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Livy tells the story of the earliest of the poison leagues. He is dependent on older historians for his facts, as the alleged events happened some three centuries before he wrote; about the year 330 in fact. A number of patricians died one after the other, their illnesses presenting similar symptoms, but the causes of these could not be traced. At last, however, a female slave gave information to the Ediles of a group of twenty Roman ladies of the highest position who, she said, occupied themselves in concocting poisons, and administering them to their husbands or others who had become inconvenient to them. The confederacy was directed by two women named Cornelia and Sergia, and although Livy says 20, some accounts give the number of the conspiratresses as 170, while others total it at 366. Cornelia and Sergia were brought before the magistrates, and indignantly denied that they had done more than prepare wholesome beverages and medicines. On this the slave, whose own life was in jeopardy, demanded that they should themselves be required to take some of these compounds. They were granted permission to consult with their associates before doing this, and in the interval they all poisoned themselves. Livy states that this story is not told by all the contemporary narrators.

Later Roman history leaves little doubt that poisoning became a profession, or rather was frequently associated with the pharmacy of the period, as it had been in Greece. Theophrastus, who wrote about 300 , alludes to a poison prepared from aconite which could be so administered as to take effect at a defined future time, three months, six months, a year, or longer after