Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 9.djvu/301

 F L A F L A 289 indecisive results since 225. Rashly crossing the To near the site of Piacenza, lie sustained a check which compelled him to capitulate. The facile Ins ub res having granted him a free retreat, he speedily, in conjunction with the Cenomani, renewed the attack at another point, perhaps on the river Oglio. On this occasion he was successful ; but it seems very doubtful whether the victory was not gained in spite of rather than by means of the generalship of the consul. At all events his conquest of the Insubres failed to make any impression on the aristocratic party who had opposed his election aud afterwards sought to obtain his recall; and the honours of a triumph were awarded to him only when the negative decision of the senate had been overborne by the popular voice. According to Plutarch (Marcellus, 4) he was nevertheless compelled to resign his office before the natural term had expired. In 221 he was chosen magister equitum under the dictatorship of M. JMinucius Rufus, but was not permitted to take office owing to a bad omeu the squeaking of a shrew-mouse which had occurred immedi ately after the election. In the following year (220 B.C.) he was censor ; and this period of office was marked by the execution of two great public works which are permanently associated with his name a circus and a road. The Circus Flaminius, erected in a locality which had previously been known as the Prata Flaminia, was designed for the accom modation of the plebeians, especially for their public meet ings, they having no right at that period to sit in the Circus Maximus. The Via Flaminia was the first to be carried across the Apennines, thus connecting the Adriatic and Tuscan seas. It was a continuation of the old military road which had been carried as far as to Spoletium (Spoleto) in 240 B.C. From Spoletium it went to Fulginium (Foliguo) and Forum Flaminii (San Giovanni in Fori- fiamma); thence it mounted the Apennine slope to the station Ad Ensem (La Schieggia), crossing the central ridge at what is now known as the pass of Furlo, and descending by the valley of the Metaurus to Fanum For tune (Fauo), whence it kept the coast as far as to Arimi- num. In 218 B.C., as a leader of the democratic opposi tion, Flaminius was one of the chief promoters of the measure brought in by the tribune Claudius, which pro hibited senators and senators sons from possessing sea going vessels, except such as might be necessary for the transport of the produce of their own estates, and generally yhut them out from everything which the Romans included under the category of commercial speculation (quaestus), such as undertaking public contracts (redemptiones), and the like. The effective support which he had given to this measure vastly increased the popularity of Flaminius with his own order, and secured his second election as consul in the following year (217 B.C.), shortly after the defeat of Sempronius at the Trebia. Without staying to go through the usual solemnities of installation at the Capitol, or to celebrate the feriaj Latins, Flaminius at once hastened to Ariminum and thence to Arretium, there to be ready for an aggressive campaign against Hannibal as soon as the roads should be open. Meanwhile Hannibal, uneasy in his winter quarters, had accomplished with comparative ease the passage of the Apennines, and forced his way south ward across the flooded plains of the lower Arno. The consul, fearing lest the enemy should find Rome unpro tected, impetuously set out in pursuit. Free to select his own ground, Hannibal chose to make his stand between Bor- ghetto and Passignano, in the narrow defile formed by the hills of Cortona, which is closed at its entrance by the Trasimene lake. With the main body of his infantry he barred the further outlet at the hill of Torre, while the light troops and the cavalry were posted on the sides of the pass. It was early morning (on the 23d of June, accord ing to the uncorrected calendar, but in reality on some day in April) 1 when Flaminius reached the spot, and a thick haze covering hill and lake altogether concealed the position and even the existence of the enemy, until the Roman army found itself completely and hopelessly sur rounded in the fatal defile. In the three hours carnage that followed 15,000 Romans perished, and Flaminius was among the slain. From the materials which Livy and Polybius no friendly critics furnish, it is manifest that Flaminius was a man of ability, energy, and probity, who with the bravery of a true soldier combined many of the best qualities of a popular democratic leader. While eminent, however, as the head of a political party, and successful in carrying some pieces of useful legislation, he has little or no claim to rank among the greater statesmen of the republic. As a general, moreover, he was headstrong and self-sufficient, and he seems to have owed such victories as he achieved to personal boldness favoured by good fortune rather than to any superiority of strategical skill (see Livy, xxi., xxii. ; Polybius, ii., iii.). FLAMINIUS, CAIUS, son of the preceding, was quaestor under P. Scipio Africanus the elder in Spain in the year 210 B.C., and took part in the capture of New Carthage. Fourteen years later he was curule sedile ; and this term of office was marked by the distribution among the citizens at very low prices of large quantities of grain, which in a time of Roman scarcity the Sicilians had sent in grateful remem brance of his father s pruetorship thirty years before. In 193 B.C. he himself attained a praetorship, and was sent to the recently constituted province of Hispania Citerior. There he carried on the war against the insubordinate populations, and after a siege took Litabrum, a city which is described by Livy as having been strong and opulent, and made prisoner Corribilo, a powerful chieftain. In 187 B.C. he became consul along with M. /Ernilius Lepidus, and was successful in giving peace to Northern Italy by the subjugation of the warlike Ligurian tribes. In the same year the branch of the Via ^Emilia (traces of which are still discernible) connecting Bononia (Bologna) with Arretium (Arezzo) was constructed by him. FLAMSTEED, JOHN (1646-1719), the first astronomer- royal of England, was born at Denby near Derby, August 14, 1646. He was educated at the free school of that town, where his father carried on business as a maltster. Ho began the study of mathematics and astronomy while still very young, and showed considerable ingenuity in the con struction of mathematical instruments. At the age of fourteen he caught cold while bathing, and he suffered during the rest of his life from a rheumatic affection of the joints. In 1665 he went to Ireland to consult Greatrakes, a notorious quack of the period, who claimed to be able to cure such diseases by manipulation; but he returned to Derby uncured. He continued his astronomical studies here till 1669. About the year 1667 he wrote an able paper on the equation of time, afterwards appended by Wallis to his edition of Horrocks s works. In 1669 he communicated a paper to the Royal Society under the assumed name J. Mathesin a sole fundes, an anagram on his own name Johannes Flamsteedius ; but Oldenburg, the secretary, addressed a reply to him, showing that he was discovered, and from that time Flamsteed corresponded with many men of science. Sir Jonas Moore, whoso acquaintance he made in 1670 when visiting London, furnished him with several instruments, amongst others with Townly s micro meter. In 1673 Flamsteed composed his treatise on The true and apparent Places of the Planets u hen at their c/reatest and least Distances from the Earth, a work referred to by 1 See Mommseii, History of Rome, vol. ii. p. 122 (note), London, 1864. IX. - 37