Episode 12. The Samnite Wars, Part Two: Sentinum and the Conquest of Italy

Works Cited Primary Sources Cicero. De Senectute; Valerius Maximus, Facta et Dicta Memorabilia. Preserve the main anecdotes about Manius Curius Dentatus, including the turnips story and the Samnite ambassadors.Diodorus Siculus. Library of History. Books 19–21. Partial parallel account; less complete than Livy for this period but useful for cross-checking key events.Livy. Ab Urbe Condita. Books 9–10. The principal narrative for the Second and Third Samnite Wars. Book 10 (covering 294 to 293 BCE) is particularly detailed and is regarded as among Livy’s stronger work for this period.Livy. Periochae, Book 11. The summary of the now-lost eleventh book covers the final campaigns of the Third War, 292 to 290 BCE, including the capture of Gaius Pontius and the final peace.Velleius Paterculus. Compendium of Roman History. Records the speech of Pontius Telesinus before the Colline Gate.Waldron, Byron. “Fabius Maximus Rullianus and the Capture of Gavius Pontius.” Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies, 2024. Examines the historicity of the final capture of Pontius and the father-son command of the Fabii.Secondary Sources Cornell, T. J. The Beginnings of Rome. Routledge, 1995. Essential on the Roman Italian alliance system and what the Samnite Wars meant structurally for Roman expansion.Forsythe, Gary. A Critical History of Early Rome. University of California Press, 2005. Critical assessment of the Livy sources for the Third War and the problems with the Fabian family tradition.Roberts, Mike. Rome’s Third Samnite War, 298–290 BC: The Last Stand of the Linen Legion. Pen and Sword, 2021. Recent detailed military history; good on the coalition-building, the Aquilonia campaign, and the final years.Rosenstein, Nathan. Rome at War. University of North Carolina Press, 2004. On the human cost of continuous mobilization and its effects on Roman and Italian peasant households.Salmon, E. T. Samnium and the Samnites. Cambridge University Press, 1967. The foundational study; still the most complete treatment of Samnite culture, politics, and the experience of the Roman conquest.