Cincinnatus served as dictator, a king-like figure appointed by the Republic in times of extreme emergency, in 458 or 457BC in order to lead reinforcements to the defense of the Roman army under the consul L. Minucius Esquilinus Augurinus at Mount Algidus. Many of the details of the story are now assumed to be spurious and some consider the entire military account fictional, believing its parallels with T. Quinctius Cincinnatus's 380BC defeat of Praeneste and Fabius the Delayer's 217BC rescue of M. Minucius Rufus from Hannibal too great for chance. Cincinnatus is recorded, having taken advantage of his position as dictator, to ignore the objections of the tribunes and to charge his son's accuser Marcus Volscius for perjury, driving him into exile.