---
title: "Seven Books of History against the Pagans"
author: "Paulus Orosius"
translator: "S. Alexander Laurent (AI-assisted, 2026)"
title_ru: "История против язычников"
title_fr: "Histoires contre les païens"
title_de: "Sieben Bücher Geschichte gegen die Heiden"
languages: [la, en]
shelf: "Church Fathers"
section: 78 of 177
url: https://scriptura.si/works/orosius-historiae/78/
cite: "Paulus Orosius, tr. S. Alexander Laurent (AI-assisted, 2026), Seven Books of History against the Pagans, section 78. Scriptura (scriptura.si), https://scriptura.si/works/orosius-historiae/78/"
---

# Seven Books of History against the Pagans

*Paulus Orosius, tr. S. Alexander Laurent (AI-assisted, 2026)*

Russian: История против язычников · French: Histoires contre les païens · German: Sieben Bücher Geschichte gegen die Heiden

Augustine's pupil tells the whole of world history to prove that the Christian times are not the worst.

## 78. Book 4 · Chapter 13

Source: https://scriptura.si/works/orosius-historiae/78/ · cite a paragraph as https://scriptura.si/works/orosius-historiae/78/#p-N

[¶0] In the year 517 from the founding of the City, Hamilcar, the general of the Carthaginians, was killed in war by the Spaniards, while he was secretly preparing another war against the Romans.

> Latin: 1 Anno ab urbe condita DXVII Hamilcar dux Carthaginiensium ab Hispanis in bello, cum aliud bellum aduersus Romanos clam pararet, occisus est.

[¶1] In the following year Roman envoys were killed by the Illyrians. Afterwards a most savage war was waged against these same Illyrians, in which, after many towns and peoples had been destroyed, the rest surrendered to the consuls Fulvius and Postumius.

> Latin: 2 Sequenti anno legati Romanorum ab Illyriis interfecti sunt. post cum ipsis Illyriis atrocissimum bellum gestum est: in quo multis oppidis populisque deletis reliqui se Fuluio Postumioque consulibus dediderunt.

[¶2] Then, in the third year, the pontiffs, powerful for ill, defiled the wretched city with sacrilegious sacrifices; for the decemvirs, going beyond the custom of the ancient superstition, buried alive in the Cattle Market a Gallic man and a Gallic woman, together with a Greek woman.

> Latin: 3 Tertio deinceps anno miseram ciuitatem sacrilegis sacrificiis male potentes funestauere pontifices; namque decemuiri consuetudinem priscae superstitionis egressi Gallum uirum et Gallam feminam cum muliere simul Graeca in foro boario uiuos defoderunt.

[¶3] But this magical binding was at once turned to the opposite effect; for the dreadful deaths of foreigners which they had inflicted they expiated by the foulest slaughter of their own people.

> Latin: 4 sed obligamentum hoc magicum in contrarium continuo uersum est; namque diras illas quas fecerant externorum mortes foedissimis suorum caedibus expiauerunt.

[¶4] For in the consulship of Lucius Aemilius Catulus and Gaius Atilius Regulus, the senate was struck with great terror by the revolt of Cisalpine Gaul, when it was also reported that a huge army was approaching from Further Gaul, chiefly of the Gaesatae — a name not of a nation but of mercenary Gauls.

> Latin: 5 siquidem L. Aemilio Catulo C. Atilio Regulo consulibus magna formidine consternatus est senatus defectione Cisalpinae Galliae, cum etiam ex ulteriore Gallia ingens aduentare exercitus nuntiaretur, maxime Gaesatorum, quod nomen non gentis sed mercennariorum Gallorum est.

*Note: The consuls of 225 BC were Lucius Aemilius Papus and Gaius Atilius Regulus; Orosius calls Aemilius Catulus.*

[¶5] And so the consuls, deeply alarmed, drew together the forces of all Italy to defend the empire. When this was done, there are said to have been eight hundred thousand armed men in the armies of the two consuls, as Fabius the historian, who took part in that same war, wrote.

> Latin: 6 itaque permoti consules totius Italiae ad praesidium imperii contraxere uires. quo facto in utriusque consulis exercitu octingenta milia armatorum fuisse referuntur, sicut Fabius historicus, qui eidem bello interfuit, scripsit.

*Note: Fabius Pictor’s figure, also reported by Polybius (more than 700,000 foot and some 70,000 horse), is the total manpower of Rome and her Italian allies in 225 BC, not an army in the field. Orosius treats it as the consuls’ army that fled (4.13.8–9).*

[¶6] Of these, the Romans and Campanians made up 249,200 foot soldiers and 26,600 horsemen; the rest of the multitude were allies.

> Latin: 7 ex quibus Romanorum et Campanorum fuerunt peditum CCLXLVIIII milia ducenti, equitum uero XXVI milia sescenti; cetera multitudo sociorum fuit.

*Note: The Latin numeral CCLXLVIIII is irregular. We read CCXLVIIII milia ducenti, 249,200, taking the L as intrusive; this agrees with Polybius’s figure of about 250,000 Roman and Campanian foot, which a reading of 299,200 would not.*

[¶7] When battle was joined at Arretium, the consul Atilius was killed; and eight hundred thousand Romans, after a part of them had been slain — and not even so great a part as ought to have frightened them — fled: for the historians relate that three thousand of them were killed on that occasion.

> Latin: 8 commisso proelio apud Arretium Atilius consul occisus est: octingenta milia Romanorum, nec saltem tanta quanta eos terrere debuit, caesa sui parte fugerunt: nam tria milia eorum tunc interfecta historici tradunt.

*Note: Orosius garbles the campaign of 225 BC. The Roman defeat was near Faesulae, not Arretium, and the consul Atilius Regulus fell at Telamon, in the Roman victory that Orosius counts as the second battle (4.13.10).*

[¶8] This is all the more ignominious and shameful — that such great columns should have scattered when so few were lost — because they betrayed that in their other victories they had prevailed not by strength of spirit but by the chances of war. For who, I ask, would believe that such a number had so much as existed in the army of the Romans, let alone that it had fled?

> Latin: 9 quod ideo ignominiosius turpiusque est, tam paucis amissis tanta agmina diffugisse, quia se in aliis uictoriis non uiribus animorum praeualuisse sed bellorum prouentibus prodiderunt. quis enim rogo in exercitu Romanorum crederet numerum istum fuisse saltem, non dico fugisse?

[¶9] After this a second battle was fought with the Gauls, in which fully forty thousand Gauls were slaughtered.

> Latin: 10 post haec secundum cum Gallis proelium gestum est, in quo plane quadraginta milia Gallorum trucidata sunt.

[¶10] In the following year the consuls Manlius Torquatus and Fulvius Flaccus were the first to lead Roman legions across the Po. There they fought with the Insubrian Gauls, of whom twenty-three thousand were killed and five thousand captured.

> Latin: 11 Sequenti anno Manlius Torquatus et Fuluius Flaccus consules primi trans Padum Romanas duxere legiones. pugnatum est ibi cum Insubribus Gallis, quorum interfecta sunt uiginti tria milia, quinque milia capta sunt.

[¶11] Then, in the year which came next after this, dreadful portents terrified the wretched city — wretched indeed, since it was terrified on the one side by the roaring of enemies and on the other by the wickedness of demons: for in Picenum a river flowed with blood; among the Etruscans the sky was seen to burn; and at Ariminum, late at night, a clear light shone out and three moons appeared, rising in distant regions of the sky.

> Latin: 12 Eo deinde anno, qui huic proximus fuit, dira miseram urbem terruere prodigia: miseram utique, quae hinc fremitu hostium, inde nequitia daemonum terrebatur; namque in Piceno flumen sanguine effluxit et apud Tuscos caelum ardere uisum est et Arimini nocte multa lucem claram obfulsisse ac tres lunas distantibus caeli regionibus exortas apparuisse.

[¶12] At that time too the islands of Caria and Rhodes were so shaken by a great earthquake that, as houses everywhere collapsed, even that huge Colossus fell.

> Latin: 13 tunc quoque magno terrae motu Caria et Rhodus insulae adeo concussae sunt, ut labentibus uulgo tectis ingens quoque ille colossus rueret.

*Note: Caria is a region on the mainland of Asia Minor opposite Rhodes, not an island.*

[¶13] In the same year the consul Flaminius, despising the auspices by which he was forbidden to fight, engaged the Gauls and conquered. In this war nine thousand Gauls were slain and seventeen thousand captured.

> Latin: 14 eodem anno Flaminius consul contemptis auspiciis, quibus pugnare prohibebatur, aduersum Gallos conflixit et uicit. in quo bello nouem milia Gallorum caesa, decem et septem milia capta sunt.

[¶14] After this the consul Claudius destroyed thirty thousand of the Gaesatae; there he himself, advancing into the front line, also killed their king Virdomarus; and among the many towns of the Insubrians which he had forced to surrender he took Milan too, a most flourishing city.

> Latin: 15 Post hoc Claudius consul Gaesatorum triginta milia deleuit, ubi etiam ipse Virdomarum regem in primam aciem progressus occidit: et inter multa Insubrium, quos ad deditionem coegerat, oppida Mediolanium quoque urbem florentissimam cepit.

[¶15] Then the Histrians were roused up as new enemies; the consuls Cornelius and Minucius subdued them, though indeed at the cost of much Roman blood.

> Latin: 16 Deinde Histri noui hostes excitati sunt: quos Cornelius Minuciusque consules multo quidem Romanorum sanguine subegerunt.

[¶16] Here there emerges for a moment that ancient appetite of the Romans for shameless praise, won even from parricides.

> Latin: 17 emergit hic paululum antiquus ille Romanorum improbae laudis etiam de parricidiis appetitus.

[¶17] For Fabius Censorius killed his son Fabius Buteo, who had been accused of theft: a crime worthy, no doubt, that a father should think it must be punished even by parricide — a crime for which not even the laws prescribed anything against any man beyond a money fine or, at the most, exile.

> Latin: 18 nam Fabius Censorius Fabium Buteonem filium suum furti insimulatum interfecit: dignum scilicet facinus, quod pater uel parricidio plectendum duceret, quod ne leges quidem nisi multa pecuniae aut summum exilii circa quemlibet hominum censuerunt.