won the clash. The bulk of the Roman soldiers in the plain fled to the river in a disorderly manner and impeded each other. The Celts killed the men in the rear. Some Romans tried to cross the river wearing their armour, which, according to Diodorus, they prized more than their lives, but that weighed them down. Some drowned and some managed to reach the bank further downstream with great effort. As the Gauls kept killing the Romans, the soldiers then threw their arms away and swam across the river. The Gauls threw javelins at them. Most of the survivors fled to the city of Veii. Some returned to Rome and reported that the army had been destroyed. Plutarch wrote that the Gauls encamped near the confluence of the Allia with the Tiber, some 18 km (11 mi) from Rome, and attacked the Romans suddenly. There was a "disorderly and shameful battle." The Roman left wing was pushed into the river and destroyed while the right-wing withdrew before the Gauls' attack from the plain to the hills and most of them fled to Rome. The rest of the survivors escaped to Veii at night. "They thought that Rome was lost and all her people slain." Sack Account of Livy Livy provides a detailed account of the sack of Rome. The Gauls were dumbfounded by their sudden and extraordinary victory and did not move from the place of the battle, as if they were puzzled. They feared a surprise and despoiled the dead, as was customary for them. When they did not see any hostile action, they set off and reached Rome before sunset. They saw that the city gates were open and that the walls were unmanned. That was another surprise. They decided to avoid a night battle in an unknown town and encamped between Rome and the River Anio. The inhabitants of Rome were in panic and did not know that most of their soldiers had fled to Veii, instead of Rome, and thought that the only survivors were those who fled back to Rome and that they had only a tiny force. Realising that they were defenceless, they decided to send the men of military age, the able-bodied senators and their families to the Capitoline Hill with weapons and provisions to defend the fortress. The Flamen of Quirinus and the Vestal Virgins, who were priests, were to take