Hirpini reason we can't fix the exact period when the Romans subjugated them, but it must have been before 268 BC, when the Romans established their colony at Beneventum, a position that likely was the military key to the possession of their country. In the Second Punic War, the Hirpini appear as an independent people, acting apart from the rest of the Samnites. Livy expressly uses the name of Samnium in contradistinction to the land of the Hirpini. The latter people was one of those that declared in favour of Hannibal immediately after the battle of Cannae, 216 BC; but the
Campaign history of the Roman military was the costliest Rome had suffered since the Battle of Cannae. After the Cimbri inadvertently granted the Romans a reprieve by diverting to plunder Iberia, Rome was given the opportunity to carefully prepare for and successfully meet the Cimbri and Teutons in the Battle of Aquae Sextiae (102 BC) and the Battle of Vercellae (101 BC) where both tribes were virtually annihilated, ending the threat. The extensive campaigning abroad by Rome, and the rewarding of soldiers with plunder from those campaigns, led to the trend of soldiers becoming increasingly loyal to their commanders rather than to the state, and a