Book 38
43
M. Fulvius and M. Aemilius were on bad terms with one another, the main cause being Aemilius' suspicion that it was owing to Fulvius that he had been made consul two years later than he ought to have been. In order to stir up odium against him, he introduced into the senate some delegates from Ambracia who had been suborned to bring charges against him. They asserted that while they were at peace and had done all that the former consuls had required of them and were prepared to show the same obedience to M. Fulvius, war was declared against them, their fields were ravaged, the terror created by the bloodshed and pillage reached their city and compelled them to close their gates. Then they were besieged, their city carried by storm, and all the horrors of war, fire and slaughter, wreaked upon them, their homes demolished, their city completely sacked, their wives and children dragged off into slavery, their goods carried away, and what they felt most bitterly of all, the temples in the city stripped of their adornments, the statues of their gods, or rather the gods themselves, torn from their shrines and carried away. All that was left to the Ambracians were the naked walls and the columns to receive their worship or hear their supplications and prayers. Whilst they were stating these grievances the consul, as previously arranged, questioned them as to other charges, and elicited answers made with apparent reluctance.
