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Augustus surrounded the town, and two hills which were still held by the enemy, with a wall forty stades in length. When Testimus, another Dalmatian general, brought an army to the relief of the place Augustus met him and drove him back to the mountains, and while Testimus was still looking on he took Promona before the line of circumvallation was finished. For when the citizens made a sally and were sharply repulsed, the Romans pursued them and entered the town with them, where they killed a third part of them. The remainder took refuge in the citadel, at the gates of which a Roman cohort was placed to keep watch. On the fourth night the barbarians asaulted them, and they fled terror-stricken from the gates. Augustus repulsed the enemy's assault, and the following day received their surrender. The cohort that had abandoned its position was obliged to cast lots, and every tenth man suffered death. The lot fell upon two centurions among others. It was ordered, as a further punishment, that the surviving members of the cohort should subsist on barley instead of wheat for that summer.
Appian. The Foreign Wars. Horace White. New York. THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. 1899.
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