Gauls
In 58 BC Julius Caesar launched the Gallic Wars and had conquered the whole of Gaul by 51 BC. He noted that the Gauls (Celtae) were one of the three primary peoples in the area, along with the Aquitanians and the Belgae. Caesar's motivation for the invasion seems to have been his need for gold to pay off his debts and for a successful military expedition to boost his political career. The people of Gaul could provide him with both. So much gold was looted from Gaul that after the war the price of gold fell by as much as 20%. While they were militarily just as brave as the Romans, the internal division between the Gallic tribes guaranteed an easy victory for Caesar, and Vercingetorix's attempt to unite the Gauls against Roman invasion came too late. After the annexation of Gaul a mixed Gallo-Roman culture began to emerge.
The Stolen Eagle
During the Siege of Alesia in 52 BC, Centurion Lucius Vorenus of the 13th Legion commands his men as Gallic warriors fall on his line. In contrast to the Gauls' chaotic charge, the Roman files fight with precision, until one drunk legionary, Titus Pullo, breaks ranks and charges into the crowd of Gauls. Vorenus angrily orders him back into formation, but Pullo hits him. Later, the assembled soldiers watch as Pullo is flogged and condemned to death for his disorderly conduct. The day after, Vercingetorix, "King of the Gauls", is brought before Julius Caesar and made to surrender, ending the eight-year-long Gallic Wars. Caesar's niece, Atia of the Julii, orders her son Octavian to deliver a horse she has purchased straight to Caesar in Gaul to ensure that he remembers them above all other well-wishers. Caesar himself receives news that his daughter, married to his friend Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus with whom he shares power in Rome, has died in childbirth along with her stillborn daughter. A blood tie broken between them, Caesar orders a new wife be found for Pompey.