The Volsci around 496 BCE according to Livy raised troops to send to assist the Latins before the Romans defeated the latter at the Battle of Lake Regillus.
Because of the Roman dictator's speedy march, the Volsci forces did not arrive in time to participate in the battle.
The Romans learn of the Volscian activities, however.
The consuls Appius Claudius Sabinus Inregillensis and Publius Servilius Priscus Structus in 495 BCE march into Volscian territory.
The Volsci are alarmed, and give three hundred children of the leading men of Cora and Suessa Pometia as hostages.
The Roman army withdraws.
The Volsci shortly afterward form an alliance with the Hernici and send ambassadors to seek the aid of the Latins.
The Latins, having recently been defeated by Rome at the battle in the previous year, are so outraged by the Volsci attempts to lure them into another war that they seize the Volscian ambassadors, deliver them to the consuls in Rome, and advise them that the Volsci together with the Hernici are fomenting war.
The Roman senate, so thankful for the assistance of the Latins, returns six thousand prisoners to the Latin towns and in return the Latins send a crown of gold to the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus in Rome.
A great crowd forms, including the freed Latin prisoners, who thank their captors.
Great bonds of friendship are said to have arisen between the Romans and the Latins as a result of this event.
A group of Latin horsemen some time later in 495 ride to Rome to warn that a Volscian army is approaching the city.
The Roman plebs, angry at their burdensome levels of debt, refuse to enroll to fight against the Volsci on account of their grievances.
The patrician senate dispatches the consul Servilius to deal with the issue.
Servilius assembles the people, and soothes them initially with decrees relieving the some of the more severe hardships of debt, and also with promises of further consideration of the problems of debt after the war.
The people, thus placated, gather to swear the military oath and soon afterwards Servilius leads the Roman army from the city and pitches camp a short distance from the enemy.
The Volsci attack the Roman camp the following night, hoping to benefit from the dissent among the Romans.
The Roman army takes up arms, however, and the attack is aborted.
The Volsci attack the Roman fortification the next day filling the trenches and attacking the rampart.
The consul holds back the Roman troops at first, allowing the Volsci to destroy a large part of the fortifications surrounding the Roman camp.
He then gives the order to attack and the Volsci are routed at the first engagement.
The Roman army pursues the Volscian army to its own camp, which is surrounded, then taken and plundered following the flight of the Volsci.
The Roman force follow the Volscian army to Suessa Pometia, and takes and plunder the town, then returns to Rome in the glory of victory.
Ambassadors from the Volscian town of Ecetra then arrive in Rome, and the senate agrees to grant them peace on condition that their land be given to Rome.
Decimation (Latin: decimatio; decem = "ten") is a form of military discipline used by senior commanders in the Roman Army to punish units or large groups guilty of capital offenses such as mutiny or desertion.
The word decimation is derived from Latin meaning "removal of a tenth".
The procedure is a pragmatic, yet vicious, attempt to balance the need to punish serious offenses with the practicalities of dealing with a large group of offenders.
The earliest documented decimation occurs in 495 BCE during the Roman Republic's early wars against the Volsci. Licy records that consul Appius Claudius Sabinus Inregillensis, in response to an incident where his army had been scattered, has the culprits punished for desertion: Centurions, standard-bearers and soldiers who had cast away their weapons are individually scourged and beheaded, while of the remainder, one in ten are chosen by lot and executed.
