History of Rome

​In the same year, Luceria became Samnite, the Roman garrison having been betrayed to the enemy.

​Nor did this matter long go unpunished for the traitors: the Roman army was not far from there, by whose first assault the city, situated on a plain, was captured. The Lucerini and the Samnites were slaughtered to the point of extermination, ​and their anger proceeded to such a point that even at Rome, when the senate was consulted about sending colonists to Luceria, many were of the opinion that the city should be destroyed.

​Besides their hatred, which was execrable against those twice captured, the distance also forced them to shrink from sending citizens so far from home among such hostile nations.

​The opinion prevailed, however, that colonists should be sent. Two thousand five hundred were sent. In the same year, when all things were untrustworthy to the Romans, secret conspiracies of the leading men were formed at Capua as well. When this had been reported to the senate, ​the matter was by no means neglected: inquiries were decreed, and it was resolved that a dictator should be named to conduct the inquiries.

​C. Maenius was named; he named M. Folius master of the horse. The terror of that magistracy was immense. Therefore—whether it was fear or consciousness of guilt—death, undoubtedly self-inflicted, withdrew the Calavii, Ovius and Novius—who had been the heads of the conspiracy—from trial before they could be named before the dictator. Then, when the material for the Campanian inquiry was exhausted, ​the matter was turned toward Rome by interpretation: that the senate had ordered an inquiry, not specifically into those who at Capua, but universally into those who had assembled or conspired anywhere against the state;

​and that coalitions formed for the purpose of obtaining offices were against the state. The inquiry became wider both in matter and in persons, with the dictator not denying that his inquiry had unlimited power.

​Therefore, noble men were accused, and though they appealed to the tribunes, no one was of assistance to prevent their names from being received.

​Thereupon the nobility, and not only those against whom the charge was directed, but all together, denied that this was a crime of the nobles—to whom, if no fraud stood in the way, the path to honor lay open—but of the new men.

​They even asserted that the dictator and the master of the horse themselves were more fit to be defendants than inquisitors of that charge, and that they would realize this as soon as they had abdicated their office. Then indeed Maenius, ​now more mindful of his reputation than of his power, went forward into the assembly and spoke as follows :

“I have all of you as witnesses of my past life, Quirites, and this very honor conferred upon me is a witness of my innocence; for a dictator was to be chosen to conduct the inquiries, not, as often at other times, because the times of the state so demanded, one who was most illustrious in war, but one who had lived his life furthest from these coalitions.

​But since certain noble men—for what reason, it is better for you to judge than for me to say anything unconfirmed on account of my office—

​first strove with all their might to destroy the inquiries themselves, and then, after they were too weak for that, lest they should plead their cause, fled to the protections of their adversaries, appeal and tribunician aid, ​patricians though they were, and finally, being repulsed from there—so much did all things seem safer than to clear their own innocence—they rushed upon us, and did not feel shame, though private citizens, to demand the dictator as a defendant, so that all gods and men may know that by them even ​those things which are impossible are attempted, lest they should render an account of their life, I, to meet the charge and to offer myself as a defendant to my enemies, abdicate my dictatorship.

​I beg you, consuls, if this task is given to you by the senate, to conduct inquiries first against me and this M. Folius, so that it may appear that we are safe from those accusations of yours by our innocence, and not by the majesty of our office.” He then abdicated his dictatorship, ​and after him immediately Folius abdicated his mastership of the horse; and being made defendants first before the consuls—for the matter was committed to them by the senate—against the testimony of the nobles they were brilliantly acquitted.

​Publilius Philo also, after many highest honors had been multiplied following so many deeds done at home and in war, but hated by the nobility, pleaded his cause and was acquitted.

​Nor did the inquiry flourish through the famous names of the defendants any longer, as usually happens, than while it was fresh; from there it began to glide to viler heads, until it was crushed by the coalitions and factions against which it had been prepared.