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Updated: May 24, 2025
First, Vercingetorix was placed as a prisoner in his hands, and then each man lay down sword, javelin, or bow and arrows, helmet, buckler and breastplate, in one mournful heap, and proceeded on his way, scarcely thankful that the generosity of their chieftain had purchased for them subjection rather than death.
The Aedui request Vercingetorix to come to them and communicate his plans of conducting the war. On obtaining this request they insist that the chief command should be assigned to them; and when the affair became a disputed question, a council of all Gaul is summoned to Bibracte. They come together in great numbers and from every quarter to the same place.
The fall of Alesia and the capitulation of the army enclosed in it were fearful blows for the Celtic insurrection; but blows quite as heavy had befallen the nation and yet the conflict had been renewed. The loss of Vercingetorix, however, was irreparable. With him unity had come to the nation; with him it seemed also to have departed.
What as completely successful with Cassivellaunus in Britain and partially successful with Vercingetorix in Gaul what was to a certain degree attempted even by Mithradates Eupator the vizier of Orodes carried out only on a larger scale and more completely.
"The day after the defeat," says Caesar, "Vercingetorix convokes the assembly, and shows that he did not undertake the war for his own personal advantage, but for the general freedom. Since submission must be made to fortune, he offers to satisfy the Romans either by instant death or by being delivered to them alive.
The downtrodden inhabitants rose to a man and invested Vercingetorix with the chief command. In the year of Rome 702, B.C. 32, Caesar was suddenly informed in Italy that his work of six years was threatened with ruin. Most of the Gallic nations, united under a chieftain hitherto unknown, were rising with one common impulse, and recommencing war. Caesar at once returned to Gaul.
Several times the Gauls nearly succeeded in breaking through, but the quickness and stubborn courage of Caesar always saved the day. DEATH OF VERCINGETORIX. Vercingetorix now proved that he was a real hero. He offered to give himself up to Caesar, if this would save the town. But Caesar demanded the submission of all the chiefs.
And thus, far from being moved by his misfortunes at the moment, he threw him in chains forthwith, and subsequently had him put to death, after keeping him to adorn his triumph." Another historian, contemporary with Plutarch, Florus, attributes to Vercingetorix, as he fell down and cast his arms at Caesar's feet, these words: "Bravest of men, thou hast conquered a brave man."
But, while the Celts had hitherto been opposed by only a part of the Roman legions, the whole forces of Caesar were united in the lines round Alesia, and Vercingetorix did not succeed, as he had succeeded at Avaricum and Gergovia, in placing his infantry under the protection of the walls of the fortress and keeping his external communications open for his own benefit by his cavalry, while he interrupted those of the enemy.
Out of forty thousand combatants within the walls, it is said, scarcely eight hundred escaped the slaughter and succeeded in joining Vercingetorix, who had hovered continually in the neighborhood without being able to offer the besieged any effectual assistance.
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