The army that marched south from Trier was a testament to Constantine's years of relentless preparation. It was not the largest force in the Roman world, numbering around forty thousand of his best troops, but it was a single, cohesive entity, hardened by the Rhine campaign and utterly loyal to its one-eyed Augustus. They moved with a disciplined speed that was itself a weapon.
The passage over the Cottian Alps tested the limits of his army. The legions became a column of engineers and laborers, carving paths through snow-choked passes and shoring up treacherous ledges against the biting wind. Constantine seemed to be everywhere at once. The soldiers would see him at dawn, already conferring with his scouts, his single eye scanning the treacherous peaks ahead. They would see him at dusk, sharing their hard tack by a meager fire, his face impassive against the punishing cold. His own refusal to acknowledge the hardship became their standard; if their one-eyed Augustus could endure, so could they. When they descended into the plains of northern Italy in a fraction of the time his enemies would have thought possible, their arrival was a profound strategic shock.
The first major response from Maxentius came as Constantine's army approached Augusta Taurinorum, the city of Turin. Scouts reported a large Maxentian army moving to block their path, commanded by the Praetorian Prefect Ruricius Pompeianus. Its core strength, the reports noted with concern, was a massive contingent of clibanarii – heavy cavalrymen encased in articulated steel armor, their horses equally armored. They were living statues of iron, a terrifying force designed to shatter infantry lines through sheer weight and momentum.
Constantine listened to the reports from his tribunes, his single eye fixed on the crude map drawn in the dirt of their marching camp. "Their cavalry is their main weapon," Metellus stated, his face grim. "Our spears will struggle to pierce that armor, and their charge could break even the VI Victrix." "An object that is all armor is often inflexible," Constantine mused, a cold, analytical light in his eye. "It relies on a single, overwhelming blow. If that blow fails, it becomes a clumsy, heavy weight."
He formulated his plan, a tactic born of his own unique, almost alien understanding of warfare. It was unorthodox, a departure from standard Roman doctrine. He deployed his army before the city of Turin with a deliberately shallow, but very wide, infantry line. He wanted to prevent the heavy cavalry from outflanking him. When the Maxentian army appeared, the sight of their cavalry was indeed intimidating – a glittering line of steel that seemed to stretch across the plain.
The enemy charge came as expected, a thunderous, earth-shaking avalanche of armored men and horses aimed at the center of his line. The Roman legions braced, their shields locked. But as the clibanarii neared, Constantine's centurions roared a strange command. "Clubs! Use your clubs!"
The front ranks of his legionaries, instead of relying on their spears, drew the heavy, iron-tipped clubs that were part of their standard kit but rarely used in pitched battle. As the armored cavalry crashed into their line, the Romans did not try to stab. They swung their clubs with brutal force at the riders and their mounts. The effect was devastating. A spear point might glance off the intricate armor, but the crushing, kinetic force of a heavy club did not need to pierce. It dented helmets, stunned riders, broke the legs of horses. Armored cavalrymen, knocked from their saddles, became helpless, floundering turtles on the ground, easily dispatched by the daggers of the legionaries.
The elite Maxentian cavalry, their primary shock tactic completely negated, fell into chaos. Their charge blunted, their momentum lost, they became a disorganized, struggling mass. Seeing the enemy's main weapon broken, Constantine unleashed his own. "Scholae!" he commanded. "Advance!"
His personal heavy cavalry, the Scholae Palatinae, who had been held in reserve, charged forward not at the disordered cavalry, but at the now-exposed Maxentian infantry line. They hit the enemy center like a thunderbolt, their cohesion and ferocity irresistible. The battle was over quickly after that. With their cavalry shattered and their infantry center broken, the rest of the Maxentian army wavered, then fled. Constantine's own light cavalry and Crocus's Alemanni pursued them relentlessly, turning the defeat into a rout.
The citizens of Turin, who had barred their gates to both armies, had watched the battle from their walls. They had seen the supposedly invincible Maxentian cavalry destroyed by Constantine's brilliant, brutal tactics. They had seen his smaller army achieve a swift, total victory. As Constantine's victorious legions approached the city, the gates of Augusta Taurinorum were thrown open. They greeted him not as a conqueror, but as a liberator.
He rode into the city, his face a mask of sweat and dust, a ruin of scarred flesh where his right eye had been. He had won the first battle for Italy. He had shattered one of his enemy's premier forces with a plan born of cold, inhuman logic. The road deeper into the peninsula, towards the city of Mediolanum, now lay open. The first blow had been struck, and it was a masterpiece of calculated violence.