Roman History for Latin Students

Roman History for
Latin Students

Ambush at Caudium, Livy
Ab Urbe Condita Book 9.1–12.328

Edited by Steven M. Cerutti

PETER LANG

New York • Bern • Berlin

Brussels • Vienna • Oxford • Warsaw

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Livy, author. | Cerutti, Steven M., editor.
Title: Roman History for Latin Students: Ambush at Caudium, Livy
Ab Urbe Condita Book 9.1–12.328 / edited by Steven M. Cerutti.
Other titles: Ab urbe condita. Liber 9 | Ambush at Caudium,
Livy Ab urbe condita book 9.1–12.328
Description: New York: Peter Lang, 2019.
Includes bibliographical references.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019024019 | ISBN 978-1-4331-6306-7 (hardback: alk. paper) ISBN 978-1-4331-6307-4 (ebook pdf) | ISBN 978-1-4331-6308-1 (epub) ISBN 978-1-4331-6309-8 (mobi)
Subjects: LCSH: Livy. Ab urbe condita. Liber 9.
Caudine Forks, Battle of, Italy, 321 B.C. | Rome—History, Military.
Classification: LCC DG237.4 .C3 321 B.C..L58 2019 | DDC 937/.03—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019024019
DOI 10.3726/b14819

Bibliographic information published by Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek.
Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the “Deutsche
Nationalbibliografie”; detailed bibliographic data are available
on the Internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de/.

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Reprint or reproduction, even partially, in all forms such as microfilm, xerography, microfiche, microcard, and offset strictly prohibited.

About the editor

Steven M. Cerutti was born in New York City and received his Ph.D. from Duke University in classical studies. He is a Fulbright fellow and a fellow of the American Numismatic Society. He has taught at Duke University and The Intercollegiate Center for Classical Studies in Rome.

About the book

In the first twelve chapters of Book 9 of his Ab Urbe Condita, Livy tells the story of how, in 321 B.C., a young and untested Samnite commander named C. Pontius traps four Roman legions in the narrow mountain pass in the southern Apennines called the Caudine Forks. Stunned at his own success, he seeks the counsel of his father, who tells him that he must either let them go unscathed or slaughter them all to the man; there is no third option. For Pontius, however, turnabout is fairer play: long bristling under the jackboot of Roman saevitia et superbia, he decides to take this opportunity to inflict a little of his own. He frees the Romans, yes, but only after humiliating them by making them strip to their undertunics and crawl beneath the yoke of the vanquished. What Pontius fails to realize is that the Romans will never suffer such indignation without answering with absolute reprisal. So, by his own foolish act of saevitia et superbia, Pontius guarantees the very outcome he was trying to avert: the destruction of his people and the ultimate hegemony of Rome throughout peninsular Italy.

This gripping story of Roman honor and fortitude under fire, at a time when Rome’s hegemony on the Italian peninsula was far from a foregone conclusion, is presented in Roman History for Latin Students: Ambush at Caudium, Livy Ab Urbe Condita Book 9.1–12.328 for the first time in a student-friendly edition, complete with Latin text (328 lines), a full vocabulary, and a comprehensive apparatus of notes on grammatical matters and rhetorical terms.

This eBook can be cited

This edition of the eBook can be cited. To enable this we have marked the start and end of a page. In cases where a word straddles a page break, the marker is placed inside the word at exactly the same position as in the physical book. This means that occasionally a word might be bifurcated by this marker.

contents

Preface

Acknowledgments

List of Abbreviations

Introduction

Text. Ab Urbe Condita: Book 9.1–12.328

Commentary

Appendix I: Glossary of Political and Military Offices and Proper Names and Places

Appendix II: Glossary of Grammatical Terms and Rhetorical and Poetical Devices

Vocabulary←ix | x→ ←x | xi→

Preface