Sextus Iulius Frontinus, vir consularis de re militari

...many have written that he was named Quintus Calpurnius Flamma. When he saw the army sent into a valley whose sides the enemy had occupied on the higher edge, he requested and received three hundred soldiers. Having exhorted them to save the army by their valor, he ran down into the middle of the valley. The enemy descended from all sides to crush them, and by an arduous and rough battle, he gave the consul the opportunity to extract the army. Lucius Minutius, the consul in Liguria, when his army was sent into a narrow pass and was opposed on all sides, following the example of the Caudine disaster, ordered the Numidian auxiliaries—who were to be despised because of the deformity of their horses—to ride up to the passes that were held. At first, the enemies, intent on not being provoked, put up a station. The Numidians, by design, to increase the contempt for themselves, affected to fall from their horses and to be an object of mockery for the spectacle. Due to the novelty of the thing, the barbarians relaxed their ranks and even resolved into an audience for the show. While the Numidians noted this, they advanced little by little, and adding spurs, broke through the enemy's neglected outposts. Finally, when they attacked the nearest fields, the Ligurians were compelled to be called away to defend their own property, letting the enclosed Romans out. Lucius Sylla, in the Social War near Aesernia, trapped between narrow passes by the enemy army which Duillius commanded, sought an interview and negotiated about the conditions of peace without effect. However, noticing the enemy was relaxed in their negligence due to the truce, he set out by night. Having left behind a trumpeter who would mark the watches to maintain the trust of those remaining, and follow him at the fourth watch, he led his men safely with all their baggage and equipment to safety. The same man, against Archelaus, the prefect of Mithridates in Cappadocia, pressed by the unfavorableness of the locations and the multitude of the enemy, mentioned peace. After a time and even a truce had been interposed, he escaped the adversary by diverting their attention. Hasdrubal, brother of Hannibal, when he could not escape a pass because its outlets were besieged, negotiated with Claudius Nero, and having been received, was dismissed as if he would depart from Spain. Then, cavilling over the conditions, he drew out several days, during which he sent his army through narrow paths—which were neglected for that reason—in parts. He himself then escaped easily with the rest of his light-armed men. Spartacus, when surrounded by Marcus Crassus with a trench, filled it at night with the bodies of captives and cattle, and crossed over. The same man, when besieged on Mount Vesuvius in the part where the mountain was most rugged and therefore unguarded, fashioned chains from wild vines, by which he descended and not only escaped, but also terrified the enemy on the other side with his sword, so that several cohorts yielded to seventy-four gladiators.