Aulus Postumius Tubertus was a Roman

Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....

 military leader in the wars with the Aequi

Aequi

thumb|300px|Location of the Aequi in central Italy.The Aequi were an ancient people of northeast Latium and the central Appennines of Italy who appear in the early history of ancient Rome. After a long struggle for independence from Rome they were defeated and substantial Roman colonies were...

 and Volsci

Volsci

The Volsci were an ancient Italic people, well known in the history of the first century of the Roman Republic. They then inhabited the partly hilly, partly marshy district of the south of Latium, bounded by the Aurunci and Samnites on the south, the Hernici on the east, and stretching roughly from...

 during the 5th century BC. He served as Magister Equitum

Master of the Horse

The Master of the Horse was a position of varying importance in several European nations.-Magister Equitum :...

under the dictator

Roman dictator

In the Roman Republic, the dictator , was an extraordinary magistrate with the absolute authority to perform tasks beyond the authority of the ordinary magistrate . The office of dictator was a legal innovation originally named Magister Populi , i.e...

 Mamercus Aemilius Mamercinus in 433 BC.

Postumius' son-in-law was Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus Pennus, consul in 431 and 428 BC. When it was decided to appoint a dictator to undertake the war with the Aequi and Volsci in 431, the consuls could not agree, and by lot the choice fell to Cincinnatus, who nominated his father-in-law. The two men proceeded against the enemy, and on the 18th of June, won a great victory over the Aequi and Volsci at Mount Algidus

Algidus Mons

The Algidus Mons is the eastern rim of the dormant Alban Volcano in the Alban Hills, about 20 km southeast of Rome, Italy. The ridge is traversed by a narrow crevasse called la Cava d'Aglio...

. This was the site of a previous victory over the Aequi by the dictator Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus

Cincinnatus

Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus was an aristocrat and political figure of the Roman Republic, serving as consul in 460 BC and Roman dictator in 458 BC and 439 BC....

 in 458 BC. That of 431 was the last major battle between Rome and the Aequi, and on his return, Postumius received a triumph

Roman triumph

The Roman triumph was a civil ceremony and religious rite of ancient Rome, held to publicly celebrate and sanctify the military achievement of an army commander who had won great military successes, or originally and traditionally, one who had successfully completed a foreign war. In Republican...

.

A well-known story relates that during this campaign, Postumius' son was so eager to engage the enemy that he quitted the post assigned him by his father, and that in consequence Postumius had him put to death. Livius

Livy

Titus Livius — known as Livy in English — was a Roman historian who wrote a monumental history of Rome and the Roman people. Ab Urbe Condita Libri, "Chapters from the Foundation of the City," covering the period from the earliest legends of Rome well before the traditional foundation in 753 BC...

 doubted the truth of this account, noting that a similar and more infamous tradition was associated with Titus Manlius Torquatus

Titus Manlius Torquatus (347 BC)

Titus Manlius Imperiosus Torquatus held three consulships of republican Rome and was also three times Roman Dictator.His father Lucius was appointed dictator in 363 BC in order to fulfill religious duties, but instead undertook preparations for war...

, consul in 347, 344, and 340 BC. However, Niebuhr

Barthold Georg Niebuhr

Barthold Georg Niebuhr was a Danish-German statesman and historian who became Germany's leading historian of Ancient Rome and a founding father of modern scholarly historiography. Classical Rome caught the admiration of German thinkers...

felt that Livius' reasoning was insufficient to dismiss the story.