Quintus Poppaedius Silo

Quintus Poppaedius Silo led the Italian allies against Rome in the Social War, the rebellion that won citizenship for Italy by nearly destroying the Republic. He was a Marsian noble and a friend of the reformer Livius Drusus, who had proposed extending the citizenship to the allies and was assassinated in 91 BC with the bill unpassed. The allies had provided most of Rome's soldiers for a century without the vote, the legal protections or a share in the land distributions, and Drusus's murder ended the argument that it could be got by asking. They formed a federal state called Italia with its capital at Corfinium, its own senate, consuls and coinage - some of it showing the Italian bull goring the Roman wolf - and Silo was one of its two commanders. He beat Roman armies in the field, including one under the consul Rutilius Lupus, who was killed. The war was ended less by fighting than by concession: Rome passed laws in 90 and 89 BC granting citizenship to communities that had stayed loyal and then to those who laid down arms, which took the cause away from the rebellion piece by piece. Silo fought on with the southern allies after the north had settled and was killed in 88 BC. Within a generation every free Italian south of the Po was a Roman citizen, which is what he had wanted. The war killed perhaps 300,000 people to obtain by force a concession that had been on the table as a bill. It also militarised Roman politics: the armies raised to fight it were the armies Sulla and Marius turned on each other within two years, and the Republic never recovered the habit of settling anything without them.

• Lived: 130 BCE – 88 BCE
• Nationality: Italian
• Roles: military_leader, politician