The Boii in 218 B.C.

The Boii — Celtic Tribes.

The great people of the plain south of the Padus, settled in the rich country of the Apennine foot about Felsina and the towns of the Aemilian land — the fiercest of all the Gauls in their long quarrel with Rome. They it was who, with the Insubres, called the Gaesatae down from the Alps for the war that ended in ruin at Telamon; and now, in 218, hearing of Hannibal’s approach, they have thrown off their hostages and risen again. They have fallen on the new Roman colonies of Placentia and Cremona, driven the fleeing settlers into Mutina and laid siege to them there, cut up a Roman army in a wooded ambush — and they will be the first allies to greet the Carthaginian as he comes down into the Po.