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dren. Later the Pappian and Poppaean Law was framed by Marcus Pappius Mutilus and by Quintus Poppaeus Secundus, who were then consuls for a portion of the year. It turned out that both of them had not only no children but not even wives. From this very fact the need of the law was discernible.--These were the events in Rome. [-11-] Germanicus meanwhile had captured among other posts in Dalmatia also Splonum, in spite of the fact that it occupied a naturally strong position, was well protected by walls, and had a huge number of defenders. Consequently he was unable to accomplish aught with engines or by assaults, yet he took it as a result of the following coincidence. Pusio, a Celtic horseman, discharged a stone against the wall which so shook the superstructure that it immediately fell and dragged down the man who was leaning upon it. At this the rest were terrified, and in fear left the wall to ascend the acropolis. Subsequently they surrendered both it and themselves. The Romans under Germanicus having reached Raetinium, a city of Dalmatia, fared rather badly. Their opponents, forced back by the numbers, could not resist them and therefore placed fire in a circle about themselves and threw it into the buildings near by, devising a way to keep it surely from blazing up at once and to make it go unnoticed for a long time. The enemy after doing this retired to the heights. The Romans, unaware of their action, followed hard after them expecting to find no work at all in pillaging extensively. Thus they got inside of the circle of fire and with their minds directed upon the enemy saw nothing of it until they were encompassed by it on all sides. Then they found themselves in imminent danger, being pelted by men from above and injured by fire from without. They could neither safely stay where they were nor break their way out without danger. If they stood out of range of the missiles they were consumed by the fire, or if they jumped away from the flame they were destroyed by the hurlers of missiles. Some were caught in narrow places and perished by both at once, wounded on one side and burned on the other. The majority of those who entered the circle met their fate in this way. Some few by casting corpses into the very flame and making a passage over them as over bridges managed to escape. The fire gained such headway that not even those on the acropolis could stay there, but abandoned it in the night and hid themselves i
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