Gaius Hostilius Mancinus
Encyclopedia
Gaius Hostilius Mancinus was a Roman consul
Consul
Consul was the highest elected office of the Roman Republic and an appointive office under the Empire. The title was also used in other city states and also revived in modern states, notably in the First French Republic...

 in 137 BC. Due to his campaign against Numantia in northern Spain, Plutarch
Plutarch
Plutarch then named, on his becoming a Roman citizen, Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus , c. 46 – 120 AD, was a Greek historian, biographer, essayist, and Middle Platonist known primarily for his Parallel Lives and Moralia...

 called him "not bad as a man, but most unfortunate of the Romans as a general." During this campaign in the Numantine War
Numantine War
The Numantine War was the last conflict of the Celtiberian Wars fought by the Romans to subdue those people along the Ebro. It was a twenty year long conflict between the Celtiberian tribes of Hispania Citerior and the Roman government. It began in 154 BC as a revolt of the Celtiberians of...

, Mancinus was defeated, showing some cowardice, allegedly putting out his fires and trying to flee by night before being surrounded and forced to make peace. According to Plutarch, Tiberius Gracchus
Tiberius Gracchus
Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus was a Roman Populares politician of the 2nd century BC and brother of Gaius Gracchus. As a plebeian tribune, his reforms of agrarian legislation caused political turmoil in the Republic. These reforms threatened the holdings of rich landowners in Italy...

 was instrumental in bringing about the peace and saving 20,000 Roman soldiers. He returned home something of a hero, but Mancius was put on trial by the Senate, which refused to accept the treaty. While Gracchus and other lieutanants were saved by Scipio Africanus Minor, the Senate decreed that Mancinus be handed over to the Numantines, as some 20 Roman commanders were handed over to the Samnites after the defeat at Caudine Forks in 321 BC. Plutarch does not relate Mancinus' further fate, but Appian noted that he was taken to Spain and handed over naked to the Numantines, but that they refused to accept him.
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