Twenty-eight senators chose a voluntary death; the remainder gave over the city to the discretion of an implacably exasperated foe.

Of course a bloody retribution had to follow; the only discussion was as to whether the process should be long or short: whether the wiser and more appropriate course was to probe to the bottom the further ramifications of the treason even beyond Capua, or to terminate the matter by rapid executions.

Appius Claudius and the Roman senate wished to take the former course; the latter view, perhaps the less inhuman, prevailed.

Fifty-three of the officers and magistrates of Capua were scourged and beheaded in the marketplaces of Cales and Teanum by the orders and before the eyes of the proconsul Quintus Flaccus, the rest of the senators were imprisoned, numbers of the citizens were sold into slavery, and the estates of the more wealthy were confiscated.

Similar penalties were inflicted upon Atella and Caiatia.