who’s completely okay for the patricians because he’s such a mediocre individual.

Dr Rad 22:26
Exactly, yes, I feel like Calvus is a name that kind of distinguishes him. So that guy, the guy that was the first official military tribune with consular power in 400 BCE, the end of last episode, when they were organizing the elections for the next year. He was brought in even though he wasn’t running for the position, because the Romans looked around and thought, You know what? We need someone moderate right now, things are a little tense in the city, between patricians and plebeians. This whole situation with they there’s been that whole lake issue. We need someone moderate who’s going to calm everything down. You know what? We’ll bring him back, and we’ll get the band back together, military tribunes with consular power, 400 BC, it’s your time to rock and roll.

Dr G 23:18
It’s retro.

Dr Rad 23:19
Only one slight problem with that, Dr, G, and you already highlighted it in your list of magistrates.

Dr G 23:25
And what is that problem?

Dr Rad 23:27
That they’re not all from 400 BCE.

Well, this is the issue. Livy tells us that this is what happened that he was brought in. And they were like, yep, we’ll bring back his whole little gang, because that worked really well. Let’s go with a tried and true recipe here. But the names do not match. Some of them do, sure, but not all of them.

Dr G 23:55
These people

Dr Rad 23:56
Problem number one. Now the interreges come into the story because, of course, they were holding power because, you might recall, there was an issue with the previous set of military tribunes with consular power, so they were holding power until the next elections were organized, and that’s why we have some interreges listed.

Dr G 24:16
Oh, okay, so they’re actually related to whatever happened in 397

Dr Rad 24:21
Yes, this is probably something we should probably mention quickly. The Roman year doesn’t function in the same way that our current calendar year works, where we say we begin in January and end in December. Technically speaking, Dr G and I have been misleading you somewhat. Listen in that there’s always kind of two of our years that make up a Roman year because they end at a different time. So it might be September, for example, that the Roman year ends in terms of when new magistrates are coming in. And the Romans, of course, date their years by the magistrates. They don’t know who Jesus is; they don’t care at this moment in time, and so they just don’t have the same system that we have. So yes, basically, as far as we can tell, there was an issue where the previous group of military tribunes with consular power, there was some problem with the way that they were inaugurated. I’m going to say

Dr G 25:19
yep

Dr Rad 25:20
And as a result, they had to have some interreges, and they had to organize a new set coming through. And this is where we had Calvus being mentioned as being someone who would be good for the job. So look, that is where we are at.

Dr G 25:33
Safe pair of hands. Get him in there.

Dr Rad 25:36
Exactly. Now, Calvus himself is pretty chuffed, as you can imagine, to have been brought up as the leader of this dream team. We are Dream Girls. Yeah, we’ll make you happy. Yeah, yeah. However, there’s a problem, there’s a problem, yeah, there is a problem, yeah, in spite of the exhilarating soundtrack to this year, Calvus is getting on in years. You might remember when we first talked about him as military tribune with consular power in 400 we talked about the fact that he’d apparently served in the Senate for like yonks, and we were shocked that he’d just been in the Senate. This little plebeian guy never heard of-

Dr G 26:19
Just hanging out there-

Dr Rad 26:19
Yeah, he is the one. So he seems to be an elderly man by this point in time, okay? And he doesn’t feel like he’s actually physically up to the job. He actually details all the different ways that he’s not up for the job. He’s got issues with his sight, his hearing is worse. I sympathize. And just generally, physically, he’s just about for he even says his memory is bad. I mean, I think we’re dealing with Joe Biden here.

Dr G 26:52
It’s a tough time. Yeah, look, look, put that guy in charge. You know, the one with the white hairover there. It’ll be great.

Dr Rad 27:00
Well, it would make sense as a senator, given where we think that word comes from, something to do with old men. However, he has a plan, because he doesn’t want to let this opportunity slip through his fingers. And after all, he knows why he’s being singled out, and he doesn’t want to ruin that for Rome, given that everyone seems to be on board. So he suggests, Hey, did you know I have a kid, Calvus 2.0 I like to call him the new and improved model. He has exactly the same values as me because I raised him. And as we all know, in ancient Rome, anybody has children, their children turn out to be exactly the same as them. That’s why all their families have exactly the same characteristics. It doesn’t even matter if you’re talking about the grandfather or the son, they’ll basically be the same person.

Dr G 27:54
Yes, so this is a way in which Roman families work very differently from the way we think of modern families. So the politics of the ancient Roman family seems to be really grounded in upholding familial tradition. So you gotta toe the line. If you don’t, you’re just not gonna progress with your career in any particular way, like your family won’t put you forward for things. We start to see this really particularly later on in the Republic. But I suppose what Livy might be suggesting here is that there’s some retrojection of those sort of ideas. Those ideas come from somewhere, and the natural sort of conservatism of the Roman family structure is on full display here.

Dr Rad 28:42
It is. And what is even more shocking than the fact that this guy was chosen for this highly contested office without putting himself forward and seemingly being on his last legs, everyone agrees that, yeah, we’ll just take the sun. That’s fine. We’ll take the discount model we want. We want him. We want a bit of that interesting. Okay, yes, now this is where I do have to highlight a possible problem with Livy’s source material, and it pains me to say it, Dr G.

Dr G 29:14
Well, I’m glad you’re confessing to it, because it sounds like a problem to me as well, and I was going to mention as such. So please. What’s the problem here?

Dr Rad 29:25
I shall atone for him. Shame. So Livy is drawing on, obviously, a bunch of earlier sources, which we unfortunately don’t often have, or if we do have any of them, it’s very fragmentary, hard to put together. We do know, though, that one of his sources that he switches around between is from a family chronicler called Licinus Macer or Macer, depending on how you like your C’s. Now the name says it all, Dr G, these two guys that we’re talking about, if I give them their full name, they are, of course, the Publius Licinius Calvus Esquilinus – that’s the dad Publius Licinius Calvus Esquilinus – Licinius, it’s right there. It seems like maybe one of Livy’s sources might have been trying to add a little bit of pixie dust to his family history, perhaps.

Dr G 30:19
Ah yes. So Licnius Macer is obviously part of the broader Licinius gens, and there’s a real incentive in terms of Roman family politics, to build the gens history up in various ways. So we are caught in a pretty tricky position, because we know that there is incentive in our source material to put together a certain perspective for us.

Dr Rad 30:48
absolutely it is the curated Instagram of ancient Rome, these family histories which have snuck into our source material.

Dr G 30:57
Well

Dr Rad 30:57
Dodgy.

Dr G 30:58
What else did Livy have to work with? I mean, this is the real trouble.

Dr Rad 31:01
Well, yes. I mean, if we look at the Fasti and we look at other sources, they all list the father as the magistrate for this particular year. So it’s interesting that we do have this embellishment where the Romans are like, yeah, cool, just flip your son in, yeah, you’re basically the same person because you’re related, right?

Dr G 31:20
Yes. So the Fasti Capitolini was produced quite a bit later, as far as we assume. But yes, they do mention the father holding the position for the second time.

Dr Rad 31:32
Yes

Dr G 31:32
Not the son, which would be distinguished with a different sort of ligature.

Dr Rad 31:38
Yeah. So obviously, there are huge issues with the lists of names for this year, given that Livy’s telling us, oh yeah, they got all the guys from 400 and then the father was like, No, take my son. And everyone was like, yeah, cool, sure. And none of this seems to be reflected in the records of names that we have. The names do not match up with the narrative that Livy is giving us. Now it is possible that they’re trying to perhaps imitate another story from Greece, with this whole father son dynamic, that of Periander, who was the second tyrant of Corinth and ruled from around 627, to around 587 BCE, there was a whole shindig with him possibly stepping aside for a son, didn’t really work out that well, but it might be that they’re trying to draw on other examples here. We don’t know what’s going on, but this is what academics have noticed in terms of the way that the source material is developing and the kind of narrative that might be being laid over the bare bones that they would have had to work with.

Dr G 32:45
Look to me, all of this is really fascinating, because, as you know, I don’t have a lot of Dionysus, of Halicarnassus right now, who was-

Dr Rad 32:54
What? This is brand new information.

Dr G 32:58
I’ve got a little bit, but I don’t have him in the fulsome way that I would really like to be able to offer a counter narrative to what Livy is doing. But because this year is so significant, I actually have heaps of sources for this year. But you know what? None of them care about anything to do with these military tribunes, fathers, sons or otherwise, it is not on their radar. It is not the centerpiece for this year at all. And so I’m really grateful that Livy is providing a little bit of embellishment and detail, because this is making up for a more fulsome story, which I had no idea existed because I didn’t have to read Livy in order to prepare for this episode.

Dr Rad 33:39
This is why you have to read all the primary source material, children.

Dr G 33:44
Let this be a lesson to you all. Now, as a good ancient historian, I would if I was studying this period for real, not within the context of this podcast, which is also studying for it, for real in another way,

Dr Rad 33:56
I was going to say – what? This isn’t for real? Am I in The Matrix?

Dr G 34:00
But let’s say, If I was writing an academic paper, obviously I would have also read Livy

Dr Rad 34:04
Sure

Dr G 34:04
But because that’s not what we’re doing here, because we’re reading different

Dr Rad 34:08
We have a schtick

Dr G 34:09
Yeah, we’re reading different primary source material. That’s part of the process with this. So it creates these really interesting gaps for me at times, and this is definitely one of them, like I had all of this list of names that I got from Broughton. Love Broughton always thankful for the work that Broughton has done here, compiling these massive lists of magistrates for every year throughout all of the Republic. And I had this list, and then I had the source material. And look, I have excerpts from Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Plutarch, Diodorus Siculus, Valerius Maximus Pliny the Elder, Appian, Florus, Aulus Gellius, Eutropius, the anonymous but pseudo Aurelius Victor, Augustine, Orosius, and Zonaras. I have. All of these sources. And you know what? None of them mention this controversy with father and son as military tribunes with consular power.

Dr Rad 35:07
Well, quite frankly, you just look lazy, now.

Dr G 35:12
What are they not telling me?

Dr Rad 35:13
I do appreciate all that different source material, because I have read… Livy.

Dr G 35:18
The suppression of information here is profound.

Dr Rad 35:24
Now let’s get on to some action, because I think this is what your sources want us to get to. So Titus and Genucius some of our military tribunes with consular power, they are sent to deal with the allies of Veii. Now I know I just said that the Etruscans were later-dazing the people of They, however, not all Etruscans turned their backs on the people of Veii. We do have people from nearby cities, the Faliscans and the Capenantes, who decided that, oh, I guess if Veii falls,that means that we’re probably next on Rome’s plans of expansion. So we probably should help them out. So they do have some allies from up north, Titanius and Genucius are very keen to wipe the floor with these guys. However, their enthusiasm might have led them astray, Dr G.

Dr G 36:19
Oh, no, what have they done?

Dr Rad 36:21
They didn’t spend quite enough time planning everything out, and they decide that they’re going to launch straight into an ambush without following all the possibilities through. Now what ends up happening is that Genucius dies fighting bravely at the front of this battle. In fact, he dies in front of the standards, Dr. G.

Dr G 36:48
Oh, that’s terrible news. Okay, of all of the places to die, that is from a sort of divine perspective, the worst.

Dr Rad 36:58
However, it is kind of admirable in the sense of it shows his bravery. So even though the Romans are going to be really irritated by the fact that they just launch in without much forethought, they forgive him because he’s dead.

Dr G 37:15
Ah, okay, because he led from the front, so presumably his wounds are also at the front.

Dr Rad 37:22
Hell yes, they are. Actually, it doesn’t specifically say, but I would presume so definitely, the point is being made here that he was brave and he was trying to do the right thing, even though completely missed that.

Dr G 37:34
And the kind of commander that is willing to put themselves at risk in the front line is you could view this as being, like, quite silly, because obviously the army needs its commander, and if you lose the commander, the army will probably fall apart, because they won’t know what to do anymore. Because you need somebody strategic maybe. But from a Roman perspective, this is a huge courage as well. Like, this is the sort of thing where it’s like, you can really rally the troops if you lead from the front and get them into it, if they weren’t really sure about what was going on and be like, run in.

Dr Rad 37:34
Yeah, just try not to die in the process.

Dr G 38:08
Yeah.

Dr Rad 38:08
That tends to be a downer.

Dr G 38:09
Don’t do a Genucius, because it’s risky if you die.

Dr Rad 38:15
And there are some questions again, about the nature of this death, because there is another conucius from 362 BCE, who dies in a suspiciously similar fashion, Dr G.

Dr G 38:28
So, looking forward, in another sort of 40 years, we’re going to have a similar moment. Okay.

Dr Rad 38:35
We might, we might.

Dr G 38:37
I sense problems with the chronology.

Dr Rad 38:40
Yes. Now Titinius, of course, is still alive, but the men all around him are thrown into chaos. Things are unraveling fairly quickly in this scenario, not ideal, so Titinius decides to gather all the men around, and he says, You know what? I feel like it’s too much of a risk to fight our enemy on level ground. So I would imagine like some sort of open plain where everyone can see everybody. It’s open season.

Dr G 39:10
There’s nowhere to hide.

Dr Rad 39:11
It’s wabbit season. Yeah, so things are not going particularly well, and the Romans do not feel great about this, and Titinius is going to cop all of the flat, because he is the one that’s left alive after this defeat. Very disgraceful. The Romans back in the city as well are panicking, as we see so often, because rumor of what is going down has reached them, which, again, sort of shows you just how close these things must be happening. Even though they sound very grand, they’re obviously not that far away, in that rumour can get back to the city pretty quickly in time enough for people to start tearing out their hair.

Dr G 39:55
All right. So, yeah, Rome’s not in a great way. They’re not feeling the vibe. They’re having a bit of a panic. Okay, goodo.

Dr Rad 40:00
Now even worse, perhaps, there is, of course, the military encampment before they where the Romans are besieging the city. They also hear that there’s been a pretty catastrophic defeat, and one of the Roman magistrates has been killed again. Not a morale booster. No, not what you want to hear in 396 BCE,

Dr G 40:03
No, not after you’ve been at this siege for so long.

Dr Rad 40:05
No. So they’ve heard that the Capenantes and Faliscans have won, killed the commanders and slaughtered the whole army, and that the remnants of their enemies are now coming for them, backed by all the men of Etruria.

Dr G 40:45
Oh, okay, well, that’s a real turnaround for the books, because last I heard, Etruria was not coming.

Dr Rad 40:52
Look, it’s another good lesson for our listeners, Dr G, in that rumors can get out of hand really quickly. Yeah. So in Rome, they’ve heard that all of the same things. So they’ve heard all of that, plus they’ve heard that the encampment before they of their fellow Romans is also being assaulted, and that, you know, there are going to be more people sent from their enemy towards the city itself. Okay, so their camp is under siege. They’re going to be attacked next and again, not far away. So time is a ticking.

Dr G 41:28
It seems like the panic is really setting in, and it’s becoming a bit contagious, isn’t it? And everybody’s story is worse than the last story, and people are believing everything that they hear regardless.

Dr Rad 41:40
It does seem that so we have this scene in Livy where the Roman citizens are racing to the walls. The women of Rome are running to the temples to pray for the protection from the gods, and they want instead for the gods to back Rome. Trash Veii. What is with this? What is with this turning of tables? Not appreciated gods of Rome. Thank you very much.

Dr G 42:03
We started this violence. We need to win to end it, not lose.

Dr Rad 42:08
Exactly. And they’re like, look, we’ll make sure that all the sacred rites are fully renewed. We’ll make sure that all the signs are dealt with. We’ll deal with all the stuff you want us to deal with. Just please, please, make sure our city stays strong and our enemies are defeated.

Dr G 42:29
Okay, that’s, it’s a big call.

Dr Rad 42:30
Now if this is ringing any bells it should. Once again, we have a bit of Homeric additions being inserted here. This is potentially meant to remind readers of what happened when Hector went out to battle. So it’s meant to be drawing on the Iliad basically.

Dr G 42:53
Interesting.

Dr Rad 42:54
Yeah. So panic in the city, women in temples. You know? Prayer happening? People at the walls.

Dr G 43:02
Yeah, everything’s getting to its sort of climactic moment, isn’t it?

Dr Rad 43:08
It really is, yes. So this is perhaps the moment to pause and just talk a little bit about what Livy’s actually drawing on here. So we’ve already talked about the priestly records, the family chroniclers, maybe drawing on later incidents in Roman history to make sense of the bare bones, and not Livy directly, perhaps also obviously his sources, the earlier analysts and that sort of thing. But we may also even have other sources, like Ennius, who I know you’ve spoken about a little bit before.

Dr G 43:40
Yes, so Ennius writes an epic of Rome’s foundation and early history, and his text becomes the preeminent school text for many centuries. So it’s only really displaced by Virgil’s Aeneid, and that takes a while. So there’s a good couple of 100 years where Ennius is the go to text, to learn, to study poetry, but also to learn about Rome’s history. So it would make sense for Livy to be drawing upon it, for sure.

Dr Rad 44:19
Yeah, and this is exactly it we so we’ve got Licinius Macer. He’s probably also drawing on someone called Valerius Antius, again, someone we don’t have much of, but we know was a major source of Livy. But he is also drawing on these epic traditions, which would come from ennius, would come from Homer. And this passage, apparently was also then later copied by other Greco-Roman writers because they found it, you know, very inspirational scene. I think it would be like them seeing a really intense part of a movie, you know, a scene that really resonates with them and gives them a strong visual. And so they go back to it as a reference point. And they’re doing their own version of something later on. So that particular passage is actually meant to be kind of iconic, I suppose.

Dr G 45:08
Mmm0mmm. Ah interesting. So, yeah, we’re getting more into like, what is history and is it just literature in another form.

Dr Rad 45:19
Indeed, indeed. Now, of course, the Romans need to make sure that their relationship is square with the gods if they want to see any success against Veii, and want to make sure they escape this terrible fate which seems to await them right now, enemies of the gate, although they’re not really in this rumored so water obviously had to be drawn off the Alban lake. And we know that potentially, this actually did happen, because we’ve got those remnants that we’ve talked about before, of, you know, the tunneling and that sort of thing. We don’t know exactly when that happened. Does it line up with these accounts? But there’s some sort of record there which is interesting, giving some archeological backing to our literary accounts. There does seem to have also been some issues with games, or some sort of festival that the Romans were meant to have held at this point in time, which would be again, connected with the gods. It sounds like, Oh, what a great moment to kick up your feet and have a great time, but that’s not, obviously what it’s about. And you would know more about this than I would with its religious connections, things like games and festivals.

Dr G 46:24
Well, sure, if it had cropped up in any of my sources, I would be able to tell you something about it. I mean in general terms, I assume this is going to be a reference and correct me if I’m wrong to one of the sort of Pan Latin get togethers, where people of a Latin background gather in certain locations to do some shared ritual stuff. So you have to send people out of the city, which obviously, in this at this point in time, sounds like it would be quite dangerous. Maybe it’s not the time to have a festival where you send some delegates.

Dr Rad 47:01
The Festivus for the rest of us.

Dr G 47:02
Yeah, look, everybody’s running around like chickens with their heads cut off. Is now the time other people would definitely argue, within the context of the city, that it is more important than ever to send a delegation to something that might be a collective kind of festival, precisely because everything seems to be in a very delicate balance, not in favor of Rome.

Dr Rad 47:28
Yes, and this is exactly why they’re like, Oh, crap. We really should have dealt with that water situation on the Alban lake before all of this went down. And they talk about games and a Latin festival. So I think you’re 100% on the money. Part of the issue, apparently, is that, from later sources, standpoints, they tend to use terms like Ludi and Feriae. I don’t know how to say that actually properly. And that, now that I read, now that I’m saying it out loud, I’ve just been reading it all this time, they are both things that involve people having holidays in ancient Rome, but they’re not necessarily, obviously, exactly the same thing that happened at exactly the same time. When we talk about Ludi or games later on, we are talking more about public games. You know, by the time we get into the period that’s better documented. But that’s not necessarily what’s happening at this moment in time. We don’t necessarily see games being attached to festivals this early, from my understanding, so there might be a bit of confusion there, but certainly there’s some sort of, you know, festival connected with the gods that the Romans realized. Well, we better hold them again, because the gods are clearly not on our side right now, not with enemies at the gate. No, thank you. And so they’re dealing with basically everything they possibly can. They’re trying to put out all the fires to make sure that they are protected.

Dr G 48:53
Yep, fair enough. Send the delegation. Do the games? Do the festivals? Go to the sweet locations and do some sacrifices.

Dr Rad 49:01
Yes, and now that this is all taken care of, that the Romans think very smugly to themselves, it is time for Veii to die. Mwahahahahaha.

Dr G 49:14
Oooo boy. Okay? Well, in that case, I think as as horrifying as it’s going to sound, I think this might be the moment to pause and to wrap up this episode, because I leave it on this cliffhanger, because things are about to happen and wow, what a build up.

Dr Rad 49:35
Absolutely. I mean, it shows that 396 didn’t necessarily start off that well for the Romanshowever, trust us, listeners, we’re building to a climax.

Dr G 49:49
Ooh, boy

Dr Rad 49:50
yeah, fun is us here with us. All right. Dr, G, well, that means it is time for the Partial Pick.

Dr G 49:58

(bird noises)

Dr Rad 50:01
Tell us how the Partial Pick works, Dr G.

Dr G 50:03
Well, we are raiding Rome against its own sort of measures of success. Now, I don’t, I don’t anticipate Rome’s gonna do great right now, but let’s give it a whirl and see. So we’ve got five categories, and within each category there are 10 Golden Eagles up for grabs. So the golden eagles are like the fancy things that might sit on top of your standard and

Dr Rad 50:34
Before you die in front of it.

Dr G 50:35
Before you die in front of it, yeah, or before you lose it, you know, all of those kinds of positive things. So the first category is military clout.

Dr Rad 50:45
Right. Well, so far in 396 the Romans have had a disastrous defeat.

Dr G 50:51
Yeah, they’ve gone for what an unplanned ambush that has led to the death of one of the military tribunes with consular power, and then the other one copping all of the blame for whatever happened next, which doesn’t seem great.

Dr Rad 51:08
And the Romans themselves don’t even seem to really know what is going on, because there’s such chaos amongst his forces. So, yeah, not looking good.

Dr G 51:17
Look, I feel like we can’t give them much of a score. It’s probably I, I’d be inclined to maybe give them a one for the fact that they’re still holding out at the siege area of Veii

Dr Rad 51:29
sure, yeah, well that’s the thing. They haven’t actually lost any territory or anything. They just were trying to take care of the allies of Veii It did not work.

Dr G 51:40
Yeah, yeah, they’ve suffered some military defeats, but we haven’t heard anything particularly negative about what has happened outside the gates of Veii. I mean, there’s been some sort of panic stations in Rome, but it sounds like they’re operating on rumor rather than fact. So I’m willing to give Rome one.

Dr Rad 51:58
Fair enough, that is one.

Dr G 52:00
One point. So far so good. Our second category is diplomacy.

Dr Rad 52:08
I feel like there is not much diplomacy going on, given that they’re trying to ambush their enemies. It sounds like there is no diplomacy going on. That’s a zero from me.

Dr G 52:20
All right? Expansion.

Dr Rad 52:23
No, not yet. Not yet. We’re tiptoeing closer, ever closer.

Dr G 52:31
Foreshadowing. Okay, so that’s a zero. Virtus?

Dr Rad 52:37
Okay, now, as disastrous as this whole plan was, I feel like maybe is dying at the front of his forces is an example of virtus, and that’s why the Romans are like, Well, you’re a bit of an idiot, but we love you, buddy.

Dr G 52:56
It’s sad and tragic, but thanks for doing it the right way.

Dr Rad 53:01
Exactly if you’re gonna go out, glad you went out in style.

Dr G 53:04
Yeah. So this is where, like Roman value systems are really quite different from anything that we would be accustomed to. Because when I hear about somebody leading from the front, I think very foolish, but I think the Romans think, Wow. What a man.

Dr Rad 53:23
They do. They hear that Salt’n’Pepa, and they’re like, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Dr G 53:29
And look, if he’d come back alive, that would have been chef’s kiss from a Roman perspective.

Dr Rad 53:36
Yes, exactly, leading from the front. Glorious win.

Dr G 53:41
Yeah.

Dr Rad 53:41
All would have been good.

Dr G 53:42
You can’t beat anything like that. He would have been a star player for years to come as a result of that. It’s just a real tragedy that he went and died instead.

Dr Rad 53:51
Yep, and left his teammate out there, going, what am I going to do now?

Dr G 53:57
Yeah, like guys, I thought we were a team, but you’ve left me all by myself.

Dr Rad 54:06
Poor Titinius.

Dr G 54:08
Indeed. So the last category is the citizen score. Was this a good time to be a citizen of Rome?

Dr Rad 54:17
Sounds pretty panicky. Sounds pretty sweaty.

Dr G 54:19
It sounds like everybody’s scared and rushing to the temples, doing some prayers, rushing to the walls, being like is the enemy at the gate. Oh God!

Dr Rad 54:31
They’re keeping eagle eyes out. They’re definitely feeling paranoid and not unjustifiably, whilst we’re laughing at the fact that this rumors got completely out of hand. You can understand why they would think that if the Romans have just had a catastrophic defeat, it’s not out of the question that the remnants of the Faliscans and Capenantes will eventually make their way there. I mean, why wouldn’t they, in some senses?

Dr G 54:57
Well, exactly. So there is a justifiable fear that the army that has just won over the Romans on the field will proceed to then March on Rome. And really, Romans sort of set themselves up for something like that, because if you’ve been besieging one of your neighbors for the last decade, maybe you’ve given your neighbors some ideas about how they could treat you.

Dr Rad 55:25
So look, it might be mythologized. Maybe the Romans were actually in the bath with a cup of tea and a scented candle burning, and they weren’t panicked at all. But even if we strip away the Homeric elements, I think it would make sense for the Romans to be feeling the pinch right about now.

Dr G 55:43
Definitely. So, in this sense, and particularly when we also have to account for the facts that people who had died on the battlefield also very likely to have been Roman citizens of some kind, then this is not great, not great news at all.

Dr Rad 55:59
So is that a zero?

Dr G 56:00
I think so.

Dr Rad 56:02
Wow. We really built up this episode, and now the Romans are here with just one out of 50 Golden Eagle.

Dr G 56:07
We are not done with 396.

Dr Rad 56:10
No, I was gonna say, I feel like we should maybe add that one eagle to the other eagles that they may or may not win for themselves down the track.

Dr G 56:22
Ooo that is, that’s a big call. I think we can argue about that one when we get there.

Dr Rad 56:26
All right, all right. I look forward to it, Dr G.

Dr G 56:30
Likewise. Thank you for listening to this episode of the Partial Historians. You can find our sources sound credits and transcript in our show notes. Over at partialhistorians.com – We offer a huge thank you to you, if you’re one of our illustrious Patreon supporters, if you enjoy the show, we’d love your support in a way that works for you. Leaving a nice review really makes our day. We’re on Ko-Fi for one or four ongoing donations or Patreon, of course. Our latest book, ‘Your Cheeky Guide to the Roman Empire’, is published through Ulysses Press. It is full of stories that the Romans probably don’t want you to know about them. This book is packed with some of our favorite tales of the colorful history of ancient Rome. Treat yourself or an open minded friend to Rome’s glories, embarrassments and most salacious claims with ‘Your Cheeky Guide to the Roman Empire’.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai