Back in 409 BCE, the Romans had captured the fortifications of Verrugo from their Volscian foe. Unfortunately, in this episode we must discuss the bloody fall of Verrugo.

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Episode 147 – The Fall of Verrugo

The Romans had seized Verrugo after Carventum was retaken by the Aequians, allies of the Volscians. Verrugo was located in Volscian territory to the south of Rome. This had seemed like a huge triumph as they had secured lots of booty along with the fort.

In 407 BCE, the garrison that had been left behind sent an urgent message for help, hidden in a small droid. The Romans took their sweet time to send reinforcements. When they arrived, a terrible scene greeted them…

Join us in this short episode on the fall of Verrugo!  

Our Players 407 BCE

Military Tribunes with Consular Power

• L. Furius L. f. Sp. n. Medullinus (Pat) Cos. 413, 409, Mil. Tr. c. p. 405, 398, 397, 395, 394, 391?


• C. Valerius L. f. Volusi n. Potitus Volusus (Pat) Cos. 410, Mil. Tr. c. p. 415, 404


• N. (or Cn.) Fabius Q. f. M. n. Vibulanus (Pat) Cos. 421, Mil. Tr. c. p. 415


• C. Servilius P. f. Q. n. Ahala (Pat) Mil. Tr. c. p. 408, 402

Our Sources

• Dr G reads the Fasti Capitolini and Diodorus Siculus 14.11.5-6, 14.3.1


• Dr Rad reads Livy ab Urbe Condita 4.57.


• Bradley, G. 2020. Early Rome to 290 BC (Edinburgh University Press).


• Broughton, T. R. S., Patterson, M. L. 1951. The Magistrates of the Roman Republic Volume 1: 509 B.C. – 100 B.C. (The American Philological Association)


• Cornell, T. J. 1995. The Beginnings of Rome: Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars (c. 1000-264 BC) (Taylor & Francis)


• Forsythe, G. 2006. A Critical History of Early Rome: From Prehistory to the First Punic War(University of California Press) 


• Lomas, Kathryn (2018). The rise of Rome. History of the Ancient World. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. doi:10.4159/9780674919938. ISBN 978-0-674-65965-0. S2CID 239349186.


• Ogilvie, R. M. 1965. A Commentary on Livy: Books 1-5 (Clarendon Press). 

Sound Credits

Our music was composed by Bettina Joy de Guzman.

Automated Transcript

This transcript has been automatically generated by Otter AI.

Dr Rad 0:12
Welcome to the Partial Historians.

Dr G 0:15
We explore all the details of ancient Rome.

Dr Rad 0:20
Everything from political scandals to love affairs, the battles waged, and when citizens turn against each other. I’m Dr. Rad. And

Dr G 0:30
I’m Dr. G. We consider Rome as the Roman saw it by reading different ancient authors and comparing their accounts.

Dr Rad 0:41
Join us as we trace the journey of Rome from the founding of the city.

Welcome to another episode of the Partial Historians and ancient Roman history podcasts. I am one of your hosts, Dr. Rad,

Dr G 1:10
and I am Dr. G.

Dr Rad 1:13
Hey, hated Dr G, what’s happening?

Dr G 1:16
Oh you know, just sitting down ready to talk about Ancient Rome in all of its glory.

Dr Rad 1:24
We are in an exciting moment, Dr. G, because we’ve been tracing the journey of Rome from the founding of the city and we are slowly edging our way towards the turn into a new century, which I find very exciting. I don’t know why because of course, centuries are arbitrary that, hey,

Dr G 1:39
I think it is exciting. Partly because as historians, we tend to periodize things mentally. So it’s like, even though it might not just be another year, it holds a certain significance, because we start to think about, well, we’ll call it a different century. And maybe there’ll be some different evidence coming through and maybe events will shift who knows what we’ll discover.

Dr Rad 2:04
Indeed, now, if you haven’t been listening to the podcast up until now, I highly recommend you go back because we’ve been talking a lot about the conflict of the orders, which is between these two supposes groups, the patricians and plebeians. And quite frankly, we can’t read capital here.

Dr G 2:19
It’s long and arduous. And let’s just say the patricians are probably on the balance still on top.

Dr Rad 2:29
Indeed, and the plebeians are, on the whole, not. So Dr G. We’re up to 407 this episode, but before we get into that, what happened in 408 BC? Well,

Dr G 2:43
if my recollection serves 408, was marked by a little bit of military tribunes with consular power, then that gave way to a dictator and his master of the horse.

Dr Rad 2:58
Not without some slappy fighting though.

Dr G 3:00
No, there was there was some upset folk amongst that. But nevertheless, it went ahead. And they headed down to Antium, which is south of Rome, but on the coast. And they took back what I think Rome thought was theirs, which was control of Antium. Because Antium had sort of started to get into a little bit of a situation with the Volscii and the Aequians. And although it seems like they were laughing at those guys, at in any case, there seem to be a confluence of these groups of peoples in the south towards Antium. And Rome was not having that they were like, that’s gonna, that looks like collaboration. We’re not into that kind of thing. Let’s go down and put a stop to that right there. And they did,

Dr Rad 3:49
indeed, with remarkable ease.

Dr G 3:52
So easy that we have no details about the battle. Exactly.

Dr Rad 3:56
Which means that I think it’s time for us to dive in to 407 BC.

Dr G 4:18
It’s 407 BCE. What a time to be alive.

Dr Rad 4:24
It is now I did. I did give a bit of a spoiler last time, which is that we know that we’ve got military tribunes with consular power, which means there is a possibility for the plebeians. But once again, I did ruin it by saying that they weren’t going to be any elected. So we know it’s going to be all patricians. all the time.

Dr G 4:42
Patricians all the way down. So we get four of them voted in as military tribunes with consular power for 407.

Dr Rad 4:50
Indeed, now I also did let slip that they all have previous experience in this position

Dr G 4:56
they do which kind of suggests that Rome whether our animalistic sources are telling us or not seems to suggest that Rome in this period, maybe had some military qualms, and were concerned about things that were going on in the general neighbourhood. So maybe they wanted some experienced players in there. I

Dr Rad 5:16
think they had an evil plan. I think Rome was planning to take over the world and by the world I mean, some more tearing

Dr G 5:28
things next door at the very least.

Dr Rad 5:32
God dammit, I want those things next door.

Dr G 5:36
I see whatsoever on that fence. The grass is greener, and I shall have it

Dr Rad 5:40
that we mark we mark but by this point, Rome is actually the preeminent power in this area at this point in time.

Dr G 5:49
They are they seem to be consistently winning now. At least from what we’ve seen from the last few years. That wasn’t true before. No.

Dr Rad 5:59
And like the Etruscans are They’re more just there. They’re not like, you know,

Dr G 6:04
oh, well, let’s Look for that one too much. Wait for it, guys.

Dr Rad 6:08
Like they did they are there but they’re not like menacing Rome really.

Dr G 6:13
They haven’t come south for some rains for a little while. No, like, anyway, we’ll see. We’ll see. I’m looking forward to what happens in this year because all I have is a great passage to read out to you from Diodorus Siculus yet again. And in terms of evidence, literally the FastI Capitolini Which I’ve supplemented as always with Broughton, who I adore. Yeah, so our military tributes are Lucius Furius Medullinus. A Furii.

Dr Rad 6:47
Yeah. Now we have met this particular Furii before I believe we

Dr G 6:52
certainly have and very recently as well, he was previously consul in 413. And also in 409, which was not that long ago. No,

Dr Rad 7:02
and that was the big you and everyone was very upset because a plebeian being actually got somewhere. How

Dr G 7:07
How dare they? Very rude. Then we have Gaius Valerius Volusi Potitus Volusus.

Dr Rad 7:17
Another familiar name.

Dr G 7:18
Indeed. So he was previously consequent 410. Yeah. And also a military Tribune with consular power in 415. Hmm.

Dr Rad 7:28
So he swings both ways. He

Dr G 7:30
doesn’t min