Fabius

Fabius, the name of one of the most illustrious patrician families of Rome.—QUINTUS FABIUS RULLIANUS, a general in the second Samnite war, was dictator (315), censor (304), and six times consul.—QUINTUS FABIUS MAXIMUS VERRUCOSUS, five times consul and twice censor, was elected dictator (221) immediately after the defeat of the Romans at Trasimenus. The peculiar line of tactics which he observed in the second Punic war obtained for him the surname of Cunctator ('De-layer'). Hanging on the heights like a thundercloud, to which Hannibal himself compared him, and avoiding a direct engagement, he tantalised the enemy by the favourite devices of guerilla warfare; he harassed them by marches and counter-marches, and cut off their stragglers and foragers; and at the same time his delay allowed Rome to assemble her forces in greater strength. But this 'Fabian policy' was neither appreciated in the camp nor at home; and shortly afterwards, Marcus Minucius Rufus, Master of the Horse, was raised to an equal share in the dictatorship. During his fifth consulship Fabius recovered Tarentum (209 B.C.), which had long been one of Hannibal's important strongholds. He died in 203 B.C.—CUNCTATOR FABIUS, surnamed Pictor, executed in 302 upon the walls of the temple of Salus the earliest Roman painting of which we have any record. His grandson, QUINTUS FABIUS PICTOR, was the first writer of a Roman history in prose.