Citation with stable link: Philip A. Harland, 'Iberians: Valerius Maximus, Petronius, Florus, and Appian on brave and/or savage Numantines (first-second centuries CE),' Ethnic Relations and Migration in the Ancient World, last modified August 4, 2026, https://philipharland.com/Blog/?p=22808.

Ancient author: Valerius Maximus (early first century CE), Memorable Deeds and Sayings 7.6, external / foreign 1-2 (link); Petronius, (first century CE), Satyrica 141 (link); Florus (early second century CE), Epitome of Roman History 1.34 (link); Appian of Alexandria (mid-second century CE), Roman Matters: Iberian Book 6.66, 76-96 (link).

Comments: Several anecdotes and stories circulated to the effect that peoples in Iberia (overlapping with modern Spain) such as the Numantines would, at least in dire circumstances, engage in the consumption of human flesh. (See also Juvenal on the Saguntines of Iberia at this link). Specific Greek and Roman authors deployed these stories in different ways, but the suggestion that certain Iberian (or Celtiberian) peoples were more savage and criminal than other populations tends to prevail. In some cases, the eating of human flesh could be taken as the most heinous of crimes, so criminalization of entire populations (often in the context of conquest by an external imperial power) is sometimes involved in these narratives.

Valerius Maximus’ first century collection of memorable deeds includes several involving foreigners. It’s under that heading that he includes some of the more extreme actions taken in dire circumstances by Kretans and by Numantines and Callagurrians in Iberia (Spain). While some other Greek and Roman authors would deal with the Numantine case differently and perhaps with more nuance (see Juvenal at this link and both Florus and Appian below), Maximus suggests that no amount of need excuses such savage behaviour. Similarly the Callagurrians are cast as worse than wild animals.

The fragments of Petronius’ first century novel about the adventures of Encolpius and Giton end with a reading of (most likely) Eumolpus the poet’s will. This will contains a humorous yet gross stipulation that any recipients of his legacy (beyond his own freedpersons) would be required to cut up and eat his own body. Sauces are suggested to make this palatable. In the process, Petronius has his character cite a variety of ethnographic precedents involving the eating of human flesh (in these cases under siege and in famine), including the case of the Saguntines and Numantines of Iberia and the Petelians in southeastern Italy.

Florus’s early second century summary of Roman history, which draws in part on the earlier and much longer work of Livy, includes a few paragraphs on the Numantine war. But Florus has mostly praise for Numantines as the glory of Iberia and as a particularly brave and resilient people (with some similarlities to Appian, as explained below). Although Florus’ story of the siege does refer to the Numantines resorting to the consumption of the bodies of the war dead, unlike Maximus, Florus refrains from moralizing about the eating of human flesh in this context. The story ends with the Numantines engaging in noble death rather than facing defeat by the Romans.

Appian of Alexandria’s much more extensive discussion of the Numantines is, expressly, an account about this people’s character, and more specifically about an ostensibly savage and yet manly and resilient people. They withstand Roman forces under numerous generals (in the mid-second century BCE), on the one hand, but they end up resorting to the most savage of behaviours, on the other.  In particular, the consumption of human flesh here in Appian is interpreted as a regression for the Numantines whose souls are marked by this wild and animalistic behaviour, bringing them back to their genuinely barbaric roots. At certain points, it becomes clear that Appian considers the Numantines as a subset of the broader ethnic category of the Arevakians, so that larger group is implicated as well.

Appian’s account here serves to criminalize an Iberian people while still acknowledging their manliness and resilience. Quite different is Juvenal’s roughly contemporary citation of similar rumours about Iberians, in that case Saguntines or Vaskonians (link). Juvenal is concerned to contrast truly savage and criminal Egyptians – who eat human bodies without pressure of a siege – to cases such as the Iberian ones, where some justification is imagineable and the reader is encouraged to pity the Iberians, on which contrast Maximus.

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Valerius Maximus

[Foreign peoples’ behaviours under extreme conditions]

[Kretans and the drinking of urine under siege]

(7.6, external / foreign 1-2) No such light of protection shone for the Kretans. Pushed to the extremes of need by Metellus’ siege, they tormented rather than quenched their thirst with their own urine and the urine of their pack animals. Fearing defeat, they suffered something that even a victor would not have made them suffer.

[Numantines in Iberia and the consumption of human flesh under siege]

Encircled by [the Roman consul and general] Scipio [ca. 133 BCE] with a defensive fence and a mound, the Numantines ate everything until finally they fed on the flesh of human bodies. For that reason, when the city was captured, many were found carrying the butchered limbs and parts of bodies under their clothing. In this case necessity is no excuse. For people who were free to die, it was not necessary to live in this way.

[Callagurrians in Iberia and the consumption of wives and children under siege] 

Their wild obstinacy was surpassed by the horrible impiety of the people of Calagurris [modern Calahorra, Spain] in a similar action. In order to more obstinately keep their word to the ashes of the slain Sertorius [ca. 73-72 BCE] in frustration over Gnaeus Pompeius’ siege, since there was no longer any living thing left in the city, they turned to consume their wives and children in a criminal (nefarius) feast. In order to nourish their flesh with their own flesh, the soldiers were not afraid to add salt to the unfortunate remains of the corpses. These were soldiers you might exhort in battle to fight bravely for their wives and families! Such a great general [i.e. Pompeius] should have punished rather than seeking victory against these enemies, since their punishment could bring him more respect than their conquest could bring him glory, because they surpassed in wildness (feritas) every species of reptile and wild animal you might compare them with. To those creatures the sweet pledges of life are more precious than their own breath; to the men of Calagurris they became lunch and dinner.

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Petronius

[Will requiring consumption of the deceased’s body compared with ethnographic cases of eating human flesh]

(141) [Gorgias (?):] “The ship from Africa with your money and slaves that you promised does not arrive. The fortune-hunters are tired out, and their generosity is shrinking. So that unless I am mistaken, our usual luck is on its way back to punish you. . . [missing text].”

[Eumolpus (?):] “All those who come into money under my will, except my own freedpersons, will get what I have left them on one condition, namely that they cut my body in pieces and eat it up in view of the crowd. . . [missing text].”

“We know that in some countries a custom (lex) is still observed that dead people should be eaten by their relatives, and the result is that sick people are often blamed for spoiling their own flesh. So I warn my friends not to disobey my orders, but to eat my body as enthusiastically as they cursed my soul. . . [missing text]”

. . . His great reputation for wealth dulled the eyes and brains of the fools. Gorgias was ready to manage the funeral. . .

[Eumolpus (?):] “I am not at all afraid of turning your stomach. You will get it under control if you promise to repay it for one unpleasant hour with heaps of good things. Just shut your eyes and dream you are eating up a solid ten million sesterces instead of human flesh. Besides, we will find some kind of sauce which will take the taste away. No flesh at all is pleasant in itself. It has to be artificially disguised and reconciled to the unwilling digestion.”

“But if you want the plan to be supported by precedents, the Saguntines [in Iberia] ate human flesh without any prospective inheritance in the time when Hannibal [the Punic general] besieged them [ca. 218 BCE]. The Petelians [in southeastern Italy] did likewise in the extreme conditions of famine, and gained nothing by the diet, except of course that they were no longer hungry. And when Numantia [in Iberia] was stormed by Scipio [ca. 133 BCE], some women were found with the half-eaten bodies of their children hidden under their clothing. . . [missing text]”

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Florus

[Character of the Numantines and context of the war with the Romans]

(II, 18) Although Numantia was inferior in wealth to Carthage, Capua and Corinth, it was the equal of any of them with regard to excellence (virtus) and honour (honor) and, if one judges this properly, was the greatest glory of Hispania [modern Spain]. This city, without any walls or fortifications and situated on only a slight eminence on the banks of a stream, with a garrison of 4,000 Celtiberians, held out alone against an army of 40,000 men for eleven years. The city not only held out but repulsed its foes with considerable vigour on several occasions and drove them to make discreditable terms in any treaty. Finally, when they found that the city was undefeated, they were forced to call in the general who had overthrown Carthage [i.e. Scipio Africanus the younger].

Scarcely ever, if the truth may be confessed, was the pretext for any war more unjust. The Numantines had harboured their allies and kinsmen the Segidians who had escaped from the hands of the Romans. The intercession which they made on their behalf produced no result. When they offered to withdraw from all participation in the war, they were ordered to lay down their weapons as the price of a regular treaty. This demand was interpreted by the barbarians as equivalent to the cutting off of their hands; and so they immediately had recourse to war under the leadership of the brave Megaravicus. They attacked [the Roman consul and general] Pompeius, but, when they might have utterly defeated him, they preferred to conclude a treaty.

They next attacked [the Roman consul] Hostilius Mancinus. They also held him back by inflicting continual losses upon him, so that no one could endure even to look in the eyes or hear the voice of a Numantine. Nevertheless, when they might have wreaked their fury in wholesale destruction, they preferred to make a treaty with him, being content to take his men’s weapons. But the Roman people, as much incensed at the dishonour and shame of this Numantine treaty as they had been at that of the Caudine Forks, wiped out the disgrace of the disaster of the moment by surrendering Mancinus to the enemy, and then, under the leadership of [the Roman consul] Scipio, who had been trained for the destruction of cities by the burning of Carthage, at last their desire for vengeance burst into flames.

At first Scipio had a harder struggle in the camp than in the field, and more with our own soldiers than with the Numantines. Worn out with continual, excessive and, for the most part, servile tasks, on the ground that they did not know how to fight they were ordered to carry more than the usual number of stakes, and because they refused to stain themselves with blood, they were bidden to cover themselves with mud. In addition to this, the women and camp-followers and all the baggage except what was absolutely necessary were dispensed with.

It is a true proverb which says that a general has the army which he deserves. The troops having been thus reduced to discipline, a battle was fought, and the sight of the Numantines in flight, which no one had even expected to see, was actually realized. They were willing to surrender if conditions were imposed to which men of spirit could submit. But since Scipio desired a complete and unqualified victory, they were first reduced to the necessity of rushing into the fray resolved to die, after they had first gorged themselves with, as it were, a funeral banquet of half-raw flesh and caelia, a name which they give to a local drink made from corn. Their intention was perceived by the general, and so, ready though they were to die, no opportunity was given them of fighting.

[Eating of the war dead and preference for noble death]

When famine pressed hard upon them — for they were surrounded by a trench and breastwork and four camps — they begged the general to allow them to engage him, so that he might slay them like men, and, when their request was refused, they determined to make an excursion. This resulted in a battle in which very many of them were slain and, as hunger pressed them hard, they lived for a while on the dead bodies. Finally, they made up their minds to flee, but this was prevented by their wives, who cut the girths of their horses. This was a grievous wrong, but due to their affection. Despairing, therefore, of escape and in a revulsion of rage and fury, they, at last, under the leadership of Rhoecogenes, made an end of themselves, their families and their native city with the sword, with poison and with general conflagration.

[Bravery of the Numantines]

All glory to a brave city, a city blessed, so it seems to me, even in its misfortunes. For Numantia loyally helped its allies and with so small a force withstood for so long a period a people which was supported by the resources of the whole world. Having been finally overcome by the greatest of generals, it left the enemy no cause for exultation. For not a single Numantine was left to be led in triumph as a prisoner; the city, being poor, provided no spoil; and, their weapons they themselves burned. Only the name of the city remained over which they could triumph.

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Appian

[Preview of the Numantine war]

[66] Lacking his previous confidence, Viriathus detached the Arevakians (or: Arevaci), Titthians (or: Titthi), and Bellians (or: Belli), extremely war-like peoples (ethnē), from their allegiance to the Romans, and these began to wage another war on their own account which was long and tedious to the Romans, and which was called the “Numantine war” from one of their cities. I will provide an account of this after finishing the war with Viriathus. . . [omitted sections].

[Leadership of Mettelus against the Arevakians and the war-like and “brave” Numantines]

[76] Our history returns to the war against the Arevakians and the Numantines, whom Viriathus stirred up to revolt. Caecilius Metellus [the Roman consul in 143 BCE] was sent against them from Rome with a larger army and he subdued the Arevakians, attacking them suddenly while they were gathering their crops.

There still remained the two towns of Termantia [modern Tiermes, about 168km north of Madrid, Spain] and Numantia [modern Garray] to engage his attention. Numantia was difficult to access due to two rivers, the ravines, and the dense woods that surrounded it. There was only one road to the open country and that had been blocked by ditches and palisades. The Numantines were first-rate soldiers by both horse and foot, there being about 8,000 altogether. Although small in numbers, they still gave the Romans great trouble by their excellence (aretē) in fighting.

[Leadership of Pompeius and Numantine success]

At the end of winter Metellus surrendered command of the army to his successor, Quintus Pompeius Aulus [142 BCE]. The army consisted of 30,000 foot soldiers and 2,000 horsemen, admirably trained. While encamped against Numantia, Pompeius had occasion to go away somewhere. The Numantines made a sudden attack against a body of his horsemen that was ranging after him and destroyed them. When he returned, he drew up his army in the plain. The Numantines came down to meet him, but retired slowly as though intending flight, until they had drawn Pompeius to the ditches and palisades.

[77] When Pompeius saw his forces wasted day by day in skirmishes with an enemy much inferior in numbers, he moved against Termantia as being an easier task. Here he engaged the enemy and lost 700 men. One of his tribunes, who was bringing provisions to his army, was caused to flee by the Termantines. In a third engagement the same day they drove the Romans into a rocky place where many of their infantry and horsemen with their horses were forced down a precipice. The remainder, panic-stricken, passed the night with weapons. At daybreak the enemy came out and a regular battle was fought which lasted all day with equal fortune. Night put an end to the conflict.

[High-spirited “bandits”]

From there, Pompeius marched against a small town named Malia, which was garrisoned by Numantines. The inhabitants slaughtered the garrison by treachery and delivered the town to Pompeius. He required them to surrender their weapons and give hostages, after which he moved to Sedatania, which a bandit-leader (lēstarchos) named Tanginus was plundering. Pompeius overcame him and took many of his men prisoners. So high-spirited were these bandits (lēstai) that none of the captives would endure servitude. Some killed themselves, others killed those who had bought them, and others scuttled the ships that carried them away.

[Pompeius’ failures against the Numantines]

[78] Pompeius, coming back to the siege of Numantia, tried to turn the course of a certain river in order to reduce the city by famine. The inhabitants harassed him while he was doing this work. They rushed out in crowds without giving any signal, and assaulted those who were working on the river, and hurled darts at those who came to their assistance from the camp. Finally they shut the Romans up in their own fortification. They also attacked the foragers and killed many, and among them Oppius, a military tribune. They made an assault in another area on a group of Romans who were digging a ditch, and killed about 400 of them including their leader.

About this time certain counsellors came to Pompeius from Rome, together with an army of new recruits, still raw and undisciplined, to take the places of the soldiers who had served their six years. Pompeius, being put to shame by so many disasters, and desiring to wipe out the disgrace, remained in camp in the winter time with these raw recruits. The soldiers, being exposed to severe cold without shelter, and unaccustomed to the water and climate of the country, fell sick with dysentery and many died.

A detachment having gone out for forage, the Numantines set up an ambush near the Roman camp and provoked them to a skirmish. The latter, not enduring the affront, attacked them. Then those who were in ambush sprang up, and many of the common soldiers and many of the nobility lost their lives. Finally the Numantines encountered the foraging group of Romans on its return and killed many of those also.

[Pompeius’ attempts to negotiate an end to the Numantine war]

[79] Pompeius, being cast down by so many misfortunes, marched away with his senatorial council to the towns to spend the rest of the winter, expecting a successor to come early in the spring. Fearing that he would be required to give account, he made overtures to the Numantines secretly for the purpose of bringing the war to an end. The Numantines themselves, being exhausted by the slaughter of so many of their bravest men, by the loss of their crops, by want of food, and by the length of the war, which had been protracted beyond expectation, sent legates to Pompeius. He publicly advised them to surrender at discretion, because no other kind of treaty seemed worthy of the dignity of the Roman people, but privately he told them what terms he should impose. When they had come to an agreement and the Numantines had given themselves up, he demanded and received from them hostages, together with the prisoners and deserters. He also demanded thirty talents of silver, a part of which they paid down and the rest he agreed to wait for.

[Leadership of Marcus Popillius Laenas and his failures]

Pompeius’ successor, Marcus Popillius Laenas, had arrived when they brought the last instalment [ca. 139 BCE]. Pompeius being no longer under any apprehension concerning the war, since his successor was present, and knowing that he had made a disgraceful peace and without authority from Rome, began to deny that he had come to any understanding with the Numantines. The latter proved the contrary by witnesses who had taken part in the transaction, senators, and his own prefects of the horsemen and military tribunes. Popillius sent them to Rome to carry on the controversy with Pompeius there. The case was brought before the Senate, and the Numantines and Pompeius debated it there. The Senate decided to continue the war. At that point, Popillius attacked the Lousonians (Lousones) who were neighbors of the Numantines. However, he accomplished nothing, and on the arrival of his successor in office [in 137 BCE], Hostilius Mancinus, he returned to Rome.

[Leadership of Hostilius Mancinus and his failures against the Numantines]

[80] Mancinus had frequent encounters with the Numantines in which he was worsted, and finally, after great loss, took refuge in his camp. On a false rumour that the Cantabrians (Kantabroi) and Vakkaians (Ouakkaioi; or: Vaccaeans) were coming to the aid of the Numantines, he became alarmed, extinguished his fires, and fled in the darkness of night to a desert place where Nobilior once had a camp. Being shut up in this place at daybreak without preparation or fortification and surrounded by Numantines, who threatened all with death unless he made peace, he agreed to terms like those previously made between the Romans and Numantines. To this agreement he bound himself by an oath. . . [omitted details of activities under the leaderships of Aemilius Lepidus in 136 BCE and Calpurnius Piso in 135 BCE, since the Numantines are not central there. Also omitted extensive discussion of Scipio Africanus’ preparations that result in his success where others failed].

[Scipio Africanus’ successful siege of the Numantines after extensive preparations of the Roman army]

[90] Not long afterwards [in 133 BCE] Scipio Africanus [the Roman commander] established two camps very near to Numantia and placed his brother Maximus in charge of one while he commanded the other. The Numantines came out in large numbers and engaged in battle. However, Scipio disregarded their challenge, not thinking it wise to engage in battle with men who were fighting in sheer desperation, but rather to shut them up and reduce them by famine.

Placing seven towers around the city, he began the siege and wrote letters to each of the allies, telling them what forces he desired them to send. When they arrived, he divided them into several parts and afterwards subdivided his own army. Then he appointed a commander for each division and ordered them to surround the city with a ditch and palisade. The circumference of Numantia itself was 24 stadium-lengths, that of the enclosing works more than twice as great as that figure. All of this space was carefully allotted to the several divisions, and he had given orders that if the enemy should make a quick attack anywhere, they should signal to him by raising a red flag on a tall spear in the daytime or by a fire at night, so that he or Maximus might hurry to help those who needed it.

When this work was completed and he could effectually repel any assaults, he dug another ditch not far behind this one and fortified it with palisades and built a wall 8 feet wide and 10 feet high, excluding the parapets. He built towers along this entire wall at intervals of 100 feet. As it was not possible to carry the wall around the adjoining marsh he threw an embankment around it of the same height and thickness as the wall, to serve in place of it.

[91] In this way, in my opinion Scipio was the first general to throw a wall around a city which did not shun a battle in the open field. However, the river Dorios [modern Douro River], which took its course through the fortifications, was very useful to the Numantines for bringing provisions and sending men back and forth, some diving and others concealing themselves in small boats, some making their way with sail-boats when a strong wind was blowing, or with oars aided by the current.

As he was not able to span the river on account of its breadth and swiftness, Scipio built two towers in place of a bridge. To each of these towers he moored large timbers with ropes and set them floating across the river. The timbers were stuck full of knives and spear-heads, which were kept constantly in motion by the force of the stream dashing against them, so that the enemy were prevented from passing covertly, either by swimming, diving, or sailing in boats. Thus was accomplished what Scipio especially desired, namely, that nobody could have any dealings with them, nobody could come in, and they could have no knowledge of what was going on outside. The Numantines would therefore be in need of provisions and equipment of every kind.

[92] When everything was ready and the catapults, ballistae, and other engines were placed on the towers, the stones, darts, and javelins collected on the parapets, and the archers and slingers in their places, he stationed messengers at frequent intervals along the entire wall to pass the word from one to another by day or night to let him know what was taking place. He gave orders to each tower that in any emergency the one that was first attacked should hoist a signal and that the others when they saw it should do the same, in order that he might be advised of the commotion quickly by signal, and learn the particulars afterward by messengers. The army, together with the native forces, now numbering some 60,000 men, he arranged so that one half should guard the wall and in case of necessity go to any place where they should be wanted, 20,000 were to fight from the top of the wall when necessary, and the remaining 10,000 were kept in reserve. Each division had its place assigned, and it was not permitted to any to change without orders. Each man was to spring to the place assigned to him when any signal of an attack was given. This is how carefully Scipio arranged everything.

[93] The Numantines made several attacks here and there against those guarding the walls. Swift and terrible was the appearance of the defenders, the signals being everywhere hoisted, the messengers running, the defenders of the walls springing to their places in crowds, and the trumpets sounding on every tower, so that the whole circuit of 50 stadium-lengths presented to all observers a most formidable aspect. This circuit Scipio traversed each day and night for the purpose of inspection. He was convinced that the enemy enclosed in this way and unable to obtain food, weapons, or assistance from outside could not hold out very long.

[Rhetogenes, the best Numantine]

[94] In the meantime, Rhetogenes – a Numantine who was surnamed Karaunios and was the greatest (aristos) in excellence (aretē) – convinced five of his friends to take an equal number of servants and horses and cross the space between the two armies secretly, on a cloudy night, carrying a bridge made in sections. Arriving at the wall, Rhetogenes and his friends jumped on it, killed the guards on either side, sent back the servants, drew the horses up the bridge, and rode off to the towns of the Arevakians, bearing olive-branches and entreating them, as fellow-members of their descent group, to help the Numantines.

[Preventing support from the Loutians]

Some of the Arevakians, fearing the Romans, would not even listen to them, but sent them away immediately. There was a rich town named Loutia, which was 300 stadium-lengths away from Numantia, whose young men sympathized with the Numantines and urged their city to send them aid. The older citizens secretly communicated this fact to Scipio.

Receiving this intelligence about the eighth hour, he immediately marched to Loutia with a numerous and well-equipped force. Surrounding the place about daylight, he demanded that the leaders of the young men should be handed over to him. When the citizens replied that they had fled from the place, he sent a herald to tell them that if these men were not surrendered to him he would sack the city. Being terrified by this threat, they delivered them up, to the number of about 400. Scipio cut off their hands, withdrew his force, rode away, and was back in his own camp the next morning.

[Conditions among the Numantines, Numantine manliness, and savage incidents of eating human flesh]

[95] The Numantines, being oppressed by hunger, sent five men to Scipio to ask whether he would treat them with moderation if they would surrender. Their leader, Avarus, explained a lot about the reputation (proairesis) and manliness (andreia; i.e. bravery) of the Numantines, and said that even now they had done no wrong. Instead, they come to experience their present misery for the sake of their wives and children and for the freedom of their homeland. Avarus said: “Therefore, Scipio, it is worthy of you, as a man renowned for excellence, to spare a good-souled (eupsychos) and manly (andronikos) descent group (genos) and to extend to us terms dictated by love of humanity, which we shall be able to bear, now that we have at last experienced a change of fortune. It rests not with us but with you whether you receive the surrender of our city on fair terms, or allow it to perish in a last struggle.”

When Avarus had said this, Scipio (who knew from prisoners the state of affairs inside) said merely that they must surrender their weapons and place themselves and their city in his hands. When this answer was made known, the Numantines, who were previously savage (chalepoi) in disposition because of their absolute freedom and quite unaccustomed to obey the orders of others, and were now wilder (agriousthai) than ever and beside themselves by reason of their hardships, killed Avarus and the five ambassadors who had accompanied him, as bearers of bad news. Perhaps they were also thinking that they had made private terms for themselves with Scipio.

[96] Soon after this, when all their food was consumed and they were without grain, flocks, or grass, they began, as is frequently necessary in wars, to lick boiled animal hides. When this also failed, they boiled and ate the flesh (sarkophagein) of human beings, first of those who had died a natural death, chopping them in small bits for cooking. Afterwards being nauseated by the flesh of the sick, the stronger inhabitants violently took the weaker. No form of misery was absent. They were made wild (agriousthai) in their souls (psychai) by their food, and their bodies were reduced to the semblance of wild beasts by famine, plague, long hair, and neglect.

In this condition they surrendered themselves to Scipio. He commanded them the same day to bring their weapons to a place designated by him, and on the following day to assemble at another place. But they put off the day, declaring that many of them still clung to freedom and desired to take their own lives. Therefore, they asked for a day to arrange for death.

[Appian’s summary of the lesson regarding the Numantines’ character and reason for the account]

[97] Such was the love of freedom (eleutheria) and of manly character (andragathia) which existed in this small barbarian (barbaros) town. With only 8,000 fighting men before the war began, how many and what terrible reverses did they bring upon the Romans! How many treaties did they make on equal terms with the Romans, which the latter would not consent to make with any other people! How often did they challenge to open battle the last general sent against them, who had an army of 60,000 men!

However, Scipio showed himself more experienced in war than themselves, by refusing to join battle with wild animals (thērioi) when he could reduce them by that invincible enemy, hunger. In this way alone was it possible to capture the Numantines, and in this way alone were they captured. Reflecting upon their small numbers and great sufferings, their valiant actions and long endurance, it has occurred to me to narrate these particulars of the Numantine history. Many, directly after the surrender, killed themselves in whatever way they chose, some in one way and some in another.

The remainder congregated on the third day at the appointed place, a strange and shocking spectacle. Their bodies were foul, their hair and nails long, and they were smeared with dirt. They smelled most horribly, and the clothes they wore were likewise squalid and emitted an equally foul stench. For these reasons they appeared pitiable even to their enemies. At the same time, there was something fearful to observers in the expression of their eyes, an expression of anger, grief, toil, and the consciousness of having eaten one another (allēlophagia).

[Analysis of Scipio]

[98] Having reserved fifty of them for his triumph, Scipio sold the rest and razed the city to the ground. So this Roman general overthrew two most powerful cities: Carthage, by decree of the Senate, on account of its greatness, its power, and its advantages by land and sea; and, Numantia, small and with a sparse population, the Romans knowing nothing about the transaction as yet. He destroyed the latter either because he thought that it would be for the advantage of the Romans, or because he was in a violent rage against the captives, or, as some think, in order to acquire the glory of two surnames from two great calamities. At any rate, the Romans to this day call him Africanus and Numantinus from the ruin he brought upon those two places. Having divided the territory of the Numantines among their near neighbors and transacted certain business in the other cities, threatening or fining any whom he suspected, he sailed for home. . . [omitted subsequent material].

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Source of the translations: D.R. Shackleton Bailey, Valerius Maximus: Memorable Doings and Sayings (LCL: Cambridge, MA: HUP, 2000), thoroughly adapted by Harland; Michael Heseltine, Petronius, Satyricon / Seneca, Apocolocyntosis (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1913); E.S. Forster, Lucius Annaeus Florus, Epitome of Roman History. Cornelius Nepos LCL (Cambridge, MA: CUP, 1929); and, White, Appian’s Roman History, 4 volumes, LCL (Cambridge, MA: HUP, 1912-13), public domain, adapted by Harland.