History of Rome

​The other consul, Postumius, because there was a lack of material for war among the Samnites, transferred his army into Etruria and first thoroughly devastated the Volsinian territory;

​then he fought a battle not far from their own walls with those who had gone out to defend their borders; two thousand eight hundred of the Etruscans were slain;

​the proximity of the city protected the rest. The army was transferred into the Rusellan territory; there not only were the fields devastated, but the town was also taken by storm; more than two thousand men were captured, and less than two thousand were slain around the walls.

​Yet a peace more illustrious and greater than the war in Etruria had been in that year was secured: three very powerful cities, the capitals of Etruria—Volsinii, Perusia, and Arretium—sought peace;

​and having agreed with the consul on clothing and grain for the soldiers, so that they might be allowed to send envoys to Rome, they obtained a truce for forty years. A present fine of five hundred thousand asses of bronze was imposed on each state.

​On account of these achievements, when the consul had petitioned the senate for a triumph, more for the sake of custom than from hope of obtaining it, and saw that some, ​because he had gone out from the city too late, and others, because he had crossed from Samnium into Etruria without the order of the senate—partly his own enemies, partly the friends of his colleague—were denying him a triumph as well, to provide a consolation for an equal refusal, ​he said, “Conscript Fathers, I shall not so remember your majesty as to forget that I am consul. By the same right of command by which I waged wars, now that the wars have been successfully waged, Samnium and Etruria subdued, and victory and peace secured, I shall triumph.” Thus he left the senate. Then a dispute arose among the tribunes of the plebs;

​some said they would interpose their veto, lest he should triumph by a novel precedent, others that they would be of assistance to him as he triumphed, against their colleagues.

​The matter was brought before the people, and the consul, being summoned there, when he said that the consuls Marcus Horatius and Lucius Valerius, and recently Gaius Marcius Rutilus, the father of him who was then censor, had triumphed not by the authority of the senate ​but by the order of the people, added that he too would have brought it before the people, did he not know that the tribunes of the plebs, the slaves of the nobles, would block the law; and that the will and favor of the agreeing people was and would be to him in place of all orders.

​And on the following day, by the assistance of three tribunes of the plebs, against the veto of seven tribunes and the consensus of the senate, he triumphed while the people celebrated the day. And the memory of this year is not very consistent.

​Claudius is the authority that Postumius, after capturing some cities in Samnio, was routed and put to flight in Apulia, and, wounded himself, was driven with a few men to Luceria; and that the achievements in Etruria were performed by Atilius, and that he triumphed.

​Fabius writes that both consuls performed achievements in Samnium and at Luceria, and that the army was transferred into Etruria—but by which consul, he does not add—

​and that at Luceria many were killed on both sides and in that battle a temple of Jupiter Stator was vowed, as Romulus had vowed before; but there had been only a sacred precinct, that is, a place designated for a temple by speech.

​But in this year at last, it became a matter of religious obligation that the senate should order the temple also to be built, the state having been twice condemned to the fulfillment of the same vow.