Siege of Aracillum 25 BC
Recorded location from Wikidata; battle sites are often approximate.
About the battle
The siege of Aracillum was a siege of the Cantabrian Wars that occurred in 25 BC. The battle took place between the forces of the Roman Empire, which consisted of five Roman legions commanded by Gaius Antistius Vetus and the forces of the Cantabri people, who had fortified the hill fort at Aracillum. The battle resulted in a Roman victory.
Aracillum was subjected to a fierce siege by the Romans, who would eventually take the settlement. The Roman commander, Gaius Antistius Vetus had taken charge of Caesar's legions when Augustus had fallen ill on the campaign (though Caesar did conduct a majority of the battles in this campaign himself).
The hill fort was able to withstand the Roman forces for some time, but the fort was eventually surrounded by three Roman camps. The Romans constructed more than 20 kilometers of walls, battlements and trenches (circumvallatio) to trap the defenders inside the fort and to prevent any aid or reinforcements from gaining entrance. In the face of starving to death, many of the Cantabri warriors opted instead to commit suicide rather than dying of starvation or being taken prisoner and being turned into slaves.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Siege of Aracillum (revision 1370738940), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section; shortened by selecting paragraphs and trimming at a sentence boundary; formatting and citations removed. No text added.
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