Litana Silva

Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography

LITANA SILVA a forest in the territory of the Boians in Gallia Cispadana, memorable for the defeat to the Roman consul L. Postumius, in B.C. 216. On this disastrous occasion the consul himself perished, with his whole army, consisting of two Roman legions, augmented by auxiliaries to the amount of 25,000 men. (Liv. 23.24; Frontin. Strat. 1.6.4.) At a later period it witnessed, on the other hand, a defeat of the Boians by the Roman consul L. Valerius Flaccus, B.C. 195. (Liv. 34.22.) The forest in question appears to have been situated somewhere between Bononia and Placentia, but its name is never mentioned after the reduction of Cisalpine Gaul, and its exact site cannot be determined. It is probable, indeed, that a great part of the tract between the Apennines and the marshy ground on the banks of the Padus was at this time covered with forest.
[E.H.B]

Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography

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