History of Rome

​Upon the approach of Gaius Claudius, whom the enemy remembered as the general by whom they had recently been defeated and routed at the river Scultenna, they, intending to defend themselves against the Roman force which they had unfortunately experienced, rather by the protection of the places than by arms, occupied two mountains, Letum and Ballista, and moreover enclosed them with a wall.

​About one thousand five hundred of those who were migrating too slowly from the fields were overtaken and perished;

​the rest kept themselves on the mountains, and not even in their fear forgetting their inborn ferocity, they raged against the booty which had been acquired at Mutina. They killed the captives with horrible mutilation; they slaughtered the cattle in the temples, rather butchering them everywhere than sacrificing them in due form.

​Satiated with the slaughter of living creatures, they fastened to the walls those things which were inanimate, vessels of every kind made for use rather than for show.

​The consul Quintus Petilius, lest the war should be finished in his absence, sent a letter to Gaius Claudius, that he should come with his army to him in Gaul: writing that he would await him in the Macrian plains.

​Upon receiving the letter, Claudius moved his camp from the Ligurians and delivered the army to the consul at the Macrian plains. To the same place a few days later came Gaius Valerius, the other consul.

​Having divided the forces there, before they separated, both armies jointly performed a purification. Then they drew lots for the districts they should seek, because it was not pleasing that both should attack the enemy from the same side.

​It was established that Valerius had drawn lots after taking the auspices, because he had been in the sacred precinct; in the case of Petilius, the augurs afterwards replied that this defect had occurred, that being outside the sacred precinct, he himself ought to [have drawn] the lot into the urn brought into the precinct, [while being] outside.

​Departing thence into different regions, Petilius pitched his camp against the ridge of Ballista and Letum, which connects those mountains with a continuous ridge.

​There, while he was encouraging his soldiers in assembly, unmindful of the double meaning of the word, they say that he made an omen, saying that on that day he would capture “Letum” (Death / Mount Letus).

​He began to ascend the opposing mountains in two divisions at the same time. The part in which he himself was, advanced vigorously. When the enemy had repulsed the other part, in order to restore the wavering situation, the consul, riding up on his horse, recalled his men from flight, but he himself, while moving about too incautiously before the standards, was pierced by a missile and fell.

​Neither did the enemy perceive that the general had been killed, and a few of his own men who had seen it, not negligently, as those who knew that victory depended on it, concealed the body.

​The rest of the multitude of infantry and cavalry, having dislodged the enemy, captured the mountains without a leader. About five thousand of the Ligurians were killed; from the Roman army, fifty-two fell.

​In addition to so evident an outcome of the gloomy omen, it was also heard from the keeper of the sacred chickens that there had been a defect in the auspices, and that the consul had not been ignorant of it.

​Gaius Valerius, having heard [...]. Those skilled in religious matters and public law asserted that, since the two regular consuls of that year had perished, one by disease, the other by the sword, a consul elected in substitute could not rightly hold the elections.

[...] led away.