History of Rome

​The consuls arrived in the Sentinate territory, facing the enemy who had crossed the Apennines. There, their camp was pitched at an interval of about four miles.

​Then, deliberations were held among the enemy, and it was agreed that they should not all be mixed in a single camp, nor should they descend into the battle line at the same time; the Gauls were joined to the Samnites, and the Umbrians to the Etruscans.

​Then the day for the battle was fixed; the battle was delegated to the Samnites and Gauls; during the contest itself, the Etruscans and Umbrians were ordered to attack the Roman camp.

​These plans were disrupted by three Clusinian deserters who crossed over secretly by night to the consul Fabius; having disclosed the plans of the enemy, they were sent away with gifts so that, thereafter, as each new decision was decreed, they might discover it and report it immediately.

​The consuls wrote to Fulvius to move his army to Clusium from the Faliscan territory, and to Postumius from the Vatican territory, and to devastate the territory of the enemy with the utmost force.

​The rumor of this devastation moved the Etruscans from the Sentinate territory to defend their own borders. Thereupon, the consuls pressed that the battle should be fought in their absence. For two days they provoked the enemy in battle;

​during the two days nothing worthy of mention was done: a few fell on both sides, and minds were rather provoked to a regular contest than the main issue brought to a crisis. On the third day they descended into the plain with all their forces.

​While the drawn-up battle lines were standing, a hind fleeing from a wolf, driven out from the mountains, ran across the plains between the two lines; then the beasts turned in different directions: the hind directed her course to the Gauls, the wolf to the Romans. To the wolf, a path was given between the ranks; the Gauls pierced the hind.

​Then a Roman soldier from the front ranks said, “To that side flight and slaughter turn, where you see the sacred beast of Diana lying; on this side the victorious wolf of Mars, whole and untouched, has reminded us of the race of Mars and of our founder.” On the right wing the Gauls, on the left the Samnites took their stand.

​Against the Samnites, Quintus Fabius drew up the first and third legions for the right wing; against the Gauls, on the left wing, Decius drew up the fifth and sixth;

​the second and fourth were waging war in Samnium with the proconsul Lucius Volumnius. At the first encounter, the action was fought with such equal forces that, if the Etruscans and Umbrians had been present, whether in the battle line or in the camp, to whichever side they had inclined themselves, a disaster must have been received.