Brennus (4th century BC)

Brennus ( gall. Brennos ) was a military leader of the Gallic senones the BC pushed forward in the 4th century to Rome and sacked the city.

The senones among those Gallic tribes, the BC settled in northern Italy since the 4th century. They harried the Etruscans there and came up with the emerging Roman Republic was founded around 475 BC in conflict, as the Etruscan city Clusium asked for assistance. The most devastating of the Roman view encounter was the Battle of the Allia, which probably took place in the year 387 BC. The day of battle, July 18, went as this ater, as a black day in the history of Rome one, which was then barely larger than the Senonenstamm. The victorious Gauls sacked as a consequence the city of Rome. Only the castle on the Capitol could be held by the defenders - According to legend, the cackling geese of Juno prevented a secret, night attack of the Gauls to the castle.

An invasion of the Veneti in northern Italy moved the Gauls to retreat, not without having first negotiated with the Roman Quintus Sulpicius Longus Konsulartribunen a ransom of 1,000 pounds of gold. According to legend, the Romans accused in the Auswägung this ransom Brennus to use false weights. Then Brennus is with the words " Vae Victis! " (Eng. " Woe to the vanquished !") Additionally have thrown his sword into the scale, so that they had to pay even more gold now. The saying became proverbial and was later cited as Plautus and Plutarch. The material damage for the Roman state was far less than the intangible. The self-confidence was shaken; the Celts fear remained for decades a major factor in the Roman foreign policy. So writes Jochen Bleicken: "Never forget [ the Romans ] the terrible misfortune; as a shock had it cast on them, and many centuries later, when Rome was Empire, drove each Romans horror in the limbs when showed a bunch of Gauls on the distant horizon. " as a direct result of this ater put Rome in the following centuries great importance to a standing army with well-trained soldiers, which became the foundation of the Roman success.

Whether Brennus however really bear this name, or received it in hindsight after Brennus, who later invaded a century deep to Greece and in a similar bogey was the Greco-Roman world, is unclear.