ss
of the Roman government on the one hand and the looseness of the
connection among the federate communities on the other contributed
to this want of unity in the conduct of the war. It is easy to see
that with such a system there would doubtless be victories and defeats,
but the final settlement might be very long delayed; and it is no less
plain that a clear and vivid picture of such a war--which resolved
itself into a series of engagements on the part of individual corps
operating at the same time, sometimes separately, sometimes in
combination--cannot be prepared out of the remarkably fragmentary
accounts which have come down to us.

Commencement of the War
The Fortresses
Caesar in Campania and Samnium
Aesernia Taken by the Insurgents
As also Nola
Campania for the Most Part Lost to the Romans

The first assault, as a matter of course, fell on the fortresses
adhering to Rome in the insurgent districts, which in all haste
closed their gates and carried in their moveable property from the
country. Silo threw himself on the fortress designed to hold in
check the Marsians, the strong Alba, Mutilus on the Latin town of
Aesernia established in the heart of Samnium: in both cases they
encountered the most resolute resistance. Similar conflicts probably
raged in the north around Firmum, Atria, Pinna, in the south around
Luceria, Beneventum, Nola, Paestum, before and while the Roman armies
gathered on the borders of the insurgent country. After the southern
army under Caesar had assembled in the spring of 664 in Campania which
for the most part held by Rome, and had provided Capua--with its
domain so important for the Roman finances--as well as the more
important allied cities with garrisons, it attempted to assume the
offensive and to come to the aid of the smaller divisions sent on
before it to Samnium and Lucania under Marcus Marcellus and Publius
Crassus. But Caesar was repulsed by the Samnites and Marsians under
Publius Vettius Scato with severe loss, and the important town of
Venafrum thereupon passed over to the insurgents, into whose hands
it delivered its Roman garrison. By the defection of this town,
which lay on the military road from Campania to Samnium, Aesernia was
isolated, and that fortress already vigorously assailed found itself now
exclusively dependent on the courage and perseverance of its defenders
and their commandant Marcellus. It is true that an incursion, which
Sulla happily carried out