ion of
Parma)--two smaller Celtic cantons presumably clients of the Boii--
peopled the plain. At the western end of the plain the Ligurians
began, who, mingled with isolated Celtic tribes, and settled on the
Apennines from above Arezzo and Pisa westward, occupied the region of
the sources of the Po. The eastern portion of the plain north of the
Po, nearly from Verona to the coast, was possessed by the Veneti, a
race different from the Celts and probably of Illyrian extraction.
Between these and the western mountains were settled the Cenomani
(about Brescia and Cremona) who rarely acted with the Celtic nation
and were probably largely intermingled with Veneti, and the Insubres
(around Milan). The latter was the most considerable of the Celtic
cantons in Italy, and was in constant communication not merely
with the minor communities partly of Celtic, partly of non-Celtic
extraction, that were scattered in the Alpine valleys, but also with
the Celtic cantons beyond the Alps. The gates of the Alps, the mighty
stream navigable for 230 miles, and the largest and most fertile plain
of the then civilized Europe, still continued in the hands of the
hereditary foes of the Italian name, who, humbled indeed and weakened,
but still scarce even nominally dependent and still troublesome
neighbours, persevered in their barbarism, and, thinly scattered over
the spacious plains, continued to pasture their herds and to plunder.
It was to be anticipated that the Romans would hasten to possess
themselves of these regions; the more so as the Celts gradually began
to forget their defeats in the campaigns of 471 and 472 and to bestir
themselves again, and, what was still more dangerous, the Transalpine
Celts began anew to show themselves on the south of the Alps.

Celtic Wars

In fact the Boii had already renewed the war in 516, and their
chiefs Atis and Galatas had--without, it is true, the authority of the
general diet--summoned the Transalpine Gauls to make common cause with
them. The latter had numerously answered the call, and in 518 a
Celtic army, such as Italy had not seen for long, encamped before
Ariminum. The Romans, for the moment much too weak to attempt a
battle, concluded an armistice, and to gain time allowed envoys from
the Celts to proceed to Rome, who ventured in the senate to demand
the cession of Ariminum--it seemed as if the times of Brennus had
returned. But an unexpected incident put an end to the war before it