Falto

the name of a family of the Valeria gens.

1. Q. Valerius Falto, Q. F. P. N., was the first Praetor Perogrinus at Rome (Dict. of Ant. s. v. Praetor.) The occasion for a second praetorship was, that the war with Carthage required two commanders, and A. Postumius Albinus, one of the consuls for the year B. C. 242, being at the time priest of Mars, was forbidden by the Pontifex Maximus to leave the city. Falto was second in command of the fleet which, in that year, the last of the first Punic war, the Romans dispatched under C. Lutatius Catulus [Catulus] against the Carthaginians in Sicily. After Catulus had been disabled by a wound at the siege of Drepanum, the active duties of the campaign devolved on Falto. His conduct at the battle of the Aegates so mulch contributed to the victory of the Romans that, on the return of the fleet, Falto demanded to share the triumph of Catulus. His claim was rejected, on the ground that an inferior officer had no title to the recompense of the chief in command. The dispute was referred to arbitration; and the arbiter, Atilius Calatinus, decided against Falto, alleging that, as in the field the consul's orders took precedence of the praetor's, and as the praetor's auspices, in case of dispute, were always held inferior to the consul's, so the triumph was exclusively a consular distinction. The people, however, thought that Falto merited the honour, and lie accordingly triumphed on the 6th of October, B. C. 241. Falto was consul in B. C. 239. (Liv. Epit. xix.; Fast. Capit.; V. Max. 1.1.2, 2.8.2.)

2. P. Valerius Falto, Q. F. P. N., brother of the preceding, was consul in B. C. 238. The Boian Gauls, after having been at peace with Rome for nearly half a century, in this year resumed hostilities, and formed a league with their kindred tribes on the Po, and with the Ligurians. Falto was despatched with a consular army against them, but was defeated in the first battle with great loss. The senate, on the news of his defeat, ordered one of the praetors, M. Genucius Cipus [Cipus], to march to his relief. Falto, however, regarded this as an intrusion into his province, and, before the reinforcement arrived, attacked the Boians a second time and routed them. But on his return to Rome he was refused a triumph, not merely on account of his defeat, but because he had rashly fought with a beaten army without awaiting the arrival of the praetor. (Zonar. 8.18; Oros. 4.12.)

3. M. Valerius Falto, one of the envoys sent by the senate, B. C. 205, to Attalus I. king of Pergamus. Their mission was to fetch the Idaean mother to Italy, according to an injunction of the Sibylline Books. Falto was of quaestorian rank at this time, but the date of his quaestorian is not known. On the return of the envoys to Rome Falto was sent forward to announce the message of the Delphic oracle, which they had consulted on their journey, to the senate--" The best man in the state must welcome the goddess or her representative on her landing." (Liv. 29.11.) Falto was one of the curule aediles, B. C. 203, when a supply of Spanish grain enabled those magistrates to sell corn to the poor at a sesterce the bushel. (30.26.) Falto was praetor B. C. 201. His province was Bruttium, and two legions were allotted to him. (30.40, 41.) [W.B.D]