Plutarch: Lives of the noble Grecians and RomansPlutarch
PhilosophyPhilosophy
Plutarch: Lives of the noble Grecians and Romans
Plutarch
Greece -- Biography -- Early works to 1800; Rome -- Biography -- Early works to 1800
were asleep or expected no such matter, they took the camp, and
destroyed most of them; and that this was done on the nones of July,
which was then called Quintilis, and that the feast that is observed on
that day is a commemoration of what was then done. For in it, first,
they run out of the city in great crowds, and call out aloud several
familiar and common names, Caius, Marcus, Lucius, and the like, in
representation of the way in which they called to one another when they
went out in such haste. In the next place, the maid-servants, gaily
dressed, run about, playing and jesting upon all they meet, and amongst
themselves, also, use a kind of skirmishing, to show they helped in the
conflict against the Latins; and while eating and drinking, they sit
shaded over with boughs of wild fig-tree, and the day they call Nonae
Caprotinae, as some think from that wild fig-tree on which the maid-
servant held up her torch, the Roman name for a wild fig-tree being
caprificus. Others refer most of what is said or done at this feast to
the fate of Romulus, for, on this day, he vanished outside the gates in
a sudden darkness and storm (some think it an eclipse of the sun), and
from this, the day was called Nonae Caprotinae, the Latin for a goat
being capra, and the place where he disappeared having the name of
Goat's Marsh, as is stated in his life.
But the general stream of writers prefer the other account of this war,
which they thus relate. Camillus, being the third time chosen dictator,
and learning that the army under the tribunes was besieged by the Latins
and Volscians, was constrained to arm, not only those under, but also
those over, the age of service; and taking a large circuit round the
mountain Maecius, undiscovered by the enemy, lodged his army on their
rear, and then by many fires gave notice of his arrival. The besieged,
encouraged by this, prepared to sally forth and join battle; but the
Latins and Volscians, fearing this exposure to an enemy on both sides,
drew themselves within their works, and fortified their camp with a
strong palisade of trees on every side, resolving to wait for more
supplies from home, and expecting, also, the assistance of the Tuscans,
their confederates. Camillus, detecting their object, and fearing to be
reduced to the same position to which he had brought them, namely, to be
besieged himself, resolved to lose no time; and finding their rampart
was all of timber, and observing that a strong wind constantly at sun-
rising blew off from the mountains, after having prepared a quantity of
combustibles, about break of day he drew forth his forces, commanding a
part with their missiles to assault the enemy with noise and shouting on
the other quarter, whilst he, with those that were to fling in the fire,
went to that side of the enemy's camp to which the wind usually blew,
and there waited his opportunity. When the skirmish was begun, and the
sun risen, and a strong wind set in from the mountains, he gave the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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