After the General shouts another order, they hear the pounding footsteps and soon hundreds of lightly armoured
Velites come pouring out of the forest behind them, their thin but impossibly pointy spears rising up and down like the bristles of some gargantuan centipede.
Born into a patrician family about 440, and served as censor (403); selected as dictator during the war with Veii (396), and captured the city by digging a tunnel into the city; dictator again during the Gallic invasion of central Italy under Brennus (391-390); raised an army in the countryside while the Gauls sacked Rome, but only removed them by paying a large bribe (390); military tribune with consular powers seven times between 401 and 381; reputedly reformed the army, introducing classification of troops by age and equipment (
velites, principes, etc.); defeated the Aequi and Volsci (389), and repulsed a second invasion of the Gauls (367); accepted the Licinian-Sextian Laws as a compromise with the plebeians, despite his own patrician background (367); died of plague in 365.
Cornelius Scipio the Elder near Massilia (Marseille) and crossed the Rhone the next month; undertook difficult passage of the Alps and entered Italy (September-October 218); defeated a force of Roman cavalry and
velites (lightly armed troops) at the Ticinus (November) and routed the main Roman army under T.