Page "Aulus Atilius Calatinus" Paragraph 3

In 249 BC, following the disastrous naval losses of Publius Claudius Pulcher and Iunius Pullus, Pulcher was fined 120, 000 asses and his colleague committed suicide.

Both consuls were now unfit for command or deceased ; the dictator Claudius Glycia, appointed by Pulcher, was removed on the grounds that he was Pulcher's freedman, and thus not even a Senator, let alone a senator of some status.

Calatinus was therefore elected dictator and led an army into Sicily, becoming the first dictator to lead a Roman army outside Italy.

He had no great military successes, or at least none noted by Roman historians or in Smith.