Insubres

The Insubres are mentioned by Caecilius Statius, Cicero, Polybius, Livy, Cassius Dio, Pliny the Elder, and Strabo.

Polybius called the Insubres the most important Celtic tribe of the Italian peninsula, while according to Livy they were the first to inhabit Cisalpine Gaul, from the 7th century BC.

The Insubres were part of the Golasecca culture, which takes its name from a town near Varese, where Abbot Giovanni Battista Giani made the first findings of about fifty Celtic graves with pottery and metal objects.

Thanks to the cultural and commercial exchanges with neighboring areas, such as Etruria, Venetia and Transalpine Gaul, the Insubres made some advances and created a distinct society of their own.

This was prompted by developments that started in 283 BC, when unspecified Celts besieged Arretium (Arezzo in Tuscany) and defeated a Roman force that came to the aid of the city.

[3] What prompted the Insubres to join the Boii in another rebellion was a law passed in Rome that provided for the subdivision of the ager gallicus into Roman administrative units.

This created fears among the Boii and Insubres that the Romans were now fighting wars to exterminate and expel the enemy and annex their territory.

[4] In 225 BC, the Boii and Insubres paid large sums of money to Gaesatae mercenaries led by Aneroëstes and Concolitanus.

The Gauls encountered Roman forces near Clusium (Chiusi); instead of engaging, they withdrew to Feasulae (Fiesole) at night.

They were routed by the combined forces of the two Roman consuls, Lucius Aemilius Papus and Gaius Atilius Regulus, at the Battle of Telamon.

[7] In 222 BC, the Romans besieged Acerrae, an Insubre fortification on the right bank of the River Adda between Cremona and Laus Pompeia (Lodi Vecchio).

The consul Marcus Claudius Marcellus headed for Clastidium and his colleague Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio Calvus continued the siege of Acerrae.

The Romanisation of the Insubres was probably quick owing to the presence of Roman colonies and to Julius Caesar using Mediolanum as a staging post for his conquest of Gaul (58–50 BC).