Res Gestae

So, when all the preparations for battle had been made, the barbarians just before the beginning of the third watch, since the fear caused by their former wounds had died out, poured in more numerous masses upon the barred gates of the city, with the great persistency ofthose who are guarding against disaster.[*](Text and meaning are somewhat uncertain.) But with the soldiers the provincials and the court attendants rose up with all the greater vigour to overwhelm them, and such were the numbers of the foe that weapons of every kind, even though thrown at random, could not fall without effect.

Our men noticed that the barbarians were using the same missiles that had been hurled at them. And so it was ordered that the cords by which the barbs were fastened to the shaft should be partly severed before the arrows were shot from the bows; these during their flight kept their whole strength, and when they were fixed in the bodies of the enemy lost none of their effectiveness, or at any rate, if they found no mark, were at once broken.

But an entirely unexpected chance had great influence in the midst of this hot fight. A piece of artillery known as a scorpion, but called a wild ass in the language of the people,[*](Cf. xxiii. 4, 4 and 7.) placed exactly opposite a great mass of the enemy, hurled a huge stone, and although it dashed to the ground without effect, yet the sight of it caused the enemy such great terror, that in their amazement at the strange spectacle they fled to a distance and tried to leave

But at the order of their chiefs the horns sounded and the battle was renewed, and in the same way the Romans held the upper hand, since almost no bullet from the thong of a slinger,[*](There seems to be no other mention of the use of the amentum by slingers. It usually means a thong by means of which a javelin, or a spear, was given a whirling flight, or it may mean the missile itself (so perhaps here?). See T.L.L. s.v.) or any other missile when hurled, missed its mark. For the chiefs, inflamed by a desire to carry off the treasures which Valens had acquired by his ill-gotten gains took their place in the foremost ranks and were followed by the rest, who made a display of equalling the dangers of their superiors. For some were writhing mortally wounded, either crushed by great masses of stone, or with their breasts pierced with javelins; others who carried scaling-ladders and were preparing to mount the walls from every side were buried under their own burdens, as stones, fragments and whole drums of columns were thrown down upon them.