History of Rome

​Then the Alban army, a spectator of the contest, was marched down into the plains. Mettius congratulates Tullus on the defeat of the enemy; on the other hand, Tullus addresses Mettius kindly. Praying that this might turn out well, he orders the Albans to join their camp with the Roman camp; he prepares a lustral sacrifice for the following day.

​When it was light, everything having been prepared as is customary, he orders both armies to be summoned to an assembly. The heralds, beginning from the outermost, summoned the Albans first. These, moved also by the novelty of the thing, in order to hear the Roman king holding an assembly, stood closest.

​By agreement, the armed Roman legion surrounds them; the centurions had been given the task of executing the orders without delay.

​Then Tullus begins thus: “Romans, if ever before in any war there was a reason for you to give thanks first to the immortal gods, then to your own valor, that was yesterday’s battle. For the struggle was not more against the enemy than against the treachery and faithlessness of our allies, which is the greater and more dangerous struggle.

​For, lest a false opinion possess you, the Albans went up to the mountains without my order; nor was that command mine, but a plan and a simulation of command, so that, with you remaining ignorant that you were being deserted, your minds might not be turned away from the contest, and that terror and flight might be inspired in the enemy, who thought they were being surrounded from behind.

​Nor is that guilt, which I charge, that of all the Albans; they followed their leader, just as you also would have done, if I had wished to turn the line of march in any direction from there. That Mettius is the leader of this march, the same Mettius is the contriver of this war, Mettius is the breaker of the Roman and Alban treaty. Let another dare such things hereafter, unless I exhibit in him a notable example to mankind.”

​Armed centurions surround Mettius; the king finishes the rest, as he had begun: “May it be good, auspicious, and fortunate for the Roman people, and for me and you, Albans: it is my intention to transfer the entire Alban population to Rome, to grant citizenship to the common people, to enroll the chief men into the senate, to make one city, one commonwealth. As the Alban state was once divided from one into two peoples, so now let it return to one.”

​To this, the unarmed Alban youth, hemmed in by armed men, keep silence, amid diverse feelings, yet compelled by a common fear.

​Then Tullus said, “Mettius Fufetius, if you yourself could learn to keep faith and treaties, that discipline would have been applied to you by me while you were alive; now, since your disposition is incurable, do you at least by your punishment teach mankind to hold those things sacred which have been violated by you. Therefore, just as a little while ago you kept your mind divided between the Fidenate and the Roman states, so now you shall give your body to be torn asunder in different directions.”

​Thereupon, two four-horse chariots having been brought up, he binds Mettius stretched out to their cars; then the horses, urged in opposite directions, carry away the mangled body in each chariot, with the limbs torn where they had clung to the bonds.

​All turned away their eyes from so foul a spectacle. That was the first and last punishment among the Romans of an example little mindful of human laws; in other cases it is permitted to boast that milder punishments pleased no nation.