Historical background

[Illyrian]

i love you guys, ur awesome and the team is just superb

[Sparton Matticus]

THE FACTIONS - UPDATED LIST

VENETI
LIGURES
RHETI
INSUBRES
CENOMANI
BOII
SENONES
ETRUSCI (Etruscans of northern Etruria)
TUSCI (Etruscans of southern Etruria)
UMBRI
SABINI
SPQR (Senatus PopolusQue Romanus)
SAMNITES
LUCANI
BRETTII
APULI
MESSAPII
ITALIOTAE (the league of the surviving Greek poleis of southern Italy leaded by Tarentum/Taras)
SYRACUSAE
POENI (Carthaginians of western Sicily)

Oh so Poeni will be the cahaginians! You have made me very happy!

Im also glad you have included "TALIOTAE" - effectivly by including the poeni and taliotae you are adding an extra dimension to this mod because it makes the game factions and soilders more diverse

And which of the above factions are barbarians? or gauls?

[Luciano B]

The Insubres north of the Po river, the Senones on the adriatic coast, the Cenomani near the north-eastern lakes, the Boii between the Appenines and the Po river will be the celtic factions.
The Rhetians on the eastern Alps were also a somewhat celtized nation, but also with strong etrusco-itallic influences.

Other nations, not included as playable factions, will be reproduced with a dedicated set of regional units, like the Italic Campani, Picentes, Sabelli; or the celto-ligurian Taurisci and the celtic Lingones; and also the Siculi.

[Hister]

Every faction is already finished. Our internal version doesn't have resources and buildings implemented yet.

Yes, samnites were not Latins. See below for which faction belongs to which culture ingame.

Current PI cultures:

Italic (SPQR, Umbri, Sabini, Sabelli, Samnites, Lucani, Brettii, Veneti)
Etruscan (Etrusci)
Hellenic (Italiotae, Syracusae)
Celtic (Boii, Insubres, Cenomani, Senones, Rhaeti)
Phoenician (Poeni)
Ligurian (Ligures)
Iapygian (Messapii, Apuli)

[Ramiro]

How wolud you manage to make the possible annexation of the samnites by rome as difficult as it was historically?

If they are in the same culture as SPQR and Rome takes a samnite city the player would be able to rapidly put it under control. Could this be prevented even if both nations are of the same culture?

If not I would suggest a new OSCAN culture to include at least SAmnites, marsi, equi and Volsci (others cultures listed as latins where in fact osco-umbrians) but just putting some sabelians and samnites into this culture would represent quite well the efforts that SPQR took to bring this countries under control.

I would suggets leaving sabines, umbrii, lucanni , and brutti as LATINS although they where not just to represent how fast the join the republic

You could put the ligures into the celtic culture to free a slot for oscan culture

[SigniferOne]

I think we'd have to split off the Samnites into its own culture, the shared culture between Samnites, Lucanians, and Bruttians.

To make Samnites very hard to defeat, there are a number of ways. First off Samnites will be poorer than Romans, that's just simple fact. But geography will play a big part -- they'll live in the mountains, and so all of their cities will be extremely hard to assault, and in their regions their soldiers will have an advantage. Also, Samnite soldiers will have less damage in frontal combat, but have excellent stamina and numbers of hiding units (i.e. great ambushing skills). So Romans will have greater morale, but Samnites greater stamina.

[Ramiro]

The tactical differences seem fine to represent the struggle in the samnium, but in the strategic level (besides tactical advantages). Would the samnites cities be easily put under control once occupied? or would them be prone to rebellion? The proposition about a separate culture for them was just to represent the ardous strategic work that SPQR took building fortresses and putting heavy garrisons all around the samnites because their cities won´t be easily subdued. But i really do not know if it is neccesary to make Latins and samnites two different cultures to achieve this in the game, but i guess it would be easier than other ways.

[SigniferOne]

It just makes a lot of recruitment choices easier. Say someone possesses barracks -- if latin culture, build Triarii; if samnite, build Linteati (silver armored).

[S.P.Q.R.]

Woot!! I'm very exited about PI...I've been waiting something like that for 5 years!!
Btw The romans adopt the Manipula formation from the Samnites in those bloody 3 wars they had back then. I hope you'll be very accurate about military units since there were very few differances among armies in the Italian peninsula...they were basically oplites armies with sling shooters and some cavalry unites.

keep up the good work.

P.S.
do you have a screenshot of the map?

[SigniferOne]

Yep. Check Previews 1 and 2.

[SigniferOne]

In this mod we are aiming to portray Italy in the late fourth century BC. For over a hundred years since the founding of the Republic, Rome's remained a small, almost provincial town, with only two notable events to its name: the successful taking in 396 B.C. of Veii, a major Etruscan city, and its own sacking by Gauls just a few years later. Now, in the last half/quarter of 4th century BC, Rome has grown considerably in power. It has dissolved the Latin League in 338 B.C. and has taken up the leadership among the Latin states. To the south-east are the great numbers of hardy Samnite mountain warriors. In the north are still eleven of the old twelve powerful Etruscan strongholds. Even further to the north are teeming hordes of Celts, who have just 50 years ago invaded across the Alps into the Po Valley, and entirely obliterated the old twelve Etruscan powerful cities there. And to the south, of course, are the Greeks. News has arrived that Alexander of Epirus, uncle of Alexander the Great, has just landed in Campania, with ambitions for the whole peninsula.

The scene is set.

[SigniferOne]

Official site:

http://www.freeforumzone.it/viewforum.aspx?f=72672

(If you can read Italian, or have access to Google translator...)

[Izildur]

Hello, I am new guy around here. Sorry for posting in this thread, but I have just one small question: is this mod compatible with RTW or you also need BI?

Thanks

[Luciano B]

Welcome Izildur.
You'll need also BI 1.6

[Izildur]

Thanks, it's really nice to be here. I feel like at home

All right, I will try to find BI v1.6 until the end of the week.

[Hister]

Antonius, the mod starts at 333/4 BC when Alexander of Epirus, uncle of Alexander the Great, arrives in Campania to help Italiotae Greeks against Oscans.
About the Spartans: "The increase of Taras' wealth produced a disaffection to the military duties among the rich citizens. This disaffection as well as the ceaseless pressure of the Oscans explains Taras' reliance after 350 on foreign mercenaries. In 343 King Archidamos of Sparta landed with a Spartan and mercenary force; he was killed in battle and his men surrounded and wiped by the Lucani and the Messapians. In 334, Alexander king of Epirus began a series of successful campaigns overrunning most of Apulia. But Taras, withdrew support, fearing his ambitions for personal power, and he was in addition surrounded by the Lucani. Trying to break out, he killed the Lucanian general in single combat but his army was destroyed and he was killed by a Lucanian soldier, maybe a deserting mercenary of his own army. Next was Kleonymos, an adventurer of the Spartan royal house, who brought 5.000 mercenaries from Greece, recruited 5.000 more in Italy, was given 20.000 Tarantine foot citizens and 2.000 horses, and was joined by other Italiote cities and the Messapii. Again he was feared by Taras and was too ambitious so, to keep him away, Taras turned his attention on the northern Adriatic for an attempt of invasion of the Venetia, to keep him away. He started the invasion with a series of raids against the Venetic coastal settlements, but the sudden reaction of the Veneti nearly destroyed his entire force and only a small part of his army with few ships could escape. Finally in 280 BC, when Rome was the enemy, Taras called in king Pyrros of Epirus to head a grand coalition. He imposed conscription and a harsher discipline than the Tarantines were used to, retraining the army. After his withdrawal Taras was soon captured by Rome, and stayed in Roman hands except for revolting to Hannibal from 212 to 209 BC."

All clear now Antonius?

[Antonius]

thx for this very detailed answer!!!!

[SigniferOne]

Resources from modern authors:

Samnium and the Samnites (excerpts -- Samnite army)
by Steven Salmon

Samnium and the Samnites (excerpts -- Samnite government)
by Steven Salmon

The Social Structure [of the Etruscans] and the Serf Question
by Francoise-Helene Massa-Pairault

Etruscan Religion
by Mario Torelli

[SigniferOne]

Samnium and the Samnites (excerpts -- Samnite army)
by Steven Salmon

------

According to Frontinus (Strat. 2.1. 8) and Livy (10.28.3) the shock of the Samnites' initial charge was very difficult to withstand.

Livy's linen tunics are much more normal. Pliny (N.H. 34.43) and Festus (p. 102 L.) join him in recording the tradition that one at least one occasion the Samnites fielded a legio linteata. Linen tunics, either plain or particoloured (tunicae versicolores 9.40.3, 22.46.6) are authentic Samnite equipment. They actually appear as soldiers' apparel in Sabellian tomb- and vase-paintings.

For the Samnite combat weapons we must turn elsewhere than to Livy. There was a tradition that the Samnites used both the pilum and the scutum and that it was in fact from them that the Romans obtained these weapons. The most explicit version of this tale occurs in the so-called Ineditum Vaticanum. The way the story of the Romans' borrowing military notions from the enemy appears in this document should make us wary. [ Listing of the excerpt ] This passage is pure rhetoric of the sort that finds its pithiest expression in the oft-repeated commonplace fas est et ab hoste doceri. Roman willingness to learn from the enemy was a traditional article of Roman pride, and the way that it is set forth in Ineditum Vaticanum is too neatly symmetrical and schematic to be at all plausible.
In any case the matter is put beyond doubt by the archaeological evidence, which reveals that the scutum was in general, even though not exclusive, use among the various Italic peoples well before ever Romans and Samnites came to blows about the middle of the fourth century. It has been used in some parts of Italy from prehistoric times.

The evidence for the pilum is more shadowy, and the old argument as to where the Romans got this weapon, and when, is still unsettled, although it seems fairly certain that they did not get it from the Samnites. On a priori grounds the rhetoric that brings the pilum to Rome from Samnium is no more likely to be accurate than that which similarly attributes the scutum to the Samnites. In fact pilum and scutum, and manipular tactics, too, for that matter, seem to hang together. They are all aspects of the same military reform: manipular tactics postulate the use of pilum and scutum, and vice versa. Hence it is probable that the Romans adopted all of them simultaneously, at the beginning of the fourth century and, as Livy and Plutarch suggest, possibly at the instigation of Camillus. (Note: the disasters to the Fabii at the Cremera and to the Romans in general at the Allia had demonstrated the advisability of their exchanging phalanx tactics for manipular which required pilum and scutum. Note that the modification of the pilum in Marian times was accompanied by some change in the shield and in tactics (Plut. Marius, 25.1; Festus, p274 L., 149 L., 238 L.).

The archaeological evidence makes it certain that in the days of their true independence the Samnites were typically Italic in their military equipment as in so much else.

On the other hand, sculptured representations of Sabellian warriors haver survived. Sabellian tomb-paintings and South Italian vases also depict fighting men, some of them indubitably Samnites.

Description of a Samnite warrior
His close-fitting helmet was often adorned with crest or horns (horned helmets are by no means exclusively Celtic (Q.F.Maule-H.R.W.Smith, Votive Religion at Caere, p. 48). The horns indicated that the Sabellian soldier was fighting under the emblem of Mamers (with whom the bull was closely related). The helm might also have sockets on either side, in which one, two and sometimes more eagle feathers were set upright (an Italic helmet in the Louvre has holes for five feathers). These holes were a widespread Italic practice, known to Romans as well as Samnites, and they are frequently represented in paintings, on coins and in sculpture (Polyb 6. 23. 12f; cf. Prop 4. 10. 20. The Sabines did not use them according to Sil. Ital. 8. 419. They were usually white, but sometimes black). A bronze helmet from Larinum labelled Samnite tapers toward the crown and is surounded by a boss, but has no provision for feathers. It may be that they were officers' insignia: certainly M. Fannius, the Samnite commaner in the fresco from the Esquiline of c. 200, wears them, whereas some of his men do not.

The Samnite soldier's tunic, of linen or possibly leather, was short-sleeved and abbreviated, barely reaching to the loins, where it ends sometimes in a kind of apron. Around his waist he wore a broad leather belt covered with bronze and furnished with elaborate clasps. These belts were sometimes of fine worksmanship and were evidently greatly valued. The prominence with which they are paraded as trophies in the tomb- and vase-paintings suggests that they had symbolic significance as well as practical usefulness. (Archaeological evidence reveals that young boys had such belts and this supports the theory that they were more than mere military equipment.)

To protect the torso, and especially the heart, the Samnites used a circular disk about 7.5 inches in diameter, and sometimes decorated with an animal. The Warrior of Capestrano shows that originally a single disk was worn on the breast with another to match it on the back. Later, additional protection was given by placing a second disk alongside it (a specimen of this type is in the Louvre); and by the fourth century if not earlier a third disk had been added below the other two. The three disks could be combined into a single piece of protective armor roughly triangular in shape, and when two such trefoils were hinged together at the shoulders and under the armpits a cuirass was formed. (The cheek-pieces of some helmets in the museum at Ancona, said to be Gallic, are miniature replicas of the trefoil cuirass). Probably not every Samnite soldier had one: many had to be content with the single disk and the inadequate protection it afforded.

In the paintings the Samnite shield is deeply convex, usually round, but sometimes oval. But there is evidence that, like other Italic peoples, the Samnites also used the long elliptical scutum (This is not well attested archaelogically, but Dion. Hal. 20. 1. 5 has no doubts whatever on the matter, and the Samnite commander of the Esquiline fresco has one).

The Samnite soldier covered his legs with greaves, not one but two, reaching to the knees. The evidence for this is abundant: the Louvre statuette, Sabellian tomb-paintings, the Esquiline fresco (But he may not always have covered his feet. Many Sabellian soldiers are depicted with bare feet, whether as an artistic convention or because they often were in fact without footwear).

For the offensive weapons the Samnite had lances (normally for thrusting), a species of small javelin, long daggers with hilts ending in a knob, and less frequently short, two-edged stabbing swords. A few maces have also been found.

[SigniferOne]

The Social Structure [of the Etruscans] and the Serf Question
by Francoise-Helene Massa-Pairault

From The Etruscans, edited by Mario Torelli

------

The originality of the Etruscans with regard to the other people of antiquity was first perceived -- and carefully analyzed -- by the Greek historians and philosophers. They stressed the existence of an evident dichotomy in their soiety between those they called lords (despotai) and those they generally caleld "serfs" (oiketai) or domestics (therapontes), describing the dominance of the former and the subservience of the latter to the family group (oikos). Most of the information we have about Etruscan society --mainly gleaned from the work of Athenaeus of Naucratis (third century A.D.) The Learned Banquet -- quotes Aristotle (I, 23), Theopompus (XII, 517 ff.), Heraclides Ponticus or Timaeus of Tauromenium (IV, 153r. ff. and XI, 517r.), etc. Other Greeks provide a different point of view: in the work of the Stoic Posidonius of Apamea, summarized by the historian Diodorus (V, 40 ff.), it may be noted that the reason for the Etruscan dominion over Italy prior to that of the Romans was seen in relation to their economic resources and social equilibria. Thus, in some cases, starting from a reflection on customs, an explnaation was given for the peculiarity of the religious practices, laws, and constitutions. Seen from this point of view, the anomalous status of the serfs with regard to Greek customs could almost appear to be the hidden key to the wealth and productive capacity, allowing us to view the Etruscan opulence in a more positive light. Thus Posidonius informs us about the prosperity of the serfs, who were well dressed, "better than is becoming for subodinate people", and possessed, if not land, at least buildings of every type -- workshops, and town and country houses.

From a legal point of view, although the Roman clients abandoned their domestic cults in order to embrace those of their patrons -- renouncing a considerable part of their legal rights in exchange for the protection of the more powerful individual -- they did not, as a result, lose their citizenship or right to vote. It is a situation that our sources do not seem to associate with the Etruscan serfs, whose subjection seems, in fact, to be reflected by the internal layout of the house with an atrium. Indeed, the oldest form of the atrium, the testudinate (vaulted) space in whic hthe roof was supported by columns (as in the Tomb of the Capitals or that of the Shields and Chairs at Cerveteri), appeared between the last quarter of the seventh and the begining of the sixth centuries B.C., just as public spaces in the city were being given a moumental character, almost as if this were a sign for the introduction of a social order that relegated the serfs and not the citizens to the only public space in which they have function, the hall of state and government in their masters' houses. There, seated on a throne, the pater familias and mater familias received their serfs according to a ritual that we must imagine as being similar to the one described by Macrobius (Saturnalia, I, 16, 32) and other authors with regard to the "Etruscan kings" who, every nine days (the day on which the markets were held), received their peasants, who brought them the produce of their land, explained the reasons for quarrels, and renewed their pledges of loyalty. Another illustration of the condition of the serfs, from the same period (ca. 630 B.C.) is provided by the scenes carved on the back of the wooden throne found in Tomb 89 at Verucchio: these depict the most prestigious domestic activity, associated with the rites of matrimony and triumph of a gens, the production of textiles and woolen clothes. Numerous serfs take part, grazing the flocks of sheep, taking the shorn wool to be carded, then bringing it to the mistress, who before the large pedimented house, dies and spins it with her daughters and maids. A number of armed men (the master and his relatives) protect these domestic activities, heralding the triumph.

The Etruscan aristocracy emerged by exploiting the new legal system of the city and its territory in order to bring the poorest memebers of the community (Latin tenuiores) into its services. The instititution of the patronage system (linked to the heredium, the minimum area of land that could be inherited) that Romulus had created in Rome at about the same time attempted to address the problems of social organization resulting from the extension of and changes to the forms of property. The Etruscans seem to have found other solutions to these problems: the level of wealth reached by a number of lords -- frequently thanks to the practice of piracy -- allowing them to have immence political power and military prestige, and the fact that they could turn the last migratory movements in the direction of Campania to their advantege (as in the case of Veio), resulted in even more drastic appropriation of land, men, and implements by individuals and more marked forms of subjection, leading, in some cases, to the poorest people being deprived of their citizenship.

The southern coastal cities responded to the economic stimuli, therefore, with a marked and extensively diffused social structure comprising various levels of wealth, with the possibility of progressing from one elvel to another (vertical social mobility) and a larger variety of obligations and social types, not all based on the gentilitial model of servitude: crafts or commercial guilds and societies with religious, military, nautical, and trading objectives were able to express themselves with greater freedom. The phenomenon of the painted tombs of Tarquinia in the last quarter of the sixth and the first quarter of the fifth centuries B.C. may be regarded as reflecting this social development. Relationships within the societies seemed to be stressed, in particular, by the frescoes in the Tomb of the Inscriptions at Tarquinia; in a huge building, perhaps the seat of a Collegium Mercatorum (corporation of merchants), a festival is being celebrated with joyous freedom -- and games -- bringing together the serfs (oiketai) Tetiie and Pumpu (both of Sabellian origin) and members, all male, of various families, such as the Matue, the Recieniie, and the Vinacna, whose names were not found, so it seems, among those of the subsequent, more limited, oligarchy of the city in the fourth century.

With just a few variations, this socal structure was to be found in the large large Etruscan ports, such as Populonia on the Tyrrhenian, which served the mining district. In Campania the multiplicity and complexity of the social models relating to each geopolitical area hinders a unified vision of this large region that then became Etruscan. At Capua the system of semi-servile tenancy of land, mainly on the part of Italic peoples called Opici ("those who work"), must have been in effect until the pressure, towards the middle of the fifth century, of a new Italic state that had formed on the eastern border of Caputan territory in the Matese massif, obliged the small group of Etruscan landowners ot divide the ownership of the land (and also of the Opici) and the government of the city with the leaders of those who were known henceforth as Campanians; in fact, a term in the treaty betweeen the Etruscans of Capua and the Italic peoplse who had settled in the city and its territory specified, in the Latin translation, societas urbis agrorumque. However, although this ended in 421 B.C. with the liquidation of the Etruscan oligarchy, this outcome to the contradictory situation was preceded, from ca. 530 to 490 B.C., by a notable development of trade and industry in the city, and the growth of the middle and lower classes parallel with the establishment of Aristodemos' tyranny in Cumae.

At the end of the Archaic perid (ca. 480 B.C.), Etruscan society overcame the most market inequality of the Orientalizing period between gentes of the upper class and the lower classes, or, at least, it managed to find room for new participants and models within the older, well-tried social organization. A series of events that had a disastrous outcome for the nation that had hitherto been hegemonic in Italy then followed: a naval defeat off Cumae at the hands of the Syracusans and Campanian Greeks in 474 B.C.; the end, due to the Italic peoples of Campania, of Etruscan domination of the cities in the region in 435 B.C.; the end, due to the attacks of the Gauls, of the Etruscan cities in the Po Valley at the beginning of the fourth century; and the conquest of Veio by the Romans in 396 B.C. However, aside from these setbacks, the social equilibrium achieved thus far could only have been maintained on two conditions. The failure, albeit spread out in time and space, to satisfy these caused a crisis to which Etruria proper (between the Tiber and the Arno) and -- as long as it was governed by Etruscan magistrates -- Capua gave a political response aiming at social conservation rather than innovation. This is the attitude that is to be found, for example, in the scenes on the sarcophagus from the Sperandio cemetary at Perugia, where the possessions (in Latin, familia, family property) of the deceased are paraded before us: flocks of sheep driven by a serf, and prisoners, possibly of war, or else nexi, debt-slaves. The restoration of the power of the oligarchy led to the revival of the system of domination over the countryside on which Etruscan society was based in the Orientalizing period, with the large estates being run on semi-servile basis.

Dionysius of Halicarnassus recalls the episode in his Roman Antiquities (II, 44, 7) mentioning the presence among the troops of Veio's allies, of numerous "Penests" (Penestai) under the command of the most powerful leaders (dunatotatoi). In Greece, the term Penests referred to a people that had been conquered by the Thessalians and worked the large estates of their masters, dividing -- on an unfair basis, no doubt -- the produce of the land with them; they were also required to do military service as foot-soldiers alongside the cavalry of the landowners. Their status, which was certainly not that of free citizens, did not prevent them, nevertheless, from enjoying a degree of affluence and having the right to own certain forms of property -- for instance, houses. According to classifications that date from the Hellenistic age and are repeated in Pollux's Onomasticon (III, 83), the condition of the Penests was in-between that of freedom and slavery. The apperance of the term "Penests" cannot, therefore, be considered to be a coincidence in the writings of Dionyisus; he had read Aristotle, who wrote a book on the customs of the Etruscans (Tyrrhenon Nomima), and also the works by Theophrastus, who, according to Cicero (De finibus, V, 4), not only described the customs, institutes, and learning of the barbarian peoples, but also collected their laws. Although very little of Theohrapstus' vast output has survived, there is perhaps an echo of these works in the writings of the Byzantine historian Johannes Zonaras where he stresses the equilibrium of the constitution of the Volsinii (polis eunomoumene) before it was overthrown by those he called "serfs". Dionysius' text also gives an extremely accurate picture of southern Etruria after 480 B.C. It is sufficient to mention the recent discovery at Vetulonia of the helmets of the gens Haspna (fifth century B.C.) who must have led their freemen and "Penests" to war in much the same way as the gentes allied with Veio described by Dionysius. Or else a comparison may be made with the information given by Dionysius with that provided by Livy (IX, 37, 12) with regard to a later period (late fourth century), when he describes the cohorts of peasants mobilized by their masters to defend the lands that the Roman troops had invaded from the Monti Cimini. This seems to suggest that, in the countryside, there was a network of large estates located near the owners' residences and cultivated by a subordinate peasant class.

Bearing in mind the evolution of what appears to be the state of affairs in Etruscan society on the eve of its Romanization, we are in a better position to assess the crises and conflicts that shoook the Etruscan world between the fourth and the beginning of the second centuries B.C. It is worthwhile focusing our attention on the events that affected two cities: Arretium (Arezzo) and Volsinii. The Latin inscriptions (elogia) of the Spurinna family adorning the forum of Tarquinia in the Julio-Claudian age (part of the Elogia Tarquiniensia) recalled a certain Aulus Spurinna who repressed a serf revolt in Arezzo. This serf revolt should probably not be confused with the one, recorded by Livy (X, 3, 2) in 302 B.C., of the urban plebeians of Arretium against the excessive power and enormous wealth of the family holding sway over the city, the Cilnii, for the pacification of which Roman mediation was necessary. The backbone of these uprisings was formed by artisans, especially those who wrought the bronze artifacts, and other subordinate classes who worked on the lands of the Cilnii, perhaps supported by the free social classes who aspired to more equitable access to property and to the government of the city, and for whom it was necessary to create a currency system that was absent here, as it was in most of Etruria., It must, however, be pointed out that, perhaps in order to avoid events like those in Arezzo, probably to meet the requirements of the middle and upper urban classes, and certainly to oppose the monetary expansion of Rome, Tarquinia put into circulation a new bronze coin at the end of the fourth century. At almost the same time, Volsinii issued the oval series. In the case of Volsinii it is possible to follow the development of a crisis lasting from the late fourth to the early third centuries (the wars against Rome from the late fourth century B.C. to the battle of Sentinum of 295 B.C. and the battle of Lake Vadimonis of 283 B.C. are the probably context for these events. The serfs were apparently then required by their masters to participate (perhaps when they became free citizens) in the government of the city (diokesiis poleos), perhaps with regard to the administration of the enormous riches of its sanctuaries, including those of the Fanum Voltumnae, the temple of Voltumna, where the general assemblies of the Etruscan Confederation were held. From then onwards there were more specifically political demands, such as the right to become members of the senate and hold government posts; this was, in fact, obtained in a violent manner by eliminating the majority of the members of the old ruling class and marrying their wives. This is the account of the Byzantine historian Johannes Zonaras (and of Johannes Antiochensis, fr. 50 Muller), which tallies with the Roman sources (especially Paulus Orosius, I, 5, 3, 5), in which reference is made to wills made under threat, and property taken by force from the natural heirs. Instigated by a number of Volsinian oligarchs who had survived the violence, Rome put an end to this situation in 264 B.C. by storming Volsinii after a difficult campaign, crushing the rebels, laying waste to the city, sacking it and resettling the survivors, masters and the serfs loyal to them alike -- on the site of what is now Bolsena. Other echoes of the events in Volsinii are to be found in the so-called prophecy of Vegoia (Gromatici Veteres). Moreover, Pseudo-Aristotle's De mirabilibus ascultationibus refer to a city in Etruria, isolated on the top of a hill surrounded by springs and forests, called Oinarea: this is, in other words, the city of Wine, Abundance, and Liberty, or Oina, resembling Vina (vineyard in Etruscan) o Velzna (Volsinii in Etruscan). The landowners of Oinarea, to avoid the excessive power of one of their number -- it appears that the lesson of the revolt at Arezzo against the Cilnii had been learnt -- entrusted the government of the city to their manumitted serfs who held office for a year. This throws further light on the events at Volsinii, and before their dramatic outcome no trace of which remained.